13.
Old Vương’s house looked as if it had been dyed black as ink.
As soon as I stepped inside, I felt my movements grow sluggish.
The ghost had gotten here even before the police.
At the scene, the ghost and I faced off, while Linh Nhi held the coin sword, protecting Old Vương and Vương Thu Hồng.
“You, you vile wretch! Did you kill Nguyên Cẩn?”
“Didn’t he deserve to die?”
“He did, but I should have been the one to kill him!”
“If you’d been able to bring yourself to do it, he’d have been dead long ago.”
The exchange between the woman and the ghost sounded less like enemies speaking and more like old friends who hadn’t seen each other in years.
Fat Old Vương trembled with fear. “Master, are you all right? Are you confident you can handle this?”
“I’ve fought it twice already. I have some experience.”
Old Vương nodded. “Master, I trust you.”
My experience consisted of running away.
Ignoring Fat Vương, I listened to their exchange and finally pieced together what had happened.
Before my master became a Daoist priest,
he had indeed done wrong. Though he already had a family, he had an affair with Vương Thu Hồng. Fat Old Vương was also my master’s son. Fat Vương and Nguyên Lai could be considered half-brothers, sharing the same father.
My master’s wife couldn’t bear the humiliation. She jumped from a building in red, and her resentment was so intense that she became what she was today.
Back then, my master was disheartened, and he hadn’t taken good care of young Nguyên Lai, either.
Grief-stricken and blaming himself, he decided to become a monk on Mao Shan.
Vương Thu Hồng held the newborn Fat Vương and knelt before my master, begging him not to become a monk and to stay and care for her and her son.
But my master had already lost all hope and was determined to go up the mountain.
Vương Thu Hồng must have hated my master with all her heart after that.
Once my master’s wife became a vengeful ghost, she truly had a chance to kill him. Though she didn’t dare go to Mao Shan, my master was bound to come down from the mountain sooner or later.
But in the end, she couldn’t bring herself to do it.
Her resentment went unresolved, and her mood grew heavier and heavier. Meanwhile, Nguyên Lai missed his mother so much that he somehow learned how to raise ghosts.
That made my master’s wife’s powers grow stronger and stronger.
Later, she went after Vương Thu Hồng’s family.
Without a second thought, she tried to kill both mother and son. She wrapped Vương Thu Hồng in resentment, trying to drive her into depression and death, while using that resentment to bind Fat Vương and ensure he would have no descendants.
But Vương Thu Hồng often went up to Mao Shan to burn incense. Resentment and evil things like that would naturally be worn down by Daoist power when they entered the mountain gate.
So over the years, her health had improved considerably.
Unfortunately, Vương Thu Hồng hadn’t gone up the mountain to pray for blessings. She had gone to find my master—to find the man who had been Nguyên Cẩn back then.
Her real goal was to find a chance to kill him and settle the score for what had happened years ago.
Sigh. My master may have become a monk and left worldly affairs behind, but he’d left countless people to suffer in this world.
My master’s wife must still have loved him, even after becoming an evil spirit.
And Vương Thu Hồng, who went up to offer incense day after day, had only acted recently. Perhaps she, too, couldn’t quite bring herself to do it.
“Everyone here dies today!”
The evil creature shrieked and moved.
This time, thunder rumbled outside, and rain poured down in sheets.
I drew my sword and charged.
Though this was my master’s family business, it had happened before he became a monk.
After he became a monk, he had no ties left to these people.
As a disciple of Mao Shan, I absolutely couldn’t stand by and let the evil creature kill people.
After a few rounds, I truly couldn’t take it anymore.
It felt as if a million little knives were slicing through my head. The pain was unbearable. My steps grew heavier and heavier, and my breathing grew more and more ragged.
This wasn’t working. I’d have to risk everything!
I clenched my teeth, ignoring the blood running from my mouth, and flung all my talismans into the air. With no wind, they formed a Bagua diagram and descended toward the evil spirit.
“Burn!”
The talismans exploded, burned black, and let out a shrill whine.
“Sword, come!”
The copper sword in Linh Nhi’s hand flew out. I formed the sword seal, and the copper sword plunged into the evil creature’s body, suddenly exploding in another flash of lightning.
“Little Daoist, didn’t you say flying talismans and summoned coin swords were all fake?” Linh Nhi murmured.
I had no time to answer. After using those two moves, my vision blurred, and I could only drop to one knee and pant.
The evil creature still wasn’t dead.
As the black shadow gathered into its shape again, its eyes were bloodshot, and not a shred of reason remained.
If it didn’t die today, the whole city would suffer.
I gave a bitter laugh. Damn it. If I didn’t go to hell, who would?
Bracing the Long Tuyền sword against the ground, I struggled to keep my balance and formed a seal with one hand. “Thunder God and Lightning Mother, quickly unleash your divine power! Let the heavenly thunder strike in terror and drive out evil! By the authority of the Supreme Lord Lao, let it be done!”
“Thunder! Come!”
A bolt of lightning smashed through the villa’s roof and struck my sword seal directly.
Without the Long Tuyền sword, that bolt would have reduced me to ashes. Even with it, I couldn’t hold out for long.
