Rules of the Strange: I Became a God in a Bizarre World Through Taoist Arts

"Now that you've got what you wanted, are you happy?"

Her tone was completely flat.

Upon hearing these words, the mangled puppet on the ground began to struggle violently.

He was unwilling to accept it!

This shouldn't be his fate!

Shen Xingzhuo seemed to have seen through its thoughts, and a fierce glint flashed in his eyes.

She formed a hand seal with her right hand, and the puppet's mangled body seemed to be suppressed by an invisible mountain, instantly freezing and lying flat on the ground.

Wow! I haven't stopped exclaiming in amazement since Sister Shen appeared! She's so cool!

Yes, yes, yes! My sister Shen is both beautiful and strong!

Why do I feel like Shen Xingzhuo's behavior has changed so much? Didn't Sister Shen clearly already completely overshadow the brother in the ghost story?

[History Bro: My personal understanding is that Sister Shen wasn't familiar with the usual tropes when she first entered the world of ghost stories. She wasn't just representing herself; she also represented the entire Tianxia Kingdom. It's normal for her to be cautious.]

I think so too!

+1+1+1

[History Bro: Sister Shen is bold and meticulous. She has tested the effects of Taoist magic in ghost stories many times before. Now... Sister Shen must have discovered something, which is why she punished this brother so severely.]

[Tch, isn't History Bro just a mindless fanboy of Shen Xingzhuo? Even if the brother did something wrong, it doesn't warrant this much, does it?]

[Feeling sorry for bro again? Wait until Sister Shen comes out, then I'll turn you into the next puppet!]

[Wait a minute before you start arguing, let's see what Sister Shen is looking for!]

In the sky, Shen Xingzhuo no longer gave the puppet's remains any extra glances.

She placed the paper doll in the housekeeper's arms first, and then searched through the room, which was almost in ruins.

"The gardener gave me a hint because I saved Tongtong. So the clue in the diary should be true..."

"For someone as skilled at disguise as my brother, he definitely doesn't want crucial clues to be exposed."

'Then the diary will definitely be placed in the place he considers safest or most important.'

Thinking of this, Shen Xingzhu stopped searching.

There's still one unused reward from the hidden quest...

She pressed her palms together, looked up at the void, and said, "I want to use the plot progression hints to see my brother's inner monologue."

[The item has been distributed.]

The ghost story's response was extremely brief, only indicating that the item had been distributed, but without explaining how to use it.

This was exactly what Shen Xingzhuo wanted.

As long as there are no rules on how to use the props, she can use questions as an index to accurately find out what she wants to know.

She turned to the suppressed puppet and posed her first question:

"What is the most perfect thing in your heart?"

As soon as he finished speaking, Shen Xingzhuo sensed a ghostly aura emanating from the room.

However, the expected monologue did not appear, nor were there any text prompts.

"What's the point of playing such petty tricks?"

She curled her lip and went straight to the object that was radiating ghostly energy again.

Shen Xingzhuo picked up the mirror that was cracked in the middle, with spiderweb-like cracks running through the entire surface.

The inner monologue did indeed appear in the form of words on the mirror, but it was fragmented due to the cracks and was difficult to decipher.

Shen Xingzhu shook her head gently.

She has been practicing cultivation since childhood, and visualizing the operation of the Yin-Yang diagram is a compulsory course for her.

She possesses an intuition that transcends visual perception regarding fragmentation and wholeness, chaos and order.

These broken strokes rotated and pieced together on their own in her eyes, and in just two breaths, all the fragments had been put back into place in her mind.

She whispered these thoughts to herself:

"The most perfect... is Mom."

Shen Xingzhuo instantly flew to the front of the most perfect puppet.

No wonder, only this one is the size of an adult.

She clenched her fist quickly and shattered the puppet's heart with a single punch.

A tattered diary fell out.

The brother's puppet remains desperately tried to get closer and snatch it, and even without a mouth, they let out a deafening roar.

Poor?

But compared to his sister who was being replaced inch by inch into a puppet, Shen Xingzhuo felt no sympathy for him.

She turned aside to avoid the futile struggle and opened her diary.

On the title page, a line of neat handwriting reads the name—Lin Fengchun.

It's my mother's diary.

[Sunny on July 20th]

Today, Tongtong said "brother" (哥哥), the first word she learned. Seeing how much she likes Ah Shi makes me so happy.

But Shi's expression is a little strange... Is he shy? What an adorable child.

[Sunny on July 30th]

It's so good to see the brother and sister getting along so well. I used to think that Ah Shi didn't like his sister. Thank goodness! ^_^

My husband will be back in a couple of days, right? Maybe if he sees our two adorable babies, it'll cheer him up a bit.

The company's stock falling isn't a big deal; I hope my husband can pull himself together!

[January 10th, cloudy]

It's raining again, and Ah Shi's legs are hurting terribly. Seeing him holding me like that breaks my heart. Thankfully, Tong Tong is with us; her smile dispels the gloom.

My husband will be back in a few days, I'm so happy~ Then our little family will be all together.

I want to tell him the great news that my new book has been signed for publication! And tell him that he doesn't need to feel so much pressure anymore!

[January 5th, cloudy]

It's another cloudy day. It's been raining for several days in a row, and Ah Shi is sleeping worse and worse. He can only manage to sleep for a short while with the help of painkillers... It's heartbreaking.

Tongtong slept very well. This little pig does nothing but sleep and eat, so cute!

My husband is coming back tomorrow. I miss him.

……

Shen Xingzhuo quickly read through a few articles.

My mother is a very gentle and optimistic woman.

While taking care of her two children on her own, she was also able to pursue her writing career and comfort her husband who was struggling with his business.

This is simply superhuman.

but……

There's nothing unusual about this. Why would Dad kill his wife, who loved and supported him so much, after he got home?

Shen Xingzhuo fell into deep thought, and a cold and absurd answer suddenly came to mind.

No way?

She looked at her brother on the ground and asked her second question.

Do you love your sister?

The inner monologue reappears on the mirror:

I hate her! She stole my mother's love the moment she appeared! I want her dead! That way, my mother will only love me!

Shen Xingzhuo frowned, took a deep breath, and asked the third question.

"Did you show this diary to Dad?"

This time, the words on the mirror appeared and disappeared, repeating intermittently many times, before finally revealing a passage of text.

I... I didn't mean to! I just wanted Dad to see that Mom was being biased!

What's wrong with wanting my parents' love?

She's the one who's wrong! She shouldn't have been born! She deserves to die, she deserves to die!!!

Shen Xingzhuo clenched his fists tightly, unable to believe that so many people had been killed simply because of a child's jealousy!

She closed her diary, and a yellowed family photo slipped from between the pages.

In the photo, the mother is holding the baby Tongtong with a gentle smile, the father is standing to the side with a slightly stiff expression, and the older brother is nestled close to the mother's legs, while his hand is tugging at the father's clothes.

The last remaining question in my mind gradually became clear...

She turned to the butler in white and asked her last question.

"Grandpa Butler, does my brother usually cling to Mom or Dad more?"