Otherworldly Merchant

That day, Ms. Wu’s daughter woke up at midnight and screamed, “I don’t want to go! I don’t want to go!”

Ms. Wu was frightened and hurried to her daughter’s room.

What she saw next made her shiver even more.

Her daughter stood on her toes in the middle of her room. In front of her was a hanging lamp, and right above the lamp was a red scarf hung down like a rope.

Her daughter walked forward and shook her head painfully. She screamed, “I don’t want to go!”

However, it seemed she couldn’t control her body. Eventually, she reached the red scarf and was about to put her head through the loop.

Ms. Wu screamed her heart out and stormed forward to hug her daughter.

However, her daughter seemed to possess superhuman strength, and Ms. Wu couldn’t stop her no matter how hard she tried. She could only watch as she put her neck through the red loop. The fabric then shrank and started strangling the young girl.

The girl couldn’t breathe. Her eyes rolled to the back of her head, and her throat produced some choking sounds.

Ms. Wu was scared out of her wits. She hugged her daughter and tried to pull her off, but it didn’t work. Out of frustration, she grabbed a pair of scissors and cut the red fabric. Her daughter fell off the loop. Fortunately, she was still alive.

When the daughter woke up, she cried. Ms. Wu asked her, “What happened? Why did you want to hang yourself?”

The daughter told her that while she was sleeping, she heard someone call her name. When she opened her eyes, she saw a big man standing in front of her. He was the one calling her.

He kept calling her name and asked her to go with him. Ms. Wu’s daughter didn’t know what was going on, but her body wasn’t listening to her anymore. She felt as if someone else was controlling her body.

She struggled, but no matter how hard she tried, she couldn't break free.

Her mind was a haze, but she heard more and more voices calling her. However, those voices came from outside the window. She turned around and found many of her peers hanging out of her window. They all wore a creepy smile and watched her.

Some of them were actually her classmates!

“Come play with us! If you use that red scarf to hang yourself, you can come to us…” Her friends kept encouraging her to hang herself.

Of course, Ms. Wu’s daughter didn’t want to do that. She struggled hard but to no avail.

If Ms. Wu hadn’t cut off the rope, her daughter would have died for real.

When Ms. Wu heard the story, she knew that it wasn’t a normal disease. She suspected that her daughter had provoked something evil or supernatural. As such, she did everything in her power to find me.

I took a deep breath and became tense. According to Ms. Wu’s description, it was possible that her daughter’s soul was lost. That would explain why her body became so feeble.

If her soul was really lost, it was going to be very difficult to solve this issue.

I asked Ms. Wu to find some candles. Then, I told her to soak them in castor oil and arrange ten of them around her daughter.

A human had three ethereal souls and seven corporeal souls. These ten candles represented her ten souls. I wanted to know which ethereal souls or corporeal souls she had lost.

After the candles were lit, I asked the girl to sit down and not to move. At the same time, I asked Ms. Wu to lock all the doors and windows and let down the curtains as I didn’t want the wind to affect the result. Then, I started to observe the candle lights.

The candles burned slowly, and their light gradually grew bigger. Although the lights had different intensities, they didn’t vary too much.

Soon after, I spotted a strange phenomenon. The candle at the Southeast of Ms. Wu’s daughter had its flame pointed at the girl. At the same time, the color went from faint yellow to blood red; it was getting redder and redder as time passed by.

I immediately rushed to check it out. When I confirmed that there was no wind in the room, I blew out all the candles. “Ms. Wu, one of your daughter’s corporeal souls has left her body after experiencing a fearful event. Also, the ‘human corporeal soul’ is the most important among the ten souls. If it leaves the body, the person can only live up to ten days. How long ago did your daughter become this feeble?”

Ms. Wu turned pale with fright and quickly counted on her fingers. She answered me with a frightened face. “It’s been around seven or eight days already. Grandmaster, please save my daughter! I’m begging you!”

Her daughter was also startled. I comforted the family and tried to calm them down.

