Volume One: The Eight-Coffin Corpse Field, Chapter Ninety-Two: Days So Dull They Could Drive a Bird Crazy

I flew into a red-faced tirade, and Liang Yue just stared at me in silence.

When I finally ran out of steam, she waved a hand. “All right, all right, enough already. You’ve gone on forever, and you’re practically spitting in my face. Gross. Li Yang, what’s wrong with you? You come back and start bullying me right away?”

“Nonsense. If you say something like that, how could I not spit back at you?”

Hearing the noise, Chen Tao came over to smooth things over. “Assistant Liang, Yang, what is it with you two? Every time you get together, you start fighting. You’re both clearly thinking about each other, so why can’t you just talk properly?”

Liang Yue spat to one side. “Pah. Who’s thinking about him?”

Chen Tao shot me a knowing wink and turned to leave.

I knew Liang Yue was a warm-hearted girl; she just never spared anyone with her tongue. After Chen Tao left, I said, “I know you’ve helped our company a lot. Thank you.”

Liang Yue said indifferently, “What do you mean, your company? This company belongs to our group too. It was only right that I help. Now tell me, how did you make that money?”

So I told her how we had gone to clear out that haunted house.

Liang Yue was sharp-tongued, but at heart she was still a girl with a fierce curiosity. As she listened to my story, she was gradually drawn in without even realizing it. When it came to the dangerous parts, she clutched the edge of the table, not daring to blink. When I told her how we’d turned danger into safety, she let out a breath too.

Only after I finished did Liang Yue come to herself, praising it again and again. “That was far more thrilling than the house at Heaven’s Blessing Plaza. If I’d known, I would’ve gone with you. The love story between the wooden man Yang and Wanqing is so touching, so enviable...”

She rested her chin in both hands and gazed toward the doorway, tears shimmering in her eyes. She looked adorable.

I curled my lip. “What’s there to envy? They clung to each other for a hundred years, and in the end didn’t they still part like startled birds?”

Liang Yue gave me a vicious glare. “Pah. You really are hopelessly dull. Such a beautiful love story, and the way you put it makes it sound completely tasteless.”

I was about to argue further, but Liang Yue picked up the ledger and gave it a shake. “All right, I don’t have time to spar with you. I’m heading back to report in.”

After Liang Yue left with the ledger, she didn’t show up for several days. Even stranger, Third Uncle said he had something to handle outside and was away from the company for several days too.

Before he left, Third Uncle left me the haunted-house notes and told me that when I had time, I was to copy those few pages of parchment carefully onto paper, then put the parchment and the Five-Emperor Buddhist Lamp somewhere safe.

It took me five days to copy the parchment word for word.

Only while I was copying it did I realize that this book truly deserved to be called a miraculous text. It contained all kinds of intricacies about haunted houses, and even classified them into different types. Each type of haunted house had to be broken in a different way. Ghosts who had died violently inside a house would also make that house far more sinister or less so depending on the manner of their death. To break a haunted house was like unraveling a cocoon thread by thread.

Thinking back on the haunted houses Third Uncle and I had cleared before, I realized we had relied almost entirely on sheer nerve and lucky breaks. Of course, a lot of problems had also been solved by Third Uncle’s genuine skill. But if this book could truly be understood, it would be like giving us wings, and it would save us a great deal of trouble.

Only, the manuscript simply broke off toward the end. I had no idea what the missing portion had recorded, and that only made me more curious. I wondered whether I would ever have the chance to see the second half of the haunted-house notes.

After I finished copying it, I began to worry about where to put the parchment and the Five-Emperor Lamp. We were often out running around, and nowhere seemed entirely safe.

Later, during a casual conversation, I asked Chen Tao, “Brother Chen, if you had something especially precious, something you were afraid of losing, and wanted to keep it in a safe place, where would you put it?”

Chen Tao had plenty of experience and answered at once, “A lot of banks offer safe-deposit boxes these days. That ought to be the safest place. Think about it—who’d have the nerve to steal from a bank? But your Brother Chen here has cleaner pockets than his face, and I’ve never used one of those before. You’ll have to go ask about the details yourself.”

I nodded. That did seem like a good solution.

After checking with the bank, I rented a safe-deposit box at a bank near the company and put both the parchment and the Five-Emperor Lamp inside. Once that worry was settled, I could finally relax.

Over the next few days, I studied the haunted-house notes I had copied down, and I felt I was benefiting from them immensely.

Things often go like this: once you learn a certain skill, you grow eager to try it. From what the book described, breaking a haunted house did not seem all that difficult. I very much wanted to go with Third Uncle again and put what I had learned to use.

But after we came back, Third Uncle was running around outside all day long, and I had no idea what kept him so busy. He also paid little attention to the matter of haunted-house listings. By my count, I had not seen him for more than a week.

I called him once to ask what he was busy with, but he only told me not to worry about it and to stay at the company.

Without any haunted houses to clear, I spent my days eating, drinking, and sleeping. In my spare time I would wander the streets, and when I had a little more time, I would train Iron Pillar. After I came back, Iron Pillar was not as fierce as before. But the dog really did seem to be exactly as they said: no matter how I tried to train it, it behaved like a stupid mutt and never seemed to learn anything.

In the end I lost heart and stopped trying to train it at all. I simply fed it every day.

Life became so dull it was almost painful, and before I knew it, I actually began to miss the days when I had cleared haunted houses with Third Uncle. Those days had been dangerous, yes, but in hindsight they were full of accomplishment, and every single one of them deserved to be remembered.

If I had known then what I know now, I would never have thought that way.

Because before many days of that peaceful life could pass, Third Uncle dragged me once more into a hazardous journey where I could not eat properly, could not sleep soundly, and had to walk on eggshells every day, nerves stretched tight. And on that occasion, I nearly lost my life.

That night, I went to sleep early on the second floor of the company.

In the middle of the night, half asleep and half awake, I vaguely heard Third Uncle’s voice drifting up from downstairs, as if he were talking with someone.

In that drowsy state, I couldn’t be bothered to care. But after a short while, Third Uncle came up and woke me.

Rubbing my eyes, I asked him what was wrong.

With a mysterious air, Third Uncle pulled me up and told me to get dressed and go downstairs to help him with something.

Not knowing what was going on, I got dressed and went downstairs.

Every light in the company was on, yet only Third Uncle was there, and he did not seem to be working overtime at all.

Still half asleep, I yawned and asked, “Third Uncle, is this where you’re treating me to a midnight snack?”

Third Uncle waved a hand. “Nephew, do your Third Uncle a favor. Once this is done, there’ll be a reward for you. Forget a midnight snack—I’ll take you out for a seafood feast.”

Somehow, those words, that line, felt strangely familiar to me.

The end.