Chapter 840 — How to Cure an Illness?

And so Zhen Dazhou's home was filled with offerings to ghosts, foxes, immortals, and sprites of every description. But who could have guessed that the more you fear a thing, the more surely it comes? He had scarcely arrived in Songshan City when trouble struck.

Looking at his son — mouth twisted, eye askew, one leg lame — Zhen Dazhou's heart ached for him: "Son, hurry and beg the great immortal to bless you, to make you well again!"

"Yes, yes!" Frightened half to death, Zhen Yingjun hastily began to pray in his heart.

Zou Tiandi turned and left the room of the Zhen father and son. Before contacting any great immortal, he put in a call to his son, Zou Ruoguang.

Zou Tiandi had seen Zhen Yingjun storm off in a fury, and did not dare go after him — best to let him cool down on his own. Zou Ruoguang was no fool either, and was already turning something over in his mind: Zhen Yingjun had offended Wei Zhao, and shouldn't he himself keep his distance from now on? The man was not worth knowing — if he got dragged down with him as well, he would be finished.

"Dad, is something the matter?" Zou Ruoguang picked up his father's call.

"Ruoguang, do you know about Zhen Yingjun?" Zou Tiandi asked. "He's been possessed!"

"Possessed? What do you mean?" Zou Ruoguang was startled. He had meant to tell his father about how Zhen Yingjun had offended Wei Zhao, to warn him to keep his distance from Zhen Yingjun and not let the Zou family be dragged in. But then he heard that Zhen Yingjun had been possessed, and for a moment he was dumbstruck, unable to make sense of it. "How was he possessed? Wasn't he perfectly fine before?"

"Oh? You didn't know? Well, of course — it was after he played billiards that he went out and got possessed..." And so Zou Tiandi recounted to his son the whole business of how Zhen Yingjun had been possessed, then said: "Ruoguang, you're all right, aren't you? If you're fine, then stay far away from that creature Zhen Yingjun. Don't let him drag you down with him!"

"Dad, that's just what I wanted to talk to you about!" The moment Zou Ruoguang heard how Zhen Yingjun had been possessed, he grew all the more certain: he must have nothing more to do with the Zhen father and son. They had offended Wei Zhao, and that meant certain death! He said hurriedly: "Dad, possessed? That's not it at all. Do you know who he offended? Do you know who he was playing billiards with?"

"Oh? Not possession? Who did he offend?" Zou Tiandi was taken aback; he had the feeling his son knew the truth of it.

"He offended the Great Immortal Lin!" Zou Ruoguang said, a note of terror in his voice. "The one he was playing billiards with was a friend of the Great Immortal Lin. He made the Great Immortal Lin unhappy, and so naturally he ended up the way he is! Dad, didn't you say so yourself? The Great Immortal Lin is almighty — omnipotent!"

"Gah!" The instant Zou Tiandi heard the name Great Immortal Lin, he suffered a violent fright. He thought: no wonder Zhen Yingjun has turned into this pitiful state — so he offended Wei Zhao! Well, then it all makes sense! Once you've offended Wei Zhao, no great immortal of any kind is of any use.

"Ruoguang, those Zhen father and son are veritable stars of calamity. It seems this whole business of negotiating a partnership with them has been a complete failure. I don't dare play games with them anymore — let them work out the gambling ship business on their own. Send them packing at once, before they drag our Zou family down with them!" Zou Tiandi said, making his decision on the spot.

"Yes, that's what I was thinking too. Zhen Yingjun doesn't know death when he sees it — he even meant to set his sights on those two girls around Wei Zhao. I warned him that Wei Zhao was formidable, but he wouldn't listen. And what came of it? He stirred up disaster, didn't he?" Zou Ruoguang sighed.

"All right, I understand. The Great Immortal Lin hasn't taken his anger out on you, has he?" That was what Zou Tiandi feared above all. As for whether the Zhen father and son lived or died, it had nothing whatever to do with him.

"No. Earlier there was a red-haired fellow who provoked the Great Immortal Lin, and I even did him the favor of teaching that red-haired punk a lesson. You could tell the Great Immortal Lin was quite pleased!" Zou Ruoguang said, very cautiously.

"That's good!" Zou Tiandi nodded. "Fine, I'll find Zhen Yingjun a shaman to perform the rites — that counts as doing all that benevolence and righteousness require. Then we'll just send them off."

Though Zou Tiandi had been trampled on by Wei Zhao several times, it had to be said that his connections across Songshan City were still quite extensive. Before long he had found a famous shaman — one called Aku, who enjoyed a modest reputation in those parts and was invited to perform his rites at every wedding or funeral for miles around.

But whether he truly had any powers, no one could say for certain. Some said he could seize evil ghosts with his bare hands; others said he could converse with the dead. Whether it was really so, only the ghosts he had seized and the dead he had spoken with could tell.

Once Aku arrived, he began leaping and capering about as he performed his rites over Zhen Yingjun. He chanted the incantation a hundred times, skewered a yellow paper talisman on the tip of a peach-wood sword, jabbering who knew what, and then suddenly bellowed. He set the yellow talisman alight, quenched it in a bowl of water, and carried it before Zhen Yingjun. To Zhen Dazhou he said: "Young Master Jun has been possessed by something called a vengeful spirit, and that is what brought on all these bizarre symptoms! I have now, through my rites, captured the vengeful spirit. But the evil qi lingering in the young master's body cannot be dispersed in a single day or night, so he must drink the holy water for three days before he can be fully cured!"

"Master, you have worked hard!" Seeing Master Aku claw and caper about like the Monkey King himself, Zhen Dazhou concluded that his powers must indeed be extraordinary, and so he believed what the man said: "This is the incense-and-offering fee we agreed upon. Please, Master, do not refuse it!"

"Think nothing of it, think nothing of it!" Aku glanced at the thickness of the red envelope — a good fifty thousand yuan at least — and accepted it with a smile.

Tap water mixed with paper ash — that was what Zhen Yingjun drank down. Whether it dispelled any evil qi was unknown, but the diarrhea was real enough. From the moment he gulped down a bowl of that holy water, he began to have the runs, and after a whole night it showed no sign of easing.

But Master Aku had explained beforehand that this was the detox stage, expelling the evil poison from the body. So Zhen Yingjun took it as proof that the magic was working, and happily took up residence in the outhouse.

The Zou father and son, however, stood to one side throughout, maintaining an attitude of cold observation. They did not believe for a moment that any shaman could cure the illness the Great Immortal Lin had inflicted on Zhen Yingjun. Still, neither of them said much — it was enough that they knew the truth themselves; why bother spelling it out to those two?

What did the fate of Zhen Dazhou and Zhen Yingjun matter to them? Say too much, and if the Great Immortal Lin somehow got wind of it and blamed the Zou father and son — what then?

"Dad, is that really going to cure Zhen Yingjun's affliction? For real? Is he really detoxing?" Zou Ruoguang said with some sympathy, watching Zhen Yingjun vomit and shit until he had taken up permanent residence in the toilet.

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