Chapter 73: The White Shadow

The drop wasn’t very high. As soon as I stepped down, I realized I had entered a strange place, utterly different from the burial chamber I’d just left. Looking more closely, I found myself in a wide corridor, flanked on both sides by all sorts of statues. Glancing back at the trapdoor, it seemed almost like a magician’s wall—one flip and the scene behind it changed, a phenomenon that was nothing short of magical.

“It seems this mechanism is constantly in motion, almost like an elevator,” I thought silently to myself. “Yet I didn’t feel any sense of movement in the space around me. It’s truly eerie.”

Six and the others had already positioned themselves some distance away. In the beam of my flashlight, I saw their wary expressions and the way their hands hovered, ready to draw weapons. I couldn’t help but give a wry smile. Resigned, I also took the submachine gun off my back. Beside me, Black Sunglasses mirrored my movements.

“Wait for my command. Don’t hesitate,” he whispered.

I nodded unconsciously, because in such situations, hesitation was not an option. I wasn’t the kind of person who killed without a second thought, but when my life was at stake, I would not hesitate to act. Especially when the people before me were criminals steeped in evil—eliminating them would hardly trouble my conscience, just as it hadn’t before.

Just as Black Sunglasses and I were preparing to fire, I suddenly saw something that made my scalp tingle—a figure standing silently behind Six and his men.

It was draped all in white, with long hair obscuring its face, eerily reminiscent of the female ghosts so often seen in horror films. The sight was chilling. Could it be that ghosts truly existed in this world? Here, in an ancient tomb, the thought was even more unsettling. Fortunately, my nerves and composure held firm; an ordinary person likely would have screamed out by now.

As I stared anxiously at the white figure, I kept a wary eye on Six and his men. I felt a chill crawl up my spine, and before I knew it, a cold sweat had broken out across my back.

Clearly, Black Sunglasses had seen it too. In a barely audible whisper, he said, “A corpse-walker.”

A corpse-walker? Might as well be a mooncake, I thought wryly, but then it hit me—this was the thieves’ slang for a zombie. I asked him what we should do next, but he sounded uncertain. “It shouldn’t be. I’ve never seen a real corpse-walker, but this doesn’t seem like a zombie. Look, it’s not moving. Something’s off.”

He was right—it was strange. I also noticed that Six and his men appeared frozen in place, unnaturally stiff and motionless. That wasn’t right. I shone my flashlight over them and realized, to my alarm, that they really did look as though they’d been rooted to the spot—unnervingly so.

“So it’s not a corpse-walker,” I muttered to myself, “Could it really be a ghost?” The thought sent waves of shock through me, shaking my convictions to their core. I had always believed that ghosts did not exist, nor did zombies for that matter. Even when we’d encountered a blood corpse before, there had been a scientific explanation—in that case, some kind of parasite or venomous worm controlling the corpse’s brain. But a ghost, that intangible, ethereal being—this was something I simply could not accept.

In the blink of an eye, the white figure vanished. Black Sunglasses seemed momentarily stunned as well. We exchanged glances, though I couldn’t see his eyes behind the shades; I could just sense his disbelief. Then something even stranger happened—Six and his men suddenly came to life, moving as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened. After exchanging glances, all three drew their guns and aimed them directly at us.

Black Sunglasses and I were faster—we both squeezed our triggers at once. My marksmanship wasn’t great, but Black Sunglasses was deadly accurate. Before Six and his men could even lift their weapons, he’d already opened fire, dropping one of them immediately. The other two took cover behind the statues on either side of the passage. Though the statues weren’t large, they were enough to shield a person.

A burst of bullets quickly emptied our magazines, and the entire corridor resounded with gunfire, shattering the silence. Since we’d taken the initiative, Six and his men were caught off guard and suppressed by our fire, one of them taken down instantly.

But as we reloaded, we noticed something odd—there was no movement at all from where Six and the others were hiding. Why weren’t they returning fire? Were they paralyzed by fear?

Impossible. Men like them, hardened tomb raiders living on the edge, would never be so easily frightened. If they were, they wouldn’t survive in this line of work—these were ruthless, cold-blooded men.

The more I thought about it, the stranger it seemed. Why was there no sound at all? Black Sunglasses and I exchanged glances and nodded in silent agreement. We decided to investigate. After all, there were still countless corpse centipedes behind us, and once the fire burned out, they would swarm in, making the situation far more perilous.

But after only a few steps, I suddenly recalled that ghostly white figure—it had seemed all too real. I was certain it hadn’t been my imagination, especially given the bizarre behavior of Six and his men. They couldn’t possibly have stood there, statuesque and unmoving, only to suddenly spring into action. Everything about this was just too strange.

With these thoughts, unease crept into me, my steps growing smaller. Black Sunglasses whispered, “Be careful.”

He, too, seemed tense, his pace matching mine. When we reached the spot where Six and his men had just been standing, the ghostly white figure was nowhere to be seen. I couldn’t help but breathe a sigh of relief, my nerves beginning to settle—until, suddenly, they tensed up again, even more tightly than before.

Behind the statue on the left, I saw a body sprawled on the ground. I shone my flashlight over it—it was one of Six’s men. But behind the statue on the right, there was nothing—just empty space. Where had Six gone? I looked around carefully; there were no exits or passageways nearby. It was as if Six had vanished into thin air, like a magician’s trick, leaving no trace behind.