IBGSW Chapter 80
A New Recruit
As soon as her injuries recovered, Zhao Fusheng felt completely refreshed.
Zhang Chuanshi fell to the ground screaming, as violent pain washed over him and made him roll about.
“My lord, my lord, save me.”
A large piece of flesh was torn from his cheek, and that face, usually a little sleazy, was now a mass of blood and flesh, blood gushing out in great streams through the gaping hole in the cheek, exposing a side of white, blood-stained teeth and a sinewy, bloody eyeball.
Zhao Fusheng sat cross-legged on the ground and looked down at him.
This old man was cunning and had designs of his own, but on this trip to Goutou Village he hadn’t caused trouble, and he would still be useful if she wanted to find Paperman Zhang.
She pulled the Soul-Life Register from her robe and pushed it into Zhang Chuanshi’s hands. “Hold on to this.”
Zhang Chuanshi, in agony, reacted with his body before his mind could turn, and at her words gripped the thing she handed over as if receiving an imperial decree.
He didn’t even have time to look at what it was. The moment it touched his hand, he felt as though some cold liquid flowed into his palm.
A thick smell of blood rose, and ghost talismans spread over the back of his hand and cheek in an instant, icy to the bone.
But the cold happened to suppress the violent pain. He stopped screaming and gasped for air, shaking all over.
The blood light in his eyes gradually faded, and with the pain held within a bearable range, he finally looked down at what Zhao Fusheng had given him.
On the Soul-Life Register, the name “Zhang Chuanshi” glowed blood-red, and a pair of resentful eyes watched him through the jade book.
Seeing this, Zhang Chuanshi jumped, almost throwing the register away.
But then he saw Zhao Fusheng’s warning look and realized it was this thing that was keeping him alive.
“Only a malignant ghost’s power can deal with a ghost.”
Zhao Fusheng reminded him, “You nearly died at a malignant ghost’s hands. You can only rely on the Soul-Life Register to stay alive. Until we get back to the bureau, hold this tight.”
Zhang Chuanshi realized in an instant why his pain had eased and nodded frantically. “Rest assured, I won’t let go, I won’t let go.”
The old man wasn’t stupid. He realized the register’s marvelous use.
Having his name on the Soul-Life Register made him one of Jia Yi’s spare ghost servants, and the malignant ghost would never be willing to let a ghost servant it had already in hand die elsewhere.
Though because of the great distance the malignant ghost’s power in this register might not be strong, it should be enough for the moment to dull the pain and keep him alive.
As long as he held the register, he could hold out until his injuries were no longer life-threatening.
Having worked this out, he hastily said, “I’ll protect it with my life and give it to nobody, and not even to Paperman Zhang if he asks...”
Zhao Fusheng gave him a meaningful look and then stood up.
Zhang Chuanshi, hugging the register, followed close behind her.
The people of Goutou Village were still screaming desperately.
Some, unable to endure the agony, had already fainted and fallen. Wu Shaochun rolled on the ground in pain, tears and snot streaming.
Since she’d come to Goutou Village to handle the case, this young man had run errands and helped her a bit. He was young and strong and rather quick-witted, but unfortunately, born in Goutou Village, he had been branded by the malignant ghost from birth, and now, though not dead, he was close to it.
Wu Shaochun’s injuries were severe. Without human intervention he wouldn’t survive.
Zhao Fusheng stopped in front of him.
Before she could speak, Zhang Chuanshi, reading her expression, endured the pain in his body and crouched down. “Hey, hey.”
Wu Shaochun no longer looked human.
His body was a mess of blood and flesh, as if most of his skin and flesh had been stripped away alive. Dying, he vaguely heard someone call, and turned his head...
Half the skin of his face had been peeled away, exposing the muscle beneath, with white tendons and blood vessels faintly visible, mixed with mud and grass bits, and Zhang Chuanshi retreated again and again in horror, letting out a cry.
