Chapter 17: Three Souls and White Bones (Part 9)
Upon learning she would see her sister, Xu Lanyue was incredibly nervous. She wanted to ask more about her but was afraid of disturbing Jiang Si while he was driving, so she could only hold it in.
Xiao Fengxian noticed her anxiety and leaned over to comfort her. “Oh, don’t worry. I’ve met your sister; she’s beautiful and rich.”
Jiang Si couldn’t help glancing at the rearview mirror, wondering if voice modulation was a unique skill for women. Even after death, they could switch their vocal range at will.
His understanding didn’t yet include the concept of a “pick-me voice” (a cutesy, high-pitched voice), so he just assumed Xiao Fengxian was being gentle because she pitied Xu Lanyue.
The car sped along and braked in the city hospital’s parking lot. Following the address Wang Zhao gave, Jiang Si led the three ghosts to find Xu Jing’s ward.
Pushing the door open, he saw Xu Jing wiping tears while looking at her phone. The screen seemed to display a childhood photo of hers. Seeing someone enter, she hurriedly put away her phone and got out of bed.
“You’re here.” Xu Jing forced a smile. “Thank you so much this time. I owe you a favor. If you need any help in the future, you can come to me.”
Jiang Si nodded and simply said, “If you don’t want to smile, don’t force it.”
Xu Jing’s smile instantly collapsed, and she lowered her head, her eyes rimmed with red.
Seeing her remain silent, Jiang Si thought the conversation was over and turned to leave. Xu Jing called out to stop him again, her voice hoarse and filled with sorrow. “My sister… is she okay now?”
Was she asking about the body or something else?
Jiang Si looked at her in surprise, then at the empty air a step away from her.
In a place Xu Jing couldn’t see, Xu Lanyue was loosely hugging her, her eyes full of heartache. Because she didn’t dare touch her, afraid of tainting her sister with yin energy, she kept her distance despite her guilt and longing.
They seemed close, but they were separated by life and death.
“She’s fine. She’ll be better in the future. You will be too,” Jiang Si said. The tears Xu Jing had been holding back burst forth. Realizing it, she immediately turned her back to Jiang Si.
Jiang Si closed the door behind him as he left. Just as he stepped out, he saw Wang Zhao sneaking around, waving at him.
“Why are you acting so shady?” Jiang Si was baffled. Wang Zhao was a graduate of a prestigious university, so why were his mannerisms always so wretched?
“I’m just embarrassed to see Sister Xu,” Wang Zhao explained. “The police interrogated him all night and finally got it out of him.”
“It shocked me to my core. Calling that homestay owner a beast earlier was too light. His whole family are animals!”
“Whole family?” Jiang Si said. “I didn’t see his family or kids.”
“His kid is in college out of town,” Wang Zhao said, recounting the whole story to Jiang Si.
Fifteen years ago, as an outstanding graduate of the music department, Xu Lanyue chose to teach in a mountain village for a year to hone herself.
At that time, Yanming Mountain was the remotest of remote areas. There was only one road connecting it to the outside world, and buses took over four hours from the city, navigating pothole-ridden roads to get there.
Across several nearby mountains, there was only one simple elementary school with a dozen or so children and one old teacher who also served as the principal.
Xu Lanyue was stunned by the conditions but showed no disdain. Especially after seeing how difficult student recruitment was and witnessing many girls being treated as goods for marriage, she became even more determined. She wanted to lead them out to see another world.
Xu Lanyue hid it from her parents and changed her one-year contract to ten years, putting down roots there.
At first, the residents were polite to the teacher from the big city. But when they heard about her plans to recruit more female students, they were unhappy.
Labor was scarce at home. It was one thing for boys to go to school, but if girls went too, who would do the laundry and cooking?
Besides, girls would marry eventually. What was the use of studying so well? It would just benefit someone else’s family.
Xu Lanyue wore out a pair of shoes walking across several nearby hills just to recruit two or three female students.
Full of ambition, she didn’t know her goodwill had sparked jealousy and hatred.
To live somewhere long-term, the first rule should be to blend in. But Xu Lanyue didn’t know that. Carrying the habits of the big city, she wanted to shake the mud off these little radishes dug from the pit and help them become better people.
There was a troublemaker in her class. Relying on the fact that his father had just been released from prison, he bullied his classmates everywhere.
Unable to bear it any longer, Xu Lanyue went to his home for a visit. She walked in on the boy’s mother being beaten.
Accustomed to seeing his mother bruised and swollen, the boy turned a deaf ear to her screams. Instead, he pulled at Xu Lanyue’s hem. “Teacher, you’re so pretty, come be my mom!”
