(three)
Zhou Ziqiu reached out and stopped the underworld official's movement: "Brother underworld official, could you grant me a favor?"
The underworld official chuckled a few times: "Please speak, I will help if I can."
"Thank you so much. Please wait a moment while I speak with the old man."
This was a very simple matter, and the underworld official readily agreed: "Alright, I'll wait for you for a while."
Having received permission, Zhou Ziqiu walked up to the old man and Yangyang, smiled gently, and after meeting Yangyang's uneasy gaze, he squatted down, opened his arms to Yangyang, and asked, "Brother, give me a hug?"
Yangyang didn't answer, but looked up at his grandfather. The old man looked down at the child and said, "Go on, let your brother hug you."
When an elderly person spoke up, Yangyang became a little bolder, let go of his grandfather's hand, walked up to Zhou Ziqiu, and hugged Zhou Ziqiu's neck.
He really liked the handsome older brother in front of him.
Zhou Ziqiu lifted Yangyang's bottom, hugged him, and stood up. Ghosts have no weight or physical form; he simply made the gesture of holding a child.
"Yangyang, are you sleepy? Do you want to go to sleep?" Zhou Ziqiu asked softly.
Miraculously, upon hearing Zhou Ziqiu's voice, Yangyang yawned, his childish voice clearly tinged with sleepiness: "Ugh... Yangyang is sleepy... Yangyang wants to sleep..."
"How about your brother takes you to sleep?"
"good…"
Zhou Ziqiu smiled at the old man and gestured for him to come into the child's room. The small room contained a children's bed, and the child's body was lying on the bed with his eyes closed and his face pale.
The old man watched Zhou Ziqiu nervously, waiting for Zhou Ziqiu's next move.
Zhou Ziqiu gently patted the child's soul, and Yangyang gradually closed his eyes and fell into a deep sleep. Then he gently placed the child's soul onto the body on the bed.
When the body and soul came into contact, a soft white light was emitted. After a moment, the white light dissipated, and the child's soul had disappeared. The child on the bed regained color in his face and even had a smile on his face, as if he was having a sweet dream.
Seeing this, the old man felt relieved and repeatedly bowed to Zhou Ziqiu to express his gratitude.
A red rope appeared in Zhou Ziqiu's hand at some point, and he tied it around the child's wrist.
“If a child’s soul has left his body, it will be easy for him to leave his body on his own in the future. This red rope can suppress his soul.”
The old man was so grateful he didn't know what to say, he could only say, "Thank you so much, sir! Thank you so much, sir!"
In his eyes, Zhou Ziqiu's ability to be on friendly terms with the underworld officials was akin to that of a celestial being.
"I am not a priest, so there's no need to address me as 'sir.' I merely possess some magical abilities. Let's go; the underworld officials are still waiting for you."
The man and the ghost left the room, where the underworld officials were waiting for Zhou Ziqiu and the old man.
"Thank you, sir."
The underworld official replied with a smile, "No need to stand on ceremony."
"Please take good care of this old man on his journey, so that he may enter the cycle of reincarnation as soon as possible." Zhou Ziqiu reached out and handed the offerings on the altar to the underworld messenger. The items in Zhou Ziqiu's hands were illusory and without substance.
The underworld official accepted the money and replied with a smile, "It's nothing."
The old man's ghost disappeared into the room with the underworld messengers, and the damp smell of the underworld also disappeared from the room.
Zhou Ziqiu walked to another room with its door tightly closed and gently knocked on the door.
The door opened after a while, and Liu Mei was behind it.
Her eyes were red and tears streamed down her face. She covered her mouth tightly with her hand to keep from making a sound, and her face was red from the force of her hand.
"It's time to stick to the agreement."
— Just before the moment of his return, Zhou Ziqiu stopped Liu Mei and asked her that question.
Liu Mei was shocked. She asked doubtfully, "Isn't it true that there can't be any strangers in the room..." Before she could finish speaking, she realized that the boy in front of her must have a way to keep her from being discovered, so she changed her words and said, "I think, I really want to."
"Then I need to inform you of some things in advance."
Liu Mei nodded.
"There is a separation between the living and the dead. It's best for humans and ghosts not to communicate. So you must stay in the room. No matter what sounds you hear outside, you cannot come out, and you cannot make a sound. Do you understand?"
Liu Mei nodded.
"On the night of the return of the soul, underworld officials will come to collect the soul. These officials cannot be recognized by mortals, so I will erase all your memories related to them. Is that acceptable?"
Liu Mei nodded, but then remembered something and asked, "If it's a memory related to my father but not to that priest, would you erase it?"
Zhou Ziqiu raised an eyebrow slightly, seemingly surprised that Liu Mei would ask such a question: "No."
Liu Mei breathed a sigh of relief: "That's good, I accept."
"Very good." Zhou Ziqiu liked people who didn't dawdle. He reached out and tapped Liu Mei's forehead. "That's fine."
Liu Mei asked incredulously, "Master, is this all?"
Zhou Ziqiu nodded: "Mm."
