Chapter 59: Spirit-Communication Divination

Xu Jia stayed here for one night and another day; no matter what, he had to return. Although he had not yet practiced the "Climbing the Mountain of Knives" from the Lushan Five Prisons Great Method, he had already borrowed the Dharma Power, and it would not be too late to practice it when the time came for a magical duel.

Thus, holding that Wooden Staff, he sat on the donkey cart with Niu Congcong and returned to the Xu Residence.

"Brother Xu, I heard from the people at the pharmacy counter that your family is currently purchasing medicinal herbs. My family has stockpiled many of these herbs, and we have many herb workers who can help process them. Why didn't you tell me? Are you afraid of wasting my family's money?"

Xu Jia laughed: "Since you brought it up, I won't be polite. It's just that you aren't the head of the household yet. How about this: I have a formula here, a secret medicine for men to boost yang, specifically for soaking in wine. It comes from my cultivation in a past life. Many people once begged for it. Drink it for a month or two, and you will surely conceive, perhaps even have a dragon-phoenix pair or twins. I will copy the formula for you later. You find a way to open up sales channels. If we make money, our two families will split it. I provide the formula, you provide the materials and manage the sales. If you can make the decision, write a contract, and each keep a copy."

Niu Congcong became anxious: "This is something I am offering to you, Brother Xu. Speaking of which, I have kowtowed and taken you as a master; how could I ask you for money? Doesn't this treat me like an outsider?"

Xu Jia laughed: "I need to cultivate; it's impossible for me to let your family fall into ruin as well. Just do as I say."

Niu Congcong had no choice but to give up, then immediately asked: "Can this wine really help people have dragon-phoenix twins?"

"Who would dare to guarantee that?" Xu Jia smiled: "Just don't sell it too cheaply; we are earning money from the rich."

"I'll go to Cuichun Pavilion to promote this wine! The secret yang-boosting medicine at Cuichun Pavilion is all supplied by my family!" Niu Congcong said.

"Isn't that immoral?" Xu Jia laughed: "They were making money easily before; won't they be quite miserable after drinking this wine?"

He then thought that Cuichun Pavilion was run by a nest of fox spirits, and feared they wouldn't be afraid at all...

After returning to the Xu Residence.

Xu Mu had long since had people prepare for his arrival. When the servants saw Xu Jia, they ran to notify her. Nowadays, Xu Mu would set aside at least three out of the twelve double-hours of the day to worship the Buddha; the rest of the time, apart from eating and sleeping, she spent learning to copy the Bodhisattva portraits on the covers of Buddhist scriptures.

She came out of the Buddha hall and chided Xu Jia: "Jiedi, where have you run off to again? You've been so irresponsible, spending the night outside several times."

Xu Jia did not bring his troubles from outside into the home, only smiling: "I am out there earning gold and silver."

"Stop with the glib talk!" Xu Mu sighed: "Your father has been possessed these past two days. He set up a cot in the study; he eats there and relieves himself there. The cultivation you told him about seems like it's going to exhaust a person to death. If this continues, his body will collapse!"

Xu Jia had already anticipated this result. The Wenchang Array Method has exactly this effect; learning is not tiring or annoying, so it can make people obsessed and intoxicated without feeling dizzy or blurred.

Therefore, he joked: "He is not a child; even children know to rest when they are tired. I estimate this heat will only last three or four days."

"If after ten days he is still like this, I will prepare a formula for you, Mother, to make him some nourishing food."

"Father seeking progress like this is actually not a bad thing. If he happens to pass the exam and become a Provincial Graduate, you, Mother, will enjoy endless blessings for the rest of your life."

"Besides, passing the Provincial Graduate exam was also Grandfather's dying wish. Is Father afraid of suffering for these hundred-odd days?"

"In the future, when his official career is smooth and he is granted titles for his wife and children, perhaps you, Mother, might even become a Title-Bestowing Madam."

"Title-Bestowing Madam or not, I have long since let go of that; it doesn't matter," Xu Mu shook her head and said: "I am a person who eats vegetarian food and chants Buddha's name; what use is it to seek these things?"

