Zhou Zhanxie really had not been lying about being famous around the area.
First came an elderly couple in a taxi.
The taxi had already driven a little way past when it braked sharply and reversed.
Then the old man and woman opened the rear doors and climbed out, looking delighted. After taking a careful look to confirm who she was, they pressed their palms together in excitement, repeatedly addressing her as Master Zhou.
Zhou Zhanxie, normally such a goofball, played up the mysterious air of an expert. With Shane refraining from exposing her, she aloofly offered the elderly couple a few sheets of talisman paper.
Then she named her price: over fifty thousand Hong Kong dollars.
After the elderly couple paid and left perfectly satisfied, Shane sidled up to her as though he had seen a ghost.
"Wow, have you got no conscience? You charged that much for a few sheets of yellow paper?"
Zhou Zhanxie showed her true colors as she counted the money. At Shane's question, she shrugged and rolled her eyes at him.
"The talismans I sell at my stall are the real deal, not those decorative knockoffs sold online."
"Is the haunting here really that bad? I distinctly saw a wealthy neighborhood down at the foot of the mountain."
Zhou Zhanxie clicked her tongue, stuffed the stack of money she had just received into her bag, then took out a few more sheets of talisman paper and beckoned Shane over. "Amateur. Who said talismans were only for dealing with ghosts... Come here!"
Zhou Zhanxie laid the sheets of talisman paper on the table one by one, explaining each as she went.
"This one is specifically for warding off evil. That doesn't just mean ghosts, but also all sorts of external pathogenic influences in traditional Chinese