The small boat is about to sink.

This sudden change completely disrupted everyone’s plans.

Based on the previous situation, this black boat was sufficient to bear the weight of everyone. Although waves were rising on the Ghost Lake and the boat was swaying non-stop, there was no sign of sinking.

But now…

The cold water beneath their feet was spreading, and the black boat could no longer float, sinking continuously into the Ghost Lake.

And the lake water here wasn’t the same lake water they encountered in Zhongzhou City.

Having reached the source of the Ghost Lake, the water here is even more eerie. Even those who can manipulate spirits feel powerless against it and gradually start to sink. And as they continue to sink, this feeling becomes stronger.

It seems as though an invisible force is pulling them down into the depths of this lake, to be forever immersed in it.

The boat’s sinking speed is fast, and the process is irreversible.

What to do?

Yang Jian, Leuk San, Li Jun, and Ah Hong were all thinking about how to handle this crisis.

“I’ll use the Ghost Domain to get us out of the Ghost Lake first. We can’t sink, or we’ll all die here,” Li Jun said as the Ghost Flame ignited again.

His eerie Ghost Domain enveloped everyone on the boat, attempting to carry them out of the Ghost Lake.

However, unexpectedly,

Li Jun’s Ghost Domain, although it covered the area, couldn’t transfer everyone away from the Ghost Lake. The eerie Ghost Flame flickered unstably, extinguishing and reigniting like a faulty light.

“My Ghost Domain is being interfered with. Yang Jian, you need to take action. Your Ghost Domain can still work, just like before… Yang Jian, are you listening?” he shouted urgently.

But Yang Jian did not respond.

Leuk San said, “There’s something wrong with him. It’s like he’s been eroded by the Ghost Lake.”

“Damn it, how did it come to this? Everything was going smoothly before,” Ah Hong said anxiously as she looked at Yang Jian.

At this moment, Yang Jian was soaking wet, water seeping out from his body as if he were being constantly eroded by the supernatural. He was sinking faster than anyone else.

“At this crucial moment,” Li Jun gritted his teeth, thinking rapidly.

“Li Jun, we can’t continue like this. Let’s retreat for now. The boat is sinking, and Yang Jian has issues. We can’t fight the Ghost Lake in this situation,” said Leuk San.

He knew Li Jun must have a retreat plan, otherwise, he wouldn’t have dared to enter the Ghost Lake so recklessly.

Ah Hong added immediately, “This isn’t right, Li Jun, retreat for now. We can’t continue like this. We’re about to sink.”

“If we leave now, it’ll be like leaving Shen Lin behind. If anything happens to him, it’ll mean the loss of another captain. It will be even more difficult to come back next time.” Li Jun replied.

Although he had a way to retreat, he was reluctant to do so.

Because leaving now would make resolving the Ghost Lake issue even harder.

“It’s better to retreat than to be wiped out here. Yang Jian has issues now. If he didn’t, we could have continued to act,” Leuk San urged.

At this moment, the boat was sinking, the water already to their waists. Half of their bodies were submerged, and struggling was futile.

The Ghost Lake could swallow everything, even malevolent ghosts. Even those of Captain Level would have a hard time standing firm here without specific strategies.

They thought the black boat might not bear everyone, but at least two people in the team had Ghost Domains for self-protection.

Who would have imagined Yang Jian’s issue at the critical moment?

“I can’t feel my body… not even the Ghost Shadow can be controlled.” Yang Jian’s face was pallid. He stood motionless.

He felt bitterly cold throughout, water continuously leaking from his skin. He was numb, as if frozen stiff, with impaired mobility.

Moreover, the Ghost Shadow was also affected, as though trapped within his body, unable to struggle or regain control.

The water seeping from his body possessed strong supernatural power, like a cage trapping the Ghost Shadow inside Yang Jian.

This was the first time such a situation had occurred.

Even Yang Jian didn’t know why this was happening to him.

There were no signs, and then suddenly it happened without warning.

“The Ghost Lake couldn’t have suddenly attacked me. It must be something Shen Lin did before that implicated me in the Ghost Lake. What exactly did he do in my memory?” Yang Jian realized the cause of the problem.

But now wasn’t the time to think about it.

Li Jun’s Ghost Domain failed; he couldn’t bring anyone up from the Ghost Lake. He was stuck in place, unable to move.

