Chapter 135
Chapter 135
The transaction wasn’t complete. The girl had merely declared that she wanted to place the pair of eyeballs under Dead Pawn and named her terms.
If she came back in a few days, I could still refuse her then.
It was just a shame about those eyes.
They had been gouged out while she was still alive and left here. It wouldn’t be long before they lost their vitality.
If the girl changed her mind later, there would be no putting them back in.
I sighed. What had I gotten myself into?
I fetched a small bowl, put on a pair of gloves, picked up the blood-soaked eyeballs, and placed them inside. Then I covered the bowl with plastic wrap and put it in the refrigerator.
After cleaning the blood from the counter, I was wide awake. I went outside, stretched hard, then looked toward the Hexagonal Palace Lantern beneath the western corridor.
When Sister Yu Nian left, she had given half the Souls in the Thousand-Soul Banner to the Hexagonal Palace Lantern, greatly increasing the Merit within it. It had long since passed the halfway mark.
Even so, the Black Cat had not returned to the Hexagonal Palace Lantern. It preferred staying with Liu Junyan.
Now that the door to the West Room had been opened, whenever Liu Junyan meditated, the Black Cat would either sleep in an altar niche or curl up on his crossed legs.
Once, I had even seen it dozing on the Copper-Coin Figure’s shoulder.
It truly had no taboos whatsoever.
All that remained inside the Hexagonal Palace Lantern was Fu Wan’s tiny spark, drifting through an ocean of Merit.
At this rate, I even suspected that Fu Wan’s spirit might one day condense into a physical form again and return to this world.
If that day ever came, I honestly didn’t know whether it would be a blessing or a curse for her.
Perhaps everything was predetermined by fate.
More than one of the Souls had been offered through Soul Sacrifice since the Pawnshop reopened, yet in the end, only this wisp of Fu Wan’s Essence Spirit remained. How could that not be fate?
I waited and waited. Four o’clock came, but Li Qingying still hadn’t returned. At some point, I laid my head on the counter and drifted off to sleep.
The next morning, I was awakened by a startled cry. Li Qingying was back.
I jolted upright and turned toward the sound. Li Qingying was standing in front of the refrigerator, disbelief written all over her face.
I asked, “Sister Qingying, what’s wrong?”
“What the hell is this?” Li Qingying asked. “Did you put it in here?”
I immediately understood. The pair of eyeballs must have startled her. As I walked over, I explained, “A girl gouged them out right in front of me last night. She said she wanted to pawn them to me, but she left before I could even issue the Pawn Ticket. I was afraid they’d spoil, so I put them in the refrigerator. Why? Have they gone bad?”
By the time I finished speaking, I had reached the refrigerator.
The instant my gaze landed on the eyeballs in the small bowl, I froze.
Not only had the marble-sized eyeballs not spoiled, but they had turned completely transparent. A faint Light of Merit swirled around them.
Yes — the exact same Light of Merit found inside the Hexagonal Palace Lantern!
The girl’s words from last night suddenly came back to me. She had said… she was pawning this pair of Buddha Eyes.
Everything had happened so suddenly and horrifyingly, and the girl had run off immediately afterward. I hadn’t stopped to consider what was wrong with that statement.
Now that I thought about it, there was a huge problem.
“Buddha Eyes?” I murmured. “What are Buddha Eyes? A Buddha’s eyeballs?”
Li Qingying looked even more bewildered. “Xiao Jiu, what are you talking about? I don’t understand.”
I told her everything that had happened the previous night. Li Qingying frowned. “I’ll call Jin Wuya and ask him. He might know something.”
Watching her bustling figure, I couldn’t help feeling that something was a little strange.
Sister Qingying and Jin Wuya seemed to have been talking quite often lately.
Before long, Li Qingying ended the call and shook her head at me. “He doesn’t know either. He said he’d ask around among people who might know something about it.”
I nodded, then changed the subject. “How did things go for you two at the Ghost Market last night? Did you find what you needed?”
