“Xiao Fan, tell my parents and my wife to stop worrying about me. If they keep bothering with me, this family will be completely destroyed. Tell my mother to watch over my two children. Without me, my wife will be better off.”
Having said that, he suddenly tried to break free from Gu Qingyun and bolt outside. He never expected that despite her gentle and refined appearance, her strength was so immense. He felt like a fish on a chopping block, completely unable to shake off her grip.
Gu Qingyun seemed to read his mind and grinned.
“Brother, were you planning to find a place to end your own life? Rest assured, as long as I don't let go, you won't escape my palm.”
The moment those words left her mouth, Gu Qingyun felt a wave of regret. She had let herself get a bit too carried away—why poke right at someone's sore spot like that?
Zhang Dayou's face flushed red, and the grown man could no longer hold back his sobs, weeping aloud. His cries were so heart-wrenching that anyone who heard them would shed a tear. At any rate, Gu Qingyun felt a bitter sting in her heart watching him.
She knew that this was merely treating the symptoms, not the root cause. It was her qi that had temporarily cleared Zhang Dayou's mind, but if she didn't find the real reason why he had turned out like this, there was no telling when he might relapse.
Outside, the sun was shining brightly. After much persuasion, Bai Fan finally managed to dissuade Zhang Dayou from his thoughts of taking his own life.
As for how he did it, the boy simply told Zhang Dayou that Gu Qingyun was an expert and that his problem was easy to solve. Gu Qingyun listened without contradicting him—after all, one had to give an honest man some hope.
The two led the restored Zhang Dayou out of the room. Bai Fan's aunt, who had been waiting anxiously in the courtyard, covered her mouth in delight when she saw Zhang Dayou emerge.
Tears streamed uncontrollably down her face, and she hurriedly wiped them away as they fell.
“Look at me... I didn't want to cry. My son is better, I should be happy.”
Zhang Dayou stood beside his mother, at a loss for words.
“Mother, I'm sorry for making you worry.”
Seeing her son return to his simple, honest self, Lady Bai couldn't help but smack him a few times.
“You foolish boy! Acting like that so suddenly—do you have any idea how we got through this past month? Yinniang washed her face with tears every single day. Now that you're better, you must treat her well!”
Zhang Dayou nodded, his heart full of bitterness.
“I know, Mother.”
Seeing that her son was well again, a smile remained plastered on her face. She trotted into the kitchen and came out carrying a basket.
“Dayou, make sure to entertain Qingyun and Fan'er properly. I'll go buy some ingredients and be back shortly.”
Humming a little tune, she walked out the door. Gu Qingyun was their family's great benefactor, so they couldn't afford to be rude or neglectful.
Zhang Dayou watched his mother leave, his throat feeling choked as he rasped:
“Qingyun, you must help me find the cause. I don't want my mother to be sad again.”
Looking at this man whose desire to live had been reignited, she nodded.
“Brother Zhang, think carefully about the days right before you turned out like this. Did you encounter anything unusual? For you to change so suddenly, there must be a reason.”
Zhang Dayou thought about it for a moment and said uncertainly:
“The only unusual thing was that Ren Zhuang, a fellow who works with me, gave me a wooden token. He said he prayed for it at a temple and that it could guarantee wealth. I thought there was no harm in wearing it, so I put it on.”
“I didn't take it seriously at the time, but after that day, I couldn't sleep peacefully. Every night, it felt like someone was whispering in my ear: 【Want to get rich? Go gamble just once. Just once. If you win, your whole family can live well.】”
“It was manageable at first, but gradually, my heart felt like it was being scratched by a cat's claws. Every time I went to work and passed by the gambling den, I would subconsciously look over.”
“Even though I didn't want to go in, my feet wouldn't listen to me, as if possessed, walking right inside. At first, I could win money and thought this was much easier than working, earning far more too. And that voice was always urging me in my ear: 【Keep going, you can win even more.】”
“You both know what happened after that. If I hadn't come to my senses this time, I probably would have gambled away all our family possessions, and in the end, I might have even lost my conscience.”
After speaking, he removed a wooden token wrapped in red cloth from his neck and placed it on the table. Bai Fan reached out to grab it, but Gu Qingyun stopped him instantly.
“Don't touch it. Something is wrong with this wooden token. It's a dead person's possession, tainted with the deceased's obsession and resentment.”
What presented itself before Gu Qingyun's eyes was a black aura clinging to the wooden token. It was this black qi that was continuously altering Zhang Dayou and corrupting his thoughts.
It was the dead gambler's obsession borrowing his body to gamble once more. The ghost didn't care whether Zhang Dayou had the financial means, nor did he care if gambling would tear his family apart.
“This wooden token is ominous—it couldn't possibly be a peace talisman. If I'm not mistaken, it's the relic of a gambler who died a tragic death because of his addiction.”
“In life, he lost all his family possessions, his wife and children abandoned him, and even in death, he was still thinking about gambling to turn his luck around.”
“In his heart, he despises people like you who have a harmonious marriage and a happy family. So when this token came into your hands, you became his vessel, unable to stop yourself from walking into the casino.”
“No matter who holds this token, the resentment will haunt them. But an honest, dutiful man like you triggers the resentment inside it even more. This dead gambler is using your hands to carry on the life he didn't finish gambling away.”
“That resentment will devour your family's fortune, your conscience, and your honesty. Once you've lost all of those, you will meet the same fate as the owner of this resentment.”
Gu Qingyun looked at Zhang Dayou with a solemn expression.
“Fortunately, you met me before your family was destroyed and before you lost your conscience. Now that we've found the source, we just need to destroy it.”
“Get plenty of sunshine when you have time. If you want a peace talisman, go pray for one yourself. If someone else gives you one and it makes you feel uncomfortable, throw it away immediately.”
Gu Qingyun grabbed the wooden token with one hand. The black qi bored through her flesh, trying to seep inward, but the moment it did, it fled outward as if encountering a natural enemy.
Without batting an eye, she wrapped a portion of her qi around the wooden token. As soon as her qi enveloped it, the black aura didn't even have the strength to struggle, dissipating instantly into thin air.
The wooden token that had nearly driven Zhang Dayou to ruin was utterly helpless in Gu Qingyun's hands. She tossed it over to Bai Fan.
“Alright, the resentment on it is gone. Take it over to the stove and throw it into the fire.”
Gu Qingyun didn't know why she understood so much either. Whenever she read those books, the contents were etched into her memory, as if she were born with these skills and destined to make a living through them.
The moment the resentment on the wooden token dissipated, a faint wisp of golden light sank into Gu Qingyun's body. She felt a soothing warmth spread through her, and her spiritual energy circulated even faster.
At that moment, Zhang Dayou felt the force that had been controlling him burst like a bubble with a 【pop】 and disappear without a trace. He felt light from head to toe, completely relieved inside and out.
Deep inside a mountain cave in Jinghe Prefecture, a masked man in black glared at a shattered wooden token and frowned.
“What happened? The resentment dissipated... Well, fortunate that it's only one. It won't have much of an impact.” Looking at several other identical wooden tokens, he murmured to himself:
“It seems I still need to devise other methods to absorb more resentment born of greed and madness. I must speed up the process for the other six types of resentment as well.”
With that, the masked man swept down the mountain like a phantom.
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