Yin energy was still swirling in the room just like during the day. Li Mazi 

was getting impatient

. However, I had a feeling that something would happen tonight. 

To avoid alerting the Yin spirit, Li Mazi and I hid underneath the bed

. E

ach of us kept a Yang Concealing Talisman. As the night grew darker, the surroundings quieted down. In the end, all I heard was He Kui snoring. 

I leaned over to check outside through the window. The sky was dark and there was no moonlight. I was more certain that the Yin spirit would come. 

However, as time ticked by, my presumption faded. At around 2:00 AM, the mass of Yin energy was still 

the same

. I 

became

 a little weary. Li Mazi was fast asleep next to me under the bed. 

It seemed the Yin spirit wouldn’t come tonight. I woke Li Mazi up and crawled out of the bed. Li Mazi got up and mumbled, “Little 

B

rother Zhang, I

 was

 having a good sleep. Why did you keep knocking

 on something

?”

“I kept knocking on something?” I was perplexed. 

Li Mazi 

said, “Oh.”

T

hen

, he 

pricked his ear

s and

 shook his head

.

 “I heard the sound of 

a

 walking stick. I thought you were doing something…”

Before he finished, I muffled him. I 

laid

 flat on the groun

d and listened

. Indeed, I heard 

a

 vague knocking sound. It sounded like someone was moving with a walking stick. 

The low noise came from the ground, though. But when I received 

a

 shovel from Li Mazi to open up the soil, 

the sound

 disappeared. I somehow managed to locate the noise. It was moving toward the door. I immediately grabbed the Sirius Whip

 and chased 

after it. 

Since I had to be close to the ground to capture the noise, after running for a while, I had to kneel to listen. When I rushed to the village entrance, I stuck my ear on the ground one more time. However, this time, I heard nothing. 

“You… You lost it?”

Li Mazi looked puzzled. I nodded reluctantly

 and brushed 

off the dirt and mud on my clothes. We returned to He Kui’s house together. 

On the way back, Li Mazi said in a low tone, 

“Little 

B

rother Zhang, I ha

ve

 a feeling that 

He Kui’s father

 made that noise. What do you think?” 

I suddenly recognized that after his serious injuries from last time, this dude seemed to have become much smarter. 

“

It should

 be him.” I nodded. 

Earlier today

, I felt that 

his

 c

orpse

 wasn’t in his grave. What happened just now 

sort of confirmed my guess

. Moreover, 

ghosts couldn’t move

underground

. He 

could be

a

 walking 

corpse

! 

When

we returned

 to the house, I squatted by the basin to wash the dust 

off

 my face.

Then, I heard 

Li Mazi

’s

 sudden 

scream

. I turned and saw his dull face gazing at the ceiling. Subconsciously, I followed his line of sight. The Yin energy that lingered in the room 

was

 gone. 

“

Uh

… What happened? Did the grandfather erase all the Yin energy?” It took Li Mazi quite a long time to pull himself together. He looked perplexed. I didn’t know what had happened, either. However, it wasn’t a bad thing that the Yin energy 

was

 gone. 

I couldn’t sleep after this. 

Li Mazi and I

 crouched with our ears on the ground

 and listened

. 

While

 the sky was getting brighter, a tiny walking noise came from the ground. I jolted up

 and shot 

Li Mazi a glance. 

He was surprised, but he soon got my idea. He la

id

 down again to listen then pointed at the ground. 

I quietly tiptoed 

in

 the direction he was pointing at. A moment later, Li Mazi’s finger stopped moving. He lingered for a moment more

. Then, he 

stood up

 and said, 

“He’s gone.”

I used the Emei Piercer to draw a circle on the ground. When I lifted my head to check the ceiling, Yin energy began to congregate and spin. 

“Do you want to dig it up?” pried Li Mazi. 

I thought then answered, “We should wait until the morning. It could be Mr. He, but the thing down there has profound Yin energy. We should unearth it in the morning.”

“

You have a point

. It seems he will come every night. We don’t need to worry 

about it running

 away.”

Li Mazi agreed.

 It wasn’t

 broad daylight yet, so we 

took 

a short nap. 

I didn’t know how long I had slept until He Kui woke me up.

He rubbed his hands

, h

is face look

ing

 strange. “Master, I just went to my greenhouse. I found something strange!”

It turned out that after He Kui 

came 

back to this countryside village, he started to build and work at his family’s greenhouse to grow some out-of-season fruits. He frequently 

visited

 his greenhouse. However, these days, as his daughter was sick, he 

wasn’t in

 the mood to care about his vegetables. But yesterday, after I had saved his daughter, He Kui wanted to go to the greenhouse to pluck the wild grass. 

