The Bureau of Corpse Management.
"Hm? He didn't die?"
Sun Xianfu, the bureau's deputy director, had just returned from the morning court session and removed his official hat when he heard a clerk report.
The No. 9 corpse stitcher from last night had come out of the side room alive that morning.
"Was the corpse stitched up?"
"It was. I inspected it myself, and the corpse should be ready for burial. What should we do about that No. 9 corpse stitcher?"
"There was an evil spirit on that corpse. Only someone with a baleful fate could suppress it. That No. 9 corpse stitcher must have a powerful Heavenly Sha Lone Star aura. That's probably why he survived."
Sun Xianfu assumed Lin Shou's baleful fate had suppressed the corpse. How could he have known Lin Shou had a knack for stitching corpses from a distance? He took a sip of tea and said:
"Never mind. Corpse stitchers like him are useful to our bureau. Raise the corpse quota for No. 9 Corpse-Stitching Shop to match No. 1 Corpse-Stitching Shop. No. 1 Shop is struggling to keep up anyway. From now on, send some of the more troublesome corpses to Shop No. 9 as well."
The clerk accepted the order and was about to leave, but then remembered something else.
"Lord Sun, yesterday the Corpse-Salvaging Team at Shallow Water Pier clashed with the local Canal Gang. Two corpse salvagers were beaten to death. The others are furious, and they've been gathering people lately, planning to fight the Canal Gang."
"The Canal Gang at Shallow Water Pier? Weng Deyan's branch?"
"Yes, my lord. It's Weng Deyan's branch."
Sun Xianfu narrowed his eyes and picked up his pipe. A low-ranking clerk at the Bureau of Corpse Management might not understand the situation with the Canal Gang at Shallow Water Pier, but a sixth-rank court official like him couldn't afford to be that clueless.
Weng Deyan's branch of the Canal Gang had long been suspected of being a lapdog raised by the Western Affairs Party at court. Lately, the Three Judicial Offices and the Six Fan School had gotten involved too. With the court in turmoil and the various factions' positions unclear...
"Tell the corpse salvagers to behave and not make trouble."
"Yes, my lord. But if they won't listen..."
"If they won't?"
Lord Sun lit his pipe and said indifferently:
"Then let them be. But keep an eye out for people who can swim well. Tell them we have work for them. Once this batch of corpse salvagers is dead, we can put the new people in their place."
That evening, at Shop No. 9.
Lin Shou lounged on a stool outside the shop. He silently recited the Classic of Burial to practice his cultivation while watching the young women and newlywed brides pass along the night market street.
That one's pretty and fair. That one's nice too, slim and graceful. That one has wide hips—good for bearing children. This one, that one... Tsk, why's Ning Luowei here again? What a nuisance.
Ning Luowei brought Lin Shou a bowl of goji berry tofu to nourish him, then sat beside him on a small stool and tried to get a conversation going.
"My good sir, what are you looking at?"
"Girls."
"I'm a girl too."
"No, you're not. You're a delivery boy."
"A... a what?"
That was more or less how their daily exchanges went. They weren't exactly stimulating, but Ning Luowei came every day, and Lin Shou had gotten used to it.
As soon as the lanterns lit up each evening, Ning Luowei would seek Lin Shou out and sit with him in front of the corpse-stitching shop, admiring the splendid night market of the Capital City.
Lin Shou couldn't stand Ning Luowei, but all the young bachelors nearby were green with envy.
Ever since the Tofu Beauty became famous, the whole street had grown livelier, drawing in plenty of strong young men. They all had one clear goal: Miss Ning.
The more decent ones only watched from a distance. The brazen, foolish ones put on a whole monkey show. They flexed their muscles, performed magic tricks, smashed stones on their chests outside the tofu shop... Lin Shou wanted to suggest they put on a variety show.
Ning Luowei turned them down every time. But that sweet, gentle girl was still unmarried, and nobody had heard of her having a sweetheart. Who could give up?
Maybe Miss Ning has already taken a shine to me. She's just shy, that's all. Tsk, tsk... From top to bottom, the Capital City is full of fools who think far too highly of themselves.
But lately, Miss Ning kept heading over to the corpse-stitching shop to bring that little fool tofu. Miss Ning was truly... truly beautiful and kindhearted!
