Chapter 44: Corpse Qi

Bai Laokui stumbled forward a couple of steps in a hysterical fit, his hands and feet cramping up. The woodchopping knife in his hand dropped to the ground with a loud clatter, and unable to support his weight anymore, he collapsed in agony.

Just like the rest of us, he had been drugged and completely lost all physical strength.

The man with the twitching mouth caught sight of this and his lips twitched a few times.

"Master Bai, I am Second Master's man in life and his ghost in death. No, no... I'm not a traitor, heh heh."

As mentioned earlier, in order to track down Liao Xiaoqin, who was infected with the Spiritual Language Centipede, the Nine Nether Hall had specifically planted an inside mole within the Xu Family Medical Clinic.

That mole was none other than Old Ou standing right before us.

Old Ou was a seasoned grave robber. Once, while descending into an ancient tomb, he had been overcome by toxic gas, and his entire gang perished underground. He alone managed to escape, though on the brink of death. He fled to the capital and begged a master from the Nine Nether Hall for treatment. His life was saved, but it left him with the bizarre affliction of his mouth twitching uncontrollably from time to time.

Treating illnesses at the Nine Nether Hall was exorbitantly expensive. He had spent every last coin he had, yet it still wasn't enough. To continue paying for his medical care and recuperation, he simply joined the Nine Nether Hall, working off his medical debts through his service.

When Bai Laokui was selecting someone to keep an eye on Xu Qingguo, he factored in that this fellow possessed rich underworld experience, top-tier grave-robbing skills, and a slight physical disability that made him inconspicuous, so he dispatched him to Chang City.

Old Ou successfully applied to be a cleaner at the Xu Family Medical Clinic. Usually taciturn, diligent, and hardworking, he was practically invisible.

The person tailing us all the way to Medicine King Ridge last time was precisely this bastard.

However, Jiang Sheng'er had somehow managed to bring Old Ou under his own control.

In other words, Old Ou was essentially a double agent whose true master was actually Jiang Sheng'er.

Seeing the other party face to face, Bai Laokui naturally flew into a towering rage.

If it were me, I would have been itching to hack this traitor to pieces.

Jiang Sheng'er leisurely twirled a pair of iron walnuts in his hand, gazed down at Bai Laokui lying helpless on the ground, and let out a cold snort.

"Master Bai, without the antidote within half a month, the poison in your bodies will flare up. Every time you exert yourselves physically, the onset will advance a bit. I suggest you all save your energy."

To my surprise, Old Ou sauntered over to me with an eager expression and offered me a cigarette.

Hongtashan 1956.

That was the exact brand of the cigarette pack we had spotted back at Medicine King Ridge.

"Little Meng, old Ou has spent a lifetime digging up graves, but seeing how you handled the roadblock beasts, located dragon veins, and bypassed mechanisms and hidden weapons at Medicine King Ridge, I still think you're too... too damn awesome! However, you broke a major taboo of our trade!"

I declined the cigarette.

"What d-d-damn taboo?"

Old Ou chuckled.

"You like to pr-pr-protect people!"

I: "......"

Right at that moment, I caught sight of Fat Man Dong standing beside me, arms crossed over his chest, staring at Old Ou with a sneer that wasn't quite a smile.

When Old Ou turned his head and caught a glimpse of Fat Man Dong, a flicker of sheer terror suddenly flashed across his eyes. His mouth twitched a few times, and like a scolded child, he spun around, squatted on the ground, and started drawing circles in the dirt with a twig, looking thoroughly aggrieved.

Seeing that everything was fully prepared, Jiang Sheng'er gave a wave of his hand.

"Let's move out!"

Everyone climbed into the vehicles.

Fat Man Dong, Xu Qingguo, Xiaoyao, Wu Ping, and I squeezed into the commercial van.

Jiang Sheng'er, Bai Laokui, Praying Mantis Luo, and Old Ou boarded the same Santana from last night.

