At five or six o’clock, the sky had already completely darkened.
A small lamp was lit in the living room. Yan Lanyu sat on the sofa, staring at the cardboard box in front of him, with only one feeling in his heart.
—What’s meant to come will come.
From the very beginning, he had never believed he could smoothly leave the Esoteric School.
What kind of place was the Esoteric School? The darkest world of Japanese Onmyodo, a hall where power was most highly concentrated. For hundreds of years, only a very few had managed to escape from there, but those who left alive ultimately could not escape the fate of soon treading the path to the underworld.
Fortunately, no matter what came now, at least it wouldn’t implicate others.
Yan Lanyu took a deep breath, cut open the transparent tape with a small knife, and opened the cardboard box. The orange-yellow light revealed a palm-sized round box inside. The lid was carved with intricate and blurry patterns covered in a bluish patina.
Yan Lanyu picked up the round box, his expression changing slightly.
—It was actually a bronze mirror.
·
In a noodle shop downstairs in the neighborhood, the cold north wind swept through the shabby dining hall. From the kitchen, a hot wok was lifted, and a plume of white steam mixed with the fragrant smell of scallions rushed out.
“Your beef noodle soup—”
The black-clothed young man took the bowl, returned to his seat, broke apart the wooden chopsticks, and started eating.
“Slurp… slurp…“
The young man’s sleeve moved slightly. A moment later, a thumb-sized head, snake-like but with horns, poked out and moved to the edge of the noodle bowl to drink the soup.
The young man didn’t mind. However, after a few sips, the snake-dragon creature slid its entire body out of his sleeve and began to climb up his arm toward his shoulder. Its black scales shimmered with a faint luster, not conspicuous on the young man’s black clothes. It quickly climbed to his shoulder and coiled up, looking around.
The young man let out a low reprimand.
The small dragon buried its head, then dove into his collar and disappeared.
The noodle shop owner, who was passing by with a bowl, didn’t notice this scene but heard the young man’s reprimand. It was not in a Chinese dialect, and he couldn’t help but look back.
He saw a young man of about seventeen or eighteen, wearing only a black T-shirt and a black jacket in the dead of winter. He wore a pair of fingerless leather gloves, the edges of which were clearly worn. His skin was slightly dark, but his features were very distinct and handsome, especially his brow bone and the bridge of his nose, which were very deep and three-dimensional. At first glance, his features didn’t look Han Chinese, but rather had the feel of an ethnic minority from the southwest.
There were only a few scattered customers in the shop. The owner listlessly wiped the stove with a rag, idly observing the young man in black.
An out-of-towner? A Beijing drifter?
Still not going home for the New Year. Who knows what kind of work he does in Beijing. Life is tough these days.
At that moment, the young man seemed to sense the gaze upon him and looked up at the owner. In an instant, as if a cold wind had grazed his neck, the owner suddenly shivered.
—What… what bright eyes!
Like the sharp glint in a falcon’s eyes when it locks onto its prey, just one glance was enough to make one feel an indescribable sense of fear.
“Curiosity killed the cat…” the young man murmured in the Miao language, finished the last mouthful of noodle soup, and put down the bowl.
At that moment, his gaze went past the shop door and suddenly saw a person walking out of the neighborhood entrance across the street. In the middle of winter, he was wearing only a shirt, looking particularly thin in the wind. He crossed the intersection and walked to a private car by the roadside, leaning in to say something to the driver inside.
The young man’s eyes narrowed slightly.
—That person was Yan Lanyu.
The young man tossed a fifty-yuan bill onto the greasy table, suddenly stood up, and strode out of the shop, heading straight across the road.
At that moment, something unexpected happened up ahead. Yan Lanyu suddenly grabbed the private car driver’s collar and started punching him!
The driver immediately struggled and screamed.
There were not many people on the street on a cold winter night. When the driver screamed, the sound carried far. Even the security guard at the neighborhood entrance and the few customers in the noodle shop poked their heads out to look. In full view of everyone, Yan Lanyu cleanly flipped the driver out of the car and onto the road, then bent down to get into the car.
