Fourth Master Rong looked at the grand Ren Residence before him, his brow furrowing, his expression going dark — though whether from having woken up in poor spirits or from some thought that had just struck him, it was hard to say.

“Whatever sort of person that young woman may be, she must have something seriously wrong with her. To hold a meeting and choose a haunted-looking place like this — sure enough, anyone who can make that old bastard eat crow is no easy mark to deal with!” He had actually rushed to arrive in Wu Jing before the city gates closed the previous day, and had fully intended to come straight to the meeting place then — but night had already fallen deep by then, so he hadn’t pressed the urgency.

As it turned out, not pressing the urgency had been the right call. Being dragged out to a haunted mansion at night instead of drinking and sleeping — what would that have been, a ghost hunt? The place was obviously a house with a long and dark history.

And besides — the family name Ren?

Fourth Master Rong felt a tightness in his chest. A sense of foreboding settled over him — as though something had gone beyond his control, as though events had deviated from what he had assumed them to be.

This visit bodes ill.

Fourth Master Rong felt some resistance to going inside — an urgent, almost instinctive desire to flee.

He decided immediately. If he was going to leave, he would leave now.

He turned his head and said, “Your master has done a calculation, and today is inauspicious for receiving guests. We’re returning to the inn.”

Sande was somewhat taken aback. Was Master feeling uneasy? How extraordinary. In all the years he had followed his master, this was the first time he had ever sensed unease from him.

“Master?”

“Move quickly!” Fourth Master Rong gripped the armrests of his wheelchair and said in a low voice.

“You’ve come all this way — where does the Fourth Master of the Rong Family think he’s going?” A voice rang out from atop the wall above them — it sounded like a human voice, yet was somehow strange.

Both men looked up. Perched on the top of the wall — they had not noticed it before — was a white cat. No — that was no ordinary cat.

“Master, the cat has become a spirit!” Sande’s eyes lit up as he gazed at Jiangche. “It can speak human words! Is this the cat demon recorded in the Records of Myriad Strange Things — the kind with nine tails?”

“What nonsense are you talking about — that’s a tiger cub!” Fourth Master Rong snapped, staring at Jiangche, his expression growing ever more grave. A tiger cub that could speak in human tongue — that was far more than simply having become a spirit. It had already passed through a tribulation of Heaven and was cultivating the path.

The tightly shut doors swung open.

Fourth Master Rong gripped his wine jug, pressed his lips together. There was no running away now.

He lightly patted the armrest, and Sande pushed him inside. The moss-covered gates swung shut behind them with a dull thud.

The moment he entered the Ren Residence, Fourth Master Rong’s heart contracted. It was only the second quarter past dawn, and the sky showed no signs of clearing — instead, dark clouds were piling up on the horizon, as though a storm was gathering itself to descend.

He shed the habitual dissolute slovenliness of his usual manner, his expression going cold and intent as he surveyed the estate. His frown deepened with every step, but it was far surpassed by the pounding in his chest. What was happening?

This estate looked as though it had been abandoned for a very long time. It couldn’t quite be called crumbling ruins — but it was decayed and rotting. The beams and pillars had long since been claimed by withered vines, which swayed in the wind like grasping phantom claws, casting twisted and grotesque shadows in the faint light.

A gust of wind swept through, threading through the broken window lattices and hollow doorways, and produced a low, keening moan — as though grieving souls were weeping.

No — someone must have performed rites of passage here before.

He could not see a single lingering ghost. Some residual resentment remained, but it was very faint — it was simply that this estate had been abandoned for too long, with not a single trace of living human warmth. The air was saturated with nothing but a heavy, inescapable stench of rot and decay.

Most of all, despite the estate’s open grounds, it harbored a thread of chill that was faint yet seemed to seep into one’s very marrow — a dead, silent desolation and resentment buried deep within.

Fourth Master Rong could not understand why the other party had chosen this place for the meeting. He had come as requested — but the deeper they walked into the estate, the larger and more restless his unease grew. There was an indescribable pounding in his chest, and a grief and dread that seemed to rise from the depths of his very soul, something close to an instinct.

