Ch53 – The Chosen Lucky Goose

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Zong Jiu felt terrible.

He felt as though all of him was plunged into ice water stuffed full of ice cubes, and his body, already without its consciousness, became as cold as an ice cellar.
A purplish-blue hue spread across his lips, and it was as though ice shards had crystallised on his coarse linen clothes, freezing tightly to his body, the chill permeating his bone marrows. 

For it to be this cold, something had obviously happened.

He was willing to bet that he was the chosen lucky goose winning the grand opportunity to have his soul drift out of his mouth!

 

 

Zong Jiu already had an ominous premonition back when Grandma Yin spoke those words.

After all, among the many trainees present, he was the only one who held the mole identity card.
This was before even mentioning that his identity as a mole was that of a novice corpse chaser, which had a natural affinity with unorthodox professions like Yin walking.
Pressing it further and taking into account how they both dabbled in things imbued with Yin energy, they could even be considered professions that went hand in hand with each other.
It was only fitting that now the ‘good grace’ was bestowed unto him. 

Zong Jiu sorrowfully opened his eyes.

 

However, contrary to what he expected, it wasn’t the pitch-black temple nor himself floating under the vaulted roof that entered his field of vision.

He was still standing on land.

Only, the vast expanse was a dead, dreary grey and thick layers of fog flooded the surroundings, giving off a sense of surreality.

 

Even Zong Jiu was a bit stupefied at first, but when he glanced down at his own milky white body, realisation instantly dawned on him.

Did he seriously get brought down to the nether world?

Once figuring out this puzzle, Zong Jiu felt that the deathly-still continent, the gloomy sky of never-ending night, the murky fog,  and the concentrated Yin energy were explainable.

It was extremely perilous to descend to the nether world. 

While Zhuge An claimed to not interfere in the plot of this instance, in reality, he was unable to resist the occasional outbursts of his hidden chatterbox attribute, and took the afternoon to enlighten Zong Jiu on popular science.

Yin walkers would usually establish a time point, or use some other method, to remind themselves that they belonged to the mortal world.

This was because after descending to the nether world, if they couldn’t find their way back when Yin walking, or if the wrapping of Yin energy around them caused them to forget their spell, then Yin walkers would be eternally trapped in the realm of the dead, never to return to the mortal world.

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Without a soul, a body in the living realm would naturally transform into a corpse. 

The barrier to entry to being a Yin walker was even higher than being a corpse chaser.
At a young age, Yin walkers would manifest a gift for having their souls leave their bodies, and only people with this gift could learn how to Yin walk.
As such, Yin walkers generally only had a single line of succession, further exacerbated by the perils involved with this profession, wherein they could possibly get a single-way ticket down to visit the Yellow Springs of the afterlife.

This profession, similar to corpse chasing, had largely petered out by now.
The only place where one could find such eccentric professions would be in horror instances.

After thinking it through, Zong Jiu decided to check out the surroundings first, and with any luck, find Grandma Yin.
Otherwise, it definitely wouldn’t bode well for him, a very much alive and breathing mortal, to get trapped in the nether world for too long.

He slowly walked onwards. 

After taking just one step, Zong Jiu realised that he had floated up.

Zong Jiu, “…”

 

With much difficulty, he controlled himself from sliding forward, when he suddenly felt a foreboding gust whip around him.

We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection.
If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.

After taking that first step, the obscure dense fog disappeared.
What replaced it was a long mountain range in the far distance, a city where countless red lanterns hung suspended, a tall tower with a black lock that rose steeply from the ground, and a blood-red full moon that was stitched in the night canopy. 

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[The trainee is situated in a special scene where material props cannot be used.] 

The white-haired young man was startled.

He reacted quickly, immediately turning tail and running like mad, trying whatever props he had on him.

First, the tarot deck was unusable.

Next, those supernatural props he had exchanged in the casino were unusable. 

The Strange Black Box was even more point-blank.
He was only able to grab hell money from it, at best.

Zong Jiu cursed under his breath, glancing at the ghastly faces that hemmed him in on all sides, and was about to back away when his finger suddenly brushed against something in his pocket.

He froze for a brief moment before quickly realising that these were his corpse chaser props.

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The props assigned to the mole in this instance couldn’t be kept in the system backpack at present, which was why Zong Jiu had kept the Soul Devouring Bell and the talisman papers in his pocket.
He didn’t expect that after transforming into a spiritual body, these two items would also be brought down with him. 

“Linglinglingling—”

The Soul Devouring Bell was useless against humans as it couldn’t be heard by the living.
But it was an unbearable, harrowing clamour that pierced the ears of ghosts and demons.

The ghouls all restrained their expressions, fluttering and dancing about in the air, no longer daring to approach that white-haired young man.

Zong Jiu let out a sigh of relief, shaking the Soul Devouring Bell as he slowly walked ahead. 

The only problem was that the Soul Devouring Bell could only be used for a maximum duration of ten minutes, with a half-hour cooldown.

He mentally gauged the distance, planning first to charge into the faraway ghost city before making follow-up plans.

 

But just then, unexpectedly, a wizened hand suddenly perched lightly on his right shoulder.

Zong Jiu’s pupils contracted.
He abruptly turned his head back. 

Grandma Yin, clad in her heavy black robes, was standing behind him, carrying a lamp.

A crimson candle hung inside the Yin walking lamp, dyed with a red flame on its wick that burned slowly.
Zong Jiu recalled that she had mentioned in the temple that if she hadn’t returned before the candle burnt to its end, then she would be unable to return for eternity.

