Chapter 2

Chapter 2

After we entered the General’s Mansion, a maid came to lead us to the main hall for the discussion.

Before we even saw anyone, we heard the noise.

We hadn’t even stepped into the hall when the Old Swindler started putting on airs, throwing his voice out as he shouted, “Boundless Heavenly Venerable! This old Daoist has come to catch ghosts!”

I played along, giving my horsetail whisk a solemn little flick as I followed close behind him with my blind man’s cane.

Who would have thought that the moment we entered the hall, the Old Swindler would sound as if someone had grabbed him by the throat? His voice cut off at once.

“Pfft.”

“Heh.”

“Tch.”

“Amitabha…”

The main hall was already packed with every sort of Taoist priest, along with men bearing the title Monk.

Everywhere I looked, there were people in the same line of work.

The Old Swindler tugged out one of his own beard hairs and hissed in pain.

When peers meet, contempt comes first.

I could feel their gazes sweeping over us from head to toe. Then came a wave of little noises from every direction. It was honestly hard to imagine the human mouth could make that many different sounds.

The Old Swindler fell silent. With an awkward chuckle, he pulled me into a corner.

In a low mutter, he said, “Sure enough, offer a heavy reward and brave men will appear. Girl, looks like the competition’s pretty fierce this time…”

In my heart, I gave him two cold heh-hehs. If not for the fact that I was currently playing the role of an immortal child, I would have mocked him to his face.

Before long, the person in charge arrived. They said she was the Great General’s wife.

At the top of this General’s Mansion was the old general, Xiao Yannian, who had followed the Retired Emperor in conquering the realm and had earned glorious military merits. Unfortunately, he was already gone.

In recognition of his achievements, the emperor had bestowed this residence upon him and promised that his descendants could serve in court as officials for generations to come.

The old general had one son, named Xiao Pingshan, the current head of the General’s Mansion.

Unfortunately, he had not inherited his father’s talent for leading troops into battle. But with his father’s halo shining over his head, he held a comfortable sinecure in the capital, and people who dealt with him respectfully called him General Xiao.

The woman who had come out now was his wife, Lady Xiao.

Three nights ago, the dog belonging to the General’s Mansion’s legitimate young lady, Xiao Yinfeng, went missing.

Xiao Yinfeng flew into a rage. Her shrieks practically pierced the heavens.

An entire room’s worth of furniture was smashed to splinters, and Qiufeng, the maid in charge of watching the dog, was slapped over and over until her face swelled up like a steamed bun.

That very night, Qiufeng went out looking for the dog with her swollen face.

Then she disappeared.

The afternoon before yesterday, the dog’s corpse appeared in the pigsty. Its head had been separated from its body, and half the corpse had already been gnawed away by the pigs.

Don’t ask me why the General’s Mansion had a pigsty.

Rumor had it that this young lady Xiao Yinfeng had a rather special hobby: she liked watching pigs fight.

“Uh…”

The Old Swindler tugged at the hairs of my whisk and lowered his voice. “That is special, all right. Pure proof of someone with too much food and too little sense.”

The corner of my mouth twitched, and I snatched the whisk back from his hand.

The night before yesterday, a young servant was halfway through scrubbing the chamber pots when his stomach suddenly hurt. Clenching his backside, he ran off to find the latrine.

When he reached the courtyard, he suddenly saw a figure in an extremely strange posture.

By the moonlight, the servant rubbed his eyes hard.

The figure had all four limbs on the ground, yet its belly was facing upward. Its neck seemed to have been broken, its head hanging upside down in front of it, and it was smiling right at him.

“Aaaaaaah!”

A miserable scream tore through the night sky. He shat himself on the spot.

That “person,” however, seemed to have smelled some delicious delicacy. Drool flung from its mouth as it crawled toward him at terrifying speed.

In the final instant before he lost consciousness, the servant recognized that person.

It was Qiufeng, the missing maid.

“Hiss…”

Beside us, a Taoist priest couldn’t help rubbing his arms as he muttered, “That creepy?”

“It was so dark. Could the servant have seen wrong?” someone questioned.

At the center of the crowd, the beautiful woman had dark shadows under her eyes, her expression haggard.

“No.”

Because that night… the guards on duty had been startled and rushed over, and almost all of them saw it.

A black shadow shot onto the wall like a spider, climbing up the vertical surface and leaving a string of afterimages behind before finally vaulting over the wall and disappearing.

“Then… what about that servant? Did he die?”

“He didn’t die… only…”

The General’s Lady seemed to recall something. Her fingers twisted tightly around her handkerchief, her face turning pale. Then she couldn’t help covering her mouth with the cloth and retching once.

The steward beside her didn’t look too good either, but he still took over for her.

“That young servant didn’t die. He was merely frightened out of his wits. To stop him from going mad and disturbing the masters of the household, I had him locked up.

“But who could have expected… last night, as if possessed, he ran out. Then he charged into the privy… grabbed a chamber pot… and frantically stuffed feces into his mouth until he died from it.”

“Urgh-!!”

As the people in the hall listened to the steward’s account, cracks appeared one after another in those previously sage-like, unfathomable faces. Several people failed to hold themselves back.

The sound of retching filled the hall.

I couldn’t help frowning too, but I still did my best to maintain the image of an immortal child.

“Old Swi- Master, this job is filthy. Do we really have to take it?”

The Old Swindler: “…”