Eight-Character Talisman

"What?"

Chen Mo's mouth hung slightly open, his face etched with astonishment.

Since when did he suddenly have a fiancée?

Chen Dachuan looked at his son's bewildered expression and instead curled his lips into a self-deprecating, bitter smile. "It was decided back when Big Mouth Li was still alive. We never really took it seriously."

"Now that the girl isn't willing, we won't force it."

He spoke with finality, turned around, and walked into his own room.

After a flurry of rummaging through cabinets, Chen Dachuan emerged holding a faded red envelope. "I've kept her Eight Characters scroll all this time. Go and get yours back."

"Let's just call this matter finished."

Chen Mo took the thin red envelope, feeling a strange sensation in his heart.

Recalling it now, the original owner's memories seemed to contain a trace of this, and he had apparently been quite infatuated with her.

No wonder that woman looked at him with such disdain; it turned out she had found someone better.

Father and son walked out one after the other.

The gate to the Li family courtyard next door was left ajar, and low sobs drifted from within.

Chen Dachuan knocked on the door, and the sounds inside stopped abruptly.

A moment later, Widow Li opened the door with red, swollen eyes. Seeing the red envelope in Chen Dachuan's hand and catching a glimpse of Chen Mo behind him, a flash of shame crossed her face.

"Master Chen, Little Mo, come in quickly..."

"No need." Chen Dachuan waved his hand, his tone as calm as he could manage. "The children are grown and have their own ideas; that's a good thing. As elders, we shouldn't stand in their way. This is Siqing's Eight Characters scroll. I've come to take back Little Mo's, and we can consider this chapter closed."

Widow Li's tears welled up again. She looked at Chen Dachuan, then at the expressionless Chen Mo. "Master Chen... our family has let you down... that girl Siqing, she's being foolish..."

"Little Mo's scroll... wait a moment, I'll go get it."

She wiped her hands frantically on her apron and turned to go inside. After a period of rustling and searching, she emerged empty-handed. "It... it's gone... I remember putting it in the small box at the very bottom of the wardrobe... how could it be missing?"

Chen Dachuan frowned. "Missing?"

"Mom! Did you put it somewhere else?"

Li Siqing's voice came from the inner room, carrying a hint of imperceptible guilt.

She walked out, having changed into old, casual clothes. Her eyes were red, but she held her head high and refused to look at Chen Mo and his father.

"I didn't touch it! It was always there!" Widow Li said anxiously.

Li Siqing pursed her lips, her gaze sweeping quickly over Chen Mo before she lowered her lashes. "Maybe... maybe I accidentally took it to school when I was tidying up last time. I was in such a rush, I forgot to bring it back."

This excuse was full of holes.

Who would accidentally take a betrothal scroll to school?

Chen Dachuan's face darkened. "Siqing, this scroll is no ordinary object. If you feel this arrangement is inappropriate, just be upfront and we can settle it face-to-face; no one will blame you. Making excuses like this is meaningless."

Li Siqing's cheeks flushed red and her fingers twisted her hem, but her voice grew harder. "Uncle Chen, I'm not making excuses! I really forgot it at school! If you don't believe me, I'll definitely find it and return it to you the next time I go back!"

Chen Mo watched her flickering gaze and felt something was off, though he couldn't quite put his finger on what.

Chen Dachuan's chest heaved once. After a moment of silence, he placed the red envelope he held gently onto the stone stool in the courtyard.

"Since it's forgotten, then so be it." His voice was calm but carried a biting chill; even an honest man had his limits.

"From this day forward, consider this engagement as if it never existed. Our two families will remain neighbors."

Having said that, he stopped looking at the pale-faced Widow Li and the lip-biting Li Siqing, and turned to Chen Mo. "Let's go."

Chen Mo took one last look at the red envelope on the stone stool, then at the complex, unreadable expression on Li Siqing's face. He said nothing and followed his father away.

"That girl has too deep a mind and acts too ruthlessly. In the future, try to keep your distance," Chen Dachuan said.

Chen Mo nodded.

He didn't care about the scroll, but Li Siqing's behavior suggested she was hiding something guilty.

The night deepened. With the Mid-Autumn Festival approaching, the moonlight should have been clear, but at this moment, it shrouded the entire Linshui County in a viscous, dark red light.

