Carrying a feather duster along the pitch-black trail, Li Banfeng picked his way forward with utmost caution.
This path was called the Lesser Underworld. The old hunter had warned him repeatedly that this stretch was the most treacherous of all, and on no account should he hurry.
Dense fog choked both sides of the path. Within it, there seemed to be wild weeds, trees, and what looked like faint shapes of creatures crawling along the ground.
According to the old hunter, one could only walk along this narrow path and must never step off it. Straying even a single step outside was a matter of life and death.
Aside from that, one had to pay constant attention to the wind direction.
If the wind blew south, one could keep walking forward, but under no circumstances should one look back, for there was no telling how many things were following behind.
If the wind blew north, one had to stop and stand perfectly still. A single step more, and there was no saying what horrors one might run into.
If the wind blew east, one had to set down some food and drink on the ground. It didn't need to be much, just a token of sincerity. Once the offerings vanished, one could continue.
If the wind blew west, one had to light a cigarette to produce a little fire and smoke. As long as the cherry didn't go out, one could press on.
If the wind blew irregular and off-course, one had to turn around and walk backwards until the wind blew straight again.
The old hunter had repeated this several times: "These rules were passed down to me by others. As for the reason behind them, I can't say for sure. But I've seen people on the Lesser Underworld who failed to follow the rules. Even a single mistake, and their lives were gone in the blink of an eye. Ghosts are invisible things, and in the end, people don't even know how they died."
Li Banfeng remained fairly optimistic. He could see ghosts.
Yet that didn't mean he wanted to watch himself march to his death.
The rules regarding wind direction still had to be observed, and the best tool for gauging it was a feather duster.
Li Banfeng walked south with the feather duster in hand. A light breeze blew south the entire way, the feathers drifting southward with it, making for very smooth progress.
After walking for over a dozen li, the wind suddenly stopped.
Li Banfeng froze in place, unsure of how to proceed.
The old hunter had never mentioned what to do if the wind died.
He had said the wind on the Lesser Underworld blew constantly.
Yet now the wind had truly died, and the feather duster hung motionless.
Should this count as an irregular wind?
Li Banfeng turned around, preparing to walk backwards, when he caught sight of a cluster of green flames trailing behind him.
It wasn't just one cluster—it stretched the entire way back.
Innumerable ghost fires, clump upon clump, were arranged in a neat column, following right behind Li Banfeng.
It seemed he shouldn't have turned around just now.
Just as Li Banfeng wondered whether turning back forward would resolve the issue, a wave of malice surged toward him from within the ghost fires.
Leaving no time for second thoughts, Li Banfeng immediately raised the Hanxue pendulum. It was the only numinous treasure he possessed capable of harming departed souls.
*Bang!*
The Hanxue pendulum took a heavy blow, vibrating violently along with Li Banfeng's entire body.
*Bang, bang, bang!*
The impacts came without pause, forcing Li Banfeng to stumble back repeatedly.
"Master, I can't hold out!" the pendulum wailed in agony.
With one hand, Li Banfeng pulled open the door to the Portable Abode, dropped the key, and left the door wide open.
*Since you've come to offer yourselves up as dishes, don't blame me for being impolite.*
Clumps of ghost fires rushed in after him, circling through the room for a long while, yet the gramophone made no move.
Dodging left and right within the main room, Li Banfeng called out repeatedly, "Wife, dinner is served!"
*Hiss! Hiss!*
The gramophone finally responded: "Husband, please go wait in the outer room. Your humble slave has been starved for days, and my eating manners are rather indelicate; I do not wish for husband to see."
"It's just the two of us here—you care about that now?"
Li Banfeng couldn't fathom the gramophone's intention, nor could he make his way to the outer room at the moment.
A dozen or so departed souls pressed the assault, another dozen covered their flanks, and yet another dozen sealed off his escape routes.
These spirits moved with discipline and flawless coordination, fighting like a well-trained army and leaving Li Banfeng hard-pressed to hold his ground.
