“If you’re not Lu Yu, then who are you?” Ji Luo tugged at the corner of his mouth. “Has your ghost brain gone muddled?”
Lu Yu tightened his grip on Ji Luo’s hand. “If I were only some nameless evil ghost from the riverbed, would you still like me as much as you do now?”
Ji Luo laughed dryly. “How could that be? If you weren’t Lu Yu, we never would have met in the first place, much less fallen for each other.”
There was not a trace of a smile on Lu Yu’s face. “You’re right.”
A chill crawled up Ji Luo’s spine until his hair nearly stood on end. He slapped Lu Yu lightly. “Stop fooling around. Didn’t you say the pastries from that shop up ahead were good? Go buy me a bag. I’m a little tired and want to rest.”
Seeing that Ji Luo truly looked unwell, Lu Yu said, “Wait here. Don’t run around.”
Ji Luo nodded and waved a hand. “Remember to get a little of every flavor.”
Only then did Lu Yu enter the shop with his mind at ease.
The moment he went inside, Ji Luo stood up and followed the voice in his mind. After hurrying around several street corners, he indeed found Yue Jingming and Xiao Chunhe.
“Daoist Yue, Young Master Xiao, why did both of you come down here?” Ji Luo was shocked and worried to see familiar faces in the underworld. “Don’t tell me I dragged both of you to your deaths too?”
The two quickly explained what had happened. Ji Luo’s expression shifted repeatedly as he listened. “Xiaoyu suddenly asked me some strange questions just now too. He… but if Lu Yu died when he was three, then who is the Lu Yu I know? Even if he really is an evil ghost from the river, surely he wouldn’t… surely he wouldn’t harm me like this.”
Yue Jingming asked, “Has he ever behaved strangely in ordinary life?”
Ji Luo looked dazed. “I’ve known him since I was very young. My mother said I was healthy as a child, but later I somehow started falling ill all the time, especially when I played with Xiaoyu. I always thought it was because Mother disliked him. Things improved a great deal once I grew older… And Xiaoyu spent more than half the year living at our house, but every year around the Thousand-Dragon Water Festival he insisted on going home, no matter how I tried to stop him…
“When I went to the capital for the examinations that year, he unexpectedly gave me a piece of clothing he had sewn himself and said it would help me pass on my first attempt. But Ji Chen had an identical one. I was angry, yet I couldn’t bear to reject Xiaoyu’s kindness, so I kept wearing it. I always felt muddled and dazed while I had it on…”
“With Ji Chen’s ability, there’s no way he could have passed the jinshi examination. Every time I brought it up, everyone thought I was jealous of him, but we studied in the same school. I know exactly what his scholarship was like!”
Ji Luo spoke incoherently, yet many half-glimpsed clues seemed to connect in his mind. He turned to leave. “No. I’m going to find him and demand an explanation!”
“Young Master Ji, don’t be rash.” Yue Jingming stopped him. “This is still only our conjecture. We have no conclusive evidence yet.”
“What conjecture? Lu Yu told me himself that he often pulled one of my hun souls down here to keep him company!” Ji Luo laughed from sheer fury. “I kept wondering how Ji Chen suddenly passed as a jinshi. Now it seems the two of them must have been colluding. Wonderful! Lu Yu kept saying he had someone else, and I wondered which shameless little ghost it was. Turns out it was that bastard Ji Chen! He even called Ji Chen ‘Brother’ before. The signs were there all along! Stealing my scholarly success wasn’t enough, he even dared make a cuckold of me!”
He was furious beyond measure, murderous intent rolling off him.
“Brother Ji, calm down.” Xiao Chunhe stretched out his fan to block him. “Have you considered that Lu Yu may be a fierce ghost with two or three hundred years of cultivation, while you’re only a frail scholar without the strength to truss a chicken? If he turns on you, how are you supposed to survive?”
“What’s the point of surviving…” Ji Luo said self-mockingly. “Things have already come to this. I might as well be dead.”
