In the Blood Moon, there were countless eerie tales of ghosts and monsters.
Painted Skins, coroners, butchers, and the like.
Legend said there were a hundred kinds of ghost, but in truth mankind had actually laid eyes on fewer than three in ten.
Jin Buhuan was among the most mysterious existences in all those eerie legends.
He had always taken it for nothing more than a story.
He'd never dreamed it was real.
But then...
This roast duck had been meant to celebrate Chen Qing's coming-of-age. Eighteen yuan—and in the blink of an eye it had appreciated five hundred thousand times over.
He was itching to act, but the fever had him now; all he could do was wait for tomorrow.
The next day.
Chen Qing was feeling better. He packed the gold duck into a hiking backpack and headed out.
The biggest gold dealer in the city was called Baifu Jewelry.
"I'd like to sell ten gold bars."
The counter clerk blinked. Big clients like this weren't a common sight.
She sized Chen Qing up—young, not a stitch on him worth more than fifty yuan—and naturally didn't believe a word of it.
Still, in the service trade, no one was foolish enough to let it show on their face.
Chen Qing was shown to a VIP room.
When he heaved out the gold duck, the floor manager was struck dumb on the spot.
"This is..."
His first reaction was that it had to be fake.
His second reaction... was also that it had to be fake.
A gold duck?!
A gold roast duck, at that?!
It was too lifelike!
Every little bump on the duck skin stood out clearly. Even a wing with half its feathers plucked, and the stubble of quills not fully cleaned away, were rendered to the life.
"My family used to run a chain of roast-duck shops. This was the treasure of the house."
Only then did the floor manager believe it a fraction.
He called for a spectrometer.
Everyone here had dealt with gold their whole lives, but a gold duck was a first—and one this large, no less.
So anyone with nothing to do crowded into the VIP room to gawk at the marvel; even a few counter clerks came by in shifts to look.
One pass with the handheld spectrometer: Au 100%!
That proved the gold content was at least 99.9 percent.
Utterly absurd!
"Sir, if you wish to sell this, we'll need to cut it open."
"Cut it."
A few guards brought out hydraulic shears half a man tall.
They'd all forgotten the last time they'd had cause to use this big beauty.
With some effort they snipped off a piece of wing and ran it through a benchtop spectrometer of even higher precision...
Still Au 100%!
Which meant the purity reached at least 99.999 percent!
Utterly absurd!
They tested the density too: 19.32 g/cm³, textbook-standard!
Then they melted it into liquid with a blowtorch—still the most standard gold there was.
"This is a little hard to believe."
"Talk about a holy shit moment!"
"Absurd knocks on Absurd's door—it's absurd all the way home!"
A gold duck this size was worth half a year's total scrap intake for the shop. Before long, a higher-ranking manager arrived as well.
To be safe, they cut the gold duck into a good twenty-odd pieces.
Only then did they discover that even on the hidden inner surfaces, the duck's ribs had been carved out to the life.
Was that even necessary?
Some master craftsman showing off his skill?
The shop's manager stayed at Chen Qing's side the whole time, all courtesy and politeness.
At last, the gold duck was fully verified.
21,259.33 grams in total.
At today's scrap rate of 440, that came to 9,354,105.2 yuan.
9.3 million!
The manager's mouth split into a crooked grin.
Scrap buying, of course, meant buying low and selling high; on this one duck alone they'd clear at least a million. Factor in fabrication fees, and it was more still.
"Wire nine million to a card, the rest in cash."
"No problem!"
Nine million landed in his account in no time, and the cash was brought to Chen Qing in an elegant wooden box.
Chen Qing went home, tore out the box's golden silk lining, and wrapped it around the outside.
Inside, he stashed some rope and a hammer.
He might need them climbing the Ghostless Pagoda.
Chen Man had been watching the whole time. "Chen Qing, are you selling the apartment?"
Chen Qing gave a small start. Had making Chen Man photograph the loan-shark numbers put the idea in his head?
"Didn't you say no matter how broke we got, we'd never sell this place?"
Chen Man's face was expressionless as he said it.
"Do you trust me?" Chen Qing crouched down.
"I trust you."
Chen Man nodded, then shook his head. "But if we sell the apartment, when Chen Shan and Chen Kuan come back, they won't be able to find us."
Chen Shan was their father.
Chen Kuan was their eldest brother.
The two of them had vanished without a trace. But last life, before the Blood Moon, Chen Kuan had come back once.
He'd left behind the paper armor and paper blade that Chen Qing and Chen Man had leaned on to survive all the way to the third Blood Moon.
Only, that day the brothers hadn't been home, and they'd missed him.
"Don't worry, they'll call." Chen Qing offered a few words of comfort, then—too lazy to cook—ordered takeout instead.
He told Chen Man to lock the door and get to sleep, then set out in the last of the evening light for the Ghostless Temple.
The Ghostless Temple.
Not large in scale, but with a long history.
By the entrance stood a small booth with a simple sign: Adults 15 yuan, children 10 yuan, children under 110 cm free.
