Otherworldly Merchant
Chapter 594: Loyalty and Patriotism

Bang! Bang! Bang!

Every time the door banged, my heart throbbed. The Sirius Whip was useless now, and I wasn’t sure if the Yin and Yang Umbrella could deal with thosezombies. Even if it worked, it couldn’t protect the three of us.Furthermore, the despicable couple was waiting for us outside.

At thismoment, I heardSenior Shu’s voice. “Grandson, you’re about to die again?”

“Can’t you seewhat time is it? You still have the mood to tease me!” I answered instinctively. However, Isoon understood thatSenior Shuwashere. Weweresaved!

Excitedly, I looked around the room and saw a big,grey rat inonecorner. It wasSenior Shu’s life-bound rat.

It seemed the despicable old man was around.

“Brother rat, please tell the old man that I can’thold them back anymore.” In this dangerous situation, Iwasn’t inthe right mind to care about my words. It was also the first time I thought thisfat, old rat looked so cute.

The rat squeaked twice and crawled intoarat hole. Then, I saw a smallsilver bell on its tail.

IfSenior Shuhadusedhis life-bound rat tosendme this bell,the item would definitely help me. I carefullyremovedthe bellfromthe rat’s tail and observed it. Even if thislittle treasurewaspowerful, I didn’t want to be caught unprepared.

Fortunately, I had spent a lot of timelearningabout otherworldly items with my grandpa when I was young. Soon, I recognized that this bell was theIllusory Mind Bell.

TheIllusory Mind Bellcould control people’s minds.A personwith a dark heart wouldfeela head-splitting painwhilelistening to the bell, while the ones with a clearconsciencewould feel strangely comfortable. Moreover, it couldexpel evil spiritsand invite good fortune.

With this thought, I sat down cross-legged and started to read the Sacred Text of Daoism. I needed to calm my mind.

Then, with a loud bang, the door sprang open. Thezombiehad succeeded incomingin.Li Mazi and Zhang Henshui wereblocking themwith sticks. I knew we couldn’t waitany longer. I got up and slowly jingled the bell.

Ding ding ding!

When thezombiesheard the bell jingle, they halted.Theylookedbewildered. Then, they dropped theirarms and startedlookinglike paper dolls again.

“Follow closely behind me,” I shouted. “Whenwe get to the yard, Li Mazi, takeBrother Zhangand flee!”

Then, I ran out of the house.

TheIllusory Mind Bellprobablywouldn’twork on that man since he had earned his living with magic illusion.

Indeed, when I got out of the house,thezombieswere standing still. The woman wearing the black silk veil had slumped on the ground, butshe still heldthe cotton yarn nettightly.

However, the migrant worker was nowhere to be seen!

It seemed theIllusory Mind Bellwas ineffectiveagainsthim. Idecided to ignore himand asked Li Mazi to pick up the cotton yarn net.

“If Iwasn’ta nice person, I would haveslappedyou a hundred times!” Li Mazi scolded the woman, who wassitting helplessly on the ground. He picked up the net and tried to break it. However, after a long time, the net wasstill intact. Meanwhile,Li Mazi had to gasp for his breath.

“It’s impossible to tear it, you idiot!” I had started to doubt Li Mazi’s intelligent quotient. I gavehim theIllusory Mind Bell,then received the net to check it.

This net was ancient. From the symbols carved on the handle,it waspossibly the birdsealfrom the State of Chu.

If itwasa genuine itemthat datedback from the Chu era,it would be priceless even though it was just a broken net. However,becauseit could control thosezombies, I had to grit my teeth and destroy it. I tookout the lighter to burn the net into ashes!

While I was burning the net, the veiled woman started to struggle angrily. She wanted to stop me. Li Mazi immediately jingled the bell,which gaveher nochanceto move.

Indeed, after the net was burned, thezombiessuddenly ignited and burned. From the popping sounds emitting from them, I found something strange. I came to check and found that all thezombieswere paper dolls.

It turned out that our original guess was correct. Ithen concluded thatthose drowned ghosts hadpossessedthe dolls.

When the net was completely burned down, the veiled woman’s eyes rolled to the back of her headas she lostconsciousness. I hurriedly attached a spirit talisman to her body to save her, then asked Zhang Henshui and Li Mazi to tie her up.

After those paper dolls were burned, I was afraid that the man would cast his magic illusionon meagain. However, he didn’t return.

When wereachedthe village and passed by the old locust tree, someone suddenly blindfolded me. I was startled at first. Then,I became excited.“Youdamnold man, where have you been lately?”

“Kiddo, watch yourmouth! Call me grandpa!”Senior Shulet go of me and kicked mybutt.

I sniggered and rubbed my hands. “Grandpa, thank you so much.”

“You’re finally speaking the humanlanguage!”Senior Shustroked hismustache. “When I passed by this village, I felt something was wrong, so I sent my life-bound rat to scout around. It happened to see you guys trapped by the paper dolls. As such, I askeditto give you theIllusory Mind Bell.”