"The more ambitious your father becomes, the more uneasy I feel. Men change for the worse when they have money, and they act recklessly when they have power. I have been his wife for many years, and I am truly afraid he will go astray..."

Xu Jia wanted to laugh upon hearing this; Xu Mu clearly felt that Xu Father lacked willpower and was prone to corruption.

Without needing to think about his wording, he directly joked: "Then, Mother, you can use the Dharma to influence Father. I actually think you are overthinking it. My father is currently single-mindedly trying to become a Virtuous person, someone who pleads for the hearts of the people of the world."

"Confucianism says: at forty, one has no doubts; he should know what he wants. Moreover, at a certain age, many things are beyond one's strength..."

Xu Mu listened and felt there was some truth to it: "That's true. Such a little old man, only I treat him like a treasure; who else would treat him like a treasure?"

Xu Jia:...

Xu Father:...

Xu Mu set her mind at ease, pulled Xu Jia inside, and personally prepared a meal for him.

Xu Jia picked up Gui Linggao from the courtyard floor; this little fellow liked to get closer to the study this time, wanting to obtain some nourishment from the Literary Qi.

Xu Jia stroked his turtle shell, while saying to the Xiaopangdun beside him: "Can you see what is different about my turtle?"

Xiaopangdun had an entry-level understanding of Ten Thousand Things Have Spirits and possessed extremely high intuition. Looking at this turtle, what he vaguely saw was a young boy.

At this moment, the boy was working hard to absorb the "Qi" from Xu Jia's body, as if it were some kind of delicacy.

"It's also a spirit creature!" Xiaopangdun said with certainty.

Xu Jia said: "He has a background; he is the grandson of the Prefecture Assistant of the Jinsha Xi Shuifu, named Gui Linggao. Jinsha Creek is the parent water system of Yushan County. Although it is called a creek, it is actually a small river. The Creek Deity is conservatively estimated to be an Eighth Rank Water Uncle, and the Prefecture Assistant is also estimated to be a Ninth Rank official. When you have a chance, add him to the Lineage."

Niu Congcong might not have understood Xu Jia's meaning before, but now he was the first to grasp it. Fearing that this was also about dragging the Earth Deity into the water and building a good relationship with the local Water Mansion and River Earl, he nodded directly to show he understood.

Xu Jia gave an "en" sound, but placed the little turtle into Xiaopangdun's hands, instructing him to stay for dinner later so he could teach him a skill. He himself headed toward the Ming Tang. In the Ming Tang feng shui layout, the Wood Sha of the Condolence Guest Sha had already been mostly dissolved; it was half-dead, motionless, and making a stable contribution to the feng shui of the Xu Residence.

Xu Jia had not dared to divine ghost matters before, fearing that having just returned to the soul, he would be entangled by ghosts and ruined. Now that he had practiced the Lvshan Ascending to Heaven Great Method and borrowed a bit of his past life's Dharma Power, he had no such concerns and directly performed divination on this Condolence Guest Sha.

Divining and communicating with spirits is like asking "how did the pen spirit die"; it is actually a very dangerous thing.

But Xu Jia was not afraid of these things at this moment, and since this Condolence Guest Sha was already trapped, he directly matched his frequency with that of the Condolence Guest Sha.

He saw a scene of a woman hanging herself emerge in his mind.

Pain, immersive pain, appeared in his own senses; he couldn't breathe, his throat hurt from the constriction, his cervical spine fractured, his consciousness gradually disappeared...

If not for Xu Jia's clear mind, he would likely have been manipulated by this evil ghost to hang himself.

After personally experiencing the hallucination of hanging, Xu Jia divined the cause and effect of the matter.

It turned out that this involved the ancient problem of "mother-in-law and daughter-in-law relations."

This woman was a new bride who had been married into Li Village for less than two months. She was harassed in every way by her mother-in-law, and after being unable to bear the humiliation, she died by hanging, filled with resentment.

The last thought before she died was regret; it shouldn't be her who died, but that old woman who should die, and thus she transformed into a fierce ghost, a Condolence Guest Sha.

