S.C.I Mystery Series Volume 4 Chapter 58

Bonus Chapter – Hungry Ghost Festival Extra: Float Around Part 1

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Seven thirty in the morning.

Ma Han drove his car, transporting a yawning Ma Xin, to the underground garage of the police station.

When he stopped the car, he bumped into Zhao Hu who was closing his car door.

Ma Xin was holding an egg pancake in her hand and cocked her head to look at Zhao Hu who was waving his keys and walking over.

"Hu Zi... why are you dressed like this?" Ma Xin's eyes widened as she surveyed Zhao Hu from head to toe.

Once Zhao Hu saw Ma Xin, he came up and smiled, "Lass, are there any more egg pancakes?"

Ma Xin turned around and looked through the bag, as she had bought several, and just as she turned around, she heard an "ah-mph".

Ma Xin turned around again and the egg pancake she was holding had been half eaten by Zhao Hu.

......

"Mmm!" Zhao Hu nodded as he chewed, "The egg pancakes are crispy today!"

Ma Xin's life was always tough: in addition to protecting Luo Tian and Yang Yang, she also protected her food. When she saw that half of the egg pancake was gone, her hair stood on end and she kicked the car door open, "Zhao Hu!"

Zhao Hu turned around and ran.

Ma Han shook his head speechlessly, parked the car and got out. In the process, he grabbed the furious Ma Xin and took a bag of egg pancakes with him, "There are still a lot of them, why are you so angry?"

Ma Xin angrily replaced the egg pancake.

At that moment, two cars drove in together.

A handsome silver-white sports car, which belonged to their captain Bai Yutang, and a big black jeep behind, which belonged to Zhao Zhen.

Opening the door, Bai Yutang got out of the car in good spirits, and behind him, Zhan Zhao touched his nose, "The smell of egg pancakes."

The door of Zhao Zhen's car opened, it was Bai Chi who was driving, and Gongsun was in the passenger seat. Bai Chi went to open the back door and they saw Lisbon get out enthusiastically, shaking his snow-white mane and yawning, rubbing against Bai Chi's waist like a big cat.

Ma Xin shared the egg pancakes and asked Bai Chi, "Chi Chi, why did you bring Lisbon?"

"Heh heh." Bai Chi laughed dryly and seemed a little embarrassed as he rubbed his head.

"Chi Chi, you're wise!" Zhao Hu ran back and took the half egg pancake, then went over to rub Lisbon, "I'll stay with you today."

Bai Yutang looked Zhao Hu up and down – He didn't know what was wrong with him, he was dressed in bright yellow today, no different from a banana.

"Why are you dressed like that?" Bai Yutang asked, puzzled.

"It's fashionable." Zhao Hu bristled.

"Heh." Ma Han laughed.

Zhan Zhao nibbled on an egg pancake and thought for a while, "Oh... it's the 14th of July today."

Everyone understood.

Bai Yutang looked speechlessly at the somewhat embarrassed Bai Chi and Zhao Hu, one who made sure to bring Lisbon to work and one who wore all lemon yellow, no doubt to ward off evil spirits. On the 14th day of the 7th month of the lunar calendar, the Ghost Gate opens, and once twelve o'clock in the evening passes, it is the Hungry Ghost Festival, also commonly known as the Ghost Festival. The SCI team is on night shift tonight to screen cases, so the two most superstitious ones will probably need some spiritual support.

Everyone was eating their breakfast and was about to enter the elevator when they heard someone in the distance shout, "Dr. Gongsun!"

......

Everyone looked at each other in silence – It was rare that anyone would call Gongsun that, and they were a little unused to hearing it.

Gongsun himself almost didn't remember that he was a doctor. When he looked back, he saw that it was the police station's security guard.

"Doctor, there's an air express for you." The security guard trotted over holding a box, "It's from Thailand."

"Ah!" Gongsun's mouth opened and his face instantly took on a look of surprise and satisfaction. From his expression, the crowd could roughly tell that the contents of the box were probably quite exciting.

Gongsun happily signed for the package and walked back with the box in his arms.

Zhao Hu asked Ma Han, "What do you think it is?"

Ma Han visually measured the size of the box and said, "A human head."

The others were silent for a moment.

Ma Xin nodded, "A human head."

Zhan Zhao and Bai Chi also nodded, "A human head."

Bai Yutang pressed the elevator button and sighed.

Gongsun walked into the elevator, holding his box, humming a tune that appeared to be from a scene of some horror movie.

Everyone looked at him, and then at the box.

Gongsun narrowed his eyes and smiled at the crowd.

Zhao Hu ran out and stood with Bai Chi side-by-side with Lisbon, gesturing – You guys go up first.

