Holy shit… The old broker wasn’t lying, this female ghost does look like that… A chill ran down Xu Qi An’s spine.
But he wasn’t afraid. The chill was the natural reaction of a former ordinary person seeing a ghost in reality.
After all, he was the kind of person who, after watching a horror movie, wouldn’t dare go to the bathroom. When he couldn’t hold it anymore, he’d resort to using a Mizone sports drink bottle. It’s a good thing he used Mizone – a regular mineral water bottle wouldn’t have been able to accommodate his size.
The white-robed female ghost stared at them blankly for a moment, seemingly sensing a threat. Her mouth split open to her ears, black blood flowing, as she silently screamed and lunged at the two of them.
At the bottom of the deep well, the yin energy intensified several times over, causing goosebumps to rise on Xu Qi An’s skin.
I don’t know how to deal with vengeful spirits… I’ll just give her a slash… Xu Qi An gripped his sword hilt, intending to get in front of Chu Caiwei, but the beautiful girl in the yellow dress pressed her hand down, stopping his action.
She made hand seals, and the taiji fish in the center of the feng shui compass began to rotate. Xu Qi An saw the “Gui” character of the Heavenly Stems light up.
A jet of black light shot out of the feng shui compass, enveloping the female ghost and drawing her into the compass.
Chu Caiwei withdrew the feng shui compass, holding it in her hand. She turned to Xu Qi An with a charming smile, then pointed to the bottom of the well and swam over, swaying her hips.
The two of them investigated the bottom of the well for a moment but found nothing.
“Splash…” Xu Qi An emerged from the water’s surface. With no leverage at the bottom of the well, he supported himself on the well walls and climbed up, turning back to say:
“Grab my legs.”
Chu Caiwei made an “Oh” sound and hugged Xu Qi An’s legs, letting him carry her up as he climbed.
Xu Qi An sensed something and muttered softly: “The little lotus has just revealed its tiny tip… Eating all day long, how come they never grow bigger?”
“What did you say?” Chu Caiwei didn’t hear clearly.
“Nothing. Climb up a bit more, you’re about to pull my pants down. There’s another handle up here for you to grab onto.”
Chu Caiwei kept searching but couldn’t find the handle Xu Qi An mentioned.
After emerging from the well, Xu Qi An circulated his qi to evaporate the well water soaking him. Chu Caiwei made a hand seal, summoning an orange flame from her feng shui compass. It circled her body a few times, creating steam without damaging her clothes.
Once her body was cool again, Chu Caiwei said: “This is just an ordinary vengeful spirit.”
Just an ordinary vengeful spirit? How has she maintained herself for so long… Xu Qi An frowned. The old broker had mentioned that the haunting had been going on for over two years.
Chu Caiwei’s next words resolved his confusion, “The bottom of the well connects to an underground current. That’s where the resentful energy in the well comes from. I suspect there’s a yin vein underground.”
Xu Qi An guessed that “yin vein” was a feng shui term and nodded in realization: “So that’s why your purification didn’t work, and the rituals performed by previous masters were useless – because they weren’t Occult Masters.”
Chu Caiwei nodded vigorously, proud to be an Occult Master. “We should give up on this residence. With the yin vein underground, the feng shui is extremely poor. This house is probably sitting on a small yin vein. Living here for a long time would bring constant misfortune.”
“Why give it up? This house is such a bargain,” Xu Qi An looked at her strangely. “You didn’t think I asked for your help just to take a look, did you? You need to help me fix the feng shui.”
“That’s so much work…” Chu Caiwei made a sour face. She was already exhausted from studying alchemy every day. “Then you’ll have to…”
“Add some extra meals, I understand,” Xu Qi An said.
That’s more like it… She pouted, then leaped back onto the roof ridge and called down: “Send me up to the sky.”
Do you want to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the moon? Oh, there’s no moon today, never mind then! Xu Qi An mocked inwardly as he jumped onto the roof ridge and cupped his hands to form a “small bench.”
Chu Caiwei jumped up, her toes lightly touching his palms. Borrowing the terrifying strength of a martial artist, her lithe body shot towards the night sky like an arrow.
During this process, she used the mystical properties of the feng shui compass to summon wisps of wind, supporting her body and slowing her descent.
With her Clear Light Vision activated, Chu Caiwei surveyed the entire residence from above, then turned her head to observe the surrounding area and the feng shui of the whole district.
