Chapter 3

Chapter 3

The blood was a dark red, and the reek of it hit me right in the face. Beneath the stench, though, there was an extremely faint sweetness. I dabbed a little on my fingertip and touched it to my tongue. That confirmed it: this was black dog blood.

In the twelve Earthly Branches, dogs correspond to Xu Earth. Xu Earth is yang in nature, and earth also restrains water, so black dog blood is extremely yang and is often used to ward off evil.

But according to Old Zhou, the ghost had used black dog blood to write on the wall. That was about as absurd as a normal person taking a bath in sulfuric acid. It was basically finding new and creative ways to die.

Either this ghost was outrageously powerful, or Old Zhou was lying.

I chose to believe the latter.

Because if it was the former, I couldn’t beat it either.

I looked around, then asked Zhu Hongsheng to show me last night’s security footage. Zhu Hongsheng hemmed and hawed before admitting the cameras were just for show and had never actually been powered on.

The moment he said that, Old Zhou’s expression relaxed. Very suspicious.

Luckily, I had come prepared. I set up the altar, placed the incense burner, then took out my phone and video-called Lu Lingzhu.

The call connected, and a solemn grand hall appeared on the screen. More than a hundred Daoist priests were circling statues of the Three Pure Ones. I propped my phone on the altar and nodded at Zhu Hongsheng with a grave expression.

“This is a cloud ritual.

“They’re Maoshan on the other end. A major sect. As luck would have it, they’re holding their October Youjiao today. You’re getting a bargain.”

Daoist fasting and offering rituals are divided into rites for the living and rites for the dead, or Qingjiao and Youjiao. A Youjiao is meant to deliver the souls of the dead, refine and transform them, and make offerings of food. The Maoshan Sect opens an altar on the fifteenth of every month, summoning its disciples to hold a grand Youjiao ceremony.

Zhu Hongsheng’s eyes widened. He stared at the phone for a while, growing more doubtful the longer he looked.

“Master Qiao, does a cloud ritual really work? Can their power actually transmit over here?”

I kept my gaze lowered, calm and composed.

“Yes. A large-scale ceremony like this has immense ritual power. It’s more than enough to deal with the little ghost on your end. Stop talking.”

“But this is a recording. Look, someone over there is clearly holding another phone up to the video. You can even see their hand. Whoa, that ring is flashy.”

“Shh. Don’t worry about details like that.”

In the video, Lu Lingzhu started cursing someone out.

“Feifei, what are you doing? You can’t even hold a phone steady? Stop shaking it!

“You’re hungry? Me too, a little. Qiao Moyu, are you done yet? Can’t I just send you the video directly? This is so annoying.”

Zhu Hongsheng and I looked at each other. I forced out a calm smile.

“Ritual masters are all like this. The greater the ability, the greater the temper.

“Look at how bad-tempered that ritual master is. There are ninety-nine more like her over there. Even if a ghost king showed up, he’d have to take a couple slaps. You can rest easy about your problem here.”

After perfunctorily playing the video for Zhu Hongsheng, I took a large pack of wet wipes out of my bag and wiped all the writing off the wall.

“Don’t leave anyone on the construction site tonight. I’ll set up another formation here after dark, and by tomorrow everything will be fine.”

Hearing that I still had more work to do, Zhu Hongsheng’s expression finally improved a little. He seemed to feel that his money hadn’t been spent quite so unfairly after all.

“All right, all right, you all heard her, didn’t you? The ritual’s been done, and the writing’s gone. Everyone come back to work tomorrow and do your jobs without worrying!”

After Zhu Hongsheng left with the workers, I was packing up when he came running back alone, his face full of conflicted hesitation.

“Master Qiao, the more I think about it, the more something feels off. You just said the greater the ability, the greater the temper, and I think that makes sense.

“But your temper-”

I rushed up and slapped him across the face.

“Get lost!

“Keep running your mouth, and you can stay here and catch ghosts with me.”

Zhu Hongsheng was satisfied. Clutching his cheek, he left in complete contentment.

“Now I’m relieved. Master Qiao, I definitely won’t get in your way. I’m leaving right now!”

I walked out of the work shed with my bag on my back. The sky was almost dark.

Xi’an was dry, and the construction site had been dug up into pits and mounds. When the wind blew, loose dust drifted everywhere. A faintly restless, tense atmosphere hung in the air, like walking alone through a forest while wild beasts lurked nearby. For no reason at all, it made a person uneasy.

I turned and looked around. In the large pit at the northwest corner of the construction site, Murong Shan was squatting on the ground, holding a Luoyang shovel as he frowned and studied the pile of soil beneath his feet.

I suppressed the unease in my heart and put on a warm smile.

“Grandfather Murong, did you find anything?”

Tomb raiders have their own Jerusalem.

As a tomb raider, Grandfather Murong had already washed his hands of the business, but every year he still brought his granddaughter to Xi’an eight or ten times for vacation, taking a part-time job at a geological exploration company to scratch that old itch.

This time, when I saw the green plaster clay on the wall, I texted Murong Yue. As soon as Grandfather Murong saw the message, he abandoned the biangbiang noodles he was eating and rushed to the scene at top speed.