Chapter 136.2

Tan Wenbin let out a long yawn, rubbed his eyes, and then followed along to wash up.

“You’re not going to sleep?”

When they returned to the dorm after washing up and Tan Wenbin started changing clothes, Li Zhuiyuan asked.

“I’m going to sleep in the Audit classroom.”

“Oh.” Li Zhuiyuan understood.

Tan Wenbin gave a bitter smile.

That day, when his fourth uncle had chased him through the residential compound with a cleaver, he had pushed Zhou Yunyun out of the white fog for her safety. Once the white fog receded, he had immediately rushed to the photo studio to help.

Yesterday, he had first been busy writing the letter, then hurried nonstop to his fourth uncle’s house to deal with the corpse. He could hardly bring his girlfriend along for something like that.

So in the end, he had left her hanging for two whole days.

Tan Wenbin said, “Good thing Yunyun has a good temper and didn’t blame me. I told her I’d go to class with her this morning, and she was pretty happy about it.”

Li Zhuiyuan said, “Because she likes you more.”

Tan Wenbin raised both hands dramatically. “Ah, that makes me sound like such a heartless bastard. Hahaha.”

Li Zhuiyuan emptied out his schoolbag. He had originally wanted to leave the empty jar on his desk, but worried that Tan Wenbin or Lin Shuyou might mistake it for trash while cleaning the dorm, so he put it in the desk drawer instead.

The two of them went downstairs together.

Li Zhuiyuan said, “I’m going to the cafeteria to buy breakfast. Want anything?”

Tan Wenbin shook his head. “The one who likes me more will bring me food. If I go, there’ll already be something to eat.”

Li Zhuiyuan glanced at him, said nothing, and walked into the cafeteria.

Tan Wenbin scratched his head and let out a long breath.

Sure enough, every time Little Yuanhou had gotten a proper rest with Ah Li, he became a lot more approachable.

Only at times like this did Tan Wenbin dare crack a few jokes on his own initiative, though even then he still felt a little nervous inside.

He took out his car keys and went to the shop entrance to start the little pickup.

It had rained last night, so he had taken advantage of the rainwater to wash the truck overnight. He couldn’t help it. He had used this truck to dump a corpse.

Fortunately, everyone was a Corpse Retriever. A vehicle that had carried corpses didn’t feel unlucky to them. If anything, it felt familiar.

Tan Wenbin drove to the Audit building. After parking, seeing that he still had time, he went straight to the eight a.m. classroom he had been told about in advance.

Zhou Yunyun was already there, with breakfast laid out in front of her.

What surprised Tan Wenbin was that Miss Luo Mingzhu from the adventure club was also there, sitting right next to Zhou Yunyun.

Luo Mingzhu had clearly been crying. Her eyes were red, and she held a printed letter in her hand.

“I really never thought my fourth uncle had lived so painfully and unhappily all these years.”

Zhou Yunyun said, “You should be happy for your fourth uncle. Even though he couldn’t see, he still got to experience a new life.”

“Mhm.” Luo Mingzhu nodded, picked up the soy milk on the desk, took a sip, and sighed. “I never expected that something my fourth uncle wrote in braille could have such beautiful prose.”

Tan Wenbin secretly felt smug. That was his care and refinement at work.

Actually, that day when they had eaten at his fourth uncle’s Old Sichuan Restaurant, once his fourth uncle came out of the kitchen and called Luo Mingzhu “Zhuzhu” instead of “Yuyu,” Tan Wenbin had already found it a little strange.

Luo Mingzhu herself had said that she had originally been called Luo Mingyu, but later her parents had changed her name to match the family hotel, for the sake of good fortune.

The older relatives should still have been calling her “Yuyu.”

Now, of course, he understood what had happened. The real fourth uncle had died long ago. The fourth uncle who later cooked meals, donated to children, and did good deeds had been the Corpse centipede borrowing a corpse to return to life.

Since it had never known Luo Mingzhu as a child, naturally it called her “Zhuzhu.”

Still, Tan Wenbin really didn’t understand why Zhou Yunyun was still hanging out with Luo Mingzhu.

Class monitor, haven’t you realized that Miss Luo’s intentions toward me are not exactly pure?

So what are you doing here, opening the door to a thief and inviting the wolf into the house, or are you deliberately using this to test the cadre?

Tan Wenbin said, “Senior, I think you’ve gone to the wrong classroom.”

Luo Mingzhu said, “I haven’t even told you that you went to the wrong school.”

“Senior, move over.”

“No.”

