Tianjin, starting with unorthodox methods to achieve immortality

Chapter 284 The Know-It-All

As we approached Kowloon, the sky gradually darkened.

At first, it was just a few tiny wisps, barely audible when they hit the small round window of the cabin.

By the time the small steamship sounded its whistle and docked at the Kowloon Pier, the rain had intensified, turning the coal ash on the pier into black mud.

The pier at Kowloon Pier was built by the British. With its concrete piers and iron-framed roof, it was considered one of the most impressive harbors in the Far East at that time.

The pier was filled with boats, their gunwales touching gunwales, and boatmen darted between them on gangplanks.

"Make way...make way..."

A boatman wearing a short jacket with a front opening brushed past Chen Mo, carrying two boxes of matches on his shoulder.

A row of rickshaw pullers were squatting at the dock exit, waiting for customers.

The cars were all parked outside the awning, making a pattering sound as the rain lashed against them.

Several rickshaw drivers huddled against the wall, some wearing raincoats, others with their heads bare, letting the rain soak them, craning their necks to look towards the exit of the pier.

"Sir, it's time to get on the bus..."

'

"Yau Ma Tei, Mong Kok, Tsim Sha Tsui, anywhere is fine..."

'

Li Shun helped Chen Mo flag down an empty car.

The driver was a lean middle-aged man with high cheekbones. His trousers were rolled up to his knees, revealing his two calves, which were dark and thick from the sea breeze.

"Where to?"

Yau Ma Tei, Temple Street.

The driver nodded and pushed the lever down.

Chen Mo sat down, placed the rattan box on his lap, and waved goodbye to Li Shun.

The driver pulled up the cart, his feet sinking into the wet asphalt, and headed deeper into Kowloon.

The dock area quickly fell behind.

The houses on both sides of the road are arcade buildings, one after another. The pillars downstairs are blackened by the rain, and moss grows on the base of the pillars.

The arcade is lined with shops and stalls.

Rice shops, salted fish shops, general stores, herbal medicine shops...

The signs are bilingual (Chinese and English), with the Chinese characters written from right to left and the English characters at the bottom, in a smaller size.

Several glass jars were placed at the entrance of the herbal medicine shop, containing the bones of some unknown animal and medicinal herbs.

The road surface was paved, but it was full of potholes and puddles of rainwater.

A black Ford car drove up from the opposite direction, honking its horn deafeningly. The driver quickly swerved to the side of the road, almost knocking over a fish ball vendor's cart.

The old woman selling fish balls cursed in Cantonese, which Chen Mo couldn't understand, but he understood the anger in her tone.

The rain showed no signs of stopping; in fact, it poured down harder and harder.

Chen Mo tilted the umbrella to one side to block the water splashing down from the eaves.

When the driver stopped him at the entrance of Temple Street, the rain was at its heaviest.

The streets were nearly empty, and a few vendors moved their stalls under the arcade, curiously eyeing Chen Mo in the car.

After walking another hundred meters or so, the driver parked the rickshaw under an old banyan tree at the entrance of Temple Street. The tree canopy blocked some of the rain, but not all of it.

The driver wiped his face with the towel draped over his shoulder, took the few copper coins Chen Mo handed him, and pulled the empty rickshaw back into the rain.

Chen Mo stood under the banyan tree, opened his umbrella, and looked up at the dense rows of signs overhead.

Temple Street.

The most chaotic street in Kowloon is also the most well-informed street.

He lowered the edge of the umbrella by half an inch, switched the rattan box to his left hand, and walked along the corridor under the arcade.

The ground of Temple Street is paved with bluestone slabs. Over the years, black mud has accumulated in the gaps between the slabs, making it slippery when soaked by rainwater.

The incense and candle shop he was looking for wasn't on the main street.

The address the fat man gave was at the end of a side alley in the middle of Temple Street, and the shop was called Baofu Incense and Candles.

There was a man called "Know-It-All" behind the shop; it was said that you could find out the address of Xuan Yin Zhai from there.

To put it bluntly, they are middlemen who specialize in selling information.

Just as I stepped into the middle of the street, I saw a commotion ahead.

Two young men wearing black t-shirts stood outside the alley entrance, blocking an old man.

It also blocked the already narrow road.

The old man was in his early sixties, his back was already hunched, and he stood under the arcade with his shoulders hunched.

A bamboo basket sat at my feet, half-filled with green tangerines, glistening after being wet by the rain.

"Uncle, I already told you last month."

The young man leaning against the wall spoke in Cantonese, "The shop is changing hands, and the land needs to be recalculated. Do you think I'm joking?"

The old man's lips trembled a few times, and he replied in Cantonese with a heavy Hakka accent.

Chen Mo didn't quite understand, but he could roughly guess what it meant: no money, they paid last year, and someone in their family was sick.

Another young man snorted, walked to the old man's bamboo basket, bent down, scooped up a handful of green tangerines, and tossed them in his hand.

