New Times, New Hell

Chapter 52 - Ghost Festival Garden Party

Due to the popularity brought in by the technology summit, Amazing Future’s product sales reached a new high. Aside from the sales contributed by netizens and fans, the main increase was unexpectedly brought in by high level administrators in the technological field. Especially the social circle that Jiao Shanlan and Zhao Ruola belonged to. Everyone was very curious about the company that was home to singer, someone Jiao Shanlan praised a lot, and had also attracted Zhao Ruola. They wanted to see what was so special about it.

And these people were generally quite well off. When they bought things, they didn’t bother with the price. Many had simply bought entire sets for themselves.

As they noted the steadily increasing revenue, all of Luofeng’s employees felt great joy, to the point that the current atmosphere was quite merry. Only Shang Que, who had made incredible advancements in his MBA class and gained a considerable knowledge of finance, couldn’t act fully ecstatic.

Their company was earning more, but in comparison, they were spending more and more too. Especially since Zhao Ruola’s addition. Without mentioning her shocking salary and only speaking of the developmental fees she calculated to be necessary, Shang Que’s noble Ghost King Heart felt heavy. He couldn’t peacefully be a ghost anymore.

Most importantly, Shang Que could now tell that Zhao Ruola’s calculations were right.

Their entire setup was designed to last for a long time. Thus, it couldn’t be half-assed in the slightest. In fact, it even had to be better than what large factories could produce. This determined that their development fee couldn’t possibly be lowered.

In this gloomy atmosphere hidden under a joyful one, they reached the seventh month of the lunar year. Then, Luofeng’s three living employees discovered that seemingly overnight, their originally cheerful ghostly coworkers had become depressed.

Yu Zhengdu had worked at Luofeng for a while. He had a pretty good relationship with his ghostly coworkers. Upon witnessing this, he secretly asked Kang Jin about the situation.

Kang Jin was sighing too. He looked around to confirm that Shang Que wasn’t anywhere nearby, then casually tugged his wig off. He used it to fan himself while explaining to Yu Zhengdu, “Isn’t the Zhongyuan Festival coming up……”

Yu Zhengdu expressionlessly stole his wig from him and put it back on his head. “That isn’t a good enough reason for you to harm my eyes.”

Coincidentally, Zhao Ruola was passing by. Upon seeing this, she became extremely surprised. She looked like she had been lied to. “Didn’t you say that there aren’t any bald people in our company?”

Yu Zhengdu calmly replied, “He’s not a person.”

Zhao Ruola: “……You’re absolutely right.”

Kang Jin nervously made a sh gesture. “Speak softer. Boss warned me that I can never let him catch me without my wig on.”

Zhao Ruola nodded and walked away quickly with her eyes covered. “It’d be best that you never let me see that again either.”

Kang Jin sorrowfully straightened his wig. He asked Yu Zhengdu, “When can we develop the technology for Underworld hair regrowth……”

Yu Zhengdu ignored him. He asked, “What’s wrong with the Zhongyuan Festival?”

The Zhongyuan Festival, also known as Diguan Festival, Shigu Festival, and “Bon Festival” in Buddhism. But among the common folk, it had a more popular name——Ghost Festival.

According to legend, this day was the day the earth official forgave sinners. The Underworld would open the gates of Hell and spirits could leave. This was known as the parade of a hundred ghosts. Those that still had living relatives could return home to reunite with them, whereas those left alone could wander the mortal realm.

No matter from which perspective, this day was one that deserved to be celebrated by ghosts. It shouldn’t make his coworkers so dejected.

Kang Jin slapped his thigh and complained, “I won’t talk about the historic ghosts. I’m just going to talk about us good, socialist ghosts. Normally, we follow the laws of the Underworld and don’t dare to loiter in the mortal realm. We finally have a festival where we can normally walk about the mortal realm, but look at the mortals’ attitudes. They avoid us like we’re ghosts……”

Yu Zhengdu couldn’t help refuting, “But they truly are avoiding ghosts……”

Kang Jin paused for a moment. He slowly corrected, “Like we’re vengeful and evil ghosts. For us good, lawful ghosts, this is too unfriendly.”

