The General Temple

The most direct threat was a plain statement of fact. At that moment, even Yin Meng, standing beside him, was already considering where on campus would be suitable for burying a body. Her nature would never normally allow her to act with such ruthlessness. Yet if the boy merely patted his leg and said, "Bury her," she would undoubtedly grab a shovel and start digging a pit without hesitation. She knew well that while he could tolerate Runsheng acting foolishly, he would never give her a second chance. By the same token, if even his companion believed it was real, the threatened party naturally had no lingering delusions of getting off easy. Sun Hongxia could not help but wonder whether the youth before her would rather bury her alive than hear the truth. "I'll speak..." Li Zhuiyuan tilted his head toward the open shop door. Yin Meng stepped over, closed the door, and locked it. Li Zhuiyuan asked, "Have you been to her room?" "No." "Take her there." "All right." Yin Meng hoisted Sun Hongxia to her feet, wrapping one hand firmly around her arm—a locking hold designed for pinning down a dead-flipper. Before heading downstairs, Li Zhuiyuan took a can of soda from the beverage rack, popped it open, took two sips, and then picked up a second can. Down in the basement, the door to Sun Hongxia's room was open. It was quite spacious inside. Just as Xue Liangliang had previously said, the only drawback to the rooms down here was the lack of good lighting; everything else was decent. However, Sun Hongxia's room contained two offering tables, casting an oppressive gloom over the space. One offering table was large and the other small. The larger one was roughly the size of a standard dining table, while the smaller one was barely bigger than a wooden bench. Upon the large table rested the memorial portrait of a girl, while on the smaller table sat the portrait of a boy. The two tables were set facing each other, one high and one low. Next to the boy's portrait on the low table lay a kneeling cushion fashioned from strips of old clothing. The candles and incense burner upon the tables showed no signs of having been used in the past couple of days. Sun Hongxia leaned against the bed, half-sitting and half-kneeling. When Li Zhuiyuan walked in, he took a sip of soda while holding the unopened can in his other hand. Yin Meng instinctively raised her hand to take it. Yet the boy merely sat down on the edge of the bed and set the unopened can down beside his feet. *Oh, so it wasn't for me.* Li Zhuiyuan disliked sweet drinks, but his head felt a little dizzy right now, and he needed the sugar. Sun Hongxia parted her lips several times to speak, only to hesitate each time. The greatest taboo during an interrogation was interruption in the middle of it, as it gave the subject a chance to rebuild their psychological defenses and harbor hope of playing for time. Li Zhuiyuan did not care, however. His knowledge of the *Detailed Exposition of Yin-Yang Physiognomy* allowed him to discern whether most ordinary people were lying, and beyond that, he preferred to hold the initiative himself. He pointed toward the boy's portrait on the small bench and asked, "What is your son's name?" Yin Meng felt a mild flicker of surprise. She had assumed the girl's portrait on the taller table was Sun Hongxia's daughter, perhaps connected to the long-haired, faceless figure. She had not expected that Sun Hongxia's child was actually a son. Sun Hongxia answered, "Zhao Junfeng." "And this girl?" "Her surname is Qiu. Her name was Qiu Minmin." Li Zhuiyuan finished his first can of soda, popped open the second, and asked, "What evil deed did Zhao Junfeng commit against Qiu Minmin?" Sun Hongxia said, "Fengfeng violated Minmin in the restroom... and murdered her." "A student of this university?" "Yes, she was." "How many years ago did this happen?" "Seven years ago." "Qiu Minmin's family is still at this university too, aren't they?" Sun Hongxia's lips trembled. She seemed reluctant to say, but the boy merely glanced at her. A violent shudder ran through her entire body, and she finally spoke in resignation: "Yes, her mother is here." "My patience is limited." "Qiu Minmin's mother has the surname Ran. She's the dorm manager for your building." Standing in the same room, Yin Meng felt her mind struggling to keep up. Rather than an interrogation, the boy's line of questioning seemed more like he was simply confirming what he already suspected. The question was, how did he know all of this? Could he have known beforehand? That was impossible. If he had known in advance, things