Then, with a loosening of his fingers, the green oranges fell to the ground with a clatter, rolling everywhere.

The old man didn't dare say anything and could only silently squat down to pick them up.

"Hey, Yankee, what are you looking at?"

A young man saw Chen Mo, moved the toothpick he was holding from the left corner of his mouth to the right, and tilted his chin slightly in Chen Mo's direction.

The other one also turned his head, his gaze sweeping over him from head to toe.

That demeanor was exactly like that of the gangsters in the movies.

"A sideline job?"

Chen Mo did not answer.

"The three of them don't understand Cantonese."

The other person switched to broken Mandarin, asking, "What do you do for a living?"

"Just passing by."

"Just passing by?"

He pulled the toothpick out of his mouth and flicked it to the ground. "If you're just passing through this street, you have to pay a toll. It's not much, just take out all of it."

After speaking, the man stretched out his hand towards Chen Mo, palm up, fingers hooking inward.

The movements were very practiced, clearly indicating that it had been done countless times.

"You want money?"

Chen Mo's lips twitched slightly, and he lightly stomped his foot.

Two wisps of very faint black smoke rose from the cracks in the bluestone slabs underground.

The black mist was as thin as a hair, moving along the wet ground at an astonishing speed.

The two people opposite each other shivered almost simultaneously.

"Damn it, why is it suddenly so cold..."

The young man leaning against the wall shrank his neck, his voice trembling.

The other person, who had intended to reach out to Chen Mo again, froze in mid-air, their fingers involuntarily curling up. "Hey, you..."

""

The two young men stumbled a couple of steps and fell backward onto the bluestone slab.

His fingernails began to turn black, and his limbs began to twitch uncontrollably, like a fish that had been thrown ashore.

The old man was terrified, and the green tangerines he was holding spilled all over the ground.

He didn't bother to pick it up and kept backing away, his back bumping into the pillar behind him.

Chen Mo stood there watching, his face expressionless.

The process of evil energy entering the body is not long.

In the time it takes to smoke a few cigarettes, the two young men's struggle turned into weak spasms.

They lay side by side on the muddy bluestone slab, their eyes sunken, their faces ashen, their lips purplish-black, and their fingernails covered with clumps of dark blood clots.

The old woman selling fish balls glanced at it from afar, then turned and pushed her cart away.

The shop assistants from several nearby shops peeked around cautiously, but no one dared to approach.

Those who make a living on this street all know one thing: if you see something happening on Temple Street, pretend you didn't see it, and you'll live a long life.

Chen Mo carried the wicker trunk past the two people lying on the ground and continued walking deeper into Temple Street.

An hour later, the rain lessened a bit, but it didn't stop.

A crowd had gathered at the entrance of a side alley in the middle of Temple Street, completely blocking the already narrow alley.

The crowd was packed three or four deep, and several heads were poking out of the windows on the second floor of the arcade building.

Many people whispered that the two thugs who collected protection money must have offended something, because they were lying on the ground in broad daylight and couldn't get up.

The two young men had been carried to the base of the arcade and were lying side by side against the wall pillars, in the same position as they had been half an hour ago, only their faces looked even worse.

If half an hour ago they still had a trace of life on their faces, now they look completely like dead people.

His face was ashen, his eyes were sunken, his lips were as black as if they had been coated with ink, and the black blood under his fingernails had congealed into scabs.

A black police car was parked at the entrance of the alley, its roof covered with a layer of rainwater.

Two police officers in black uniforms were dispersing the crowd, while two others were kneeling beside the injured person to examine him.

At that time, the police uniforms in Kowloon were still in the style of the British colony.

Black serge fabric, brass buttons, a leather belt around the waist, and black knee-high boots.

"There were no external injuries, no bleeding, and no signs of a struggle."

A young officer examined the two men's eyelids, then turned to report to the people behind him, "But they... look very strange."

A middle-aged policeman in his forties stood behind him.

The man was of medium build, neither fat nor thin, and was wearing a black police uniform.

He has a somewhat distinctive appearance, with thick eyebrows that slant towards his temples and a faint vertical line between his brows.

With a straight nose and slightly downturned corners of his mouth, his face looked somewhat stern, yet also strangely familiar.

If Chen Mo were here, he would definitely think that this person looks five or six parts similar to Uncle Nine.

His name is Ho Shui-kau, an undercover detective from the Kowloon Police Station.

Because of his mature appearance and the fact that his name contains the character "九" (nine), people in the area call him Uncle Jiu.

He Ruijiu squatted down in front of the two people, extended two fingers, and placed them on their wrists respectively.

The young police officer watched from the side, not daring to say a word.

He pressed his fingers on the pulse points of the two men for almost the time it takes to brew a cup of tea, his brows furrowing deeper and deeper.

The vertical line between his eyebrows was almost twisted into the shape of the Chinese character "川" (river).

