Otherworldly Merchant

After a while, the blades on the ground seemed to come to life. They moved toward us like shark fins surfacing on the sea. 

I took a step back. At this moment, Li Mazi’s voice suddenly came to me. “Little Brother Zhang, help me!” 

I couldn’t believe it and turned to look. Li Mazi was tied to a pole. A female ghost was raising a knife above him. His bean-sized eyes turned watery when he saw me. “Little Brother Zhang, save me! I don’t want to die here. This ghost is so ugly! I don’t want to be killed by her!” 

I shot him a disdainful glance. So, you want to die in the hands of a beautiful ghost?

I rushed toward him and used the Emei Piercer to smash the female ghost. Then, I curtly cut off the rope that was tying Li Mazi. After checking his body once, I found he wasn’t injured in any way. 

“Why are you here?” I was puzzled. 

He blinked, still looking rather vulgar. He lowered his voice. “You know, all the items in this Ghost City are top quality. We just need to get one. After that, we won’t need to worry about a thing for the rest of our lives!” 

I was speechless. I shouldn’t have saved him. For the sake of money, he came to a place he shouldn’t have come to. Li Mazi giggled and awkwardly changed the topic. “Little Brother Zhang, why are you here? What have you got?” 

“Of course, I…” 

I suddenly felt a lump in my throat. I couldn’t speak. My mind became muddled, then empty. 

Li Mazi wrapped his arm around my shoulder and smiled. “I think I’ve found some good stuff. You should come with me and see.” 

I shot him a doubtful glance. “Is it something dangerous?” 

Li Mazi gave me a scornful look. “Little Brother Zhang, we are in the Ghost Market. What kind of otherworldly item would dare to wreak havoc here?” 

“I saw a strange bead. Tch, tch, if we get it, we will be rich!” Li Mazi made a face and said, “Hurry up! I don’t want someone else to get it!” 

I felt that something was wrong, but I couldn’t tell what it was. Perhaps, I was just too cautious.

Since the Ghost Market had opened, ghosts of all shapes had come and mingled with humans. It was a strange scene. 

Li Mazi pulled me to the center of the market and pointed at a booth above. He said, “You see, that item is on that booth. I’ve asked around and the people have told me it’s something called the mermaid’s tears. It’s priceless!” 

Mermaid’s tears? I heard something explode inside my head. It felt as though a lightning strike had hit me right at my head. I looked at Li Mazi. He was waving his hands while describing the good qualities of the mermaid’s tears. 

“Get lost!” 

I stabbed the Holy Mother Scepter at him. He felt the pain and wrinkled his face. Looking at me, he groaned, “Little Brother Zhang, it’s okay if you don’t need the mermaid’s tears, but you shouldn’t vent out your anger on me.” 

I looked at him in fright. Was he the real Li Mazi? 

I bit my finger and smeared blood over my eyes. After taking another look at him, I saw the man was still groaning. The three Yang flames were burning on him. He was a living person. 

“Little Brother Zhang, are you all right?” He waved his hand in front of me in bewilderment. 

I shoved his hand aside and said, “I’m okay. Stay here and wait for me.” 

Then, I ran to the village entrance. However, I couldn’t sense Zen Master Baimei’s whereabouts. Li Mazi followed me, gasping for his breath. “Little Brother Zhang, what happened to you? You look bewildered and frightened. Has a ghost possessed you?” 

I shot him a fierce glance. He came and walked next to me. 

“Hey bro, tell me. Have you seen any nice female ghosts? Any beautiful girls? I knew it! Show me, show me!” he said despicably. 

I pushed him aside. His face turned red as he pitched his voice. “Zhang Jiulin, I’ve come here from so far away. I was worried about you, but you’re a freaking ungrateful dude. Why do you do this to me? Do you think I will always stay around and let you bully me?”

Suddenly, he raised his fist and punched my stomach. I felt a sharp twinge. I couldn’t believe it and lifted my head to look at him. Li Mazi was vanishing right in front of me. 

I lowered my head and saw half a blade was stabbed into my stomach. Blood was dripping from the knife. Drops of my blood fell to the floor. 

Zen Master Baimei put me on his back and ran toward the village. “Young Benefactor, were you in an illusion?” 

I shivered in pain. I couldn’t even speak, so I nodded at him. 

“Merciful Buddha.” 

He carried me upstairs and put me on the bed. Then, he said, “Be patient. Endure it for a while.” 

Then, before I could react, he pressed on my shoulder blade and pulled the blade out of my stomach. 

I crouched my body in pain, cursing Zen Master Baimei and his ancestors in my mind. I was lucky that the small knife hadn’t stabbed my stomach too deeply. It had barely missed my internal organs. Otherwise, I would have died already. 

He quickly poured some medicinal powder on the wound. I heard it sizzle. Frightened, I tried to look at my wound. Miraculously, my wound was closing at a speed the naked eye could see. 

A few seconds later, there was no wound on my stomach anymore. If it weren’t for the blood on the bedsheet, I would have thought that I was never injured.

Zen Master Baimei looked sullen. He sat next to me and said, “I was in the illusion too. I was the one who stabbed you. I’m really sorry.” 

My teeth itched. I really wanted to grab the knife and stab it into his stomach.

