Chapter 139
Chapter 139
The tomb chamber shook violently. Even the hand Dou Zhile held his long-stemmed pipe with was trembling, but that did nothing to stop him from stubbornly — and aggrievedly-listing the Gray Immortal’s “crimes.”
It turned out the Gray Immortal had been trapped here before the Dou Family ever began worshiping him.
Thinking about it more carefully, why had Liu Junyan asked me to invite this Gray Immortal instead of Bai Xian’er?
Aside from the fact that Bai Xian’er never did anything decent, there was another very important reason: she wasn’t qualified!
Bai Xian’er wasn’t one of the Five Blessing Immortals.
But the Gray Immortal before me was!
At that thought, something suddenly occurred to me. The one who had spoken through Bai Xian’er just now and tried to persuade the Gray Immortal had to be the White Immortal, one of the Five Blessing Immortals!
No, it couldn’t really be called possession.
She had probably used Bai Xian’er’s body as a medium to transmit her voice from afar.
Following that line of thought, many things began to fall into place.
Many years ago, the White Immortal and the Gray Immortal were both persuaded by the Copper-Coin Figure to pledge their loyalty to him. In return, the Copper-Coin Figure promised that one day, he would make them gods.
After all, what did animal immortals cultivate for so many years and accumulate so much Merit for?
Wasn’t it all so they could one day ascend to the Celestial Court and become gods and immortals?
But things clearly hadn’t turned out as they had hoped.
Their grievances had festered for years. When the door to the Pawnshop’s West Room opened once more and the Copper-Coin Figure reappeared in this world, the Five Blessing Immortals, who had spent so many years away, were forced to make another choice.
Should they return to the Pawnshop and work for the Copper-Coin Figure again?
Or had they already established themselves elsewhere and decided to go their own way?
The White Immortal had clearly become utterly disillusioned with the Copper-Coin Figure. She chose not to return and wanted to persuade the Gray Immortal to join her.
The Gray Immortal had wrestled with the decision for a long time. He hadn’t immediately accepted the White Immortal’s proposal, but neither had he made his final choice.
Had he also stopped believing in the Copper-Coin Figure, just like the White Immortal?
Or was it because the one who had truly appeared in this world wasn’t the Copper-Coin Figure himself, but Liu Junyan?
The night the West Gate opened, I had already noticed that Liu Junyan had changed.
I had also suspected that his change had something to do with the Copper-Coin Figure.
Now, everything finally made sense.
Liu Junyan had struck a deal with the Copper-Coin Figure. The Copper-Coin Figure helped him escape the Pawnshop, while what Liu Junyan had promised in return might have been far greater.
No. There were still some things that didn’t add up.
Liu Junyan wasn’t the kind of man who would trade certain ruin tomorrow for temporary relief today.
I had always wondered who first established the Wufu Town Pawnshop.
Now it seemed that even if it hadn’t been the Copper-Coin Figure, the Pawnshop becoming what it was today was inextricably linked to him.
The Copper-Coin Figure wasn’t merely burdened with the Wufu Town Pawnshop’s feng shui configuration. There was also his promise to the Five Blessing Immortals, as well as the dozens of memorial tablets occupying the other niches of that shrine. Every last one of them represented a debt he had to repay!
Could Liu Junyan possibly repay all of that? Yet he had still made a deal with the Copper-Coin Figure?!
The more I thought about it, the more frightened — and furious — I became.
My mind was so consumed by the deal between Liu Junyan and the Copper-Coin Figure that I completely forgot about my present surroundings.
Then a young but slightly roguish voice called down from above. “Hey, sis, what’s on your mind? My Medium has talked himself dry, and this tomb chamber is about to collapse. Aren’t you going to give us an answer?”
Being called “sis” startled me. I instinctively looked toward the voice and saw a young man leaning against the pile of coffins not far ahead of me.
He was slender and around six feet tall, dressed in a white robe. His features were somewhat delicate. If he kept his mouth shut, he could easily have been praised as a peerless young gentleman.
But the moment he opened his mouth and called me “sis,” the entire effect was ruined.
A streak of white hair ran along the right side of his forehead. For some inexplicable reason, that made me feel an immediate sense of kinship with him.
He was toying with a wooden bead about the size of a ping-pong ball. The moment my gaze landed on his well-proportioned, sharply defined fingers, my eyes lit up.
Those hands… They were gorgeous!