“Young Master Ji, even in desperate straits there is still a thread of hope. If you truly die, wouldn’t that simply fulfill someone else’s wishes?” Yue Jingming handed him a talisman. “No matter what, you should give yourself a chance.”
Ji Luo looked down at the talisman and accepted it. “Thank you both for risking your lives to save me. I will find out the truth.”
Ji Luo hurried away with the talisman, but Yue Jingming’s expression suddenly changed.
“What is it?” Xiao Chunhe saw all the color drain from his face and immediately supported him. “Yue Jingming?”
A burst of agony tore through Yue Jingming’s dantian. He hurriedly sealed several major acupoints and closed off his meridians. “Someone touched our physical bodies.”
Xiao Chunhe grabbed him. “Forget everything else. Let’s go back first.”
The moment Yue Jingming opened his mouth, he coughed out a cloud of black mist. He immediately pulled the red thread from his finger, wound both his own and Xiao Chunhe’s strands around his wrist, sat cross-legged, and silently recited an incantation.
Before Xiao Chunhe could react, a halberd carrying icy ghost qi descended from above and chopped straight toward Yue Jingming’s head. Xiao Chunhe instantly raised his fan to block it, the impact numbing his entire arm. When he looked up, it was Lu Yu. Ji Luo, who had only just left, was trussed up tightly beside him. Ji Luo shouted, “Run! Lu Yu has gone mad!”
“I’m not mad.” Lu Yu turned and glared at him, then looked at the meddlesome Daoist and fox before him. “You’ve ruined my plans again and again. Don’t blame me for losing my patience.”
Already frantic and furious because something had happened to Yue Jingming, Xiao Chunhe said coldly, “If it weren’t for my wife, I wouldn’t give a damn about this mess of yours. You’d better get out of my way right now.”
Lu Yu naturally refused. Xiao Chunhe sprang upward, and while still in midair transformed into an enormous fox demon. His body was gigantic, twice the size of his demon form in the human world, his crimson fur blazing like fire. The ghosts in the market screamed and fled the instant they saw him.
He slammed a paw toward Lu Yu. Surging demonic qi sent Lu Yu flying, while the surrounding buildings collapsed into ruins beneath the fox’s feet. Lu Yu retreated a hundred paces before barely stopping. Staring at the terrifying demon fox with black veins covering its face, he demanded, “What exactly are you?”
Xiao Chunhe said nothing. He opened his jaws and lunged. Lu Yu brought his halberd down, only for the demon fox to bite the shaft clean in two. Xiao Chunhe struck Lu Yu with one paw, and half of the fierce ghost’s body immediately rotted away. Alarmed, Lu Yu formed a hand seal and transformed into a gigantic stone man, grappling with him.
A demon and a ghost were battling with supernatural arts. The ordinary underworld guards who rushed over after hearing the commotion did not dare approach and could only hurry off to report it.
At the same time.
Ye Shijiu and Liang Yun reached the ghost gate. Facing the towering stone statues, Ye Shijiu held his compass up and compared them one by one.
Liang Yun asked, “Can we really find Lu Yu this way?”
“The talisman Master gave me definitely works.” Ye Shijiu was speaking when he suddenly looked toward the distant Wangchuan River. Dust and smoke billowed from the middle stretch of the river, and two enormous figures could be faintly seen. As he wondered what was happening, Yue Jingming’s voice suddenly sounded beside his ear. “Shijiu, are you there?”
Ye Shijiu jolted and scrubbed hard at his ear. “Master?”
“Our physical bodies are in danger, and Xiao Chunhe and I cannot get away right now. You and Liang Yun must return to your bodies immediately and set up protective formations.” Yue Jingming’s voice remained calm. “Be careful in everything. Protect yourselves above all.”
Ye Shijiu’s heart tightened. “All right, Master. Don’t worry!”
Yue Jingming had long ago taught him the importance of the physical body to the soul and had passed all the protective formations on to him. Ye Shijiu did not hesitate. He grabbed Liang Yun and rushed straight toward the ghost gate.
But just as they were about to reach it, a series of cracking sounds suddenly came from behind.
