Otherworldly Merchant

Li Mazi and I stood there awkwardly and wondered if we should comfort the young man or not.

“Hello, do you know Liu Fuguo?” I asked carefully.

Hearing my question, the young man stopped crying. He lifted his head and looked at us in puzzlement. “Who are you two? Why do you want to see my father?”

He’s Liu Fuguo’s son!

I quickly told him, “There’s something we need to talk to you about. Could we go inside and talk?”

If we stayed outside, someone would likely eavesdrop on us.

The young man shook his head. “No, it’s not convenient. You’ll get hurt. If you have something you want to say, just say it. Afterward, you should leave quickly.”

“We’re here to help you,” I told him. “Have you encountered anything strange these days?”

The young man was tense. “Are you the police?”

I smiled and shook my head. “No.”

“Are you here to help me? Who sent you?”

“You don’t need to worry about that.” Li Mazi gave him five hundred renminbi. “This will help you.”

Seeing five one-hundred-renminbi notes, the young man was excited and looked at them for a long time before carefully pocketing the notes. He said excitedly, “Brothers, please wait for me. After I bury my dad, I will tell you all the details.”

Then, he lifted the corpse and headed to the mountain.

My mind was clouded.

They said that old Liu Fuguo had come back from death, didn’t they? Why is he a corpse now?

Why did his corpse appear in his house and arouse the curiosity of the villagers?

The corpse ran back home?

Then, I remembered that we were stalked yesterday. I felt a chill creep along my spine.

After looking at the young man struggling to carry the body up the mountain, I knew something fishy was there. I decided to go up to the mountain with him.

The young man looked at us coldly. “If you don’t mind getting bad luck, you can follow me.”

Then, he ignored us and continued to go up the mountain.

What does he mean? Getting bad luck? Where does the bad luck come from?

Since this was related to the welfare of Chu Chu and the old shaman, I didn’t care about bad luck and followed the young man to the mountain.

I watched the young man try his best to carry the corpse while struggling many times. I wanted to help him. Although carrying the corpse wasn’t something good, I sympathized with him.

But the young man didn’t like it. He kept shouting that we shouldn’t touch the body.

I gave up on trying to help.

The young man took us to the mountain and stopped in front of a cave grave.

We were surprised to see that this cave grave looked much more complex than the other graves we had seen before. There were several, layered stones that sealed the cave. However, all of them were pushed aside. I even saw a thick iron chain that was the size of a human wrist. It had been pulled broken at the entrance…

These stones must be very heavy. Unless someone used dynamite, they couldn’t be pushed open that easily.

Who had broken through this grave?

The young man knelt in front of the grave and mourned. It was heartbreaking to watch. Since I was there, I couldn’t hide my worries and sympathy.

After crying, the young man moved the broken stones aside and pulled out the coffin from inside the cave.

The coffin lid stayed open. I saw fingernail scratches on the coffin. Seeing this gave me a feeling that… this corpse had crawled out of the coffin…

Although I had guessed the situation earlier, I was still fearful after seeing it with my own eyes.

I took a deep breath. I nervously studied the coffin and the corpse on the ground. “Little brother, is it convenient for you to tell us your story?”

The young man lifted his head upward and wiped his tears. “Wait a moment. I have to seal my father. Otherwise, a great calamity would follow.”

Then, he placed the corpse into the coffin and carefully closed the lid. He pushed it back into the cave grave and sealed the entrance.

After everything was done, he stretched his sore back. He looked at us and apologized. “I’m so sorry. You had to wait for me for quite a long time.”

I was actually scared and felt the hair on my nape stick up.

I had observed all the moves the young man had done. He seemed very skilled. It had frightened me because I realized it wasn’t the first time he had done this. This corpse hadn’t just run away one time.

So the ‘coming back from the dead’ event that the shopkeeper from Sichuan had told me about was this...?

This guy couldn’t rest even when he had already died. It was the worst torment to a person!

