From the moment Shi Pengpeng stepped out of the elevator, she felt something was off.
It wasn’t because of the faint yin energy lingering in the hallway.
In large residential complexes, the presence of yin energy isn’t unusual.
With so many people coming and going, their auras often mix and mingle, much like how viruses spread more easily in densely populated cities.
The problem was that while the hallway had yin energy, the elevator didn’t.
This suggested that the yin energy wasn’t brought in from outside but was instead emanating from the residents themselves.
Shi Pengpeng immediately noticed Zhan Jie’s neighbor to the right.
An ordinary person might not have noticed, but Shi Pengpeng could tell at a glance that the heavy black solid wood door wasn’t made from ordinary timber.
It was cypress wood, commonly used for coffins.
As the saying goes, “Cypress wood doesn’t belong in homes.”
While cypress is durable and resistant to decay, it’s also an oily wood that doesn’t dry easily, making it unpopular for furniture.
In Xiluo, people rarely use cypress wood for doors.
Yet, this neighbor’s door was not only made of cypress wood but also carved with patterns of cranes and auspicious clouds-designs typically used to decorate coffins.
What was most bizarre was the unusual talisman pasted above the doorframe.
Though faded, the talisman still retained a faint trace of spiritual energy, indicating it wasn’t a common household protection charm but rather a sealing talisman meant for coffins before burial.
Shi Pengpeng had already begun to form a suspicion, and upon entering Zhan Jie’s home, her thoughts were confirmed.
Zhan Jie’s apartment had excellent orientation, layout, and design, perfectly suited for daily living.
It should have been an ideal yang residence, yet the indoor energy felt imbalanced, as if it were sitting atop a yin burial site.
When Shi Pengpeng used her compass to assess the feng shui, she discovered that the energy flow was indeed disrupted, and the source was the neighbor’s coffin-like setup.
Zhan Jie’s neighbor had essentially turned the master bedroom into a coffin and the entire apartment into a burial chamber, sealing the vacant unit to create a massive yang-world coffin.
The deceased, who should have been laid to rest in the earth, had instead been placed here.
Using yang space for yin purposes had caused a chaotic imbalance, leaving the deceased restless.
Zhan Jie’s son wasn’t suffering from nervous exhaustion; he was simply born with heightened sensitivity, making him more attuned to phenomena that ordinary people couldn’t perceive.
When he lived here, he was awakened every night by the “non-existent” neighbor’s noises-not hallucinations, but sounds that shouldn’t have been present in a yang residence.
Though Zhan Jie hadn’t heard the noises herself, she appeared visibly fatigued, clearly affected by the yin energy.
As for the neighbor to the left, they had hung gourds and protective talismans at their door, so they likely hadn’t been disturbed yet.
But given enough time, that could change.
After Shi Pengpeng finished speaking, the room fell into a long silence.
Zhan Jie, who had been half-skeptical, now stared at the eerie black brick wall and the yellow talisman pasted on it-clearly not for decoration.
Anyone with half a brain could see that the neighbor’s apartment was definitely problematic.
After a while, Zhan Jie finally snapped out of her daze and exclaimed, “Ah! I remember now! When the old man next door passed away, his son came back for the funeral and briefly met with us.”
“Later, he specifically came to complain to us, saying that the cemeteries in Xiluo were too expensive, and his mother refused to sell the house. He was abroad at the time…”
Money wasn’t exactly abundant, and he had a wife and children to support.
He also mentioned that cemeteries abroad are often integrated with residential areas, unlike in China where there are so many taboos…
Zhan Jie had a vivid memory of this incident because they weren’t particularly close with their neighbor’s son.
She couldn’t understand why he suddenly came to them to pour out his heart.
It wasn’t until now that Zhan Jie finally realized the neighbor had been giving them a heads-up all along!
Ju Ziyi, who had been a real estate agent for over a decade, was also encountering this situation for the first time.
She was stunned for a moment before squeezing out a sentence: “This is just too unethical!”
In reality, modern people no longer pay much attention to these things.
Many find it troublesome and simply keep the ashes at home.
But turning a house into a coffin and placing it among so many neighbors isn’t that just unsettling?
