"I took the painting to my grandmother's courtyard and spread it out in front of her. The ghost in the painting really did break free of the paper and pounce out, merging straight into my grandmother's body. She shrieked like a madwoman for a long while, drawing the other servants. Her most loyal old servant, who had followed her all her life, collapsed on the ground, unable to move at all. Mistress and servant... were both killed by that ghost. The same scars appeared on their faces when they died. When I looked at the painting again, the female ghost was still inside it, so I burned it and had monks chant sutras to send her on her way... My father, of course, wouldn't let me off. I was sent away to a country estate. Later, my father took my younger siblings to serve as officials elsewhere, and I ran away from home, wandering the land and making a living by painting for people. When I returned to my hometown years later, I learned that our ancestral home and farmland had all been sold. No one knew what had become of my father and the others. But the story of my family had spread far and wide. Our house had even become a haunted house in the area."
Ye Zhengyi shook his head with a sigh and fell silent.
"That female ghost..." The thin man grew curious.
Ye Zhengyi said, "It's a predictable old story. The female ghost was one of my grandfather's concubines. She had been with him before my grandmother married into the family. After my grandmother came, she abused the woman. My grandfather begged an official from another region for help and left home with the woman, never to return. Only after the concubine died did my