The sinking continued.

Leuk San and Ah Hong urged Li Jun to retreat temporarily.

But Li Jun hesitated; he didn’t want to abandon his comrade Shen Lin or retreat from the fight. It was unacceptable to him.

But he couldn’t watch everyone else be submerged in the Ghost Lake and be wiped out here.

At this critical moment, personal decision-making was crucial.

“Damn it.”

Li Jun let out a low growl, but he made his decision: “Retreat, I’ll get you out of the Ghost Lake.”

As soon as he said that,

The Ghost Flame reignited, but it was different this time. Ping’an Tower reappeared within the flame, existing in both reality and the Supernatural World.

At this moment, only through such an extreme method could Li Jun take everyone away.

“To Ping’an Tower, we can leave using this opportunity…” Li Jun said.

However, before he could finish speaking,

He suddenly sensed something. Looking down slightly,

his feet seemed entangled by something.

It was long black hair drifting underwater. A female corpse, swaying with the waves, approached him, unclear if intentionally or inadvertently.

As soon as the corpse touched Li Jun, it became incredibly heavy.

Like being bound with countless lead weights.

In an instant,

Li Jun didn’t have even a chance to struggle or resist, and he was immediately pulled underwater, vanishing before the others.

“Li Jun.”

The sudden change left Ah Hong and Leuk San stunned.

With Li Jun’s sudden submersion, the Ghost Flame was extinguished, and the path to the Ghost Domain leading to Ping’an Tower vanished as well.

The escape route was blocked.

Instantly, a feeling of despair spread.

Shen Lin went missing, Yang Jian had issues and was invaded by the supernatural, Li Jun was pulled underwater, and the escape route was cut off… Now only Leuk San and Ah Hong were left.

“We can’t get away. We’re doomed to sink to the bottom.”

Leuk San took a deep breath and looked at Ah Hong: “It was a mistake to come here. We couldn’t hold out even before the ghost of the Ghost Lake appeared.”

Ah Hong broke out in a cold sweat, her body still sinking, now only her head remained above water.

Powerless.

The lake water covered too much of the body. It’s too late for self-rescue now. The water here can corrode the body and suppress the supernatural, reducing a ghost handler to an ordinary person.

“If I’d taken action from the start, maybe things wouldn’t have turned so bad.”

Ah Hong bit her lip: “Who could have thought three captains would have issues one after another? Our luck is just too bad.”

She was not afraid of death.

If she were afraid of dying, Ah Hong would not have survived until today, but she remained very unwilling.

Clearly, four captains teamed up with such strength, why did it end up like this, with one mishap after another?

“Perhaps someone tampered with us, causing our luck to worsen.” Leuk San said with a gloomy face, letting the lake water gradually cover his chin.

Ah Hong sharply looked at him, appearing very surprised.

“I don’t believe in luck; I only believe in reality.”

Leuk San said, “If it were just one person having a problem, I could understand, but so many people having problems together is absolutely unacceptable to me; this is the Supernatural World, and so-called accidents might not really be accidents.”

In such a situation, he had no choice but to suspect if someone had cursed their group.

Otherwise, it is absolutely impossible.

“It’s too late to say anything now, let’s hope for the best.” Ah Hong forced a bitter smile as she gradually submerged, sinking into the lake.

No miracle occurred, nor was there any other change, only the inevitable outcome.

“Once submerged, is there still a chance of coming out alive?” Leuk San took a deep breath, looking at the eerie Ghost Lake filled with countless corpses, with a complex emotion in his heart.

Shortly after, he too quietly submerged into the water.

The cold lake water swallowed everything.

At this moment, the lake surface was already empty, all people and items had sunk into the water.

Ordinary water can’t drown those who control ghosts.

At least the captain level who became anomalies cannot be drowned by anyone; they can survive without eating, drinking, sleeping, or even breathing, because their activities rely on Supernatural Power, not normal bodily functions.

However, they were submerged in the Ghost Lake, a lake capable of drowning malevolent ghosts.

“Damn it.”

Li Jun was ensnared by the black hair of a female corpse, wrapped around his feet, and though he was sinking, he remained conscious, attempting to break free from the hair’s entanglement and ascend to the surface once more.

He was quite anxious.

Because Li Jun knew his mishap would lead to the failure of the retreat, possibly resulting in all being annihilated here.

