Midnight Bookstore

The young man remained still. He peeked over the counter, looking at Zhou Ze seated behind it.

“Don’t worry, I don’t have any surveillance cameras here, nor do I have a recorder pen,” Zhou Ze stretched, “Of course, you might not believe me, but whatever.”

“I don’t know what you’re saying.” The young man was extremely calm.

The young man was impressively calm considering what he had done.

The cops still had not found any clues about the arsonist. It indicated how good the young man was, in a negative connotation.

“I am pretty sure that you were the one that set the cinema on fire,” Zhou Ze waved his hand, like he was just stating a piece of truth, something that he did not even need to argue about.

“You’re drunk,” the young man said.

“I’m not,” Zhou Ze smiled.

“You are accusing me of setting the fire just because of that? Do you think you are better than the cops?” The young man seemed to be panicking a little, yet he was trying his best to control himself.

“Well… I’m no better than the cops, but I’m not blind. As for your question of asking me if I am accusing you of burning the place down because of the single clue I have, I’m sorry that I lied. It’s just something that crossed my mind after I confirmed that you were the arsonist. I was pretending to be Conan there,” Zhou Ze said.

Zhou Ze reached out his finger and pointed behind the young man.

The young man immediately turned around. He initially thought there were cops behind him, but there was no one there, not even the sound of a siren.

It was already late at night. There was not a single pedestrian nearby, considering how desolated the shopping district was.

“They came in with you,” Zhou Ze said.

“Who?” the young man frowned.

“The six people that died in the cinema, they followed you in. So I immediately realized that you were the culprit, it’s pretty obvious. Apart from the idiot behind me, you can’t possibly say that the rest of the victims are mistaken about their killer, right?” Zhou Ze slowly rose to his feet and glanced at the young man.

“Stop fooling around!” the young man almost shouted. For some reason, he could feel a great pressure on his shoulder. He was breaking out in cold sweat, too.

“Don’t be nervous, they won’t do any harm to you,” Zhou Ze walked out from behind the counter with a plastic bag.

It had some rice and pickles in it.

In Zhou Ze’s vision, the six people were seated on the plastic stools. There were men and women, and two of them were elderly.

They were quietly reading books on the stools without making a single noise.

Zhou Ze gave each of them a bowl of rice and some pickles. He stuck the chopsticks vertically into the rice.

Zhou Ze took out a bottle of wine that cost him less than ten yuan. He took some cups from the drinking station and poured each person a cup of wine.

“Brothers and sisters, I’m living a tough life, too. My bookstore has been losing money, so I can only treat you to this. Hope you don’t mind. You are already dead, but I still have to live. Your family will burn you offerings too, so I guess what I give should be enough, right?” Zhou Ze bowed slightly and spoke as if he was attending his customers.

However, Zhou Ze did not bother serving the idiot behind him.

“Is there something wrong with you?” The young man ran out of patience, “Huh, I should have recorded it and uploaded it to the Internet, so the others can see what you’re doing!”

“Would you dare to?” Zhou Ze turned sideways, “You speak as if you have the guts to do it. You only started streaming a few days ago. You won’t be able to stay under the radar for long. It’s true that the cops are having a hard time tracking down the arsonist, but once they find some clues, the arsonist won’t be able to hide any longer.”

“I’m leaving, there’s seriously something wrong about you!” the young man snapped furiously. The reason why he had managed to gain a lot of viewers and a huge income from it was not because he was a hero, but he because had come up with a marketing plan.

He had made himself approachable and had a good character setting. Streaming his work as a takeaway boy sounded boring, but he was able to make it look interesting.

He knew what he had done. He started to panic and lose his calm. He had a strong urge to leave the bookstore.

He regretted coming here today.

Zhou Ze did not stop him. However, when the young man reached his hand out for the handle, Zhou Ze took out his phone and looked at the time, “It’s twelve.”

Thud!

The bookstore did not have a clock, but the young man felt like he just heard the chime of a clock.

He tried pushing harder, but the door just would not budge. He was infuriated. He took a quick look at the lock. The door was not locked, nor was it blocked by anything, but he just could not open it.

The young man started kicking the door, yet it still would not budge.

Little did he know, the six people he could not see had all risen to their feet. It was the seventh day after their deaths. It was time to settle their debts. They had followed their murderer here, and now, they had fixed their eyes on him, the man who had set the cinema on fire, but somehow became a hero.

“This is for not saving me!” Zhou Ze heard a groan behind him.

Zhou Ze happened to be blowing on his nails. He quickly turned around. The nails on his right hand suddenly grew a lot longer while reflecting a strange glow. A black mist was circling his fingertips. His eyes were rolling with black smoke.