“Carjacking! Carjacking!” The driver, as if seeing a ghost, crawled backward while shouting, “Help! Carjacking!”
In the distance, people started running toward them, but none of them were as fast as the black-clothed young man. He rushed across the intersection, and with a single leap, he was there, grabbing Yan Lanyu’s arm and dragging him out of the car with a backhand motion.
Yan Lanyu looked up. “Who are you?”
His voice was unusually hoarse and unpleasant. The black-clothed young man was slightly taken aback, and then he saw that Yan Lanyu’s eyes were actually double-pupiled!
—Only a person possessed by a demon or ghost would show double pupils!
“And who are you?” the young man said coldly, striking at the back of Yan Lanyu’s neck with a backhand chop!
Yan Lanyu’s movements were extremely fast. He “slid” out of the young man’s grasp and out of the car, striking back at the young man’s back. In that split second, a snake-dragon creature shot out from the young man’s collar and let out a ferocious, silent roar at Yan Lanyu. The sound waves rippled through the air with terrifying force, directly knocking Yan Lanyu to the ground!
The young man let out a sharp shout. A few passersby who had wanted to investigate hesitated and stopped in their tracks.
“My car…” The driver struggled to get up, but then the young man bent down and pressed a spot behind his ear with his strong, slender fingers.
With just that simple touch, the driver immediately collapsed without making a sound.
“So it’s you.” Yan Lanyu staggered to his feet, staring at the creature coiled on the young man’s shoulder, his double pupils reflecting a demonic light. “The legendary old dragon. I didn’t expect to run into you here… Are you the legendary ‘cleaner’ of the Special Department, Long Jiu?”
The black-clothed young man didn’t answer, just stared intently at Yan Lanyu while dragging the driver to the side of the road.
Yan Lanyu laughed contemptuously. “I heard the cleaner only shows up when something big happens. Why are you here?”
“…I was sent to protect the person you’ve possessed.” Long Jiu finally spoke. It was clear he didn’t speak Chinese often; his pronunciation was a bit stiff and difficult. “You’re a summoned ghost. Who is your master?”
“Oh, I can’t tell you that.” “Yan Lanyu” smiled strangely and then pulled out two short daggers from the sides of his thighs!
—Long Jiu’s eyes instantly narrowed. The blades were as thin as a cicada’s wing, and their edges glinted with a poisonous blue light.
“My mission is only to take him away, but it doesn’t say I have to take a complete Yan Lanyu. If necessary, missing an arm or a leg is also acceptable.”
The summoned ghost made a gesture of putting the blade to Yan Lanyu’s wrist. Under Long Jiu’s instantly sinking gaze, he said maliciously, “So when we fight later, you’d better be careful. Otherwise, this little beauty might die at your hands, you never know…”
·
At the same time, in Jiangxi.
Yu Jingzhong had just finished a meeting. He was walking down the hotel steps, exchanging pleasantries with people, when his phone suddenly rang.
The two people beside him tactfully stepped back with polite smiles. Yu Jingzhong made an apologetic gesture, then looked at the caller ID on his phone, his brow instantly furrowing.
“Hello, Long Jiu?”
“Something has happened to Yan Lanyu.”
Yu Jingzhong’s expression changed instantly. “What happened? Where are you?”
“…Yan Lanyu’s home.”
In the dim living room, the black-clothed young man panted slightly, sitting on the floor covered in blood. Beside him was the cardboard box with the courier slip still attached. On the coffee table was a bronze mirror shattered into four or five pieces.
“The Japanese Esoteric School sent Yan Lanyu an ancient bronze mirror with a very powerful demon sealed inside. As soon as Yan Lanyu opened the mirror, the demon would come out and possess him.”
Long Jiu swallowed a mouthful of bloody saliva and said, “Just now downstairs, I saw Yan Lanyu carjacking. I tried to stop him but couldn’t. The demon should be trying to get him to Japan with his body now.”
Long Jiu couldn’t express complex ideas in Chinese, so he had to use the old Miao language. Fortunately, Yu Jingzhong could understand. “Why couldn’t you stop him?!”