That household forced the daughter-in-law to her death, and the daughter-in-law's natal family came to demand an explanation. After seven days of such a scene, no one had handled her funeral arrangements.

This Condolence Guest Sha brewed for seven days, completed the transformation into a fierce ghost, and finally hanged the mother-in-law first, then hanged the husband...

Only then did a Daoist use the hanging rope to subdue her.

Xu Jia saw from the spirit-communication vision that this Daoist had thick facial hair and an ugly face, as if he had not fully evolved.

He split the hanging rope into two; he kept a small piece for himself as a means to drive the evil sha, and hung the remaining rope on the beam of the "ghost house" where the mother-in-law, the bride, and the husband—a family of three—had died and which was no longer inhabited, using it to continue raising the sha.

Xu Jia ended the spirit-communication divination and secretly said: "I don't know what kind of sin was committed here."

That Wood Sha, having been communicated with by Xu Jia, repeated the memories of the past, and its resentment grew a bit stronger. It began to struggle and churn, but instead, it provided a source of power for the feng shui array, stirring up the Qi of life and auspiciousness.

Xu Jia did not bother with her and climbed up to the rafters to check on the golden toad.

The situation with the golden toad was still fine; the evil Qi of the Yin Earth Sha could not corrode real gold. However, small water droplets had condensed on the toad's back, looking like crystal bumps; this was the meaning of "carrying wealth."

Xu Jia said: "I have guided my father into cultivation, but Father is single-mindedly focused on taking the Provincial Graduate exam. He is studying hard now, and I believe there will be results soon."

"I will also avenge the grudge of the evil Daoist who harmed you. You can rest assured and dissolve the sha here."

A thought came from within the golden toad: "Are you not going to sit for the imperial examinations?"

This was also his obsession.

"I will!" Xu Jia pacified him, saying: "It is just that I am a practitioner of the Dao and do not much care for being an official; at most, I will pass the provincial examination to gain a status that allows me to go anywhere under Heaven, and that will be enough."

"A provincial graduate is already quite good." The original owner's wish was to pass the provincial examination, and he immediately added: "I have recalled some things; that Daoist took away my fingernails and hair. Although you are using this body now, I do not know what other methods he might conjure up to cause trouble."

Xu Jia heard this and said: "Then how did he control you? The Wood Sha used that rope; you were struck by the spell and fell unconscious, dying only after being placed in the coffin. Among the Five Sha, it belongs to Yin Earth, so there must be some earth-attribute Sha object related to you."

"It is a Jade Scepter!" the original owner's Soul said: "It was held in my hands at the time; after he obtained it, he used it to command me."

Jade is the essence of mountains and is also quite common in burial objects.

Xu Jia asked again: "Then how did you fall under the spell? Can you guess?"

The original owner's Soul recalled: "That day I was studying and heard a commotion outside. It turned out someone was fortune-telling and interpreting characters, and everything was accurate. The one doing the fortune-telling was precisely a Daoist. I was preparing for the County Examination and, thinking to seek a good omen, I sat down to ask for a divination."

"He saw my appearance and kept saying that I had noble Qi and that my fate carried an official rank. I was happy to hear it, and when he asked for my Eight Characters, I gave them to him. He then said some more pleasant things, and I listened, feeling dizzy and muddled, without thinking much of it."

"After I returned home, that very night I vaguely heard someone calling my name. Then I began to run a fever, at times conscious, at times delirious, and finally, I was trapped in a place where the sky could not be seen... When I woke up again, that Daoist had already gained control over me."

PS: I have less than twenty thousand words in my draft, which should be enough to keep going. Tomorrow I will go to the funeral home for the cremation, and the day after will be the funeral and wake. I have seen everyone's comments and am very grateful.

I kept vigil by the body all day today, yet I did not feel afraid. While guarding the body, I recited the Precious Proclamation of Taiyi Jiuku Tianzun and the Blood Lake Sutra many times, hoping that my grandmother will ascend to the Heavenly Realm.

Actually, although I write Xianxia novels, I am not particularly superstitious. Now that the person closest to me has passed, I have come to believe deeply; I hope that my grandmother is simply living a happy life in another world.

(End of chapter)