Hearing Jing Jiujiu's shout, not only did Bai Yuhuai move, but Ding Hanbing did as well.
Ding Hanbing rushed through the door, first stepping on the eyeballs on the ground, slipping with a bang.
Bai Yuhuai entered, scanned the room, and promptly grabbed Jing Jiujiu's wrist.
The man hanging from the rope, like a mouse seeing a cat, his head swaying back and forth on the rope even more violently, as if struggling desperately.
Bai Yuhuai frowned slightly, getting a clear look at the man's appearance: "He's not a ghost."
Jing Jiujiu: "Huh?"
Jing Jiujiu: "Take another careful look at his face."
How could he not be a ghost when his eyes, nose, and mouth had all fallen to the ground?
"He's indeed not a ghost," Bai Yuhuai said.
"Oh, no wonder he's afraid of me," Jing Jiujiu suddenly felt his back straighten. "Then what kind of thing is he?"
Jing Jiujiu suddenly remembered Baku Yumemakura's "Onmyoji" that he had read long ago, and asked, "Is that a word spirit? He's dressed very much like the character you played in the script."
Ding Hanbing lay on the ground, listening to their conversation, his nostrils filled with the smell of blood, unsure whether to get up or not.
It was embarrassing enough!
And quite disgusting!
He had actually stepped on an eyeball like it was a bubble!
Bai Yuhuai: "It doesn't seem to be a word spirit."
Jing Jiujiu responded, but couldn't help looking at Ding Hanbing, asking softly, "Did you hurt yourself when you fell?"
He originally didn't want to ask.
Because his neighbor had a strange temper when he was young. If he fell, he wouldn't let anyone help him up; if he bumped his head, he wouldn't let anyone rub it; if he choked, he wouldn't even let anyone offer him water... especially not him.
But Ding Hanbing had been lying there for too long.
Jing Jiujiu hesitated, barely holding back from asking if Ding Hanbing had hit his head.
Ding Hanbing's brain, slightly numbed by the collapse of his worldview, slowly retrieved some of his fleeing thoughts.
"I'm not..." The words reached the tip of his tongue, but Ding Hanbing suddenly swallowed them back.
Ding Hanbing: "I hit my knee while practicing dance the day before yesterday. I think I might have hit it again just now."
Jing Jiujiu blinked.
Had he changed?
Well, it had been seven years since he died. Many things had already changed.
Jing Jiujiu reached out his hand to him.
Ding Hanbing quickly grabbed it, holding on tightly. The young man's hand was ice-cold; he was a ghost, he had already become a ghost. Ding Hanbing's temples throbbed, his heart jumped to his throat, his chest burning hot... It's, it's okay. I'm warm, after all.
Ding Hanbing held onto Jing Jiujiu even tighter.
Jing Jiujiu: "Hmm?"
Ding Hanbing used the support to stand up.
Jing Jiujiu tried to pull his hand back, but couldn't.
Jing Jiujiu: ?
The last time he held his hand was at the script reading meeting, and several days had already passed since then.
Ding Hanbing was reluctant to let go.
Jing Jiujiu tilted his head and looked him over, trying hard to determine where exactly Ding Hanbing had hurt himself.
"Can't you stand steadily? Do you want me to call an ambulance for you?"
Ding Hanbing quickly replied, "No need!"
If he left, wouldn't it just be Bai Yuhuai and the young man left?
Bai Yuhuai frowned imperceptibly and turned to ask the man hanging from the rope, "What exactly are you?"
Jing Jiujiu's attention was immediately drawn back.
Ding Hanbing, still grasping, suddenly felt his palm empty.
Jing Jiujiu had turned and walked away.
Ding Hanbing clenched his fingers, slowly digesting the fact that the young man before him was a ghost... but thinking about it, Ding Hanbing felt an indescribable ache in his heart.
When he was alive, he couldn't hold onto him. As a ghost, he could hold onto him even less...
Ding Hanbing stood there dumbfounded for a few seconds, but quickly comforted himself.
— At least Jing Jiujiu didn't hide it from him! He didn't hide becoming a ghost from him either! Did this mean their neighbor relationship from back then had progressed a step further?