would never have unfolded to this point. In truth, deducing these things was not difficult. The arrangement of the large and small offering tables painted an easy picture of Sun Hongxia regularly kneeling on that cushion, bringing her son along to atone before the girl. The ages of the boy and girl in the portraits matched those of college students. Sun Hongxia spoke as if she were a local, yet her speech carried an accent from another province. Securing a permanent logistics post at the university was hard, but temporary labor was easy to come by. The wages and benefits of such jobs were far better than toiling away doing odd jobs in Xue Liangliang's shop. Working backward, this proved she was deliberately hiding her identity and was not merely working for money. Carrying an overwhelming sense of guilt and staying at the university, she was most likely doing so to atone. Since Qiu Minmin was already dead, the object of that atonement had to be her family. Li Zhuiyuan had simply reasoned backward through ordinary logic, then checked his answers against Sun Hongxia. That they all matched was partly down to luck as well. "You knew Qiu Minmin was still at the university, and right here." Sun Hongxia nodded. "Yes. Late at night when no one is around, she often dances upstairs. She used to perform at all kinds of campus galas in the past; she was a wonderful dancer." "Why didn't she take revenge on you?" "When I first 'saw' her, I was terrified too. But I thought to myself that this was the sin and crime committed by my son. Even if she had turned into a fierce ghost, it was only right for her to kill me to claim my life and vent her hatred. Back then, I often knelt in the dance studio upstairs, begging her to take my life. "Yet... she never did. "Later on, as the years passed, I grew accustomed to it. "Perhaps she felt that letting me die so easily would let me off too lightly, so she wanted to keep appearing around me to torment and punish me. I accept that." "'Perhaps'?" "That is just my guess." "No, that is not your guess. You don't have the brains for it." Sun Hongxia fell silent. "Did Qiu Minmin's mother, that Auntie Ran in our building, tell you that?" Li Zhuiyuan remembered the name displayed on the badge on her desk: Ran Qiuping. "Yes, that's right. She told me those exact words. I've always been grateful to her." "Weigh your words carefully before speaking next time. I will not correct you a second time. If I have to, I will bury you alive—along with that Ran Qiuping." Runsheng had made an error in professional diligence this time, but fundamentally it had been understandable. The real issue now was that the person he had worried over and sought to protect was not so innocent, and was very likely conspiring with a dead-flipper to actively target them. When someone was plotting to take your life, there was no need to be softhearted or hesitate. "I... I understand." "How does Ran Qiuping view the fact that Qiu Minmin is still here?" "She told me that her daughter's resentment refuses to dissipate. She wanted me to wait with her until the day Minmin lets go of her hatred and disperses. When that happens, my sin will be fully atoned for." *Is the dorm manager nurturing a corpse?* Yin Meng thought to herself. Li Zhuiyuan took another sip of soda, feeling that this was unlikely. Qiu Minmin was being controlled, and the presence controlling her was exceedingly terrifying. That did not seem like something Ran Qiuping was capable of, unless she had been deliberately putting on an act during their very first meeting. Beyond that, the most fundamental contradiction was: as Qiu Minmin's birth mother, what reason would Ran Qiuping have to control her tragically deceased daughter? Unfortunately, no more useful clues could be extracted from Sun Hongxia. They could continue interrogating her, but it would yield little value. She had already been brainwashed by Ran Qiuping into a devout penitent. Whether the family of a murderer deserved public condemnation was not Li Zhuiyuan's concern right now. All he knew was that if Ran Qiuping truly possessed the ability to "nurture" and "manipulate" a dead-flipper of that caliber as her minion spirit, there would be no need whatsoever for her to keep Sun Hongxia working under her, repenting and praying before an altar. There had to be another secret here, because the pieces did not fit together smoothly. "How did Zhao Junfeng die?" "While fleeing, he took a classmate hostage and was shot dead by the police at Jiangjun Mountain." Sun Hongxia looked toward her son's portrait. "He refused to show any remorse even in