Wang the Scabby, the hooligan whose leg Chen Mo had broken during the day, was being supported by two lackeys, limping toward the back wall of Deliverance Studio.

His leg was haphazardly wrapped in cloth strips, his face twisted in pain, and he clutched a pitch-black clay pot tightly to his chest, filled with pungent, volatile fire oil.

"Deliverance Studio? This is the right place, right?"

"It shouldn't be wrong. Sanzhuzi said he saw that guy go in with his own eyes."

"Damn it... that little bastard... I'll burn his pathetic nest to the ground and see if he can still act so arrogant!"

Wang the Scabby spat, his eyes filled with venomous light.

"Brother Scabby, are we really going to burn it? If we get caught, we won't be able to stay in Linhe County anymore." One of the lackeys sounded timid.

Murder and arson were grave crimes in any era.

"What are you afraid of! It's a dark night with no moon, we burn it and run, who's going to know it was us? My leg didn't get broken for nothing!"

Wang the Scabby cursed in a low voice, directing his accomplices to bring over several bundles of dry firewood and pile them against the base of the wall, while his own hands trembled as he reached to pry the seal off the pottery jar.

Just as the contents of the jar were about to be poured out.

A sinister wind whipped up without warning, bone-chillingly cold, cutting through the alley and making the dry firewood rattle.

The three of them shivered in unison.

"Why did it suddenly get so cold..."

Before the words had even faded, the shadows in the corner of the wall suddenly came to life, coalescing into three vague human silhouettes.

They had no facial features, only hollow faces turned toward Wang the Scabby and his men, their bodies radiating an intense, thick resentment.

These three vengeful spirits were none other than the three people Chen Mo had killed back in Jin City.

They had been mindlessly tracking the source of Chen Mo's aura, following it all the way to Linhe County.

At this moment, however, they were drawn by the strong malice radiating from Wang the Scabby and his men, misidentifying their target.

"Ghosts... ghosts!" The two underlings were scared out of their wits, abandoning Wang the Scabby and turning to run.

Wang the Scabby was terrified out of his mind; his hand shook, the pottery jar fell to the ground, and the fierce fire oil gurgled out, its pungent odor filling the air.

The three vengeful spirits seemed stimulated by the sound, black mist churning around their bodies as they lunged forward!

As the yin energy entered his body, Wang the Scabby immediately felt as if he had fallen into an ice cellar, a piercing pain shooting through his broken leg.

"You two bastards, don't leave me behind!"

He let out a miserable shriek, his strength rapidly dissipating, his vision beginning to blur and darken.

Just as his consciousness was about to sink into the abyss...

"Shh!"

A very faint sound of something piercing the air rang out, like a sharp blade slicing through thick cloth.

At the edge of Wang the Scabby's blurred vision, he seemed to catch a glimpse of a yellowish, swift shadow, as thin as a piece of paper, streaking past with incredible speed.

Immediately after, the three vengeful spirits, whose figures had become slightly more solid, suddenly froze.

A slender crack appeared simultaneously on their illusory bodies.

The cracks expanded rapidly.

Like bubbles bursting, or something being scattered by the wind.

They turned into a few wisps of thin black smoke, caught by the sinister wind in the alley, and vanished without a trace.

The thick aura of resentment in the air faded along with them.

The sensation of cold being drawn out of Wang the Scabby's body vanished instantly, but the weakness of blood loss and the excruciating pain of his broken leg surged back, causing him to collapse to the ground, with only enough strength left to gasp for air.

"Who is it? Many thanks to the senior for saving my life!"

He looked at the empty alley before him, still shaken, his face filled with the joy of having survived a disaster.

"You're thanking me too early!"

On the low wall to the left of the alley, Chen Mo stood silently, a trace of cold yin energy that hadn't fully dissipated still lingering on him.

He frowned slightly, glancing at Wang the Scabby, who was slumped on the ground like mud, then looked toward the two figures fleeing in panic deep in the alley.

His gaze swept over the oil jar on the ground, the fierce fire oil spilled everywhere, and the firewood at his own back door...

"Seeking death." His eyes turned cold as he leaped lightly from the wall and walked up to Wang the Scabby.

Wang the Scabby struggled to lift his head, seeing Chen Mo's expressionless face under the light of the Red Moon; his pupils shrank, and fear instantly overwhelmed his exhausted body: "Spare... spare me... I won't dare to do it again..."

"Snap."