“It seems that we will need to find your daughter’s soul tonight. We’ll take action when it becomes dark. We don’t have much time left. I’m going home to prepare the items I need. You guys stay here and wait for me!”

Ms. Wu was afraid that I would run away. Before I left, she got on her knees and said, “Grandmaster, please do not abandon us. If something happens to my daughter, I won’t be able to live on…

“As long as you save my daughter, I will do anything. Even if you ask me to serve you for the rest of my life, I would do it.”

I could hear the ambiguous offer in her words, but I knew that she was saying it out of desperation.

“Ms. Wu, don’t worry. I’ve agreed to help you, so I will try my best to solve this.”

As soon as I got to my shop, I took the Soul Summoning Banner from the chest my grandfather had left me. Then, I went to a market nearby to buy a rooster with a big red comb.

When I returned to her apartment, Ms. Wu asked me respectfully, “Did you find all the things you needed?”

I nodded then placed the Soul Summoning Banner and the rooster on the ground.

Ms. Wu was puzzled and asked, “How do you plan to use these things?”

I checked the sky. “It’s still early, and it would be pointless to tell you now. I’ll tell you when the sky becomes dark. We're going to need a lot of energy tonight; you better have a good rest.”

Ms. Wu nodded and told me I could rest in her room while she took care of her daughter.

There were many rumors about widows looking for young men, but I knew that she just wanted to earn my favor to solve this problem. She didn’t like me or anything.

I smiled at her. “It’s okay. I’ll just rest on the sofa.”

Ms. Wu looked at me with gratitude in her eyes. She forced a smile and took her daughter back to her room.

I rolled on the sofa for a while but couldn’t fall asleep.

Anyway, Ms. Wu’s house had good geomancy, and I didn’t find any imbalance between Yin and Yang energy. Also, almost all the stuff in her house was modern. There shouldn’t be any otherworldly item.

I was walking around the apartment when Ms. Wu came out of her bedroom. She gently closed the door and embarrassedly looked at me, saying that she couldn’t fall asleep.

I smiled and said, “In that case, can we sit and talk? I have some questions I want to ask you.”

Ms. Wu nodded and sat across the table.

“Are there any old items in your house? Things that are older than one hundred years old.”

Ms. Wu contemplated then shook her head. “No, all the furniture in my house was just recently bought.”

“In that case, where did the red scarf come from? The one your daughter used to hang herself.”

Ms. Wu thought for a bit and then panicked. “Right, the red scarf! Where did it come from? We don’t have any red scarves in our house. Also, my daughter hasn’t gone out for a while. Where did she get it?”

I felt that there was a problem with that red scarf. “Where is it now?”

Ms. Wu tried to search through her memory. “I don’t remember. I was just worried about my daughter at the time, so I wasn’t in the right mind to check the red scarf. After I cut it, I just trashed it on the ground. I haven’t seen it since then...”

I urged, “We have to find it. I suspect that your daughter lost her corporeal soul when she used that scarf to hung herself. Her lost soul is probably attached to that scarf.”

Ms. Wu nodded. She let me wait in the living room while she searched around.

However, she couldn’t find the item. She was so anxious that her face turned pale. “Something’s wrong. How come I can’t find it? It was on the ground the last time I saw it!”

After looking at her panic-stricken figure, I pitied her. “It’s all right. I think someone might have taken it. One question, did that red scarf look ancient?”

Ms. Wu shook her head. “No, that red scarf wasn’t an antique. I remember seeing that type of scarf before. It was near our apartment building. A granny has a stall where she sells miscellaneous stuff.”

“Oh? Except for her, does anybody else sell that sort of red fabric scarf?”

“No, there’s no one else.” Ms. Wu didn’t hesitate to answer. “Nowadays, that sort of fabric scarf isn’t really used.”

I contemplated then nodded. I asked Ms. Wu to seize the time and take me to see that old woman. Perhaps we could discover something from her.

Ms. Wu took me downstairs, and right at the entrance of the neighborhood, I met that granny.