Chapter 21: One-Hit Kill of the Beggar Specter

"Be a kind soul, spare some food!"

The old beggar, his hair sparse, disheveled, and gray, hunched his back as he shuffled forward. Despite his stooped posture, his pace was swift, bypassing the other patrons to stop directly in front of Xia Tianqiong.

Xia Tianqiong, who had been on high alert, frowned at the sight of him. He recognized the man instantly: this was a Beggar Wraith.

Why would it target him specifically instead of anyone else? He wasn't afraid, merely puzzled. Glancing around, he noted the restaurant was crowded and under surveillance; it was not the place to settle this directly.

"Take it and eat," Xia Tianqiong said, pushing a plate of stewed catfish with eggplant that a waiter had just placed on his table toward the creature.

The Beggar Wraith’s face was a map of deep wrinkles, its eyes cloudy and utterly grotesque. The grin it offered was enough to terrify a child. Slowly, it extended a finger and plunged it into the steaming dish. The once-appetizing food rotted and withered at a visible rate, turning into a pile of gray-black powder within seconds.

This was the Beggar Wraith’s ability, "Rapid Aging." It was highly lethal, though it required physical contact to take effect. Fixing its pitch-black eyes—devoid of any white—upon Xia Tianqiong, it suddenly let out a bizarre cackle. "Not enough. I want more. Let me eat you instead!"

The lights in the room began to flicker erratically. The Beggar Wraith slowly stood straight, its bones popping with a dry, cracking sound. Its body swelled, tearing through its tattered rags to reveal a frame akin to a desiccated corpse.

"What’s going on?"
"Is that a monster?"
"Run!"

The other diners witnessed the scene and scrambled out of the restaurant in a panic. Within moments, only Xia Tianqiong remained seated, though his expression had darkened. He had not triggered the Beggar Wraith’s death rule, yet the creature was attacking him regardless.

Wraiths cannot harm humans who have not triggered their death rules, but there is one exception: if a human enters into an equal or master-servant contract with a wraith, and then orders it to harm another human, the act is no longer the wraith's own intent and thus does not violate the rules.

In other words, this Beggar Wraith was under someone else's contract, sent to attack him under orders.

Outside the restaurant, Bai Jingjing and Bai Yichen watched through the window. "Take it easy," Bai Jingjing cautioned. "Don't ruin the atmosphere; it will make negotiations difficult later."

"Don't worry," Bai Yichen replied. "I've already given the instructions. I won't let it take his life."

Bai Jingjing frowned. "It’s not about whether he lives or dies. It’s best not to hurt him at all; a simple test will suffice. If we leave a bad impression, how can we recruit him?"

Bai Yichen shook his head, disagreeing. "Based on past experience, once an ordinary person contracts a wraith and gains supernatural powers, their mindset shifts. If you don't intimidate them or beat them into submission, they aren't willing to be recruited or commanded."

"Someone who can contract at least three wraiths in just two days is clearly no ordinary person," he added. "We can't treat him like other amateur wraith hunters. You've seen his file: he's an orphan with no background, a man in his twenties without a steady job. He must have just gotten lucky and stumbled upon the conditions to contract those wraiths."

Bai Yichen was determined to humble Xia Tianqiong. Seeing that she couldn't dissuade him, Bai Jingjing said nothing more.

As they spoke, the confrontation inside reached its climax. The Beggar Wraith lunged, claws outstretched, only to find its legs rooted to the spot, unable to move. Instantly, Xia Tianqiong held up a mirror, and a suction force drew the creature inside.

The Delivery Wraith and the Gambling Wraith entered the mirror world in unison, joining forces with the Mirror Wraith to pummel the Beggar Wraith into submission. Battles between wraiths rarely involve death rules; those of the same rank prefer to use their abilities or brute force. The Gambling Wraith pinned their target, the Delivery Wraith opened its cavernous maw to tear at it, and the Mirror Wraith created a dozen clones of Xia Tianqiong to pummel the creature from all sides.

The Beggar Wraith, completely outmatched, began to leak wisps of nether energy as its form shattered.

"A mere stray, daring to throw its life away!" Xia Tianqiong watched the battle within the mirror, quite satisfied. Now he knew that when facing wild wraiths, he didn't need to worry about their death rules—he could simply strike back. He ordered the Mirror Wraith to use the paper ingots he had folded earlier to absorb the dispersing nether energy and convert it into ghost currency.

The entire process took only a blink of an eye. Outside, Bai Yichen stood stunned, needing a few seconds to process what he had seen.

"How is this possible? He slaughtered my Beggar Wraith in seconds!"

Bai Yichen’s expression shifted wildly as he moved to rush into the restaurant, but Bai Jingjing grabbed his arm. "Don't be impulsive!"

"Why stop me? If I go in now, I might still save my wraith!"

"Don't forget our mission!" Bai Jingjing whispered. "If you had defeated him, meeting him now would be fine. But your Beggar Wraith was annihilated in a single encounter. Do you think he will respect us? Will he agree to be recruited?"

"But... that was my only wraith. Without it, I'm no longer a wraith hunter."

Bai Yichen looked devastated; without a wraith, his status and treatment within the Bai family would plummet.

Bai Jingjing soothed him. "Times are not what they were. Years used to pass between sightings of wraiths, but now they are everywhere. With the expertise of the Bai family, contracting a new one won't be difficult."

Bai Yichen pondered this, his mood easing slightly, though he still glared at Xia Tianqiong inside the restaurant. "Jingjing, why don't you let Dog Brother deal with him?"

Bai Jingjing gently stroked the head of the scruffy little dog in her arms and refused. "Dog Brother doesn't like to fight, and I won't force him. Besides, what if even Dog Brother loses?"

"Then what do we do?"

Bai Jingjing thought for a moment. "Today is not the day to meet him; he would surely guess that we sent the Beggar Wraith. We'll wait until tomorrow and find an opportunity to approach him directly. No more tests."

Inside the restaurant, the owner cowered behind the counter. The Beggar Wraith was gone, and Xia Tianqiong sat alone, alert. He suspected someone had deliberately sent the creature to target him. But after waiting for a long time, with the Beggar Wraith having been completely shredded and destroyed in the mirror world, no one appeared.

The nether energy from the creature had been partially consumed by the Delivery Wraith, with the vast majority converted into roughly five hundred gold ingots—slightly more than he had gained from the Dream Wraith. Looking at the glittering pile of gold in the mirror world, Xia Tianqiong felt much better. He hoped more wild wraiths would come to be slaughtered. He had been down to less than two hundred ingots, so this windfall would last him a while.

"You three did well. Fifty ingots each as a reward; take them yourselves," he told them mentally.

"Thank you, Master!" the Delivery Wraith chimed in first, its voice devoid of any dissatisfaction.

"Only fifty? I used a lot of nether energy to manifest those clones! And I did the most work—couldn't you give me a bit more?" the Mirror Wraith complained. With over five hundred ingots in front of it, receiving only fifty felt unfair.

The Gambling Wraith remained silent, quietly taking its fifty ingots and retreating to a corner to absorb them.