Looking at the people in the car, I felt a wave of sentimentality. This was essentially the same crew that went to Medicine King Ridge, with the sole addition of Xiaoyao.

The last time we went down into a tomb, the purpose was to save my sister-in-law.

This time, descending into a tomb was actually to capture my sister-in-law.

Yet I felt no depression whatsoever; on the contrary, I was somewhat excited.

Although our elaborate double act had been cut short halfway due to Jiang Sheng'er's sudden ambush, it wasn't a total loss.

First, constrained by the poison in his body, Bai Laokui had followed Jiang Sheng'er's demands and called his subordinates in the Nine Nether Hall, ordering them to continue searching for Liao Xiaoqin and her apprentice in Chang City. This meant the charade involving the Nine Nether Hall was still ongoing.

Second, although Jiang Sheng'er was now coercing me into heading to the ancient tombs in Yunnan Province, as long as I could eliminate this old bastard before encountering my sister-in-law, the overall situation would remain unaffected.

Third, the mastermind Jiang Sheng'er, whom we failed to drag out behind Liao Xiaoqin's back, had now been pulled right out into the open by myself. If this desperate counterattack succeeded, not only could I show off in front of her, but I could also set up a memorial tablet for my brother!

The gambling table was still open.

Everything won in the early rounds was just paper money.

Winning the final rounds was the real cash!

Xu Qingguo and Xiaoyao hit it off wonderfully, chatting animatedly all the way. From Xiaoyao's master's illness to movie stars, then to makeup, and eventually arriving at menstruation, the two discussed topics with increasing depth, occasionally bursting into silvery laughter completely disregarding the men in the car.

Fat Man Dong wore an expression of utter speechlessness on his chubby face.

"You two... are you holding a midnight fireside chat? Don't forget we're heading down to a tomb to march to our deaths!"

Hearing this, Xiaoyao made a funny face at Fat Man Dong.

"I just like chatting with my big sister! Bleh!"

Ignoring Fat Man Dong, Xu Qingguo turned her head to look at me, and noticing my entirely relaxed demeanor accompanied by a slight upward curve at the corner of my mouth, her pretty face instantly shifted.

"Meng Xun, what are you smiling at?!"

What was I smiling at?

I was mentally picturing the awkward, undignified plight of Jiang Sheng'er making a one-way trip to the halls of King Yama.

"I'm smiling at who's going to stop your periods."

Hearing this, both ladies blushed a deep crimson.

Xiaoyao curled her lips.

"Brother, you're being a bit obnoxious!"

Xu Qingguo was exceptionally clever and had likely guessed I was plotting how to screw over her godfather next. She raised a hand in warning.

"You'd better be smiling about something else!"

Through all the dust and wind, we sped toward Yunnan Province.

In truth, Jiang Sheng'er was quite anxious. After all, he had no concrete idea when Liao Xiaoqin would retrieve the Golden Silkworm Molting from the tomb.

If Liao Xiaoqin had already emerged from the tomb, Jiang Sheng'er would have no choice but to use my life as leverage to force my sister-in-law to bring the Golden Silkworm Molting as a ransom.

However, if things came to that, Liao Xiaoqin would be prepared.

Once she was prepared, Jiang Sheng'er would suffer extreme anxiety over whether he could emerge victorious and whether the Golden Silkworm Molting could be secured.

For the old fellow, catching Liao Xiaoqin off guard by dragging a hostage straight into the tomb chamber to seize the treasure was the superior strategy.

Originally, we could have taken a plane or train to Yunnan, but carrying a substantial amount of grave-robbing tools made security checkpoints too risky, leaving us with no choice but to barrel forward by car.

During a meal stop at a roadside truck diner along the way, I noticed a very peculiar phenomenon.

Old Ou seemed somewhat terrified of Fat Man Dong. Seeing the latter sitting at a table to eat, he didn't dare join them at all, choosing instead to ladle out a bowl of food and squat outside to wolf it down.