“Because the demon is a top-tier undead servant from the Japanese Onmyodo, extremely difficult to deal with. What’s more, it’s using harm to Yan Lanyu as a way to injure us both. If I anger it, Yan Lanyu’s life will be in danger.” Long Jiu briefly recounted what had happened downstairs and added, “It can only use human transportation to get Yan Lanyu out of the country. It should be heading to the airport now.”
On the hotel steps, the wind howled. Deputy Chief Yu’s face was extremely grim.
“I understand,” he said in a deep voice after a long moment. “I’ll deal with it now.”
Yu Jingzhong hung up the phone, then turned to his contacts and found Zhou Hui.
·
Ten minutes ago, at the Beijing airport.
The departure hall was as bright as day. Chu He wore sunglasses and sat with his legs crossed, flipping through a magazine.
Zhou Hui walked through the rows of seats with coffee, leaned down, and kissed Chu He on the cheek, completely ignoring the strange gazes of the people around him. “When did you start reading this kind of fashion magazine?”
Chu He was calm. He flipped the cover of the magazine, revealing a yellowed copy of The Child Holding a Corpse wrapped inside.
“…” Zhou Hui asked incredulously, “Why on earth do you read your own diary all day? You haven’t gotten tired of it after thousands of years?!”
Chu He took a sip of coffee from Zhou Hui’s hand and said seriously, “Everyone has their own hobbies and principles. For example, I don’t know why you always refuse to buy two cups of coffee and insist on sharing saliva with me…”
“Don’t be like that, darling. We’ve shared more X-rated things. What’s saliva? What time is it now?”
“Boarding starts in twenty minutes.” Chu He said tactfully, “Actually, I think it’s not good to go straight on a trip after just coming back from hell, without reporting to the unit first…”
“Oh, it’s fine. What could happen in just a few days? Besides, we have Jia Louluo and the little beauty.” Zhou Hui sat down beside him nonchalantly and said casually, “The little beauty is so reliable. He even thought of us when he made a birthday wish. How could such a sensible child not be my daughter? If I were to slap him dead with my shoe now, do you think he’d reincarnate as our third daughter…”
Chu He was simply exasperated. “Wake up. Yu Jingzhong would slap you dead with his shoe first, okay?”
Zhou Hui shook his head with great regret, grabbed his bag, and started to look for the boarding passes, pulling out all sorts of miscellaneous things the Phoenix had brought from Buzhou Mountain.
The miscellaneous things included, but were not limited to—Maha’s childhood doodles, Jia Louluo’s shed teeth, a deck of cheating-specialty poker cards Zhou Hui had bought from the human world to avoid washing dishes, and the fluffy down that the little Phoenix had shed everywhere when he first hatched…
Zhou Hui finally found the boarding passes and also pulled out a soft bag. He opened it and saw several cyan eggs inside. “What are these?”
“Jia Louluo’s favorite hell snake eggs. They can be brought to the human world for artificial breeding, so he’ll have an endless supply of snakes to eat.”
“…” Zhou Hui said sourly, “Oh, you’re such a good mother.”
Chu He turned a page of The Child Holding a Corpse and said gently, “Darling, we will never reach a consensus on education… Speaking of which, I’ve never really understood why you can’t get along with Jia Louluo. To be honest, sometimes I feel you’re deliberately making things difficult for him. I think on some matters, it’s not necessary…”
Zhou Hui immediately retorted with a guilty conscience, “I didn’t!”
“You did,” Chu He said. “Last night, you sent Jia Louluo an email behind my back, demanding he get plastic surgery so he wouldn’t look so much like the ‘handsome, dashing, and romantic’ you, otherwise you would charge him a copyright fee. I saw it all.”
Zhou Hui: “…”
Zhou Hui hummed a tune and started playing Candy Crush on his phone, pretending he hadn’t heard anything.
Chu He didn’t press his advantage and continued to sit there, reading his eternally unfinished The Child Holding a Corpse, a book whose contents were known to no one but himself.
The fourteen- or fifteen-year-old boy’s face had a beauty that transcended gender. With sunglasses on, the visible lower half of his face made it almost impossible to tell if he was a boy or a girl. The bright lights of the departure hall made his skin look fair and transparent, his lips a very light pink, so beautiful he looked like a young female star in disguise.