Jing Jiujiu didn't know what ghostly thoughts Ding Hanbing was having behind him.
It was simply because of the fish tank incident that he had already locked onto his target, so he didn't specially avoid Ding Hanbing anymore.
Jing Jiujiu circled the man twice.
The man's face, now lacking features, twitched again, seeming a bit shy and even more afraid.
"I'm not a thing." "I'm a person."
Jing Jiujiu: ?
Even Ding Hanbing couldn't help but want to curse, what nonsense was he spouting with that ghostly face?
"I have a name, a surname, and a background." Because his neck was hanging, his tongue was also hanging out, making the man's speech a bit slurred. But he seemed to be a bit afraid of Bai Yuhuai, every time his gaze touched him, he would immediately turn away. So being hung by the rope, a bit further from Bai Yuhuai, the man felt quite safe and thus wasn't willing to come down.
He continued in his slurred voice, saying, "My name is Lin Zhi, I'm 28 years old this year, I was born in the 4th year of the Republic of China, my grandfather was once a Qing army general. Later, I inherited the family's mantle and also became a general..."
Jing Jiujiu opened and closed his mouth, muttering, "Isn't this still the character from the script?"
Just Bai Yuhuai's character.
Bai Yuhuai looked the man up and down: "I know now. It's not a ghost, not a word spirit, not a person... it's chaos."
The man tremblingly asked, "What... what is chaos?"
Jing Jiujiu let out a soft "Ah."
Looking at this appearance, it did seem quite chaotic.
But Jing Jiujiu also didn't know: "What is chaos?"
Bai Yuhuai examined the man.
The man became even more frightened, swinging the rope more violently, as if he might pull the ceiling down.
Bai Yuhuai said, "It's a mass of energy in the universe, or you could say a mass of consciousness."
This was knowledge that Jing Jiujiu had never seen in past books, and he couldn't help but let out a small exclamation of admiration: "Mr. Bai knows so much."
The uneducated Ding Hanbing felt like he had been indirectly insulted, and immediately took out his phone, wanting to salvage some face with the all-knowing encyclopedia.
"It has no form or shape, no life or death. It is said that when the primordial chaos first opened, it already existed. After Pangu opened the heavens and earth, it scattered into the mortal world. Who knows how many portions it was divided into..."
The man shuddered, as if truly feeling the threat of being dismembered into several pieces by Bai Yuhuai.
Ding Hanbing interjected: "Such an impressive thing?" After saying this, he looked at the man's appearance: "Just this?"
"Chaos that hasn't awakened has no self-awareness. Like a blank piece of paper, it can be molded by others at will... so it can be shaped into different forms as desired. Legend has it that when it was born, it carried the power of creation." Bai Yuhuai stopped here.
Chaos neither lives nor dies, but it can be eaten.
Legend has it that immortals captured it to reconstruct their immortal bones.
Bai Yuhuai didn't know if the rumors were true, but he could try to mold a real body for Jing Jiujiu.
Jing Jiujiu let out a low "Hmm": "If that's the case... then, Lin Zhi." Jing Jiujiu temporarily used this name to address the man.
"Who has been talking to you every day?" Jing Jiujiu asked.
Everyone around was stunned, including Lin Zhi.
But Bai Yuhuai quickly reacted.
Since chaos was a blank piece of paper, who had painted it into its current form?
Jing Jiujiu had discovered the most crucial point in this.
Ding Hanbing: "..."
Fuck.
He couldn't understand.
Ding Hanbing tapped his phone.
The screen had hit the ground when he fell earlier, and now it was a bit cracked. The all-knowing encyclopedia couldn't search up anything for a long time.
[Chaos, one of the Four Fiends, shaped like a big dog...]
This wasn't the same as what Bai Yuhuai said at all.
Or was Bai Yuhuai making it all up?
Lin Zhi: "I can't say."
Bai Yuhuai raised his eyelids slightly.
Lin Zhi: "It's not that I can't say. But he said, only smart people can see him."
Jing Jiujiu muttered, "This is the real ghost."
Thinking that there was still a ghost crouching behind, and this ghost casually made up a "The Emperor's New Clothes" version of the story, creating such a thing in front, while hiding in the dark with unknown intentions.
