Ita Era

Chapter 174 Companion
Ding Shi said, "Grandma, the warlord cut down the sacred tree and suffered retribution, and then what?"

Granny Liu asked, "And then what?"

Ding Shi asked, "Are the villagers happy?"

Grandma Liu replied, "Of course we're happy, we'll set off firecrackers to celebrate."

Ding Shi said, "Didn't they plan to desecrate the corpse? For example, dig up the aunt's grave?"

Granny Liu glared at Ding Shi reproachfully: "You little devil, how can you speak so recklessly? How can you do such a wicked thing? The dead should be respected. They're already dead, there's no need to go to such lengths."

Ding Shi smiled and asked again, "Grandma, you said everyone knows that coffins made of sacred wood are valuable, but isn't anyone envious? Tomb raiding was rampant during this period." Officials were digging, warlords were digging, and civilians were digging—everyone was digging.

Granny Liu said, “What you’re talking about is tomb raiding, and many people do this kind of work. Liu the carpenter in the village is over sixty years old this year. He came to our village more than ten years ago. It is said that he is a tomb raider, and he is also a so-called ‘tomb raider’. We didn’t know anything about it at first, but one time he got drunk and took out a polished pangolin claw, saying that this thing is called a ‘tomb raider’s talisman’ and has the power to ward off evil spirits.”

Ding Shi asked, "Can it really ward off evil spirits?"

Granny Liu thought for a moment: "I don't know, but five years ago, Liu the carpenter's grandson fell into a well and died. It took more than a day to find him. One son and daughter-in-law went to town to work as carpenters, and the other son went to live with his daughter-in-law, leaving Liu the carpenter alone in Tianmen Village. I haven't heard of Liu the carpenter performing any rituals, but he's been perfectly fine living at home. Maybe it's because of the 'treasure-hunting talisman'." The ritual mentioned in Tianmen Village refers to the soul-slave ritual, which is the best way for villagers to deal with evil spirits in their homes.

Ding Shi asked, "Does Liu the carpenter also make coffins?"

Granny Liu nodded: "That's right, there are four coffin makers in the village."

Ding asked, "Grandma, why is our village called Tianmen Village?"

Granny Liu said, "It's not called Tianmen Village, it was originally called Xiaoxi Village. The county magistrate felt that having four Xiaoxi Villages in one county was inconvenient, so he gave our Xiaoxi Village this name to distinguish them. In addition to Xiaoxi Village, our township also has Banxi Village, Xikou Village, Shangxi Village, and Xiaxi Village." They named it after a small stream.

Ding Shi felt that Granny Liu was a treasure trove; once you built a good relationship with her, she would tell you anything. But the key was whether you asked the right questions. If you asked the Divine Tree directly, she would tell you about the warlords, but nothing more. Because she wouldn't connect everyday information with the Divine Tree.

Ding Shi asked about Liu Niang.

Granny Liu was puzzled: "Recently, many people have been asking me about Liu Niang, but the questions are quite inexplicable."

Ding Shi asked, "Grandma, do you think Liu Niang is pretty when she first married into the village?"

Granny Liu exclaimed, "To be honest, the first time I saw Liu Niang, I was shocked. She looked like a pumpkin. But girls change a lot as they grow up. Once they mature, they become beautiful. Girls in their early teens are disliked by even dogs. They have bad tempers and are ugly. But after that age, they become more and more beautiful."

Ding Shi asked, "Was Liu Niang also a matchmaker for Qi Niang?"

Granny Liu said, "No, Liu Niang is a girl from Xikou Village. She took a liking to Zhang Dahe at the market and insisted on marrying him. Her mother searched for matchmakers everywhere, including Seventh Aunt. Seventh Aunt also arranged for the two to meet, but Dahe refused on the spot. Unexpectedly, in less than two years, Liu Niang became less unattractive, and in the end, Zhang Dahe agreed."

Ding Shi asked, "Grandma, when was the first time you met Liu Niang?"

Granny Liu recalled for a long time: "She must have been twelve or thirteen years old. She married Dahe when she was eighteen."