He leaned against Zhou Hui’s shoulder, their affection undisguised, looking like a pair of lovers with a significant age gap. Almost every passerby would look at them with curiosity and surprise.
The scene should have been very intimate, harmonious, and beautiful, but the ever-restless Boss Zhou could only stay quiet for less than five minutes before he started flirting again.
“Speaking of which, what’s written in your diary anyway?”
“Nothing much.”
“If it’s nothing, why do you read it for so long? Are there any fond memories of old lovers in there?”
“No.”
“If not, how can you read it for so long? Are you sure there are none?”
“Haven’t you already read it?”
Zhou Hui put down his phone, dissatisfied. “It’s useless! My little brother-in-law said The Child Holding a Corpse appears in different forms to everyone. In my eyes, it’s only a dozen pages, okay! And it only records some outdated Heavenly Dao gossip and recipes copied from the human world. Anyone who didn’t know better would think you were a virtuous and good wife!”
“There are indeed recipes,” Chu He said peacefully. “When we first came to the human world to live in seclusion, one day you wanted to eat Buddha Jumps Over the Wall. We even went to the imperial kitchen of the palace to copy a secret recipe. Have you forgotten?”
As he spoke, he flipped through The Child Holding a Corpse and pointed to a page for Zhou Hui to see. On the yellowed and brittle paper, a whole page of recipes was indeed neatly written in small regular script: so many liang of chicken, so many liang of ham, so many winter bamboo shoots, so many qian of shark fin…
“…” Zhou Hui craned his neck. “What else? What’s written before that? Let me see!”
Chu He flipped a page back. “On a certain day of a certain month of a certain year, Maha wet the bed. To hide his shame, he secretly washed the sheets in the middle of the night. He was discovered by Zhou Hui and mercilessly mocked…”
“Further back, further back!”
“On a certain day of a certain month of a certain year, Jia Louluo lost two teeth and secretly hid them under his pillow. They were discovered and taken by Zhou Hui. Jia Louluo cried incessantly for three days…”
“Why is it all about me bullying the children? You must have remembered it wrong!” Zhou Hui snatched The Child Holding a Corpse and took out his Montblanc gold pen from his pocket. “Hmm, let me make some changes for you. All these untrue statements must be crossed out. And let’s see if there’s any other slander against my noble character further back…”
Chu He had three hundred black lines on his face. He got up to snatch the diary, but Zhou Hui jumped up and dodged. While dodging, he was also flipping through the diary, muttering, “What, using Maha’s tail to mop the floor, using Jia Louluo’s feathers to make a shuttlecock, being lazy and not cooking, only feeding the two children boiled eggs… It never happened! All of this must be crossed out…”
“Zhou Hui!”
“Ah, there really is an old lover!” Zhou Hui was like he had discovered a new continent. “On a certain day of a certain month of a certain year, compared to Sakyamuni, Zhou Hui is indeed more—”
“Give it back!” Chu He pounced to snatch it, but Zhou Hui ran away like the wind.
Boss Zhou ran like a wild horse with its reins cut. In a few seconds, he crossed the departure hall and disappeared into the restroom in a flash. Chu He’s body was not yet fully grown, so it was impossible for him to keep up with that tornado-like wild pace. He gave up after chasing for two steps.
He was quite sure he had not written “compared to Sakyamuni, Zhou Hui is so-and-so” in his diary. That sentence was most likely made up by Zhou Hui on the spot. But to make up such a thing just to snatch the diary, he really was desperate…
Chu He turned around, a little dejected. Just as he was about to go back to his seat, his peripheral vision caught a glimpse of a familiar figure not far away.
“Huh?”
Chu He narrowed his eyes and looked. He saw that person wearing a shirt, not even feeling cold in the middle of winter, and looking up at the departure gate sign.
“…Yan Lanyu?”
Why is little brother Yan here, and all alone, without even a jacket?
Chu He was a little confused. He subconsciously glanced at the restroom Zhou Hui had run into, then quickly walked toward Yan Lanyu.
