Long before helping the Bai Family break the curse, when Lang Jiuchuan had been at Tongtian Pavilion attempting to settle a tab on credit, A’Piao had asked her to cast a divination to find someone — specifically, the young daughter of Miaoliu Residence across from Tongtian Pavilion: Qiao Shuyao, twelve years old this year. Counting today, she had been missing for five days.

Lang Jiuchuan had cast the divination using the girl’s birth date and time, and the hexagram indicated searching southward near water. A’Piao had personally gone to search and found nothing, so she came to ask Lang Jiuchuan again — and incidentally to check whether the matter Lang Jiuchuan had handled for the Bai Family had rebounded against her.

She checked — the aura was still in good order.

As long as someone wasn’t dead, it was nothing serious in A’Piao’s view. She quickly set aside her concern for Lang Jiuchuan and spoke again of Qiao Shuyao’s matter.

The little girl had a good rapport with her. Now that she had been missing for several days, not only was the Qiao Family frantic with worry — even A’Piao, this old companion of hers, had a foreboding sense that things did not bode well.

“Based on the hexagram you gave, the Qiao Family — needless to say — has only increased their search party, not reduced it. They’ve long since stopped caring about appearances. On my end, not only did I recruit some minor ghosts to help, I even searched personally — and still found nothing in the direction you indicated.”

Lang Jiuchuan’s brow furrowed. How could this be?

“Are you certain the birth data is genuine?”

“Things have come to this point. The Qiao Family has no reason to lie about something like that.”

Lang Jiuchuan listened, then took out her copper coins and divined again. A’Piao looked at the resulting hexagram, her expression turning grim.

Exactly the same hexagram.

“How did she go missing?” Previously, Lang Jiuchuan had had other things on her mind, and since it had been just a simple missing-person query, she hadn’t asked for details after the hexagram was cast.

A’Piao said, “It was on the fourth day of the month. She and her family went to Huguo Temple to offer incense and pray — wasn’t there a grand Buddhist ceremony that day? It was right after the ceremony concluded. She was with her mother at the foot of the mountain distributing alms to the poor. The crowd surged and separated them. In the blink of an eye, she was gone.”

Fu Yi, standing nearby, couldn’t make sense of it. “Miaoliu Residence isn’t exactly a lavish establishment, but because their ancestor was once an imperial chef, the quality of their food is exceptional, and naturally the prices aren’t what ordinary commoners can afford. In other words, the Qiao family owner is a person of considerable wealth. Families like that travel with many servants in attendance, and at such a lively, bustling event, they would guard a young daughter of the household all the more carefully. How could something like this still happen?”

“The grand ceremony at Huguo Temple — that’s a day almost all of Wu Jing’s residents turn out for,” A’Piao said, pressing her lips together. “For one thing, they can listen to esteemed senior monks lecture on the sutras and witness debates on the Dharma, receive blessings from masters through the ritual of touching the crown of one’s head in prayer. And after the ceremony, noble families and distinguished households distribute charitable alms — naturally it’s a tremendous occasion.” He continued, “On days like that, children going missing is actually not unheard of. But little Yaoyao vanished in the blink of an eye — she must have been targeted beforehand.”

Everyone fell silent.

Lang Jiuchuan didn’t dwell on lamenting the misfortune. The girl had been missing for days. Whether it was an accident or premeditated malice, she was gone — dwelling on that was meaningless. The key was to find her. She turned to A’Piao and said, “Go get something of the child’s — hair, something like that. If there’s nothing like that, bring her parents’ fingertip blood. I’ll craft a soul-guiding incense and search again.”

A’Piao stiffened. “She’s dead?”

“Not necessarily. It’s simply using blood ties and karmic connection through the soul incense. If we have something belonging to the girl herself, it’ll be easier. The soul incense will lead us to find the person.” She paused, then said the cruel part anyway: “Or locate the body.”

Everyone tensed.

“Wait for me.” A’Piao flashed and vanished.

Jiangche asked, “Is this child… going to die?”

Lang Jiuchuan shook her head. “Her birth chart shows she’s still alive. But she has a death calamity in her twelfth year.”

