Chapter Forty: Revealing the True Identity

Chapter Forty

From the clues at hand, both the ghost calamity forty years ago and the recent incident in Beggars’ Alley seem to be inseparable from this Temple of the Master.

Paper Man Zhang spun lies endlessly, yet there was one thing he said that rang true—that the headless ghost corpse Liu Huacheng brought back to Wanan County forty years ago was sealed beneath the Liu Ancestral Hall. The Liu Ancestral Hall was the predecessor of the Temple of the Master. In other words, there is a ghost suppressed within the temple.

At this thought, Zhao Fusheng’s heart pounded wildly. She cast her gaze toward the Temple of the Master.

The temple’s main doors stood ajar, revealing a tranquil and deep inner hall.

Yesterday, she had arrived during the temple’s charity distribution. The place was bustling with chaos. Her name had been inadvertently recorded in a register, and with the imminence of a vengeful spirit’s awakening, the situation was dire and she hadn’t observed the temple’s interior carefully.

Now, with no one around, since she was already here...

The thought emboldened her. Zhao Fusheng, steeling her courage, stepped forward several paces, peering into the temple’s grand hall.

The folded doors were pressed against the walls. The hall was spacious and silent, immaculate and dust-free.

Neatly laid blue stone tiles covered the floor; several massive, red-lacquered pillars stood firm within the hall.

Built with Liu Huacheng’s donations, the Temple of the Master was grand and imposing, its ceiling rising at least twenty feet high.

Pale lantern light spilled into the hall, illuminating drifting motes of dust.

Zhao Fusheng advanced two more steps, halting only when she reached the high threshold at the temple’s entrance.

With her heart thundering in her chest, Zhao Fusheng turned toward the hall, closed her eyes.

Darkness descended, and a pure, malicious intent enveloped her.

A vengeful spirit watched from the shadows.

Her heart tightened. Slowly, she opened one eye and looked inside—

Perhaps because she commanded a ghost, or perhaps because her eyes had adjusted to the gloom, she could just make out a long offering table in the depths of the inner hall.

Above the table stood a shrine, taking up half the wall. Even though Zhao Fusheng could not see the details of its arrangement, she could sense the shrine was set with unusual ceremony.

Heavy curtains hung from the shrine, their colors indiscernible in the dark. Behind the layers of drapery, a ‘divine statue’ sat at an angle.

Zhao Fusheng opened her eyes wide, striving to see the statue’s features.

Alas, within the ghostly domain, the light was dim, and standing in the glow herself, the inner hall appeared even darker.

The statue was concealed behind the curtains—she could not make out its form.

Dimly, she saw the statue sitting askew, not upright at all. In the darkness, a rounded bulge rose high. For a moment, she couldn’t tell if it was the great belly of Maitreya or a head...

The ‘divine statue’ enshrined here looked neither dignified nor sacred. Instead, it exuded a faint, sinister aura.

As she stared, lost in thought, she instinctively leaned her head further into the temple—

Suddenly, the statue’s eyes reflected light. Startled, she saw a gleam sweep by, as if a pair of cold eyes in the dark were watching her.

A shiver ran down Zhao Fusheng’s spine; an instinctive unease seized her.

But she knew well that what she was doing was fraught with danger—the more hesitant and fearful she was, the sooner she would meet her end.

Her mind made up, she was about to step over the temple threshold for a closer look at the statue within the shrine, when the lantern hanging above flickered twice, and a wave of rot stench wafted out.

The foul odor instantly engulfed her, making her shudder. Simultaneously, that eerie sensation of being watched faded with the stench’s appearance.

“What’s that smell?”

Zhao Fusheng frowned, sniffing her sleeve.

A faint, foul stench lingered on her clothes, tinged with death—familiar, as if she’d smelled it before...

“Ghost lantern!”

It came to her—this was the odor of a ghost lantern.

After her rebirth, finding herself in this strange world and inheriting the host’s memories, she’d gone to the Zhenmo Office, where two shattered ghost lanterns hung at the entrance, lamp oil spilled everywhere. The lantern now hanging before the Temple of the Master exuded the same scent as those at the Zhenmo Office!

No—more than just similar.

The aura from this lantern was far stronger than those at the Zhenmo Office. There was a ghost lantern here as well!

