Translator: Dj22031
Editor: Dj22031
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On the table was a wooden man that was about a little above the knee. It was very solid, with a metal cover on the bottom and movable joints. It had battery wires and the like wrapped around it, and a small door was hollowed out at the back.
This was the automatic mahogany man that Fang Zhe had mentioned earlier.
Xie Lingya opened the small door and put a little man cut out of gold foil into the slot, “Is that it?”
This was a wooden man made by Fang Zhe. It was not quite the same as what Xie Lingya had imagined. He thought it would be a wooden man as tall as an adult.
But it was not easy to move around at such a high altitude. This was how Fang Zhe explained it.
“Let’s do this and give it a try.” Fang Zhe inserted a sword into the little wooden man’s hand, turned on the switch, and pressed the remote control. The wooden man automatically raised his hand and performed horizontal chops continuously.
After looking at it for a long time, Xie Lingya still felt that it was too petite, “To be honest, you can only chop the legs…”
“You can also do it vertically!” Fang Zhe pressed it, and the wooden man changed his posture again.
“Hahaha, sure. Your fingers are quite flexible. Can you control them individually?” Seeing him nod, Xie Lingya took the remote control and operated it a few times. The wooden man raised his left hand, with his thumb, index finger, ring finger and little finger bent, and his middle finger standing straight up.
Fang Zhe: “…………”
“Hahahahahahahahahaha!” Xie Lingya almost rolled over with laughter and even called other people to come and see.
Everyone knew that Fang Zhe had been tinkering with this for a long time. It was not until Xie Lingya came back and his hand healed that he had time to experiment with him on the parts involving magic. He had gotten tired of watching it before, but when he heard Xie Lingya laughing, he also came over to take a look.
Who would have thought that the first thing he saw was the peach wood man with his middle finger raised, “Mr. Xie, what quality!”
“Hey, this is the Lingguan Jue, okay?” Xie Lingya still argued.
Fang Zhe frowned: “Let’s try the effect of the shape-shifting technique.”
The core of this technology was still the shape-shifting technique. Whether the wooden man’s sword swinging could have the same effect of exorcising evil spirits as a real person’s sword swinging, the key was whether the shape-shifting technique was successfully integrated.
Xie Lingya had just put the gold foil figurine that symbolized himself into the slot behind the peach wood man. Logically speaking, it should be able to drive away evil spirits by swinging the sword now.
“It’s hard to tell just like this. We need to find a sinister object to experiment on.” Xie Lingya pondered for a moment, “I don’t know how much of my power this wooden man can exert. If I find a toilet ghost, will it be killed with just one chop?”
The toilet ghost was probably shivering in some corner. Fang Zhe said reluctantly, “I guess so. Let’s not look for it.”
“I got it. There’s a guy who can definitely withstand it.” Xie Lingya clapped his hands and called the Eastern Ghost King!
Fang Zhe: “…Is it convenient?”
Xie Lingya: “I’m fine. I don’t know if it’s convenient for him.”
Whether it was convenient or not, they had to come. The Ghost King was holding a jar of wine in his arms when he was found by Xie Lingya. He looked a little drunk. And when he saw them, he suddenly floated forward, “Xiao Liu!”
Xie Lingya flashed to the side and covered Liu Lingtong on his shoulder with one hand.
But he thought too much. The drunk Ghost King held the peach wood man and said foolishly: “Xiao Liu, how have you grown up?”
Everyone: “…”
Xie Lingya quickly tortured the Ghost King until he woke up and pulled the peach wood man out of his hand. Just kidding, this peach wood man was his form. He felt goose bumps when he saw the Ghost King holding it.
The Ghost King sobered up and sighed, “If I let you chop me today, how can I face the elders in the ghost world?”
Xie Lingya asked puzzledly, “Do you still have face left in the ghost world now?”
The Ghost King: “…”
The Ghost King compromised: “Forget it, forget it. I respect Master Sa’s disciples. Give you some face.”
He stood in front of the peach wood man and opened his arms – of course, this action was very unnecessary.
If facing a ghost of ordinary height, the peach wood man could only chop the calf with a horizontal chop, but when facing the ghost king, he could only chop the ankle.
The peach wood man mechanically raised his hand and chopped down with a sword, hitting the Ghost King’s ankle. A golden light shimmered and a black mark immediately appeared.
“It worked!” Fang Zhe said in surprise.
The peach wood man did not stop when he was pressed down and kept swinging his sword. The Ghost King quickly covered his feet and jumped back.
Xie Lingya picked up the peach wood man, turned off the switch, and then the hand holding the sword stopped in mid-air.
After a while, the marks on the Ghost King’s legs began to heal and soon disappeared. It could be seen that compared with the real person, the peach wood man’s sword swinging was useful, but the effect was quite discounted. Even so, it was also very good, because the one being chopped was the ghost king, not an ordinary ghost.
