Chapter 109: 109 Everything Depends on Her Mood

Tushan Jiu spoke up: "You two don't need to argue; you're only attempted murder."

Zou Xiuling asked in a trembling voice: "You, you said attempted murder? Li Tingfeng isn't dead?"

She shook her head, as if unwilling to accept reality: "No, impossible! I clearly saw him die—he didn't even have time to let out a cry for help before his breath stopped."

Tushan Jiu frowned at her: "He's dead, but it wasn't you who killed him—it was your daughter, Jiang Zhiyi."

Upon hearing that, Jiang Wu and Zou Xiuling both turned to look at Tushan Jiu.

Tushan Jiu didn't look at them; instead, she turned her head to the empty space three meters to their side, where a girl in a white dress stood under the moonlight.

She was crying, but she had no tears.

When Tushan Jiu looked over, her formerly listless expression turned to shock: "Can you see me?"

"Yes, I can see you." Tushan Jiu also produced her credentials: "Sword-lender, Tushan Jiu—I'm here to send you back."

Jiang Zhiyi first froze for a moment, then recalled something.

She quickly floated up to Tushan Jiu, pleading: "Master Tushan, I beg you, could you lend me a sword? I want—I want to see my parents."

Tushan Jiu sized her up; having just killed someone, her originally mere trace of yin energy was slowly turning into killing energy.

Her punishment after death includes not only killing, but also interfering with the work of mortal officials.

Because she wanted to conceal her mother's attempted murder, she wiped away all traces of Zou Xiuling's visits inside Li Tingfeng's residence.

That's why, when she just saw Jiang Wu and Zou Xiuling confessing guilt, she became so anxious and helpless.

She shouted loudly, "Don't confess—they have no evidence, I erased all the traces," and similar things.

But the living and the dead walk different paths; they simply couldn't hear her.

Tushan Jiu shook her head: "No need for me to lend a sword—feel the ghostly power within your body."

Jiang Zhiyi's attention had been on Jiang Wu and Zou Xiuling the whole time, completely unaware of the killing energy flowing and shifting within her body.

As for Tushan Jiu talking to the air beside them, Zhang Xuefeng wasn't overly surprised, merely finding it a bit novel.

In contrast, Jiang Wu and Zou Xiuling widened their eyes.

Combining what Tushan Jiu had just told them with the scene now unfolding before them, they reacted after a moment.

That girl was speaking to their daughter!

With that realization, Zou Xiuling was the first to falter, staggering a step: "Zhiyi?"

Jiang Wu supported her, then cautiously called out toward Tushan Jiu and them: "Daughter?"

Jiang Zhiyi tried to control the killing energy within her body to manifest.

But because she was too anxious, she couldn't regulate it properly—either it coalesced into a mass of killing energy, or it became too insubstantial to see clearly.

Tushan Jiu had no choice; she patiently taught her again, explaining how to use the killing energy within her body.

That's also because there were no companions present.

If there were companions, they'd suspect this sword-lender had come to 'straighten out the workplace'.

Who teaches ghosts to use killing energy and ghostly arts!

Tushan Jiu doesn't care about those things—everything depends entirely on her mood.

If she finds someone pleasing, helping them is no big deal; if she finds someone displeasing, her Ghost Head Saber shows no mercy.

"Your parents have already turned themselves in, so stop saying useless things—just spend the final fifteen minutes chatting privately."

After saying that, Tushan Jiu conjured a talisman, shook it twice, the talisman burned away, and the killing energy clinging to Zhang Xuefeng, Jiang Wu, and Zou Xiuling was cleared, while also forming a 'protective shield' around them.

Having done that, Tushan Jiu walked away.

She didn't want to hear those sorrowful words.

Yesterday, Li Tingfeng's operational mistake locked himself in the cold storage—that wasn't an accident either.

That was Jiang Wu's doing.

That's also why Tushan Jiu said, "You two" are only attempted murder.

Actually, since Jiang Zhiyi's death began, over these five years Zou Xiuling's emotions have been on the verge of collapse—just being sick took up two and a half years.

Later, she happened to hear from others a scandal about Li Tingfeng.

It said he sexually harassed female employees, prompting their families to come to his door, and it took over a hundred thousand to settle the matter.

Recalling, her daughter had once said before the incident that she didn't want to work at that factory and wished to quit.

But at that time, the two of them thought it was just that the factory work was too tiring, so without further inquiry they told her, if you don't want to work, just quit.

But they never expected that such a thing would happen just a few days later.

So the couple planted the seeds of suspicion.

They quit their jobs at another factory and came to this one to apply as security guards and assembly-line workers.

This arrangement lasted two and a half years.

During this period, they became familiar with the factory people, and many longtime employees learned more about Li Tingfeng's character.

After hearing that, they grew increasingly suspicious of him.

Once during a night shift, Jiang Wu invited him for a drink, hoping to draw out a bit of information; the other didn't say it outright, but he proudly said he had bought a house in the city center.

It seemed like an irrelevant remark, but it wasn't.

As a team leader earning only seven thousand, with downtown housing costing seventy to eighty thousand per square meter, what could he use to buy it?

Nor was it because the factory's monitor watcher was his brother, who wanted the surveillance to fail so it could break at any time, then he'd sneak out raw materials and semi-finished products via backdoor deals, selling them cheaply to construction site canteens and the like.

And on the day his daughter met with an accident, all the other monitors worked fine—only the cold storage's monitor was broken.

If you say this is a coincidence, it's too much of a coincidence.

Afterwards, they investigated for another half a year.

Jiang Wu's relationship with Li Tingfeng grew ever 'better', and along with it came increasing certainty: he was the one who killed their own daughter.

Thus he has constantly schemed in his heart to avenge his daughter.

Little did they know, Zou Xiuling was the same.

In fact, over the past few months, accidents like yesterday's have happened more than once.

But Li Tingfeng's life was still tough; he successfully dodged everything from falling objects from high altitudes to equipment 'malfunction'.

This also successfully angered the couple.

If it weren't for this sudden incident, Jiang Wu actually planned to lure him to the garbage room behind the factory, kill him outright, and then turn himself in.

He knew his wife, although she didn't say it, was likewise plotting how to take revenge.

He couldn't let his wife take the risk; if anyone were to go, it would be him.

So when Zhang Xuefeng just said Li Tingfeng was dead, his first reaction was to think his wife had acted first, so he hurriedly claimed he was the one who killed him.

Likewise, Zou Xiuling thought she was the one who killed him, not wanting to implicate her husband; when someone in the group said Li Tingfeng was dead, she hurriedly came out of the factory to the gate.

On the other hand, seeing her mother about to kill someone, Jiang Zhiyi acted even faster and killed Li Tingfeng herself, just so her mother wouldn't carry the sin down to the Netherworld, and also to prevent her mother from getting into trouble, covering up and erasing traces, creating something eerie for those people to see, not forgetting even the surveillance.

And how could she not know that the human realm has the Faction (or Place)?