Fat Man Dong would occasionally glance at Old Ou, letting out cold chuckles from time to time.

At nine o'clock in the evening, everyone checked into a small, humble inn to rest.

Fat Man Dong and I shared a room.

Making sure no one else was around, I asked Fat Man Dong, "You damn well aren't trying to have a bromance with Old Ou, are you?"

"Bromance your grand-uncle! Do you even know what he is?"

"What?"

"A ghost!"

"......"

Fat Man Dong chuckled darkly.

"Stinking of corpse aura, eyes darting about, and patches of bluish discoloration starting to show—I can't possibly be wrong!"

I retorted, "Are you bullshitting me? Old Ou is a veteran grave robber who spends all day going down into earth and tombs; it's completely normal for him to have corpse aura on him. As for the bluish patches, aren't those just age spots?"

Fat Man Dong wore an expression of supreme exasperation on his chubby face.

"Little Meng, why do you always refuse to believe me?"

I replied, "It's not that I don't believe you; it's that I don't believe in ghosts!"

Fat Man Dong scratched his head.

"How about this? Tonight at midnight, I'll take you to see for yourself."

"However, the worldly yang energy is too strong during the day, so he's a bit afraid of a Daoist priest like me. At night, the yin energy is heavier, but I don't have any exorcism props on me, so I can't do anything to him. We'll only be able to sneak a tiny peek. If the other bastard discovers us, we're dead meat. Do you dare?"

There was nothing I wouldn't dare!

This time, when Jiang Sheng'er headed to the ancient tombs in Yunnan, the only grave-robbing specialist he brought along was Old Ou. This indicated not only that the old man trusted him implicitly, but also that Old Ou's grave-robbing skills must have been formidable. Otherwise, he wouldn't have tailed us all the way to Medicine King Ridge without us noticing a single thing. With that level of competence, while his feng shui dragon-spotting might not match Liao Xiaoqin's, his skill in tomb raiding and grave excavation was probably on par with hers.

If I couldn't even figure out whether the opponent was human or a ghost, how could I play the subsequent hands?

I asked, "Where are we going to see this?"

I turned my head to look, and the fat bastard was already snoring softly.

Unable to sleep anymore, I watched reruns of *The Tale of the Qing Dynasty Emperor* on television until midnight, then gave him a kick to wake him up.

Fat Man Dong wiped the drool from the corner of his mouth, got up from the bed, and led me out of the room.

Instead of heading toward Old Ou's room, we went straight to the inn's back kitchen.

A large pile of empty vegetable baskets was stacked high in the corner, towering taller than a person, creating a dark, secluded wedge against the wall. The two of us squeezed ourselves right inside.

After waiting for about ten minutes without a single sound, just as I was about to ask the fatty what game he was playing, I heard a faint "creak," indicating someone had entered the kitchen.

The inn's lobby lights were on, casting faint beams of illumination into the back kitchen.

Peering outward, I saw Old Ou step inside. His expression was bizarre and terrifying, and even his facial twitch had completely vanished. He looked like an entirely different person as he walked straight toward the stove.

After casting glances left and right to make sure no one was following him, he reached out, picked up something from the stovetop, and shoved it into his mouth.

My scalp instantly went numb.

What that fellow was eating was a piece of raw, bloody meat!

The hygiene conditions at the small inn we stayed in were less than ideal, and refrigerators were not yet common in the 1990s. That basin of raw meat was buzzing with quite a few flies and emitted a foul, stinking odor.

Yet Old Ou was stuffing it into his mouth frantically like a starving ghost, chewing voraciously, his entire face smeared with bloody froth.

"Pfft!"

Fat Man Dong suddenly let out a loud fart.

The sound echoed sharply.

Old Ou abruptly halted his movements, whipped his head around, locked his venomous gaze directly onto our hiding spot, and began striding toward us.

We're totally screwed!