Ding Shi asked, "Her husband is gone, what kind of work does she do?"

Granny Liu said, "Dahe was the village chief's wife's nephew. After Dahe passed away, Liu Niang went to work as a helper at a funeral parlor. Although she didn't earn much money, she was provided with food, and the food was quite good."

Ding Shi finally caught a clue: "But I didn't see Liu Niang go to the funeral shop to start work."

Granny Liu replied, "On the day you arrived, Liu Niang asked for leave from the funeral parlor."

Clue 1: Liu Niang started taking leave on the day the tourists arrived, likely to find a vessel for them; the Taoist priest was the vessel she found. Previously, Xi had died because he was unsuitable for the vessel.

Clue 2: This method of resurrection is exactly the same as Cuilan's.

Clue 3: Tie Zhu said Wang Zhu wouldn't be working at the funeral parlor because she was getting married. Shan Zi was also getting married and couldn't work at the funeral parlor temporarily. But Tie Zhu didn't mention that Liu Niang originally worked at the funeral parlor.

If the soul inside the Taoist's body is Zhang Dahe, then Tiezhu is closely related to this matter. The first possibility is that Tiezhu helped Liu Niang complete the resurrection through possession of another body. This possibility is not very high because Ding Shi is familiar with Tiezhu's schedule. He only leaves home when handling funerals and resurrecting Cuilan's soul; otherwise, he is basically at home.

The second possibility is that both Tie Zhu and Liu Niang received guidance and learned how to possess another's body. This is highly likely, as although Tie Zhu possesses the art of controlling ghosts, he hasn't mastered it and his skill level is not high.

The third possibility, although he couldn't think of any possibilities, Ding Shi intuitively felt that Tie Zhu and Liu Niang were not closely related.

Seventh Sister was in a hurry to marry off Wang Zhu because she knew that Tie Zhu had designs on Wang Zhu. However, Tie Zhu rarely went out, so how could Seventh Sister have noticed him?
Therefore, it can be inferred that both Tie Zhu and Qi Niang knew someone who could use the magic of resurrection.

Proving whether the speculation was correct was quite simple. Ding Shi bid farewell to Granny Liu, grabbed the silly dagger, and asked, "What are the special steps involved in Tie Zhu's possession of a corpse? What do you think doesn't belong to him?"

Sha Bi looked puzzled, but he was just pretending; he wanted Ding Shi to share the information.

Ding Shi could understand perfectly well, so he could only explain the message. Sha Bi said with certainty, "I don't have the ability to remove evil spirits from other people's bodies. Do you think my body would be so weak after using ghost power twice?"

Sha Bi said, "No, after I drank a bowl of talisman water and summoned a ghost, someone remotely controlled my body until you showed up and ruined everything."

Ding Shi squinted: "You're lying." No one knows Ding Shi better than the fool; why would he lie?

Sha Bi insisted, "No, I think Tie Zhu and Qi Niang both know who the Ghost Cultivator is. However, based on what I know about Tie Zhu, he loves his family very much, and he would never tell you this secret before he leaves Tianmen Village. He can't withstand the Ghost Cultivator's revenge."

Ding Shi understood that Sha Bi was lying to smear Tie Zhu, but how to explain the two cases of possession and resurrection?
There are four questions now. The first question is: Where is the divine wooden coffin? Ding Shi guessed that Feng Qiniang took it and used it to make a Yin-gathering array.

Second question: Who is the ghost cultivator in the village?
The third question: If the coffin is not considered part of the sacred tree, then where is the sacred tree?

The fourth question: We've basically figured out what happened to Liu Niang, but we haven't gotten to the core of the matter.

……

Nothing happened that night, and the fourth day dawned early.

Tiezhu announced that after Cuilan's wedding tomorrow, he and Cuihua would pack their things and move to Banxi, the village where their son-in-law lived. Yesterday afternoon, they not only went to Banxi to meet their future son-in-law, but also found a house they liked. Although it was relatively remote, the environment was very nice.

