Chương 20: The Blood Moon

Zhao Baocai was just an ordinary cultivator. Fang Cheng hadn't gotten any useful information from him, and he'd found nothing suspicious about the bank. So he continued along his original line of inquiry, questioning everyone who'd had contact with Yuan Min. The coffin maker's shop was in the northern district. The door was shut. Fang Cheng climbed over the back wall and found no one inside. He searched the place. It wasn't big, and he turned up no clues.

The demon sword alerted him to a lingering trace of Han Bingxuan's presence. It seemed the Underworld Officer had taken the coffin maker away. Perhaps, upon hearing of Yuan Min's death, Han Bingxuan had moved to protect him. Fang Cheng could only hope that was the case. He didn't have time to find Han Bingxuan now. He could only trust that the officer was as good a person as he seemed. Leaving the coffin shop, Fang Cheng rushed to Yuan Min's home.

He found nothing useful, except half a rack of lamb hanging in the kitchen, carrying the wonderful aroma of the steppe. It seemed Yuan Min had returned home the night he was killed. Fang Cheng questioned Yuan Min's neighbors one by one. They chattered on and on, but it was all useless nonsense. So he expanded his search to the entire eastern market, hoping to find anyone unusual Yuan Min had recently encountered. Time flew by. Evening came.

Fang Cheng wanted to keep investigating, but the people were growing resentful. Some even said to his face that he, the City God, had killed Yuan Min. Why was he pretending? Fang Cheng's mind was in chaos. The bloodthirst inside him stirred restlessly. The demon sword was about to break free. He forced himself to stay calm. He looked at the people around him. In each of their hearts, a strange smile bloomed, like crabapple pear flowers dripping with thick red sap. Illusions. The demon sword's trick.

Fang Cheng pinched his thigh hard, trying to wake himself up. But the vision remained. The flowers in their hearts grew more vivid and sinister. He had to leave the eastern market. He returned to the City God Temple in the west. Standing before the Everlasting Emperor's statue, his heart finally calmed. The restless evil inside him faded. His intelligence returned. He began reviewing everything from the day. In his investigation, he'd covered nearly every corner of White Flower City. White Flower City was strange.

The shops, markets, and homes were all in the eastern district. The west and north were mostly empty. A few poor households, but hardly any other living souls. Yet the most important building in the city, the City God Temple, sat at the westernmost edge. That meant the people had to cross the entire city from east to west every day just to burn incense and pray. The efficiency was abysmal. With the previous City God's death, the people had lost interest in visiting the temple.

Today, the incense in the main hall was pitifully sparse. The Everlasting Emperor's statue looked dull and faded, lacking its former serenity. Something was wrong. Definitely wrong. Fang Cheng paced back and forth, trying to pinpoint the problem. A fragrant smell drifted from the backyard, interrupting his thoughts. He went to the backyard and saw Magistrate Li Sanshui cooking hotpot on a wooden table, surrounded by four or five side dishes. He was eating happily.

When he saw Fang Cheng, he put down his chopsticks and hurried over.

"My lord, you're finally back!" Li Sanshui's voice carried a hint of tears. Ever since parting from Fang Cheng at Heavenly Blessing Teahouse, he'd been on edge, with a strange feeling that he was about to die. Unable to find the City God, he'd returned to the temple and begged the Everlasting Emperor for protection. He'd prayed all day. When hunger became unbearable, he'd sent his servants to bring hotpot and ingredients, then sent them away immediately.

For some reason, he saw everyone as a demon except this frightening-looking City God. Fang Cheng found Li Sanshui strangely agreeable. Perhaps after dealing with the hostile people of the eastern market, this cowardly, pathetic magistrate seemed not so bad by comparison. His stomach growled. He realized he hadn't eaten all day. Without a word, he found a stool and sat down to eat. The hotpot broth was spicy and refreshing, the vegetables smooth and tasty. Too bad there was no meat.

"Magistrate Li, are you vegetarian?" Fang Cheng asked as he ate.

"No. Just been eating light lately." Li Sanshui replied.

"If you want meat, my lord, I can have some sent over."

"No need. It's too far from the eastern market." Fang Cheng waved. He raised a question that had been on his mind.

