Fu Jinshu grasped Wei Yunchan’s hand. Over the past few days, Wei Yunchan had put on some weight, and his palms were no longer as bony and withered as before. Fu Jinshu slowly traced characters into his palm: [Not fat].
Wei Yunchan pinched his plump hand right back. Ever since they had formed the habit of holding hands to sleep, Wei Yunchan had grown completely accustomed to touching this hand; the thickness of the joints and the length of the fingers were firmly etched in his memory.
He was indeed not fat; Wei Yunchan had just been teasing him, and holding it in his hand felt quite comfortable.
“Cares whether you’re fat or not. I’m going to sleep, stop bothering me.”
With that, he closed his eyes and drifted off into a hazy slumber while keeping a firm grip on Fu Jinshu’s hand.
Fu Jinshu closed his eyes to rest for a moment. Once Wei Yunchan’s breathing grew steady and deep, he gently disengaged his hand from the other’s grasp, slipped out of bed, and left the room without making a single sound.
Guards stood watch outside the door, but Fu Jinshu cast an invisibility spell and walked right out of the estate through the main entrance in broad daylight. Within a few blinks of an eye, he arrived at the tailoring shop on the edge of the city the exact same shop he had visited with Madam Wen that morning to make clothes.
Why couldn’t the subordinates of those powerful nobles see the massive storefront even when they tracked the exact location?
How was the shopkeeper able to custom-make exquisitely peerless garments in a mere day and a half?
The answer was simple: the owner of this shop was not human at all.
Or rather, none of the people inside this shop were “human.”
To prevent the other party from setting up deceptive illusions, Fu Jinshu had deliberately left a positioning talisman on one of the errand boys before leaving today. Tracking it all the way here had gone smoothly.
Wei Yunchan had good fortune; Fu Jinshu had just been worrying over how to find a way into the Ghost Realm, and now, stumbling across a few ghosts by pure coincidence, didn’t that mean getting his hands on Yellow Springs water had a promising path forward?
With a light leap, Fu Jinshu easily entered the courtyard. The moment his feet touched the ground, an angry shout suddenly rang out from thin air: “Audacious wretch, how dare you trespass into this lord’s residence!”
The next instant, a ferocious skeleton soldier lunged toward Fu Jinshu. Amidst its bone-chilling roars, gloomy winds surged, and eerie, hair-raising cackles echoed through the air.
Unflustered, Fu Jinshu flicked one hand, igniting a cluster of red flames between his five fingers. Rising into the air, he grabbed the skeleton soldier by its bare neck and applied a slight squeeze; the skeleton soldier, which had looked so imposing just a moment ago, instantly crumbled directly into fine powder.
The flames vanished in a flash.
Fu Jinshu flicked his hand and pulled out a handkerchief to gently wipe his fingertips, which bore no dust at all.
The old ghost who had just called him a “wretch” revealed his true form, prostrating himself on the ground with three kowtows and nine prostrations, trembling as he stammered: “This humble one had eyes but failed to recognize Mount Tai! Please, Your Honor, raise your hand high and spare my life!”
Although Fu Jinshu could not speak aloud, he could convey his thoughts using mental telepathy.
Upon learning his intention, the old ghost looked somewhat troubled. “Your Honor, after this humble one died, I relied on absorbing the spiritual energy of an earthen bodhisattva by the graveside to cultivate and take human form, and I never went to undergo reincarnation… If this humble one leads Your Honor to the Ghost Realm and gets discovered by the underworld soldiers, my two hundred years of cultivation will all go down the drain…”
Over the years, he had hidden in Yunliang City under the guise of “Tailor Gao,” focusing purely on cultivation without ever committing any heinous acts. He had even taken in a few stray, lonely ghosts, providing them with incense, candles, and paper money to fill their bellies and save them from the misery of wandering aimlessly.
Yet if they were caught by the underworld soldiers, their group would inevitably be punished by being cast into the beast realm, unable to become human even in their next life.
Fu Jinshu told him that he would guarantee his safety, so he only needed to lead the way.
The old ghost had no right to refuse, and could only agree with trembling fear.
“When do you wish to go?”
Fu Jinshu replied: Wait a few more days.
“Understood, this humble one will quietly await your arrangements.”
The old ghost respectfully saw off this terrifying deity and returned to his room, still shaken with lingering fear—he possessed at least two hundred years of cultivation, yet he couldn’t perceive a single trace of that being’s true form. In the present world, a spirit with such cultivation probably hovered on the threshold of ascending to divinity.
Fu Jinshu returned to the Wei family estate. The moment he reached the front entrance, he sensed the black mark branded on the doorframe.
Just as he anticipated, as Wei Yunchan’s health recovered, the mastermind behind the scenes could no longer sit still. Fu Jinshu was quite curious what kind of “unwelcome guest” this was today.
No matter what the opponent was, however, they were bound to suffer today.
The barrier he had set up was ruthless: anything lacking sufficient cultivation would be instantly reduced to ashes; those with a bit of cultivation, even if they managed to withstand it slightly, would still sustain severe internal damage. As for those with profound cultivation—Fu Jinshu pushed the door open and entered if their cultivation were truly profound, they would have broken his barrier long ago; why would they be unable to even step through the front door?
Inferior demonic entities; not worth mentioning.