Bai Yutang reluctantly closed the elevator door.

Ma Xin asked Gongsun curiously, "Wise Monarch, what did you buy? Sending it so far from Thailand?"

Gongsun smiled more mysteriously, "It's a secret."

Zhan Zhao glanced at Bai Yutang, who indicated that he didn't want to ask.

When they exited the elevator, they heard that the office was quite lively, and they could smell the aroma of garlic.

Zhan Zhao pinched his nose, "... What's going on?"

There was a bunch of garlic cloves hanging next to Jiang Ping's computer.

Luo Tian smiled helplessly at the crowd, and they saw Luo Yang standing on the edge of a swivel chair, putting a hanging garlic string on a smiling Qin Ou.

"Yang Yang, what are you doing?" Ma Xin took her lovingly hand-made breakfast out of her bag and ran over to hold Luo Yang and feed him, giving Luo Tian egg pancakes in the process.

Zhao Hu padded over, "Lass, you are biassed, we all have egg pancakes while Yang Yang has breakfast."

Ma Xin glanced over, "Yang Yang is growing, he is not allowed to eat greasy food, and has to eat less salt, less sugar, more carbohydrates and crude fibre, and a balanced breakfast must include vitamins ABCDEFG!"

The corners of Zhao Hu's mouth twitched as Luo Yang gave him a string of garlic while eating his breakfast.

Zhan Zhao was curious, "Yang Yang, why are you giving out garlic?"

"My teacher said that it's the Ghost Festival, so the garlic is to ward off evil spirits." Luo Yang opened his mouth and had another mouthful of breakfast stuffed into it by Ma Xin.

Everyone felt the need to complain about the education of this school...

Today, SCI has no major cases to investigate, but recently there have been unsolved cases sent over from various parts of the country, with all kinds of gory photos and bizarre case details. Bao Zheng had the information categorised and sent to SCI together, so that they could spend the whole day today sifting through it and saving some unsolved cases for investigation.

Zhang Long and Wang Chao came over with buns in their mouths and pulled over several large boxes of information.

At this time, the twins also came, and when they entered, they said that it had been a long time since they had had a gathering, and that they wanted to have a meal together.

Bai Yutang frowned, "Why are we eating again when it's not a holiday?"

The twins tilted their heads, "It's the Ghost Festival."

Jiang Ping came over, and with Zhang Long and the others, they carried boxes and boxes of case files and information that had been couriered over to the conference room to be unpacked.

At that moment, Gongsun was seen washing his hands and coming in while wiping his hands with a handkerchief.

When the twins saw him, they immediately saluted, "Good morning, my Lord."

With a wave of his hand, Gongsun said, "Free."

The twins glanced at each other – Yo, in such a good mood today?

Gongsun entered the office and looked down, "Where's my box?"

Everyone looked over together. Gongsun had just entered the office and ran to wash his hands, he probably grabbed a pancake and put the box on the swivel chair.

Everyone thought back, that box... seems to be similar to the box Jiang Ping and the others had opened for the materials...

"Oh my god!"

As they were thinking, they heard a miserable scream in the conference room.

The crowd went in to take a look and saw Jiang Ping sitting on his butt on the floor with an opened box in front of him.

Gongsun hurriedly ran over, picked up the box and covered it, squinting at Jiang Ping, "You saw it?"

Jiang Ping froze and hurriedly shook his head, like a rattle.

Gongsun narrowed his eyes to show his disbelief.

Jiang Ping held out three fingers and swore, "I didn't see it clearly!"

With a raised eyebrow and a mysterious expression, Gongsun walked out of the conference room with the box in his arms and went back to the forensic room.

Ma Xin blinked, stuffed three bites of breakfast in a row into Luo Yang, shoved a tube of Vitasoy into his hand, gave him a kiss on the cheek, and rushed off to the forensic room to hunt.

Luo Yang tilted his head and looked up at Luo Tian.

Luo Tian stretched out his hands – Indicating that it was probably inappropriate for children.

Zhan Zhao approached Jiang Ping's side and asked, "What did you see?"

Jiang Ping suddenly hissed and shivered, "A skull."

The crowd looked at each other with a look of understanding – It was indeed a human head.

"Is this the first time you've seen a skull?" Bai Yutang looked at Jiang Ping in disbelief, "Why are you so scared?"

Jiang Ping grinned, "That head has no eyes on the front and the brain is full of eyeballs..."

After Jiang Ping finished speaking, the crowd was silent for a moment, and all hissed together. Zhao Hu covered his ears and shook his head, "Fuck, don't think wildly, scared me to death!"

After breakfast, everyone sat down at the conference table and began to sort through the case files.