No sooner had Zhao Fusheng pieced this together than the chilling sense of being watched returned.

At the same moment, the flame inside the lantern above the temple door began to flutter. The wick flickered twice, then abruptly flared and burst.

A twisted, agonized ghostly face appeared on the lantern’s surface, and in the next instant, the lantern’s skin split silently, tearing open a massive gash.

The oil within suddenly poured out, dousing the flame. Oil leaked through the torn human-skin parchment, dripping down with a steady patter.

The foul stench filled the air before the temple. Had Zhao Fusheng not stepped back in time, she would have been doused in the oil.

The oil pooled where she’d just stood, forming a small puddle.

With the lantern’s flame extinguished, the light before the temple grew dimmer. At the same moment, the cold gaze that had appeared a second time failed to find her, passing her by and gradually dissipating.

Zhao Fusheng’s eyes glinted as she recalled the warning from the young man serving porridge the night before: Do not enter the Temple of the Master.

There was indeed a ghost inside.

The ‘divine’ enshrined in the great hall was no true deity, but something else entirely.

The young man had warned her twice not to enter—surely because of this.

He’d said, come find me when you arrive, just call my name and I’ll come out.

Page 2

That young man was hardly a good person. He handed out charity here, but it was a deadly business. When he served her porridge last night, he must have known her fate, yet still gave her the bowl. Was it out of malice, or because he knew she wouldn’t escape anyway?

Regardless, his warning for her not to enter the temple seemed genuine.

In other words, the temple was dangerous—entering recklessly could spell disaster.

She was indeed curious, but compared to her own life, curiosity was trivial.

Now was not the time to risk entering.

With this in mind, Zhao Fusheng decisively abandoned her plan to force her way inside. She withdrew several paces, distancing herself from the temple door. Then she opened her mouth to call out.

Just as she was about to shout, she hesitated.

The young man had said to call his name, but in the urgency of the previous night, they’d barely spoken. She didn’t even know his name.

After a moment’s thought, Zhao Fusheng simply called out:

“Food server, food server, I’m here!”

“Food server—”

“Food server—”

“I’m here—here—”

The street was so deserted that, though she kept her voice low, her calls echoed, rebounding from the empty houses all around, adding a ghostly, mournful touch that made her rub her arms at the sudden goosebumps.

Fortunately, the young man didn’t keep her waiting. Before she could call again, faint footsteps echoed from deep within the temple.

At first, there was no sound—as if only halfway along, the owner of the footsteps deliberately made noise for her to hear.

Soon, a silhouette emerged from the darkness, pausing at the boundary of shadow and light in the center of the hall.

He stood there for a moment, then stepped forward into the lantern glow—it was the same young man who had been serving porridge at the temple the previous day.

His gaze was cast down, the light falling from above. His heavy brows, deep-set eyes, and straight nose were all shrouded in shadow.

Yesterday, he’d seemed a silent type. But now, perhaps influenced by the night, the atmosphere, and Zhao Fusheng’s own suspicions, he struck her as cloaked in a chilling aura, with a certain coldness in his eyes.

He glanced uneasily behind him, then turned to Zhao Fusheng.

She, true to her word, stood five paces from the threshold, and looked at him with a hint of apology.

“You told me yesterday to come find you and call your name, but I forgot to ask what it was. My apologies.”

She must not have slept well last night.

Since entering the ghostly domain, it had likely been her first encounter with a murderous spirit—sleeplessness was only natural. After all, every survivor here had endured countless sleepless nights.

Yet here she was, venturing out alone as promised, standing before the temple and calling for him, even apologizing at their meeting...

It struck the young man as odd, as if something about this conversation was off.

She was... surprisingly polite.

“...”

Feeling slightly absurd, the young man scratched his left eyebrow awkwardly.

He was broad-browed and large-eyed—a face that should have been righteous, but perhaps due to his residence in the temple, sharing space with ghosts, his demeanor was somber, cold, and unapproachable.

He didn’t answer Zhao Fusheng’s words but instead looked to the ground at the threshold.

Following his gaze, Zhao Fusheng saw the small puddle of foul liquid.

Above it, the broken lantern still dripped oil.