Chu Caiwei drifted down like a falling leaf, frowning as she said: “Strange, the feng shui in this area is quite good. There shouldn’t be a yin vein forming…”
Could it be that your skill level is too low… Xu Qi An didn’t dare voice this thought. Instead, he asked, “Why don’t you take another look? Or go back to the Department of Astronomy to ask your senior brothers for help.”
“No need for all that trouble,” Chu Caiwei waved her hand. “Let’s directly communicate with the female ghost and empathize with her to see how she died. If we don’t find any clues, then I’ll ask my senior brothers for help.”
“Hurry up, I have things to do tomorrow,” Xu Qi An said.
Tomorrow he needed to go to the yamen to find Wei Yuan. If Dad was willing to shield him from the pressure, then all would be well. If Dad didn’t intervene, he’d have to go into hiding and find another opportunity later to deal with the impact of the traitor’s betrayal.
And this residence was the base Xu Qi An had found for himself.
It was haunted, so people usually stayed away. It wasn’t in an area frequented by high officials and nobles, and it was some distance from the main street – not a priority area for the Imperial Guard or the night watchmen.
Chu Caiwei said: “The female ghost’s yin energy is too strong. Empathizing with her requires enduring yin energy entering the body, which is not good for a woman’s health. You’ll have to do it. A martial artist’s vigorous blood energy won’t suffer any after-effects.”
“Alright!”
Chu Caiwei took off her feng shui compass. Her lips moved, and the taiji fish in the center slowly began to rotate. A faint black mist was ejected, floating three inches above the surface of the feng shui compass.
The black mist writhed and darted about but couldn’t leave the feng shui compass, bouncing back to hover above the taiji fish each time it hit the clear light barrier.
Chu Caiwei flicked her finger lightly: “Go!”
The black mist shot forward, crashing into Xu Qi An’s brow.
Xu Qi An felt a chill all over his body, a thread of cold rising from his spine. Then he sensed thoughts full of hatred, madness, and fear.
This mass of thoughts frantically attacked his primordial spirit, attempting to control his body. Suddenly, the female ghost seemed to sense something and became very quiet… No, she became trembling with fear.
This made Xu Qi An abandon the idea of suppressing the vengeful spirit with his thoughts. He carefully sensed the ghost’s consciousness.
Did she detect the presence of Monk Shenshu… The monk is indeed asleep, otherwise, he might have already eliminated the female ghost…
His thoughts enveloped the vengeful spirit, and the two empathized. In the next moment, unfamiliar scenes floated up, as if a movie were playing.
The woman was originally the daughter of a wealthy family in Taikang County. Because of her beauty, suitors were constantly at their door. Following a normal life trajectory, she would have married into a good family and lived a peaceful life.
But a certain outing changed her life forever. In a secluded alley, she was forcibly abducted by human traffickers and sent to a large mansion in the capital.
The mansion housed many women like her, as well as many handsome young men and even boys.
They all did the same thing – every night they accompanied the guests who came to the mansion, allowing them to be played with.
They called each other “Lord,” obviously people with official positions. These “Lords,” having shed their official robes, were more beastly than beasts, wantonly toying with the women in the mansion.
The female ghost had served many “Lords,” and was even forced to serve together with an effeminate young man. Her heart was full of pain and resentment, but fearing death, she could only endure the humiliation.
After a few years of this, she caught the eye of a client and became his exclusive lover, improving her situation.
That client was called Tamraha, a medium-built, stocky man with a round face and monolids.
The cause of her death was accidentally overhearing a conversation between Tamraha and a high-ranking official.
The conversation involved words like “Yun Province,” “cannons,” and “machinery.”
There was a “rebirth well” in the back courtyard of the mansion, where many who had committed suicide or been tortured to death by clients were buried – women, young men, and boys. After the woman was killed, she too was thrown into that well.
After her death, she became a fierce ghost but was trapped in the well. By coincidence, she followed the underground current from the well bottom and arrived here.
And nourished by the resentful energy seeping from the current, she had remained until now, her soul not dissipating.
In these fragments of memory, Xu Qi An saw many familiar faces. Especially in the moments before the woman’s death, during that conversation, he saw through the woman’s eyes the high-ranking official talking with Tamraha.
The Minister of Works from the Qi faction!
“Phew…” Xu Qi An opened his eyes and exhaled the stagnant air in his chest.
This empathy wasn’t something a human should do. From a first-person perspective, he had experienced being mounted by men N times, deeply feeling the humiliation of being ridden.
At the same time, he was affected by the ghost’s resentment, pain, despair, and other emotions.
