Chapter 24

"You two brats, let go of my Hong Nainai now, or I'll never forgive you!"

We hadn't even spoken when the red-clad female ghost first seized the person, glaring angrily at both of us.

Pangzi bared his teeth and said to this Hong Nainai, "Uh, Hong Nainai, right? It's clearly you who brought this karma upon yourself, trying to rope my brother into being your substitute. Why does it seem like you've suffered more injustice than us two?"

Although Hong Nainai was wrapped in Pangzi's clothes, her aura showed no weakness.

"Who made him save my substitute today, causing me to lose my chance at reincarnation for nothing? If I don't come after him, who else would I go after?" Hong Nainai glared angrily, staring ferociously at me.

Holy shit, you harm people and still think you're in the right? I saved someone and yet I'm wrong.

The arrogance of this Hong Nainai's water ghost aura is truly over the top; I couldn't stand it, so I thought of going up and giving her an extra Five Thunder Palm strike, to let her see how formidable I am.

I had just taken a step when Pangzi pulled me back.

"Pangzi, what are you doing?" I asked.

Pangzi pulled me aside, leaned in, and whispered softly: "Hai Sheng, it seems like you're really at fault here?"

"What?" I looked at Pangzi in surprise, I saved someone and yet I'm wrong.

Pangzi quietly told me that water ghosts mostly are those who died wrongfully or tragically in water, and after death they cannot leave that area, so the Underworld permits them to come out on the fifteenth of the seventh month to seek substitutes; these substitutes are usually people destined to suffer water-related misfortunes, prone to early death. And by saving that child today, I've effectively destroyed Hong Nainai's chance at reincarnation.

Finally, Pangzi added: "This is the karma you've created yourself; you need to handle it well. If you smash her with one palm, you'll cut off her chance at reincarnation, committing another wrongdoing."

I don't know whether this is karmic cycle and predestined, or ghosts will stop at nothing for reincarnation. If it were my approach, I wouldn't care whether you reincarnate or not—anyone who provokes me, I'll just kill you outright.

But now I have Pangzi by my side; given his personality, if I really killed this Hong Nainai, he'd probably turn against me right away.

The situation has reached a point where killing isn't an option, nor is keeping her around? Thinking that my brainless self still couldn't come up with a good solution, damn it, being a Daoist is too exhausting—this can't be done, that can't be done, it's more frustrating than Ah Q in Lu Xun's writings.

Finally, Pangzi thought of a compromise, went up and persuaded the female ghost: "Hong Nainai, would this work? We brothers will buy some paper money, a house, and burn them for a man tomorrow; after you take these, go back to your territory and be a good water ghost, from now on turn to virtue—if someone falls into the water, you rescue them; if no one does, you still drag someone in to rescue them. In this way you'll accumulate merit, perhaps not only allowing reincarnation but even securing a position as a Yin God in the Underworld. What do you think?"

Hong Nainai paused for a moment, then asked Pangzi: "Do you think many people will fall into the water in my river?"

Pangzi looked at this poor little pond—it's not even a third of a mu—and saw that the few farmers who went into the water today, the deepest part only reached their necks; unless a water ghost drags someone in, anyone who drowns would be strange.

Pangzi stared for a while and managed to force out a sentence from his lungs: "Uh, there's a great person named Li Ning, didn't he say something like 'Everything is possible'?"

Regarding Pangzi's spiel uttered from his lungs, Hong Nainai naturally wouldn't agree. But she couldn't do anything about us two, and we two also wanted to properly perform a rites for her to accumulate some virtue. After all, we're also afraid that if we let her go, she'll continue harming people.

Perhaps seeing our sincerity, this water ghost Hong Nainai finally loosened up. But when I heard her condition, I felt an urge to smash her with one palm and make her vanish like smoke.

Hong Nainai's condition was just one sentence: "Find me a disciple, and I want to become a smoke ghost."

A smoke ghost is a spirit that helps people with yin divination, and a smoke ghost's disciple refers to those rural women who perform yin divination for people.

We call these women yin-divination grannies, also known as xianghua grannies. In Hong Kong they're called spirit grannies or wenmi grannies.

Such people, because of their special physique, are sought out by ghosts or yin masters, and they sign contracts with the ghosts. They make money, while the ghosts accumulate incense and merit. Since the ghosts have not been conferred an official title, they are not proper gods and have no celestial position, so these women usually do not tell their teachers that their master is a ghost; when they meet people, they only say they have invited some great deity from heaven.

Now this Red Granny wants us to find her an apprentice. It's nothing more than to accumulate merit and become a yin deity of the netherworld or something like that. But such people have a special physique, even rarer than Daoists, and the vast sea of humanity—where are we supposed to go to find you an apprentice? Moreover, such people, after long contact with ghosts, will certainly not be long-lived; even if we found one, are you sure they'd be willing to be your apprentice?

I said to Pangzi, feeling very vexed: "I think… I'll just go home and fetch the command flag, order the Five Ghosts to take her to the netherworld, so I won't have to watch her and feel wronged."

Having said that, I turned and left, preparing to go to Pangzi's house to fetch the command flag and dispatch the Five Ghosts troops.

"Don't… aren't you afraid of creating karma by doing that? Sending the ghost into the City of Wrongful Death—what if it escapes and becomes another evil ghost?" Pangzi grabbed me and advised.