death, and his death was so quick and clean. If only he had faced trial and punishment under the law, I might have felt slightly better. It is all my fault. I gave birth to him, yet failed to raise him right, letting him turn into a beast and harm others." "Who was the classmate he took hostage?" "I don't know." "What happened to his remains?" "Right here." Sun Hongxia bent down and pulled an urn from beneath the bed. "Do you want to see?" "Open it." Sun Hongxia removed the lid. Li Zhuiyuan reached in, pinched a small amount between his fingers, and confirmed it was indeed bone ash. "Do you have any other family?" Li Zhuiyuan asked. "His father passed away early. I have no family here." "Tie her up and secure her first." "Understood." Yin Meng took the netting used for restraining dead-flippers and bound Sun Hongxia. Before gagging her mouth, Yin Meng stepped to the boy's side and whispered, "It seems we haven't asked why Qiu Minmin attacked us yet?" "Go ahead and ask." Yin Meng turned to Sun Hongxia. "Speak. Why did Qiu Minmin attack us?" Sun Hongxia looked bewildered. "I don't know." "You don't know?" Sun Hongxia glanced toward the offering tables. "Could it be because you arrived and moved in right next door to me, preventing me from lighting incense and burning paper money for her over the past two days?" Yin Meng stuffed the gag into Sun Hongxia's mouth. Clearly, she did not believe that excuse either. Li Zhuiyuan walked out of the room. Yin Meng locked the door from the outside and hurried after him, asking, "Why did she attack us?" "If you want to think about it in complicated terms, our arrival—or specifically certain actions taken by you, Runsheng, or Xiaohei—must have offended her." "And if we look at it simply?" "Suppose you were a criminal in hiding, and suddenly discovered that police officers had moved into the rooms on both sides of yours. Wouldn't you think they were there to arrest you?" "That simple?" "The reason she attacked us is not important. What matters is that she did attack. If we hadn't arrived in time, Runsheng might have died at her hands. "What we need to do now is strike back." Yin Meng's expression shifted. "Then we should hurry and apprehend the dorm manager right now." "Qiu Minmin already escaped. Do you think Ran Qiuping knows by now? Even if we hurry, it's already too late." Yin Meng suddenly felt she ought to keep her mouth shut around the boy. Aside from proving her foolishness over and over again, speaking accomplished nothing. The two returned to Building 9. The dorm manager's office remained pitch-black. Yin Meng moved to pry open the window. *Click!* The light inside turned on. Having just pried the window loose, Yin Meng looked up to see Li Zhuiyuan walking in through the office door. It had been unlocked. The boy glanced at her. "Put the window back." "Oh... right." The office was quite small, containing only a desk, a bed, a cabinet, a wardrobe, and cloth organizer pouches hanging on the wall labeled with room numbers, with keys resting beneath them. The only lead of any value was inside a large enamel mug resting by the foot of the desk, which bore scorch marks. Li Zhuiyuan lifted the mug to his nose and sniffed. There was the faint smell of burned paper ash. Having refitted the window, Yin Meng walked in, surveyed the room, and said, "She fled?" Li Zhuiyuan said, "I was actually worried she might be waiting here for us." If that had been the case, it would mean Ran Qiuping possessed substantial backing. Meanwhile, their own team was heavily depleted after losing both Runsheng and Tan Wenbin. Li Zhuiyuan walked over to the organizer pouches and reached beneath the pocket for their room number. No key. It seemed they would need to change the lock. "Yin Meng." "Yes!" Yin Meng straightened her posture, awaiting orders. "Return to the shop now and watch over Sun Hongxia. Tomorrow morning, go to the infirmary and swap places with Tan Wenbin." Relatively speaking, when it came to investigating matters, Zhuangzhuang was vastly superior to Mengmeng. "What about you?" Yin Meng explained, "There's no one by your side. I'm worried about your safety." Li Zhuiyuan pointed upstairs. "It's late. I'm going up to sleep." "Sleep?" "Yes. My head feels a little unwell, and I need rest." "What if..." "There is no 'what if.' Qiu Minmin was beaten until she was nearly shattered. If Ran Qiuping possessed any other means, she wouldn't have fled. We are safe for now." As Li Zhuiyuan stepped out of the office, he added, "Remember to turn off the lights." Back in his dorm room, Li Zhuiyuan picked up his washbasin, placed his whip inside along the bottom, and walked toward the communal sinks. There was no sense in constantly guarding against a thief every hour of every day. One still had to rest when it was time to rest, and bathe when it was time to bathe. Just as written in Wei Zhengdao's books: *We represent the righteous path.