This estate made him profoundly uncomfortable. His chest felt dense with something he could not name.

Fourth Master Rong’s breathing grew heavier. He drew a deep breath.

Following the tiger cub that led the way ahead, he arrived at a courtyard that had been consumed by fire. There, standing perfectly still, was a slender figure — dressed in plain, muted blue-green robes, her frame slight and lean, her back to him — as though she had merged with the dead silence pervading the courtyard.

His breath caught. His knuckles turned white where his fingers gripped the armrests, the force of his grip blanching them.

His gaze fixed on her with intensity, and stayed there until she turned around.

It was Lang Jiuchuan.

The instant Fourth Master Rong made out Lang Jiuchuan’s face, his throat moved, and instinctively he began to rise from his wheelchair. “Yao…”

Thud.

He toppled from the wheelchair — yet his neck remained craned upward the entire time, his eyes unblinking as they stared at her, his gaze hungry and carrying within it a thread of tender longing. But very quickly, he sensed something was wrong.

This was not her. This was not Yaoyao!

This was simply a young woman who bore a certain likeness to Ren Yao in her youth.

Sande helped Fourth Master Rong back into the wheelchair, and curiously studied Lang Jiuchuan — staring at her intently for a moment, then looking back at his master’s face.

This young woman’s appearance was strangely peculiar.

Her brows and eyes were clearly someone else’s altogether — yet at first glance, one seemed to catch a glimpse of the master’s own likeness reflected in her. And yet she looked nothing like the master at all. To put it broadly, it was an air — a presence — that carried some resemblance.

How could that be?

Lang Jiuchuan’s eyes, which were deep and fathomless as a still, dark pool, gazed quietly at Fourth Master Rong — without joy, without sorrow, yet carrying within them a quality of appraisal and inquiry. A faint stirring she felt in her heart made her press her lips together slightly, and she could not help feeling a twinge of pity.

Watching the doubt and bewilderment that welled up in Fourth Master Rong’s eyes, she sighed inwardly. If the original soul had not died — would he have recognized her in an instant?

Fourth Master Rong and she held each other’s gaze, his heart hammering with an uncontrollable force. Looking at this young face, he kept feeling as though some cruel answer was pressing up to the surface, on the verge of being spoken — yet he could not grasp what it was.

He pressed his hand against his wildly pounding chest and asked in a low, hoarse voice, “You are Lang Jiuchuan?”

How could he be seeing a shadow of the young Ren Yao in this woman? An absurd yet overwhelming premonition surfaced in his mind, and before he could stop himself the words came out: “Can it be — that you are Yaoyao’s daughter?”

Lang Jiuchuan’s eyes narrowed slightly. Something felt off. When he spoke Ren Yao’s name, there seemed to be not a trace of grief in his voice — only longing. And moreover, he had said Ren Yao’s daughter — he knew she had given birth to a child?

Something was not right.

She did not answer his question directly, but instead turned it back on him: “Does Fourth Master Rong not know what place this is? The Ren Yao you speak of — is she one of the daughters of the family that once lived in this haunted residence?”

Fourth Master Rong froze. He looked around in bewilderment, his gaze falling on the fire-ravaged courtyard before him. For no reason he could name, a vast and crushing despair welled up within him. His heart felt as though a sword blade had been driven into it without warning, the pain so acute that a muffled groan escaped him and he curled in on himself in the wheelchair.

When he lifted his head again, his voice was raw and ragged, his eyes flushed red as he stared at Lang Jiuchuan: “What do you mean by that? This — this is Ren Yao’s home?”

No, wait — he had just seen that this was the Ren Residence, meaning the family who had once lived here was surnamed Ren. This was not necessarily her home — it could have been her parents’ home.

That wasn’t right either. Her tone was too strange. It wasn’t that she didn’t know who Ren Yao was — rather, she was gauging whether the person he spoke of was the same person she knew. Or else… she was probing him.

Fourth Master Rong’s voice went dry, carrying a wariness and an almost imperceptible trembling: “Who exactly are you? What is your purpose in summoning me here?”