Ghost Immortal

Li Feng stood there, completely stunned.

Is it possible for a normal person to escape from a brothel like the Grand View Garden?

How come I always seem to run into someone who dies?

The flames died down, but the man's fingers remained in the strange, convulsing posture they had before his death.

The skin was warm, the pulse had stopped, yet the person stood upright, like a puppet held by invisible strings.

Li Feng pried open his fingers, one by one.

The knuckles made a dry, cracking sound, like a withered branch breaking.

The man fell backward, his head hitting the bluestone slab with a dull thud.

"Oh no! Another person has died!"

When the madam, Zhou Mama, chased after the body to the alley entrance and saw it on the ground, she screamed instantly.

The messenger arrived very quickly.

With Constable Sun leading the team, the torches illuminated the alley as if it were daytime.

The coroner squatted beside the corpse, examining it for a long time, his brow furrowed.

Finally, he stood up and shook his head at Constable Sun.

"There are no external injuries, and it's not poisoning."

The coroner was puzzled: "His internal organs looked like they had been burned, but his skin and flesh were intact, and even his clothes weren't burned. In my 26 years as a coroner, I've never seen a death like this."

Officer Sun turned his triangular eyes toward Li Feng, his gaze showing considerable displeasure.

This was the second time he had seen this kid at the crime scene.

Less than ten days later, he was dragged out of bed in the middle of the night to work overtime again.

"It's you again! Why do you always seem to run into these strange murder cases?"

Li Feng shrugged, looking helpless: "I didn't want this to happen either."

Constable Sun knew that this guy had now become a disciple of Master Four Eyebrows, and his status was different from before, so he could only wave his hand and say, "Never mind, give me a detailed explanation of what you saw."

Li Feng rattled off a string of words, pouring out everything he had seen.

He knew that Officer Sun didn't believe him.

This is normal. If he were the head constable, he wouldn't believe a night watchman who appeared at the scene of a murder twice in a row.

After listening, Constable Sun did not speak, but simply waved for the constables to carry the body back to the yamen, and then sent someone to the mortuary to invite the Taoist priest with four eyebrows.

Qiulan followed behind the Taoist priest with four eyebrows, carrying a small box in her hand.

The Taoist priest with four eyebrows squatted beside the corpse, not in a hurry to take action.

He walked around the corpse three times, stepping on a fixed spot.

Li Feng recognized it as the Heavenly Gang Step, which he's been learning recently.

The Taoist priest with four eyebrows took out a yellow talisman from his sleeve and stuck it on the corpse's forehead.

The talisman ignited on its own as soon as it touched the skin, burning into a small clump of grayish-white powder.

The Taoist priest with four eyebrows picked up some powder, put it to his nose, and sniffed it. His expression became even more unpleasant.

Then he took out the Bagua mirror, and using the faint light of dawn, he shone it through the seven orifices of the corpse.

The golden light swirled on the mirror's surface, yet nothing unusual was observed.

"It's not a ghost, nor is it the work of a demon."

Master Si Mei put away the Bagua mirror, somewhat puzzled.

"It doesn't look like Gu poison, and there are no traces left by talismans. He's just an ordinary person who has never cultivated. Yet the burns on his internal organs seem to have started from within his own body."

Officer Sun stroked his chin in bewilderment: "Taoist priest, what you're saying is too far-fetched. What could you eat that could spontaneously combust? And only burn the lungs and internal organs, without harming the body?"

Master Si Mei stood up and dusted off his Taoist robe.

"I can't understand it either. What kind of fire can burn the internal organs to charcoal without burning through the skin?"

He instructed Qiulan to take out a silver needle and insert it into the corpse's abdomen.

When the silver needle was pulled out, a wisp of blue smoke rose from its tip.

Master Si Mei could only shake his head: "The case file will be temporarily sealed. This case needs to be investigated in detail."

Head Constable Sun knew the Four-Eyebrowed Taoist's abilities. Even this authentic successor of the Maoshan sect couldn't see through the tricks, so what could a mere head constable like him do?

It can only be listed as an unsolved case for now.

