Lang Jiuchuan recuperated inside the Small Nine-Story Pagoda overnight. When she emerged from the pagoda the following day, it was already nearly noon. Song Niang had already made a trip back to her house early that morning, retrieving a few articles of clothing and important items from the rubble, and was now at her daughter’s bedside keeping watch.

Seeing Lang Jiuchuan arrive, she rose promptly and bowed, saying: “I’ve been back to the house. I also filed a report at the local office — everyone was told the house was struck by lightning and collapsed, and no one raised any suspicions.”

Some neighbors, seeing that neither of them had been inside when it happened, exhaled in relief — a disaster, but a fortunate one. Other neighbors made cutting, spiteful remarks about how they had incurred heaven’s wrath, hence even their house was struck by lightning and reduced to rubble. Song Niang simply treated such words as though she hadn’t heard them.

Knowing that everything she had been through was the work of human beings — not some curse of her stars — her heart had settled. It wasn’t that she was a lone and ill-fated star that brought calamity. It was the evil of human nature that had brought disaster upon her.

Now her daughter had passed through her death tribulation. Even if she could only live for a few more decades — that was enough. By then, she herself would no longer be young, and it would be entirely fitting to walk that road alongside her.

So whatever others chose to say about her — it no longer mattered. Their mouths were their own; they could say whatever they liked. As long as her daughter was well, that was all she needed.

The traces of lightning and fire on the collapsed house were unmistakable. The structure had fallen, but no lives had been lost, and the local office found nothing suspicious — they simply registered the report and let the matter rest.

“I was thinking,” Song Niang began, “that once Diedie has fully recovered, I’d sell the house.” She seemed to find the next words difficult to say. She knelt: “By rights, you are our mother and daughter’s benefactor, and I should not shamelessly cling to you like this. But I can see that this shop of yours comes with a residence behind it, and once Zhuang the Manager has returned home, you’ll need someone to manage the place. Do you think I could do it?”

Lang Jiuchuan was momentarily taken aback. “Are you volunteering to serve me?”

“I don’t want wages — just a place for my daughter and me to stay. My cooking is decent enough, and I can clean the house and wash clothing. Consider it my way of repaying the debt of saving our lives.”

Lang Jiuchuan studied her. Song Niang, under that gaze, broke into a light sweat across her forehead — yet she bit down and persisted: “I… I admit, I have a selfish motive as well. Diedie’s health is too fragile. I thought that if we stayed close to you, basking in your blessing might help her recover better. I… I…”

She stumbled over her words, her face flushing deep red. She bowed her head in shame, and finally said: “I’m sorry. I’ve overstepped.”

“You are quite candid, at least,” Lang Jiuchuan said with a faint smile. She glanced at Song Niang’s hands. “You’ve always done embroidery work. One assumes the Song household didn’t allow you to do rough household chores, for fear of roughening your hands and snagging the silk. If you worked as my housekeeper here, your hands would coarsen. What would become of your embroidery then?”

Song Niang let out a rueful smile and shook her head. “Everything that happened to me — it was the evil of human nature, yes. But wasn’t it also, in a way, brought about by my embroidery? If I didn’t know how to embroider, would I have taken on that commission from the Marquis Estate? And if not for that, would I have encountered Luo Chan? So… I don’t intend to embroider anymore. I can no longer bear to go through something like this a second time.”

Last night, as she had kept vigil over her daughter, she’d done a great deal of thinking. Even granting that Luo Chan was the one who had harmed her — if she had never mastered double-sided embroidery, if she had never accepted that commission for the Guanyin portrait, would any of this tragedy have come to pass?

The disaster had been caused by Luo Chan — but she herself had played a part too. She no longer wished to make embroideries.

“That line of thinking is mistaken,” Lang Jiuchuan said evenly. “Some fated entanglements cannot be escaped. If not manifested here, they will manifest elsewhere. Those who are meant to meet will meet; what is meant to come will come. Whether one has the fortune to avoid the tribulation — that depends on fate and luck. So sometimes the workings of heavenly karma can be rather heartless. The embroidery skill you have — it was earned through countless sleepless hours of painstaking effort. You also prospered because of it, lived without want because of it. One calamity falls, and you would resent it? To refuse a good thing out of overcaution — in my view, that is the greatest foolishness.”