Ye Shijiu was desperately pushing at the gate when Liang Yun looked back, his face turning whiter and whiter. “Sh-Sh-Shijiu, th-th-those statues came alive!”
The two white dragons on the gate heard the commotion and abruptly opened their eyes.
“…” Ye Shijiu cursed inwardly, grabbed Liang Yun, and dodged left and right as he pulled him away from the ghost gate.
The stone statues rolled their eyes toward them in unison, advanced with heavy steps, and raised their blades. Yet they seemed to be aiming only at Ye Shijiu. The two white dragons circled overhead, meanwhile, repeatedly crowding toward Liang Yun to suck in the purple qi around him.
Ye Shijiu quickly understood what was happening. He grabbed a handful of the golden light on his body and stuffed it into Liang Yun’s hand. “B-Brother, those stones won’t hurt you. Watch the two dragons overhead and get the two sides fighting each other. Hold them off. I-I have to save Master and Martial Uncle, or-or we’ll all die.”
Liang Yun gritted his teeth. “Go! Leave this place to me. They’re only a few rocks and little dragons.”
Ye Shijiu nodded and followed the red thread around his finger, floating out through the ghost gate.
Trembling, Liang Yun turned and met the gazes of the stone men and white dragons. His vision darkened again and again. With a roar, he clutched the ball of golden light Ye Shijiu had given him and charged in. “Come on! Who’s afraid of whom?”
A crowd of enormous stone men charged straight at Liang Yun.
Liang Yun froze, then immediately turned and ran. “You’re really coming?! Aaaaaah—!”
Elsewhere, Ye Shijiu’s soul followed the red thread back into his body. His body abruptly became heavy, but he had no time to adjust. He seized his sword and ran toward Yue Jingming and Xiao Chunhe. Sure enough, Ji Chen was standing before the rock wall with a dagger raised.
“Damn your ancestors!” Ye Shijiu roared and kicked straight at Ji Chen’s chest.
Ji Chen spat out a mouthful of blood and pitched forward. The dagger in his hand was tightly bound by a horsetail whisk. Yue Jingming’s and Xiao Chunhe’s physical bodies against the stone wall had several bloody cuts on them but no deep wounds. Even so, Ye Shijiu’s rage did not diminish. He seized Ji Chen by the collar, slammed him hard into the wall, then drew his sword to stab him to death.
“Shijiu!” Yue Jingming’s stern voice suddenly rang beside his ear.
Ye Shijiu clenched his sword tightly and gritted his teeth. “Master, this man deserves to die!”
“His fate is deeply entangled with Ji Luo’s. Until the matter is settled, we must keep him alive,” Yue Jingming said. “The higher your cultivation becomes, the more people you will be capable of killing. But killing cannot solve every problem. Do not let the baleful aura and hatred in your heart seize control of your mind.”
Ye Shijiu’s chest heaved violently twice. He forcibly suppressed the baleful aura around him and returned to his usual obedient appearance. He tied Ji Chen up, then followed Yue Jingming’s instructions and set up a Guardian Formation around them.
Beside the Wangchuan River.
Xiao Chunhe was covered in blood, his expression cruel and cold, his killing intent surging. Lu Yu was badly wounded and stared darkly at the demon fox before him while gripping his halberd. Ji Luo anxiously watched the two combatants and said, “Daoist Yue, they can’t keep fighting. Please stop them.”
But the Daoist sitting in meditation had his eyes shut and did not move at all.
A cold gleam flashed through Xiao Chunhe’s fox eyes. The demon-gu that had been lying dormant in his hind leg shot toward his neck at an unbelievable speed. His fur abruptly doubled in length, hideous black veins flickered across his body, and all four claws dug into the ground. With a shriek, he charged Lu Yu.
Lu Yu’s gaze sharpened. He drove the halberd toward the demon fox’s heart.