Tan Wenbin reached out, grabbed Luo Mingzhu by the hair, and hauled her up. It hurt, and she was clearly displeased, but she still had no choice but to be forcibly moved to the front row.

She turned back and looked at Tan Wenbin with a face full of grievance.

Tan Wenbin ignored her and picked up a tea egg to peel.

Once he finished peeling one, he first handed it to Zhou Yunyun for a bite, then stuffed the rest into his own mouth before starting on the second egg.

Luo Mingzhu said, “I haven’t had breakfast either.”

Tan Wenbin said, “Your family runs a restaurant. Go eat at your own place.”

Luo Mingzhu said, “My family’s restaurant passes off inferior goods as the real thing. I don’t dare eat there.”

Tan Wenbin said, “Tell your boyfriend to peel one for you.”

Luo Mingzhu said, “I did have one, but we broke up after that last adventure.” Then she said earnestly to Zhou Yunyun, “So really, as a couple, you have to take a trip somewhere far away together before you can truly see what someone is like.”

Tan Wenbin said, “Want to go eat at my mom’s place at noon?”

Zhou Yunyun said, “I keep mooching meals from Auntie. I really do feel a little embarrassed.”

Tan Wenbin said, “It’s fine. We’ll buy groceries, take them home, and then you can cook. My mom can sit there and wait to eat.”

“But I only know how to make a few simple home dishes, and they don’t taste as good as Auntie’s. I’m afraid Auntie won’t be satisfied.”

“It’s fine. Let her get used to old-age life in advance, so she won’t keep clinging to unrealistic fantasies when she’s older.”

“You...” Zhou Yunyun bit her lip and punched Tan Wenbin’s arm a few times.

“Heh heh.” Tan Wenbin shrugged and laughed.

Luo Mingzhu asked, “Can I come to your house for lunch too?”

Tan Wenbin shook his head. “No. I’m afraid my mom will misunderstand.”

Luo Mingzhu said, “How could she misunderstand? I don’t mean anything else by it. Yunyun is your girlfriend.”

Tan Wenbin said, “I’m afraid my mom will think my dad’s mistress from Jinling came knocking at the door.”

…

There was Aunt Liu at Granny Liu’s house to make breakfast, but Li Zhuiyuan felt that eating outside once in a while was pretty nice too. After all, the cafeteria breakfast window had a much bigger variety.

But he couldn’t just buy enough for two people. He bought a lot, filled his schoolbag, and took it all to Granny Liu’s house.

There were portions for Aunt Liu, Uncle Qin, and the old lady too. Uncle Qin had a big appetite, so naturally he ate more, and even if the old lady didn’t want this, Aunt Liu could always make something separately for her.

By the time Li Zhuiyuan carried soy milk, fried dough sticks, sesame balls, and the rest into Ah Li’s bedroom, Ah Li had already pushed open the floor-to-ceiling window and was sitting there waiting.

There were two little cushions. The girl sat on one, and another had been placed beside her.

The old lady had strict household rules. Even back when they lived at Li Sanjiang’s house and ate plain food, the proper formality of the dining table had always been preserved.

But one was her own granddaughter, and the other was the family’s new Dragon King. If the two children wanted to relax a little and not follow all those rules and courtesies, the old lady couldn’t really control them.

In fact, after going downstairs, she even had to stop at the bedroom door and look in with a beaming smile.

“Heh heh, eating breakfast, are you?”

After breakfast with Ah Li, Li Zhuiyuan took the girl’s hand and, while there were still few people out in the morning, went for a walk on the school track.

Whether or not Little Yuan was by her side, Ah Li’s whole perspective was completely different.

When she had gone to buy Jianlibao the day before yesterday, if Little Yuan had been holding her hand, she would at most have felt uncomfortable and ill at ease. She would never have come so close to breaking down by the time she got home.

By the time they had walked enough for the school to gradually wake from the morning quiet and grow lively, Li Zhuiyuan brought Ah Li home again.

Ah Li had originally thought the boy was about to leave, but he did not. He led her into the study, and the two sat facing each other.

“Ah Li, I’m planning to change my strategy. This time, I’m going to walk toward the fourth wave myself.”

Li Zhuiyuan had thought about this a long time ago: setting the problem for himself.

Originally, he had thought this idea was still a long way off, something for the middle or even late stage of River walk.

But plans never kept up with changes. Since the one setting the questions had already changed their thinking, then he naturally had to keep up too.

Since Wei Zhengdao had succeeded in history, there was no reason Li Zhuiyuan had no chance at all.