Zhao Fusheng hurried to explain:

“This has nothing to do with me—”

She had just arrived, done nothing, and the lantern broke on its own, spilling oil that nearly splashed her.

“A pity—another lantern ruined.”

A shadow crossed the young man’s brow. He shook his head and sighed, “I hope this matter ends soon, otherwise—”

“Otherwise what?” Zhao Fusheng caught the implication in his tone and narrowed her eyes.

“It’s nothing.”

He seemed to have a thousand things to say but ended with a long sigh and shook his head, dropping the subject.

Zhao Fusheng suppressed her doubts for now. She had more questions than he did, and since he didn’t want to discuss the ghost lanterns, she pressed ahead:

“The vengeful spirit in Beggars’ Alley isn’t the same as the one from the Liu Ancestral Hall forty years ago, is it?”

She went straight to the point, catching him off guard.

He shook his head, slightly dazed. “No...”

“The spirit’s killing rules are connected to the porridge distribution, aren’t they?” she continued.

“Yes—”

Perhaps it was Zhao Fusheng’s calm and composed manner, showing neither panic nor distress, that made the young man unconsciously answer her questions, forgetting to ask hers in return.

“If the spirit’s killing is linked to the porridge, then surely its origin is connected to that act,” Zhao Fusheng reasoned.

The young man could only nod, “Yes...”

Suddenly she fixed him with a stare, stepping forward.

Though shorter, she exuded such calm authority that he instinctively retreated.

“So, this vengeful spirit in Beggars’ Alley is still a consequence of the Liu family?”

What exactly was the Liu family?

According to Paper Man Zhang, the calamity forty years ago arose from Liu Huacheng. Now, the new vengeful spirit in Beggars’ Alley was again tied to the Liu family.

“You...” The young man finally realized something was amiss.

He, too, was curious about her identity, but rather than questioning her, she’d already forced several answers from him.

“Answer my questions first.” Zhao Fusheng paid his attempt at a counter-question no heed and continued, “After the ghost calamity was ‘resolved,’ the Liu family withdrew from Wanan County, leaving a temple keeper in the ancestral hall—now the Temple of the Master—still distributing porridge, thus creating Beggars’ Alley.”

“Yes.” Interrupted, the young man suppressed his own questions and nodded.

“A month ago, the Zhenmo Office received a report—a young man arrived, wishing them to fulfill a promise made forty years ago.”

But at the time, the Zhenmo Office was beset by its own ghost troubles; the Fan brothers refused the request, and the young man vanished.

Zhao Fusheng asked directly, “Was that you?”

At this, the young man froze. Finally, a thread of understanding dawned on him. For a moment, his calm broke; he stared at Zhao Fusheng in disbelief, and instead of answering, asked in shock, “You’re with the Zhenmo Office?”

He put the pieces together.

Zhao Fusheng had never intended to hide her identity. Since he’d guessed, she simply nodded, “Yes.”

The gloom cleared from his eyes, replaced by surprise. He looked her up and down.

“You—you’re the new commander at Zhenmo Office?” He spoke a little louder than before.

Zhao Fusheng was young, tall and slender, her complexion pale, but her gaze steady and manner calm—nothing like what he’d expected from the Office.

What, did he underestimate her?

She drew out her Soul Register. “I am the acting commander of the Zhenmo Office. The ghost calamity in Beggars’ Alley is mine to resolve.”

The Soul Register in her hand glowed with ghostly script—her identity beyond doubt.

The young man was even more astonished.

He knew much about the Zhenmo Office. “You’re a ghost handler as well?”

“Yes.” Zhao Fusheng nodded.

He paused again, then, as if thinking of something, bowed his head and managed a bitter smile.

“I never thought...” He seemed troubled, not knowing how to start, and finally let out a long sigh. “Alas—you have come too late—”

From his expression, something dire had already happened. A sense of foreboding crept into Zhao Fusheng’s heart.

Yet she kept her composure and pressed on:

“Since you were the one who reported to the Zhenmo Office a month ago and mentioned the Liu family and their promise, it means the ghost calamity in Beggars’ Alley is connected to the old Liu family incident, isn’t it?”

Now that her identity was revealed, the young man seemed more guarded. He thought for a moment before sighing, “There was once a connection—”

His words instantly put Zhao Fusheng on alert.

(End of chapter)