Zhan Zhao was holding a folder of documents in his hand, not very peaceful.

Bai Yutang stared at the case file and said, "Cat."

"Hm?" Zhan Zhao looked at him.

Bai Yutang closed the file he was looking at and replaced it with another one, while he slowly said, "Curiosity killed the cat."

Zhan Zhao squinted at him – More and more curious!

In the forensic room, under the dim light, Ma Xin held a bowl of cup noodles and waited for three minutes with a fork, observing Gongsun's actions as he unpacked the box.

"Wise Monarch, what's in the box?"

Ma Xin then saw Gongsun take a glass table and place it on the shiny dissecting table, then from the box, he carefully lifted out a skull.

The skull looked very special. From the shape, it was a complete skull, but the teeth were protruding outwards slightly, and the upper and lower rows of teeth were sharper than normal for humans, but they were indeed human teeth, not like those of animals.

The most peculiar thing was that the two eye sockets of the skull, which should have been black, were covered with white bone, and the eye sockets were only sunken in, which did not fit the principle of a human skull. Was it a replica?

In addition, on the top part of the skull, there were seven grooves, similar to the pan used to make octopus roast, and in the grooves, seven beads were placed. These beads resembled eyeballs, with a layer of transparent glass on the outside and pupils of various colours on the inside, a bizarre but exquisite look.

Ma Xin opened the lid of the cup and snorted – It really suited Gongsun's aesthetic.

"I asked someone to buy this from a Thai shaman, it's called Yangguang Shenhunzhen." Gongsun raised an eyebrow.

The group of people at the door exclaimed in unison, "Yangguang Shenhunzhen?"

Gongsun looked helplessly towards the door, and saw that all the SCI members, led by Zhan Zhao, apart from Bai Yutang, were looking into the forensic room with their hands on the door.

In the SCI office, Bai Yutang sighed and looked across at Bai Chi, the only one left behind, "Zhao Hu has gone to look at it and you're not going?"

Bai Chi leaned against Lisbon with his files in his arms and shook his head firmly, "I'm not going! I've been having trouble sleeping lately."

Zhan Zhao walked into the forensic room and stared at the skull, "Is this handcrafted or real bone?"

"Real bone." Gongsun said, "This is used to complete the ancient Thai art of invoking spirits and raising ghosts."

After Gongsun finished speaking, Zhao Hu silently turned around and walked away.

"Raising ghosts?" Zhan Zhao's eyes lit up, "How exactly?"

"It's like this." Gongsun pulled a piece of paper out of the box with a flourish.

Everyone looked at each other and asked him in confusion, "What is it?"

Gongsun bristled, "An instruction manual."

......

"An instruction manual?!" The crowd exclaimed.

Gongsun laughed and took the box out of the courier packaging to show the crowd the introductions on the box – "Yangguang Shenhunzhen, want to have your own ghost? Follow the instructions and you will have an obedient ghost in no time. This toy is only for adults over 18 years old, minors under 18 years old are advised to use it under parental guidance.

......

Everyone took a deep breath – A toy?!

Gongsun hummed a tune and opened the manual to 'play' with the toy.

Zhan Zhao walked over and leaned on the dissecting table to look at it.

Ma Xin felt full after eating her noodles, so she got up to give Gongsun a hand.

"Find a container that is airtight and put the skull in it." Gongsun said as Ma Xin brought over a large glass jar for immersing specimens, and Gongsun carefully placed the human head in it.

"Make the eyes look in different directions, to the south, east, north and west, without any possibility of them looking in the same direction." Gongsun adjusted the position of the eyes with a long bamboo stick.

Seeing this, Zhang Long and Wang Chao silently retreated.

"Three drops of bat blood." Gongsun said. Ma Xin ran out and returned not long after, carrying a bag with a bat inside.

Seeing this, Qin Ou silently retreated.

Zhan Zhao rested his chin on his hand as he watched Gongsun tie up the bat, and after draining three drops of blood from it, he told Ma Xin to let it go.

"Three drops of corpse oil." Gongsun crossed out another entry on the instructions.

Ma Han wondered, "What's corpse oil?"

Ma Xin smiled, "It's the oil boiled out of corpse fat."

When Ma Xin finished, Gongsun took a white piece out of the freezer and put it in the burner dish above the alcohol lamp, and Ma Han silently retreated.

"Three drops of a woman's tears."

Gongsun took a test tube out of the freezer, getting a dropper along with it.

Zhan Zhao was surprised, "You can find this too?"

Gongsun was proud, "The forensic room is rich in resources."

Luo Tian sighed and silently retreated as well.

Thus, Gongsun, Ma Xin and Zhan Zhao were left in the forensic room.

