Chapter Twenty-Seven: Born from Death

In this inverted world, a blood-stained jungle is interspersed with scattered corpses, hanging like countless bodies from natural clotheslines.

The corpses have been decapitated, their eyes glazed like those of dead fish, all converging at a single point—the exact direction of Shen Lin.

Among the countless remains, Shen Lin caught a glimpse of withered, bark-like hands tracing strange patterns through the jungle, as if manipulating the bodies themselves.

It was the Inversion Ghost!

Shen Lin knew the lethality of this entity; it could invert everything within a person’s perception. The moment those decaying hands touched you, your vital signs would be inverted, turning you into ash like charred coal until you vanished entirely.

Shen Lin understood the gravity of the situation; from the moment it appeared, he knew the danger had escalated to a new level. He watched calmly as the countless stiff hands moved like marionettes.

The Inversion Ghost was hiding among them, using the others as puppets to mask its movements, waiting for an opportunity to destroy Shen Lin completely.

He had to find the ghost and glimpse its true form; this was his only chance to turn the tide.

His dark red Ghost Domain expanded. Compared to the Ghost Mother’s, the nature of the Ghost Mask’s domain was more potent. He could withstand this inverted world, and with that, he felt confident enough to challenge the ghost.

A bone-chilling, ghostly wind seeped into his marrow, sounding like a clarion call to battle.

In the next second, Shen Lin’s figure flickered, and he vanished from his spot.

Within the jungle, the dark red domain shimmered. In an instant, he nimbly harvested four or five corpses, but compared to the trees full of fruit-like heads, such results were insignificant.

"Hum~"

A throb came from the Ghost Mask. Shen Lin felt as if his dark red domain had suffered some kind of impact, with various patterns appearing all around.

*Impossible!* Shen Lin was shocked. The transformed Ghost Mask should be able to resist this inverted world. Then, he realized—it was the Inversion Ghost’s ability!

The Ghost Mother’s domain had once been lost; the creature’s power could invert everything, including the domain itself! It was distorting his own domain!

The distortion of the domain defied logical description. Seeing the crumbling dark red light around him, Shen Lin knew he had little time left.

The crimson patterns vibrated again, and blood-red lines flowed from the eyes of the Ghost Mask like tears of blood.

Shen Lin scanned his surroundings frantically. He had to find the ghost; he had no other choice.

The distortion of the domain intensified, and the Ghost Mask’s influence wavered, as if it were about to collapse at any moment.

Shen Lin flashed forward, appearing before a pair of withered hands, attempting to banish them under the shroud of dark red light.

Everything went smoothly; the hands simply vanished before him, without any resistance.

*No, it’s not these hands!*

He flashed again, appearing before a second, similar-looking pair of hands. The dark red light enveloped them once more.

Still not it.

A third, fourth, and fifth time.

The Ghost Mask’s domain developed cracks, falling away like shards of glass in this world.

Shen Lin held onto his last resort; his left hand remained inside his coat, clutching a Ghost Candle, hoping to secure a sliver of survival.

In the broken domain, countless hands reached out from the periphery, grabbing at him, brushing past him repeatedly. He was completely trapped in a jungle piled with flesh and blood.

*I cannot go on like this,* Shen Lin gritted his teeth. The corpses here were countless, the withered hands innumerable; he did not have the time for trial and error.

The cracks in the domain continued to spread, yet the Inversion Ghost remained hidden. It was far more patient than he had anticipated.

Shen Lin took out the prepared Ghost Candle, intending to light it.

A cold, unnatural wind blew through the jungle of corpses. Before the flame of his specialized lighter could touch the candle, it seemed affected by some force, and in Shen Lin’s eyes, it dissolved into distorted light and vanished.

The Inversion Ghost. It was that ghost again. It inverted everything, even turning existence into non-existence.

His last backup plan gone, Shen Lin gritted his teeth.

A cacophony of footsteps echoed through the jungle—chaotic, rhythm-less, and maddening. Once the domain was completely devoured, Shen Lin would die here.

His expression darkened further.

He had repeatedly overestimated the horror of the Inversion Ghost, but only after a direct confrontation could he truly feel the terror of this thing.

The twice-transformed Ghost Mask was being completely suppressed; he had no chance of victory.

Unless he could control a second ghost, perhaps then he would have a fighting chance.

But there were no "ifs" in reality. There were no ghosts to be contained nearby, and no conditions to bind a second one.

This was a situation of ten deaths and no life.

He had to seek life within death and find a way to resolve this predicament.

The Inversion Ghost’s ability aimed to invert everything. Anyone attempting normal actions in the inverted world would trigger its laws. In this world, your right might be left, your left might still be left; reaching into a roaring fire might feel like extreme cold, and staying in a refrigerator might feel like standing in an oven.

It even possessed the ability to invert and distort other ghosts. While the limits of this power were unknown, it was already terrifying enough.

At this stage, there were few, if any, that could counter this ghost.

If you attacked it, the inversion of direction might mean you would never hit it.

If it attacked you, a single strike was enough to invert everything, including your vital signs, turning you into charred ash.

This was not a balanced contest; no one could gain an advantage in such an environment.

Watching his domain shatter and the Ghost Candle in his hand refuse to ignite, Shen Lin laughed recklessly. The pulsing nerves in his brain filled him with a sense of madness.

He tucked the Ghost Candle back into his coat, keeping it close to his body.

Shen Lin voluntarily withdrew his domain and stared defiantly at everything around him.

The moment the domain retracted, the withered arms pressed in as if they had been waiting for a long time. They scrambled to grab Shen Lin, tearing at him as if they wanted to rip him limb from limb.

Suddenly, something arrived. The tearing hands felt something and stopped in unison.

It was a pair of hands—withered, old hands, like interwoven tree bark, resembling a coffin buried in the annals of history, ready to rot and turn into ash, drifting away with the wind.

*Thwack!*

The expected sensation of Shen Lin’s throat being crushed did not occur. Beneath the tearing of countless hands, he lifted his bowed head, his body mangled, and smiled like a child.

Then, his own hands lashed out, fiercely grabbing those withered, old hands.

"Come on! You want to kill me, don't you? Come on!"

Shen Lin roared. It was his madness. He didn't care if the ghost could understand him; he was recklessly venting everything he had.

*Hiss—*

The Inversion Ghost’s ability activated. Shen Lin’s body began to decay; he was like a furnace breaking from within, crumbling like dead wood.

His cheeks began to crack and peel, like embers falling from a furnace. He could clearly feel his essence slipping away.

At the very end of his life, he used his remaining strength to take a giant step forward.

To seek life through death!

A final burst of dark red light erupted from the Ghost Mask, and everything around them seemed to be banished.

Within the broken domain, Shen Lin looked at the creature with his only remaining half-head, his smile hideously savage.

"I caught you, you bastard!"

It was a long-withered corpse, its body pierced with branches and weeds. A foul stench radiated from its rotting flesh, like a traveler who had died in the deep woods. A thin, long branch had pierced through its temple, running clean through its skull.

Most importantly, it was standing on its head, feet pointed toward the sky.

*Patter, patter...*

That was the sound of Shen Lin’s decaying ash hitting the ground. His state was horrific; half his head had turned to ash, and his right side had vanished. Over his heart, the blood-red Ghost Mask emitted a dark red fluorescence, guarding his final remains.

The light grew dimmer, like a match in the dark, ready to be extinguished at any moment.

The withered hands broke free from Shen Lin’s grip and lunged at him once more.

In the final second before the dark red light vanished, the patterns of the Ghost Mask underwent a profound transformation.

If one looked closely, it looked as if...

It was the ghost right in front of him!