116: Haunted

After entering the manor, finishing their tea, and exchanging pleasantries, Master Zhu dismissed his servants. Lowering his voice, he asked, "Master, are you confident you can handle this?"

Yi Fan smiled but remained silent. Since the moment he stepped through the door, he had not sensed even a trace of demonic aura; rather, the air was thick with the scent of rich food and wine.

Seeing Yi Fan’s calm, self-assured demeanor, Master Zhu opened his mouth as if to speak, but hesitated. He glanced at the silent Shegu sitting nearby, the old donkey lying motionless on the floor, and, most strangely, the "Yangu" (the Grudge-Ghost) who was draped in heavy coverings from head to toe.

This ragtag group, with their secretive and odd appearances, made him deeply uneasy.

"Master Zhu, have no fear," Yi Fan said, shaking his head to dispel the man’s doubts. "Just tell me the truth. Whether we can subdue the demon or not is a matter of our own capability."

Master Zhu gritted his teeth, clapped his hands, and began to recount the story.

The Zhu family had once been impoverished, barely able to afford their next meal. After decades of struggle, they had finally built up some wealth, and with Master Zhu earning the title of Juren, they had suddenly become a prominent gentry family in the county.

A few years ago, he had arranged for the purchase of this current manor, intending it to be the family’s ancestral home. Yet, that was when the strange occurrences began.

One evening, after dinner, Master Zhu was reading in his study. By the third watch, with the moon high in the sky and the surroundings deathly silent, a sudden, unnatural gust of wind blew out his lamp.

"Who’s there? Who is it?"

In the dim light, he vaguely saw a figure standing by the wall. Thinking it was merely a prank played by his children, he felt no alarm. He picked up his flint to relight the lamp, but another gust of wind snuffed it out again. This happened four or five times before he realized something was terribly wrong.

He looked toward the wall again. The figure had turned around, and to his horror, it was his late wife, who had drowned herself over a decade ago. Trembling with terror, he realized that if the dead had returned, it could only be a ghost.

Overcome with fear, he fainted. When he awoke, it was the next morning, and his family was gathered around him in anxious concern. It was the butler who had found him after noticing the flickering light in the study; he had broken down the door to find Master Zhu collapsed on the floor and had immediately summoned a physician.

Awakening, Master Zhu still remembered that scene, his face pale with dread. When his family asked what had happened, he dared not speak, fearing he would throw the entire household into chaos. Over the following days, he ordered the butler to increase security, but his unease grew. Eventually, he made an excuse to secretly visit his late wife’s grave to offer sacrifices.

He burned basket after basket of paper money bought from temples and even had paper effigies of maids and servants crafted from fine materials, ensuring the "house" was well-appointed.

For a time, peace returned. He hoped the matter would end there, as he did not want to stir up further trouble—after all, the specter of a former wife was not something that would improve his reputation.

However, the day his current wife returned from visiting her maiden home, the strange events resumed. First, a maid claimed to see a ghostly shadow; then, a concubine woke up the next morning to find herself sleeping on the floor. These bizarre incidents left the Zhu household in turmoil.

The only consolation was that, so far, no one had died. The rumors spread throughout the city, becoming the talk of every street corner.

Realizing the situation could not continue, Master Zhu invited a renowned master from a temple outside the city to chant sutras and perform exorcisms for three days and nights, but it was to no avail. He then spent a fortune to hire a wandering sorcerer who boasted of great demon-slaying skills, only for the man to be scared out of his wits and flee the manor in the middle of the night.

Hearing this, Yi Fan asked curiously, "If that is the case, Master Zhu, why don’t you move away?"

Master Zhu’s lips trembled, his face turning pale as terror filled his eyes. "It is not that I do not want to move; it is that I dare not."

"Oh?"

It turned out that Master Zhu had indeed tried to move. Though he had spent a fortune on the manor, the lack of peace was unbearable. Yet, the very day he proposed the move, tragedy struck: a maid was found dead in the garden for no apparent reason.

The entire household was terrified. This incident only strengthened his resolve to leave; he ordered the butler to handle the funeral arrangements while he took his family back to their old residence.

On the night of their return to the old home, just as he had finally drifted off to sleep, he heard a noise. He snapped awake, and seeing his wife sleeping soundly beside him, he assumed he had been mistaken. Then, he heard a knocking at the door.

This time, he was sure.

"Who is it?"

"Master, it is I."

Master Zhu was startled. It was his concubine. Feeling a flash of anger and glancing at his wife—who remained sound asleep—he quietly got out of bed to open the door.

He found his concubine shivering in the cold wind, her face pale. His anger vanished. "Why are you not sleeping in the middle of the night? What are you doing here?"

"Master, I am too terrified to sleep. I tossed and turned, so I finally gathered the courage to come to you."

"You... this is truly reckless."

As Master Zhu began to scold her, the concubine threw herself into his arms. He felt her soft, warm form, and his heart stirred. Though she was twenty-five, her skin was as delicate as a young girl’s. He had doted on her when he first took her in, but over the years, the passion had faded. Lately, exhausted by the strange happenings, he had lost interest in such things, yet tonight, for reasons unknown, he could not resist.

"Master?"

"It is cold out here. Let us return to the room."

The storm seemed to pass, but afterward, Master Zhu felt as though he had been hollowed out. He lay there, utterly exhausted, eyes closed. After a long while, noticing the concubine had fallen silent, he turned to face her—only to find that there was no concubine there. It was his late wife, staring directly at him.

Master Zhu rolled his eyes back and fainted dead away.

When he woke, it was already daylight. He learned that he had been found unconscious in the main hall in the middle of the night, completely naked, which filled him with shame.

He dared not speak of it to anyone. When he asked about the moving process, the answer he received was that another maid had died—not at the new manor, but in the old one, found drowned in a pond.

Realizing that moving back to the old house would only make things worse, he gave up on the idea and returned to the new manor. No more deaths occurred, but the constant strange occurrences left everyone in a state of panic, leading several servants to flee.

Running away was a grave offense, as servants were bound by contracts; they became fugitives, and if caught, they could be beaten to death without any hope of justice. Under normal circumstances, Master Zhu would have been furious, but he was in no position to care. He simply gave a few perfunctory orders and left it at that.

With such a major crisis unfolding at the Zhu manor, the county magistrate naturally offered his condolences. Master Zhu was a well-known philanthropist and a scholar, with classmates serving in the imperial government who might offer support. Though Master Zhu was too proud to ask for help, his wife, who came from a prominent family, had no such reservations. In her desperation, she laid the whole story out for the magistrate.

Upon hearing this, the magistrate dispatched guards to patrol the area day and night, but the situation showed no signs of improvement.