"Don't you need any talismans or magic treasures?"
"I am not skilled in runes, nor do I possess any magical artifacts."
"Then, Master, you..."
"It is not always necessary to use external things to achieve one's goals."
Liu Mei suddenly realized that Master Zhou Ziqiu was so powerful that he could achieve everything on his own.
"I will definitely remember what the master told me!"
Zhou Ziqiu nodded and left the room.
"It's time to keep the agreement."
Zhou Ziqiu looked at Liu Mei and reminded her.
Liu Mei wiped away her tears with her sleeve, quickly composed herself, walked up to Zhou Ziqiu, and waited for him to erase her memory, looking like she was bravely going to her death.
Zhou Ziqiu looked at Liu Mei with amusement and explained, "There's no need for that. You just need to get a good night's sleep, and those memories will naturally disappear."
Liu Mei thought she was going to experience some pain, just like in the TV dramas, but it turned out to be different from what she expected, and she couldn't help but blush.
"It's late, please go to bed."
Zhou Ziqiu did not mock Liu Mei. After leaving those words, he left Liu Mei's house and slowly walked down the street in the night breeze.
It was already midnight, and pedestrians hurrying home passed by him.
He looked up at the starless and moonless night sky, let out a long sigh, and then lowered his head again. He took out his phone from his pocket, turned on the screen, and sent a message to someone.
It was already 12:30 when he walked back to his own Liaoyuan Pavilion from Liu Mei's house.
The snack shop next to Liaoyuan Pavilion was still open.
When the boss saw Zhou Ziqiu return, he greeted him: "Xiao Qiu, you're finally back."
Zhou Ziqiu stopped in front of the snack shop and asked in confusion, "Why aren't you closed yet?"
The shop owner carried the stool he had left at the door back into the shop, looked at Zhou Ziqiu and said, "Hey, you haven't come back yet. I was worried something might have happened to you, so I was waiting for you here."
Zhou Ziqiu chuckled softly: "Thank you so much."
"Don't talk like that! We're neighbors. Alright, since you're back, I'll close the shop." The shop owner closed the shop and turned to go home.
Zhou Ziqiu suddenly stopped him, went into his shop, took out a piece of red rope, and handed it to the shop owner: "Please accept this. Don't take it out of your sight. It can protect you."
The shopkeeper looked at the delicate red string in his hand and laughed a few times, saying, "I didn't expect Xiao Qiu to believe in these things."
"It's not a matter of belief or disbelief, it's just about having peace of mind."
The shopkeeper liked Zhou Ziqiu's way of speaking, laughed a few more times, and without any hesitation, put the red rope into his pocket and said, "I'll take it as you say."
"Okay, take care."
The boss waved to Zhou Ziqiu: "Take care of yourself!"
Zhou Ziqiu smiled.
After the owner left, Zhou Ziqiu opened the shop door, then suddenly paused, glanced thoughtfully in a certain direction, and went back upstairs.
Meanwhile, on the other side—
In a deep, old forest in the suburbs of Luoqi.
Several disheveled young people stood in the silent forest. Apart from the occasional sound of birds flying by, there was no sound at all; it was eerily quiet.
A short, chubby boy wiped the sweat from his face with dirty gloves, making him even more filthy than before.
"Glasses, are you even working properly?"
The boy he called Glasses was a tall, thin man. He patted the compass in his hand forcefully and said, "This is Qingdeng's compass! How could it not work!"
The magical artifacts of the Taoist priests and ghost hunters in the Green Lantern Village are mostly not as powerful as those of the scions of aristocratic families with historical heritage. In order to help them, the Green Lantern Village constantly purchases magical artifacts from aristocratic families and also commissions old craftsmen to make them. Although they cannot compare with the old treasures of aristocratic families in terms of magical power, their functions are very new.
The fat man spat out a mouthful of saliva: "Bullshit, you're the most unreliable person. No matter how good something is, it's no good if it's in your hands." He then tried to snatch the compass from the glasses man's hand, but another person next to them got there first.
The man who snatched the compass from the glasses had a face covered in dirt, except for his eyes, which shone brightly. He looked at the "broken" compass in his hand, grinned to reveal his white teeth, and spoke in a hoarse, rough voice.
"Damn it, do you even know how to read a compass? This thing points north, and you're leading us this way."
The fat man immediately widened his eyes and looked at the compass in the man's hand, cursing, "You little brat, you've got the compass wrong! I've been digging graves here all night for nothing!"
"What?! Impossible—Holy crap!" Glasses snatched back the compass, and after examining it closely, he realized that it was indeed pointing north. He then realized that he had misread the cardinal directions and quickly opened the map to see what was to the north: "Boss, the city is to the north, let's go there!"
"What city?"
"Luo Qi!"
Upon hearing this, the fat man cheered, "Luoqi is great! It's the provincial capital!"
The man called "Boss" wiped the sweat from his face, revealing fair skin beneath the grime, and smiled. "Maybe that ghost is hiding in Luoqi. Let's go." 18:55:31
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