IBGSW Chapter 114
Tallying Gains and Losses
"The ghost domain is lifting—"
Gu Jiansheng, huddled in the crowd, muttered it under his breath.
He sounded unsure at first. Then he saw the torches flare up all around him, the faces of the people near him plain in the firelight.
Every face wore the shock of disaster survived, the dazed look of people not yet fully awake from a brush with death.
With the ghosts gone, the shuddering dread they had put in everyone's hearts went with them. Gu Jiansheng rubbed his arm, where the goosebumps hadn't yet smoothed away.
It dawned on him, slowly: the ghost domain was lifting!
That meant the ghosts had left. And that meant the double-ghost case had been solved!
Fan Bisi's earlier shout finally reached his mind. The terror-clotted fog in his head cleared bit by bit. The corners of his mouth lifted, his face brightened, and he couldn't help grabbing the person next to him:
"The ghost domain is lifting? The case is solved?"
"The ghost domain is lifting!"
"The case is solved!"
"We're alive!"
Belated cheers rose inside Ding'an Tower.
Compared with the crowd in the garden below, who were slower to catch on, Xu Yachen and the others who had been told to hide inside the tower reacted first. The old tower couldn't stop a ghost, but next to the people forced to stay in the garden they had been far luckier, and in far better spirits.
The moment they heard the case was finished, though, all of them let out a thunderous cry of relief.
"Lord Zhao's merit is boundless!"
"Lord Zhao—"
Along with the shouting came the clatter of feet pounding down the stairs.
...
The people outside the garden caught on quickly too. They clutched their heads and wept, yelling to let out their fear.
Fan Wujiu had only just been shaken awake by his brother when he heard the wailing and shouting erupt on every side. The crowd's relief turned into words that rang through the inside and outside of Ding'an Tower.
"Fusheng—"
Fan Bisi was holding his brother up, and had barely begun to speak when Zhao Fusheng waved a hand.
From the corner of her eye she saw Zheng He hurrying over.
This commanding officer of Baozhi County was full of questions. Before he could open his mouth, she gave him orders:
"Gather the order envoys and the yamen runners of Baozhi. There are too many people at Ding'an Tower tonight. To avoid trouble, send them home in batches."
By now Zheng He admired her down to his bones. He no longer dared go against her wishes, and was glad to run around handling the aftermath:
"Rest easy, my lord. I'll see to it right away."
"Keep the people who said they'd donate money. Have them sign and press their fingerprints1 before they leave," Zhao Fusheng added.
Zheng He nodded as though it went without saying:
"I remember."
Then he added:
"A few lowlifes tried to fish in troubled waters back then. Should we punish them?"
Zhao Fusheng thought of the public sentiment the Investiture had flagged after the investiture was done.
"A few words of warning will do," she said, with some reluctance.
While they talked, a large crowd poured out of Ding'an Tower, led by Liu Rong and Xu Yachen with his cane. The old man was aged and frail, yet now he moved with astonishing vigor, walking briskly at the very front.
Zhao Fusheng knew they all had plenty of questions. But she was itching to check the Investiture and the ghost-god she had just invested, and to avoid being pinned down by them, she told Zheng He:
"I'll leave these odds and ends to you. Have hot water prepared. I need to wash up first."
Zheng He did have questions for her.
In their short time together, he had found that Zhao Fusheng wasn't like any ghost-controller he knew. Her temper hadn't been twisted by her ghost, with no sign of going out of control, which meant she wasn't someone given to sudden swings of mood.
Set aside the awe her status as a ghost-controller inspired, and he found her rather easy to get along with. On matters of ghost cases, she was even willing to share her experience and what she'd seen.
As for this double-ghost case of the Zhao couple, Zheng He felt she could probably clear up most of his doubts.
But that could wait.
He waved at Liu Rong, who was running over from a distance.
The plump steward had shed his earlier long face, and now beamed so hard his eyes disappeared. He ignored Zheng He's wave. Palms pressed together, he bowed and scraped toward Zhao Fusheng:
"My lord's divine might—"
"..."
Zheng He gave the fat man a sour look and said coldly:
"Say your piece later. Have hot water prepared for Lord Zhao—"
"Right away!"
