Brain Borrowing

The rain poured down like a deluge.

Beside a cluster of low-lying shrubs, two men clad in straw rain capes were digging a pit.

The excavated soil was flung away by their shovels, landing in a nearby mud pit and splashing water high into the air.

"Third Uncle, that should be enough."

Chen Luo stopped his work, driving his shovel deep into the earth. He pressed one hand against the handle and spoke to the older man beside him.

Third Uncle stopped as well; in just this short time, the pit they had just dug had already accumulated a significant amount of water.

"Bury them."

Third Uncle glanced at the row of straw mats caked in yellow mud at his feet.

This was a group of corpses whose names were unknown, and no one knew who had killed them. The Authorities had ordered the uncle and nephew to handle the disposal to prevent the spread of disease.

This was their profession.

Corpse Collector.

To put it bluntly, they were lowly laborers who cleaned up the messes left by the Authorities and Jianghu Organizations.

Chen Luo had never wanted this kind of life; when he transmigrated here, he never imagined he would end up digging pits to bury people.

But one had to survive!

This world was incredibly strange.

Outside, the land was plagued by war and chaos, and it was not a dynasty he recognized. At night, Jianghu Wanderer figures would leap over rooftops, and one could lose their head at any moment. In order to survive and have enough to eat, he had sought refuge with his Third Uncle in the city, living a life that the villagers envied. He had started digging pits and burying corpses back then, and he had been at it for three years now.

Once this year passed, he would be twenty!

"Right."

Chen Luo grabbed a straw mat and moved the body into the mud pit.

Anyone else would have simply kicked the corpse in, but Chen Luo would not. Third Uncle, who had taught him, would not either.

Third Uncle said this was the Rules of the Corpse Collector.

Respect every deceased person.

Chen Luo had learned this and kept it firmly in mind. He did not know why Third Uncle made him do this, but there was certainly a reason; every trade had its own wisdom, and Chen Luo did not believe that the knowledge he brought from his previous life was more useful than the experience accumulated by others over generations.

The first corpse was laid down and quickly blended into the muddy water.

The rain was too heavy, and the turbid water submerged the Corpse Body. Fortunately, these were all nameless Jianghu Wanderer types, and since the bodies were incomplete, there was no need to be particular.

Into the earth was enough.

After placing the first body, Chen Luo climbed back up to carry the second.

Third Uncle watched from the side, observing every movement Chen Luo made, offering pointers from time to time.

Collecting corpses was no simple task.

One didn't need to worry about beggars who died of old age, but these Jianghu Wanderer types were different. Most died in a Grudge Killing, and some carried potent poisons even in death. Many young Corpse Collector recruits had died after being poisoned while handling the bodies of such people. Besides the Jianghu Wanderer, there was another type of corpse to be wary of: disaster victims. Because many victims died of illness, such bodies could still transmit diseases and kill even after death.

Poison, plague.

These were the natural enemies of the Corpse Collector.

"Xiao Luo, you're turning twenty soon, aren't you?" Third Uncle looked at Chen Luo, who was working nimbly, his eyes full of satisfaction.

He held his Eldest Brother's son in high regard.

He was steady and hardworking.

Most importantly, he was meticulous—a trait rarely seen in young people. Since he began his apprenticeship, Chen Luo had never made a fatal mistake, and he learned everything as soon as it was taught. By now, Chen Laosan had little left to teach, and in a few more days, his nephew would be ready to stand on his own.

"After the new year."

Chen Luo replied without looking back, not understanding why Third Uncle brought this up.

"It's time to get married. After the year starts, Third Uncle will go to the outer streets to find you a match, someone with a thick waist and wide hips, so she can help our Old Chen Family branch out and flourish."

Third Uncle grinned.

Their generation preferred women who could bear children; they looked down on thin, frail women.

"That's not urgent, is it?"

Chen Luo's face was full of rejection.

He truly could not accept the aesthetic standards of the older generation. Just thinking about spending the rest of his life with such a wife gave him the urge to dig a pit and bury himself.

"You brat, you're still unwilling? Once you're married, you'll know the benefits of wide hips!"

This was not the first time Third Uncle had brought up this topic with Chen Luo.

Facing Third Uncle's teasing, Chen Luo simply chose not to Pay Attention To him. After laying down the body, he climbed out of the pit again, preparing to carry the last one. By now, the rain had intensified, mixed with wind that stung his face. A nearby mud pit was washed away by the rainwater, forming a small mudflow that stained both their pant legs a yellowish-brown. The straw mat wrapping the corpse was also swept open by the flow, and Chen Luo, his eyes blurred, accidentally grabbed the head of the corpse through the mat.

"Careful!"

Chen Laosan's expression changed instantly. He lunged forward, gripping Chen Luo's wrist, while his other hand quickly pulled out a red cord to bind the blood vessels.

If he had been poisoned, constricting the vessels would give Chen Luo a chance to amputate his arm, preventing him from losing his life on the spot.

Chen Luo froze for a moment, subconsciously taking another look at the corpse.

His pupils contracted slightly. Before he could take a closer look, he heard Third Uncle shouting in his ear, followed immediately by his right arm being bound by a red rope, the constriction making his wrist ache.

"I'm fine, it's just a poor man, there's no poison on him."

Coming to his senses, Chen Luo hurriedly responded. He glanced at his palm, which hadn't changed color, and Sighed in Relief.

He had been startled himself.

Since starting this profession, he had heard many rumors about people accidentally touching the corpses of a Jianghu Wanderer and being poisoned to death, or contracting diseases and coughing up blood until they died.

The deadly poisons in this world were incredibly unreasonable; even if it was just something clinging to a corpse, one could still die after touching it. Therefore, under normal circumstances, they would absolutely never open the straw mat, let alone touch the corpse with their hands.

