Chapter Twelve: The Mother and Child Rakshasa

Amidst the mist, a streak of dark light suddenly appeared. Shen Lin seemed to hear wails echoing faintly. At the very moment he answered the phone, countless hands before his eyes vanished, leaving only a pair of pale, shriveled palms that seemed shocked into stillness, pausing repeatedly.

This was Shen Lin’s second encounter with the ghostly woman—just like the first time.

She was adorned in the gentle, noble style of the Republican era, resembling a refined and virtuous lady of that time.

Her hands were withered, her cheeks cracked and dry, and her bulging eyes almost protruded unnaturally.

Only her small cherry-red lips seemed normal, painted vividly with rouge—a blood-like crimson.

She gazed at Shen Lin so intently, the cracked corners of her mouth rising into a strange curve, as if smiling at her husband.

The phone in Shen Lin's hand vibrated several times, like an old, failing device struggling with signal interference.

From the receiver, he seemed to hear a summons from the abyss.

“hoa!!!”

The woman from the Republican era appeared restrained, her movement halting repeatedly as if held back.

The eerie voice in the receiver faltered again, like a phone completely garbled with static.

This was a clash between two fierce spirits—an arena beyond human comprehension.

Shen Lin clearly felt, in that instant, that his own ghost realm, squeezed between the two forces, regained much of its power.

The battle between the woman ghost and the ghostly caller shifted the initiative back to him. In a flash, his ghost domain spread across the entire neighborhood.

It was like a gray-white world invading, the entire scene turning into a faded old photograph—barren and desolate.

His ghost domain was like a sharp blade, delivering a heavy blow to the woman ghost at that moment.

The once smiling spirit now bore a different expression—one of anger, or perhaps the eerie calm before a storm.

“Now, it’s time to end this!”

Under the shroud of his ghost domain, Shen Lin’s figure vanished, the gray-white light greatly restricting the woman ghost’s movements.

He completely released the suppression on the ghostly form within him, the switch inside his body flipped without hesitation.

From his chest, the ghostly eyes glowed faintly, solidifying as if becoming real. Shen Lin seemed to lose consciousness, lunging directly at the woman ghost.

It was like biting glass. The ghost domain surrounding her shattered under his bite, and then his mouth closed on those eerie red lips!

Under the gray-white ghostly light, something beyond reason occurred.

That single bite left the woman ghost stunned; her body seemed to dissolve into smoke, then fully absorbed into Shen Lin’s body.

The moment the woman ghost vanished, the ghost slaves ravaging the neighborhood stopped moving. Without their primal source of supply, they too dissolved into mist and disappeared.

With the first rays of dawn piercing through after more than fifty hours, the survivors in the neighborhood, unable to believe their eyes, broke down into tears of relief and despair.

“Damn it, Linzi, you’re crazy for women! You actually kissed that thing!”

A booming voice echoed inside Shen Lin’s mind—it was Li Meng’s shout—followed by a sharp pain in his abdomen that snapped him fully awake.

“Fatty? How did you end up here?”

Li Meng glanced around nervously, and after confirming there was no danger, scratched his head and pointed toward the doorway.

“This is a long story. After you left, we were minding our own business inside the coffin. But then nature called, and with a lady around, I held it for over twenty hours, but I just couldn’t anymore. You know your brother’s bladder, right? I had no choice but to come out.”

Li Meng looked sheepish as he admitted this, clearly ignoring Shen Lin’s strict warning to stay inside the coffin.

“You—you better not make a move! What choice did I have? The three of us can’t live, eat, and relieve ourselves all inside there—that would kill us. Wait, without food or water, I was about to starve to death.”

Shen Lin was both amused and exasperated, unsure how to react.

After all he’d been through, this guy acted like he’d just woken up from a nap because he couldn’t hold his pee.

“Where’s the coffin?”

The golden coffin was crucial—it had been Shen Lin’s key tool.

His original plan centered on Song Wan, intending to use her as the focal point to trigger both the ghostly phone call and the woman ghost simultaneously, forcing them into conflict. Song Wan would likely perish in the process, but as a ghost slave, she would eventually revive as long as Shen Lin survived.

At the moment of their clash, Shen Lin would use his ghost form to aid the ghostly call in subduing the woman ghost, then imprison her in the golden coffin before turning to deal with the phone spirit.

But plans couldn’t keep up with reality—the golden coffin was nowhere to be found, and Song Wan had fallen.

He hadn’t anticipated just how relentless the woman ghost was; if not for the special manifestation of his ghost form, he would have been utterly destroyed without a trace.

“There it is.” Li Meng pointed toward the doorway, where Shen Lin saw a blushing Sun Yue and a somewhat embarrassed Zhou Fang. They looked guilty, having clearly disobeyed Shen Lin’s orders not to leave the coffin.