For an ordinary attraction it would have closed by now, but the Ghostless Temple was different—a thin trickle of worshippers still lingered at this hour.
Chen Qing bought a ticket, went inside, and made straight for the abbot.
He found the old monk in reading glasses, thumbing through short videos.
"What brings you here, benefactor?"
"I've come to fulfill a vow." Chen Qing's tone was pious, and he gestured to the box wrapped in yellow brocade at his side. "When my grandfather was alive, there was a stretch when he was on the brink of ruin. Later he came to this temple, to the—is it the Demon-Suppressing Pagoda?"
"The Ghostless Pagoda."
"Ah, right, to the Ghostless Pagoda, to pray. After that his business went smoothly, and he lived to a peaceful old age. So today I've come specially to the Ghostless Pagoda to fulfill his vow."
Chen Qing spun the lie without a hitch. "Things haven't been going too well at home lately either, so along with the vow, I'd like to spend a night here—to wash off the bad luck clinging to me."
"Benefactor," the abbot said, troubled, "the Ghostless Pagoda has fallen into disrepair. It's been locked up for a long time."
Chen Qing pushed two thick envelopes across. "Master, please, do me this kindness. I know these things are terribly vulgar, but it's a small token from a man who reveres the Buddha—use it to mend the temple gate, or whatever's needed."
The abbot's eyes lit up bright!
It had been years since he'd met a benefactor this generous and openhanded!
At once his face was all smiles. "Such filial devotion, of course we must honor it. Hui—never mind. Benefactor, I'll take you there myself."
And so, tucking the two envelopes away as smoothly as could be, he led Chen Qing around behind the temple.
The front of the temple was tastefully developed, but the rear half was still primitive.
The whole path was choked with deep weeds.
The abbot switched on his phone's flashlight...
And at last, Chen Qing saw the Ghostless Pagoda.
Seven stories, and truly worse for wear—nearly every level draped in cobwebs.
After much rattling, the abbot finally got the lock open.
A gust of mold and dust hit them in the face.
There was a scrabbling, scurrying sound too—probably startled rats.
"Benefactor, no one has tended this place in a very, very long time..." The abbot looked a little embarrassed.
Chen Qing shook his head. "It's fine."
Making no complaint, he knelt straight down on a dust-caked prayer cushion.
As pious as pious could be.
"Amitabha, Amitabha."
The abbot pressed his palms together and slowly withdrew.
"Abbot, please lock the door behind you."
The abbot faltered for a moment, then did as asked and locked it.
Chen Qing wanted this precisely because he feared they'd grow uneasy—if someone came to check late at night and saw the door open, he'd be finished.
He took in his surroundings.
Reeking of mold, thick with dust, grotesque ghost statues everywhere, and rats flitting past now and then.
For a man who'd survived a Ghost Tide, this hardly counted as frightening.
The Ghostless Temple fell quiet around nine at night.
By twelve, there wasn't a single sound left. Chen Qing, aching all over from kneeling so long, worked his stiff body loose and slowly rose.
Half of Ximing knew the Seven-Treasure Demon-Suppressing Pagoda came from the Ghostless Temple—the seventh floor.
Chen Qing softened his footsteps, clicked on the flashlight, and climbed step by careful step.
Creak... creak...
The floorboards were far from steady, groaning with every step.
He crept up to the second floor.
Inside stood a statue: a ghost nailed to the ground, snarling and howling.
The third floor had a statue too—a ghost bound tight with rope.
The fourth, fifth, and sixth floors all had statues as well.
Then Chen Qing's brow furrowed.
The staircase to the seventh floor had collapsed.
He'd brought rope, but nothing to go with it—no grappling hook or the like.
At the window he gently pried loose half a brick already worked free, tied it to the end of the rope, and tossed it lightly up toward the stairwell opening.
Thunk!
A dull thud.
At once, the seams in the whole floor above bled cascades of dust, sifting down in soft sheets.
He pulled, and the brick slid smoothly back down.
Chen Qing caught the falling brick and frowned in spite of himself.
The temple wasn't big, wasn't small; the noise probably wouldn't carry to the front. But what if it did?
Thinking that, he wound a thick coil of rope around the brick and threw it up again.
Thunk!
Another dull thud.
Chen Qing shook the rope every which way, trying to snag it on something.
Once again, failure.
Then a third time, a fourth...
About twenty tries in.
Finally, on one more swing, the slack rope snapped taut in an instant!
It had caught on something!
Chen Qing was overjoyed.
He tugged a few times to test it—it held nice and firm.
Right away he stamped a loop of the rope around his foot, gripped it between both feet, and inched his way up to the seventh floor.
The flashlight swept over it—and Chen Qing's heart lurched!
The other end of the rope was clutched in the hand of a blue-faced, fanged ghost—and it was winking at him.
TL Notes:
TL Note: Painted Skin — a classic Chinese ghost that wears a human skin as a disguise; it recurs later as one of this world's ghost types.