Pangzi's words are indeed correct: water ghosts are mostly those who died wrongfully, their resentment not dissipated; even if I forcibly order the Five Ghosts troops to send her to the netherworld, she can only wander in the City of Wrongful Death. A resentful spirit wandering there for one day is equivalent to a year of cultivation in the Yangjian; if she were ever allowed to return to the human world, she would certainly become another troublesome evil ghost.

But what can we do now? I'd rather send her to the netherworld than go through all this trouble, running all over the world to find her an apprentice. You know Daoists all have precepts binding them; every word we speak is heard by the heavens above. If I promise Red Granny, unless I die, I must bear responsibility for my vow.

Once I agree, wouldn't it mean I'd have to do nothing else until I find her an apprentice in this lifetime? Moreover, I can't leave her in this world to keep harming people; after thinking it over left and right, I'd rather take her back to the netherworld and bear some karmic debt myself.

"Don't run, I've really thought of a method that isn't so troublesome and doesn't require sending her back to the netherworld." Pangzi gripped me tightly.

I rolled my eyes, turned around, and asked him what the method was.

Pangzi gave a hehe smile and whispered in my ear: "Troops."

I slapped my forehead in sudden realization: Oh, I can take Red Granny as my troops. The arts of Yin Mountain are fundamentally heavy-yin arts; practitioners of Yin Mountain used to go to graveyards or the crossroads where traffic accidents happened, collecting these evil spirits to do their bidding.

Don't think that employing ghosts to work for you is necessarily a deeply karmic act. Whether it's karmic or not, harmful or not, depends on the individual Daoist. If after taking in ghosts you go about harming people, bewitching girls for personal desire, or colluding with others for money, that is naturally creating karma. But if you employ the evil ghosts to exorcise evil for others and dispel disasters for them, then you are accumulating virtue; having accumulated virtue, the ghosts under your command will naturally receive merit as well.

However, over the years, because QingSongShu has been around, I've mostly just followed him learning things, rarely engaging in duels with others or handling matters on my own. Moreover, maintaining troops requires money; every few days we need to offer fruit, incense oil, candles, and rice. When you add it up, that's also a considerable expense.

So I usually don't keep troops; if I need them somewhere, I just borrow them from temples.

Now Pangzi has proposed this method, having me take Red Granny as my troops. Although it will mean spending a bit more on offerings later, it's still not a bad approach.

After I agreed, Pangzi, this negotiation expert, went up and appealed to her emotions and reasoned with her, moving Red Granny.

The negotiation stalled for ten minutes; finally Red Granny glanced at me and said, "Alright, Granny will temporarily humble myself to be this kid's troops, but you must promise me that once I find a disciple I like, you won't stop me from leaving."

... I, damn it, is this you begging me or me begging you? Even if I'm begging you, you don't have to look down on me like that.

Since my command flag and container are at Pangzi's house, I can't collect Red Granny right away; I can only ask her to wait a moment while Pangzi and I go to Meigu's house to fetch the umbrella, so she can stay inside it for a while.

On the way, the more I thought about it, the more vexed I felt, and I complained to Pangzi: "Pangzi, why do I feel I'm becoming less and less like a Yin Mountain Daoist, completely lacking the style of the Yin Mountain sect."

I'm telling the truth; I used to hear from Li Fengkou that our Yin Mountain disciples were very carefree and did whatever they wanted—collecting troops was just a matter of offering rice and red paper for the ritual, unlike now, when we have to hesitate and ask the ghosts whether they're willing.

Pangzi gave a hehe laugh and replied: "Ghosts also have the right to bodily freedom, you know—you have to let yourself choose, you know. Think about it: if you just snatched a bride and forced her, that's fine, but if she's unwilling, going to bed with her would be pointless."

I… even if ghosts have the right to bodily freedom, what does that have to do with taking a bride to bed?

All the way silent, I decided to ignore Pangzi, returned to Meigu's house, took the umbrella I had for the light rain tonight, ran to the riverbank, and captured Red Granny inside it.

Then Pangzi and I went back to the room and fell asleep face down.

The next day, I borrowed the umbrella containing Red Granny on the pretext of fearing rain, and took my leave of Meigu's family.

"Ah… sometimes I really like the countryside—look, the smell of cow dung and earth, how fragrant it is." Pangzi sighed as he walked along the stone path in the village.

... Hey, Pangzi up there, stop.

Just as Pangzi finished his sigh, a shout of pursuit suddenly came from behind.

We turned to look behind and saw, a dozen meters away, an old man chasing after Pangzi.

"Holy shit, run fast!" I and Mengxue hadn't even reacted when Pangzi grabbed us and we took off running.

"Pangzi, you dug up someone's ancestral grave—do you really need to panic like that?" I asked while running.

"I used my money to order flowers for Sister Jingjing?"

"What the hell does that have to do with you ordering flowers for Silijing?"

「It matters, I had no money when I bought cinnabar yellow paper yesterday, I robbed and ran—you didn't see that old man now recognize me, came to collect debt? 。」

「Damn, then you still aren't running fast? 。」

At this moment, Mengxue weakly said from the side, 「Brother, we didn't pay, we can just pay now, why do we still need to run? 」.

Pangzi".........."

I".............."