“I must escape quickly.” Li Jun struggled, growling.

But he was powerless.

After only a momentary struggle, his limbs shriveled, devoid of strength, and even moving them freely became extremely difficult.

He felt the lake water invading his body, suppressing the Ghost Flame within, causing an imbalance in his supernatural powers.

In the end, Li Jun was left as nothing more than a human skin, drifting down toward the lake bottom.

His Ghost Flame continued to burn and flicker in the water, emitting a sinister green glow, but to no avail.

Moreover, most critically, the dye on Li Jun’s face was gradually peeling away… a strange, cold face was slowly emerging.

The Ghost Lake’s influence was even causing Ah Hong’s ghost makeup on the human skin to fade.

Once the makeup fully faded, Li Jun would no longer be Li Jun, just a human-skin ghost.

“Even Ah Hong, Leuk San, and Yang Jian have sunk into the water…”

In the water, Li Jun’s sunglasses slipped off, and in his vacant eye sockets, the Ghost Flame flickered, seeing those who had similarly plunged into the water above.

He couldn’t accept such an outcome.

Hoping someone could change the situation.

Li Jun finally looked toward Yang Jian, that guy who could create miracles.

But Yang Jian remained motionless, maintaining a standing posture, still gripping that cracked long spear, sinking like a statue.

It seemed that at this moment, even Yang Jian couldn’t create a miracle.

“Wait, something seems to be floating up.” Suddenly, Li Jun’s remaining vision caught sight of something behaving abnormally, drifting up from the lake bottom toward the surface.

He saw clearly.

It was… a paper boat.

“It’s the paper boat Yang Jian was holding earlier, which he placed on the wooden boat, and just now the wooden boat sank, yet this little paper boat actually floated up.” Li Jun observed but couldn’t reach to grasp the paper boat.

Because that paper boat was five meters away from him.

He couldn’t stretch out even if he tried, and even if he could, he couldn’t grab it.

The paper boat continued to float up, drifting past Li Jun, past Yang Jian, past Ah Hong, and finally surfaced.

The lake surface rippled, the floating paper boat swaying like it was mourning the dead souls.

But at this moment, how could a small paper boat change anything?

It could change nothing.

“They’ve all sunk into the Ghost Lake, and my body still can’t move…”

Yang Jian’s consciousness was also clear at this moment; the Ghost Lake suppressed the supernatural, but it couldn’t destroy his consciousness.

He attempted to move, but his entire body was cold and numb, still uncontrollable.

“Damn it, if this continues, I might end up like the previous ghosts, eternally submerged here.”

Yang Jian watched anxiously.

If his body hadn’t experienced this anomaly, he could have used the Ghost Domain to rely on Li Jun’s Ping’an Tower to leave this place.

He could even use supernatural items.

But everything he prepared and planned had been shattered.

Even Yang Jian himself didn’t know why such a thing happened to him out of nowhere.

But in the memory from four years ago.

On that day on the school playground, Yang Jian’s instincts did not perceive.

An ongoing supernatural confrontation.

The Evil Hound preserved in memory now gathered into a pack, tearing into the malevolent ghost.

Pale flesh scattered around, with fragmented corpses everywhere.

The malevolent ghost in Ghost Lake had possessed Shen Lin, invaded Yang Jian’s memory, but now was being torn apart alive by the pack of Evil Hounds.

Not a single piece of the remains was whole.

Memory invasion failed.

But there is a price to failure,

Shen Lin’s invasion failed, possessed by the ghost in Ghost Lake, and now the ghost’s invasion failed, killed by the dogs, thus Ghost Lake too would be possessed… This is the paranormal rule within the memory, unchangeable, and even Shen Lin, the instigator, must abide by this rule.

Snarling, the sounds of tearing stopped.

A pack of large black dogs paced on the playground, their bloodthirsty red eyes watching the remnants of the malevolent ghost on the ground, still on guard.

But the outcome was certain; the world of memory began to collapse.

The school was disappearing, the playground was disappearing, the remains on the ground were disappearing… even the black wolves were gradually disappearing.

But this was Yang Jian’s memory.

The owner of the memory, Yang Jian would not disappear.

He survived, thus he would inherit everything left.

According to the supernatural rules, Yang Jian was to replace the ghost in Ghost Lake, gain everything, and become the biggest winner.