His fingers were exceptionally long. Every joint shifted as he rolled the bead between them, graceful yet powerful, as though a single finger of his could decide the fate of the world.
Judging by those hands alone, this man could have had girls swooning over him.
There was only one condition: he had to keep his mouth shut.
“Tsk, taken a liking to these hands of mine?” Just as my thoughts began to wander, he went and opened his damn mouth again. “How about… I let you touch them?”
I stared at him in utter speechlessness, genuinely at a loss for how to communicate with him.
Dou Zhile snapped impatiently from beside me, “Can you get rid of that old habit of running your mouth? Let’s talk business. Business!”
“Hold on, Old Man Le. Which one of us is the immortal here, you or me?” The man frowned. “Have I given you so much freedom that you’ve forgotten your place? Have I spoiled you so badly that you no longer know your own limits?!”
“Enough.” My temples were throbbing. I cut them both off with a stern expression. “I came here on my Seventh Master’s orders to invite the Gray Immortal back to the Pawnshop to take up a post. But everyone is free to choose their own path. If the Gray Immortal has other plans, I won’t force you.”
With that, I fixed my gaze on the Gray Immortal and waited for his answer.
Beside me, Dou Zhile was blinking so hard his eyes were about to cramp, desperately signaling for the Gray Immortal to agree.
The Gray Immortal drew in a breath.
I had noticed that ever since he assumed human form, the entire tomb chamber had been shaking, yet none of the surrounding coffin planks had budged an inch.
It made no sense. Then again, the Gray Immortal was skilled in the Lu Ban Arts, so perhaps it made perfect sense after all.
The wooden bead he had been toying with all this time was clearly no ordinary object.
Naturally, I wanted nothing more than to bring someone like him back immediately and put him on a pedestal.
Of the Five Blessing Immortals, the White Immortal had already made it clear that she would not return to the Pawnshop.
The Yellow Immortal had always been in league with the White Immortal.
As for the other two, they both seemed extremely difficult to control at present.
That left the Gray Immortal as the only one we had any real chance of winning over.
But I didn’t dare get dragged into bantering with him. The tomb chamber was bound to collapse sooner or later, and I was afraid we might all be buried here while he was still cracking jokes.
“What a coldhearted Little Madam.” The man pondered for a moment before asking, “Say, if I go back now, would I rank number one among the Five Blessing Immortals?”
He raised his thumb and cheekily bobbed it up and down.
I answered honestly, “All the positions among the Five Blessing Immortals are currently vacant. If the Gray Immortal returns now, you will naturally take first place.”
“Then it’s settled!” The man flicked the sleeve of his white robe, instantly delighted. “I’m a man who cares about appearances, and I always like to come first. Since all the positions among the Five Blessing Immortals are vacant, I suppose I’ll reluctantly go back and be the boss.”
Dou Zhile curled his lip, lifted his pipe to his mouth, and took a long, hard drag. He was visibly relieved.
I took out the sheet of purple Talisman Paper, formed a hand seal, and slapped it against the Hexagonal Palace Lantern.
The instant the Purple Talisman burst into flames on its own, the Gray Immortal transformed into a wisp of smoke and vanished into the Hexagonal Palace Lantern.
The Gray Immortal was under Heavenly Retribution and could not leave this tomb chamber.
However, he could use the Hexagonal Palace Lantern to return with me.
His circumstances seemed somewhat similar to Liu Junyan’s previous condition.
The moment the Gray Immortal entered the Hexagonal Palace Lantern, the surrounding coffin planks began collapsing. The entire tomb chamber shook violently, and Dou Zhile and I immediately ran for the exit.
On the drive back, Li Qingying drove while Dou Zhile kept singing his immortal patron’s praises. “He just likes to run his mouth a little. He’s a good person and very capable. Maybe he spent too long trapped in that tomb chamber and is always desperate for someone to talk to. Shopkeeper Xiao Jiu, whenever you speak to him in the future, just tune out all the nonsense. If that still doesn’t work, have Seventh Master place a Silencing Spell on him. That should buy you a couple hours of peace…”
I didn’t think there was anything wrong with the Gray Immortal’s personality. The Wufu Town Pawnshop was desperately short on liveliness and needed someone like him to liven things up.
Smiling, I asked, “Old Dou, I still haven’t asked your Gray Immortal’s name. What should I call him?”
Dou Zhile replied, “His name is Hui Moqiong. People call him Fifth Master Hui…”