Zhan Jie was so angry she almost couldn’t catch her breath: “How could they do this?”
Shi Pengpeng didn’t want to comment too much.
After thinking for a moment, she said, “You should talk to the neighbor properly. I think he might not be entirely unreasonable.”
Ju Ziyi wasn’t convinced: “How can you tell?”
Shi Pengpeng pointed to the remaining half of the talisman on the black brick wall and said, “He hired someone to seal the house like a coffin.”
If this neighbor truly didn’t believe in superstitions, he wouldn’t have gone to such lengths to modify the house.
In fact, if he had properly sent off the elderly and kept the ashes at home like any ordinary item, it wouldn’t have been a big issue.
But the neighbor built walls, sealed windows, and inscribed talismans to seal the coffin, indicating that he still firmly believed in feng shui and had specifically hired someone to transform the house into a yin residence.
However, the person he hired was clearly an amateur, which is understandable.
A truly skilled master would never take on such a sinister task.
As a result, the amateur failed to send off the elderly’s spirit and instead used a coffin-sealing technique, trapping the deceased.
The coffin- sealing talismans initially did contain the yin energy of this “yang-world coffin.”
But since the coffin wasn’t buried, the talismans gradually faded and lost their power due to exposure to wind and sun.
The neighbor, being abroad, didn’t return in time to replace the talismans.
Especially the one in the master bedroom-somehow, half of it broke, causing the sealing technique to fail.
The restless spirit of the deceased then began to cause disturbances.
Zhan Jie also recalled that two months ago, there was a heavy rainstorm in Xiluo.
The wind was so strong that many windows in the neighborhood were rattling.
One homeowner wasn’t home that day and couldn’t close the windows in time, resulting in one of them cracking.
It was after that storm that Zhan Jie’s son’s “neurasthenia” started to relapse.
Now, thinking back, it was likely that the storm had shaken the neighbor’s curtains, and when the curtains fell, they took half of the coffin-sealing talisman with them.
From then on, the yin energy from the yang-world coffin began to leak out.
Since the neighbor wasn’t entirely dismissive of superstitions, the situation was somewhat easier to handle.
After all, he was far abroad, while Zhan Jie and the other neighbors were living next to his father’s coffin.
He had to consider that if he provoked public anger, even if they couldn’t forcibly dismantle the yang-world coffin, there were plenty of ways to ruin his family’s feng shui.
Moreover, his father’s lingering spirit could be seen as a form of self-entrapment.
After hearing Shi Pengpeng’s words, Zhan Jie finally felt a bit more at ease.
She had always been reluctant to sell the house, and if they could resolve the issue smoothly…
“Falling into trouble, not having to move, that would be the best,” she sighed, “Ah, I hope he can cooperate.”
Yan Jing had been silently observing.
Hearing this, he lifted his eyelids and suddenly spoke, “If it doesn’t work, just call the police. This violates the neighborhood rights clause.”
He had recently been studying both law and magic.
Besides criminal law, he had also read some other legal provisions.
In Zhan Jie’s case, she could claim psychological or property damage from her neighbor, as there had been precedents for such rulings.
Shi Pengpeng glanced at him and silently gave a thumbs up.
Not bad, he had taken a big step forward on the path to becoming a mage!
“Ah, okay, thank you,” Zhan Jie nodded and then turned to Ju Ziyi, “Miss Ju, I’m really sorry, but I won’t be selling the house for now.”
Ju Ziyi naturally understood.
In such a situation, even if Zhan Jie were still willing to sell, potential buyers would need to weigh their options carefully.
It would be best to wait until Zhan Jie resolved the issue first.
Zhan Jie then looked at Shi Pengpeng and asked eagerly, “Miss Shi, if I need to perform any rituals or anything later, can I contact you?”
“Of course,” Shi Pengpeng cheerfully opened her WeChat QR code, “Add me, and feel free to reach out anytime you have questions.”
“Okay, okay,” Zhan Jie added the master’s WeChat and immediately felt much more at ease, though she was a bit puzzled, “Wholesale of local specialties?”
Shi Pengpeng laughed heartily, “Yes, that’s my other profession.”
Zhan Jie: “…”
Before leaving, Zhan Jie remembered something else, “Ah, by the way, is there any way to solve my son’s problem?”
