IBGSW Chapter 13
As It Should Be
"I-I... f-forget it. I don't want it anymore..."
Old Zhang hesitated for a long while, then shook his head.
He realized he had acted too hastily. He had fallen right into Zhao Fusheng's trap, letting her maneuver the information out of him. Gnawed by regret, he took a step back.
"Forget it, forget it. I won't collect the debt for now—"
"That won't do."
He wanted to leave, but Zhao Fusheng wouldn't allow it.
"Debts must be paid. It's only natural." She feigned kindness.
"I tell you what. I'm a ghost-controller. Living right next door, I'm sure you know that."
Cold sweat broke out on Old Zhang's forehead at once.
A bad premonition rose in him. His right eye twitched, and as he was about to speak, Zhao Fusheng went on.
"After all, we've been neighbors for years, so you should know this ghost of mine better than anyone. It gives first and takes later, doesn't it?"
She was all smiles.
"As I see it, what kind of ghost is that? It's practically the God of Wealth reborn! A good ghost who brings you charcoal in the snow!"
"..."
Fan Bisi and Fan Wujiu looked at her in disbelief, their expressions too complex to decipher.
"I've tried this ghost's 'abilities.' They include sending money and sending rice."
The sweat on Old Zhang's forehead came thicker. Zhao Fusheng stepped forward and he shook as he retreated.
"No, no, no..."
"Why don't I ask the ghost for your hundred and two taels..." Before she finished, Old Zhang cried out, "That won't do!"
"Why not?" Zhao Fusheng asked with a smile. "It's only money. If it's not enough, I can ask for more."
"No." Old Zhang shook his head.
Zhao Fusheng suddenly reached out and grabbed his clothes. Caught off guard, he was seized on the spot. The girl's hand was cold and slender, and thinking of the ghost wrapped around her, the old man was so frightened he screamed over and over.
"Ah! Help, help!"
"Don't kill me, I don't want the money..."
"How can you not want the money? You must." Zhao Fusheng sneered.
"Not only can you ask for it, you have to take every bit."
"N-no, no, no, I miscalculated, it's not that much silver, I need to recount—" Old Zhang cried, and called to the Fan brothers for help.
"E-Envoy Fan..."
"Fusheng." Things had gone beyond anything the Fan brothers expected. Zhao Fusheng had swept away her old timidity and become shrewd and domineering. Fan Bisi's heart gave a jump and he spoke quickly.
"Don't kill him. H-he's of the same clan as Paperman Zhang..."
"Y-yes, yes, Paperman Zhang is my distant nephew." As if he'd found a lifeline, Old Zhang said loudly.
"Don't kill me!"
"A distant nephew. Not a real one," Zhao Fusheng sneered, unmoved.
"And this so-called Paperman Zhang tried to play a trick on me and nearly killed me. I survived, but my parents didn't. Even if he doesn't come looking for trouble, I'll go looking for him to settle the score."
Her cold resolve caught Fan Bisi off guard.
Still, ghost-controllers were always like this. Spending long years dealing with ghosts, they inevitably fell under a malignant ghost's influence. Their temperaments became gloomy, cruel, and eccentric, making them extremely difficult to deal with.
With a malignant ghost on her body, she'd gotten carried away and forgotten the limits of her own strength. Fan Bisi had seen people like that. Most didn't last long. Later, under the ghost's influence, their behavior spun out of control. Within a year or so, if they didn't die at a ghost's hands, they died at the court's.
But that was in the future. For now, Zhao Fusheng was on the verge of "losing control."
If she were allowed to continue and killed Old Zhang, she would likely enrage Paperman Zhang.
She, with a malignant ghost, might not fear trouble. But the Fan brothers would be left with the headache.
Most important, her words had revealed something that unsettled Fan Bisi: she was holding a grudge over her parents' deaths and was only biding her time.
"Don't kill me, don't kill me—"
Seeing that even Paperman Zhang's name hadn't made her back off, Old Zhang thought of the ghost-controllers the bureau used to have, and grew even more afraid.
"What did you want to take from the bureau?"
Zhao Fusheng asked again.
"I..." Hearing this, Old Zhang paused. After a while, despair flashed in his eyes. "I-I misspoke. I just wanted money..."