“My, my lord, save me...”
After a while he seemed to recognize Zhao Fusheng, and reached out a hand to her for help.
Hearing this, Zhang Chuanshi raised a leg as if to kick him, and Zhao Fusheng hurriedly stopped him with a hand and asked, “Wu Shaochun.”
“It’s me...”
Wu Shaochun tried to push himself up, but his body was powerless, and in the end his hand merely clutched at empty air and fell, and he struggled until he touched the tip of Zhao Fusheng’s shoe.
His hand left a long trail of blood. Zhao Fusheng’s gaze fell on his fingers, bone showing, and she said, “I have a way to save your life, but even alive now, you’ll still face great danger in the future and may die.”
Zhang Chuanshi, holding the register, froze, seeming to guess what Zhao Fusheng was about to say.
“Are you willing to join the Demon-Suppression Bureau?” Zhao Fusheng asked.
Wu Shaochun’s consciousness was no longer clear, but he heard the words “save your life,” and with all his strength he nodded desperately.
Zhao Fusheng turned to Zhang Chuanshi. “Have him give a drop of blood to the register.”
Zhang Chuanshi agreed, took Wu Shaochun’s hand, and touched it to the Soul-Life Register.
The blood on Wu Shaochun’s finger had dried, but the moment the wound touched the register, it was as though an invisible mouth on the register “bit” his finger.
Blood gurgled out, a tiny black shadow full of resentful baleful aura flashed on the jade book, and finally turned into a name that appeared on the register.
“Wu Shaochun”!
Zhang Chuanshi had long heard about the bureau’s Soul-Life Register, and had even given blood to it himself, but when he saw this eerie scene he still turned his head away in terror.
Only after the name was branded onto the register and he knew it was done did he put the book away like a treasure and hug it to his chest.
“The Goutou Village case is over...”
Her business done, Zhao Fusheng prepared to head back.
Hearing that the Goutou Village case was finished, Zhang Chuanshi was both startled and delighted.
In fact, the moment all his memories returned, he’d guessed this ghost case must be over.
From the time the two decided to handle the ghost case to truly entering Goutou Village, only one night had passed.
This case had been eerie and terrifying. He hadn’t even seen the malignant ghost, yet had been caught in danger.
Memory disrupted over and over, and under such circumstances, how had Zhao Fusheng finished this ghost case?
“The ghost case, the ghost case is finished...?”
Zhang Chuanshi could hardly believe it.
Zhao Fusheng gave a light nod.
His blood-stained nostrils flared and his pupils dilated, and he asked instinctively, “Really finished?”
Zhao Fusheng frowned. Zhang Chuanshi’s heart clenched, and he lowered his voice. “And the ghost? Did the ghost leave?”
“The ghost was taken by me...”
Before she finished, chaotic footsteps came from afar, as if many people had rushed into the village.
The two speakers turned instinctively toward the sound.
The ghost fog had now dispersed, the horizon was faintly bright, and many people called as they walked, “My lord, my lord, Lord Zhao?”
“Here,” Zhao Fusheng answered.
Zhang Chuanshi’s eyes lit up. “It might be people from Wu’an Town1.”
From what he knew of the bureau’s past, when commanding officers went out there were many rules and great pomp: the local village and town would turn out in grand style to welcome them and offer fine wine, meat, and plenty of silver and jewels to wash away the dust of the road.
Yesterday Zhao Fusheng had bypassed the town and had the carriage go straight to the village. The people of Wu’an Town must have heard later, and fearing she’d punish them afterward, hadn’t dared show up until early this morning.
“Hmph, too late!”
Delighted at first, Zhang Chuanshi then grew angry. “My lord, you’ve finished the case and these dogs only come dawdling in now. What use are they?”
Zhao Fusheng shook her head and went out of the courtyard.
The people who’d come heard Zhang Chuanshi’s words and were frightened. Before they could rush in to beg pardon, they saw Zhao Fusheng come out and immediately knelt in a heap on the ground, not daring to rise.
