Chapter 84: Reach Out, God of Wealth

At dawn, as the sun rose, Ning Zhe transformed into a peregrine falcon and flew over Yunmeng Marsh, arriving above Chuyun Mountain Villa.

A damp breeze blew across the wide lake, rippling the emerald forest beyond the villa; in July, Yunzhou was in the height of summer’s splendor, and Chuyun Mountain was a sea of lush green.

Solitude sounds poetic, but in reality it’s a nightmare—modern people with soft skin and delicate flesh who enter deep forests become buffet meals for mosquitoes and insects, so the woods surrounding Chuyun Mountain Villa were not a pristine natural forest, but an ornamental grove planted and maintained by human hands, consisting almost entirely of one single tree species.

That is, the tree Lan Shiwen mentioned yesterday: the paper mulberry.

“Paper mulberry blooms from April to May, and fruits from June to July; in the north, it’s slightly later, but not by much.” Ning Zhe beat his wings, ascending higher to look down at the vibrant, emerald-green ornamental grove below.

Today was June 10, 2018, the peak fruiting season for paper mulberries—but outside Chuyun Mountain Villa, the forest remained a solid expanse of green, with no sign of red flowers or fruits.

Paper mulberry is a highly adaptable wild tree species, unlike cherry or lychee trees that require careful tending; it doesn’t suffer mass crop failure or total loss from extreme weather.

Thus, the only possible reason the forest outside Chuyun Mountain Villa bore no fruit was—

“All the paper mulberries in this grove are male trees.” Ning Zhe immediately reached his conclusion.

Paper mulberry is a classic dioecious plant; unlike monoecious peach or plum trees, it cannot self-pollinate. When a forest contains only male trees and no females, there are no partners for cross-pollination, resulting in the awkward situation of fruiting season arriving with no fruit at all.

Locally called a “bachelor forest.”

Ning Zhe circled the ornamental grove outside Chuyun Mountain Villa for a long time, largely confirming his suspicion: this bachelor forest had indeed been artificially cleared of female trees; as far as he could see, only emerald green stretched out, with not a single tree bearing fruit.

…No, there was one.

After searching long and hard, Ning Zhe finally spotted a small patch of trees with red and green intermingled, near the deep mountains north of Chuyun Mountain Villa—the green was leaves, the red was fruit. Paper mulberry fruit resembles mulberries, since it belongs to the Moraceae family, but its sugar content is lower and it’s far less tasty than mulberries.

This fruiting patch was small, only five or six trees, deeply hidden within the vast forest; even as a bird circling overhead, Ning Zhe had to exert considerable effort to find them.

Precisely: five male trees clustered around one female tree, like stars surrounding the moon—just like the God of Wealth statue yesterday, guarded by five seven-brew kettles.

“This is it.”

Ning Zhe slowed his flight and landed gently before the lone female tree, shedding his feathers to become a young man wearing an oni mask, but he did not approach rashly.

For beneath the tree sat a slumped, lifeless figure.

Out of caution, Ning Zhe kept his distance; he was already beyond the limit of human vision. From his pocket, he pulled out a camera he had prepared in advance and observed the figure seated beneath the female tree.

More precisely, it was not a person, but a clay statue seated inside a small shrine.

The shrine stood beneath the canopy of the lone female tree, built of blue bricks and roofed with bright red glazed tiles. A three-legged, two-eared bronze incense burner stood silently before it, three incense sticks emitting pale blue-gray smoke.

Judging by the burn level of the incense, it had been lit only recently—hardly any ash had accumulated.

“One wisp of smoke from the mountain means fifteen days at the office.” Ning Zhe lowered the camera and shook his head slightly.

Who the hell would light incense deep in the wilderness, risking ash igniting dry leaves and setting Chuyun Mountain Nature Reserve ablaze? That wouldn’t just mean fifteen days at the office—it’d be a light sentence for life imprisonment.

Ning Zhe adjusted the camera’s focus, crouched down, and peered directly into the shrine. Inside sat a hunched statue of molded clay and carved ceramic, resembling an elderly man with thinning hair, slender bones, an ethereal aura, draped in a loose Confucian robe, a curled leaf resting on his shoulder, dappled sunlight filtering through the leaves striking his chest like age spots.

…This wasn’t a statue. It was a person.

Ning Zhe snapped a photo and compared it with the image of Ji Baichang in his phone—confirmed.

The elderly man seated in the shrine was Ji Baichang. Zooming in, he could faintly see the man’s belly slightly swollen—that was gas produced by the fermentation of internal organs, excrement, and undigested food after death, inflating the once-shrunken abdomen into a round bulge.

“Dead and still refusing burial? Sitting in a shrine deep in the mountains like some kind of god?” Ning Zhe frowned slightly.

The seated posture of Ji Baichang’s corpse felt eerily familiar—it matched almost exactly the God of Wealth statue in his study.

The statue’s face was round and auspicious; the old man’s face was thin and otherworldly—but the similarity lay in the fact that both “deities” had a small cloth bag tied with a string resting on their laps.

What was the cloth bag for?

Before he could investigate further, a tendril of blue smoke drifted upward through the paper mulberry branches, and a dread feeling surged through Ning Zhe.

“God of Wealth?”

Ning Zhe hesitated, then decided not to approach rashly—he should return first to Shi Yurou and the Ji siblings. If this was the God of Wealth, the copper coins they carried must have some significance here.

But just as Ning Zhe took a deep breath and turned to leave, a long sigh echoed through the silent forest.

=9+ Shu _ Ba

Ning Zhe’s pupils widened. He raised the camera, refocused—and saw that the incense sticks in the burner had completely burned out, leaving only a pale white ash.

A strong wind swept in, darkening the sky with heavy clouds, blotting out the clear blue. Inside the shrine, the “God of Wealth” opened his eyes.

They were hollow eye sockets, devoid of eyeballs.

Through the dappled forest, the God of Wealth’s empty sockets fixed on Ning Zhe, camera in hand.

【No distinction between civil and martial; life and death irrelevant】

A hoarse, ancient voice emerged from its chest, resonating with hollow reverberation, like a string of copper coins clinking against the hips as someone ran in haste.

As the God of Wealth spoke, it extended one hand toward Ning Zhe.

The next instant, Liu Hongzhi died.

Ning Zhe’s face beneath the mask shifted instantly. Without hesitation, he turned to flee—but before he could take a single step, another life slipped away.

The God of Wealth raised one hand—and claimed two lives.

Having died twice in an instant, Ning Zhe dared not linger. He immediately shed his human form, transformed into a bird, and shot out of the forest, fleeing without looking back.

Behind him, in the forest, the God of Wealth slowly lowered its hand, rose to its feet, and crawled out of the shrine.

(End of Chapter)