Chapter 68: The Last Bus (Part 3)

The destination was still a five-minute walk from the parking lot. Chen Xiaoxuan had somehow crawled into Chen Jiu’s backpack, only poking his head out. This meant he didn’t much like the nearby environment.

Chen Jiu stopped in front of an old residential building. The white paint on the walls was already mottled, revealing the gray cement beneath. Several rusty bicycles were piled at the entrance to the stairwell, and the walls were covered with small advertisements for unclogging drains.

Old-style buildings had no elevators, so Chen Jiu had to climb to the fifth floor. Most of the lights in the stairwell were broken. Only one at the corner of the fourth floor still worked, emitting a buzzing electrical sound.

Stopping at the door of unit 502, Chen Jiu checked the information one more time. The driver’s widow was called Wang Xiulan, around forty years old, with no children, and had not remarried.

A faded Spring Festival couplet was pasted on the door. The upper scroll had curled up at one corner and been taped back with transparent tape. Chen Jiu pressed the doorbell twice before discovering it was actually broken.

Just as she was spacing out, footsteps came from far to near inside the door. The chain lock made a slight sound, and the door opened a crack. A woman looked out from inside, her expression somewhat wary: “Who?”

“Ms. Wang Xiulan? Hello, my surname is Chen.” Chen Jiu sized her up. The woman’s condition was not very good, quite haggard. It seemed these past few years had not gone smoothly.

Wang Xiulan did not relax her guard, continuing to ask: “What do you want?”

“I am currently investigating the accident of your husband falling into the river that year. Is it convenient to go inside and talk?” Chen Jiu showed her cards directly, not planning to disguise herself. In this kind of situation, being direct was actually the best way to dispel the other person’s doubts.

Wang Xiulan examined her for a while in the dim light, seeming to be struggling with something. In the end she sighed and let her in.

“Sit anywhere.” Wang Xiulan went to pour water for her, her tone flat: “Plain boiled water okay? The tea leaves are all gone.”

Chen Jiu: “Plain boiled water is fine.”

She surveyed the furnishings in the room. Several expired TV newspapers were piled on the coffee table, with a photo frame pressed underneath. In the photo, a man was wearing a bus driver’s uniform, smiling somewhat simply and honestly.

Wang Xiulan brought out a cup of water from the kitchen and placed it before Chen Jiu.

“Are you a reporter?”

“No.”

“Police?”

“Also no.”

Wang Xiulan’s brows furrowed, somewhat puzzled: “Then you…”

“Before your husband’s accident, did he have any strange behaviors?” Chen Jiu did not offer much explanation, taking out paper and pen, directly launching an interrogation mode with her.

Wang Xiulan’s complexion was not very good. She picked up the photo frame, staring at her husband’s face for a long while, then said: “At that time the police all told me not to speak anymore. Getting the money was enough. The dead cannot come back to life.”

Chen Jiu said: “They don’t believe you because they have never encountered these things, and they cannot empathize with the pain of you losing your husband. But I have seen those things. I believe you.”

These words were calm and sincere, without any embellishment or exaggeration.

Wang Xiulan turned to look at her, her brows finally relaxing somewhat. She nodded: “Good. You’re willing to listen to me speak. That’s wonderful.”

“During the period before the accident, he had nightmares every day. I thought it was just that stage everyone goes through at middle age, and it was normal for his temper to get worse. At first I didn’t pay too much attention.” Wang Xiulan fell into memories, speaking slowly: “Later it really became unbearable. I accompanied him to the hospital to get some medicine. He took it but didn’t get better. His two eye circles were black like a panda’s. Whoever ran into him would jump in fright. I said what exactly is wrong with you, are you being pressed by something? Only then was he willing to tell me the truth.”

Chen Jiu’s eyebrows moved slightly, but she did not interrupt her narrative.

Wang Xiulan: “He said he always dreamed of a river, with a person standing in the river, waving at him to come down, saying come, come down. But he didn’t know that person at all, and couldn’t see the face clearly. When that person called him, he wouldn’t go, so at first there was nothing much, just poor sleep. Later it slowly became wrong. One day he suddenly sat up in the middle of the night and said to me out of nowhere, someone is waiting for him.”

Chen Jiu silently noted down several key points with paper and pen, still not making a sound.

“The day of the accident, he was not supposed to work. The dispatcher called and asked him to cover a shift. He didn’t want to go. I said if you don’t want to go then don’t go. Everything was fine at first. Then he suddenly changed his expression and said no, I must go. No matter how I tried to stop him, I couldn’t.” Wang Xiulan’s eye circles reddened, saying blankly: “When he reached the door he even said, Xiulan, the food is in the pot, remember to eat. And then this one departure, he never came back. You know, people, really…”

She really couldn’t continue, choking up, trembling as she breathed several times, finally unable to speak further, burying her face in her palms and crying silently.

Chen Jiu felt somewhat uncomfortable watching this. She placed a calming talisman on the coffee table, pressing one corner with an empty cup, meaning to give her one for free.

“Press this under your pillow. You’ll sleep a bit better.” Chen Jiu said.

Wang Xiulan wiped her tears, working hard to calm her emotions. After quite a while she said: “Thank you, thank you.”

Chen Jiu: “He wanted you to eat well from now on, which was why before leaving, he used his last bit of clear consciousness to say that sentence to you.”