*What is wrong with my wife?*
*I bought groceries and brought them home—why isn't she eager at all?*
*Scritch! Scritch! Scritch!*
The sound of strings rose slowly.
Accompanied by crackling static, the gramophone began to sing a melody:
*In spring the green grass grows, battle coats finely sewn.*
*In summer the red flowers bloom, drums and horns thunder aloud.*
*In autumn the yellow leaves fall, enemy heads taken at the front.*
*In winter the white snow flies, blood is spilled to honor valiant souls.*
*Whoosh—*
The sound of wind arose, so vivid and tangible that it felt as though an actual gale were sweeping through the Portable Abode.
Within that wind, one could hear the wife's chanting voice—the most beautiful singing Li Banfeng had ever heard.
What song was this?
Perhaps there was no need to dwell on that question. No matter what his wife sang, it possessed the power to soothe departed souls.
These disciplined spirits were no exception. They halted their assault at once, lining up in an orderly formation, and silently listened to the song flowing from the gramophone.
A burst of steam puffed out, pushing open the door to the outer room.
Taking the hint, Li Banfeng slipped inside and shut the door behind him.
He produced the Thread-Hook Earring and listened intently to the sounds outside.
The song continued, and amid it, he faintly detected sobbing—sobs coming from the departed souls.
It began with one or two, then gradually swelled into a chorus. It seemed all several dozen souls that had entered the room were weeping.
Were they moved by his wife's singing?
Could it really be just because they were moved?
When the song came to an end, the gramophone spoke:
"I intended never to see you again, yet here we meet.
"What you owe me, you cannot repay, nor do I ask you to.
"Leave. From now on, you are not allowed to touch that man."
*She knows them?*
*She knows these wandering ghosts in the newland?*
While Li Banfeng was still stunned, the door to the outer room swung open.
Several dozen clusters of ghost fires stood in neat rows, waiting for Li Banfeng to open the exit.
Reverting to her usual operatic drawl, the wife sang in a measured cadence, "Aiyo, Husband, who knows how long these resentful ghosts have been dead—tough and stringy, bitter and acrid, truly hard to swallow. Hurry and send them on their way."
Li Banfeng fell silent for a moment, then nodded.
He had heard everything the gramophone said to the spirits just now.
The gramophone also knew he had heard it.
Yet Li Banfeng did not ask a single question. He opened the front door and led the host of departed souls out of the Portable Abode.
The moment he stepped outside, before he could even pick up the key, another massive swarm of ghost fires surged forward.
The fires that had emerged from the room quickly circled around Li Banfeng, driving back the spirits outside. Once he retrieved the key, they escorted him south the entire way.
Inside the Portable Abode, the Red Lotus spoke up: "Seeing old acquaintances, does it feel as though your heart is being gouged out?"
The gramophone gave a sneer of her own. "If you want to mock me, you need to hit the mark. Do I still have a heart?"
The Red Lotus's petals parted and closed slightly, as though still ridiculing her. "Whether you have a heart or not, only you know. Have you forgotten what they reduced you to? When given a chance for revenge, you didn't lift a finger and even let them go?"
*Hiss!*
*Hiss!*
"What if I killed them? What if I had my revenge? It's precisely because my heart is gone that I no longer care."
***
Escorted by the host of departed souls, Li Banfeng walked for a full hundred li.
Lanyang Village wasn't particularly large, but the expanse of this newland was staggeringly vast!
The narrow path grew wider and wider. As the chilling fog gradually dispersed, the surroundings opened into an expansive wilderness.
Li Banfeng had stepped out of the Lesser Underworld.
The rest of the journey was flat terrain. Though he occasionally encountered unusual creatures, fortunately their tiers were not very high, and Li Banfeng avoided them using his art of seeking good fortune and avoiding calamity.
After sprinting across the wilderness for two hours, Li Banfeng spotted a vast grove of orange trees.
From a distance, these trees looked no different from the ones he was familiar with, aside from having denser foliage and slightly larger fruit.