Unexpectedly, when he 

got

 there, he found his big greenhouse completely clean. There was no

t a

 single blade of wild grass. 

It looked like someone had helped him take care of his greenhouse. Fortunately, the greenhouses in this village were all equipped with cameras to prevent thieves. He Kui went to check the CCTV. He wanted to see who had secretly helped him. However, the CCTV video showed that nobody had entered his greenhouse

. 

“Little 

B

rother Zhang, I think it’s Mr. He

,

” Li Mazi blurted after He Kui told us the story. 

“What 

do you mean

?”

I then told He Kui about what had happened last night. 

Yesterday I had thought that it was the stomping noise of the walking stick

, b

ut it seemed to 

have been created

 by a hoe.

It was the heart of a parent. Although Mr. He had passed away, he was still worried about his son. He Kui’s eyes turned red. “What should I do now?”

“He Kui, I think your father is now a walking 

corpse

. Otherwise, a dead body can’t move

 like that

. Anyway, he doesn’t mean harm to you

. However, 

the Yin energy that has affected the little girl seems to have something to do with a hoe.”

I analyzed the situation. The old man had come to take the hoe underground. It was also the time when the vortex of Yin energy in the room disappeared. 

W

hen he returned it in the morning, the Yin energy also returned. I needed to unearth that hoe to see how it 

had

 such strong Yin energy. 

After listening to me, He Kui became hesitant. “

Can

 you solve this without hurting my father?”

From

 my impression, he 

really cared about

 his father. I could say he was a filial son. I nodded. “If your late father doesn’t mean harm, we can talk him out of it. Don’t worry.”

He Kui looked better after I confirmed that. “Do you want to dig the floor now?”

“Yeah, let

’s 

do it now. As there

’s lots of sunlight right now, 

we won’t need to labor much!”

I went to open the window and put some more talismans around the spot on the ground I had circled

, 

before asking He Kui to start digging. 

Li Mazi grabbed a shovel and helped He Kui dig the 

soil

. However, they 

didn’t

make fast

 progress. This room was too old. Perhaps before Mr. He had built his house here, he had dumped a lot of debris to strengthen the foundation. 

While they were digging the hole, I asked He Kui’s wife to fetch me a bucket of ashes. Every time they dug deeper, I sprinkled a layer of ashes. That

 wa

s how I could save them from exerting more strength. 

As they 

began to dig

 deeper and deeper, they didn’t 

hit

 broken bricks anymore. Now

, 

only black mud came up. 

I squatted by the hole and pinched some mud, 

and brought

 it to my nose to take a sniff. It smelled of cast iron! 

It seemed the hoe was down there. He Kui and Li Mazi were sweating hard. I 

told

 them to stop and 

come up

 as I was afraid that they would be affected by the Yin energy. I jumped into the hole and started digging myself. At first, I didn’t feel that it would take a lot of energy. However, when I thrust my shovel into the soil for the third time, a strong force 

pulled

 my shovel downward

. 

I couldn’t lift it anymore. 

It seemed 

that thing had started to pull back and forth with me. 

“Li Mazi, sprinkle the ashes on me!”

I screamed, then read the Sacred Text of Daoism. At the same time, Li Mazi poured 

all the ashes that remained,

 half of 

a

 bucket full, on me. I choked, but my body felt much lighter. 

Seizing the 

opportunity

, I 

tried

 my best to dig more. I heard a low clang

 and

 recognized that I had hit something made of iron in the soil. I hurriedly shoveled around the thing and got it eventually. 

As I’d

expected, i

t was a rusty hoe. There was 

a

 dark stain on it. From my experience, 

I could tell that

 it was dried blood. 

I asked Li Mazi to take the hoe to the yard. I checked 

the ceiling 

one more time and indeed, the Yin energy swirling above our heads started to disperse. I seized the chance and relocated some furniture in the house to change the 

geomancy 

of the place. Soon, all the Yin energy vanished. I could feel the auspicious energy starting to congregate in 

the

 house. 

After He Kui 

discovered

 that the Yin energy had vanished, he picked up the shovel to fill up the hole. I stopped him 

with a smile

. “Your father will come again to fetch his hoe.”

“I understand.” He nodded

 with brimming red eyes

. 

I patted h

is 

shoulder and asked him to come to the yard. “Have you ever seen this hoe?”