“Oh,there’s somethingwondrousin our fates, grandpa!” Whileflatteringhim, I discreetly put theIllusory Mind Bellinto my pocket.This old man had so many treasures; it was good if I could take some from him for free.

He spotted me. Then, he and Istarted pullingback and forth like two kids competingfora toy. In the end, with Li Mazi’s support, I successfully subduedSenior Shu.

“You rascals!Had Iknownearlier, I would have ignored you. I would have let that guy drown both of you!”

I laterlearnedthat the migrant workerwas forced to let us go.SinceSenior Shuwas watchinghis moves, he was scaredand ranaway.

Senior Shuhad planned to departafterI was saved. However, when helearnedthat thespiritwehadencounteredwas the famous Qu Yuan, he decided to stay and help this great patriot.

The woman in the black veil woke up the next day.Her eyes no longer showed her grudge. It was replaced by worry. It was rareforSenior Shuto use hissenior tone of voice to teach someone. “Little girl, tell me what’s going on. Perhaps I can helphim.”

Of course,Senior Shuwas talking aboutQu Yuan.

After the veiled woman listened to him, she pondered for a while then said, “I used to have a happy marriage. That migrant worker is my husband. One day, we went to a park. When we came home, we both had a strange dream of a man wearing a long robe. However, he only had half of his head left. The other half was made of gold. It sparkled dazzlingly.We dreamed about him all the time. Each time, he would cry and tell us how aggrieved he was, how unwilling he was. That’s how Idiscovered thatthe person wewere dreamingaboutwas Qu Yuan.”

It turned out that after Qu Yuan jumped into the river with the rock, the fellows around tried to save him. To protect his body from the fish and shrimps, they even threw cooked rice into the river.

However, theyretrievedhis body only after three days. By that time, halfof his head was gnawed by the fish. Qu Yuan’s daughter spent the rest of her lifemaking the otherhalf of his headout ofgold.People admiredhisfilial daughter. They praised her with the saying, “Nine sons couldn’t bury their father, but one daughter could makehim agolden head.”

When King Chu Xiang heard about this story, he was embarrassed. His embarrassmentthenturned into anger. He wanted to unearth Qu Yuan. Qu Yuan’s daughter was afraid that her father would be troubled while resting. She went to a high mountain and used a sieve mesh gauze to shake the sand and dust to create a few mounds.

Whileshe wearily dozed off, shedreamed ofan old mangettingout from the ground. The old man then knocked his staff on the ground eleven times. Afterward, eleven mounds that looked exactly like Qu Yuan’s grave mound appeared. When King Chu Xiang sent his men to unearth Qu Yuan, they couldn’t figure out which wasthereal tomb…

“Inanotherworld, you didn’t know that you are Qu Yuan’s descendant. Did Qu Yuanappearin your dream to ask you to take revenge for him?” I caught thekeyword.

The woman shook her head. “No, he didn’t ask us to take revenge for him. He just wanted his body to be relocated to the public cemetery of the State of Chu.”

It was thecouple that wanted to take revenge for their ancestors,sothey took the initiative to harm Zhang Yi’s descendant, which happened to be Zhang Henshui.

“If you repay a grudge with a grudge, when will it end? Why do you and your husband have to live in difficulty like this?”

Senior Shusighed. I shook my head, but there was still another question on my mind.Why didQu Yuanrequestto have his remains buriedat the State of Chu’s public cemetery?

“Later on, King Huai of Chu’s grandsongavejustice back to Qu Yuan. He built a cenotaph. It’swhere Qu Yuan’s old clothes and relics are buried. It’s in the park in the suburbs,” explained the woman.

I got the clue now. “Is the biglocusttree where Qu Yuan was buried?”

“Yes,that’s correct.” She nodded.

I sighed emotionally. Although Qu Yuanwasexiled by King Huai of Chu, even after he died,he stilldidn’t give up onhis courtier’s responsibility. He was worthy of receiving people’s admiration.

In the end,Senior Shuand I spent five million renminbi to invite the best construction team to unearth Qu Yuan’s remains from underneath the old locust tree. We then buried him in the Chu State’s cemetery with the black rock he hadcarriedwith him to the river. Moreover, we decorated the plain-looking parkand gaveit a better look.

After the relocating ceremony was done, I thought,When Qu Yuan’sspiritfacesthe black rock, hewon’tfeel resentful or reluctant, right? Hewillfeel infinitely proud.

Thatrock was the witnessofhis loyalty. Ithadn’t worn out even after several thousand years.

After this case was done, Li Mazi and Ididn’t acceptany other cases for a while. We traveled across the country, from North to South, trying to find a modern version of Qu Yuan.

This person must be loyal and patriotic.

This person must be principled and incorruptible. This person must be honest and tell no lies.

However,inthe end, we didn’t find anyone. I askedSenior Shu, “Whycouldn'twe findsuchone person?”

He pondered for a long time then asked, “These days, do people stillhavethe concept of‘country’in their heads?”

I suddenlyfelt like crying!

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