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Ye Yingzhi was sitting on the sofa reading a book. On the coffee table was a crystal clear ice-cracked patterned porcelain cup emanating the fragrance of Tie Guan Yin. He put down the book and raised his head when he heard Chi Yan walked in hurriedly, “Why are you in a rush to come back again? You miss ge ge?”
Chi Yan shook his head hastily, catching his breath calmly.
Ye Yingzhi frowned, “Oh? Then you don’t miss me, lo?”
Chi Yan answered anxiously, “No, it’s not that I don’t miss you. But there’s something I’d like to ask ge ge to help me check.”
Ye Yingzhi put his two fingers together, supporting his chin and looked attentively at Chi Yan, “What’s the matter?”
“The news we got yesterday said that after the Gu cultivator died, the Gu worm will die too after a short period of time. How long is this short period of time? Is it possible to last a few years?”
“This is simple.” Ye Yingzhi didn’t ask why he suddenly wanted to inquire about this. He motioned Chi Yan to pass his mobile phone over, “Call and get them to ask again.”
Soon there was a reply: It was impossible for the Gu worms to last a few years, they could last at most one month before they all die.
A month. It coincided with the time.
The Chi, Ye and Xu Taoist family clans lived in seclusion in the mountains, yet similar incidents as that at He Jia Village happened to these families too. The living people died one after another and became ghosts, yet the people around them couldn’t tell whether they or even themselves were humans or ghosts.
Translated by The Red Oak Tree
www.theredoaktree.com
Lin Zhu, Ma Tian, and Chi Rong had all passed away long before they disappeared. Their souls disappeared completely and couldn’t even become ghosts before they were found missing, and then their corpses were found.
The kind of ghostly existence was similar to that of He Jia Village which confused their judgment and concealed this fact. Their bodies had not been found before. The Taoist master Jiang thought he killed Ma Tian and destroyed his soul, when he did not actually kill him because no one could kill a dead person again. He thought that he had destroyed Ma Tian’s soul and gotten rid of his non-existent corpse, all these should have been contrived under confusion.
Just like the Grandma in He Jia Village and the daughter of the guest house owner, there should be someone who discovered that he should already be dead. This person was Chi Rong. Mysteriously, he didn’t realise that he was dead by discovering his dead body under his own bed, but instead it was through those Gu worms. As a Gu cultivator, he should have discovered that something was wrong when his Gu worms died in large numbers.
Chi Yan still remembered the answer Chi Rong gave when he asked about their father’s death—”The Gu cultivator is dead, so the Gu worms cannot last long without anyone taking care of them. Once the Gu in the heart dies, the host will also naturally die soon.”
At that time, Chi Yan thought that the dead Gu cultivator whom Chi Rong mentioned was his mother. But obviously not. The Gu cultivator should be himself. Before his mother died, she should have given all her Gu to Chi Rong, including the Gu which manipulated Chi Yuan Shan. After Chi Rong died unexpectedly, those Gu worms had no one to take over. So when his father was dying, Chi Rong should already know that he was dead. He also realised that there was something strange and specifically asked Chi Yan to ask Ye Yingzhi to conduct a ritual to send Chi Yuan Shan’s spirit away to ensure that he reincarnated smoothly, instead of being trapped here like this.
Translated by The Red Oak Tree
www.theredoaktree.com
Then why didn’t Chi Rong beg Ye Yingzhi to conduct a ritual to send him for reincarnation too? What did he do after finding out that he was dead, and why did this cause him to lose his soul?
Just then, Chi Yan’s phone rang and interrupted his thoughts. He looked at the caller ID, it was Song Jin’s call.
Chi Yan answered the phone and heard Song Jin’s voice, “Chi Zi, hurry up and come home. Grandpa suddenly fainted in the morning. He is in the hospital and hasn’t woken up yet.”
The water from far away could not douse the fire nearby. Before Chi Yan left R City, he had given his Grandpa’s caregiver his and Song Jin’s telephone numbers and told her to call Song Jin for help if there was an emergency. In the morning, after Grandpa suddenly fainted, the caregiver quickly called Song Jin and brought Grandpa to the hospital where Tao Juan Juan worked. After that, Song Jin called Chi Yan to inform him.
Chi Yan was taken aback for a moment. He would take time to call his grandfather after dinner every night. Ye Yingzhi knew his schedule and would sometimes deliberately tease him during this time, because he was sure that Chi Yan couldn’t resist when he talked to his Grandpa. Grandpa was fine last night when he called. They chatted about his exercise buddy, Uncle Zhang’s son who was promoted; Uncle Hu’s granddaughter who won a prize and other trivial matters. Who would have thought that Grandpa would suddenly faint today.
He told Song Jin that he would return as soon as possible, and asked him to take care of his Grandpa before he got back and hung up the phone.
Ye Yingzhi heard the content of the call and saw Chi Yan standing dazedly with the phone that was hung up, looking confused and helpless. He stood up and brought Chi Yan to sit beside him and comforted him, “Don’t worry, ge ge will arrange a car to take you back to see Grandpa immediately, don’t be afraid.”
Translated by The Red Oak Tree
www.theredoaktree.com
Chi Yan suddenly hugged his arm and pleaded, “Yingzhi ge ge, will you go with me? Go back with me.”
