All Neat and Tidy

"You... you dare hit me?!"

Ling Zhonghai flew into a rage the moment he came to his senses. Pointing at Qin He, he drew his blade. "I'll chop you to death, you worthless bastard!"

"Don't!"

"Chief, you can't!"

Li Tie and Gao Linkun were horrified. They hurriedly grabbed Ling Zhonghai and dragged him back.

"Let go of me! I'm going to chop him to death!"

"Chief, calm down, calm down! He's just an idiot!"

"You can't lower yourself to an idiot's level!"

"Otherwise, people will think we're idiots too!"

Ling Zhonghai struggled "with all his might," but ultimately failed, and was dragged into the duty room.

A Corpse Burner could be pounced to death by a corpse, die of illness, but they could not be beaten to death, hacked to death, starved to death, or frozen to death. Otherwise, something ominous would happen.

No one knew why. In any case, it was a rule passed down for thousands of years.

There had once been an incident in the Great Li Dynasty where a Corpse Burner was starved to death after his copper coins were withheld. Something ominous happened as a result: half the people in the Eastern City Marshal's Office died suddenly overnight. From then on, no one dared lay a hand on a Corpse Burner again.

Stuffing them with corpses was fine. Laying hands on them was not.

Qin He raised his hand and looked at the mosquito corpse that had been slapped twice. He curled his lip. How could he endure that?

What was this, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles?

It almost made him feel embarrassed.

Should he move them from the villain camp into the good guy camp?

After thinking it over, Qin He decided against it.

They had yet to grasp the ultimate profundity of villainy.

The "medicine" could not be stopped.

"I know my future isn't a dream."

"I live every minute with all my heart."

"My future isn't a dream."

"My heart moves with hope."

Half an hour later, Qin He hummed as he cleaned the three corpses on the Corpse Purification Platform.

Two men and one woman.

One was an old man, the other a young man. They looked somewhat alike and were probably father and son.

The woman had a seductive charm and was quite pretty.

The old man and the woman appeared to have been poisoned. They had died clutching their throats, eyes wide open in undying grievance, blood flowing from all seven orifices.

The young man had suffered a blow to the forehead. His eyes were likewise open, and no matter how they were smoothed, they would not close.

A corpse with open eyes was a typical mutation. It could not be buried and could only be burned, which was why they had been sent to the Corpse Burning Facility.

Every sign showed that these three dead people were family. All three had been sent to the Corpse Burning Facility and assigned to the same Corpse Burner. It was truly "rare."

Qin He put on mourning clothes, cleaned away the bloodstains, arranged their garments, then fetched needle and thread and carefully sewed the eyes of all three corpses shut.

Open-eyed corpses could not be buried, nor could they enter the furnace. Since their eyes would not close, they could only be forcibly sewn shut.

Without question, they were vicious corpses.

And a cluster of vicious corpses at that, extremely prone to rising and pouncing on people.

Though the villain trio had yet to grasp the ultimate profundity, their judgment was still sharp.

But here with Qin He, no matter what kind of corpse it was, a dragon had to coil and a tiger had to lie down.

Decades of Dao Xing, plus Corpse Suppressing Nails, cured every kind of defiance.

Once the corpses had been cleaned, he recited the usual words to the dead. He addressed the man as grandpa and the woman as auntie, then carried the corpses into the furnace.

The Corpse Burning Furnace could normally only burn two corpses at once, but the two poisoned corpses were curled into balls and took up little space. Since the female corpse was petite to begin with, Qin He simply burned all three together.

He lit the fire, added coal, and worked the bellows to burn the corpses.

Good heavens, all three corpses opened their eyes at once. Even the thread snapped. Their Resentful Energy soared to the heavens, unwilling to submit.

There was no helping it.

They were being so undignified.

Qin He could only help them regain their dignity.

Twenty Corpse Suppressing Nails later, the Corpse Burning Furnace, which had been thrashing like loaches dropped into a wok of hot oil, finally quieted down.