He was clearly terrified, deeply afraid of the ghost on Zhao Fusheng. But something seemed to frighten him more than the malignant ghost, because with the words on the tip of his tongue, he would sooner die at a ghost's hands than reveal another syllable.
"Fusheng, Paperman Zhang is—" Fan Bisi saw it going badly and hurriedly tried to smooth things over.
"He’s no pushover. Even when Zhao Qiming was alive, the two of them stayed out of each other's way. You want to take control of the bureau, so why go out of your way to make an enemy of him? Besides, you shouldn't use a malignant ghost's power recklessly, not unless your back is truly against the wall..."
"What's there to fear?" Zhao Fusheng said deliberately.
"You know I'm sure to die. The only difference is sooner or later. If he wants to make trouble for me, my parents are dead and I'm all alone and won't live long anyway. I'll fight him to the death, fish dead and net torn1."
Her manner was fierce, as though there was no room for negotiation.
Fan Bisi was lost for words.
Even as shrewd as he was, he now looked helplessly to his brother, and Fan Wujiu didn't dare make a sound.
Old Zhang's face was full of despair. The owner of the joss stick and ghost money shop, together with his two mannequin-like attendants, had seen all this and quietly slipped out of the bureau, back to their shop, and even shut the door tight.
Just when everyone thought there was no room left to turn, Zhao Fusheng suddenly changed course. The cold left her face, and she smiled, her eyes curving. "But Brother Fan is right."
She let go, and Old Zhang's legs gave out. He dropped to the ground with a thud.
"We're all neighbors. We shouldn't push things too far, right?" she asked, smiling.
"R-right, right—" Escaped from the brink of death, Old Zhang nodded frantically.
"I got the coffin price wrong. How could a coffin cost three taels?" He was drenched in cold sweat but dared not wipe it. "Besides, I'm a Wan'an County person. The bureau's in trouble, so it's my duty to help. How can I still chase old debts? Let's write it all off..."
He truly feared the ghost on Zhao Fusheng. He was also afraid of taking something that wasn't his to take, and losing his life for it.
"I'll even give Commanding Officer Zhao two coffins..."
"No! How can I let you give them?" Zhao Fusheng said with righteous dignity.
"Here's what we'll do. The coffin money still gets paid, I won't let you lose out. But we truly have no money..."
"I don't want money..." Old Zhang hurried to say, his voice quavering.
Before he could finish, Zhao Fusheng's tone turned.
"No money, but I have a position. I'm the commanding officer of the bureau, and everything is up to me. I'm going to take charge right now and bring you into the yamen."
"No, no, no—" Old Zhang started and refused frantically. Zhao Fusheng took his hand and said earnestly:
"Once you join the bureau, you'll be the court's person while alive and the court's ghost when dead2. When the crisis in Wan'an County passes, the court will pay what it owes you."
"I..." Old Zhang's small eyes went wide.
"Don't worry," Zhao Fusheng cut him off. "There's no work steadier than the court's. It's a rule that's held for thousands of years!"
She spoke with finality. "Work a few more years, and the court will take care of you in old age—" She made irresponsible promises without a blink. Then she turned to Fan Wujiu.
"Bring out the Soul-Life Register. Old Zhang isn't one of ours, so I won't feel safe keeping his coffins. If it comes to that, I'll just borrow some of the ghost's money to pay him."
With a single sentence she sealed off his retreat.
Then she added, "Put what we owe him on the books. The court will pay it later."
"..."
"..."
Fan Wujiu and Fan Bisi looked at each other in silence.
Nobody had expected this turn. After she finished, the Fan brothers stood still, and Zhao Fusheng raised an eyebrow and urged, "Hurry up!"
Fan Bisi brought out the Soul-Life Register. Before the ghostly jade book, Old Zhang resisted fiercely.
He turned to look behind him several times. The big-bellied assistant stood impassive, as though he'd lost all human pity, silent before the farce.
Zhao Fusheng gazed at him with a smile, threat in her eyes.
In this world human life was cheap. Ghost-controllers were still nominally people, but from the moment they began living with a ghost their hearts were warped, and once out of control they were half human, half ghost.
Old Zhang knew well that such people were erratic. The Wan'an County bureau was now a bureau in name only. Zhao Fusheng had lost both parents, had succeeded in controlling a ghost, and acted wildly with no regard for consequences. He had no choice at all.
