Volume One, Chapter 14: An Unexpected Encounter

Wang Huazhong swallowed hard.
Never in his wildest dreams had he imagined that when Yun Mojiu said they were going to dig something up, what they would unearth would be human remains!
The others were just as tense, their faces ashen.
Hadn't the boss said they were just going to dig up a few things?
How could it turn out to be a corpse?
Oh, how terrifying!
Yun Mojiu’s expression remained calm as she walked toward the coffin at the bottom of the pit.
Inside the black coffin, she saw that the inner walls were plastered with talismans, and on the chest of the corpse lay a golden Bagua compass. The wrists and ankles were bound with red silk thread, each thread leading to a piece of flint placed in the corners of the coffin.
At the sight, her brows furrowed. She walked over to the coffin lid that had been flung aside.
Upon seeing a sequence of birth characters engraved on the inner side of the lid, all belonging to the metal element, and a bronze mirror set beside them, realization dawned upon her.
Just as she had suspected.
“Despicable! Who would do this to me? They must have wanted to keep me from ever reincarnating, isn’t that right?”
Gu Ling floated to Yun Mojiu’s side, bristling with anger.
Yun Mojiu glanced at him and shook her head.
“On the contrary, the person who did this was trying to save you.”
Gu Ling blinked in disbelief, pointing at the coffin, squinting suspiciously.
“You’re saying that being tied up like that, with all those strange things plastered around me, was someone’s idea of saving me?”
“That’s right.” Yun Mojiu nodded. “This is a very ancient method of suppressing evil. The birth characters are of the metal element, the flint—also called fire stone—represents fire. In the Five Elements, fire overcomes metal. Using a bronze mirror and a Bagua compass to form a formation, combined with talismans to ward off evil, one can suppress extremely malevolent entities.”
“You mean I’m evil?” Gu Ling was even more confused.
He had always considered himself a good person—how could he suddenly be called evil?
“Not entirely. Most likely, you were possessed by a powerful evil spirit. At the time, there was no way to fully exorcise it, so this method was used to destroy the evil spirit and preserve your soul.”
As she spoke, Yun Mojiu picked up a string of sandalwood prayer beads from the skeleton’s neck.
“These beads number twenty-four, each plump and engraved with spirit-gathering runes. They not only purify and calm the mind, but also help stabilize your soul. Since your soul was devoured by the evil spirit, your consciousness remained dormant until the evil was finally destroyed. That’s why, although you died a thousand years ago, you only awoke a hundred years ago.”
She had been puzzled before, but now, looking at the formation, she understood everything.

“So you’re saying my family put me in this coffin to protect my soul?” Gu Ling frowned.
“Yes. It’s a classic case of sacrificing the pawn to save the king.” Yun Mojiu nodded.
“At the time, your body could not be saved. If they insisted on saving your body, your soul would have been utterly consumed by the evil spirit, and you would have ceased to exist. But if they abandoned your body and used it to imprison the evil, then at the moment the evil spirit was destroyed, your soul would be set free.”
Gu Ling’s gaze trembled slightly at her words.
He’d always thought he’d been murdered.
He had never expected the truth to be this.
Suddenly, another question occurred to him.
“Then why have I been trapped here, unable to stray far?”
“That was another means of protecting you. After all, you’re a ghost, and before the evil spirit was destroyed, you were in a dormant state, unable to cultivate ghostly powers. In short, your spiritual strength was very weak. If you left the formation’s area, your soul would be affected. Of course, the person who set the formation also didn’t want you to harm others. He knew that once the evil spirit died, your soul would be free, so he secretly set a restriction, confining you to this vicinity.”
So, the formation both protected and restrained him.
This time, Gu Ling finally understood everything.
“Now that the cause of your death is clear, I’ll send you to reincarnation,” she said calmly.
At her words, Gu Ling immediately floated in front of her, eager to please.
“No, please, have mercy—let me stay in the human world a bit longer! Look how pitiful I am: I died without understanding, and have been trapped here for so many years, never getting to see the beauty of the world. I promise, I absolutely won’t cause trouble or harm anyone, alright?”
He blinked at Yun Mojiu, hope written all over his face.
Yun Mojiu was silent for two seconds.
“Fine, but I’ll set a formation on you. If you harbor any malicious intent, your soul will be destroyed instantly.”
Gu Ling straightened up solemnly. “No problem!”
“Alright, I’ll give you three months. During that time, you may only go out at night. After three months, you must report to the Underworld.”
“Yes, yes.”
Gu Ling nodded vigorously, as obedient as could be.
Yun Mojiu took out a spirit-locking talisman, and with a wave of her hand, Gu Ling vanished at once.
“She… who… who was she talking to?”

The workers Wang Huazhong had called were all trembling, huddled together and staring in horror at Yun Mojiu, who had been speaking to thin air.
“Isn’t there no one there?”
“I think I heard her mention a ghost!”
Their teeth chattered, and they were all seized by the urge to flee.
The waiter who had first discovered Gu Ling sidled over and ‘kindly’ offered, “That’s right, she really was talking to a ghost. Let me tell you, that ghost…”
He launched into a dramatic description of Gu Ling’s ghostly appearance, scaring the workers so much they shook like leaves.
Instantly, he felt much better.
Well, he was just being ‘helpful’—fear is easier to bear when shared.
Such important information deserved to be spread around.
Once everything was settled, Wang Huazhong dutifully paid Yun Mojiu her fee.
Yun Mojiu and Xiao Junhe returned to their private room to enjoy a lavish lunch.
After the meal, Xiao Junhe went to the restroom, while Yun Mojiu went ahead to wait for him at the entrance.
She hadn’t expected to run into a familiar face the moment she stepped outside.
“Well, well—if it isn’t Miss Yun, thrown out of the house.”
Wu Minyi stood with his hands in his pockets, deliberately drawing out his words, head tilted with a mocking smile.
There was a hint of ridicule in his tone.
He was Xie Jingling’s arch-rival, and had once pursued Yun Mojiu.
But Yun Mojiu had eyes only for Xie Jingling, never giving Wu Minyi the time of day.
He’d always resented that.
Whenever they met, he was never pleasant—always sarcastic, never missing a chance to sneer at her.
“I hear Xie Jingling has already brought his first love home. See, I told you—Xie Jingling is no good. You treated him like gold, and now look at you, left in the lurch. He never cared about you; you were just a pastime for him when he was lonely. The moment his first love returned, he kicked you aside.”