Chapter 840 — How to Cure Illness?

That was why Zhen Dazhou's home held any number of offerings to ghosts, foxes, immortals, and spirits of every kind. What he had never expected was that the more he feared a thing, the more surely it came for him. He had barely arrived in Songshan City when trouble struck!

Looking at his son — mouth crooked, eyes askew, one leg dragging lame — Zhen Dazhou's heart ached terribly. "Son, quick, beg the great immortals to protect you and make you right again, fast as can be!"

"Right, right!" Frightened half to death, Zhen Yingjun hurriedly began praying in his heart.

Zou Tiandi turned and left the room where the Zhen father and son were lodged. He did not go to contact any great immortal — not yet. Instead, he called his son, Zou Ruoguang.

Zou Tiandi had watched Zhen Yingjun storm off in a rage but had not dared chase after him; better to let the man cool his head on his own. Zou Ruoguang was no fool either. He was already turning it over in his mind: Zhen Yingjun had offended Wei Zhao, so ought he not keep his distance from now on? This was not a man one could be friends with — get dragged down along with him and you were finished!

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

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

"Possessed? What do you mean?" Zou Ruoguang froze. He had meant to tell his father about Zhen Yingjun offending Wei Zhao, to urge him to keep his distance and not bring trouble on the Zou family — but then he heard that Zhen Yingjun had been possessed, and he was struck dumb, unable to make sense of it. "How is he possessed? Wasn't he perfectly fine before?"

"Oh? You didn't know? That's right — he got possessed after he played billiards, on his way out..." So Zou Tiandi recounted for his son the whole process of how Zhen Yingjun had come to be possessed, and then said, "Ruoguang, you're all right, aren't you? If you're all right, then keep your distance from that fellow Zhen Yingjun. Don't let him drag you down with him!"

"Dad, that's just what I was about to talk to you about!" Hearing how Zhen Yingjun had come to be possessed, Zou Ruoguang felt all the more certain: the Zhen father and son must be cut loose at once, no more mixing with them. Offending Wei Zhao meant certain death! He said hurriedly, "Dad, how is that being possessed? 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. It sounded as though his son knew the truth.

"He offended Great Immortal Lin!" Zou Ruoguang said, a note of fear in his voice. "The man he played billiards with was a friend of Great Immortal Lin's. He made Great Immortal Lin unhappy, so of course he's ended up like this! Dad, didn't you say it yourself — Great Immortal Lin is almighty, omnipotent!"

"Gah!" The moment Zou Tiandi heard the name Great Immortal Lin, he nearly jumped out of his skin. So that was why Zhen Yingjun had turned into such a pitiful wreck — he had offended Wei Zhao! That made perfect sense now! Offend Wei Zhao, and no great immortal under Heaven could help you!

"Ruoguang, those Zhens, father and son both, are regular calamities. It seems this cooperation talk with them is a total loss. I wouldn't dare keep playing along with them — let them work out their casino-ship business on their own. Get them sent packing at once, before they drag the Zou family down with them!" Zou Tiandi spoke with instant resolve.

"Exactly, that's what I was thinking too. Zhen Yingjun doesn't know death when he sees it — he still had designs on those two girls around Wei Zhao. I even warned him that Wei Zhao is formidable, but he wouldn't listen. And what happened? He's landed himself in trouble, hasn't he?" Zou Ruoguang sighed.

"All right, I understand. Great Immortal Lin hasn't turned his anger on you, has he?" That was what Zou Tiandi feared most. As for whether the Zhen father and son lived or died, that was nothing to him at all.

"No. Earlier there was a red-haired fellow who provoked Great Immortal Lin, and I helped him out by teaching the red-haired one a lesson. From what I could see, Great Immortal Lin was quite pleased with that!" Zou Ruoguang said, very cautiously.

"That's good, then!" Zou Tiandi nodded. "All right. I'll find Zhen Yingjun a spirit-medium to perform the rites — that will be as far as my benevolence goes. Then we send them on their way."

Though Wei Zhao had trodden on Zou Tiandi any number of times, it had to be said that his connections in Songshan City were still quite extensive. Before long he had found a famous master of the spirit-dancing rites. This master was called Aku, and he enjoyed a modest reputation in these parts — whenever a family had a wedding, a funeral, or any other rite to perform, they sent for him.

But whether his arts actually had any power, no one could say for certain. Some claimed he could seize wicked ghosts bare-handed; others said he could converse with the dead. Whether any of it was true, only the wicked ghosts he had seized and the dead he had conversed with could possibly know.

When Aku arrived, he began leaping and capering about, performing his rites over Zhen Yingjun. He chanted his incantations a hundred times over, fixed a yellow paper talisman on the tip of a peachwood sword, jabbered a stream of gibberish that no one could make out, then suddenly let out a thunderous shout, set the yellow talisman alight, quenched it in a bowl of water, and carried it before Zhen Yingjun. To Zhen Dazhou he declared, "Young Master Jun has been possessed by a thing called a vengeful spirit, and that is what has brought on all these bizarre symptoms! I have now performed the rites and captured the vengeful spirit. However, the evil qi remaining in Young Master Jun's body cannot be dispelled in a single day or night. He must drink the sacred water for three days before he can be fully cured!"

"My thanks for your hard work, Master!" Seeing Aku flail about like Sun Wukong himself, Zhen Dazhou concluded that the man's powers must truly be extraordinary, and so he believed every word. "Here is the offering money we agreed upon. Please, Master, do not refuse it!"

"Surely, surely!" Aku glanced at the thickness of the red envelope — a full fifty thousand at least — and took it with a smile.

Tap water mixed with paper ash — and Zhen Yingjun drank it down. Whether it drove out the evil qi, no one could say, but the diarrhea was quite real. From the moment he downed that bowl of sacred water, he began to run, and he ran all night with no sign of improvement.

But Master Aku had explained beforehand that this was the detoxification stage, the expulsion of the evil poison from the body. So Zhen Yingjun took it as proof that the magic was working, and happily ensconced himself in the outhouse.

The Zou father and son, however, had kept to one side the whole time, watching with cold, aloof eyes. They did not believe for a moment that some spirit-dancing shaman could cure the illness the great god Lin had inflicted on Zhen Yingjun. Yet neither of them said a word about it. This was a matter best kept to themselves; why bother telling the others?

What did the fate of Zhen Dazhou and Zhen Yingjun matter to them? Say too much, and if the great god Lin got wind of it, he might bring down blame on the Zou father and son. What then?

"Dad, is this really going to cure Zhen Yingjun's ailment? True or not? Is he honestly purging the poison?" Zou Ruoguang watched Zhen Yingjun vomit and shit, until at last the man took up permanent residence in the toilet, and said with a touch of sympathy.