However, it has little to do with Ding Shi and Sha Bi. Tie Zhu needs to finish the eight coffins he has on hand and make a new set of furniture, which will take two weeks or even longer.

After breakfast, Ding Shi went out for a stroll to attend the morning meeting. Dong Cheng not only didn't show up, but also hadn't returned home the previous night, making it almost certain that Dong Cheng had gone into the tomb and died there. Adding to this, the deaths of Ji Shan and his wife the previous night left only the monk, the young nun, the Taoist nun, and Ding Shi at the meeting. Sha Bi, as usual, was absent, and as for the Taoist…

Xiao Ni said, "At breakfast, Granny Liu told me about the Taoist priest. Last night, he went to the village chief to register as a son-in-law. Obviously, we all know what happened. The Taoist priest's body is very likely inhabited by the soul of Liu Niang's ex-husband, Zhang Dahe. Now I want to ask, on the eighth day, should we forcibly take the Taoist priest away?"

Ding Shi didn't want to get involved in this. Strictly speaking, it was a human life at stake, but he wasn't sure if the Taoist's soul could return after being taken onto the bus. Compared to the other people at the morning meeting, Ding Shi had no connection with the Taoist, and he had never been a fan of this celebrity before the previous era.

Ding Shi looked at Xiao Ni: "Xiao Ni, your first question has crushed everyone's desire to discuss." Not discussing it seems too cold-blooded, but if they do discuss it, no one can come up with a reasonable answer.

The monk looked at everyone and asked, "Does anyone have anything to say?"

They looked at each other, but no one spoke. The monk sighed and said, "Let's adjourn the meeting."

After leaving Xiao Ni's house, everyone dispersed. Ding Shi immediately headed towards the village entrance. Passing by Liu Niang's house, Ding Shi saw that the gate was locked, which meant that no one was home.

Ding Shi quickened his pace, and after inquiring at the funeral shop at the village entrance, he walked 500 meters along the main road and onto the village path leading to Banxi. He quickly caught up with Feng Qiniang: "Qiniang."

"Is there something you need?" Feng Qiniang stopped and waited.

Ding Shi said, "Seventh Sister, I have a question."

Feng Qiniang: "You speak."

"Let's talk as we walk, it won't delay your business," Ding Shi said. "Did you set up a Yin-gathering formation using the divine wooden coffin?"

Feng Qiniang said, "Wasn't the sacred wood coffin taken away by the warlords?"

Ding Shi asked, "Seventh Sister, I mean no harm. I also hope that Tianmen Village will get better and better."

Feng Qiniang said, "I also hope that Tianmen Village will get better and better."

Ding Shi said, "I guess the divine wooden coffin is not in your house, because the Yin-gathering array set up by it can protect the villagers in the house, so this Yin-gathering array should be an array with the village as the area."

Feng Qiniang did not answer.

Ding Shi continued, "One possibility is to dig a deep pit and bury it, but with so many people coming and going in the village, digging a large pit is no small undertaking. Another possibility is to hide it somewhere. But where could it be hidden?"

Ding Shi said, “I couldn’t help but think of shellfish. Everyone in the village knows that eating shellfish will cause you to enter a dream world, so no one goes to collect shellfish. Coincidentally, a stream flows through the middle of the village. The stream has varying depths, but it’s no more than two meters deep. Uncle Tiezhu once told me that there was a landslide at the end of the village that killed four people. The houses that were buried have not been dealt with to this day.”

Ding Shi said, “I went to see it myself. The landslide covered most of the stream, forcing it to change course. I thought that if I dug a pit in the original streambed, not too deep, it would be a relatively simple thing. After the landslide, it would become a natural grave.”

Ding Shi said, "Unless someone is so bored as to remove all the soil and rocks from half a small mountain, no one will be able to discover that there is a sacred wooden coffin under the original stream and mudflats."

Feng Qiniang remained expressionless and continued walking forward.

Ding Shi continued, "It is said that when you were in your thirties, you were beaten up because of a misunderstanding. And wouldn't you know it, the four people who died were the family of the man who knocked on your door in the middle of the night, including the wife of the man who beat you up and their two children."