* What kind of righteous path spent every waking hour acting neurotic and timid? He had just drawn his first basin of water, poured it over himself, and started working shampoo into his hair when footsteps sounded from behind him. Li Zhuiyuan continued washing his hair as usual. He had sharp ears and could remember someone's footsteps after hearing them just once. "Well holy smoke, Brother Prodigy! Ain't this a coincidence!" Lu Yi, standing at a towering meter eighty-five, was a quintessential northern lad. "Hello." "Brother Prodigy taking a bath too? Uh, I mean, what a coincidence, you're washing up here!" "Mm." "Brother Prodigy, why'd you report to school so early?" "To catch ghosts." "Heheheh, Brother Prodigy, you sure have a sense of humor." Li Zhuiyuan began lathering himself with soap. *Splash!* Lu Yi dumped a basin of water over himself as well. "Whew, feels great!" Immediately after, Lu Yi looked at Li Zhuiyuan and wrapped a towel tightly around his hand. "Brother Prodigy, let me scrub your back." "No need." "It's fine! Back home in our public bathhouses, everyone scrubs each other down like this." With that, Lu Yi was about to reach out. "Brother, there really is no need." *Clatter!* Right then, the whip Li Zhuiyuan had laid by the edge of the washbasin slipped off. Lu Yi's eyes went wide as he stared at it, utterly bewildered. "Brother Prodigy, do you folks from Nantong use this kind of thing for bathing? How does it work? Does it do a good job?" "Brother, I'm finished washing." "Oh, okay! Want some late-night food? I'm boiling dumplings in my room. Want a bowl?" "Won't it trip the breaker?" "What luck, that's right up my alley with my major! Our dorm's power won't trip." "No, thank you, Brother." "Then want to hang out in my room tonight? I can play the guitar." "Don't you have review classes tomorrow?" "No classes tomorrow, it's a day off." "Then get some rest early." "Hey, Brother Prodigy, you still haven't told me where you're catching ghosts!" "There are some right in the dorms." Li Zhuiyuan picked up his basin and walked off. "Heheh, Brother Prodigy sure loves a good joke." Lu Yi lifted his basin, but before he could pour the water, a sudden shiver ran through him. He quickly rinsed off and bolted straight back to his room. Upon returning to his room, Li Zhuiyuan pushed two chairs against the back of the door to bar it, opened the dorm window, and climbed into bed. He closed his eyes and went to sleep. He slept until morning, and the discomfort in his head was noticeably alleviated. Getting out of bed, he dressed, moved the chairs aside, went to wash up, and returned to sit at the desk to draft an investigation plan. Just as he finished writing, Tan Wenbin's footsteps sounded from outside. The door was pushed open, and Tan Wenbin poked his head in. "Xiao Yuan, I brought you breakfast." Steamed soup buns, fried dough sticks, and soy milk. As they ate breakfast together, Li Zhuiyuan handed the plan to Tan Wenbin. Tan Wenbin picked it up, skimmed it, and upon confirming he had no questions, folded it and tucked it into his pocket. The paper listed only two tasks: one was investigating the old Zhao Junfeng and Qiu Minmin case, and the other was investigating Ran Qiuping. The latter merely required routine inquiries, while the former required tracking down case files, ideally establishing contact with the police officers who had handled the investigation back then. "Binbin, does your father have connections?" "He should. My dad was transferred to Shigang later on, and his former classmates and colleagues form a pretty broad network. Besides, even if my dad can't pull it off, there's still my grandfather and maternal grandfather. They're all veteran officers. But I'll need a little time, Yuan." "No rush. That dead-flipper won't recover anytime soon either. We have plenty of time, enough to wait until Brother Runsheng recovers." "Runsheng is recovering well. When the doctor checked his wound this morning, he said his constitution is tougher than an ox. And when Yin Meng came to swap out with me, she brought along the medicinal ointment left behind by Auntie Liu." "Mm." "Do we need to contact Brother Liang?" "This has nothing to do with him." "No, I mean, with something this interesting going on, shouldn't we invite Brother Liang to join