“We only have this one day in the whole year to openly walk on the streets. We just want to experience the joys of life again, but during the Ghost Festival, shops close early and people head home early. By nighttime, the only ones wandering the streets are us ghosts. There’s no difference from being in the Underworld……”

The more he spoke, the more wronged Kang Jin felt. He felt the sorrow from being discriminated against by the mortal realm.

But Yu Zhengdu finally understood what he was trying to say. This was the difference in thinking that resulted from the lack of communication between the mortal realm and Underworld.

Underworld spirits had once been living humans in the mortal realm. They still thought fondly of the mortal realm, especially those with relatives who were alive. To put it simply, they were somewhat homesick. Consequently, during holidays, especially large holidays in the Underworld, they naturally wished to return to their homes and reunite with their “family members”. They wanted to remember what it felt like to be alive.

But for those mortals with no memories of their previous lives, the Underworld symbolized death, creepiness, and demons and monsters. This, in addition to their cultural understanding, caused living humans to be filled with a natural fear for this separate realm. As a result, on the day of the Ghost Festival, in order to avoid running into ghosts, everyone was in the habit of returning home early. And, since there were less and less people who held large-scale sacrifices, especially in large cities like Fu City, several young people didn’t actually know that the Ghost Festival had traditions.

Slowly, the Ghost Festival became the most unfestive festival in the mortal realm.

Yu Zhengdu could understand this, though. After all, before joining Luofeng, he was also one of those young people who refused to stay outside during the Ghost Festival……

He comforted Kang Jin, “There’s no need for you to be so sad. It’s not that humans are purposefully discriminating against you guys. It’s just that the two realms rarely communicate, so they don’t understand you. Your image with the general public isn’t that great, either, so some fear is understandable……”

Kang Jin also knew that this wasn’t the fault of mortals. He could only switch to scolding those evil ghosts who often disrupted society’s normal functions. “If not for them, our image wouldn’t be so terrible in the mortal realm!”

Yu Zhengdu felt the same way he did. He scolded those evil ghosts with Kang Jin. Afterwards, Kang Jin felt a bit better, but this didn’t solve the root of the problem. The entire office and even the entire Underworld couldn’t be cured from its depressed mood.

At night, at the end of the work day, Yu Zhengdu was still thinking about this. Coincidentally, Shang Que walked over to look for him, holding hands with Peppa. He said, “It’ll be the Zhongyuan Festival in a few days. We should go together to buy some new outfits for Peppa.”

Peppa spun in circles happily, “Time to go shopping.”

As soon as he saw her, Yu Zhengdu’s eyes curved into crescents and he grabbed her other hand to hold. “Okay, we can buy a few extra sets this time.”

Since Zhao Ruola had joined Luofeng, the resolving of the Life and Death Accounts’ remaining problems became evidently faster. If they kept this speed up, they would be able to calculate Peppa’s reincarnation results quite soon.

As soon as he remembered that her next life would most likely be some small animal, Yu Zhengdu felt that he needed to utilize their time together now and buy her more little dresses.

But after hearing his words, Peppa didn’t appear overjoyed. Instead, she tugged on his fingers and leaned her neck back to ask, “Gege, I only need one dress. Can you give the rest to my friend Georgie?”

Yu Zhengdu snorted with laughter. “You’re friend’s name is Georgie?”

Peppa nodded. “He didn’t have a name, so I gave him this one.”

Yu Zhengdu: “……”

He had been extremely busy previously, so hadn’t had a good talk with Peppa in a long time. Upon seeing that she had made quite a few new friends and was willing to share her things with them, he felt very touched in his heart. Thus, he squatted and asked, “Why do you want to give them to Georgie?”