Her voice was shrill and even more raspy and grating to the ears than the night parade of a hundred demons.

“Child, why are you here?” 

Zong Jiu affected a lost expression.
“I don’t know; I appeared here after I finished chanting the spell.”

“Forget it.
Since you’re here, then just follow me.”

On this hellish earth that was suffused with Yin energy, Grandma Yin also appeared unwilling to waste time on talking, motioning for Zong Jiu to follow her.

The Yin walking lamp cast a dim glow that pushed aside the dark clouds and eerie white arms, opening up an illuminated road amidst the swarm of ghosts and demons. 

With light, one could see the supernatural apparitions in the nether world.

In the years of great famine, countless had died of starvation, and millions of common folk had collapsed on the roads.
Even the underworld officials were short-handed.
If a commoner died, they could only drift around for several months before being guided down to the realm beneath.
Even so, the wandering spirits of the dead lining up to register their names were as innumerable as the many hairs on an ox; the courts of the underworld wouldn’t be able to finish counting them even if they worked overtime.

Zong Jiu followed behind Grandma Yin, the doubt in his heart intensifying.

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He felt that this was truly a rather bizarre coincidence. 

Without someone meddling in what should have only been an ‘out-of-body’ experience, how could he have, for no rhyme or reason, followed a Yin walker down to the nether world?

It was so coincidental that he turned a suspicious gaze to the hunched-over figure of the person walking in front of him.

Everyone had assigned Grandma Yin as a support-type NPC from the beginning.
After all, it was impossible for an instance to put them through the wringer without providing at least one support character.

Since she had given them hints and provided them quite a lot of information, even providing the temple as a safe haven for the trainees, this was sufficient to prove Grandma Yin’s identity.
Her actions didn’t appear faked, thus the trainees naturally lowered their guards. 

As he was the mole, there was a likelihood that he and these support characters would be diametrically opposed to each other.

Zong Jiu had once suspected that Grandma Yin was the perfect corpse that he had to get.

 

He had originally intended to seize the opportunity when Grandma Yin’s spirit had left her body to verify if she was his task objective.
Otherwise, he wouldn’t have taken care to pick the nearest spot to Grandma Yin.

Zong Jiu ruminated over this for a long time, but still decided to bide his time for now. 

At present, as a mortal in the nether world, he was forced to depend on the Yin walking lamp.

After the business here was done, he would still have time to verify this conjecture.

With this in mind, he walked with Grandma Yin through the hellish earth that was occupied by the many ghosts and demons, walking towards the ghost city in the distance.

As they walked, Zong Jiu pretended to casually ask, “Grandma Yin, where are we going?” 

His question sank like a stone in the sea.

Just when Zong Jiu was about to ask a second time, the eerie voice finally spoke up.

“To find that old woman’s soul.”

Zong Jiu, “Where are we looking?” 

“Why do you have so many questions? Just follow me.”

And so Zong Jiu obediently stopped asking.

He followed behind Grandma Yin, walking through the desolate chilly wasteland of hell, past the rolling tides of the river of forgetfulness, to arrive before the ghost city.

On the way over, countless ghosts were sizing them up. 

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No matter how hungry they were, the Yin walking lamp emanated a fearsome aura to them; no matter what, they wouldn’t dare take a step closer.

The line in front of the ghost city extended beyond what the eye could see.

Basking in the unkind gazes of the crowd of ghosts, they directly cut the queue, walking right up to the front.

At the foot of the black basalt walls, ghost officials carrying red lanterns registered every ghost that passed through. 

Zong Jiu raised his gaze and looked inside, noticing that the roads in the city were neat and tidy, with vibrant red lanterns hung on both sides.

Tight rows of houses lined the roads, and there were even carriages pulled by young ghosts making their way.
At a glance, the entire city was densely packed with ghosts.

 

The courts of the underworld, where, in traditional Chinese culture, people belonged in the afterlife, weren’t actually as scary as people made them out to be.

Like how the mortal world had its laws, the nether world had its laws as well.
With the plight afflicting the realm of the living, people, unable to feed themselves, wouldn’t have the opportunity to have children.
As such, the chances of reincarnation had also dropped steeply. 

The ghost official didn’t even raise his head.
The white skeletal hand nimbly wrote on rice paper: Line up one by one, those who cut the queue will be flogged.

It was only when he dipped the calligraphic ink that he sensed this aura resembled a living soul and raised his head.

“So you’re here to find someone.”

The ghost official waved a hand, getting a ghost child on one side to temporarily take over his work, then spoke, “Did you bring one?” 

Grandma Yin inclined her body, revealing the white-haired young man behind her.

“Not bad.”

After seeing Zong Jiu, satisfaction shone in the ghost official’s eyes.
He stroked his long beard before saying, “Come with me.”

He brought the two of them into the government building closest to the city gates. 

After entering the government building, Grandma Yin was welcomed to the front lobby, whereas the ghost official led Zong Jiu alone to the rear hall.

Zong Jiu wasn’t a fool.
With this turn of events, he could guess that Grandma Yin was scheming to tear down his bridge of return across the river, and thus he quietly gripped the Soul Devouring Bell hidden in his sleeve.

Who would have expected that after bringing him to the rear hall, the ghost official would give him a pitying look, saying bluntly, “Ask.”

Zong Jiu didn’t have a complete grasp of the situation, so he followed his original plan and asked about the old woman from Tongbai village three years ago. 

The ghost official was caught off-guard that he actually chose to ask this instead.
He said, startled, “She had long ascended to the ranks of the immortals, why would she grace our lowly underworld?”