After taking the pulse, he turned one of the people's hands over and looked closely at the black scabs under the fingernails. He then opened the other person's eyelids to observe the pupils' reaction.

Finally, He Ruijiu gasped.

"Uncle Jiu, how is it?" the young police officer asked in a low voice.

He stood up, patted the mud off his knees, and glanced around.

Most of the onlookers had dispersed, leaving only a few daring individuals peeking out from a distance.

The old man who sold tangerines under the arcade is long gone.

"Load them into the car and take them back to the police station."

"Back to the police station? Shouldn't we be sending him to the hospital?" The young officer was taken aback.

"Sending them to the hospital won't help."

He Ruijiu shook his head, then glanced at the two people lying on the ground. "This isn't an illness, it's a curse."

"What?!" The young police officer looked bewildered.

He Ruijiu didn't explain, but simply took out a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped the stains off his fingers.

"When malevolent energy enters the body, even a god cannot save you."

He turned to his young colleague and told him the truth: "They're barely alive now. If they can't get rid of the evil energy in their bodies, they'll definitely die within a week."

The young officer's face changed: "What murderous aura? Who did this?"

He Ruijiu did not answer the question.

He looked down at the two ashen faces, his gaze finally settling on the skin at their ankles.

Several extremely fine black lines could be faintly seen on the skin there, like blood oozing out after capillaries ruptured.

At this moment, the black line was spreading upwards along the blood vessels, and had already climbed to the calf.

Once it reaches the heart, the person is gone.

Ho Shui-kau had been a policeman for twenty years and had seen many strange and unusual cases in Kowloon Walled City, including cases of possession by ghosts, poisoning by witchcraft, and curses.

But he had only ever seen records of this level of malevolent energy in the notes left by his master.

The notes say that this kind of malevolent energy is not natural, but cultivated by people.

Moreover, those who practice this kind of malevolent energy must have a skill level of at least two Jiazi (60 years) or more.

Two cycles of sixty years, one hundred and twenty years.

In his lifetime, he had seen three people practice evil energy: one in western Hunan, one in the New Territories, and the other whose whereabouts were unknown during the Guangxu era.

Now another one has emerged in Temple Street.

Could it be a dragon crossing the river from the north?

He Ruijiu put his hand into his pocket and his fingers touched a copper coin.

The copper coin was left to him by his master. The front of the coin was engraved with the four characters "Slay Demons and Subdue Monsters," and the back of the coin had a Bagua diagram.

He twirled the coin between his fingers before putting it back in his pocket and turning to walk towards the crowd.

Most of the onlookers had already dispersed, and the remaining dozen or so were stopped outside the alley by two uniformed police officers.

He Ruijiu walked to the alley entrance, his gaze sweeping over the faces of the crowd.

"Neighbors, when did these two people fall down? Did any of you see them?"

No one said a word.

Everyone shook their heads in unison, indicating that they hadn't seen anything.

Chen Mo carried the wicker trunk to the end of the alley and found the Baofu Incense and Candles shop among a row of signs.

The shop was small, with a storefront only the width of two door panels, sandwiched between a pawn shop and a coffin shop; you could easily walk past it if you weren't paying attention.

The sign at the entrance is made of wood with a black lacquered background and the four characters "Bao Fu Incense and Candles" painted in gold powder.

Half of the gold powder has fallen off, and the remaining half has turned dark from being soaked in moisture.

Chen Mo closed his umbrella, shook off the rainwater, and then pushed open the door to go inside.

The door hinges made a dry creaking sound, and the brass bell hanging on the lintel jingled, announcing the arrival of guests.

The shop was dimly lit, with most of the windows blocked by shelves, leaving only a tiny vent that let in enough light to barely outline the shop's interior.

The shelves were crammed with gold ingot candles, incense sticks, and yellow paper talismans, stacked in rows from the floor to the ceiling.

On the shelf against the wall are several small statues of deities, including Guan Gong, Guanyin, and the God of Wealth.

Behind the counter sat a thin old man wearing reading glasses with lenses as thick as the bottom of a wine bottle.

"What do you want to buy?"

The old man didn't even look up, his fingers flipping through the pages rapidly.

He folded a piece of yellow tin foil three or four times in his hands, and it turned into a gleaming gold ingot.

"Find the know-it-all."

The other person paused for a moment, then glanced at Chen Mo with their eyes open.

"In the back," the old man gestured towards the back of the shop, "someone's waiting, you'll have to wait a bit."

Chen Mo looked in the direction the old man indicated and discovered that there was a small door behind the counter. A faded blue cloth curtain hung on the door frame, and a dim yellow light shone through the curtain.

A bench stood next to the curtain, where a man in his thirties sat, his eyes revealing a hint of impatience.

Looks like we've been waiting for a while.

Chen Mo didn't say anything, placed the rattan box at his feet, and quietly extended his divine sense.