“Don’t worry, I’m not that careless. When I came out to pee and saw the mist was gone, I called them out. We pushed the coffin around—if anything happened, we'd hide inside; if not, we pushed it around. We tried to leave, but the door was still blocked. So we checked the surveillance for your status, saw you here, and rushed over.”

Li Meng’s round flesh jigged as he proudly rubbed himself, unable to hide his grin.

“Not bad, huh? Came just in time.”

“Get the coffin over here, put me inside, and close it up. I’m not calling you again, no one is allowed to open it.”

Shen Lin scolded with a laugh, the sharp pain in his abdomen worsening. He wasn’t sure what it signified.

The woman ghost seemed to have dissolved into smoke and entered his body after his strike; he didn’t know what that meant.

His ghost form was on the verge of full revival—he couldn’t let the neighborhood fall into chaos again so soon.

“All right.”

Li Meng didn’t argue, motioning Zhou Fang to help carry Shen Lin inside. Before sealing the coffin, he chuckled, pointing at Shen Lin’s swollen belly with a wide grin.

“Did a female ghost get you pregnant or what?”

Shen Lin’s condition was strange. Logically, although he had subdued the woman ghost, his ghost form should have been close to reviving.

Yet now, instead of feeling that, he seemed more alive than ever, except for a sharp, pregnancy-like pain and swelling in his abdomen. Otherwise, he was nearly normal.

What was this? A post-battle bonus?

He pondered everything, vividly recalling the sensation when he toggled the switch inside his body.

He should have died! Definitely died!

But here he was, alive.

Why?

Was it because his ghost form was incomplete, unable to fully replicate the woman ghost’s ability?

Or was it the three-way conflict among the ghostly phone call, the woman ghost, and his ghost form that caused this?

No matter where the error lay, he shouldn’t be alive now.

It was simply unbelievable.

In the darkness, Shen Lin peered at his swollen belly in the cramped space—it looked just like a pregnancy.

Pregnant?

The woman ghost had always shown a motherly tenderness toward others.

A flash of insight struck Shen Lin’s mind like lightning.

Could this be some sort of puzzle piece acquisition?

Just as a headless ghost tirelessly searches for its head,

And the headless ghost’s head persistently seeks its body,

The woman ghost might be part of a fragmented puzzle.

From current evidence, her puzzle pieces were likely one large and one small.

An adult and a child.

Or... a baby!

A ghost infant!

In a flash, Shen Lin recalled the S-level horror incident in the original story that nearly destroyed the entire city of Dachang.

So the ghost infant—or some ghost fetus—was part of this woman ghost.

This was a mother-child ghost.

Chinese folklore often describes ghost mothers. The "Records of Strange Tales" clearly states: "In the small Yushan of the South Sea dwells a ghost mother, capable of birthing heaven, earth, and ghosts. She births ten ghosts at once, feeding on them by evening."

Shen Lin looked down at his belly.

Was he incubating a ghost fetus?

A wave of dread rose within him—how terrifying would a ghost fetus born from a ghostly body be?

Had the weakening of his ghost form been because a large portion of its power was used to nurture this fetus?

Had this caused his near awakening to regress?

He began to understand much.

The ghost mother giving birth—this was the mother-child rakshasa.

Was this the power the ghost mother feared?

He could forcibly capture a ghost to gestate inside him—that was terrifying.

Shen Lin guessed this puzzle-piece acquisition could only be used once, and the gestation would severely injure the ghost mother herself. Judging by his ghost form’s condition, she was likely entering a weakened state, with her power reduced to less than a tenth.

So this was gestation?

Staring at his belly, Shen Lin’s thoughts grew complicated.

Who would have guessed that behind his earlier joy lay such a raging storm?

How could a decent young man from the twenty-first century endure this?

After a moment’s contemplation, Shen Lin made a bold move. He controlled his ghost form to dispel the manifested ghost form.

The lifelike woman ghost dissolved, her lines reshaping into a strange smiling face.

The abdominal pain vanished, and Shen Lin noticed mist gathering around him inside the coffin, beginning to form the shape of the ghost mother.

“Fatty, open the coffin just a crack, quick!”

Shen Lin shouted fiercely.

Prepared long ago, Li Meng responded immediately. As the coffin creaked open, a gray light flickered inside, and Shen Lin sprang out into the outside world, swiftly resealing the coffin.

Everything was as usual.

Shen Lin exhaled in relief.

It seemed that the incomplete revival of his ghost form had saved his life. He now deeply understood his predicament.

The ghost mother’s gestation was a fortunate accident; since his ghost form and her ability shared the same origin, there was a chance of absorption. After all, he was only an imitator, not the real woman ghost.

This was a one-time use, a targeted trial.

Timing, place, and unity—all indispensable.

A single misstep, and Shen Lin would have been reduced to ashes.

But thankfully, he survived! He succeeded!

Facing the sunlight, Shen Lin smiled—a survivor’s smile after the storm.