At that moment, the Clear Breeze Sword suddenly flew from its sheath. Wrapped in a vast tide of righteous qi, it forcibly stopped the halberd wreathed in sinister ghost qi. The young Daoist in Daoist robes arrived like a gust of clear wind and placed himself in front of the rampaging demon fox. Forming hand seals with both hands, he drew several sigils over the center of its brow. Xiao Chunhe’s mind, on the verge of losing control, abruptly cleared for an instant, and his movements faltered.
Yue Jingming immediately sealed the meridians across the fox’s chest. With a loud bang, the enormous demon fox that had seemed ready to destroy heaven and earth transformed into a fluffy little fox and plopped into his arms.
Xiao Chunhe snarled, “Let go of me! I’m going to eat him!”
Yue Jingming could barely restrain him. Sharp claws raked several bloody marks across his arm. He stuffed the little fox into the front of his robe and lowered his eyes. “Chunhe. Behave.”
Xiao Chunhe twisted around and glared viciously at him. “Who the hell are you to tell me what to do—”
Yue Jingming’s gaze cooled. He reached out and pinched the fox’s mouth shut.
Xiao Chunhe shook off his hand in defiance and angrily rammed his wrist. “You muddleheaded Daoist! They’re practically trampling all over us!”
The enraged fox was exceedingly troublesome. Yue Jingming let him struggle but refused to release him. Turning toward Lu Yu, who was barely breathing, he said, “Stop fighting. If this gets any bigger and attracts attention, none of us will benefit.”
Lu Yu sneered. “You say stop and we stop? Who do you think you are?”
Yue Jingming formed a hand seal and pointed lightly toward his chest. A burning pain instantly changed Lu Yu’s expression. “What is this?!”
“A Ghost-Seizing Talisman,” Yue Jingming said blandly. “If you insist on fighting, I’ll send you into reincarnation right now.”
Lu Yu’s expression changed. “What a joke. With your cultivation, I doubt you’re capable of that.”
“If I’m willing to have my soul scattered, I can still send you into reincarnation. It would barely count as a meritorious deed.” Yue Jingming supported Xiao Chunhe’s chin. “Or I can release my fox’s demon form again and let him eat you. Either way, Ji Luo can leave.”
Lu Yu turned and glared hatefully at Ji Luo. “Was it you who put this talisman on me? You joined forces with outsiders to trick me?!”
“You’ve tricked me plenty!” Ji Luo snapped. “Consider us even.”
Lu Yu nearly choked. The underworld guards in the distance were already itching to step forward, while the terrifying fox in Yue Jingming’s arms still looked ferocious. With a splitting headache, he had no choice but to yield a step. “What exactly do you want?”
Yue Jingming’s expression was calm. “To give Ji Luo justice.”
Ji Luo, standing nearby, froze. It was as though only now had the one hun and one po taken from him finally settled fully back into place, leaving his mind completely clear. Then endless grievance, anger, and unwillingness surged into his heart.
“You aren’t related to him and barely know him. What does his justice have to do with you?” Lu Yu frowned.
“Some things in this world simply need someone to do them.” Yue Jingming looked at him. “If you have suffered an injustice, I can help you too.”
Lu Yu choked, then ground his teeth in frustration. At last he understood exactly where all that golden light of merit on this Daoist had come from.
Why did the world have to contain a Daoist who loved meddling this much?!
…By the time the underworld guards rushed into the ruins, both the stone man and the demon fox had disappeared. The guards looked at one another, only for a high-ranking underworld guard to arrive late and say, “Disperse, disperse. This concerns the affairs of the living world. It isn’t under our jurisdiction.”
“B-but don’t we still have to clean up this mess?” one guard complained miserably.
“Don’t worry. Someone will deal with both the matter and the mess.” The high-ranking guard waved them away. “Go, go. Everywhere is busy. Looks like we’ll be receiving a large batch of newcomers today.”
The group of underworld guards could only disperse.
* * *
The white-dragon statues outside the residence recognized the newcomers and opened the courtyard gate.
Lu Yu held Ji Luo’s hand in an iron grip. Ji Luo stumbled forward and was dragged inside. Lu Yu turned toward Yue Jingming. “Do you dare come in?”