Xu Lanyue thought he was joking. That day, terrified, she ran back to her dormitory, racking her brains for a way to help the poor woman suffering from domestic violence.
But the next day, rumors started.
They said Xu Lanyue couldn’t stand the harsh conditions and planned to hook up with a man to return to a good life.
At first, she took it as a joke. But it intensified until even the principal talked to her several times, hinting openly and covertly that she should watch her conduct.
Xu Lanyue was angry but helpless. Until she saw a group of children gathered together, discussing vividly how she, the teacher, was improperly interacting with men everywhere.
Among them was a female student she had personally recruited.
The blow was immense. Xu Lanyue went back and cried all night, but she didn’t think of giving up. She put away all her pretty clothes, stopped wearing skirts, and adopted the plain dress of the local women, trying to correct the children’s values.
But she didn’t expect that doing so wouldn’t quell the rumors. Instead, it caused more dissatisfaction.
Men said she would look good even in a sack.
Women said she wore those clothes on purpose to humiliate them.
During Xu Lanyue’s most painful period, she focused solely on improving her students’ grades, which led her to visit a student’s home again.
Xu Lanyue drank a cup of water handed to her by the parent without suspicion, and she never left his home again.
It was also during that time that Xu Lanyue learned the wife, who had been abused for years, was dead. The husband dared not take responsibility, so he hid her body at home.
But he wanted a new woman. Looking down on the locals, he set his sights on Xu Lanyue, the young, beautiful female teacher.
The days of imprisonment were long. Due to the drugs, Xu Lanyue was rarely awake during the day. Only at night would the door to the small room where she was kept be pushed open, and that fierce man would walk in.
She was like a flower facing autumn, withering rapidly.
But her nature wouldn’t let her give up. Every time, she tried to escape, only to be met with endless beatings and verbal abuse.
With palms, belts, iron bars. He would grab whatever was at hand, beating her like a disobedient prey until she submitted.
Xu Lanyue could only endure humiliation and wait for an opportunity. Finally, one day, the man drank to celebrate the development project and fell asleep on the floor.
She seized the chance to steal the key, unlock the door, and run out. But under the bright moonlight, a boy stood there.
Xu Lanyue had countless questions, but they all turned into a tearful plea. “Let Teacher go, okay?”
The boy smiled and shouted loudly to wake his father.
That was the worst beating Xu Lanyue ever received. Her flesh was torn by iron bars, she was dragged by her hair across the ground, and her head was smashed against the wall.
Finally, he called a group of his drinking buddies and tore Xu Lanyue’s clothes in front of them…
The thin rags wrapped tightly around her body were slowly torn to shreds. The men present let their lewd, disgusting gazes roam over her.
Seeing those sticky, suffocating stares, Xu Lanyue finally broke. With all her might, she bit off half of the man’s ear. Furious, the man pinned her to the ground and drove a long nail into her temple until blood covered the floor and she stopped breathing.
Xu Lanyue’s death was too gruesome; the man got scared.
He threatened everyone who watched to help dismember the body and conceal it.
They first threw the body parts onto the mountain. Later, when Yanming Mountain was developed and the homestay was built, they retrieved the parts, mixed them with cement along with his beaten-to-death ex-wife, and poured them into the wall.
Afterward, even when Xu Lanyue’s parents came to make a scene and the police came to search multiple times, the locals all kept their stories straight: she had run off with a man because she was pregnant.
Her body was sealed away for fifteen years, until finally, it saw the light of day, clearing her name.
The heavy atmosphere lasted until the next day. Jiang Si thought about it all night, even shaking Hai Di awake to discuss it.
“Don’t you think letting that beast just die is too easy?”
“What do you want to do?” Hai Di saw the eagerness in Jiang Si’s eyes immediately. “Lynchings aren’t good, you know.”
“Physical pain is letting him off cheap… Doesn’t he like hitting people? Let him experience mental torment every single day.” Jiang Si was a man of action. He rolled over, turned on the light, found a stack of paper, and planned to make some handy tools.
“I heard barbed whips hurt especially bad, and it’s hard to stop the bleeding. Pulling it out might even bring out chunks of flesh… Whips seem okay too… Chains aren’t bad either; underworld officers use chains to claim lives…”
“Although underworld weapons won’t cause substantial physical harm, torturing him in his dreams is feasible.”
Hai Di propped his chin on his hand and watched with interest for a while. Seeing Jiang Si getting more excited as he spoke, he asked, “Who do you want to do it?”
Jiang Si fell silent. “For this kind of thing, of course, the victim has to do it herself to truly vent the hatred.”