Finally, helpless, he bit his index finger and let blood drip onto the Soul-Life Register.
At once a shadow wrapped in blood light rose from the jade book and became a half-bald little figure about a palm high.
Resentment and venom poured off the figure, which finally resolved into a bloody name: Zhang Chuanshi.
Soul-Life Register
Zhang Chuanshi
Seeing it, Zhao Fusheng finally smiled.
"Very good."
"Aren't you afraid my nephew will..."
Zhang Chuanshi had been forced into the bureau against his will and was deeply unwilling.
He knew exactly how things stood with the Wan'an County bureau. The moment his blood fell on the Soul-Life Register, he was effectively tied to this place.
Once the malignant ghost on Zhao Fusheng lost control, as a member of the bureau he would be in the same danger.
"I don't even know how long I'll live. Who has time to worry about anything else?"
Zhao Fusheng had gotten what she wanted and laughed.
"Now we're all one family. Send over two coffins. My parents' bodies need to be laid to rest as soon as possible."
"Hmph!"
...
With a dark expression, Zhang Chuanshi turned and left with his potbellied assistant, not even bothering to pick up the ledger lying on the ground.
Zhao Fusheng didn't bother with him. Even if he left now, he'd come back. The Soul-Life Register was in her hands, so he couldn't leave Wan'an County. As for what he really wanted from the bureau, she'd have a chance to find out later.
If he didn't send the coffins, she'd go to his shop and carry them off herself.
She looked at the Soul-Life Register. After hesitating a long moment, she didn't put it back in the box but tucked it into the front of her clothes.
The move startled Fan Bisi.
"I'll keep this on me," she said as she settled it.
Fan Bisi said nothing.
By rights, the commanding officer was supposed to keep it. But it bore a ghost language curse, so wearing it was effectively tying a fragment of another "ghost's" attention to her. Her every move might pass through the Soul-Life Register and into Jia Yi's "eyes." That was why commanding officers usually stored it elsewhere.
But he reflected that Zhao Fusheng was a ghost-controller, and she likely feared the ghost on her was slipping out of control, and wanted to use it to hold the ghost down. He nodded and said nothing.
Zhao Fusheng asked, "At the bureau, how are ghost cases normally taken in?"
"..." Fan Bisi gave her a strange look.
When she had threatened Old Zhang earlier, her smile had been enough to send chills down one's spine. But now, as she spoke of ghost cases, her face turned dead serious—she was clearly not joking.
"Fusheng, dealing with ghosts is no child's play," he warned with a frown.
"Words can't describe how terrifying they truly are. Right now, you hold all the power in Wan'an County, where heaven is high and the emperor is far away3. Why not just enjoy yourself? Why go looking for trouble with ghost cases?"
"I said I'm taking back the bureau, and taking on ghost cases is what I mean to do." Zhao Fusheng frowned.
She was nothing like the old Zhao Fusheng, and hadn't thought of hiding her nature. Perhaps because of the ghost on her, Fan Bisi dimly felt pressure when he spoke with her.
After a long silence, he gave up persuading her and said helplessly:
"Generally, when a ghost entity appears in the local area, someone has to report it first, and then the bureau acts."
But dealing with ghosts was never easy.
When local bureaus faced thorny situations, they dodged what they could and pushed off what they could. As long as things weren't too bad, they mostly suppressed public sentiment first, deceived the court, and only reported upward if matters grew too big to handle.
Unless they caused widespread chaos, the court couldn't truly control these ghost-controllers either. For the most part, the imperial officials turned a blind eye—as long as everything appeared fine on the surface.
As for ordinary commoners, ghosts were frightening, but sometimes malignant ghosts were less evil than human hearts.
To many, the ghost-controllers who dealt with the dead were no different from the specters themselves. If anything, they were worse—harboring human greed, desire, and malice that made them far crueler than any ghost.
Some families would rather have relatives harmed by a ghost than report to the bureau, afraid of worse consequences that might ruin the whole family.
So in each county's jurisdiction, ghost incidents were actually not frequent.
Even in a place like Wan'an County, where ghost fog was gradually spreading, hardly anyone reported cases.
"There have been scattered reports these past six months."
But the bureau had been in crisis then, and the Fan brothers had barely been able to protect themselves, so who had time to handle such things?