Liu Rong straightened his face and at once shouted for people.
Once the ghost case was settled, the string that had been drawn taut in Zhao Fusheng for two days finally slackened.
Gu Jiansheng, who had been hiding for so long, popped out from who knows where, elbowed the others aside, and planted himself at Zhao Fusheng's side.
...
With this crowd running interference, the people who wanted to press in and thank her were pushed to the outside so they wouldn't hold up her climb upstairs.
They watched her go up. Zheng He wiped the forced smile off his face and barked:
"Keep your voices down. Don't disturb Lord Zhao's rest."
"Gu Jiansheng, Song Tan—"
He called out several names in a row and had them disperse the common folk in the garden.
Once Zhao Fusheng's orders were handed down, Zheng He turned to look out over the garden.
The ghost fog had cleared and the clouds overhead had dissolved, revealing a bright moon in the night sky.
The elegant garden was a wreck, but below it the Shangjia River glittered, and the boats on it were faintly visible.
"It doesn't seem that late yet—"
Zheng He had barely spoken when someone beside him answered:
"It's only just the end of the You hour (around 7 p.m.).2"
Nobody had ever dared cut in on Zheng He before. He turned with a dark look and saw the Fan brothers standing behind him.
These two were Zhao Fusheng's people.
He quickly wiped the anger from his face and even managed a stiff smile.
"When we came back we checked the time, and it was past the middle of the You hour," Fan Wujiu said, his face rather pale.
The brothers had once known Deputy Commander Zheng's great name like thunder in their ears, and had even considered throwing in with him, holding him in deep awe.
They never expected this trip to Baozhi to change their minds so thoroughly.
Looking at the deputy commander they had once revered like a god, they now thought him nothing much. Apart from being able to wield a ghost, he was no different from anyone else in front of a malignant ghost: he was afraid.
Zhao Fusheng, by contrast, had both courage and cunning. She had faced head-on a ghost pieced together from the Zhao couple, and had completely won the brothers' loyalty.
Zheng He knew nothing of the change in the brothers' hearts. Hearing Fan Wujiu, he seized on the main point:
"So, from the time she lured the ghosts here, through the ghosts being pieced whole, to the case being closed, it took less than an hour—"
Fan Bisi nodded, unable to hide his pride:
"Yes."
"How did she do it—"
Zheng He was lost for a moment:
"A ghost pieced whole should have been even fiercer. How did she drive it off?"
It wasn't only Zheng He's question. The Fan brothers wondered the same.
No one besides Zhao Fusheng could answer.
And Zhao Fusheng herself, at the center of everyone's talk, had returned to her room. Alone at last, she finally had a chance to tally her gains and losses.
She'd had 433 points of merit. Fifty went on suppressing the ghost door planks when they sought her out as a substitute, and another 100 went to open the Investiture's divine position. That left her with 283.
During the ghost case, her forcible requisition of Ding'an Tower had angered Liu Rong, and using people as bait to trap the ghosts had left those she put at risk resentful. Public sentiment had dropped, and she'd been docked another 1,200 points.
Healing her wounds to save her life and settling Hell's disturbance had cost another 700 points of merit.
Not counting the fight with Zheng He after she arrived in Baozhi yesterday, this brief stretch of ghost-case work alone had cost her 2,050 points of merit!
In the thick of life and death she hadn't had time to do the sums.
Now that she did, and saw how much merit had drained away, Zhao Fusheng's heart ached so much she could hardly breathe!
Luckily she had the reward for her first investiture, plus 2,000 points for successfully resolving a Disaster-tier ghost case: 5,000 points in all.
After the deductions, she was left with 3,383 points of merit.
She also realized that now that she had successfully used the Investiture of the Gods for the first time, its rules seemed to have changed. Deductions had started to appear.
The longer she lived since her rebirth, the more capital she accumulated. That raised her chances of earning merit, but it meant she would also face losses.
In this case, if not for the first-investiture reward, she'd have taken in nothing and might even have come out in the red.
So even as she savored the joy of a successful investiture, she grew wary. She suspected this was the Investiture's way of reining her in, a limit on running wild and ignoring the will of the people.
She mulled it over a moment, then sank her consciousness into her sea of consciousness again.