Ding Shi said, "But I have serious doubts. How could you possibly do that? Even if you understand feng shui, you're not Yu Gong, who can move mountains just like that."

Ding Shi said, "Interestingly, the landslide happened three years ago. Three years ago, Wang Zhu stopped drawing the tadpole-script soul slave talisman of the Iron Pillar Sect and started drawing the soul slave talisman of the Tantric Sanskrit."

Ding Shi said, “To sum it up, this is what I think. Many years ago, you set up a Yin-gathering array in your home, and your in-laws’ evil spirits became your bodyguards. Three years ago, someone entered the village. This person was quite powerful and discovered the Yin-gathering array you set up in your home. So he asked you if you were willing to help the village.”

Ding Shi said, “You might say that most people are good, but there is one family that is particularly bad. Or you don’t need to say it, someone already knows.”

Ding Shi said, “Someone has settled in the village. They may be registered as migrants, or they may be hiding in someone’s house. Someone made you dig up the sacred wooden coffin and bury it in the stream beach. It rained heavily that day, and then a mudslide occurred, burying your enemy and the coffin deep in the ground.”

Feng Qiniang finally spoke: "You know, my husband died the moment I entered this family, and I'm still a virgin. But that day, they tore off my clothes, tied me to a wooden pole, and paraded me through the streets. If the village chief hadn't intervened, they would have displayed me at the village entrance. I can't avenge this, but I can't resolve this knot in my heart either. Knowing they're all dead, I'm truly happy."

Ding Shi's eyes sparkled as he asked, "You admit it?" He had been guessing blindly, but he hadn't expected to be right.

Feng Qiniang said, "You're only right about a little bit. The landslide has nothing to do with me. I did set up a Yin-gathering array at home, using a spiritual artifact left by my grandfather. You said the Yin-gathering array in the village does exist. This Yin-gathering array has two functions: first, to protect the villagers from Yin energy when they are in their own homes; second, to enhance the cultivation of ghost cultivators. This Yin-gathering array may have been set up by ghost cultivators, and I can only see a little bit of the details."

Feng Qiniang said, "As for the divine wood coffin you mentioned, I know nothing about it."

Ding Shi found Feng Qiniang's answer credible and further asked, "Where is the divine tree?"

Feng Qiniang's attitude immediately changed: "I have things to do, don't follow me anymore." She quickened her pace.

Ding Shi was not giving up and quickly followed: "You know where the divine tree is, but you're worried that I have ulterior motives, so you don't want to tell me."

Feng Qiniang did not answer.

Ding Shi said, "You want to rebuild the feng shui of Tianmen Village, and the divine tree is indispensable. But you can't let outsiders know about it. Otherwise, given human greed, let alone the divine tree growing into a big tree, even a small sapling that has just sprouted and broken through the soil will be coveted by many people."

Ding Shi said, "Seventh Sister, I have no ill intentions towards the Divine Tree. If you need anything, I can help you without expecting anything in return."

Feng Qiniang turned her head to look at Ding Shi: "You? You're not from Tianmen Village, why are you worrying about this?"

Ding Shi said, "Because I want to marry my beloved by the sacred tree and I also want your blessing. Love is sacred, beautiful, and without any ulterior motives, so please believe me."

Feng Qiniang stopped, looked at Ding Shi for a while, and said, "Bring your partner to me. If you are truly in love, I will try to help you. Banxi Village is just ahead. Are you still going?"

Ding Shi saw the village buildings indistinctly and, knowing the importance of knowing when to stop, stopped and said, "See you later." He watched Feng Qiniang walk into Banxi Village.

Ah... partner, ah... partner, Ding Shi couldn't help but turn into a groundhog and scream in his heart, where the hell am I going to find a partner?

A monk? Unthinkable. A fool? Unimaginable. A Taoist nun? Wouldn't she kill me? So, only the young nun is left. Is there no other way for this tender young man like me? The young nun is a PhD, and I'm twenty-four.

But this is TM's advanced main quest.

(End of this chapter)