Chapter 211

Chapter 211

Before today, I had never met Du Chan.

The Du Family clearly didn’t know me either.

We had absolutely nothing to do with each other, so why would Yu Nian say that what had happened to Du Chan was probably connected to me?

Just because our Fate Patterns were so similar?

For a moment, I was completely bewildered. I couldn’t figure out what Yu Nian meant.

Yu Nian prompted, “Xiao Jiu, is it possible that Du Chan is your substitute?”

My substitute?

Realization dawned on me. “You mean… Feng Lishu?!”

The moment the name Feng Lishu left my lips, Liu Junyan and Tang Tang both looked at me.

My heart began to pound.

Du Chan’s Fate Pattern was very similar to mine, and she had a twin sister who might currently be trapped in a state of torment, controlled and neither fully alive nor dead.

Yet Du Chan’s parents said her sister had died when she was just over three years old.

So… Du Lian hadn’t actually died back then. For some reason, someone had set their sights on her, staged her death, and taken her away?

Twin sisters… a substitute…

Two utterly sinister terms flashed through my mind: symbiosis and Body Possession!

I was Feng Lishu’s symbiotic counterpart, yet she had suffered a backlash from me. She was in terrible shape now.

The last time we encountered her at Paradise Beyond the World, half her body had been nearly rotted away.

She desperately needed me to sustain her.

But because of the Buddha Lamp Liu Junyan had dedicated to me at Great Dharma King Temple, Feng Lishu couldn’t receive nourishment from me, so she had turned to another method.

Even more terrifying was the question of how many substitutes Feng Lishu had found to take my place during all those long years before I was born, when I wasn’t there to sustain her.

Yu Nian asked, “Xiao Jiu, do you need me to come help?”

“Not yet,” I said. “My thoughts are a mess. Let me sort everything out first.”

Yu Nian told me to let her know the moment I needed anything. She would rush over to help me.

I agreed.

After hanging up, I looked at Du Chan.

At last, I understood why Du Chan’s condition resembled that of the victims of the Sacrifice, even though she hadn’t been chosen by the Qilin Deity.

Unlike Jiang Bin, she wasn’t going to be reincarnated into Tafeng Village. From the moment she was born — no, even before she was born — she had already been chosen as a symbiotic provider.

Du Lian was still alive, but she was nothing more than a puppet waiting to become a target for Body Possession at any moment.

Feng Lishu had begun preparing her as a vessel for Body Possession long ago. Perhaps my appearance had simply diverted Feng Lishu’s attention.

After several clashes, Feng Lishu had failed to obtain what she wanted from me.

With Body Possession of me still a distant prospect, she had turned her attention back to the puppet she had been cultivating all this time.

If Tang Tang hadn’t happened to encounter Du Chan, Feng Lishu might soon have appeared before me in an entirely different form.

Then again, perhaps not.

The Phoenix Clan was ancient and mysterious. Changing a puppet’s appearance after Body Possession might not be beyond their capabilities.

In other words, the body Feng Lishu was currently wearing might not even be her original body!

Just what kind of monster was Feng Lishu?

“Let’s take her back to the Pawnshop for now.” Sensing my agitation and helplessness, Liu Junyan came over and put an arm around my shoulders. “We’ll keep her safe. As long as Du Chan is with us, the other side won’t be able to stir up much trouble.”

I nodded. That was exactly what I had been thinking.

Du Chan’s parents were worried sick and had countless questions they wanted answered.

Tang Tang spent a long time negotiating with them before they finally agreed to let Du Chan leave with us.

Still unwilling to give up, Du Chan’s mother pressed, “Miss, then what about our Xiao Lian…?”
“Just think of her as having died long ago.” Liu Junyan said what I had wanted to say but couldn’t bear to voice. “Even if she’s still alive, she’s no longer the girl she was before the age of three and a half. All we can do now is try our best to save Du Chan.”

Du Chan’s mother burst into tears again.

Her father put an arm around her and turned away.

I knew he was signaling for us to take Du Chan away now.

Tang Tang and I practically had to carry Du Chan between us to get her into the car. We drove straight back to the Pawnshop and took her into the West Room.

The West Room was thick with incense smoke. The moment Du Chan entered, her entire body began to tremble. After sneezing several times in a row, she seemed to regain a little awareness.

She was still kneeling, but her head was no longer bowed quite so low, and her back was not held quite so rigidly.

Liu Junyan burned more Talisman Paper, then had Li Qingying pinch Du Chan’s jaw and force the resulting Talisman Water down her throat.

After vomiting several mouthfuls of black blood, Du Chan collapsed to the floor with a heavy thud and lost consciousness.

Tang Tang grew anxious. “Is… is she going to be okay?”

“She’s fine,” Li Qingying said unconcernedly. “That bowl of Talisman Water expelled some of the malignant yin energy inside her. Her condition has improved. Didn’t you notice that her arms and legs have relaxed a little?”

She was right.

Lying on the floor now, Du Chan looked more like she had simply fallen asleep.

After everything she had been through that day, Tang Tang still had to return to school.

I relayed the important clues I had pieced together to Hui Moqiong, who was busy outside, and asked him to investigate the grave mound as well as the area in the direction of Qilin Temple.

That evening, Li Qingying and I kept watch in the Southern Study while waiting for Hui Moqiong to return.

By eleven, he still hadn’t come back. Instead, another uninvited guest arrived.

It was already late at night when a sudden Yin Wind rose from the West Street Entrance and swept straight into the alley. Li Qingying and I both froze in the middle of folding Gold Ingot offerings.

As if by tacit agreement, we looked toward the entrance of the Southern Study at the same time.

Before long, a young man wrapped from head to toe in a black trench coat appeared on the street outside. Black blood streamed ceaselessly down his legs.

Although the blood dripped onto the street, it left no stain behind.

It wasn’t real black blood!

And the man wasn’t human.

He looked up and down the street several times before slowly making his way toward us, one step at a time.

He seemed to have become a ghost only recently and had yet to get used to his ghostly abilities. He apparently didn’t know he could simply float over.

I immediately rose from behind the counter, ready to receive our guest.

The man walked very slowly. Even after sitting down at the counter, he remained dazed for a long while without saying anything.

He looked utterly lost.

I took the initiative and asked, “Are you here to pawn something?”

The man hesitated, then nodded.

I asked again, “What would you like to pawn? May I appraise it?”

After thinking for a moment, the man said, “I want to pawn a name as a Dead Pawn. Does your Pawnshop accept something like that?”

A name?

Could a name be pawned too?

It probably could.

After all, people had even pawned their Yang Lifespan and Yin Lifespan before.

The man was one of the Souls, which made this a Yin Pawn transaction.

A request made through a Yin Pawn could not be refused.

So even if he wanted to pawn nothing more than a name, I had no choice but to accept it.

With that in mind, I asked, “What kind of name would you like to pawn? Could you tell me the story behind it?”

The man replied, “The name I want to pawn is ‘Jiang Bin.’ It’s tattooed on the back of my neck…”