"You all live in the east. Why is the City God Temple in the west?" Li Sanshui explained, "It was moved this year. The old temple was in the east, next to the crabapple pear forest. The previous City God, Zhang Ruilin, insisted on moving to the west. He pushed hard. The craftsmen worked for a whole month straight to build this small temple. You should have seen the old temple, my lord. Magnificent. Too bad it was demolished. You'll never see it."

"So there is a problem." Fang Cheng put down his chopsticks.

"A big problem." Li Sanshui agreed.

"This new temple is not only small, but it's in the middle of nowhere, practically outside the city. Looks more like a village shrine." Fang Cheng didn't waste another word. He shot out of the City God Temple and raced toward Zhang Ruilin's home. The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation. He should have realized it sooner. All the mysteries, all the causes, pointed back to the dead Zhang Ruilin.

Yuan Min's death and Chen Yalan's story had distracted him from that. If there really was a demon in White Flower City, Zhang Ruilin's home would surely hold clues. Channeling all his Divine Energy, he arrived quickly at Zhang Ruilin's home. Chen Yalan was still kneeling in the mourning hall. She seemed to truly love her husband. Fang Cheng didn't disturb her. He slipped into the back courtyard and searched room by room, overturning furniture and rifling through boxes.

But the damned Zhang Ruilin seemed to have cleaned everything before his death. Not a single clue remained.

"Do I really have to dig up the coffin and beat the corpse?" Fang Cheng frowned, but kept moving. He reached the last room and pushed the door open. This seemed to be Chen Yalan's bedroom. A strong scent of flowers and rouge filled the air. The bedding on the bed was neatly folded, without a single wrinkle. The teacups on the table were arranged perfectly. Fang Cheng picked up the teapot and sniffed. Hehuai Mountain tea. Was this the only tea this household drank?

At the vanity, the hairpins were lined up one by one, like soldiers in formation. From any angle, they were perfectly straight. On the vanity sat a small book, like an account ledger. Fang Cheng opened it. The handwriting was delicate, seemingly Chen Yalan's daily records. But something felt off. At the beginning of the month, I go to the tailor shop in the eastern market to see if there are new styles. The owner came from elsewhere recently. She has a lovely daughter with little ox-horn braids.

When I see her, I pat her head and buy her candy. The jewelry shop next door is run by a woman whose son was named by my husband. We chat sometimes, about her son growing up, going to the capital for the imperial exams, about her husband who's always away trading, coming home and sleeping without so much as a word, probably finding another woman outside. At the end of the eastern market street, an old woman is selling candied hawthorns. I buy one every time I see her, but I never eat it. The hawthorns are so sour.

After blanching the pig intestines, I wash them again. Butcher Zhang's pig intestines are never clean enough. The yellow wine needs to be warmed longer. Cold wine is bad for my husband's stomach.... The book recorded a month of Chen Yalan's life. Which shops she visited, what the owners were like, what they talked about. Why would she record such trivial details? Fang Cheng was puzzled. Maybe she had obsessive-compulsive disorder, like how her room was arranged. Perfectly neat, not a single thing out of place.

He flipped through a few more pages and suddenly found a strange passage: At the end of the month, I go to the grain shop to buy rice and flour for the month. The owner is a childhood friend. She's very talkative and tells me many stories about our childhood. But my husband is dead. I don't want to talk to her. I'm afraid it will affect my mood. I think she understands. Zhang Ruilin had died the previous morning. But from the yellowed pages and the age of the ink, this passage had been written at least a month ago.

Chen Yalan had known her husband was going to kill himself a month in advance? No, that couldn't be. If her husband was about to die, how could she write so calmly about trivial matters? Fang Cheng's mind raced with questions. Then he heard footsteps outside. He quickly put the book back, climbed out the back window, and hid behind the wall, watching. Chen Yalan entered the room. She glanced at the teapot on the table, frowned slightly, and adjusted the spout.

Then she went to the vanity and saw the book slightly askew. A strange smile curled at the corners of her mouth. She sat down, removed her hairpins one by one, and arranged them neatly. Then she began to undress, taking off her outer robe to reveal her pale shoulders. Following the principle of not spying on a lady disrobing, Fang Cheng stopped watching and left. No matter how he looked at her, she seemed like an ordinary woman. By now it was late at night. Fang Cheng returned to the City God Temple.

