Ma San’s fall was far from light, and Nan Zhi’s final lightning spell was no small matter. It left the Taoist spitting blood, his face ashen with despair.
“Lightning magic... You—how do you know lightning magic? I see, you aren't a rogue cultivator; you're from the Demon Suppression Division!”
He was severely injured.
Nan Zhi hadn't held back with that earlier palm strike. When she fell, she used Ma San as a meat cushion, delivering a heavy blow to her opponent.
Given Nan Zhi’s physique and strength, falling from such a height made her no different from a small mountain crashing down.
If Ma San hadn't been a cultivator, anyone else would have been turned into meat mud on the spot.
Nan Zhi didn't answer his question. She rummaged through his person, tearing open his collar and pulling out a collection of bottles and jars.
Seeing that the little red hedgehog in her arms was breathing more out than in, its long snout trembling, she summoned a sphere of water and splashed it onto Ma San’s face to wake him up.
“Which one is the antidote?”
The icy river water jolted him. Ma San shuddered violently and pointed with a trembling hand toward a gray porcelain bottle on the deck.
Fearing the man might be playing tricks, Nan Zhi pried his mouth open and forced half of the bottle’s contents down his throat. Seeing no ill effects, she then fed the antidote to the little hedgehog.
“Squeak, squeak...”
The little hedgehog let out a weak cry toward Nan Zhi, looking quite pitiful. It then curled into a ball and hid in her robes, eventually falling still.
It seemed to have fainted from exhaustion.
Nan Zhi handed the hedgehog to Wanniang before turning back to interrogate Ma San.
“You said before that you were taking these people to the Ghost Market to trade for silver.”
“But you also said that trading souls and trafficking people are capital offenses. I’d like to know who is so bold as to buy and sell living humans right under the nose of the Demon Suppression Division.”
“Just who are the people buying these living humans? What exactly do they intend to do with them?”
“I'll talk, I'll talk... Mercy, My Lady, mercy!”
Ma San clutched his face and suddenly spat out a mouthful of black blood before trembling as he gave an honest account.
“When the Gates of Hell open during the Ghost Festival, the evil ghosts of the Underworld pay the ghost messengers silver so they can escape to the human realm for a few days of leisure.”
“These evil ghosts love to eat humans, but if they kidnap living people themselves, they’ll surely leave traces for the Demon Suppression Division to find.”
“Additionally, some evil cultivators need human pills for their medicine. Thus, over time, the business of capturing meat sheep appeared in the Ghost Market.”
“I use beast craft sorcery to capture living humans and turn them into living sheep or donkeys to send to the Ghost Market. Once there, someone naturally comes to meet me.”
“This method is discreet and hard to detect. Even if someone notices something is wrong, it’s difficult to find any evidence against me.”
As it turned out, this wasn't the first time Ma San had done this.
Last year during the Ghost Festival, he had used this technique to kidnap five children. He turned them into meat sheep and sold them for a high price at the Ghost Market, receiving a thousand gold, which he then spent entirely on pills and spirit herbs for his cultivation.
Having tasted success, Ma San became increasingly arrogant and reckless.
He had even spent a sum of silver to set a table of fine food and wine to bribe a ghost messenger he knew, learning that the Gates of Hell would open in Bianjing this year.
Greedy by nature and obsessed with reaching Foundation Establishment to become an immortal, Ma San decided to go big this time, leading to everything that followed.
Nan Zhi quickly realized the implications.
The Demon Suppression Division dealt exclusively with demons and monsters. Even if a normal kidnapping case became a major issue, it would never reach the desks of the Demon Suppression Division.
Ordinary constables investigating kidnappings mostly conducted local inquiries.
A wandering Taoist like Ma San could drive a flock of sheep openly down the official roads without anyone suspecting a thing.
After all, who would expect that there was an evil art in this world that could turn people into livestock?
“Write down every single buyer you've ever dealt with in detail, and I might spare your life for now.”
Nan Zhi picked up the gourd from the deck and shook it. She could hear the sound of sloshing liquid inside.
“Where did you learn this evil art? And this gourd... you claimed to be a poor rogue cultivator, but this gourd doesn't look like something a common rogue would have.”
“This... everyone at the Ghost Market is masked. How would I know who bought the meat sheep from me?”
