Chapter 31
Chapter 31
Naturally, I saw nothing…
Master Cao, however, grabbed a shoulder pole leaning in the corner and strode toward the door, cursing.
“Damn your ancestors! You’ve got nerve, following someone all the way to my coffin shop. If I don’t thrash you today, you won’t know who rules this street.”
I silently gave him a thumbs-up.
Impressive!
I followed him toward the entrance. In the reflection of the Eight Trigrams mirror above the door, I saw a woman in white standing outside. Long hair fell to her waist and completely covered her face.
She was invisible to the naked eye and appeared only in the mirror.
Clearly, she was a female ghost.
Master Cao swung the shoulder pole at her.
She immediately floated away. He chased her and swung several more times, landing one solid blow.
A faint, piercing scream reached my ears.
“Pah!”
Master Cao spat. Standing in the street with one hand on his hip and the pole in the other, he continued cursing. “I pitied a lonely ghost like you because you hadn’t done much harm, so I’ll let it go today. Follow someone into my house again and I won’t be so polite.”
For some reason, the female ghost’s appearance reminded me of how Master used to deliberately make herself look wild and deranged.
Except for her patchwork clothes of many colors and fabrics, the resemblance was striking!
I laughed.
Master Cao stared at me in astonishment as he returned.
“Xiao Wu, a roadside spirit latched onto you, and instead of being afraid, you’re laughing? You truly deserve to be the Immortal Lady’s disciple. Immortal Lady Qin chose well.”
“Latched-on visitor” was another local term for a ghost, while a roadside spirit was a ghost that lingered around an intersection.
Realizing his misunderstanding, I waved quickly and explained that I had remembered something else. Then I asked about the female ghost. From his tone, Master Cao seemed to know her.
He sighed and told me the story.
She had married into the town from elsewhere and lived in the row of houses near the intersection. Mild-tempered, she had gotten along well with her neighbors.
Then, a little over a year ago, a drunk driver struck and killed her while she crossed the road to buy groceries.
The driver went to prison and paid compensation.
Her husband’s family moved away from town, and no one knew where they had gone.
The ghost probably felt wronged. She had been kind in life, only to suffer a violent death. Her soul remained at the intersection and became a roadside spirit.
Since she had never harmed anyone and generally behaved herself, Master Cao pitied her and left her alone.
He was only a coffin bearer and funerary-paper artisan, after all. Delivering souls was not his specialty, and he found it troublesome!
“Your Featherborn nature was probably too tempting today. She wanted to follow you home and drain your yang energy after you fell asleep. Tomorrow night, when I have time, I’ll deliver her after all. It’ll be tiring, but so be it.”
Master Cao grumbled as we entered the shop.
He told me to rest upstairs. At midnight, we had to help a family outside town carry a coffin to burial. They had bought the coffin from him too, so his shop provided the whole service…
Was my luck good or bad?
On my very first day, I already had to help carry a coffin.
He said I would not need to exert much strength, merely observe, broaden my horizons, and learn the procedure.
I hurried upstairs, passed a crowd of paper people and horses, and reached my room.
When I opened the door–
Just as promised!
The room that had resembled a garbage dump that morning was now spotless. Even the single bed against the eastern wall had been neatly made.
“Did Master Cao clean it himself?”
I was extremely curious.
I circled the room several times and found not a speck of dust.
With a whoosh, I flopped onto my back, folded my hands behind my head, and gazed up at the white mosquito net.
For the next three years, this would be my room!
Tired from the day, I gradually fell asleep. Half dreaming, I heard faint rustling around me, as though things were moving.
Elsewhere I might have been afraid, but this was Master Cao’s coffin shop!
Master said he was a formidable coffin bearer and funerary-paper artisan.
I had just seen him chase and beat a female roadside ghost with a shoulder pole. No evil spirit could possibly enter this place, could it?
Reassured, I slept on.
When I woke, it was almost eleven.
Master Cao had said the coffin procession would begin at midnight, so it was nearly time to leave. I headed downstairs to wait in the shop.
Passing the funerary-paper goods on the second floor, I noticed that several paper figures seemed to have changed positions since daytime!
“Huh? I remember that paper boy standing in the middle. How did he get to the left? And that little-girl figure wasn’t there either.”
Curiosity drew me closer.
In the dim light, I leaned in until my face was near them.
The hands and sleeves of several figures were grimy, as if coated with dust.
“What’s Master Cao doing? These paper people were clean earlier, but now they’re filthy… Wait!”
A startling thought flashed through my mind.
Could these paper people have cleaned my room?
Images filled my head: several paper figures sweeping and mopping the dark room at night, wiping away dust and making the bed. The dirt on their bodies had rubbed off on them as they worked.
A chill ran down my back!
This was certainly Master Cao’s work. They meant me no harm and had even cleaned for me. Still, the thought was deeply unsettling.
Worse, two or three months ago, during the ghost feast, paper effigies worshiped into uncanny entities at a grave had carried me away. I was rather wary of them…
Even so, I forced a smile, pressed my palms together, and thanked the figures. “You cleaned my room, didn’t you? Thank you. You worked hard.”
I turned to go downstairs.
Perhaps it was my imagination, but in the instant I turned, the corner of my eye caught their faces changing in the murky yellow light. Smiles seemed to curl their lips.
…
Downstairs, Master Cao sat by the entrance smoking his long-stemmed pipe.
The harsh smoke swirled around him.
Seeing me, he smiled. “You’re punctual. I didn’t have to come upstairs and wake you.”
“Of course. I can’t delay important business, or Master will scold me when I go home. By the way, did the paper people clean my room? Is that a method of spirit-paper arts?”
“Oh?”
He tapped his pipe against the doorway. “Not bad, Xiao Wu. You figured it out! Yes, it’s a form of paper-effigy craft. I put tremendous effort into making those figures. Ordinary ones couldn’t do it.”
So that was it…
I nodded. The funerary-paper arts were truly miraculous.
If I learned them, I could make several paper people into free laborers for chores and housework. Would that not be wonderful?
After a while, several men arrived outside the shop.
They were burly, fierce-looking middle-aged men in straw sandals, shorts, and coarse hemp vests. Thick hemp ropes wrapped their waists, and each carried a shoulder pole.
They surrounded Master Cao.
My heart lurched.
“Are they here to cause trouble? Master Cao may be powerful in the esoteric arts, but those methods probably won’t help much in a head-on fight with several strong living men.”
I edged behind a coffin. If they caused trouble, I would flee through the back and report them at the police station in the town center.
But what happened next was completely unexpected…