After noon, Achan locked the door and headed to the West Market.
The West Market was filled with goods from all corners of the world, but what she needed was hard to find there.
She located a shop with a sign reading “Hunter.” The shop was small, with no goods on display, only a gray-robed old man lounging behind the counter.
Seeing a young, pretty girl enter, the old man lifted his eyelids. “Miss, have you come to the wrong place?”
“I’m looking for some items,” Achan said directly.
Hearing her, the old man straightened up. “What does the young lady want?”
“Black water lichen over thirty years old, white soil from a century-old grave, freshly gathered, and a section of hollow locust tree trunk, at least fifty years old.”
The old man quickly scribbled her request, filling two sheets of paper.
“These three items aren’t expensive, but they’re a bit troublesome to find. The price is fifty taels of silver, with a fifteen-tael deposit. Can you accept that?”
“Yes,” Achan replied, pushing two silver ingots toward him.
The old man weighed the silver, stamped both papers with a square seal, and pulled a thumb-sized wooden token engraved with the word “Hunter” from under the counter.
He handed her one stamped paper and the token, saying, “This is our Hunter Shop’s token. Come back in three days with the remaining silver to collect your items.”
Achan tucked away the paper and token, gave the old man a slight nod, and left the shop.
The Hunter Shop was a relatively legitimate organization, regulated by the authorities, which allowed it to openly operate in the West Market.
They sourced special items based on customers’ requests. Though pricey, their goods were genuine.
If anything went wrong or the shop vanished, Achan could take the token to the authorities, and her complaint would be addressed.
After she left, the old man shook the paper listing the three items and shouted toward the back, “Gouzi, we’ve got work!”
Soon, the curtain at the back door was lifted, and a burly man, about two meters tall, stooped to enter.
“Father, what’s the job this time?”
The old man handed him the paper. “Small job. We have some lichen left in the shop. For the grave soil, go to Yi County; there are plenty of century-old graves there. A day’s trip should do.”
Gouzi nodded. “I’ll send Ergou later. What about the hollow locust tree?”
“The locust tree? You’ll need to go to Black Mountain. There’s a locust grove there, but it’s an unclean place. Go during the day, and handle it yourself.”
“Got it,” Gouzi agreed readily, then asked curiously, “Father, what are these three things for?”
The old man shook his head. “They’re all heavy with yin energy. I’ve never seen them combined like this.”
As the manager of a Hunter Shop, he was experienced and could often guess a customer’s purpose from their requests.
But of the three items this customer wanted, only the lichen was common. The other two were never requested.
Leaving the shop, Achan didn’t head home.
She went to an ironware stall, buying a hammer and chisel, then to a spice stall for a mortar and pestle, and a syringe.
Finally, she visited the jade stall previously investigated by the Mirror Division.
The unforgettable fat owner was recommending a jade tea set to a customer, who seemed pleased and paid with a silver note. The owner deftly packed the set into a brocade box and handed it over.
After sending the customer off with a smile, the fat owner turned and noticed Achan, who had been watching for a while.
“Miss, looking for jade?”
Achan considered how to phrase her request without seeming abrupt, then decided to be direct.
“The day your stall had trouble, I happened to be there.”
The fat owner paused but didn’t change his expression, waiting for her to continue.
“I’d like to ask, are the problematic jade pieces still here?”
“They are, but they crumble to powder with a little force. Probably useless,” the owner said honestly. He’d thought about discarding them but felt it was too wasteful.
The ruined jade could fill half a sack, and the thought pained him.
“I’m making incense pellets and need jade powder, so I’d like to buy some.”
“I see…” The owner pondered. “If you take it all, ten taels of silver will do.”
He didn’t need the ten taels, but selling useless items for that price was enough to ease his heart.
“Deal. I’ll take it,” Achan agreed.
The owner had her wait while his assistant fetched the sack of ruined jade.
When it arrived, Achan opened it and checked inside. The jade was indeed tainted by snow needle snakes.
She brushed the jade powder off her hands, tied the sack, and handed the owner a ten-tael silver ingot from her sleeve.
The items were heavy for her, and with no one to help, she walked and rested intermittently, taking over an hour to get home.
At home, she set the sack of jade behind the door. She hadn’t lied to the owner; the jade powder, aside from making incense, had no other use.
Tainted by snow needle snakes, it was highly effective at repelling common pests. If not for Lady Xiao Lin’s sudden death, Achan would have bought it earlier.
The jade powder was incidental. Her main purpose at the West Market was to order the three materials and buy tools.
She took out the hammer and chisel and brought out a piece of yin willow wood she’d previously purchased.
Achan had only seen others carve; doing it herself was different.
She wanted to carve the willow into a bowl shape, underestimating its hardness. From dawn to dusk, she finally finished.
When she set down the chisel, her hands were blistered.
Ignoring her hands, Achan checked the time and moved the carved willow, now with a hollowed groove, to the backyard.
The next day, the wood was slightly damp. By the third day, the groove was filled with water.
On the third day, Achan retrieved her ordered items from the West Market and brought the willow back inside.
At sunset, she closed the doors and windows, lighting only one oil lamp.
She took out the three materials, costing fifty taels.
The hollow locust wood was the hollow section, blackened inside with dark tree tumors. Achan knocked off the tumors, ground them into powder with the mortar, and set it aside.
She then ground the black water lichen and mixed it with the tumor powder in the willow’s groove.
Achan kneaded the powders with the water in the groove, like dough, then sprinkled sifted grave soil to bind it.
She divided the mixture into eight portions, loaded them into the syringe, and extruded them into incense sticks.
At first, her hands shook, producing wavy sticks, but she improved with practice.
Her materials yielded fewer than a hundred sticks, which needed three days to air-dry.
Three days later, Achan had ninety-two finished sticks; the rest had broken.
She split them into two portions, storing them in wooden boxes.
One box held forty-nine sticks; the other was set aside.
That night, at the zǐ hour (11 PM to 1 AM), while others slept, Achan, fully dressed, went downstairs. At the wooden table, she placed the box of incense and a bowl filled with rice, under which was yellow paper inscribed with Lady Xiao Lin’s name and birth details.
Sun Mama had provided those before leaving.
Achan sat on a stool, took an incense stick from the box, lit it with a fire starter, and inserted it into the bowl.
That night, she stayed at the table, lighting seven sticks until the fifth watch, when the last one burned out.
The room remained calm, with nothing happening.
Unperturbed, Achan closed the box and went upstairs to sleep.
The second, third, and sixth nights were the same.
For seven nights, Achan went downstairs at the zǐ hour to light incense. Tonight, only seven sticks remained in the box.
She lit one and sat, propping her chin with one hand, staring at the glowing tip.
At some point, the pitch-black room suddenly brightened.
The room hadn’t changed, the incense still burned, but on the stool sat not a person but a snow-white fox.
It was Achan’s form before she took this body.
Six black chains bound the fox, stretching into the void with no end.
When Achan tried to move her hand, the fox moved its paw. She realized she might be seeing her inner landscape.
It was said the human body held an inner realm, rarely glimpsed. Why could she see it now?
Before she could understand, a black shadow shrouded in mist appeared.
“How… am… I… here?”
The voice was halting but familiar: Lady Xiao Lin’s.
After seven nights of burning soul-guiding incense, Achan had forcibly summoned Lady Xiao Lin’s sealed soul.
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