The young man pounded his head several times to bid his father farewell. Then, he took out a shiny bead from his pocket and carefully placed it on the stone in front of the grave. Afterward, he asked us to leave.

I became excited. That bead must have been the thing the corpse kept in his mouth. Was it the ‘Night Pearl’?

After thinking about this, I walked forward. I was ready to pick it up to observe it.

However, as soon as I reached my hand out, the young man stood in front of me. He was enraged like a wild beast. “What are you doing? Do you still want to live?”

“It’s all right,” I answered, feeling flustered. “I just want to see what it is. I think it’s the key to this problem.”

“Don’t act rashly,” the young man said. “If you touch it, you’ll die.”

I couldn’t do anything else but retract my hand.

I was unable to tell what the bead was made of. It looked translucent as if it was made of some common jade. Except for the complex patterns on the surface, it didn’t have any other attractive feature. It wasn’t Empress Cixi’s pearl.

“This bead… You found it in your father’s mouth?” I asked cautiously.

The young man said, “Let’s go. We must leave this place. Hurry, we will talk later.”

He looked really worried. He seized each second as he pushed us to leave the mountain.

Feeling helpless, we had to follow him and leave.

When we were midway down the mountain, the temperature suddenly dropped sharply. This was strange. The birds and animals on the mountain seemed to sense something as well. They fled and ran away in hordes. The atmosphere was really depressing.

We ran to the foothills. The young man couldn’t get a hold of himself and was still scared. He decided to leave the village with us.

“Why aren’t we going to your house?”

The young man explained, “My house isn’t safe and the folks won’t let me stay there.”

“Why won’t they let you stay there? It’s your hometown.” I was surprised.

The young man sighed but didn’t answer.

Right at this moment, someone opened their door. After they saw the young man in the village, they were enraged and yelled at him. “Youjinx, you think you haven’t harmed us enough? Get out!”

The young man smiled then left with an aching heart.

When we arrived at the town, the young man brought us to a small restaurant and invited us to dinner. He ordered three bowls of beef noodles with extra meat for me and Li Mazi. He didn’t add meat for himself.

After looking at the slimy noodles, I didn’t have any appetite.

The young man didn’t mind that and wolfed the food down as if he was a hungry tiger that hadn’t eaten anything for days.

Soon after, he had finished his big bowl of noodles.

I gave him my bowl as well. He was a little shy but still took the bowl.

After filling his stomach, the young man looked somewhat lost. He told us he hadn’t eaten anything for two days and that he had forgotten his manners in front of us.

“It’s okay. Let’s go, where is your place? We will talk there.” I smiled at him.

The young man was embarrassed. He blushed and told us that he had been sleeping on the street. The folks didn’t let him stay in the village and he didn’t have money. He had become a beggar that lived on the street.

I felt sad for him. How could those folks treat a teenager like this?

I immediately invited the young man to stay with me and Li Mazi in the motel.

The young man awkwardly waved his hands in denial. “I’m dirty. I don’t want to dirty your place.”

“It’s okay, boy.” I comforted him.

The young man was still a little hesitant. “Aren’t you afraid that I will curse you with bad luck?”

I laughed. “I work in this business. What kind of bad luck would I be afraid of?”

The boy nodded and returned to the motel with us.

However, when he saw the clean and comfortable room and the two beautiful ladies inside, he blushed and stood by the door. No matter what we said, he refused to go inside.

Yin Xinyue recognized that the boy was belittling himself. She directly walked over, pulled his hand, and rubbed his head. “Little boy, what are you afraid of? Quick, have a nice shower and change into some clean clothes. Just consider me your sister.”

The young man burst out crying and ran out of the room.

Feeling helpless, Li Mazi and I had to chase after him.

“What are you doing?” I smilingly asked him.

The boy felt embarrassed. “The two sisters are too nice to me. I’m not used to it.”

I felt stuck. How had this boy been living? What had made him belittle himself to this point? Li Mazi and I booked another room for him. We then sat together and talked.

Since we were the only people in the room, the young man finally relaxed and told us his story.