As for the fact that the third wave had only just ended, and there was still quite a long time before the fourth wave, and that the karmic thread would only appear at a certain point—

Li Zhuiyuan had already taken that into account.

What he mainly wanted to test this time was whether he could proactively go and create a karmic thread himself, and then, once it succeeded, see whether the river water would acknowledge it or not.

In any case, right now, he had plenty of time.

Ah Li liked seeing the boy look so spirited and radiant. She took the initiative and opened her hand.

Li Zhuiyuan held the girl’s hand, closed his eyes, and entered Ah Li’s dream.

The first time he had entered Ah Li’s dream over a year ago, his head had split with pain and he had nearly fainted. Now he was already used to it.

The familiar flat-roofed house. The familiar cracked memorial tablet. The familiar threshold.

Li Zhuiyuan turned around and looked outside the house.

Outside, the thick white fog had already retreated beyond the vegetable garden fence.

The clamor was gone, leaving only whispers.

Just as he had expected, those filthy, foul things were the sort that only learned after getting beaten.

Earlier, when that pig had controlled the four beasts to block the door, the things in the white fog had cheered it on with savage enthusiasm. Now that the pig was dead, those same creatures had immediately turned into quails.

Li Zhuiyuan stepped over the threshold and casually took down the white lantern stuck in the crack in the wall.

The moment he came out, the whispering in the white fog grew even louder.

They had probably also become familiar with the rhythm and pattern of things, so they found it surprising. The pig-headed one had only just been annihilated, so why was this boy carrying a lantern back in already?

Li Zhuiyuan walked forward with the lantern and crossed the vegetable garden fence.

But after that, every time he took one step forward, the white fog retreated a step and a half.

The more he advanced, the farther away the white fog became.

It left him in the awkward position that, even if he wanted to cast out a line, the distance still wasn’t enough.

So Li Zhuiyuan kept walking, and they kept retreating.

The whispering continued. You could even hear the mocking sneer in their tone, but those things still refused to show their faces, all of them hiding inside the fog.

They all seemed to understand that showing their true faces in front of the boy would mean only one thing.

And among them, it seemed that only every so often would one appear—either out of stupidity, some special purpose, or sheer confidence—that dared come out and provoke someone answering the wave.

In other words, when he treated Ah Li’s dream, and the grudges and karmic entanglements accumulated by generations of Dragon Kings of the Qin and Liu families, as a question bank, then this place… had in fact already been influenced by the river water.

Until the time came, it would not hand the question to you.

The boy looked around and said in a tone of utter contempt, “Really, what a pack of things unfit to appear on any stage.”

It was a taunt, meant to provoke some bloody-minded dead sinker or evil spirit into jumping out on its own and helping him carry out this experiment.

Still, although Li Zhuiyuan used the tactic, he did not have much hope for it.

If any of them had enough backbone to be provoked so easily, how could they possibly have stooped to bullying an orphan girl just because all her elders were gone?

The boy’s fingertips trembled lightly. Ah Li’s dream was not reality. He had been invited in by Ah Li herself, while these dead sinkers and evil spirits had come bullying their way to her door. But in essence, there was no real difference between the two sides.

Here, most methods could not be used. He could not use spells, and he could not use formations.

But… perhaps The Twelve Edicts of Fengdu might still work.

First, because it was originally a method by which The Great Emperor of Fengdu governed all ghosts, it carried its own profound mystery. Second, because Yin Changsheng might still be alive.

When the sky collapsed, the tall ones should hold it up first. Li Zhuiyuan had no objection to dragging Yin Changsheng into the karmic chain of his River walk if it helped him achieve his goal.

Yet just as the boy was gathering strength and preparing to test this move, a crisp ringing of bells came from the white fog.

“Jingle jingle… smack… jingle jingle… smack… jingle jingle… smack…”

What came out first was the sound.

Then came a single sheet of yellow paper drifting out, followed by two, then three, and finally whole swathes of them.

Li Zhuiyuan stopped what he was doing and stared into the fog ahead.

He had not expected that someone really would be provoked into coming out by such a simple taunt.

The bell kept ringing.

A Daoist in a yellow robe emerged from the white fog.

Every time his right hand shook the bell, his left hand scattered a spray of yellow paper. Then from somewhere behind him came the sound of a line of bodies landing in neat synchronized hops.

The Daoist’s hair hung loose and covered his face, but from the withered arms visible beneath his sleeves, one could see that he was gaunt as a dried corpse.

He walked in front, leading the way. In the empty nothingness behind him, though nothing could be seen, there seemed to be a tidy line following in step, orderly even amid the killing chill.

“A corpse driver?”

Next Chapter >