He stood by the window and looked at the flaming screen in midair in silence. I went to him and said, “Zen Master, even if we lost this match, we still have a chance!” 

Zen Master Baimei turned to me. His face had resumed his usual aloofness. He brought his palms together and chanted, “Merciful Buddha.”   

The sky outside had turned dark. It wasn’t favorable to us at all. After resting for a while, we left the inn. Although the battle didn’t have a fixed arena, we didn’t want to cause trouble at the inn. If Chuyi got involved again, I thought I would collapse this time. 

During the daytime, the sky was gray here. Still, it was better than navigating the area at night. At this moment, the sky was purely dark. Zen Master Baimei was walking just half a meter in front of me, but I could only see the light from his dimly glowing beads. 

At night, the ghosts on the street looked even more terrifying. Eyes glowed of different colors everywhere, like floating flames. 

“Master, wait for me.” 

Zen Master Baimei was walking quickly. The light from his beads was moving far ahead of me. I had to run to catch up to him. After we left the village, we went to the wasteland. I decided to use the Invisible Needle to trace the path. This thing was useful, but it used a lot of energy. 

After around twenty minutes, my head couldn’t bear it anymore. I had to retrieve the Invisible Needle. All the images the needle had sent to me were black. 

I had thought that moving through the night in Fengdu would be scary and filled with many strange noises. However, it was the opposite. There was no noise here. Even the sounds of our footsteps were absorbed by the darkness. 

It made me even more anxious. I stayed close to Zen Master Baimei as I didn’t dare to stray away from him. I was afraid that I would easily get lost here. 

Zen Master Baimei didn’t say a word and kept walking forward. The further we walked, the colder it became. My teeth almost clattered. I said, “Zen Master, where are we going?”  

He halted. From the light of his mala beads, I saw that his face was blank. My heart sank. He was being controlled! 

“Zen Master!” I roared. My shout carried abundant Yang energy. Under some conditions, loudly shouting could shoo the ghosts away. However, I had done that just to try my luck. If it could control Zen Master Baimei, how could it be a normal ghost? 

Indeed, he didn’t even bat an eye on me. He continued walking forward. Soon, he disappeared from my sight. I was so flustered. I rushed and grabbed his kasaya. 

No matter what kind of trap Yin-Yang Tiger had set up for us, I had to go with Zen Master Baimei and destroy it! The Yin energy around us was getting thicker. I had goosebumps all over my body. Zen Master Baimei didn’t have any reaction to the environment. He dragged me along and walked forward. 

I sneezed, feeling that I was about to freeze. 

“Screw it! Ten more minutes!” I shouted and read the Sacred Text of Daoism in my head. After walking further for a while more, I felt my skin crack. After calculating the time, I boldly screamed, “Five minutes. I’ll walk for five minutes more!” 

Time ticked by, but it didn’t seem like Zen Master Baimei would stop in the next second. I was almost frozen. A layer of frost had appeared on my body. 

“Oh shoot! I’m not going to do this anymore! I’m going back!” 

I turned around and was about to leave. Zen Master Baimei, who hadn’t done anything but walk the entire time, suddenly pulled me back. He even pushed my back. 

In the night, I felt as though my body was falling free. I kept cursing in my head. 

I guessed Zen Master Baimei was being controlled by Yin-Yang Tiger. But since they were equally matched, if he wanted to control Zen Master Baimei, he must be within one hundred meters from us. In other words, he had witnessed our every move… 

I landed on the ground with a thud. The soil here felt soft, but my body felt like cracked ice. I wanted to get up, but I heard the wind rush above my head. I turned my head around to see. A shadow was moving toward me. 

When I saw a glowing white light in his hand, I knew Zen Master Baimei had just jumped toward me. 

Ptui! 

He landed on me, and I vomited blood. I didn’t care who was controlling him now and pushed him aside. He fell on the ground next to me, which startled me. 

“Master? Zen Master?” I called him. 

He wiggled and got up. With his palms brought together in front of his chest, he chanted “Merciful Buddha” then looked at me. “Young Benefactor, are you okay?” 

Besides telling him that I was all right, I couldn’t complain about anything else. “Zen Master, what just happened?” 

Zen Master Baimei covered my mouth and lowered his head to whisper into my ear. “When something reaches an extreme, it can only move in the opposite direction. I just checked it. The surroundings of this well have the thickest Yin energy in Fengdu. However, this well is the place with the strongest Yang energy. We can stay here tonight.” 

“Were you pretending the entire time?” 

“Of course. It was to deceive Yin-Yang Tiger’s team…” 

I felt a little angry. “Master, if they show up now, we’ll have no way to escape!” 

Zen Master Baimei frowned, then relaxed his wrinkled face. He said firmly, “They won’t come here. Right now, they think that we are dead.” 

“Master, don’t forget about the three bosses of the Ghost Market!” 

I sighed. “If we were dead, the Demon King would announce that Yin-Yang Tiger is the winner. How could our trick deceive them?” 

Zen Master Baimei was perplexed. He hadn’t thought about this. He felt embarrassed and admitted, “It seems I didn’t calculate everything this time.” 

I couldn’t blame him. At night, our movements were limited. Finding a spot to hide was a common idea. 

But now, what I was worried about the most was that this place was a trap that Yin-Yang Tiger had arranged for us! Right when I had such thoughts, we heard people laughing above our heads.