Ma San hesitated, unsure if he should speak.
But seeing Nan Zhi’s burning gaze and her hand poised as if she might crush his skull in the next instant—
He trembled, spilling everything like beans from a bamboo tube.
“I'll talk, I'll talk! The one who bought meat sheep from me last year was an evil cultivator named Duan Chunming. He seemed to be refining some wicked medicine that specifically uses the hearts, livers, and bone marrow of children...”
“There was also a fox named Xiugu. She bought two meat sheep to use as servant boys. Other than that, I really don't know...”
“As for the gourd and the beast craft sorcery, I found them years ago in an ancient tomb.”
“My Lady, everything I say is true. There isn't a single lie. If you are interested in the gourd and the beast craft sorcery, you can take them all!”
Where he had once called her Sister Nan at every turn, Ma San now abandoned all pretense in the face of life and death, showing only his fawning nature.
“What nonsense are you spouting? Am I the kind of person who covets your trifles?”
Nan Zhi stuffed the gourd into her bag and efficiently dislocated all of his joints. She then bound the limp, rubbery Ma San with rope and called the boat owner over.
“This man used evil arts to kidnap others, tortured innocent people, and told a pack of lies to deceive an official. His crimes are monstrous. I have broken his limbs and destroyed his cultivation.”
“Have your men tie him to the bow and submerge him in the river. Only pull him up when he’s ready to confess honestly.”
The river water in autumn was deadly cold!
There were many jagged rocks in the water, and in the swift currents, they could tear the flesh right off a body, not to mention the carnivorous fish and snakes.
A corpse would bloat after a few days in the river, let alone a living person.
This lady truly had ruthless methods.
The boat owner was terrified, but hearing of Ma San’s evil deeds and seeing his miserable state, he also felt a sense of satisfaction. He quickly called the crew to help lower Ma San into the water.
“Splash!”
The powerless Ma San was hung upside down from the side of the boat.
After a busy night, dawn was approaching.
The morning light was dim, and a sliver of fish belly white appeared on the eastern horizon.
The river current was swift, constantly washing against the hull. Ma San rose and fell with the boat, repeatedly submerged in the bone chilling water.
“Bitch! Thief! Dog of the Demon Suppression Division! You broke your word! I won't let you go even as a ghost!”
Ma San hadn't expected Nan Zhi to be so ruthless as to actually want him dead. He began to curse loudly.
“You heartless bastard! You dark faced killer!”
“You lowly scum, glub glub glub... how dare you treat me like this, glub glub glub... once I escape, I'll make you pay with your lives one by one!”
“Pull me up, quickly! I am a cultivator, destined for a smooth path to immortality... glub glub glub... and to enjoy all the world's riches! glub glub glub... Whoever pulls me up, I'll give them a hundred gold and a great fortune!”
“Forgive me! Forgive me, glub glub glub... I'll tell you whatever you want to know, glub glub glub... I don't want to die, glub glub glub... I don't want to die!”
“I beg you, have mercy, let me go. I was just blinded by my inner demons and lost my way... glub glub glub...”
Ma San cursed, swore, and wailed, then began to plead and beg incessantly, but it had little effect.
By the end, his voice was much weaker, likely because he had swallowed too much water.
Nan Zhi even had someone stuff a rag in his mouth to prevent him from disturbing the other passengers.
The passengers, too frightened to speak: “...”
The journey had been thrilling enough.
Was a little noise really the problem?
You're surprisingly considerate, aren't you?
**
Ma San hung from the bow for two days. By the time he was pulled back up, he was bloated and swollen.
He spat out everything he knew, including but not limited to wetting the bed at age eight, stealing plums from a neighbor’s tree at nine, blinding a neighbor’s puppy at ten, and fleeing his hometown at fifteen after injuring someone.
Once she was certain there was nothing left to squeeze out of Ma San, Nan Zhi efficiently sent him to the Western Heaven.
The Demon Suppression Division specialized in handling evil and supernatural matters, with the authority to execute first and report later. No one could question them.
This rule was something she took deeply to heart.
On the sixth day of the voyage, the river surface gradually smoothed out, and the scenery on both banks became more desolate. Ahead, the silhouette of an incredibly bustling dock began to emerge.
Rate on N.U.
