Chapter 280
Chapter 280
In the living room, Anning kept her head bowed, her back hunched and her long hair hanging loose.
But the Ninth Concubine now occupied her consciousness.
Assistant He was so frightened that he crouched down on the spot. He kept insisting that he had come to take notes, yet he could not even manage to pull out his notebook.
“This junior, Chen Mo, pays his respects to Immortal Maiden Xu.”
I hurriedly gave her a cupped-fist salute, raising my hands level with my nose.
Holding a cupped-fist salute before one’s chest was ordinary etiquette. Raising it to the nose showed respect, while raising it to the forehead was reserved for deities.
“You summoned me using the methods of a folk practitioner. Are you a practitioner?” the Ninth Concubine asked.
I hurriedly replied, “This junior has only just entered the field and would not dare call himself a practitioner. I came to visit because I wished to ask you about something that happened a century ago.”
“A century ago…”
The Ninth Concubine fell silent for several seconds before saying faintly, “You want to ask about the Luo Mansion?”
I nodded. “That’s right. The Luo Mansion.”
She suddenly raised her head. Fortunately, it was Anning’s face, which I had long since grown accustomed to seeing.
Even so, those white eyes sent a chill through me.
She was no ordinary ghost. She had lived for more than a hundred years and spent decades as an experienced practitioner, becoming well versed in the affairs of Yin and Yang while still alive.
Ghosts might all be ghosts after death, but the extraordinary aura surrounding her was unmistakable.
“Why are you investigating the Luo Mansion?”
“I mean no harm, Senior.”
I told her the truth without concealing anything. “The original site of the Luo Mansion is being redeveloped, but the wronged spirits there have been causing trouble. The developer hired another expert and me to deal with them.”
“You must know how dangerous that place is. We nearly lost our lives and had no choice but to uncover the truth before trying to solve the problem.”
“I disturbed you because I wanted to learn the truth. You have benefited the people who live nearby and are known for your benevolence. A hundred years have passed since the tragedy at the Luo Mansion, so I hope you can let go of your old grievances and help us.”
In all honesty, I had been exceedingly polite and respectful.
After all, the Ninth Concubine was my senior in this field. I chose every word with the utmost care, terrified of saying anything wrong.
Yet despite all my caution, I still seemed to have misspoken.
“The wronged spirits of the Luo Mansion?”
Anning’s eyes bored into me. “You think they were wronged?”
I swallowed and hurriedly corrected myself. “No, they weren’t. Those sons of bitches were not wronged in the slightest! I misspoke. I saw with my own eyes how Xiuzhu died and how they tormented her. From the bottom of my heart, I believe they deserved to die. I only… want to understand exactly what happened back then.”
The Ninth Concubine sighed. A century later, she might have come to terms with it, but her voice still held sorrow. “Xiuzhu… my poor Xiuzhu…”
“Back then, I married into the Luo Mansion not only to take revenge, but also to take Xiuzhu away. She was my sister’s only daughter.”
“But I never expected them to kill Xiuzhu anyway…”
I quickly asked, “Why didn’t you intervene back then?”
The Ninth Concubine let out a long sigh. “I couldn’t. I followed the literary path of cultivation. I was only twenty when I married into the Luo Mansion, just a young woman who knew a little magic, and what little I knew could not be used against people.”
The literary path of cultivation focused solely on studying metaphysical arts and magic, without any training in hand-to-hand combat.
There was also the martial path. Martial practitioners learned metaphysical arts and magic as well, but placed more emphasis on training their bodies and fighting skills.
Most folk practitioners followed the literary path. Martial practitioners were more common in times of chaos.
Seventh Master probably cultivated both the literary and martial paths.
Back then, the Ninth Concubine had been a complete novice who knew only a few minor spells. If someone attacked her, she might not even have been able to fight back.
“I never married or had children of my own because of the guilt I felt over Xiuzhu.”
The Ninth Concubine suddenly choked up. “I failed to protect Xiuzhu. I could only watch as they beat her to death. I wasn’t fit to be a mother at all. In those troubled times, I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to protect my own child. I was afraid my child would end up like Xiuzhu.”
“A little girl of only nine was beaten to death and thrown into a well. I couldn’t even recover her body.”
The Ninth Concubine’s remorse was deeply moving.
It seemed that even after so many years, she had never managed to come to terms with Xiuzhu’s death.
“Did you fake your death back then?” I asked.
She nodded. “Xiuzhu died in the autumn of that year, and her death hastened the destruction of the Luo Mansion. Not long after Xiuzhu died, I faked my own death there. In fact, faking my death had been part of my plan from the beginning.”
“Before I ‘died,’ I told Luo Baichuan not to bury my body. All he had to do was keep the Seven-Star Lamps burning and revive me on New Year’s Eve in winter. After I came back to life, we could still spend the rest of our lives together.”
Puzzled, I asked, “But I heard Luo Baichuan was a womanizer who spent all year frequenting brothels and pleasure houses. Why was he so devoted to you?”
The Ninth Concubine suddenly laughed. “My elder sister’s name was Xu Miao. The two of us looked remarkably alike, and when we were young, we were the greatest beauties for miles around. Don’t compare us to girls today, all dressed up in their finest. Poor women in those days had no such thing as dressing up.”
“It was precisely because Luo Baichuan was a womanizer that my sister and I were able to capture his heart. Had nothing happened to my sister, he would never have taken all those later concubines, because no other woman could have caught his eye.”
“If I died, he would do everything in his power to bring me back. With my death, there would be neither a Xu Miao nor a Xu Xiu left anywhere in the world.”
I had seen the Ninth Concubine in her youth while trapped inside the Ghost Wall.
I had to admit that she had truly been breathtakingly beautiful. I could not think of a single actress today who could compare to her.
“People say lust is a blade hanging over a man’s head. The Luo Mansion fell because of the lust in Luo Baichuan’s heart.”
The Ninth Concubine sneered. “That fool believed every lie I told him. I said that killing his other concubines and using the rest of the Luo household as Living Sacrifices would revive me, and he actually believed it.”
“Even I never expected the plan to proceed so smoothly.”
I did not understand. “Why did you tell him that he could only revive you on New Year’s Eve?”
Judging by her account, the Luo Mansion’s final tragedy had taken place on New Year’s Eve.
But a long time should have passed between the Ninth Concubine’s faked death and that night. The longer she delayed, the more likely something was to go wrong. Besides, the Ninth Concubine had used the Soul-Separation Art when she faked her death, and a lengthy delay would have placed her in danger too.
Once the Seven-Star Lamps went out, she would never be able to return to her body.
The Ninth Concubine explained, “You have no idea how much I hated the people of the Luo Mansion. They killed my sister, which led to my father’s death, and then they killed my beloved Xiuzhu. The point of revenge was never merely to kill my enemies. It was to condemn them beyond all redemption.”
As she spoke, she stared directly at me again. “Did you see that Qiongqi?”