“Okay, then we still need to study the instructions.” Xie Lingya said, “This way we can perform some more accurate movements, such as pinching hands.”
Speaking of this, Xie Lingya also asked the peach wood man to give the Ghost King a middle finger.
Ghost King: “…This isn’t the Lingguan Jue, right?”
“It’s a not very standard Lingguan Jue. What a pity, its fingers are still not very flexible.” Xie Lingya said seriously.
Ghost King: “…”
I always feel like I’ve suffered a loss.
Although the Ghost King was invited just for an experiment, he still had to be offered sacrifices. Xie Lingya brought out the wine and food that had been prepared long ago and burned some gold ingots and paper money.
While eating and drinking, the Ghost King said, “Where is that Fire-Dwelling Taoist? Aren’t you two inseparable?”
He was obviously referring to Shi Changxuan. The Ghost King didn’t know that Shi Changxuan had moved to the rented house for some time.
“We aren’t, don’t talk nonsense, when did we become inseparable?” Xie Lingya said with a guilty conscience.
The Ghost King said very uprightly: “Anyway, he is there every time I see you.”
Xie Lingya: “Coincidence.”
Others were also wondering if Teacher Xie really had a conflict with Taoist Shi. It seemed that these two sentences did not want to admit that they had a good relationship with Taoist Shi, but they returned home together at night yesterday. This relationship was really confusing!
After the Ghost King finished drinking the wine, Xie Lingya poured it out. When ghosts drank alcohol, they absorbed the alcohol aroma. Without the alcohol aroma, the wine became as plain as water. But because of its heavy yin energy, it could not be drunk by people as it would make them fall down.
After eating and drinking his fill, and stuffing himself with ghost money and gold ingots, Xie Lingya drove the Ghost King back.
Ghost King: “Wait a little longer.”
“We all have to rest in the temple at this time, no one will entertain you.” Xie Lingya said.
The Ghost King glanced at his shoulder, “It’s okay, I don’t need your hospitality…”
Liu Lingtong said softly, “Master, I’m scared.”
Xie Lingya felt a desire to protect him and pushed the Ghost King away, “See you later!”
He lowered his head and thought to himself, oh, Liu Lingtong is getting more and more lively, and he knows how to act like a spoiled child. He used to be scared to tears before.
How could he know that after seeing so many things outside, Reporting God became more aware of Liu Lingtong’s goodness and became much kinder to it. When they were alone, he even taught it how to act coquettishly with Xie Lingya.
At that time, Liu Lingtong was very confused. So when he saw Xie Lingya, he often stuttered and couldn’t speak.
However, it turned out that Reporting God’s theoretical knowledge was still very rich and powerful, and it was indeed useful for Liu Lingtong to do as he was told.
After the peach wood man experiment was successful, Fang Zhe followed Xie Lingya’s advice and added some action design, including making the fingers more delicate so that they could perform many kinds of hand gestures.
Fang Zhe was deft and painted the wooden man red, but did not draw on the facial features. Xie Lingya only drew a divine eye between the eyebrows, so that it could recognize ordinary ghost disguises.
Fang Zhe was full of confidence and was just waiting for the next time there would be work at Baoyang Temple so that the peach wood man could practice on site.
….
The twenty-third day of the ninth lunar month was the birthday of Sazu. Xie Lingya organized believers to wish Sazu a happy birthday. He also cleaned the statue of Sazu in the ear room with grapefruit peel and applied essential oil to it.
When he came out, he saw a man with a straight back and an old lady in the yard. The old lady was a frequent worshipper here. When she saw Xie Lingya, she greeted him and asked him where the Taoist priest who interpreted the fortune was.
“He has asked for leave to do something and will be back later.” Xie Lingya nodded to the man and said, “Auntie, what did you pray for? Let me help you take a look?”
“My son prayed for it. I brought him here to worship the ancestor today. He…” The old lady just started talking when she was stopped by her son, who told her not to continue.
Xie Lingya didn’t care. He took the lot and looked at it. He usually didn’t interpret the lot but just read books. He also read some of the interpretations and understood something. After a glance, he said, “What you asked for can’t be fulfilled… That’s not the case. It should be said that the object you asked for is wrong.”
The man actually smiled and said, “The object I asked is the ancestor, how can it be wrong?”
“Different gods have different duties, of course they can make mistakes.” Xie Lingya looked at him and said, “You are upright, I’m afraid you are in a public office, or even work in a police station, a court or something like that.”
“Young man has a good eye.” The man smiled.
The old lady whispered, “My son is a policeman and he always doesn’t want to come here. This time is no exception…” As she spoke, she looked at her son’s expression and didn’t continue, as she was hesitant.
Xie Lingya looked at the policeman carefully again, “Didn’t you get enough rest? You had a lot of dreams at night and your face doesn’t look good. Do you want to go to the clinic out back?”
The man laughed. He didn’t expect Xie Lingya to persuade him to go to the clinic. “Yes, I have a lot of dreams, but the clinic can’t cure it.”