The evil creature was clearly frightened by the power of the thunder technique, and suddenly vanished.
Even when I used qi-reading to its full extent, I couldn’t see where it had gone.
“Three o’clock! Ah!” Linh Nhi screamed in agony, blood tears pouring from her eyes.
I didn’t dare hesitate. I sent the thunder technique straight toward three o’clock.
The rumbling shook everything and went on for nearly a minute.
Vương Thu Hồng and Fat Vương helped Linh Nhi up. At last, the two of them began to give off black qi.
The fog was gone, and I could finally see clearly.
Fat Vương was Linh Nhi’s father, and Vương Thu Hồng was her grandmother.
“Linh Nhi…” Linh Nhi fell to the ground, motionless. I tried to crawl over and check on her, but could only lift a hand before everything went dark.
14.
When I woke up again, I was back in my room, completely drained of strength.
Lâm Nam was looking after me, while a woman I didn’t know was tending to Linh Nhi.
I wondered if she was the one Lâm Nam had brought over.
“Linh Nhi—how is she?”
“She’s been examined by a doctor. Her eyes are fine, but she keeps talking nonsense and throwing up.”
“What’s Linh Nhi saying?”
“She says there’s… there’s a ghost. She’s scared, dizzy, things like that.”
Her innate spirit sight had been invaded by evil qi. I didn’t know what to do; I’d have to ask the Senior Uncles.
“What about Vương Thu Hồng?”
“She’s been arrested, "“And you… you made someone’s… roof… blow a hole in it. How… how did you do that?”
I didn’t answer his question. I couldn’t, anyway—the scene had been anything but scientific.
My ultimate thunder technique could destroy evil creatures. The most tainted bodies feared thunder above all else.
If they’d survived it, they must have become immortals by now.
Still, something felt wrong, as though I’d forgotten something.
Just then, a few messages came in on my phone, all from my junior brothers. They all said the same thing: [Return to the sect immediately.]
When I got back to Mao Shan, I finally remembered what I’d missed.
That day at the Vương family villa, my master’s wife had come in person. She hadn’t been possessing Nguyên Lai.
Nguyên Lai was now in Mao Shan’s main hall, strapped with explosives.
“I’m going to blow you all to hell! I’ll blow up this temple!”
“Don’t do anything rash. Whatever you want, we can talk about it.”
The temple was surrounded by my senior fellow disciples, as well as the police.
“I don’t want anything! I just want to blow you all to hell! My mother was killed by you Mao Shan Daoists, and my father died in this very hall. I have nothing left. It’s all your fault. You owe me!”
Nguyên Lai really wasn’t right in the head.
Just then, the crowd parted, and someone stepped forward.
It was my junior brother.
“Dad…”
Nguyên Lai still hadn’t lit the explosives. Of course—not many people would blow up their own son.
That was why Master had forbidden my junior brother from leaving the sect.
He’d foreseen that Nguyên Lai would threaten Mao Shan, so he’d had Thanh Thủy wait at the sect for his father, to protect Mao Shan.
I asked my Senior Uncle about Linh Nhi.
And I’d been right: evil qi had invaded Linh Nhi’s eyes, so everything she saw was a foul illusion, along with spirits drifting all around her.
The illusions kept shattering and swirling, making Linh Nhi vomit over and over.
This couldn’t go on. If it lasted too long, something bad would happen.
I asked my Senior Uncle what we could do.
He hesitated, then said, “If an unmarried girl’s chastity is taken, her innate spirit sight will disappear too. Without that spirit sight, she naturally won’t see all that chaotic stuff anymore.”
And with that, the matter was more or less settled.
The debt Master had left behind before he became a monk had finally been repaid.
It was just that my junior brother had grown much quieter. Even when he was with me, he barely said a word. I hoped he’d recover with time.
What goes around comes around. Justice never fails.
It turned out all these awful things, all these hardships, had stemmed from adultery.
Master had an affair and fathered Fat Vương, breaking his wife’s heart and driving Nguyên Lai nearly mad.
Fat Vương got involved with a married woman and fathered Linh Nhi, condemning her to a life of suffering.
All these sins… had begun with sexual misconduct.
15.
Linh Nhi leaned against me.
We watched the sunset and talked about the past. “Master really was good at predicting things. He knew that after he died, his wife would threaten Fat Vương, so I could destroy the evil creature and save his son. He knew Nguyên Lai would threaten Mao Shan, so my junior brother could guard the sect and save the main hall.”
“He even knew that if you didn’t leave the mountain, you and my junior brother would become like brothers, and my junior brother would naturally have more good fortune. He knew that if you left the mountain, you’d lose your spirit sight saving me, and the only way to save you would be for me to leave the priesthood and marry you. He was incredible.”
“Did you notice how good Master was at predicting things? You were by his side your whole life.”
Linh Nhi nestled against me without saying a word.
“Why did you choose to come down the mountain with me that day?”
“Actually, I heard what Grandfather Gui Xu told you and Thanh Thủy that day.”
In the end, Linh Nhi had chosen all of this for herself.
Now, we were together.
-THE END-