Night was as dark as ink. As Ye Yun dragged his battered body through the courtyard gate, the wind chimes beneath the eaves suddenly stirred without a breeze, ringing in a frantic rush. Blackish-green slime seeped from the wound beneath his ribs, and every step left a corrosive mark on the bluestone path.
Young master! Uncle Fu stumbled out of the side room, and the oil lamp in his hand crashed to the ground. In the dim yellow light, the old man got a clear look at Ye Yun and sucked in a sharp breath. Five claw marks had torn open the front of his official robes, and the skin beneath was covered in a web of purplish-blue veins. Most horrifying of all were the three bloody holes in his right shoulder. What oozed from them wasn't blood, but thick black sludge.
Ye Yun managed a strained smile, but the movement tugged at the wound rotting on his neck. His fingers dug deep into the doorframe, his knuckles white with exertion. "Uncle Fu... prepare... cinnabar..."
Before he could finish, he suddenly spat out a mouthful of black blood. The drops struck the steps and writhed like living things, gathering into a clump that vaguely formed a twisted child's face.
Uncle Fu's cloudy eyes narrowed. His bony palm shot out like lightning and struck Ye Yun between the shoulder blades. A warm current surged into Ye Yun's meridians, temporarily suppressing the rampant yin energy. The old man's voice trembled. "Baleful yin has invaded your body! Get inside!"
In the candlelit side room, Uncle Fu took a faded red cloth bundle from a hidden compartment. He unwrapped three layers of oiled paper, revealing yellowed talismans and a small packet of dark red powder. He bit his index finger and drew intricate symbols around Ye Yun's wounds. With every stroke, the black qi beneath the skin roiled violently.
"Bear with it." Uncle Fu sprinkled the powder over the symbols. "This is red saltpeter mixed with black dog's blood. Nothing works better against yin evil."
Hiss—!
The instant white smoke rose, Ye Yun's muscles tightened all over, and a muffled growl escaped his throat. He saw dozens of hair-thin black strands spring from his wounds, writhing and struggling in the air before turning to ash. After the searing pain passed, the chill that had clung to his bones finally receded.
"Now tell me, what exactly did you encounter?" Uncle Fu wiped the cold sweat from his forehead. His voice was so hoarse it barely sounded like his own.
Ye Yun recounted everything that had happened at the Wang Mansion. When he described the iron chain around the female ghost's ankle, Uncle Fu's hand suddenly shook as he poured tea. Scalding tea spilled over the back of his hand, but he didn't seem to feel it. Staring at the blisters that had instantly risen, the old man murmured, "Iron chains around her feet... blue robes... It really is the Yin Child..."
"You know where that thing came from?" Ye Yun caught the name at once.
Uncle Fu fell silent for a long while, then dragged a dust-covered camphorwood chest from beneath the bed. Several notebooks lay neatly stacked inside. On the top one, its cover marked in cinnabar, were the words Records of the Mysterious. His hands trembling, he flipped to a page and pointed at a crude illustration: a little girl in blue, chained beside a well, with talismans drawn all around her.
"Thirty years ago, the Wang family had a concubine-born daughter named Wang Yun." Uncle Fu's voice suddenly grew distant. "She'd been able to see things ordinary people couldn't since birth... When she was seven, she strangled her birth mother with a dog's leash and gouged out her eyes."
The candle flame turned an eerie blue, casting the old man's shadow on the wall. The shadow was three times as large as his body. Ye Yun noticed that when Uncle Fu spoke of the girl, the shadow covered its eyes.
"What happened after that?"
"Wealthy Wang invited Taoist priests from Qingyun Temple. They said she was born with an extremely yin constitution, in a yin year, yin month, and yin hour, and was especially prone to attracting evil." Uncle Fu's fingernails scraped unconsciously across the page, making a grating sound. "They performed rituals for seven days beside the ancient well in the west wing... In the end, the child threw herself into it."
Ye Yun thought of the female ghost's hollow eye sockets. "You seem to know quite a bit about cultivation."