Peeling off his outer robe, Fu Jinshu lay back down beside Wei Yunchan. Without him around, Wei Yunchan’s entire body remained ice-cold; despite sleeping for so long, not a single trace of warmth could be felt.
Seemingly sensing his presence, Wei Yunchan unconsciously drifted closer, muttering incoherently, “Little meat bun…”
Fu Jinshu felt extremely dissatisfied with the nickname the other had given him.
To shape this physical body required a tremendous amount of effort and energy from Fu Jinshu, yet this fellow Wei Yunchan clearly had tastes worlds apart from his own, addressing him constantly as “lazy pig” and “little meat bun.”
Allowing Wei Yunchan to capture his hand once more, Fu Jinshu fell peacefully back to sleep.
Though Wei Yunchan’s complexion looked much better, lacking the aid of Yellow Springs water to thoroughly shed his mortal coil and exchange his bones, his face was still wrapped in lingering sickness, looking lean and gaunt.
A divination hex once cast for him by Grandmaster Heji suddenly flashed through Fu Jinshu’s mind:
[Unfeeling resolves unattachment, ascension brings severance].
How was one supposed to interpret this?
He couldn’t even touch the shadow of affection and love.
Wei Yunchan’s temperament was hardly charming; he was aloof, indifferent, and possessed a razor-sharp tongue, while his current appearance offered no appeal whatsoever. Fu Jinshu stared at him for a long while before finally comforting himself: perhaps once they obtained the Yellow Springs water and completely washed away Wei Yunchan’s sickly aura, Wei Yunchan would be able to reshape his handsomeness, and then maybe he could manage to stir a tiny bit of emotional warmth?
Yet what did feeling a stir of emotion even feel like? Fu Jinshu was utterly clueless.
Unable to figure it out, he simply stopped thinking about it.
Snuggling into Wei Yunchan’s embrace, he closed his eyes and slept straight until daylight broke.
Wei Yunchan had grown accustomed to the posture they woke up in every single day. Shoving the person clinging to him away, Wei Yunchan got up to change his clothes. Tomorrow was Fu Jinshu’s birthday, and Wei Yunchan had commissioned an item as a birthday gift for him. Today was the scheduled time and place to settle the transaction and collect the goods.
“Young Master, the White Jade Peony Pendant you requested is right here. Please open the box and inspect the goods.”
Wei Yunchan opened the box. The small, exquisite jade pendant inside glowed with a bright luster and was pure white throughout. Although small, it was meticulously carved into the shape of a blooming peony flower, radiating an aura of wealth and prestige.
“Acceptable.” Wei Yunchan closed the box and handed it to the attendant behind him. The attendant received it and carefully tucked it away inside his sleeve pouch.
Since he called it acceptable, it meant it was quite good. Having crossed paths with him a few times before, the merchant already knew the rules and smiled as he stated the price: “Six hundred and eighty taels.”
An exclamation of shock burst out beside Wei Yunchan: “Six hundred and eighty taels?!”
The merchant smiled cordially and explained to the speaker, “Young Master Lin, this jade pendant is carved from a piece of Tianshui mutton-fat warm jade—the only piece of its kind in the entire world. Just the raw material alone is priceless.”
Lin Jinzhou asked skeptically, “If it’s the only piece in the world, six hundred and eighty taels actually sounds a bit too cheap, doesn’t it?”
The merchant stroked his beard and laughed heartily, “Hahaha, Young Master Lin speaks wisely. Therefore, the six hundred and eighty taels old me refers to is gold.”
The tea Lin Jinzhou had just sipped sprayed out in a violent rush, splashing a few droplets onto the back of Wei Yunchan’s hand. The air pressure around Wei Yunchan plummeted instantly as he turned his head slightly to glare at Lin Jinzhou.
That icy gaze scared Lin Jinzhou so badly he jolted, hurriedly pulling out a handkerchief to wipe it clean while smoothly offering his plea for mercy: “Young Master, spare my life! I was wrong!”
If not for the bond of growing up together, a blockhead with limbs as developed and a brain as simple as Lin Jinzhou’s would have offended Wei Yunchan countless times and died a hundred deaths over.
“Making a fuss over nothing.” Wei Yunchan raised his hand slightly in a dismissive gesture, and the attendant behind him immediately pulled out a promissory note.
After Wei Yunchan wrote down the amount and stamped his seal, the attendant picked it up and handed it to the merchant. “Any money house in Yunliang can cash this. Please keep it safe, sir.”
“Many thanks, then this humble person will take his leave. If Young Master needs anything else in the future, feel free to look for me.” The merchant bowed to Wei Yunchan, tucked away the note, and departed.
Lin Jinzhou sighed with emotion, “Young Master, you treat Madam so well. Those rumors claiming you loathe Madam bitterly and subject him to daily torture and humiliation are truly complete nonsense!”
Wei Yunchan’s action of sipping tea paused.
Loathing him bitterly was out of the question; after all, Fu Jinshu had “saved” his life, and besides being somewhat spoiled and stubbornly foolish, Fu Jinshu had no other glaring flaws that made him intolerable.
As for torture and humiliation, that was even more absurd. Fu Jinshu was currently practically ruling the roost in the Wei household; backed by his parents, if Fu Jinshu didn’t torture him, it would already count as accumulating virtue and doing good deeds.