Only when he drew near did he realize what was unusual.
These orange trees stood over a dozen meters tall, and each fruit measured around fifty centimeters in diameter—far larger than any ordinary orange Li Banfeng had ever known.
To the veteran hunters of Lanyang Village, the Orange Grove was an outright treasure trove.
The fruit here was edible, rich in sugar, and contained natural oils, making it an exceptionally rare food source in the newland.
The orange peel was a precious spice of immense value; Ma the Fifth would pay eight hundred yuan for a single jin.
Besides the peel, there were orange maggots—a kind of pest that parasitized the fruit. The orange maggots from this grove could be used as medicine, possessing miraculous efficacy on traumatic wounds. A prime specimen could fetch two hundred yuan from Ma the Fifth.
In addition to the maggots, there were snout beetles. The beetles in this grove had exceptionally long snouts that served as superb needles for acupuncture, with a single snout needle fetching over five hundred yuan.
In the Orange Grove, one could peel the oranges, hunt for maggots, or catch snout beetles, but one could never take things too far—above all, one must not harm the trees. In the words of the old hunters, this was called "look up at the trees, look down at the saplings."
Some hunters had come to gather orange maggots by chopping down trees outright, stripping every orange and crushing them one by one to find the grubs.
Such people died. How they died, nobody knew.
Others, seeking orange peel, knocked down thousands of jin of fruit regardless of whether they were green or ripe, stripping the peels and letting the flesh rot away. Such people died as well.
There were also hunters who, annoyed by the undergrowth while catching snout beetles, cleared the path with sickles and cut down young saplings. They too met their deaths.
To put it simply, as long as one took in moderation and caused no wanton destruction, nothing would go wrong in the Orange Grove.
The old hunter had told Li Banfeng that the Blue Leaf Poplar might suddenly appear among the orange trees. A poplar and an orange tree were vastly different; with even a modicum of care, one would never mistake one for the other.
Li Banfeng walked through the Orange Grove for two hours, but apart from orange trees, he found no other species.
Having walked the entire day, fatigue set in, so Li Banfeng returned to the Portable Abode early to rest.
The moment he stepped through the door, a wave of warm steam enveloped him, as though his wife were wrapping him in a tight embrace.
"Husband, dear~ the journey must have been so exhausting."
"Husband, dear~ hurry and change out of your clothes; this slave will wash and starch them for you."
"Husband, dear~ the hot water is already boiled; your humble slave will attend your bath."
"Husband, dear~ if you wish to let loose, feel free to enjoy yourself to the fullest while bathing; this slave will tidy up afterward."
Because she had kept secrets from Li Banfeng and spurned his thoughtful gesture, the gramophone felt guilty, making her tone exceptionally tender tonight.
Paying her no mind, Li Banfeng crouched down and began rummaging through a cabinet.
*Hiss—hiss—*
A hint of nervousness crept into her singing tone. "Good husband, dear~ are you angry with your humble slave? I know husband worked hard to buy groceries, but this slave truly had no appetite today. Please do not blame this slave; I offer husband my humblest apologies."
Li Banfeng pulled an oil can from the cabinet and said with a beaming smile, "I'm not blaming you, Wife. I just felt you weren't speaking very smoothly today—probably a bit jammed up. I thought I'd give you a little machine oil."
The gramophone grew flustered, her lyrics drifting out of tune: "Husband, dear~ we can talk things through. There is no need for machine oil; your slave here is running quite smoothly."
Without brooking any argument, Li Banfeng carried the oil can behind the gramophone and popped open her casing.
The gramophone explained in a panic, "Husband, this slave truly does not lack oil!
"Husband, dear, listen to me! This slave did not mean to hide things from you, nor am I speaking haltingly. Those people were indeed old acquaintances, but this slave truly does not wish to bring up the past!
"Husband, dear, if you insist on oiling, that is fine, but you must use an oil brush—you can't use other tools!
"Husband, dear~
"Husband—!"
Chapter 139