Peppa said, “He’s an orphan, so nobody burns clothes for him. He admires the fact that I have clothes to wear very much, so I thought……”

Yu Zhengdu nodded. “No problem. Then we’ll buy extra. You can have a few more dresses and Georgie can have clothes too.”

Peppa clapped happily, “Yay.”

These days, Peppa was no longer a little girl who had only watched Peppa Pig, but a little girl who had watched all major cartoons. The clothes she chose were in the most popular styles. After she picked out what she wanted, Yu Zhengdu paid and had the paper shop burn it on the spot.

While waiting for the paper to burn, Peppa couldn’t hold back her excitement. She tugged on Yu Zhengdu and shared her holiday plans. “Gege, Georgie, me, and our other friends already made plans. On the day of the Zhongyuan Festival, we’re going to go play together in the amusement park……”

After saying this, she added a little dejectedly, “But Georgie said, during the Zhongyuan Festival, amusement parks will close very early. We can only play until nine.”

Nine. For Underworld spirits, this was only the start of the day……

Yu Zhengdu had also been worrying about this problem today. Upon hearing this, he looked at Shang Que. “Is there anything scheduled in the Underworld for the Zhongyuan Festival? It’s such a big holiday. If there aren’t any celebrations, it might very easily lead to societal dysfunct.”

Shang Que shook his head and shared in exasperation, “Since ancient times, the celebrations in the Underworld have all been reflections of the festivities in the mortal realm. Right now, the Ghost Festival doesn’t have a good name in the mortal realm, so there aren’t that many festivities. I can’t do anything about it.”

Yu Zhengdu watched as Peppa excitedly tried on a pumpkin costume. He suddenly had an idea. He said, “How about, we prepare a celebration ourselves?”

Shang Que turned to look at him. His gaze looked somewhat confused.

Yu Zhengdu pointed at Peppa’s outfit and very seriously stated, “I just remembered. Isn’t the foreign holiday of Halloween quite similar to the Ghost Festival? But Halloween is always very festive. Not only are people not scared, they also participate in it more and more. Why do we only link the Ghost Festival to creepy and horrifying things?”

Shang Que pondered a bit and realized that what he was saying made sense. But, he still said, “I think that people will find it very hard to treat the Ghost Festival like Halloween.”

“That’s okay too. The most important thing is to make our friends in the Underworld feel the holiday atmosphere. It helps in maintaining a good and kind society.” Yu Zhengdu already had several plans in mind. He grinned and looked at Shang Que, “Let’s make Luofeng’s own garden party.”

Shang Que gazed into his sparkling eyes and slightly smiled too. “Okay.”

Yu Zhengdu pulled out his phone and started searching. “Let me see if there’s anything interesting……”

But Shang Que suddenly asked, “Do you want to see the Underworld from a thousand years ago?”

Time passed by quickly. In the blink of an eye, it was the day before the Zhongyuan Festival.

That night, the normally desolate plaza around the corner from the technology park in Fu City’s developmental district became unprecedentedly busy.

The developmental district had once housed Fu City’s suburbs. Its surroundings were a mix of urban and rural. It had only started becoming more organized after recent policies began focusing on it. But in comparison to the older, more central districts, it was still very deserted. The technology park was technically the most densely populated area in the developmental district. Besides it was Main Street. The houses along both sides of Main Street had been demolished, but the new buildings were still under construction, so aside from a few office buildings and a shopping center, this was an empty lot.

Because it wasn’t completely developed yet, normally, as soon as it hit the end of the work day, there were very few people around. It became unnaturally desolate.

But this afternoon, things were out of the ordinary. Several people who worked nearby didn’t head home after work. Instead, they got attracted to this location and whispered to each other, exclaiming in surprise.

“When did they build this? It wasn’t here yesterday when I walked past in the afternoon?”

“I saw it when I passed by in the morning, but I was in a rush to get to work so didn’t take too close of a look. What is this?”

“So they used all of last night to build it. That’s too amazing.”