“Ge ge has to look into Ye family’s matters, so I can’t leave for the time being.” Ye Yingzhi stroked his hair with his hand, his face looking calm. “Ge ge will go and visit you sometime later, okay ? And then bring my little Ah Yan back.”
Chi Yan had a thought in his heart — Yingzhi ge ge indeed really wanted him to stay here with him.
“If Ah Yan is unwilling to stay on the mountain, then wait for me to finish with Ye family’s matters then I will go to you and stay with you in the future, OK?” Ye Yingzhi added immediately after noticing that Chi Yan was startled for a moment. His face was pale and calm with the gentleness that was reserved only for Chi Yan.
Chi Yan didn’t expect Ye Yingzhi to say something like this. He looked up at him quietly and hugged his arm tightly, “Yingzhi ge ge, do you remember Chi Rong? He is dead. I mean he died about a month ago. The “Chi Rong” we saw before was no longer human. Do you remember that incident I told you about when I accompanied my friend Song Jin on a mission and ended up in a ghost village? I suspect that the situation on this mountain is similar to that village, it’s just that everyone doesn’t know what is happening.”
Chi Yan said this with urgency and cited the examples of Lin Zhu and Ma Tian to prove his point. Ye Yingzhi faintly responded, touched his hair and replied, “Well, Chi Rong, Lin Zhu and Ma Tian were no longer humans, so was Ah Yan scared when you saw and spoke to the dead ?”
“The problem is not about being scared,” Chi Yan shook Ye Yingzhi’s arms, “Yingzhi ge ge, I’m worried about you. I’m worried about you the most in this place. We can’t even tell who are humans and who are ghosts around us and we might be killed easily. We don’t even know or remember that we have died, just like the case with the villagers at He Jia village.”
Translated by The Red Oak Tree
www.theredoaktree.com
“Silly child,” Ye Yingzhi looked at Chi Yan who was looking at him worriedly. He couldn’t resist pressing him onto the sofa and leaned over to kiss him. He finally let go after a long while, “You forgot what your ge ge does? How could I be easily harmed by ghosts.”
Ye Yingzhi stretched out his thumb and gently rubbed Chi Yan’s red and soft lips that had been ravaged, his eyes were dark, “Don’t worry, ge ge will go and find you once I finish the matters here.”
After all, Ye Yingzhi was the patriarch of the Ye family. Although his health was not very good, he could grasp and control his surrounding environment very well. Chi Yan believed that he would always succeed with his abilities, so he stopped persuading him. But he had to tell Xu Rui and Xu Xin of his conjecture. If everything was really as he had thought, then the situation was very bad.
Fearing that he was too close to Ye Yingzhi and disturbing him, Chi Yan stood up and walked aside to phone Xu Rui, but no one answered his call. As soon as he was about to make another call again, the butler walked in, saluted him and Ye Yingzhi, and then told Ye Yingzhi, “Third Master Ye, old grandfather Chi is out of his retreat. He sent someone over to inform that he wanted to meet Young Master Chi.”
Chi Yan was stunned when he heard the words. Resentment filled his heart. He really wanted to ask his grandfather why he gave Chi Rong his name back then – “Rong”, meaning his mother and him had to accommodate Chi Rong, yet he explicitly supported Chi Rong and his mother. Did he know that Chi Rong’s mother poisoned his father with the Gu worms? If he knew about it, why didn’t he stop her and see his son being manipulated for the rest of his life until he died? Was it because he was greedy for the secretive Gu witchcraft brought by Chi Rong’s mother? Or did he hate his father who insisted on marrying his mother back then?
Translated by The Red Oak Tree
www.theredoaktree.com
Chi Yan used to think that his grandfather did this because he didn’t approve of his parents’ marriage. Now thinking about it, it didn’t seem that simple.
Chi Yan stood there and did not answer. Ye Yingzhi seemed to know what he was thinking and said, “Ah Yan, just go ahead and meet him if you want to and ask him all the questions that you have. Ge ge is here and they won’t dare bully you. Settle the matters here so that you can return to see Grandpa with a peace of mind.”
Chi Yan looked at him, pursed his lips and nodded.
He didn’t take the car sent by Chi’s family to pick him up. Ye Yingzhi asked his driver to send Chi Yan over in his car.
As soon as Chi Yan got into the car, Xu Rui returned his call, “Young Master Chi, what’s up? Coincidentally, I just got a message and wanted to tell you, and then I saw your missed call.”
Chi Yan put his phone closer to him, “You speak first.”
“Do you remember Lin Zhu who disappeared suddenly? My uncle and the others have not given up on investigating the cause of his sudden disappearance. Later, when searching for his soul with the secret soul-searching method, they found the last place where his soul disappeared was at Chi’s house, close to the venue where your grandfather is having his retreat.”
Chi Yan closed his eyes, and he didn’t know how to react to such news now. If it was just himself, after knowing that something strange was happening in the Chi family, and there were problems with this place, he could have just grabbed Xu Rui and Xu Xin and run away regardless of anything. He’d quickly return and look after Grandpa and wait for Ye Yingzhi to join him after he settled his matters.
But Ye Yingzhi encouraged him to face his grandfather, encouraged him to find out the truth, and told him not to be afraid since he was around.