in?" "Forget it. I'm afraid he'd just use it as an excuse to run back to Nantong to 'investigate.'" "Pfft... hahahaha!" After laughing, Tan Wenbin suddenly thought of something and asked, "Xiao Yuan, won't you be left all by yourself then?" "There's someone." After Tan Wenbin left, Li Zhuiyuan packed a few items into his backpack, slung it over his shoulders, walked over to a nearby dorm room, and knocked on the door. Before long, the door swung open. Lu Yi looked like he had just woken up. "Yo, Brother Prodigy." "Brother, name your price. I'll hire you for the day. Come with me." "Ha!" Lu Yi bent down slightly and threw an arm around Li Zhuiyuan. "What kind of talk is that? Brothers just need to ask, why bring money into it? Hold on, let me brush my teeth." After washing up quickly, Lu Yi locked his dorm door. "Let's go, Brother Prodigy! Where are we headed?" "Jiangjun Mountain." ... Jiangjun Mountain had originally been called Guanyin Mountain, later renamed Jiangjun Mountain because Yue Fei had resisted the Jin invaders there. It was not a widely renowned scenic spot, but with both hills and water, its scenery was graceful, making it a pleasant weekend retreat on the city's outskirts. Arriving here, Li Zhuiyuan had no specific objective in mind. Tan Wenbin could handle his side of things alone, so Li Zhuiyuan had simply come out here to try his luck. If he had anticipated actual danger, he would never have dragged Lu Yi along on short notice. Li Zhuiyuan climbed a hilltop, retrieved his luopan, and began observing the area's feng shui. Beside him, Lu Yi had originally assumed Brother Prodigy had invited him out for a scenic hike. Seeing the boy pull out a luopan and observe the landscape with utter seriousness, he suddenly recalled what the boy had said the previous night. *Damn it... could there really be ghosts in the dorm?* Li Zhuiyuan changed locations across three different hilltops. Aside from spotting several auspicious burial plots, he found nothing out of the ordinary. Yet when he reached the fourth hilltop to observe, he discovered a peculiar area. *Nine bends leading to seclusion, a hidden dragon in the depths, facing the capital in reverence, borrowing royal fortune.* This was practically a textbook water burial site. Yet precisely because it was so textbook, it would be entirely natural for a mystic or a water monkey to take a fancy to it. Hence, a temple stood there. It was an ancient custom that wherever trouble was prone to arise—such as haunted grounds, mass graves, or ancient tombs—a temple would be erected over it. In modern times, one could build a school instead. Li Zhuiyuan walked up to the temple gate. It was quite small, its horizontal plaque reading: General Temple. Inside were Buddhist elements as well as Daoist ones, yet there were neither monks nor Daoist priests, only a few caretakers, and no admission was charged. However, not long after stepping inside, Li Zhuiyuan sensed something amiss. Although the temple was a hodgepodge, no matter the temple, it should never lack an aura of upright peace and harmony, differing only in degree. Yet this temple gave off a clammy, viscous sensation, and Li Zhuiyuan faintly caught a whiff of the stench of a water corpse. His nose was not as keen as Runsheng's, but since he could smell it, it was almost certainly no mistake. Yet what sort of dead-flipper would hide inside a temple? Li Zhuiyuan hesitated. If the person beside him were Runsheng rather than Lu Yi, he could investigate openly and boldly. Still, he had come out to try his luck. Now that he had encountered something unusual, turning back empty-handed would be a waste of effort. *Might as well take a look. Just looking, not making a move. I'm just a tourist.* Following the concentration of the water-corpse stench, Li Zhuiyuan gradually made his way toward the main shrine hall. By this point, Lu Yi smelled it too and even sneezed. Pointing around, he remarked, "There are so many ginkgo trees planted in this temple. I always used to think these things smelled wonderful." Li Zhuiyuan ignored him and stepped into the shrine hall. Inside stood an imposing statue of a general, beneath which hung a metal plaque reading: *Great General*. This was not Yue Fei. It was clearly Mo Liqing, the sword-wielding deity from among the Four Heavenly Kings in *Investiture of the Gods*. Li Zhuiyuan walked up to a kneeling cushion and knelt down. Seeing this, Lu Yi knelt beside him. In his eyes, Brother Prodigy holding a luopan had already taken on a tinge of mystical aura. Li Zhuiyuan sniffed carefully and confirmed that the source of the