The year my sister and I were born, the Moore family became rich overnight.

A Taoist priest foretold that our family had both a “blessed daughter” who would bring prosperity and a “drought demon woman” who would bring ruin.

When I came of age, the matriarch of the Lancaster family offered half of their fortune as a bride price to have me use my body to cure Adrian Lancaster, who was paralyzed and impotent.

Three months after we shared a bed, I was diagnosed with twins.

Adrian immediately dropped to his knees and proposed to me.

My sister, however, had been rejected by seven fiancés and, in a fit of rage, killed someone.

But on the eve of my wedding, I suddenly fell gravely ill.

My parents claimed it was urgent and insisted my sister marry in my place.

That night, she escaped arrest and married into the Lancaster family,

while I was tricked onto a cruise ship, my blood drained as I was dragged three hundred nautical miles, leaving behind nothing but my bare bones, trapped aboard and unable to reincarnate.

Ten years after my death, the Princess Mary, the world’s most luxurious cruise ship, set sail for the first time,

hosting Adrian Lancaster and my sister’s tenth wedding celebration.

In front of everyone, my sister was diagnosed as carrying ninety-nine babies.

The crowd erupted, praising her as a true “blessed mother.”

But the next second, the bridesmaids’ heads were severed out of thin air.

My sister’s belly split open, her intestines punctured, and her lungs shredded.

Adrian spent a fortune to hire Master Gregory, a “walker between worlds,” to traverse the realms of yin and yang and slay the vengeful spirit.

He comforted my sister, saying, “Don’t be afraid. Once I catch the spirit, I’ll make you an amulet from her soul.”

My parents painted the Eighteen Ghost-Slaying Formation in blood to destroy me.

“Even in death you can’t behave! Ruining our darling girl’s tenth wedding—you deserve to be obliterated!”

But Master Gregory made three trips into the underworld and returned with a drastically changed expression.

“There are a hundred ghosts roaming this ship at night. Who exactly is the one that died?”

Everyone shivered.

My parents and sister froze. “Of course… of course it’s Isabella Moore. She’s the only disgrace this family’s ever produced.”

Guests eager to curry favor with the Moore family chimed in.

“Who else could it be? Mr. Moore has been a righteous merchant his whole life, kind and generous, but somehow had such a disgraceful daughter! How could her soul be missing?”

“The Princess Mary was Miss Isabella’s wedding gift—how could anyone have died on it, let alone a hundred?”

“Master, you’re not a fraud, are you?”

“No,” he said.

Sweating profusely, Master Gregory closed his eyes again to confirm.

When he opened them, fear filled his gaze.

“My eyes see the truth between worlds—there is more than one dead here!”

His expression turned grave.

“Miss Moore, have you felt your organs twisting, your body chilled? That’s a sign of a hundred ghosts passing through you. If it’s not resolved…”

“Both you and the child in your womb will die a violent death, with no chance of rebirth!”

Everyone held their breath in fear.

My sister’s eyes bulged as if she had seen the most terrifying thing in the world.

“Ah—don’t come near me! Evelyn Moore! She’s here to take my life—”

My parents’ faces darkened, and they quickly interrupted:

“Paranoid nonsense.”

“All of Oceanview City knows your sister Isabella took her own life—it has nothing to do with you. You must be scared out of your wits…”

Master Gregory’s expression shifted with understanding.

“If Mr. Moore can’t tell the truth, I can’t save Miss Moore.”

With that, he stood to leave.

The next instant, the grand ceiling of the gilded ballroom crashed down,

revealing mottled rust and bloodstains beneath the gold paint.

The crowd gasped.

Someone stopped Master Gregory and pointed at my parents.

“Didn’t you say the Princess Mary was newly built, sailing for the first time? These rust marks are a decade old!”

“What’s going on?”

My father looked at the blood streaming from beneath my sister and spoke helplessly.

“Back then, she died on the Princess Mary.

And with her, over a hundred half-naked crew members.”

Later, when the shipwreck was investigated, it was discovered that someone had deliberately steered the vessel straight into the reefs.

“A misfortune upon our family,” my father said, his face showing shame.

“I never thought the prophecy would come true. Isabella, just for fun, took a shipload of people to crash into the rocks and die.”

“The Princess Mary cost a fortune to build. We had no choice but to repair her and keep using her. Besides, we’d already hired people to perform rites for the dead back then.”

“Master, surely this has nothing to do with that ghost?”

Master Gregory turned his gaze toward the underworld.

The next moment, blood tears streamed from his eyes, as though a vengeful spirit had possessed him.

“If it were just a sinking, there wouldn’t be such deep resentment, nor would it target Miss Moore and the three bridesmaids!”

“Victor Moore, you still won’t tell the truth?”

My father lowered his head.

“I did lie. It was disgraceful, so our whole family kept silent.”

“That year, Evelyn and her three closest friends were also on board. If Isabella hadn’t ordered them to throw her into the sea as a joke, she might never have survived.”

“Sisters turning on each other… what a sin.”

My parents even spoke these words with a tinge of regret.

“If we’d known earlier, we should have driven her out of the Moore family…”

“To be honest, Evelyn has suffered nightmares all these years, and even her blessed fertility was destroyed by the freezing seawater.”

“Looking back now, it’s all her sister’s fault! She must be jealous of Evelyn in the afterlife.”

At those words, Adrian Lancaster’s entire aura dropped to a freezing chill.

“Well… well.”

“If I can’t slay the evil spirit and avenge Evelyn, I swear I am no man!”

He held my sister’s hand tenderly.

“With me here, I won’t let you suffer even the slightest grievance.”