Song Niang was briefly startled. She stared at her own hands in a kind of daze.

“Your house collapsed, and even if you wanted to repair it, it would take time. Stay here for now,” Lang Jiuchuan said. “I won’t be living here myself, not for the time being. But you already know what my Wanshi Shop does — the clients who come here include both the living and ghost patrons. Are you not afraid?”

Song Niang shook her head. “The living look far more frightening than ghosts.”

Not one ghost had ever harmed me. It was the living who brought ruin upon my family and nearly wiped us out entirely.

“And besides,” she continued, “I could say I’ve now seen a thing or two, following you through what I have. As for ghost patrons — I don’t think I would be surprised by them. Only in those matters, I can’t really be of help to you. But in whatever is within my capabilities — please don’t hesitate to call upon me.”

Lang Jiuchuan gave a sound of acknowledgment. She looked toward the bed.

Song Yuedie had woken.

“Mother?” A rough, hoarse voice came from the bed.

Song Niang’s entire body stiffened. She spun around and crossed the room in quick strides. “Diedie — you’re awake?”

Song Yuedie’s Gu insects had been expelled, but she had been reduced to skin and bones from the ordeal. There was much that needed tending to in her recovery — she couldn’t be given heavily nourishing remedies. Only slow, gentle nurturing would do.

Song Niang clasped her daughter’s hand, laughing and crying at once. She told the girl, when Lang Jiuchuan came over, that this was the benefactor who had saved her.

“I know,” Song Yuedie said. Her large eyes looked up at Lang Jiuchuan, and though her throat clearly pained her, she made the effort to open her mouth: “Thank you, elder sister.”

Lang Jiuchuan fished out a medicinal pill and slipped it into her mouth. “Your throat has been injured — don’t speak.”

She took Song Yuedie’s wrist and felt her pulse, then said to Song Niang: “Her body has sustained no small amount of damage. I’ll write out a prescription — for the coming days, have her drink a calming and soul-settling broth to reinforce her foundation and restore her vitality. Let her sleep as much as possible, speak as little as possible. First, replenish her vital energy, then gradually nourish her from there.”

Song Niang was overwhelmed with gratitude.

Lang Jiuchuan left the mother and daughter to their reunion and went to speak with Zhuang Quanhai, instructing him to hand everything over to Song Niang when the time came.

Zhuang Quanhai had set his departure date for the Dragon Raising its Head Festival. He said with some worry: “Once we’re gone, it’ll just be the two of them here — a widow and her daughter alone. I’m afraid there might be trouble from unsavory sorts…”

“It will be fine,” Lang Jiuchuan said with a cool smile. “The Ghost General will be taking up residence in this house as well. Anyone who dares sneak in will simply have to suffer the consequences.”

Zhuang Quanhai: “!”

Just imagining it made him feel alarmed and frightened. Other old houses might be rumored to be haunted on the basis of hearsay — but here, the ghosts were real.

Lang Jiuchuan wrote out a fine prescription for Song Yuedie. Not long after, Song Niang came out, heard that Song Yuedie had fallen back into a deep sleep, and handed her the prescription. “Have her take this for now. Since you’ll be staying here, I’ll reassess her prescription for her regularly.”

Song Niang clasped it to her chest as though it were a treasure.

Zhuang Quanhai looked on with a touch of envy. He had actually wanted to stay with Lang Jiuchuan too — it was just that she didn’t want him.

Lang Jiuchuan glanced at Song Niang again. “Are you still going outside the city?”

Song Niang looked up with a questioning expression.

“To scatter the ashes.”

Song Niang’s expression sharpened. A glint of cold steel entered her eyes. She said with firm, ringing resolve: “Yes.”

Luo Chan had died far too easy a death for it to console the spirits of her husband and parents-in-law in the afterlife — let alone bring peace to a living heart. She was undeserving.