Yue Jingming lowered his gaze to Xiao Chunhe. “Go back and find Shijiu and Liang Yun first.”
“No. You’re too softhearted and too easy to fool. What if you really get your soul scattered trying to save someone?” Xiao Chunhe sprawled over his arm, his huge tail swishing back and forth against Yue Jingming’s waist. “I need to keep an eye on you. Undo the seal on me.”
“All right.” Yue Jingming carried him through the gate.
Xiao Chunhe froze and looked up at him. “Don’t pretend you didn’t hear me. I want to turn back into a human. A little fox has no dignity!”
Yue Jingming sighed and released the seal over his heart. “Wait a moment before you transform—”
Bang.
Xiao Chunhe transformed directly into human form in Yue Jingming’s arms. Yue Jingming silently released the arm he had around Xiao Chunhe’s waist and back, but Xiao Chunhe’s lips curved. He wrapped an arm around Yue Jingming’s waist and collapsed into his embrace. “Hiss… I’m so dizzy.”
Yue Jingming hurriedly supported his back and let him lean against him. “Are you all right?”
At the doorway, Lu Yu looked disgusted. “That fox demon was fierce enough to eat ghosts a moment ago. Changing form once shouldn’t make him so dizzy he can’t stand.”
With his face buried against Yue Jingming’s neck, Xiao Chunhe clicked his tongue in annoyance, gave Lu Yu a cool glance, and murmured, “Jingming, my hand feels like it’s going to break.”
He raised his injured forepaw for Yue Jingming to see.
Sure enough, the wound had split open again during the fight. Yue Jingming’s expression turned grave. He placed several talismans over it before carefully holding the hand. “Once we go back up, I’ll treat it properly.”
“Mm.” Xiao Chunhe’s voice was gentle. “I knew you were the best.”
Lu Yu looked so angry smoke might have risen from his head. He turned toward Ji Luo, his eyes reddening aggrievedly. “Brother Luo…”
Ji Luo coldly shook off his hand. “Don’t call me that. I wouldn’t dare.”
Lu Yu grew even angrier. With a smile that did not reach his eyes, he looked at the two outside. “Come in.”
Xiao Chunhe gave a gloating little laugh, only for Yue Jingming to pinch his fingers with just enough pressure to warn him. Xiao Chunhe raised an eyebrow, the corner of his mouth lifting despite himself, and lightly scratched Yue Jingming’s palm.
Lu Yu nearly ground his teeth to pieces. He looked at Ji Luo. “Ji Luo, no matter what, you should at least give me a chance to explain myself. You can’t believe everything this Daoist and fox demon say. That fox demon is terribly jealous. He just can’t stand seeing us happy.”
Xiao Chunhe narrowed his eyes. “What kind of death-seeking nonsense are you spouting?”
Yue Jingming tugged him down into a chair and said quietly, “Regulate your breathing.”
Xiao Chunhe looked wronged. “I may be a fox, but I’m the most broad-minded and magnanimous of all. Right?”
“…” Yue Jingming patted his shoulder and, with great difficulty, cast his conscience aside. “Mm.”
Xiao Chunhe instantly became smug. He crossed one leg over the other, leaned back in the chair, snapped open his fan, and began fanning Yue Jingming. At the same time, he caught Yue Jingming’s wrist and checked his pulse. “What happened just now?”
Yue Jingming lowered his voice. “Something happened at the ghost gate. Shijiu has already rushed back.”
Only then did Xiao Chunhe relax.
When Ji Luo saw that they had finished talking, he looked at Lu Yu. “Go on. In front of Daoist Yue, tell me exactly what you’ve done to me.”
Lu Yu clenched his fists.
If it came to a direct fight, the two before him were powerful, but they were still only living souls. It was not impossible to risk everything in a battle to the death…
Xiao Chunhe met his gaze expressionlessly, the dark killing intent in his eyes completely undisguised.
Lu Yu remained silent for a long time before finally speaking slowly. “It’s a long story.”