Having heightened senses isn’t exactly an illness, but it can be quite troubling for an ordinary person.
Even if the neighbor is willing to move the coffin, there’s no guarantee the child won’t encounter something else in the future.
“That’s easy,” Shi Pengpeng smiled, handing her a protective charm, “Just have him carry this with him until he’s twelve.”
Zhan Jie thanked her repeatedly, transferred some money, and politely saw them off.
After leaving the neighborhood, Shi Pengpeng coughed lightly, “Sister Ju, I’m sorry, I accidentally talked one of your clients out of a deal.”
“Not at all,” Ju Ziyi quickly waved her hand, her attitude even more polite.
Not only was Zhan Jie’s house not supposed to be sold, but the person in front of her was a true master with real skills.
She wouldn’t dare to have any complaints.
Moreover, Ju Ziyi thought of something and opened her phone’s records, saying with a hint of excitement, “Miss Shi, I have a property here, a large flat in the city center. Great location, great neighborhood, great property management, and the price is especially cheap, only 30% of the market average. Would you like to take a look?”
“That good?” Shi Pengpeng glanced suspiciously and found it was a property in a well-known high-end community in the city.
The average price in this community was over ten million, and the property Ju Ziyi showed her was nearly two hundred square meters.
At the normal market price, it would cost at least thirty million, but the owner was asking for only ten million.
Yan Jing also glanced over and asked, “Why is it so cheap?”
“Because it’s a real haunted house,” Ju Ziyi’s tone became more serious, “Don’t be fooled by the low price. We usually don’t dare to recommend it to clients.”
“Oh?” Shi Pengpeng became interested, “How haunted is it?”
“Extremely haunted,” Ju Ziyi said, giving her an indescribable look, “It’s the kind that really has ghosts.”
This house is truly terrifying.
Even though the owner has set the price so low, no real estate agent dares to take it on.
Although Ju Ziyi’s agency has recorded the property’s information, none of her colleagues have dared to show it to potential buyers.
Initially, Shi Pengpeng had requested a haunted house, but Ju Ziyi thought she was just looking for a bargain.
Seeing that Shi was a young girl, Ju Ziyi didn’t dare to recommend anything too extreme.
Moreover, Ju Ziyi herself was too scared to enter that house.
It wasn’t until just now, when Shi Pengpeng demonstrated her abilities at Zhan Jie’s house, that Ju Ziyi finally remembered this long- lingering, horrifying mansion.
However, Ju Ziyi still felt a bit uneasy and tentatively asked, “So, Miss Shi, would you dare to take a look?”
Shi Pengpeng showed a troubled expression, “Honestly, I’m not too keen…”
Ju Ziyi couldn’t help but feel disappointed, thinking Shi was braver than this, and said, “So you find it hard to handle too?”
“Yeah,” Shi Pengpeng admitted honestly, “Although it’s being sold cheaply, it’s still beyond my budget…”
It was ten million yuan, with a down payment of three million!
That was her entire budget!
Ju Ziyi: “Uh…”
So that’s what you’re worried about!
But indeed, lack of money is not much easier to solve than a haunting.
Then, Yan Jing calmly said, “Let’s go take a look. If you’re short on money, I can lend it to you.”
At such a low price, even if you don’t live there yourself, solving the problem and flipping it could make a huge profit.
Ju Ziyi felt they might have missed the point and had to remind them again, “But the haunting issue…”
“Just a mere haunting.”
Yan Jing, with a cool demeanor, took out his car keys and casually uttered two words,
“Lead the way.”
Ju Ziyi was momentarily stunned by his nonchalant and cool posture, thinking to herself, as expected of a man by the master’s side, he’s indeed well-traveled and doesn’t take such terrifying things seriously at all.
Shi Pengpeng couldn’t help but glance at him slowly, teasing, “Brother, you’ve improved a lot…”
Yan Jing met her gaze and suddenly remembered that in front of her, he was still a weak, pitiful, and helpless domineering CEO.
He immediately toned down his aura and smoothly switched to a frail tone, “It’s really scary, I’m terrified.”
Shi Pengpeng: “…”
Ju Ziyi: “……??”