Chapter 114: The Time Has Not Yet Come

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Only then did Fatty come running up. As soon as he entered, he saw the girl crawling out from under the bed. With a bewildered expression, he asked, “What’s going on here?”

“Farewell.” The girl blew me a flying kiss, grabbed her coat, and dashed outside.

After she ran off, Fatty looked even more puzzled. I briefly explained the girl’s background to him, and after hearing it, he couldn’t help but laugh and shake his head. “I like this girl—she’s got character. This is going to get interesting. Let’s see how Chen Dongfang handles this.”

Just then, Li Qing and Chen Dongfang came rushing over. As soon as Chen Dongfang returned, he shot me a sharp glance. From that look, I knew the situation must have been exposed. Sure enough, Chen Dongfang glared at me and said, “How could you let her run wild like that?”

“Could I stop her? Look at that punch she threw—it was solid,” I said, pointing to my face.

Chen Dongfang said nothing more. He took out his phone and stepped outside, presumably to report to someone named ‘A’ as he mentioned earlier. After a while, he came back in with a sigh. “Forget it, let her be. There’s a bad piece of news I need to tell you all. Liu Lao has already secured approval for a hydroelectric power station upstream of the Luoshui River. If nothing goes wrong, this project will be taken over by Tang Renjie. Do you know what this means? They’re going to strike hard at the Twelve Ghost Caves.”

Building a hydroelectric station upstream means they’ll have to divert the water flow first, which inevitably leads to a period when the Luoshui River passing through Fudi Ditch and Sanlitun will dry up. That will expose the Twelve Ghost Caves to human sight fully. Although diving equipment has advanced tremendously, it’s easy to understand that a ghost cave underwater is a completely different matter from one on the surface.

Liu Lao is truly ruthless, willing to build a hydroelectric station just for whatever’s inside the Twelve Ghost Caves.

Chen Dongfang paced around the room, seemingly deep in thought. After a moment, he said to me, “Yezi, contact your elder brother Sun Zhongmou. On the full moon night the day after tomorrow, you absolutely must retrieve whatever is inside the Twelve Ghost Caves.”

Then he turned to Fatty. “Fatty, I don’t care who’s backing you, but Chen Shitou is going to perform a sacrifice. The Corpse King inside the Twelve Ghost Caves will inevitably appear. I want you to help deal with him—even if you can only hold him off, you must buy time for Sun Zhongmou.”

The ‘Corpse King’ Chen Dongfang referred to was likely what was inside that stone coffin. Fatty had faced that person before and was completely outmatched. Even with the Four Divine Beasts and the Five Mountain Swords, he stood no chance. After Chen Dongfang said that, I honestly started worrying about Fatty.

But Fatty just nodded. “No problem. I can’t promise to kill him, but I’m confident I can hold him off.”

“Are you sure? Didn’t you use all your moves the other day?” I looked at Fatty.

“That day I underestimated him. I was never a match for him. But there’s still a day left. With some preparation, it’s definitely doable,” Fatty replied.

Then Fatty asked Chen Dongfang, “We’re doing all the work here. What about you?”

“I’ll act according to the situation,” Chen Dongfang said enigmatically.

Chen Dongfang’s tension made me nervous too. After leaving him, Li Qing took us to Fudi Ditch. Fatty and I didn’t linger; we went straight to find my elder brother. When we arrived, surprisingly, he wasn’t home. I was used to seeing him sitting there or tending to his vegetable garden, so not seeing him made me anxious, fearing his bad temper had gotten him into trouble with Grandpa again. I called out twice, and soon his voice came from upstairs. After a while, he came down, carrying a strong scent of incense—he must have been worshipping his mysterious altar upstairs.

“What’s up?” my brother asked as he came down.

“We just saw Chen Dongfang,” I said. “He said that Liu Lao from Beijing has gotten approval to build a hydroelectric station upstream. So you must retrieve whatever’s inside the Twelve Ghost Caves on the full moon night.”