“Jin Wuya ran into another dealer at the Ghost Market who had the connections to get it,” Li Qingying said. “After we left the Ghost Market, we made another trip with him and traded for two bottles of oil. That should last me a while.”
No wonder she’d returned so late.
Her Long Whip had been kept in excellent condition until recently, but after a battle like that against an opponent like Bai Xian’er, some damage had been inevitable.
After breakfast, we each returned to our rooms to rest for a while.
That afternoon, Dou Zhile arrived at the Pawnshop with Dou Jinsuo. Both were covered in dust and looked thoroughly bedraggled.
I quickly led them into the main parlor and had them sit down. Li Qingying brought them tea, then asked what had happened.
“We took part in the fierce battle at the Riverside along the Zhu Pan River when it first broke out,” Dou Zhile said.
I nodded.
Before I’d stepped outside the Pawnshop, I’d heard him fighting Bai Xian’er. Yet by the time I went out, he was nowhere to be seen.
The Dou Family Coffin Shop had also remained closed for the past two days, leaving me wondering what had happened.
At that thought, I asked, “What happened afterward? Did you go after Dou Zhifu?”
Dou Zhile clearly hadn’t expected me to figure it out without either of them having to explain. Visibly moved, he said, “Yes. This time, he came back not only for me, but also for the fragmentary copy of the Hidden Volume of The Book of Lu Ban passed down through the Dou Family.”
According to Dou Zhile, The Book of Lu Ban was also known as the Lu Ban Classic. It was a remarkable tome that combined ancient construction techniques with mysterious arcane arts, but it had long since been lost.
Legend had it that The Book of Lu Ban was divided into an Open Volume and a Hidden Volume.
The Open Volume recorded orthodox craftsmen’s techniques, while the Hidden Volume contained Witchcraft spells and incantations, including hexcraft, calamity-averting rites, blood-stanching spells, and more.
“The Dou Family was blessed by the Gray Immortal and inherited Lu Ban Craftsmanship. But ever since the Gray Immortal failed to overcome his Calamity, every generation of the Dou Family has been weaker than the last. Rumor has it that the fragmentary copy of the Hidden Volume of The Book of Lu Ban is hidden inside the Dou Family Ancestral Tomb. Plenty of people have tried to get their hands on it, but no one has ever found the entrance to the Dou Family Ancestral Tomb.”
Dou Zhile’s words suddenly reminded me of something.
Back then, the Town Head had taken Dou Jinsuo up the mountain to persuade Dou Zhile to come out of retirement. After Dou Zhile flatly refused, the Town Head had spent a long time circling that part of the mountain as though searching for something, only to return empty-handed.
Could the Town Head have been searching for the entrance to the Dou Family Ancestral Tomb?
With that thought in mind, I asked, “The Dou Family Ancestral Tomb is in those mountains, isn’t it?”
“Yes,” Dou Zhile said. “Not only is the Dou Family Ancestral Tomb buried in those mountains, but the Gray Immortal is also hiding inside it. He, like my mas-oh, no, like Seventh Master, suffered Heavenly Retribution.”
My brows drew together involuntarily.
The Gray Immortal had remained in the Dou Family Ancestral Tomb for all these years without incident.
For Dou Zhile to suddenly lay his family’s secrets bare before me could only mean one thing. I asked, “Something happened to the Dou Family Ancestral Tomb?”
“Yes.” Dou Zhile gritted his teeth. “Dou Zhifu, that damned White-eyed Wolf! May he die a thousand deaths! He failed to use the Bai Family to kill me, so he bore a grudge and set out to destroy the Dou Family Ancestral Tomb.”
I was horrified. “What did he do? Did he find the entrance to the Dou Family Ancestral Tomb?”
“No. He couldn’t find it,” Dou Zhile said. “But he carried Bai Xian’er’s physical body into the mountains. That rotten hedgehog has always been an expert burrower. I don’t know where she tunneled in, but she ruined the feng shui of the Dou Family Ancestral Tomb…”