The man in a suit that had finally turned into a vengeful spirit saw Zhou Ze grabbing his shoulder. He began to shake vigorously. The black mist circling Zhou Ze’s fingertips was stabbing into the man’s body like a dagger. Wisps of blue smoke rose from the man’s temples into the air.

“I understand you, but you seriously disgust me,” Zhou Ze said deeply. “So, it’s time to say goodbye.” Zhou Ze applied greater force with his hand.

The man in a suit groaned and begged, hoping Zhou Ze could spare him. He had turned into a vengeful spirit. If he was to die again, his spirit would simply scatter. He would not even have a chance to go to Hell.

Zhou Ze did not let go. His eyes remained cold.

He slowly withdrew his hand after the man’s body had completely vanished into thin air. He saw some dust in his palm.

“Phew…” Zhou Ze blew at his hand and dusted off his hands. He turned around and let out a sigh. It seemed like the nature of the bookstore had changed since he came, or perhaps it was just a coincidence so far.

The six customers that were initially reading their books quietly suddenly had black mist coming out of their eyes. It was the sign they were turning into vengeful spirits in order to avenge themselves.

Meanwhile, the young man was still slamming his fists into the door and kicking it.

Perhaps ‘karma is a bitch’ was the perfect phrase to describe it?

The six victims had panicked when they were surrounded by thick smoke and fire in the cinema. They failed to escape and ended up dying in the fire.

“Friends, can you give me some face and not turn into vengeful spirits?” Zhou Ze stood in front of the group and raised his hand at the six people.

“Here, relax, why don’t you give me a smile?” Zhou Ze tried to mediate. Once they turned into vengeful spirits, they could no longer be reincarnated. They would simply dissipate in the wind after getting their revenge. It was clearly a miserable outcome.

Zhou Ze believed it was not worth it.

The arsonist had taken their lives, separating them and their families. Their children had lost their father or mother, while their parents had lost their children.

It was unnecessary to push themselves deeper into the abyss just to get their revenge.

However, Zhou Ze’s words did not make any difference. The six people still had cold expressions. The black mist circling them had grown thicker. Their lips and eyes were starting to have black lines.

They almost looked like the man in a suit that had tried to hurt him.

“Since you didn’t want to smile at me, why don’t I smile at you instead?” Zhou Ze forced a smile on his face.

This was bad. He had made a mistake, and he could no longer save them.

Zhou Ze knew he could easily take out the vengeful spirits, just like the idiot who had waited an entire week for the cooldown of his ultimate to refresh, yet still died to a single slap to the face.

However, Zhou Ze had no idea how he could help the dead find peace. He was a ghost himself. He was surely not the best candidate to do it. It was like asking Zhang Fei to do some embroidery.

“The dead shall be on their way to the afterworld, to the Yellow Springs!” a voice shouted from outside the bookstore. Following that, the door swung open as Xu Qinglang came in with a porcelain bowl filled with rice, three incense sticks in it.

“Rise!” The three incense sticks quickly burned into ashes.

The white rice blackened as the dark mist circling the six people faded away. Their expressions turned calm and peaceful.

The six people slowly sat down before their bowls of rice.

“Xu Qinglang!” Zhou Ze exclaimed.

Excited, very excited, even more excited than seeing Doctor Lin coming out of the shower.

2

He had no idea how hard he was struggling to eat for the past week, why wouldn’t he be excited to see the man!?

Zhou Ze was not too bothered much by what Xu Qinglang had just done. They were just unwilling to spill the beans before.

Xu Qinglan rolled his eyes at Zhou Ze. It looked seductive, like a blossoming azalea. The man snapped, “Are you holding a late night party here?”

“I didn’t want to.” Zhou Ze briefly told Xu Qinglang what had happened.

Xu Qinglang nodded. He brought his hands together facing the six people and said, “It’s the night on the seventh day since your death. Time to go and visit your family. They must be waiting for you at home. I promise you that I’ll serve you justice.”

The six slowly walked out through the door and left.

Zhou Ze looked at the bowl that contained the black rice.

“Why didn’t it do anything to me?”

Xu Qinglang’s lips twisted. He withheld the urge to beat the crap out of Zhou Ze and harrumphed, “You’re different.”

He was still angry with the man, yet because of his appearance and his voice, it sounded like a lady being mistreated.

Xu Qinglang looked at the young man who had already fainted in the corner. “What should we do about him?”

Xu Qinglang swiped his hand across his throat.

Zhou Ze shook his head. “Let’s just turn him in.”