The Last Breath Chapter 6

What happened next stops abruptly in my memory. I blacked out—my heart stopped racing, the tightness in my lower abdomen disappeared.

The discomfort in my lower body and a pungent ammonia smell worked together to wake me. I found myself collapsed on the bed, my jeans soaked with feces and urine.

Uncle Samuel was first to rush in. Seeing the coffin nails on the floor, he kept shouting "This is bad, this is bad!" Then he leaned close to my face, staring into my eyes to confirm I was still me, that there was nothing else inside my body. Only then did he breathe a sigh of relief.

Mom and Dad, seeing my condition, turned pale with fright and immediately asked what had happened last night.

After I recounted the terrifying experience, Uncle Samuel shook his head repeatedly. He hadn't expected that thing to be so malevolent it would dare touch the evil-warding coffin nails.

I said aside from fear, my body didn't feel particularly unusual.

Had that thing gone through all that trouble only to spare me in the end?

But Uncle Samuel said: "If you hadn't been scared into soiling yourself, you'd already be dead."

According to Uncle Samuel, spirits and ghosts all have one fatal weakness—they fear filth.

Any boneless water source, once contaminated by spirits, will corrode their supernatural power and dissolve ghosts' essence.

Last night that thing knew the filth on your body was potent, so it didn't dare approach. But it couldn't bear to leave either, so it just circled the bed until before dawn.

Uncle Samuel pointed to the floor. The traces on the wood ash surface were extremely clear.

Besides footprints from Uncle Samuel, Dad, and Mom, there was another type of mark—seemingly left by very small feet, showing only the front pads with absurdly long nails.

Several scratch marks disturbed the dust before each footprint.

Uncle Samuel continued: "That thing isn't alive—it has no foundation, so we can only see the front pads."

Seeing those countless footprints and remembering that while I was unconscious, that black thing and that grotesque face had been hovering before me, I couldn't help feeling retroactive terror.

Mom asked what to do next. Uncle Samuel said: "We need to endure one more night. Once the three-day wake is over and the body is cremated along with the coffin, everything should be fine."

To save my life, Uncle Samuel prepared to find more evil-warding objects.

But before he could finish, Dad lost control of his emotions and picked me up to carry me out to the courtyard.

Uncle Samuel tried to stop him, but Dad suddenly exploded: "This is my child! I'm responsible for their life! If you want to practice your superstitious nonsense, use your own kid!"

The car was parked in the courtyard. After pushing Uncle Samuel aside, Dad put me in the back seat.

But something strange happened—no matter how Dad tried, the car wouldn't start. The engine wouldn't turn over.

Uncle Samuel pressed against the car window, shouting through the glass: "This child has been marked. Until this is resolved, they can't leave this courtyard."

But Dad wouldn't listen. If the car wouldn't start, he'd carry me on his back—we were leaving this village no matter what.

But just as Dad, carrying me on his back, rushed toward the gate, there was a thud—Dad's knees suddenly buckled to the ground.

But I only weighed about 120 pounds—how could this happen to Dad?

Dad's face was instantly drenched in sweat. Gasping heavily, he called for Mom to help, but they still couldn't stand up.

Since carrying wouldn't work, they set me down and tried dragging me together, but I still wouldn't budge.

Several neighbors saw this and came to help. Eventually eight people gathered—pulling from the front, pushing from the back. Each person's forehead was beaded with sweat, yet I remained in place.

As the person involved, it's hard to express how I felt then.

With so many people working together, they could have lifted a car, yet my body weight seemed to have multiplied dozens of times over—defying all reason.