water-corpse stench lay directly beneath the general's statue. The statue stood upon a stone pedestal, and the front of the pedestal had a seam running across it, indicating there was likely a sliding compartment inside that could be pulled out. Under normal circumstances, the next step would be to walk the yin path and investigate further. Li Zhuiyuan restrained himself. The water-corpse stench was diffusing at an even rate, proving that even if a dead-flipper lay within, it was dormant. It was quite possible that, much like the peach grove in front of Big Beard's old home, this was a suppression array set up by predecessors. Li Zhuiyuan straightened up, only to hear Lu Yi beside him already kowtowing and praying for the general to bless his parents with good health. Li Zhuiyuan had no choice but to interrupt him. "Don't bow." "Huh?" Lu Yi froze. "Then..." "Follow my lead." Li Zhuiyuan performed a ritual gesture to retract the homage. It was somewhat intricate, so he moved slowly. Lu Yi watched and copied the movements. Once finished, he rose with the boy and stepped away from the cushion. In ordinary Buddhist temples or Daoist shrines, bowing for peace of mind was harmless. But a dead-flipper inherently carried malevolent aura; even if it did not actively harm you, simply being near it could bring misfortune, unless you possessed extraordinary good fortune. As for bowing to a dead-flipper and begging for its protection, that was practically inviting karmic entanglements upon oneself—exceedingly unlucky. Li Zhuiyuan began circling the statue to inspect it, Lu Yi trailing behind him. Though young, the boy possessed a distinctive aura that compelled others to listen to him instinctively, making them feel whatever he said had to be right. After a full circuit, Li Zhuiyuan spotted an anomaly. The layout here was originally supposed to be a textbook evil-dispelling setup, but it had been tampered with. Li Zhuiyuan lightly touched a crack in the floor with the tip of his shoe. This had been chiseled out by human hands after the fact. This gave the boy a familiar feeling, as he himself liked modifying preexisting feng shui layouts. However, whoever had altered this place lacked true skill. They had merely dismantled the evil-dispelling effect. If Li Zhuiyuan had handled it, he could have altered it directly into a yin-gathering layout. For now, all he could do was mark a circle on his mental map. He did not yet know whether whatever lay inside had any connection to Qiu Minmin, and stirrings of trouble were ill-advised at this stage. Any further decisions would have to wait until Tan Wenbin obtained concrete details on the case. "Let's go, Brother Lu." "Sure thing." Just as the two prepared to leave the shrine hall, two men walked past under the corridor opposite—one old, one young. Both wore staff badges on their chests, evidently workers here. The older man had graying hair and walked with his hands clasped behind his back. Yet his folded hands were turned inward and downward, while his shoulders slumped and his shoulder blades jutted upward. This was the posture of carrying a corpse. Furthermore, it was an instinctive habit formed from years of carrying corpses, maintained naturally even in everyday life. When Uncle Qin had taught him basic techniques in the past, he had mentioned that one didn't need to set aside dedicated time to train; everyday chores were training enough. That old man belonged to the tier of people whose mastery had become second nature. The young man displayed similar tendencies, though far less pronounced. Clearly, he was the old man's apprentice. Li Zhuiyuan had not expected to encounter fellow corpse retrievers here. Still, he had no intention of going over to greet them, as the breach in the layout here might very well have been their doing. The old man and the youth parted ways in the distance. The young man continued forward, stopping before what looked like an office, and knocked on the door. The door opened, and a woman stood in the doorway speaking to the youth in an agitated manner. The youth appeared to be placating her, yet his hand behind his back was clenched tight, visibly displaying immense impatience with dealing with the woman. Neither of them realized that this interaction had fallen squarely into someone else's view. Li Zhuiyuan tugged on Lu Yi's sleeve, gesturing for him to follow out through the shrine hall's rear door. Leaving the hall behind, the two hurried out of the General Temple. Once outside, Lu Yi could finally hold back no longer and asked: "Brother Prodigy, wasn't that woman just now our dorm manager?"