“That’s nothing. These days, as long you have money, you can even get someone to build a skyscraper for you overnight. Haven’t you heard of a speed known as ‘socialist speed’?”

“My relative works in the shopping center and told me that it’s a garden party that a company in the technology park is holding for the Ghost Festival. They rented the plaza in front of the shopping center and are also using some of the nearby empty lots.”

“What? Ghost Festival garden party? Aren’t they scared of running into ghosts?”

“Don’t know if they’re scared of running into ghosts or not, but the setup for their garden party is too amazing. I’ve been to lots of amusement parks before and honestly, many professional amusement parks can’t even reach their level!”

“Isn’t that so. Not only is their setup amazing, it’s extremely unique too. What scenes are these? I’ve never even seen anything like them……”

“They’re labelled. Let me see, Rubbish Money Mountain, Bridge Over Troubled Water, Home Viewing Terrace……Ey, how come they all sound like places from down below?”

“Then it really was specially built in the theme of the Ghost Festival? That’s too interesting.”

Only to see that the plaza in front of the shopping center, along with the areas around it, had transformed into a snaking exhibition of historic buildings overnight. Pavilions and terraces, street markets and restaurants, extremely accurate and detailed, dotted the lot. Even from far away, its unique, realistic feeling was obvious.

Outside of the street market, there were several scenes that caught people’s attention because they had never seen them before. Magnificent balconies, long and wide arched bridges, mountains created from paper replicas of gold and silver……

Someone in the crowd immediately couldn’t hold themselves back. They tugged on their friend’s arm and said, “How about we go inside and check it out?”

“But it’s the Ghost Festival. Shouldn’t we head home earlier?”

“What are you scared of? Don’t you see all the people inside? It’s so crowded, even if there were ghosts, they wouldn’t dare to come out……”

“Okay then.”

This was apparently a garden party organized by a certain company but that was open to the public. Aside from their own employees, all passersby could enter and exit as they wished. Because of this, several people who were originally attracted by the architecture couldn’t help but walk in to look around.

“This garden party seems to have different themes in different areas. Let’s check this one out first.” Someone walked in and glanced around, only to see an enormous sign near the front door. On it were two words written in wild handwriting: ghost market.

“Ghost market? Do they sell things there?” The person with him couldn’t hide the excitement in his tone. He directly dragged him inside.

When they walked in, the visitors’ eyes widened and the air became filled with shouts of surprise.

The scene of the ghost market seemed to be an exact replica of the bustling markets of historic times. On its two sides were a building to listen to music in and a liquor store. There were several vendors with little carts on the street. But the difference presented itself in the white lanterns hanging from every corner of the street. The people looking out from the liquor store and the street vendors didn’t look like normal people either. Several of them had dangling tongues, dug out eyes, fangs, and blood all over. This was all stage makeup to imitate ghosts and made the noisy market that much stranger and creepier. However, the visitors that filled the street and their loud voices mediated this bone-chilling feeling.

Surprisingly, this caused an uncontrollable urge to take a chance to emerge in people’s hearts.

The street was filled with the occasional surprised shouts of visitors:

“Wow, this person’s head is about to fall off!”

“This makeup is a little badass.”

“Wait, I’m going to take a picture to make it into a meme——your head really fell off.”

The person taking the picture didn’t only speak; he also walked forward and held up the vendor’s head a bit. He said, “Big bro, can you hold onto your head? This way the picture will turn out better.”

The big bro whose head got held up: “……”

It was rare that they could hang out with living people during the Ghost Festival. He held back the embarrassment and held onto his wobbling head with both hands. “You can take the picture now.”

Someone else scooted in closer from the side and said, “I can use my own intestines to strangle my neck. Do you want to take a picture?”

The tourists hurriedly shook their hands. “We’ll get blocked if we use memes like that.”

That person could only sorrowfully mutter, “How come everyone likes to look for heads all over the floor, but no one likes to look for intestines all over the floor……”