Wang Xiulan pursed her lips, nodding forcefully, a strange light flickering in her eyes: “Miss, do you have some spiritual communication abilities?”

“Mm.” Chen Jiu did not deny it: “Your husband should have been taken by a water ghost to be a substitute for the dead. His soul is still trapped going back and forth along the final route before his death. I came to ask you today precisely to confirm this matter.”

Wang Xiulan suddenly stood up, then bent both knees toward Chen Jiu, kneeling down straight and stiff: “Miss, I beg you, save him. Let him leave in peace, leave in peace… This man, honest and simple his whole life, how did he suffer such a disaster…”

Chen Jiu hurriedly helped her up, having her sit properly on the sofa: “Ms. Wang, you can’t kneel so casually. I was going to handle this matter anyway. You really don’t need to do this.”

“Good, good, I…” Wang Xiulan fumbled around in her pockets, pulling out scattered paper money: “Miss, you have a bodhisattva’s heart. I have nothing to give you. Take this money, and later I…”

“This is also not needed, really not needed!” Chen Jiu didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.

After several rounds of declining back and forth, Chen Jiu finally managed to extricate herself and rushed to the accident site of that year.

Wang Xiulan asked why the water ghost had specifically chosen her husband. Chen Jiu also couldn’t answer. Water ghosts who catch substitutes never choose people. They only look at when the target passes by, when they are closest, when they are within reach. When all is said and done, it’s all fate.

The driver being chosen was purely his own bad luck. Chen Jiu couldn’t tell Wang Xiulan so bluntly, only vaguely brushing the matter.

The closer to the destination, the more restless Chen Xiaoxuan became. After coming out of the bag, he did a long stretch. Chen Jiu knew there were many wandering souls and wild ghosts along this road.

More than ten minutes later, the car stopped by the riverside. Chen Jiu walked to the observation position closest to where the medium-sized bus had fallen into the river that year. The compass in her hand began to tremble at extreme speed, as if something was squeezing in from all directions simultaneously.

“Most High platform star, adapting without pause. Mind and heart guarded within, evil spirits do not invade.”

Chen Jiu recited incantations in a low voice, one hand forming a stance, closing her eyes and concentrating to enter a meditative state, using spiritual sight to examine the river surface. The scene before her eyes was actually quite shocking.

The river water was pitch black, like a huge black cloth that would not reflect light, swallowing all sources of light. The rotting breath was sent into the silt at the bottom, deposited over many years, stretching endlessly.

This scene truly exceeded Chen Jiu’s expectations. She had originally thought Wang Xiulan’s husband was only the second link in the water ghost substitute chain, but she hadn’t expected that this river had already seen many caught substitutes die. Day after day, year after year, they soaked in this turbid river water, hiding in the shadows, without daylight, using greedy eyes to size up passing pedestrians, their gazes sticky, trying to break free of this cycle.

Now the driver and that bus full of passengers were at the end of the cycle. As long as Chen Jiu found him and resolved the knot in his heart, she could completely sever this substitute-catching chain.

Chen Jiu flung out eight soul-stabilizing talismans. The talisman papers scattered with faint golden light, surrounding her as the center, slowly rotating in mid-air. Then she took out the soul-sending bell, gently shaking it once toward the river surface.

A light sound rang out, and from the other shore came a clear, cool breeze. The wind did not carry the rotten breath of the spirits, but instead was fresh and invigorating.

At the center of the river surface, bubbles gradually began to emerge, gurgling. Several deathly pale faces slowly floated up. Their spirit bodies floated in the air, their eyeballs almost completely black, hollowly staring at Chen Jiu who had summoned them, their entire bodies soaking wet, dripping water.

Chen Jiu counted them one by one according to the people Wang Zhen had described. They all matched. These were them.

“I’ll point out a path for you. Go peacefully and be reincarnated.” She said somewhat coldly: “If there are still any lingering and unwilling to leave, then don’t blame me for being impolite.”

After speaking, she didn’t care whether they expressed their stance or not. Two fingers joined together, pointing toward the river surface. The talisman papers circling around her flew over rustling, following their master’s command, opening a path to the afterlife on the pitch-black river surface. The black water on both sides bubbled as if boiling.

One bell opens the road, two bells guide souls, three bells ascend to the other shore.

Chen Jiu shook it a third time, slightly raising her volume: “Souls, return home. Go to the pure land of the afterlife. Rest in peace, the other shore holds no suffering. Go!”

Those several spirit bodies seemed suddenly awakened by her shout. Their eyes cleared for a moment, lining up and floating toward that path to the afterlife.

“One, two, three…” Chen Jiu silently counted until the river surface gradually returned to calm. Still, one was missing.

Wang Xiulan’s husband still had not appeared.

Chen Jiu clicked her tongue in some annoyance. Something that could have been resolved in one go, now wasn’t this just creating extra trouble for her?

She raised her hand and made a collecting gesture. The talisman papers flew back rustling, and after a snap of her fingers, spontaneously combusted into ashes, dissipating between heaven and earth.

“Still not coming out?” Chen Jiu’s feet did not move, saying this one sentence toward the river surface.

After quite a while, a blurry figure slowly drifted out from the gaps between the scattered rocks. His gaze was extremely blank, murmuring: “Can’t leave. I still can’t leave…”