But Master Gregory cut in coldly.

“No.”

At some point, he had already led everyone to the bottom of the ship.

The sight before them made every face go pale.

A skeleton lay on the ground, stark and white.

Its bones were covered with bite marks and fractures, clear signs of severe torment before death.

“This is the body with the greatest resentment!”

Master Gregory turned to my parents.

“Do you recognize it?”

“You must tell the truth. A ghost’s true name is its life-gate—without it, there’s no way to catch them.”

My parents clenched their fists, their eyes filled with struggle.

Just then, the scent of blood from the lounge drifted in, breaking their hesitation.

My mother sighed. “For the Moore family’s reputation, we couldn’t dare speak.”

“This skeleton is Isabella’s. She ran away with several crew members, and we only found out she had died after the ship was salvaged. The coroner’s report said… she willingly had relations with more than ten men before…”

She trailed off, too ashamed to continue.

My father snorted. “The Moore family has always taught our children to be discreet and self-respecting—how did we end up with such a disgrace?”

But Master Gregory still shook his head.

“That’s not her. This ghost is definitely not Isabella Moore. Who is she really?”

My father turned away in silence.

My mother wept, her eyes filled with both pain and helplessness.

Adrian Lancaster helped my weary father to his feet and said gravely, “Do you have a reason you can’t speak, Father-in-law? Evelyn and I have been married for ten years—no matter what happens, I’ll never leave her.”

My father was deeply moved.

“With those words, I can rest assured handing Evelyn to you.”

“In truth, the one who died back then wasn’t Isabella, but her younger sister, Evelyn Moore.”

His thoughts drifted back to ten years ago.

“On the eve of her wedding, Evelyn suddenly fell seriously ill and was bedridden. After discussion, we decided to have Isabella disguise herself as Evelyn to marry in her place, planning to swap them back later.”

“But we never imagined Evelyn would be assaulted by a group of crew members and then caught in the shipwreck. Afraid the Lancaster family would reject the marriage, we kept it a secret.”

“Now, seeing how affectionate you two are as a married couple, holding a wedding every year—what does it matter whether the one who married into the Lancaster family was Evelyn or not?”

Adrian Lancaster nodded, his eyes brimming with devotion.

Master Gregory suddenly understood. “No wonder I couldn’t summon the soul.”

“Now, all we need to do is follow Evelyn Moore’s spirit, find the place where her resentment has gathered, and break the curse.”

The group walked deeper into the ship’s cabin—only to freeze in place.

Master Gregory stared at the scattered piles of bones on the floor, his voice hoarse.

“This… this is a sign of a hundred ghosts locked in slaughter! There must be a formation here designed to refine a vengeful spirit!”

“So that’s it… that’s it. Evelyn Moore has become a vengeful spirit nourished by a hundred ghosts. When she fully forms into human shape at dawn today, she will kill the primary culprit—Miss Isabella Moore!”

At his words, my parents’ expressions darkened.

My sister’s lower body suddenly tore apart, expelling a string of blood bubbles.

Looking closely, each bubble bore human-like facial features.

“Ah—Evelyn, little sister, please let me go! If I give birth to ninety-nine children, I won’t survive! I was wrong, I was wrong…”

She trembled with hysteria, her eyes darting wildly.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry. Don’t haunt me. Since you’re dead, let go of this world—I’ll take care of our parents and Adrian, you can rest in peace.”

Hovering in midair, I felt nothing but bitter irony.

After hearing the prophecy, my parents decided my sister was the blessed daughter who would protect the family, pampering her like a princess.

To them, I was the drought demon who would ruin the Moores—a curse they despised to their core.

They pored over dictionaries to give my sister the perfect name, Isabella Moore.

Mine, Evelyn Moore, was meant to erase and conceal all traces—“to go away.”

No one in the Moore family ever wanted me to exist.

While my sister rode in luxury cars to elite private schools, I was locked in a cramped storage space under the stairs, never seeing the light of day.

I wasn’t even allowed the chance to learn to read.

From childhood, whenever business took a downturn, my parents would beat me until I vomited blood.

To show their devotion to “eliminating the curse,” I was never given medical treatment.

My right wrist was left permanently crippled.

I never thought I’d live to twenty, much less that the Lancaster family would specifically request me to treat Adrian Lancaster’s illness.

It was only after meeting Adrian that I learned life could be different.

He taught me to write, to use a smartphone, and even promised to take me traveling around the world.

I still remember—the day Adrian stood up on his own was the same day I found out I was pregnant.

Overjoyed, he proposed to me.

“Evelyn, having you in this life is a blessing I earned over three lifetimes. Give me a chance to defy fate for you.”

He went directly to my parents to propose, swiftly moving my household registration out of the Moore family.

He said he wanted to build a small home just for the two of us.

I believed him completely.

Until, ten years later, when we met again—he and my sister were celebrating yet another annual wedding, honoring their “true love.”

Even if Adrian had once loved me to the bone, even if he had risked his life for me three times,

ten years was enough to wash away any love.

He gave my sister a child,

and forgot the two unborn children from ten years ago.

By the time I returned to my senses, the others had already cleared away the debris.

The bones lay cold, falling to the floor in a heap like a mountain.

Seeing the scene, everyone’s pupils shrank sharply.

“What is this? How could it be so sinister?”

The bones on the ground were arranged in a bizarre pattern,

as if a hundred ghosts were hunting a single victim.

At the very center, a formation was painted in pitch-black blood.

At the sight of it, my parents panicked.

“We personally inspected the cruise ship and saw no such formation! And these bones…”

Master Gregory drew in a sharp breath and hurried to leave.