Chapter 29

Feng Yang had finished drawing them long ago; he simply had not had time to hand them out. Hearing Duan Mingxu ask, he said, "I'll give them to you first thing tomorrow morning."

Everyone immediately felt relieved.

Duan Mingxu chuckled. "Master Feng is so capable. Your hometown must have excellent feng shui. There definitely won't be any wronged souls or Vengeful Ghosts there."

Feng Yang only smiled without replying. Though his hometown had no wronged souls or Vengeful Ghosts, there was a Scholar Ghost over three hundred years old by the moat. His obsession remained unresolved, and he refused to reincarnate. In his previous life, he had even taught the Vengeful Ghost the art of epigraphy.

Though Feng Yang had no idea why the Vengeful Ghost had been interested in that sort of thing!

Thinking of this, Feng Yang calmly glanced at Yin Li. "Do you like epigraphy?"

"What?" Yin Li had not heard clearly and froze.

"Nothing." Feng Yang read his expression and immediately knew that Yin Li had no interest in epigraphy.

At least, Yin Li at this point in time still had no interest in epigraphy.

Early the next morning, the Feng Family sent out three cars, taking Feng Yang's maternal grandparents, Yin Li, and all his little companions to Willow Tree Village.

Willow Tree Village got its name from a willow tree at the village entrance that was over six hundred years old. It was only after Feng Yang's Yin-Yang Eyes had opened in his previous life that he learned the ancient willow had long since become a spirit. It seemed to have some connection with the hanged ghost in the moat at the far end of the village. And the reason Willow Tree Village had enjoyed favorable weather and remained free of calamities for so many years was also thanks to the Willow Tree Spirit's protection.

The Willow Tree Spirit did not allow wronged souls or Vengeful Ghosts from outside to approach Willow Tree Village, lest their excessive resentment disrupt the village's feng shui. In his previous life, when Feng Yang had brought the Vengeful Ghost back to the village to pay respects to his ancestors, he had even fought the Willow Tree Spirit before he could enter the village.

As for villagers who lingered in the world of the living for too long after death, the old Willow Tree Spirit would report them to the Underworld and ask it to send ghost officials to take them away. That was why Feng Yang had found it strange: since the old Willow Tree Spirit loved reporting wronged souls and evil ghosts who remained in the world of the living, why had it tolerated the Scholar Ghost staying in Willow Tree Village?

Unfortunately, both the Willow Tree Spirit and the Scholar Ghost kept their mouths shut. Even after the Vengeful Ghost's soul scattered and vanished, Feng Yang never learned the reason.

Reborn into this life, Feng Yang had brought his still-living family and the Vengeful Ghost back to Willow Tree Village, originally intending to greet the old Willow Tree Spirit. But the spirit was not inside its original body.

"Feng Yang, what are you looking at?" Seeing Feng Yang stare fixedly at the huge willow tree at the village entrance without saying a word, Yin Li immediately grew uneasy. "Is there something wrong with this willow tree?"

His experience at the Sheep Village graveyard had made Yin Li sensitive and suspicious. Whenever Feng Yang stared intently at somewhere without blinking, Yin Li suspected that something unclean had appeared there.

Thinking that, Yin Li instinctively gripped Feng Yang's sleeve.

"It's nothing." Feng Yang came back to himself and smiled as he patted Yin Li's head. "I just haven't come back in a long time. I'm feeling a little sentimental."

Yang Qingyuan, seated in the back, let out a long sigh. "There are fewer and fewer people left in the village now. The young people all go elsewhere to work or study, leaving only old folks like us to look after the children. It's noisy from morning to night every day—tiring and troublesome."

"You don't mean a word of that!" Feng Yang's grandmother said with a smile. "Don't listen to that old man's nonsense. He's practically become the children's king now. Every day, he brings children home to teach them poetry recitation, painting, and epigraphy. I told him these children will need to study physics, chemistry, biology, and English in the future. It's not like they're taking the imperial examinations. Why do they need to learn all that?"

Yang Qingyuan snorted. "Why can't they learn it? These are precious cultural treasures left behind by our ancestors. Why shouldn't children learn them? Must studying some foreign language be the only proper thing to do? If you ask me, being so worshipful of foreign things and forgetting one's own roots—is that really something to boast about?"

Seeing that her old husband was genuinely getting angry, Feng Yang's grandmother only smiled and said no more. They said old people became like children, and Old Yang in their family was no different from one now!

The cars drove slowly all the way before finally stopping outside Yang Qingyuan's courtyard gate. Learning that the Feng Family had returned to the village to worship their ancestors, the villagers of Willow Tree Village also came to Yang Qingyuan's home. The adults sat in the main hall chatting, endlessly praising the Feng Family for raising their children so well—their son and daughter-in-law were both successful and filial, their grandsons had all been admitted to key universities, and they were sure to have bright futures ahead—empty flattery of that sort.

Feng Yang had failed to see the Willow Tree Spirit, and it weighed on his mind. Even when chatting with others, he remained distracted. At last, after enduring until nightfall, Feng Yang found an excuse to leave the main hall and ran straight to the moat at the far end of the village. He had originally wanted to catch up with the Scholar Ghost and ask, incidentally, where the Willow Tree Spirit was.

Yet when Feng Yang hurried to the moat, he was stunned to discover that there was not the slightest trace of yin energy in it.

The river water was clean and clear, glimmering beneath the moonlight. As the night breeze brushed past, he could even hear the gentle murmur of flowing water. Everything was exactly like the moat in Feng Yang's memories. The only difference was that there was no Scholar Ghost here—a scholar who had drowned himself after failing to gain recognition for his talent, had died unjustly, and refused to reincarnate for three hundred years.

"Feng Yang, what's wrong?"

After returning from his outing, Feng Yang had remained lost in thought. Yin Li and the little companions squatted in the cool summer courtyard, eating chilled watermelon Feng Fei had just picked from the watermelon field and cooled in well water, while asking him what was wrong.

"It's nothing." Feng Yang came back to himself. Knowing Yin Li was timid, he did not tell him about ghosts and spirits.

In the kitchen, Feng Yang's maternal grandparents were crouched before the stove cleaning river crabs. The crabs had been sent over by the villagers, supposedly caught from the moat not long ago. Each one waved its claws fiercely and looked especially fresh. They had also sent two fish and a basket of river shrimp. Feng Yang's grandmother said with a smile, "Our village is far from the city, and you've been driving for seven or eight hours. You must be hungry, right? Grandma will make spicy crabs, fish stewed over a wood fire, and fried river shrimp for you. You and Da Fei go to the little shop at the village entrance and bring back two cases of beer."

Feng Yang nodded absentmindedly, his gaze falling on his grandfather, Yang Qingyuan. After hesitating for a moment, he finally asked, "Grandpa, in our village's history, was there ever a scholar who drowned himself after failing the examinations?"