He poured in three ladles of fire oil, giving the cremation progress bar a buff.

Three hours later, Qin He had finished watching the three of their Shadow Plays.

Two words: insanely thrilling. A hard drive without a T could not hold it.

The three truly were family.

The old man was called Xiong Jiu, his son was Xiong Wenlang, and the woman was Liu Siniang.

Since ancient times, there were three forms of unfilial conduct, and having no descendants was the gravest.

Having no descendants was a matter as huge as the sky.

Old Master Xiong's family was facing precisely that worry. Xiong Wenlang and Liu Siniang had been married for years, yet they had never conceived a child.

One or two years could still be endured, and they could wait a little longer. But four or five years passed without any sign of pregnancy, and the Xiong family inevitably grew anxious. Xiong Wenlang was the sole heir, and the Xiong family's immense fortune looked destined to be left without a successor.

What could they do? First, they had to find the cause and see whether the problem lay with Xiong Wenlang or Liu Siniang.

They hired a famous physician at a high price.

The Xiong family was wealthy and did not lack money.

The famous physician came, took the pulses of Xiong Wenlang and Liu Siniang, said nothing, patted the dust on the table, and left.

What did that mean?

I know, but I cannot say.

As long as heaven knows, earth knows, you know, and I know, that is enough. If you truly do not understand, ask Du Niang.

This was something that could not be spoken of.

And there was an allusion behind it.

The allusion... could not be spoken of either.

In any case, it was passed down across generations.

The famous physician's suggestion was embarrassing, but it was also the only solution.

Skipping over all the quarrels, awkwardness, and Xiong Wenlang's various attempts to find concubines and doctors, in the end, the only road left was the one pointed out by the famous physician.

So, that happened.

And once that happened, things went bad.

Though Xiong Jiu was old, he had been widowed early. With nothing to do, he practiced martial arts to preserve his health, conserving his essence and gathering his strength for more than a decade. Xiong Wenlang was young, but he did everything quickly.

As for Liu Siniang, she had discovered a whole new world.

At first, Xiong Wenlang could endure it. Everything was for the sake of continuing the family line. But after the two had their first child and wanted a second, Xiong Wenlang could no longer stand it.

After several rounds of quarrels that sent chickens flying and dogs jumping, Xiong Wenlang gave Xiong Jiu and Liu Siniang a vicious beating and threatened to slaughter the adulterous pair.

Liu Siniang was no easy mark either. She whispered into Xiong Jiu's ear, urging him to kill Xiong Wenlang so that their youngest son could inherit the family fortune.

As the saying went, do not fear that no good thing will happen; fear only that there will be no good people.

Xiong Jiu and Liu Siniang had indeed gone too far in this matter, and Xiong Wenlang had only spoken in anger. But Liu Siniang kept fanning the flames and blowing fierce poison into Xiong Jiu's ear. Frightened, Xiong Jiu agreed, ready to turn against his own flesh and blood.

But man proposed, heaven disposed. The butler overheard Liu Siniang and Xiong Jiu's scheme, then secretly told Xiong Wenlang.

When Xiong Wenlang heard it, he thought, Well, well. That adulterous pair is going all out—they actually intend to take my life.

Fine, then do not blame me for striking first. That very night, he poisoned the two and drugged them senseless.

Thus the tragedy began.

That was not even the end. Perhaps it was retribution from the unseen world, but while Xiong Wenlang was disposing of their bodies, his foot slipped on the stairs. He fell, struck a beam, and died.

All three members of the family were sent to the Corpse Burning Facility.

Judgment and weighing. The Black Robed Man, Zhang Jin Kou, said, "No life escapes beneath a pomegranate skirt; when lust takes the lead, it is a blade."

The ripples faded, and three rewards appeared.

A copy of Lockpicking Art, a copy of Chamber Arts, and ten years of inner strength.