"Silently recite the incantation, 'Kāng ba gǔ lā gòng dá ba dǎo lēi gè tí yà lā.'" Gongsun recited it once and Zhan Zhao felt his cheeks ache.

"Last step." Gongsun looked at the instructions, "There is a match at the bottom of the box, please put a drop of your blood on the match stick, then quickly light the match, throw it into the airtight container, and cover it before the match finishes burning."

Gongsun touched the bottom of the box and found a green-tipped match twice the size of a normal match. He pricked himself and put a drop of blood on it, then lit the match and quickly threw it into the inside of the glass container and put the lid on it!

After the match was thrown into the jar, there was a sudden 'boom' and a blue flame flared up, but as the scarce air in the sealed container disappeared, the flame soon went out and a white cloud of smoke was created inside.

Zhan Zhao, Gongsun and Ma Xin peered over the edge of the dissecting table at the inside of the jar, and saw the white smoke gradually gather, and gradually morph, before finally... turning into a white, humanoid figure, like a white, translucent ghost-like creature, with two black holes in its face, twisting and drifting inside the jar...

Zhan Zhao and Ma Xin opened their mouths wide.

Gongsun held his face, "A ghost!"

"So small?" Zhan Zhao disliked that it wasn't big enough.

Gongsun reached out and opened the lid, and as he did so, with a 'hu', the white "ghost" floated out of the bottle and then expanded rapidly...

Just when Zhan Zhao and the others thought it was about the size of a human, a sudden gust of wind passed by...

The ghost floated out of the air window of the forensic room with a 'hula' sound.

The three of them opened their mouths wide.

"Ran away?" Zhan Zhao looked at Gongsun.

Gongsun picked up the instruction manual and saw that at the bottom, there was a row of red warning text – After the formation of the ghost, do not open the top of the container, otherwise, the ghost will go out and harm people...

Gongsun rubbed his chin, "Hmm..."

Zhan Zhao was silent for a moment, stood up, and left the room with a 'whoosh'.

In the corridor, Zhan Zhao ran into Bai Yutang who was walking towards him.

"How's it going?" Bai Yutang asked Zhan Zhao.

Zhan Zhao rubbed his chin, "Deceitful thing…"

However, as soon as the words left his mouth, a white figure suddenly floated overhead, bringing a chill with it.

Zhan Zhao blinked, and saw Bai Yutang tilting his head up, looking at the ceiling of the corridor.

At the same time, a loud thunderclap was heard outside, and, it was uncertain whether the circuitry was unstable or not, but the lights in the corridor flickered on and off.

Outside the window, the sky was covered with dark clouds, and it was so gloomy.

Underneath SCI, Bai Jintang's car pulled into the car park, and just as he got out, he saw Zhao Zhen walking over with his hands in his pockets.

"Yo, here to meet Gongsun for dinner?" Zhao Zhen asked.

Bai Jintang nodded, he had come to find Gongsun for dinner after his meeting ended early, "And you?"

Zhao Zhen spread his hands, "It was said that a typhoon landed today, so my performance was temporarily cancelled, so I came to find Chi Chi for dinner."

The two of them stepped into the elevator, and just as the doors were about to close, a pair of hands grabbed the doors with a bang and pushed them open.

Zhao Zhen and Bai Jintang looked up, a little confused, "Why is it you?"

......

Upstairs, Zhan Zhao rubbed his chin and asked Bai Yutang, "Did something fly past just now?"

Bai Yutang thought for a moment, "What strange thing did you guys do in the forensic room?"

But before Zhan Zhao could say anything, he heard a scream from downstairs, it was a high decibel female voice, "Oh my god, there's a ghost!"

From the direction, it seemed to be coming from the female restroom downstairs.

Everyone in the SCI office came running out, somewhat confused as to what was going on.

At that moment, they saw the door of the forensic room open, and Gongsun came out calmly with a long-handled net for catching butterflies, handing it to Bai Yutang.

Bai Yutang grabbed the net and looked at Gongsun blankly, "What is it for?"

Gongsun flipped open the back of the instruction manual and showed it to Bai Yutang – An effective way to catch the ghost.

Gongsun closed the instruction manual, coughed and instructed, "Keep it alive, I will raise it!"

......

"Ah-choo..."

On the top floor, Bao Zheng suddenly sneezed. He reached out and pressed his hand to his face, why did his right eyelid suddenly twitch all the time?

‿︵‿︵ʚ˚̣̣̣͙ɞ・❉・ ʚ˚̣̣̣͙ɞ‿︵‿︵

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Translator Notes

Please feel free to comment any mistakes I made so I can improve and do better as I go through the book.

Translated: May 27, 2023 by Angel

Edited: June 27, 2023 by Angel