“My lord, please forgive us.”
The leader pressed his hands to the ground and said fearfully, “We’re from Wu’an Town. I am Pang Biao2, constable of the town. We received word from the county only yesterday evening that you had come to Wu’an Town, and immediately summoned men through the night to hurry to Goutou Village...”
He feared that saying it too late would bring blame.
Ghost-controllers were gloomy and short-tempered, killing at a word to vent their anger.
“When we reached the village it was already late, and we found the village already shrouded in ghost fog...”
When Wu Dajing went into the county to report, he had said only that Goutou Village might have a ghost case.
But when Wu’an Town’s men actually reached Goutou Village and found ghost fog there, it meant there was truly a malignant ghost in the village, and ordinary people with no skill wouldn’t dare enter.
“We were afraid we couldn’t help you, my lord, and would only add to your trouble, so, so...”
“So you cowered outside and only dared come in this morning after seeing the ghost fog disperse and knowing the case was done,” Zhang Chuanshi sneered. “A pack of cowardly dogs.”
His face was now horrifying.
On one half of his face the skin hung loose, and the other side looked as if a steel blade had scraped off a great piece of flesh, exposing the gums and eyeball.
As he spoke, blood sizzled out, and his eyeball turned and moved, a sight that raised goosebumps.
Unnamed ghost curses were dense over his wounds, sealing the welling blood tightly.
Wounded like this, Zhang Chuanshi had not died but was lively and seemed in high spirits.
The eerie scene scared the wits out of Wu’an Town’s men, and they were scolded into dumb silence and dared not speak.
Zhao Fusheng saw through these people’s little thoughts. She let Zhang Chuanshi scold for a few minutes, then said lazily, “That’s enough.”
She had already handled two ghost cases and amply demonstrated her extraordinary strength.
Now that her authority was established, as soon as she spoke, Zhang Chuanshi, who had been so fierce before the Wu’an Town men, shut up and showed a meek look.
“My lord,” he said, a flattering smile on his half-intact face. “I just couldn’t stand them neglecting you.”
“We’ll let it go this time,” Zhao Fusheng said, glancing at Pang Biao and the others. “I’ll give you one chance to make up for it. The Goutou Village ghost case is solved. I sealed the malignant ghost.”
At this, not only did Pang Biao and the others raise their heads in shock, even Zhang Chuanshi gaped in disbelief.
Handling a ghost case and sealing a malignant ghost were two entirely different things.
Zhang Chuanshi had been close with Paperman Zhang and had lived next door to the bureau for years, and he knew how much pressure the bureau’s commanding officers faced in handling ghost cases.
All these years he had seen with his own eyes how often the Wan’an County bureau’s commanding officer position changed hands: the longest lasted a year or so, the shortest didn’t even survive a single ghost case.
Handling one case already meant staking your life, let alone sealing a ghost.
How had Zhao Fusheng done it?
She had handled two ghost cases back to back, yet looked clear-eyed, gentle in manner, calm in temperament, without any trace of irritability or madness, as if she hadn’t been affected by the malignant ghost at all.
Zhang Chuanshi clutched the Soul-Life Register tightly and dared not speak.
Zhao Fusheng looked behind her and said, “These are the survivors of the village. They were marked by the ghost and harmed by it. Immediately find people in town to treat the wounded and bury the dead.”
Pang Biao and the others dared not look up and listened quietly to her instructions.
“I don’t want to hear of an epidemic in Goutou Village or the nearby villages. After this is done, have the town head come in person to the county Demon-Suppression Bureau to see me. I want to know the results.”
“Yes,” Pang Biao and the others answered respectfully.
Zhao Fusheng added, “I promised them half a year’s tax relief. This year Goutou Village’s taxes are halved.”