Xie Lingya heard him say that and realized that most likely he dreamed about something unusual. Since it was not a health problem, it was not a problem that could only be solved by praying to God.
“Let’s talk to Xiao Xie. He said that your interpretation of the fortune is wrong.” The old lady advised. Everyone who often came here knew that Xie Lingya was Taoist Zhang’s senior brother.
The man thought, since they had already come here to burn incense and draw lots, why should they be afraid of one more item? So he nodded.
“Then come with me to the room.” Xie Lingya led them inside.
The man said very directly and without any preparation: “When I was investigating a homicide case, I dreamed for four consecutive days that the deceased told me that the person who killed her was in a certain community, what kind of characteristics he had, and how he killed her. After waking up, I was incredulous, but I held on to a glimmer of hope, so I investigated, and I actually found a flaw, and finally solved this clueless case.”
Xie Lingya immediately thought of the female ghost they met in Professor Zhu’s community, thinking that it couldn’t be such a coincidence, it should be her. He said at that time that if he met someone who didn’t believe in superstition, he would dream about her more often.
“That’s a good thing. Did the deceased thank you in a dream later? Are you burning incense to comfort her soul in heaven?” Xie Lingya asked.
The man’s face twisted for a moment, and he said, “No… Later I started to have dreams again, three or four times a night. They were all lonely ghosts coming to me, saying that their complaints in the underworld were rejected, but they still felt they were wronged. When they heard that I helped the dead, they wanted me to help them too.”
Xie Lingya almost laughed out loud, “Do they think you’re Justice Bao?”
Many lonely ghosts were just like the rogues in the world of the living, and they were unreasonable.
“They’re just making a fuss.” Seeing that Xie Lingya looked calm, the man couldn’t tell where he came from, so he could only continue, “And I’ve checked the files, some of the deceased have been dead for forty or fifty years… How can I investigate again? My sleep quality is really affected now.”
Xie Lingya thought that this policeman was very righteous and actually went to find the information. However, since the complaint in the underworld was rejected, there were basically very few miscarriages of justice.
“If that’s the case, you indeed went into the wrong temple and worshipped the wrong god.” Xie Lingya laughed and copied down the address of the City God Temple. “You go to the City God Temple to worship. The spiritual ancestor can exorcise evil spirits, but if you want to cure it completely, you still have to find the local Yin official. By the way, did the deceased you are looking for die in the river?”
The man looked at him in horror. Obviously he was right, but he didn’t even tell his family about this. How did Xie Lingya know? The man glanced at him sharply, and seeing that his expression did not change, he slowly said: “… I have to go to work in the afternoon, so wait until the next vacation.”
“Doesn’t that mean we have to wait another week?” said the old lady, “You look tired, let’s hurry up and go to the City God Temple now.” Although the old lady also found it strange in her heart, there was also a way to drive people who came from home to burn incense to other temples.
“Wait, the City God Temple is some distance from here.” Xie Lingya suddenly said, “Let me think of a solution for you.”
The mother and son looked at each other curiously, wondering what solution he could come up with.
Xie Lingya brought them to the room where the tablets of the ancestors were enshrined, including Wang Yuji’s tablet, and the portraits. Then he said, “Pray here for what is in your heart.”
The man was confused when he saw that the room was full of tablets of certain masters. What did it mean? Would the masters who worshipped their Taoist temple and whose spirits are still in heaven help him? What’s the difference between that and worshipping Wang Lingguan? Is it that these wizards were the local Yin officials?
He didn’t know that he had inadvertently discovered the truth. Since Xie Lingya had previously revealed the characteristics of the first deceased person who sent dreams, he somewhat acknowledged Xie Lingya’s ability and listened to him praying in front of the tablet and burning incense.
“Okay.” Xie Lingya sent them out, “If the problem is resolved, you can go to the City God Temple to fulfill your prayer.”
The old lady said in confusion: “Shouldn’t we come here to fulfill our wish?”
“Then go to both, okay?” Xie Lingya said with a smile.
….
After seeing off the mother and son, Xie Lingya saw Shi Changxuan coming. The two looked at each other, and he turned his eyes away awkwardly, and started to talk about the topic: “Ah… I experimented with the peach wood man yesterday, and it was pretty good.”
Shi Changxuan picked up the peach wood man and asked a few questions about the shape-shifting technique.
When talking about professional knowledge, Xie Lingya became much more natural. He discussed with him, saying that Fang Zhe still needed to make continuous improvements and asked if he had any comments.
At the same time, Liu Lingtong and Reporting God got the chance to be alone together again. Liu Lingtong also reported to Reporting God how he mustered up the courage last time and followed Reporting God’s instructions to act spoiled to Xie Lingya to resist the Ghost King.
The Reporting God nodded calmly, knowing everything.
Liu Lingtong whispered, “…Thank you.”
Reporting God said proudly, “As long as you are obedient, I will pass on my best tricks to you in the future.”
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