Honestly, sometimes I wished my brother would critique Chen Dongfang. After all, Chen Dongfang’s explanation was far more convincing than Fatty’s. Many times, a single sentence from him could solve problems, but he always remained silent, leaving me stuck in a dilemma.

“Not yet the time,” my brother said decisively.

His words nearly choked me. “I’ve thought about it. No matter what Chen Dongfang intends, if we don’t get it, Liu Lao will.”

“He won’t be able to,” my brother said, sitting down on the sofa.

“What exactly is it?” I asked tentatively.

My brother closed his eyes, laying back tiredly on the sofa. “Legend says the Ghost Path disrespects heavenly gods but reveres the true dragon. Back when the Ghost Path was besieged by Taoism across the land, the true dragon was slaughtered. But the dragon’s body never died; like the emperor suppressing Chi You’s body, the true dragon was torn apart and buried in pieces across various places. Chen Dongfang mentioned the dragon shadows in the giant rocks of Shennongjia Mountains. If I’m right, the Twelve Ghost Caves might contain the dragon’s essence. There’s an ancient belief that consuming dragon essence grants immortality. Their determination is all because of this.”

I hadn’t expected my brother to actually give me an answer, but his explanation sounded like listening to a scripture I couldn’t understand. I scratched my head and asked, “Brother, is there really a dragon?”

He shook his head. “I don’t know. It might be a trick of the Ghost Path, or it might really be there. But it’s still not the time to retrieve what’s inside the Twelve Ghost Caves, and no one can take it out now.”

“What are you going to do then?” I asked.

“Act according to the situation,” he said—the same cryptic phrase from Chen Dongfang.

—After leaving my brother, Fatty became very restless. Honestly, I wasn’t happy either. Fatty and I knew nothing about the Twelve Ghost Caves, yet we had clear orders. Meanwhile, the other two just shrugged it off with a vague “act according to the situation.” Those four words were so ambiguous. As Fatty put it, “Who the hell doesn’t know how to act according to the situation?”

I asked Fatty, “So, Fatty, what do you think we should do? Should we just give them the same vague answer?”

“Even acting according to the situation requires preparation. Let’s go, Yezi, we need to find Chen Qingshan,” Fatty said.

“If it’s unnecessary, don’t bother the village chief. He’s just recently freed himself—don’t drag him back in. Poor guy,” I said.

“Don’t worry. I just want him to help me find some men. He won’t get involved directly,” Fatty assured me.

We went to Chen Qingshan’s house. He was drinking tea and his face changed when he saw us come in. Fatty walked over and chuckled, “Yezi already told me your situation. Don’t worry, one day I’ll give you a prescription that’ll bring you back to the peak of eighteen years old.”

Chen Qingshan’s face instantly flushed. He glared at me. “Yezi, why do you tell everything to others?”

Before I could answer, Fatty said, “Don’t blame Yezi. If he didn’t tell me, how could I treat you? This is called not hiding illness from the doctor. Trust me, my prescription will be a cure-all.”

“You know medicine?” I asked Fatty.

“You don’t get it. Any of the alchemist formulas from our sect could make you a famous doctor,” Fatty boasted. Whether it was true or not, Chen Qingshan looked mesmerized. If it weren’t embarrassing, I think Chen Qingshan would have asked Fatty for that prescription by now.

“Help me find forty-nine strong men from the village, bring them here secretly. No one born in the year of the dragon, snake, or ox—they are all water signs. Also, anyone with blue-black marks under their nose or mouth is excluded; that indicates trouble with water lately. Other than that, anyone else is fine. Tell them to wait at the village committee tomorrow afternoon. Five hundred yuan per day as labor pay,” Fatty instructed Chen Qingshan.

“Why do you need so many people?” Chen Qingshan asked, confused.

“To form a pure Yang formation. Purple Palace Mountain is never known for magic but for formations. The Taoist path’s strongest weapon is formations. This time, Fatty is going to make that Corpse King regret ever showing up,” Fatty said.

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