The Investiture there was still wreathed in howling cold wind.
Most of the divine positions were sealed, blotched with old blood and thick with ghost shadows. But the first position was open, and on it were two dark-red ghost shadows side by side.
At a touch of her will, a jet-black ghost tablet floated up and appeared in her palm.
"Door Gods," she murmured.
Through the tablet she could "see" inside: a man and a woman carrying door planks on their backs stood motionless in a blood-red glow.
The Investiture prompted:
Door Gods.
(Blood relatives of the host. May be summoned. Must be nourished with merit.)
Notes:
- Gods can also advance in tier. The more merit they gather, the stronger they become.
- Use the divine tablet with care. Inviting a god is easy; sending it away is hard. Without offerings of merit, the god may leave you.
- They are the host's parents and are willing to remain at your side.
- Because of their special regard for you, they are willing to follow you.
Reminder from the Investiture: Following you does not grant access to their abilities. Furthermore, once bound to you, they likely cannot be dismissed.
The Door Gods' wish: To carry their daughter on their backs.
Note: Take care not to be carried by the Door Gods (lest the roles of master and servant be reversed).
Zhao Fusheng took in the string of prompts and looked at the tablet with interest.
The Investiture confirmed her original guess. The Zhao couple's killing rule followed the state they had died in: first retrieve the door planks and piece the ghosts together, then look for their daughter, and only then go on a rampage.
Now that they were invested as gods, by their wish in life, even without memory or reason, acting purely on instinct, they were still willing to stay with her.
But the Investiture had specifically told her to be careful, which meant the following cut both ways.
The upside: because of the blood tie between the two ghosts and herself, it might raise her ability to wield ghost-gods.
The downside: once she drew on them, the Zhao couple might lose control and want even more to kill her, to carry her on the door planks on their backs and make the family whole.
Still, she had the Investiture, and as long as her merit was sufficient, the crisis shouldn't come up for now.
She focused her will on the ghost-god's rules.
The Investiture had said that after a successful investiture, besides being able to wield ghost-gods with merit, she'd also gain part of their abilities.
Duplicating ghost door planks!
At the thought, her eyes fell on the door of her room.
The Investiture's prompt came at once:
Spend 500 points of merit to brand a ghost shadow?
Note: Once the ghost shadow is branded, it can block malignant ghosts.
Note: Keep respect for the ghost door planks. If you slight them, they may turn on you.
Spend 500 points of merit to brand a ghost shadow?
No!
Zhao Fusheng dropped the idea.
For one thing, this was Baozhi's territory, not where she lived. Branding the shadow here would only benefit the Prince of Chu and Liu Rong, the steward who ran Ding'an Tower.
That fat man smiled on the surface but resented her deeply behind her back, and he had cost her a pointless 200 points of merit.
Once a door was branded, the room would have an added layer of protection against ghosts. If a ghost tried to push the door open, with the Door Gods' power behind it, it would become impossible. Zhao Fusheng thought at once of the Door-Knocking Ghost.
She made up her mind: once back in Wan'an County, she'd find a way to brand a door and let the Door-Knocking Ghost have a go.
But that was for later.
Besides the reasons above, the biggest reason she didn't want to use the ability now was the cost.
Five hundred points of merit!
With only 3,383 on hand she seemed well off, but as her power grew, so did her merit consumption. And with deductions that could come at any time, once her merit ran dry she'd be in danger.
...
With the Door Gods' prompts read and a sense of how to wield ghost-gods, she turned her attention to the Investiture's second divine position.
Having tasted the sweetness of her first investiture, she even found herself hoping for another big ghost case so she could invest another god.
But when her will touched the second divine position, the Investiture prompted:
Spend 10,000 points of merit to open the divine position?
The prompt startled her.
She hadn't expected the second position to cost so much merit.
It seemed the first investiture had been an extra bonus from the Investiture itself. That kind of shortcut came only once. From now on she'd have to go back to the old method, handling ghost cases honestly and accumulating merit.
She sighed, and with some regret shifted her attention to Hell.
After the investiture succeeded, the Investiture had warned her that the balance between Hell and the Investiture of the Gods had been broken.
In her mind she ran through the course of this ghost case from beginning to end.