"You brat, have you no regard for your life!"

Chen Laosan Sighed in Relief, then, in a fit of anger, gave Chen Luo A Slap on the back of his head.

"Get out of the way and watch closely! In this line of work, a mistake means death."

After shooing Chen Luo away, Chen Laosan took Action himself. He first re-wrapped the corpse in the straw mat and then bowed to it. Only then did he carefully hoist it up and place it at the very edge of the pit they had dug. By this time, the pit was already half-filled with Turbid Muddy Water, and once the corpse was lowered, it quickly disappeared from sight.

The Turbid Muddy Water gathered more and more, and the mud washed in from the surroundings began to flow into the pit.

Seeing this, Chen Laosan did not delay further. After climbing out of the pit, he called for Chen Luo to start filling it with soil.

Working together, they Soon After filled the pit. Afterward, they piled some more soil on top and pressed it into a small mound. They stomped the Wordless Tombstone given to them by the Imperial Court onto it, and this crude grave was considered complete.

"Safe travels, everyone."

After filling the grave, Chen Laosan took a flask of cheap wine mixed with water from the box on his back and poured it over the Wordless Tombstone.

This was a habit of the Corpse Collector, a way to bid farewell to the spirits and avoid being haunted by them.

After offering the wine and reciting the prayers.

The heaviest part of the rain had passed. Chen Laosan came over to check Chen Luo's hand again, and only after confirming there were no issues did he untie the red rope and put it away.

"Let's go."

Chen Laosan packed up his things, put the Wine Bottle and some cheap ritual items back into the box, and led Chen Luo toward the foot of the mountain.

This job was done, and it was time to go back and collect the reward.

Chen Luo followed behind. After walking about a hundred paces, he suddenly stopped and looked back.

In his Field of Vision, a gray scale had appeared.

Contacted Dead Person's Brainwaves, Damage Degree 92%, read now?

He tried to focus his attention on it, and soon he saw a row of familiar text.

"Read!"

Chen Luo thought to himself.

Soon, the text above changed, and a strange frequency entered his brain, just like plugging into an external device. The next second, a string of intermittent text appeared in his mind.

'Orchid Withered Ball, Iron Thread Grass cooked until three-tenths done to extract the juice, taken with White Flower Fruit, can increase strength.'

Finished Reading this sentence, Chen Luo instantly understood what his ability was.

The source of this information was the obsession Remained from the corpse he had touched not long ago, the very thing that had been in the person's mind until their death.

"Is this the content recorded by the brainwaves Remained from that Jianghu Wanderer? In other words, I can read the brainwaves of the dead?"

Chen Luo instantly understood the function of his ability.

This world was not purely ancient; it was more like a chaotic era of multi-ethnic integration.

At the top, there were the Authorities, but below them, Jianghu gangs and Local Gangs all had their own spheres of influence. On the surface, everyone maintained the dignity of the Imperial Court and acted according to the Rules, but what happened at night was up to the Jianghu Wanderer.

When he first arrived in this world, Chen Luo had also thought about learning martial arts.

Because only by learning martial arts could one change their life.

Doing business alone was not feasible in such a chaotic world.

But Chen Luo had tried many methods and could not Come Into Contact With the martial arts class. To be precise, among everyone he knew, not a single person had ever truly Come Into Contact With martial arts. This was not strange; the monopoly of the elite class was innate and rarely delegated. The society before he transmigrated was the most direct proof: everyone knew that playing with finance made money, but how many could truly play with finance? At best, they were "leeks" or "tools," the kind of "pseudo-finance" where you get harvested as soon as you enter. The big shots who truly manipulated finance were cut off from the lower classes.

"These medicinal herbs are not hard to find. Since they could become the final obsession of a Jianghu Wanderer, they should have some efficacy."

The day after burying the corpse, Chen Luo, having collected his reward, bought some of the medicinal herbs from the obsession.

They weren't expensive; the whole set of medicine cost only three large coins.

At the crack of dawn.

Chen Luo was boiling the medicine in a broken pottery pot in the stable, the pungent smell echoing through the courtyard.

It was fortunate that Third Uncle had gone out to drink flower wine last night; if he were still in the courtyard, he would definitely have come out to beat him.

The courtyard where Third Uncle lived was not large, consisting of only two rooms. Boiling things in the courtyard meant the smell would permeate the rooms.

A quarter of an hour later.

The medicinal water was boiled, the herbs were Cooked Into dregs, and the pitch-black liquid in the pottery pot didn't look like anything a human could drink.

Chen Luo picked up the pottery pot and lifted the lid.

He held it up to his nose and took a sniff.

The pungent, spicy scent hit him so hard it nearly brought tears to his eyes. Beneath the spice lay a foul stench, like rotten eggs left out for a fortnight, making him feel as if he might retch up his dinner from the night before. It was hard to imagine that several normal medicinal herbs, once boiled together, could release such a horrific odor.

"Is this stuff actually drinkable?"

After dry-heaving, Chen Luo looked at the clay pot in his hands, his face etched with doubt.

But the money had already been spent; he couldn't just let it go to waste.

Chen Luo's gaze flickered toward the dog Third Uncle kept. He remembered that when he first arrived in the city and came to Third Uncle's place, this Scabby Dog had torn a pair of his trousers to shreds. In the corner, the Scabby Dog, which had been hiding away to escape the stench, felt its tail tighten, sensing a vague premonition that something terrible was about to happen.

"Big Flower, come here, come here. I'm giving you an extra meal today."

Chen Luo carried the pot over, beckoning to the Scabby Dog with a friendly smile.

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