The body was carried back to the mortuary and placed in the innermost thin-skinned coffin. Worried about the corpse turning into a zombie, Qiu Sheng was asked to snap ink lines all over the coffin.

The Taoist priest with four eyebrows patted Li Feng's arm.

"Go back. Don't tell anyone about what happened tonight, lest it cause panic among the people in the city."

"Yes, Master." Li Feng nodded in agreement.

For the next three days, Qingyan City remained peaceful.

On the fourth day at noon, Li Feng was squatting in the courtyard studying the "Maoshan Qi Cultivation Manual".

Qiulan suddenly pushed open the courtyard gate and rushed in, her forehead covered in sweat and her breath coming in gasps.

"Junior brother! Something's happened! Master wants you to go to the execution ground immediately!"

Caishikou is located in the east of the city and is the most bustling place in Qingyan City.

Vegetable vendors, fish vendors, firewood vendors, and street performers—the crowds are constant from morning till night.

At this moment, the execution grounds were cordoned off by the constables with hemp ropes.

The crowd of onlookers crowded outside the rope, craning their necks to look inside.

Li Feng squeezed through the crowd and saw a single-wheeled waterwheel lying overturned in the open space.

The wooden buckets on the waterwheel overturned and spilled water all over the ground.

A corpse was lying next to the waterwheel.

The deceased was an old man.

He was wearing a drab gray short-sleeved shirt, with his trousers rolled up to his knees, revealing two thin legs with prominent veins.

He was wearing straw sandals, the soles of which were worn down to a thin layer.

His hair was as white as snow, and his skin was as black as old tree bark; he looked like someone who made a living under the sun.

His body was covered with a strange layer of frost.

The midday sun was scorching hot, like an oven, and the water on the ground was steaming. Yet the old man's body was covered in white frost, as if he had frozen to death.

Frost spread from his hair, eyebrows, and beard all the way to the surface of his clothes, like frozen meat just dragged out of an ice cellar.

He curled up on the ground, his hands clasped to his chest, maintaining the posture he had adopted to keep warm before he died.

The expression on his face was not one of pain, but rather one of peace, like someone who had frozen to death in the dead of winter and had finally found release.

Zhao Tiezhu has arrived; this time he will handle the case personally.

He squatted down beside the waterwheel and reached out to check the old man's breath. As soon as his fingers touched the old man's face, he felt the coldness.

"Why is his body so cold?"

Li Feng walked over and squatted down to carefully examine the old man's body.

The old man's lips were bluish-black, his fingernails were purple, and his skin was covered in goosebumps—all characteristics consistent with death by freezing.

But it's June now, and the midday sun can cook eggs.

Even more strangely, the water on the ground was still steaming, but there wasn't a single drop of melted water on the old man's body.

The frost flowers remained intact, like a layer of ice enveloping him.

Master Si Mei arrived quickly.

He glanced at the corpse, and his face darkened.

This time, instead of circling around and performing the Heavenly Gang Steps, he directly took out the Bagua Mirror and aimed it at the old man's forehead.

On the surface of the Bagua mirror, the yin and yang fish began to slowly rotate.

Immediately afterwards, a wisp of extremely thin black mist seeped out from between the old man's eyebrows and condensed into a grain of rice-sized dot on the mirror surface.

"Aura of darkness and misfortune."

The Four-Eyebrowed Taoist's voice was solemn, and only Li Feng and Zhao Tiezhu could hear it.

"It has the same aura as the female corpse in the quarry, but it's purer!"

"He froze to death under the blazing sun? That's too strange!" Zhao Tiezhu exclaimed incredulously.

Master Si Mei turned the Bagua mirror over, aligning the Bagua runes on the back of the mirror with the old man's chest.

"He didn't freeze to death; he was drained of his yang energy. The evil energy entered his body and completely drained his yang energy. He looks like he froze to death, but in reality, it's more thorough than freezing to death. A person who freezes to death still has their three souls and seven spirits, but he didn't even have his soul and spirits."

Li Feng asked, "The water seller is always out and about, so his yang energy is stronger than the average person. Why is it him?"

The Taoist priest with four eyebrows pondered for a moment, then suddenly asked Zhao Tiezhu, "Where is the water seller's well?"