Li Sanshui was still guarding the Everlasting Emperor's statue. Seeing Fang Cheng return, he finally relaxed, sat on his little stool, and quickly fell asleep, snoring. Fang Cheng glanced at him. This man had been terrified all day. Even in sleep, his brow was furrowed, his lips trembling, as if having nightmares. Exhaustion was written all over his face. Compared to Li Sanshui, Chen Yalan was much stronger.

She'd stayed in the mourning hall from day to night without eating or drinking, shedding countless tears, yet never collapsing. Fang Cheng sighed. But then another thought struck him. How could a woman endure so much? Was she also naturally strong? Or was she drawing on the grief of losing her husband? No. Chen Yalan was definitely hiding something. Even though the demon sword hadn't detected anything, the sword wasn't infallible. When Fang Cheng had first met Zhu Youchang, the sword hadn't noticed anything either.

He decided he had to go back. By whatever means necessary, he'd get answers from Chen Yalan. Sometimes, good people need to adopt a no-holds-barred determination, just like bad people, in order to accomplish good deeds. Bang, bang, bang! Suddenly, someone knocked on the City God Temple's doors. It was nearly midnight. Who would come to burn incense at this hour? Puzzled, Fang Cheng opened the doors. It was He Chunhua, the tea shop owner.

"What are you doing here?"

"My lord, I've sinned." He Chunhua wept.

"I know you've sinned. But nothing worth killing over. Go home and reflect."

"I can kill! Just tell me who to kill, my lord. I've got it all planned. Bury the body in my hometown fields and plant sweet potatoes. When the sweet potato leaves grow, sweet and tender, I'll brew them into tea for you. Don't worry, I'll make sure to take out the corpse's gall bladder beforehand. The sweet potato leaves won't have any bitter taste, hahaha. Not a trace of bitterness, the lord wants it sweet, hahaha."

He Chunhua laughed low, kneeling and grabbing Fang Cheng's legs, begging him to come kill someone with her.

"What the hell?" Fang Cheng kicked He Chunhua flying. He was in a hurry to get to Chen Yalan's house. No time for this madwoman. Another figure lunged forward and grabbed his leg. Butcher Zhang.

"My lord, eat me! I know I'm not as tender as Widow Wang, but I'm all muscle. Tough, chewy. If you don't like tough meat, just boil me longer until I'm soft and tender. Fragrant! Definitely better than Widow Wang!"

"Get lost!" Fang Cheng kicked Butcher Zhang flying too. The coroner and Yamen runner appeared from nowhere, each grabbing one of Fang Cheng's legs, crying. The Yamen runner said, "My lord, I want to eat pork! Please, use your knife to cut a big gash in my leg, blow me up like a balloon, scrape off my hair, and cook me! I know, scraped pork tastes best!" The coroner said, "My lord, I don't want pork. I want to eat myself. Pigs and cows are lowly animals. I'm noble! Please, my lord, let me taste my own flesh!"

"I said I don't have time! Go find someone else!" Fang Cheng was furious. He grabbed the two and threw them far, far away. For some reason, his mind was stubbornly fixated on going to Chen Yalan's house. After shaking them off, he kept walking. In the darkness, pairs of blood-red eyes lit up, like hungry wild dogs fixing on their prey.

"My lord..."

"My lord..."

"My lord..." They called out, pouncing on the delicious sight before them, stretching out their tongues, licking, closing their eyes in satisfaction. Occasionally they lifted their heads and howled at the sky, as if they really were wild dogs. Fang Cheng was surrounded by these humanoid creatures. They writhed and combined, like a python crawling from a pool of blood, wrapping themselves around him layer by layer, tightening, squeezing the breath out of him. His throat made choking sounds. Fang Cheng was enraged.

He tried to summon the demon sword, but for some reason, it wouldn't come.

"Let me go! Damn you, let me go! Help! Someone help me! Help..." The python slowly engulfed Fang Cheng completely. Suffocating, he felt himself about to lose consciousness. In his last moment, he looked up at the sky. The blood moon had bloomed, just like the crabapple pear flowers in the east, vivid and dripping.