Ding Hanbing felt a bit nauseated.
"So what should we do?" Ding Hanbing asked.
Jing Jiujiu grabbed Bai Yuhuai's arm and headed for the exit: "Let's quietly ask the theater to invite a Taoist priest, and then let's hurry and leave. To avoid me being caught along with it."
Bai Yuhuai: "...It won't happen."
Ding Hanbing hurried to follow: "I'll invite one. Whether it's a Taoist priest or a monk, they all work for money anyway, as long as we pay enough it'll be fine..."
Lin Zhi, seeing that both people and ghosts had all left, leaving only himself behind, couldn't help but quietly follow.
That beautiful ghost had just said he could go teach people how to act.
So what about now?
As they walked out from backstage, the staff members gathered around them: "We thought we heard some noise just now. Are you all alright?"
"We're fine, but you might want to get someone to check this place..." Ding Hanbing responded.
"Get someone? Oh, you mean the police, right? We've already called them, we're waiting now. They'll check if anyone tampered with the stage, so we can all feel at ease."
"Not the police, a Taoist priest," Bai Yuhuai said calmly.
The staff member was stunned.
After speaking, Bai Yuhuai left with Jing Jiujiu.
Lin Zhi stood behind the curtain, watching Jing Jiujiu's silhouette, suppressing her instinctive fear and trembling, and gulped: "This ghost sure is good-looking."
The staff member turned around, vaguely hearing a voice speaking.
"Who's there? Xiao Wang?... Oh, shit!"
The staff member caught a fleeting glimpse of a face without features. But in the next moment, the figure vanished. The staff member quickly turned and rushed off to find the director.
Just hiring a Taoist priest?
Hire one! Must hire one!
As Jing Jiujiu's group walked out, Ding Hanbing's manager had just seen Kong Xiangqi off.
The manager couldn't help but sigh: "It's tough for actresses who aren't famous. Just one small assistant to pick her up. And he looked so unreliable!"
After sighing, he turned his head: "My young master, you've finally come out..."
If they hadn't come out soon, he would have suspected that they were either fighting inside or engaging in some group activity.
Bai Yuhuai's manager also breathed a sigh of relief.
Xu Sanyu: "Bro Bai, did something happen inside? Are we heading back now?"
"Someone got hurt, but it's not serious," Bai Yuhuai said as he opened the car door for Jing Jiujiu.
Ding Hanbing, without thinking, held the door: "You're... leaving already?"
Jing Jiujiu: "Mm-hmm."
If they didn't leave soon, the Taoist priest would arrive to catch ghosts.
"Let me come with you, I have so many questions I want to ask you." Ding Hanbing desperately wanted to know how Jing Jiujiu had spent these years, why he had become a ghost, and if people really did turn into ghosts after death...
But Jing Jiujiu didn't want to say too much. He himself still had many things he didn't understand.
Jing Jiujiu politely declined: "Bro Bai and I have other things to do later."
Ding Hanbing grew anxious, one hand on his waist, his brow still furrowed with anger and agitation: "Ouch, ouch, suddenly I'm in a lot of pain, really hurting..."
His manager internally facepalmed: "..."
Young Master Ding, I told you to take a few more acting classes, didn't I? How does this look like waist pain? It looks more like you're about to angrily uproot a willow tree! Your hot-tempered image isn't broken, but your acting skills have gone to hell! Don't you have any self-awareness?
Jing Jiujiu didn't find it too strange, though.
After all, Big Baby Ding had been weird enough as a child.
Jing Jiujiu turned and asked: "Do you need to go to the hospital? Should I call an ambulance for you?"
Ding Hanbing opened his mouth: "..." This wasn't the answer he wanted, of course, but Jing Jiujiu was showing concern for him.
Bai Yuhuai, who had been silent until now, calmly said: "Mr. Ding hurt his leg, why is he holding his waist?"
Jing Jiujiu: ?
Jing Jiujiu frowned slightly, but still spared a bit of worried care for Ding Hanbing. Had he really hit his head just now?
Ding Hanbing: "..."
Manager: "..."
This was even more ridiculous, it wasn't even waist pain, but leg pain!