She was going out of her way to help someone with an intellectual disability. How moving!
It was that little fool's fault, sitting there with his stupid face all the time. What if he upset Miss Ning? Well, that was what you got for being a fool—wasting Miss Ning's kindness! If only I were in his place!
It was a good thing Lin Shou hadn't gotten mind-reading or telepathy from the Record of Selling Corpses.
If he'd known what these fellows were thinking, he would've cursed them for being a bunch of spineless louts who let a pretty face scramble their brains. He'd have told them they really ought to let Master Ning scrape their scalps.
Of course, outsiders could never have guessed how much Lin Shou couldn't stand Ning Luowei, or how shamelessly she threw herself at him.
All they saw was:
The most beautiful Tofu Beauty in the neighborhood.
A little fool everyone agreed was a fool.
Judging by the brains of those men who flexed their muscles, performed magic tricks, and smashed stones on their chests, they could probably only imagine a headline like: "Ten Outstanding Citizens of the Capital City! Kindhearted Tofu Beauty Devotes Herself to Charity, Supporting People with Intellectual Disabilities!"
If you told one of them that Miss Ning had fallen for the little fool and clung to him every day, he'd laugh so hard he'd cry. He might even swallow a sword on the spot to show off his own trick and say, "Look at this stunt! How could it possibly lose to a fool?"
People's joys and sorrows were never in sync. Lin Shou found the whole thing noisy, so after eating Ning Luowei's tofu, he sent her on her way.
Then he sat there thinking.
He'd stitched up that Tomb Raider's corpse today and walked out of the Bureau of Corpse Management alive. That surely wasn't what the bureau had expected.
So he'd prepared for the possibility that the bureau might summon him for questioning, along with a set of false explanations.
If they believed him, all the better. If they didn't and decided to take action against him, Lin Shou had also prepared plan B: flee the Capital City.
Still, the odds seemed low. Sun Xianfu, the bureau's chief, was at least a court official, a sixth-rank officer. He couldn't be so petty as to insist on taking the life of a lowly corpse stitcher like him.
Corpse stitchers had low status to begin with. They could at least blend in with the common people, but in an official's eyes, they were even more contemptible—mere tools. Hardly any officials paid them any attention, let alone went after them.
And sure enough, the whole day passed, all the way into the evening.
Not a single clerk from the Bureau of Corpse Management came to summon Lin Shou.
That told him everything. The bureau hadn't considered him important in the slightest. If he died, he died. If he survived, he'd just been lucky. He wasn't even worth the time it would take to question him.
Lin Shou thought, Good. I actually like the bureau's hands-off attitude. This free and easy life suits me just fine!
That settled things with the Bureau of Corpse Management.
The last matter was the two rewards the Record of Selling Corpses had given him for stitching up the Tomb Raider's corpse.
Lin Shou really couldn't make sense of it.
If the corpse had been a pregnant woman, then you could say there had been two lives in one body. But the corpse was a man.
What's more, the Record of Selling Corpses had assigned it a Heaven-grade price.
What kind of fetus could be worth that much?
A god reincarnated?
Lin Shou couldn't figure it out, so he gave up. No matter how many lives were involved, the corpse had been stitched up, and he'd claimed the Record of Selling Corpses' rewards. A Heaven-grade price—he'd made a fortune!
Once the corpse was buried, that would be the end of it.
As for the strange events he'd witnessed in the Lantern of Life, the burial objects taken from the Bronze Coffin in the Prince's Tomb had already disappeared into the tangled web of the Capital Ghost Market. Their whereabouts were unknown.
Investigate?
Investigate my foot.
Lin Shou couldn't be bothered.
He wasn't some salaried lackey in the Three Judicial Offices. Why should he waste his time tracking down missing unearthed relics?
He was just a lowly corpse stitcher at a corpse-stitching shop.
All he wanted was to scrape by and enjoy his freedom.
If they were fated to meet again, they would. If not, there was no point in chasing them down.
Lin Shou silently recited the Classic of Burial, feeling his power grow within him.
Stitching corpses, selling them, and squeezing out rewards; cultivating and growing stronger—those were the things that truly mattered.
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