It's late at night.

"The apprentice also said that although he hadn't learned any real skills, judging from the things his master had prepared beforehand, it seemed to be for helping people to transfer evil spirits and ward off bad luck."

After Liu Lili finished speaking, Xia Yao's face darkened. "Then everything makes sense."

"The reason why so many birth charts need to be calculated is for screening purposes."

Xia Yao succinctly pointed out, "And we are the lucky ones who have been selected."

Liu Lili nodded, "That's what I think too."

Only Chen Qi was still not quite in the loop, her eyes wide as she asked, "What are you talking about? What do you mean?"

Xia Yao had no choice but to explain to her, "To win the free trial experience ticket for this scenic spot, you need to provide your identity information. This Jinsheng Group must have made everyone who participated in the lottery fill in their birthday and exact time, and then take it to the fortune teller to have their birth dates matched."

"Huh? Do we need to have our birth dates matched before coming to travel?" Chen Qi asked, puzzled.

"Of course, tourism doesn't require matching birth dates, but our purpose isn't to experience tourism, but to ward off evil spirits. This explains why there are only a few of us tourists experiencing it."

After Xia Yao finished speaking, Chen Qi suddenly realized what was going on, and her eyes cleared up.

"I think the source of the ghost's target should be the senior management of Jinsheng Group, but we were used as scapegoats."

Lu Qifa put down his chopsticks, burped, and said, "If we don't want to die, we have to find the substitution and exorcism scheme set up by the master and destroy it."

"If we find it, we won't die and we can leave, right? Then let's hurry and go find it!"

Chen Qi understood, but everyone's expressions remained indifferent.

"The scenic area is so big, it's not that easy to find." Lu Qifa was speechless.

"What are the characteristics of this special formation? How do you find it?"

Although Xia Yao had a general idea, he still only had a superficial understanding of metaphysics.

Lu Qifa scratched his thinning hair. "Since he asked for the tourists' birth dates and times, they should have the birth information, right? It's easy to identify if it's written down."

"Write?" Xia Yao pondered the word, considering possible interpretations.

"The room has been thoroughly checked; it shouldn't be there," Zhou Zean deduced.

Xia Yao suddenly remembered something and took out her room key from her pocket.

The pure white room key was pulled out of a green paper card sleeve, and then with a "ripping" sound, the sleeve was torn open.

The bottom inside the card holder has small red lettering.

The winding red, tiny, like a wriggling worm.

The puzzled looks on everyone's faces turned into shock and fear.

The others also took out their room cards, tore them up, and revealed the red text inside.

Those birth dates were clearly not theirs; they were most likely those of people they had substituted for.

"This thing is insidious; we actually carried it with us the whole time."

As Lu Qifa spoke, he leaned closer and sniffed, but couldn't quite place the smell; it was just a guess based on fear.

"Could this have been written in blood?"

In short, his words seeped into everyone's bones like a cold wind.

"We've found the birth chart, what should we do?"

Xia Yao looked at Lu Qifa; this old guy seemed to know more than others.

"If it's just the birth date and time, you can just burn it."

After saying that, Lu Qifa took out a lighter, lit the paper card holder, and threw it into the ashtray.

The blood-red eight characters shrank, twitched, flickered, and finally turned to ashes in the flames.

Seeing that nothing was amiss, the others lit their card holders and threw them into the ashtray.

"Does this mean we've severed our connection with the ghost? Are we safe now?"

Marked by the orange, Chen Qi eagerly awaited an answer. Tonight, she might be targeted and bewitched by a ghost, just like Xia Yao, and eventually meet it in a narrow encounter. Naturally, she hoped to break free of this predicament as soon as possible.

However, Lu Qifa shook his head, "Not yet."

"Huh? Why? Didn't you say you could just destroy it?" Chen Qi asked, puzzled.

Lu Qifa had no choice but to patiently explain, "It's not that easy. We only burned a birth chart, which doesn't mean we've broken the sage's plan to use a substitute death to ward off evil."

"This thing is probably meant to make it easier for ghosts to find us, and also to confuse them. If we only deal with the birth chart after they find us, without breaking the protective formation, the ghosts will still chase us even if we escape the scenic area."

"The real substitution ritual to ward off evil spirits should still be inside the scenic area, but it has been disguised as something that looks normal."

The light in Chen Qi's eyes gradually faded. She thought she was no longer going to encounter ghosts, but it turned out that this was just the beginning.

However, no one cared about her emotions, and Liu Lili urged her on.

"Let's finish our meal quickly and go back to hide, lest those strange NPCs come looking for us again."

They certainly didn't want to go through that maze where they played hide-and-seek with ghosts last night again.

Everyone finished their meal quickly and hurried back to their rooms.

Xia Yao felt much more at ease after entering the room and locking the door. He lay down on the bed, ready to rest.

With Chen Qi marked, I'll definitely be much safer.

As time passed, drowsiness overcame her, and Xia Yao slowly lost consciousness.

Just as his mind was in a daze, half-awake and half-asleep, a violent knocking sounded on the door, like a death knell.

The ghost is here again!

Xia Yao woke up with a start, and the moment he opened his eyes, he instinctively rolled off the bed and lay down on the soft gray carpet again.

The lights were still on inside.

The warm, dim light made the room cozy, a stark contrast to the tension and terror of the moment.

"Bang—bang—bang—"

Outside the door, the knocking continued intermittently, stiffly and mechanically eerily.

This guy is really something. Didn't he already use the door-knocking trick on the first night?

If no one fell for it before, will someone fall for it now?

As he pondered this, a stiff female voice sounded from outside the door.

"Hello, please open the door and come out to experience our scenic area's unique attractions."

The voice sounded familiar. Upon closer inspection, it seemed to be the female manager who had taken them to experience the maze last night.

"Please open the door. Unexcused absence from the experience program is considered a violation of the scenic area's rules and will result in being expelled from the scenic area."

Seeing no response from inside, the cold voice outside began to threaten.

And you know what? These ghosts are interesting; they can even impersonate the people they fear and use the rules they dread to oppress them.

But they were as hard as iron; they weren't so easily fooled. They didn't even utter a sound.

"Dear tourists, if you don't open the door soon, I'll personally open it and invite you in."

Sigh, she even said she wanted to come in. If she's so capable, then come in. What's the point of setting up a safe zone?

Just as Xia Yao's heart was as calm as still water, without any ripples, a crisp "beep" sounded at the door.

Xia Yao felt a chill run down her spine and was terrified.

That was the sound of a room card being swiped to open the door.

Sure enough, with another "click," the doorknob was turned open.