"This old servant, in his younger days..." Uncle Fu suddenly broke into a violent coughing fit. The phlegm he coughed up was threaded with black strands. "I worked as a menial at Qingyun Temple for a few years."
He hurriedly covered his mouth with a handkerchief, but didn't notice that half a black strand dangled from its edge, writhing as it slipped back into his sleeve. Ye Yun saw it clearly and quietly tightened his grip on the throwing knife hidden in his sleeve.
"Tell me about strange beings." Ye Yun changed the subject. "Why couldn't my Essence Qi hurt it?"
Uncle Fu seemed relieved. He took a piece of tortoiseshell from the bottom of the chest. "Between heaven and earth, there are two kinds of qi: pure and turbid. Martial artists cultivate pure, spiritual qi; strange beings gather yin and turbid qi. The Essence Qi of a lower-three-rank martial artist is too thin. It's like..." He snapped the tortoiseshell and struck a stone with a wooden sword.
Under the candlelight, the pattern on the broken tortoiseshell seemed to form a character. Uncle Fu hurriedly covered it with his sleeve and continued, "It's different for middle-three-rank martial artists. Their Essence Qi is refined like mercury and can break through evil. When the Old General was alive, a single Sword Qi could slay a hundred-year-old vengeful ghost."
Ye Yun thought of the throwing knife he'd powered with his life essence. "What about cultivators? How do they fit in?"
"Cultivators..." A strange light flickered in Uncle Fu's eyes. "They're born with spiritual roots and can absorb the spiritual energy of heaven and earth directly. Even the most basic evil-banishing talisman can match the full-force strike of a 6th Rank martial artist."
The flames lit one corner of the side room, where a bronze mirror hung. From the corner of his eye, Ye Yun saw that Uncle Fu's reflection in the mirror... had no shadow!
"But cultivators have frail bodies." Uncle Fu suddenly blew out the flame, plunging the room into darkness. "A 3rd Rank martial artist can shatter their heart meridians with a single breath. So when high-rank martial artists and accomplished cultivators meet, they often both end up badly wounded."
A sudden sound came from outside the window, as if someone were scratching at the paper. Uncle Fu sprang to his feet, moving with a speed that didn't suit an old man. He quickly scattered a circle of incense ash around the doors and windows. As the ash fell, it arranged itself into a Bagua diagram.
"Remember this, young master." With his back to Ye Yun, Uncle Fu's voice suddenly turned hollow. "To deal with the Yin Child, you must find the object it's bound to... For example..." His neck twisted unnaturally to the right. "The eyes that were gouged out..."
Before he could finish, a dull thud rang out in the courtyard, as if some heavy object had fallen into water. Almost at the same time, the talisman pasted above the door burst into flame without a spark and drifted down as ash.
Uncle Fu's body shook violently. He turned around slowly, and Ye Yun stared in horror—the old man's left eye had somehow turned pure black, oozing thick black sludge!
"It's here..." Uncle Fu's mouth stretched into an impossible grin, revealing a full set of yellowed teeth. "Young master... run..."
His final word became a piercing shriek. Dozens of moving lumps suddenly bulged beneath Uncle Fu's skin, as if countless little worms were burrowing under it. His right hand shot toward Ye Yun, his nails lengthening by three inches, their tips shining with a ghostly blue light!
Ye Yun had been ready. He rolled to the side, evading the deadly swipe. A throwing knife shot from his sleeve and lodged precisely in Uncle Fu's brow. No blood came out; only a wisp of black smoke curled up from the wound.
"You're not Uncle Fu!" Ye Yun shouted. 8th Rank Essence Qi surged through his meridians. "Who are you?"
"Giggle, giggle..." Uncle Fu laughed like a little girl. The wound struck by the throwing knife wriggled closed. "Young Master Ye, what a cruel heart you have... You'd even attack your old servant..."
Its body began to twist and warp. Its skin melted like wax, revealing the bluish-gray body beneath—it was the blue-robed female ghost from the Wang Mansion! Only now, a pair of cloudy eyeballs had appeared in its empty sockets. Their pupils... were exactly the same as Uncle Fu's!
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