“Jiang Si…” Hai Di suddenly called his name. “Aren’t you afraid of incurring karma by helping ghosts like this?”
“Repaying kindness with kindness, and hatred with hatred—that too is the cycle of karma.”
As soon as the words left his mouth, Jiang Si realized something was wrong. He tilted his head to look at Hai Di and pressed him, “Wait, that shouldn’t be in your cultural repertoire. confess honestly, what weird stuff have you been reading lately?”
His posture, leaning over from above, was particularly imposing. Hai Di pressed his lips into a line, took out Jiang Si’s spare phone, and opened a green app.
The first row of the bookshelf displayed a novel titled Genius Physiognomist.
The first sentence of the synopsis was: “People in the metaphysical world fear getting involved in karma and taboo the Three Deficiencies and Five Guilts the most. If you want to enter the practice, please remember the following rules.”
“…”
Jiang Si felt his silence was deafening. After a long while, he asked, “Is the book good?”
“It’s okay.”
“Send it to me.”
“Okay.”
Before leaving Yanming Mountain, Jiang Si specifically sought out Xu Lanyue to ask what she wanted to do.
If she wanted to reincarnate, Jiang Si could find a way to send her to the nearby City God Temple to queue up according to procedure.
If she had other wishes, he could pass them on to Xu Jing.
Xu Lanyue clutched her sleeves and fell silent. After a while, she asked with eyes full of expectation, “Can I wait until the verdict is out before leaving? I can only rest assured if I see him die.”
Before Jiang Si could answer, Xiao Fengxian immediately added, “Aren’t you recruiting actors? She would work; she’s even a music major.”
Two ghosts, four eyes, all looked at Jiang Si, nervously awaiting his reaction.
Jiang Si sighed, and Xu Lanyue’s expression grew heavy.
Xiao Fengxian hurriedly said, “I can share my incense with her; it won’t cost you money.”
But then they heard him say, “Actually, there’s a third option. You can take revenge yourself, but since you want to join my project, that’s not impossible either.”
“…” Both of them froze with blank expressions.
Hai Di couldn’t help but let out a short laugh.
Jiang Si, with his usual bad taste, just loved teasing ghosts.
“That homestay owner glared at me before, and I never got around to getting back at him. Sister Xu, please do the hard work and teach him a lesson for me.”
Jiang Si’s eyes curved into a smile as he handed her the paper-folded whip.
“I’m a person who holds grudges. I can’t get into the detention center, but you can.”
Xu Lanyue stared at him blankly, feeling a sting in her nose and heat swelling in her eyes.
Everyone present knew what she had gone through while alive, but Jiang Si didn’t point it out. He even found an excuse for her.
“Okay.” Xu Lanyue took the whip and nodded heavily.
Meanwhile, the homestay owner in the detention center had no idea what he was about to face.
Having been the local tyrant of Yanming Mountain for so long, he had saved up a sum of money and naturally wouldn’t skimp on a lawyer.
He had contacted the country’s top criminal defense attorney. After listening to the lawyer’s analysis, the owner was dreaming of a life sentence that could be reduced for an early release.
However, the moment he closed his eyes, he saw a figure that terrified him to his core.
Xu Lanyue maintained the gruesome state of her death, her face covered in dried blood. A long nail was embedded in the side of her head, exposing a rusty tail. Her eyes looked down at him coldly from above.
Trembling, the owner tried to run, desperate to escape. But a whip tightened around his neck, choking him.
His face turned red and congested, his eyes bulging. He clawed desperately at the whip around his neck, trying to make space to breathe. But the whip seemed alive, tightening further, cutting off oxygen bit by bit. The owner panted pathetically, tongue lolling out like a dead dog.
Just when he thought he would die there today, he suddenly felt his neck loosen. Before he could fall, Xu Lanyue floated in front of him. The whip controlled his limbs, rendering him immobile.
She pulled the nail from her head, covered in dried black blood and brain matter. Under his gaze, eyes splitting with horror, she personally hammered it inch by inch into the homestay owner’s temple.
It was the sensation of a sharp, cold foreign object invading the skull bit by bit, as if a hole was opened, and blood flowed endlessly from it.
The intense pain caused a ringing in his ears that echoed through his brain. The owner shook his head desperately, unable to scream, helplessly enduring everything.
Who knows how long passed before he woke up. It was broad daylight outside, and cold sweat soaked his body. The owner looked haggard and pale, Xu Lanyue’s words echoing in his ears: “I will absolutely never let you go.”
He understood that this torture would continue until death.
What he couldn’t have imagined was that because of his sins back then, his child would also pay the price with his life. After all, in the cycle of karma, all crimes have their invisible punishments.
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