“...” When Pang Biao first heard she’d handled the ghost case he was shocked, but Zhao Fusheng had successfully handled the Beggars’ Alley case before, and her reputation had spread all over Wan’an County and its jurisdiction, so handling another one wasn’t so unbelievable.
But when she mentioned tax relief, several yamen runners instinctively raised their heads.
If the Great Han’s court was a mountain pressing on the people’s heads, then to the common people of the Great Han, the local Demon-Suppression Bureaus were heavier than that mountain.
The court’s taxes could be paid late.
But the bureau’s taxes couldn’t be delayed for a moment, and moreover this tax applied equally to scholars and government people, who all had to contribute.
Even Pang Biao and the others had annual tax quotas to pay, and now, hearing Zhao Fusheng cut Goutou Village’s taxes, in their astonishment all showed undisguised envy.
“Our carriage is parked at Wu Lifu’s house...”
Mentioning Wu Lifu, she looked back, and the courtyard was full of wailing, every villager covered in blood, hardly anyone with intact flesh, and when they rolled on the ground, who could tell who was who?
Pang Biao was quick on his feet too, and hearing her pause, he hurried to flatter her. “When we learned you had come to Goutou Village, we feared they’d host you poorly, so we also prepared carriages. If you don’t mind, my lord, perhaps you could take that carriage back to town first, and once we find your own, we’ll drive it back to the town.”
Zhao Fusheng nodded. “No need to go to town. In a while, send someone to drive for us. I’m going back to the county today, and you’ll handle the aftermath.”
When she finished, she pointed at Wu Shaochun. “That man has been taken into the Demon-Suppression Bureau. He’s badly hurt and unfit to travel. Take him to town to be cared for, and after he recovers have him come find me at the county.”
Having given all her instructions, she didn’t linger and headed toward the village entrance.
Zhang Chuanshi hurried after her at a jog.
Pang Biao hadn’t lied.
Several carriages were parked outside the Goutou Village archway, one of them especially luxurious. She boarded without ceremony and sat, and Zhang Chuanshi climbed in after her and sat quietly in a corner.
The coachman sent from Wu’an Town soon took his seat and, trembling, greeted Zhao Fusheng, and with the crack of a whip the horses set off.
The Goutou Village case had finally come to an end.
It wasn’t until she was on the carriage that Zhao Fusheng finally had time to take stock of her gains this trip.
In her sea of consciousness the Investiture of the Gods was still in its state of “divine positions not yet unsealed,” and the one level of Hell she’d opened now held the first malignant ghost, imprisoned.
The second ghost case is done too.
Without noticing, the new book has completed two ghost cases and passed 300,000 characters.
In the Goutou Village case, the ghost’s origin was set as “unable to see the light,” so it has no name, no identity, and cannot be known to anyone, and thus its rule is to mark everyone who knows of its existence and then erase them one by one.
This property of the ghost means it can’t exist as a main body, so back when Wu Datong was alive it hid behind Wu Datong, and after Wu Datong’s death it hid behind Wu Liren.
Everyone it marked could become the main body it attached to, so in a way Fusheng was also initially one of its marked ones.
But later Fusheng found its origin among the clues, used her own human skin to piece together a paper figurine, and wrote its true birth date, which amounted to turning the tables and trapping it in the paper figurine.
After her amnesia Fusheng forgot this, but when she and Old Zhang suspected on the carriage that Wu Dajing was dead and Wu Dajing immediately appeared, she guessed then that the ghost had already attached itself to her.
So when her memory returned she understood at once that because she’d discovered the ghost, she must be its target for possession, which is why, when the paper figurine was half formed and lacked a name mark, she used the property that “whoever the ghost attaches to becomes the ghost” and wrote her own name, finally forming the substitute paper figurine that sealed the ghost.
The clues in this story are given out gradually as events unfold. Since it’s a mystery and supernatural story, I wanted to balance storytelling with a bit of thrill and fright, so the reading experience would be better for everyone.