Fortunately, he persisted in daily visualization to temper his primordial spirit, greatly improving his willpower. An ordinary person would probably end up with depression or schizophrenia.
“It seems there was an unexpected harvest…” Chu Caiwei looked at him. During the empathy, she had watched Xu Qi An’s face repeatedly contort, sometimes fierce, sometimes pained, sometimes indignant.
These emotions, of course, didn’t belong to him but came from that woman. But what kind of experience could give a woman so many negative emotions?
Chu Caiwei’s fingertip touched Xu Qi An’s brow, pulling out the female ghost and sealing her back into the feng shui compass.
That Tamraha didn’t look like someone from the Central Plains… Western region people typically have nose bridges and deep-set eyes, while the southern barbarians have blue eyes. Northerners have dark skin and possess the bloodlines of ancient beasts, with somewhat inhuman appearances… Tamraha’s features were more characteristic of people from the area ruled by the Witch-God Cult.
But how could the Witch-God Cult be connected to Yun Province? Yun Province is in the southeast of Great Feng. Although there were only snippets, it seemed the Ministry of Works had been supplying advanced machinery to either the Witch-God Cult or Yun Province.
“This matter involves treason. I must report it to Wei Yuan immediately…” Thinking of this, Xu Qi An briefly summarized the situation for Chu Caiwei.
After listening, Chu Caiwei was very puzzled, “Suffering endless torment in life and having unresolved resentment after death doesn’t necessarily lead to becoming a fierce ghost. But if the numbers accumulate, it would cause sky-high resentful energy. If there was such a place in the inner city, the night watchmen would have discovered it long ago.”
“We’ll discuss this matter later… Oh, right, give me back the mirror,” Xu Qi An said.
Now that he was about to make a significant contribution, he wasn’t afraid of the so-called “corruption and perversion of justice” charges. Naturally, he didn’t need to entrust the mirror to Chu Caiwei for safekeeping anymore.
No joke, there were over 900 taels of gold in there.
…
Xu Qi An took Chu Caiwei towards the night watchmen’s yamen. On the way, they encountered four patrolling Bronze Gongs who stopped them for questioning.
“It’s me,” Xu Qi An showed his waist token.
“Lord Xu?”
Although they were of the same rank, as Wei Yuan’s top assistant, Xu Qi An commanded respect from the Bronze Gongs.
“Why are you still wandering around out here? Today, the Ministry of Justice and the Court of Judicial Review sent a large number of troops to storm into the yamen and took away many colleagues,” one Bronze Gong said.
“I heard your name was on the list too, but since you weren’t at the yamen, you escaped arrest. Can’t you go home…?”
His implication was clear: You’re not planning to run away, are you?
“Who all did they arrest?”
Upon Xu Qi An’s inquiry, he learned that among the four arrested Gold Gongs was Jiang Lvzhong. Among the Silver Gongs were Li Yuchun, Min Shan, and Yang Feng – three Silver Gongs under his command during the Sangpo case.
Jiang Gold Gong was quite upright in his conduct. Even if he was corrupt, it would be minor corruption. How did he get arrested too… Is it because he has a good relationship with me, and Zhu is taking revenge… Spring Brother is unfortunate, he didn’t even get to embezzle any money before going to jail…
Sure enough, Zhu’s revenge had specific targets, particularly going after people close to Xu Qi An, both weakening the night watchmen and getting back at his enemy.
“Lord Wei will save them. These beasts in human clothing, think they can bully us.”
“Sigh, to be honest, none of us have been clean these past few years…”
“Pah! At least Silver Gong Li was clean, wasn’t he? Yet he still went in.”
The three Bronze Gongs vented their impotent rage, complaining loudly in front of Xu Qi An.
“I heard it was an investigation ordered directly by His Majesty. I’m afraid even Lord Wei will find it difficult to handle. What are we to do? The atmosphere in the yamen today was particularly anxious and silent.”
Xu Qi An comforted them: “There will be a way.”
The three Bronze Gongs shook their heads, very pessimistic, and left sighing to continue their patrol.
…
Xu Qi An made his way back to the yamen, heading straight for the Tower of Integrity. At the bottom of the tower, he was stopped by the guards.
“Lord Wei has already retired for the night and won’t see anyone. These are the rules,” said the guard who recognized Xu Qi An, but at this hour of the night, Wei Yuan didn’t receive visitors.
“I have urgent business. Go and inform him quickly,” Xu Qi An said in a grave tone.
“Lord Xu, please come back tomorrow,” the guard remained firm.