Jiangche drew a sharp breath. Wasn’t this child twelve years old this year?

If they didn’t find her in time — would she just be gone, at that age?

Lang Jiuchuan, however, was gazing at the hexagram, sinking into deep thought. She knew there were always those more capable, always heights beyond heights — but when it came to divination, she had some confidence in herself. This hexagram would not be wrong. And yet the person couldn’t be found.

If the birth data was accurate, then the reason they couldn’t find her was that someone had completely concealed her aura — imperceptible to humans and ghosts alike. The only thing capable of achieving that was a formation array!

Lang Jiuchuan stared at the four pillars and eight characters of the birth chart. If someone truly had imprisoned her with a formation array to this degree, then what appeared to be an ordinary disappearance was far from simple.

Meet whatever comes when it comes. Find the person first — everything else could wait.

Lang Jiuchuan put aside her thoughts, rose, and went to the room she had set aside specifically for making incense.

The water spirit on the ceiling, who had watched the entire scene and then been completely forgotten: “?”

Hadn’t someone just been saying it could come along to cultivate? How had it just been ignored like that? Shouldn’t there be more persuasion — more talk of the benefits?

The water spirit was so aggrieved it kept changing shape.

Jiangche couldn’t help herself — she pounced, swiped with her paw, and rolled it into a ball, squashing it flat!

The water spirit: “You ugly thing, stop it!”

Lang Jiuchuan entered the incense room. This room had been waterproofed and pest-proofed during renovation, making it dry and well-ventilated. Incense materials stored here would never become damp. Beyond that, she had laid a small formation array to ensure the materials would not lose their intrinsic spiritual energy.

Inside the incense room, two paper-form figures were methodically and methodically preparing incense materials. Seeing Lang Jiuchuan, they quickly set down what they held and greeted her with respectful, slightly awkward bows.

The process of making incense was painstaking and complex. Tongtian Pavilion frequently asked Lang Jiuchuan to craft soul incense, and those procedures alone were exhausting and mentally taxing. So Fu Yi had made a point of searching around and recruited two ghosts, bound to service in exchange for offerings of incense, candles, and food, to handle these miscellaneous tasks. But the core work — hand-rolling the incense and imprinting the incense seals — still had to be done by Lang Jiuchuan herself.

Lang Jiuchuan dismissed the formality of their bow, had them set out the materials for the soul-guiding incense, and sat to one side drawing talisman characters to mix into the materials. Only then did she grind, hand-roll, and shape the incense, and finally imprint it with the soul-guiding seal.

The two incense ghosts beside her watched in reverent awe, shrinking quietly to the side.

By the time the incense was finished, Lang Jiuchuan had also taken the opportunity to make several other varieties for reserve use. When A’Piao arrived, she brought out the soul-guiding incense and found standing beside A’Piao a plump, round-faced middle-aged man — that was Qiao Yang, the proprietor of Miaoliu Residence. He had the face and build of a laughing buddha, but his expression held none of a buddha’s serene compassion. His face was lined with worry, his eyes red-rimmed, the skin beneath his eyes darkened into deep bruises, and a ring of fever blisters had broken out around his lips.

The moment he saw Lang Jiuchuan, his eyes brightened with desperate hope. “Master, can you truly help me find my daughter?”

Lang Jiuchuan pressed her lips together. “I’ll try. Did you bring everything?”

Qiao Yang took out a clean white handkerchief and unfolded it, revealing a few strands of hair. “These are strands my daughter left in her comb.”

Lang Jiuchuan took them, wrote out Qiao Shuyao’s name and birth date and time, rolled everything together with the strands of hair, formed hand seals with both hands, and murmured an incantation, pressing the seal upon the eight characters.

Whoosh.

The name and birth date were declared to the heavens — and ignited without flame. The soul-guiding incense let out a faint, soft sound, a bright crimson spark flared to life, and the pale smoke trembled slightly, then began to drift in a certain direction.

“Hold it, and follow the soul-smoke. In your heart, silently recite your daughter’s name.” Lang Jiuchuan handed the soul-guiding incense to Qiao Yang.

Qiao Yang received it solemnly.