Chapter 120: The Secret of Building Thirteen

“Pi Xiu? Why would it have anything to do with dropping this wallet?” I asked, holding the wallet in confusion.

“Don’t you know? The Pi Xiu is a fierce beast that represents the swallowing of wealth; it takes in but never lets out,” Mo Qingyan said.

“It was originally an object used to seek fortune.”

“That Yansheng object only needed a slight modification to exert its original power.”

Xiao Qing had mentioned to me earlier while we were shopping that the Pi Xiu symbolized wealth, which was why she suggested I buy one.

I hadn’t expected the effect to be so instantaneous; Mo Qingyan had only made a small adjustment, and I immediately received a windfall.

“But isn’t this a bit inappropriate? This money belonged to that bizarre freak; it feels unclean.”

“What if it’s been tampered with, and taking it causes some misfortune, or the people behind him come knocking?”

Having recently used “buying-life money” to scheme against Cao Bao, I was extremely wary of such unexpected windfalls.

“Rest assured, this is wealth swallowed by the Pi Xiu.”

“Even if there were an issue originally, the Pi Xiu would neutralize it.”

“How could wealth consumed by a fierce beast leave any karmic debt for you?”

“If you’re still uneasy, I have another method…”

Before Mo Qingyan could finish her sentence, Bai Yue suddenly let out a small gasp. “Ah?”

“What’s wrong, Yue’er? Did that man from just now do something?” Mo Qingyan asked with concern, having been interrupted.

“No… wasn’t he just killed?” Bai Yue uttered a spine-chilling sentence.

Both Xiao Qing and I wore expressions of shock.

“He wasn’t killed by the Gu poison?” Mo Qingyan asked solemnly.

At the same time, she gestured for us to return to the room first and locked the door before continuing the conversation.

“No, he was killed suddenly by someone else. He didn’t even make it out of the residential area.”

“I originally intended to follow him to see where he would run to,” Bai Yue said.

Xiao Qing added from beside me, “Xiao Yue can sense the location of anyone she has placed a Gu on.”

“If the conditions are met, she can even share the vision of the person afflicted by the Gu.”

“Could it be the person behind him killing him to keep him quiet?” Mo Qingyan proposed a guess.

“It doesn’t seem like it. His death was too sudden.”

“He seems to have been killed in a secluded corner of the neighborhood.”

“I’m sending my Natal Gu bug to check the situation,” Bai Yue said.

Only then did I remember that Bai Yue still had her Natal Gu bug collecting residual souls in the rose bushes.

Moreover, my Golden Bee Gu could also share its vision, so I asked: “Can you point me to the location? I want to send my Golden Bee Gu to take a look too.”

“I want to see exactly who is committing murder.”

I couldn’t bear not knowing if there was a killer nearby.

Furthermore, that man with the displaced face had just been in a conflict with us, and his wallet had ended up in my hands.

If the killer was coming for us, or if they found traces of us from the man and followed the trail to our door, it would be bad.

“Correct, one must always be on guard against others. Yue’er, I want to see as well; release another Gu bug,” Mo Qingyan agreed.

“Then I’ll release one more. You have your Golden Bee Gu follow it.”

Bai Yue opened her palm, upon which sat a white moth with wing patterns resembling human eyes.

Mo Qingyan took out her red pencil and lightly tapped the moth.

Then, she adjusted her black-framed glasses, pulling them slightly further from her face as if adjusting the focus.

It seemed this allowed her to synchronize with the Gu bug’s vision.

“Go.” Bai Yue pushed her hand upward, and the moth flew out.

I immediately ordered the Golden Bee Gu to follow, and the two insects flew out from the balcony.

The moth led the way with the Golden Bee following behind.

The two insects flew one after the other toward a corner of the residential area.

There were very few people still walking outside in Liubaiyuan.

The area of Liubaiyuan was quite large, with many places I had never visited.

The direction the moth Gu was heading was toward the back of Building 13, a place where few people ever went.

At night, it was pitch black.

Looking closely, that area seemed to be a trash incineration zone.

There was a small grove of trees by the wall, and the perimeter wall was relatively low; perhaps the man had intended to climb over the wall to escape from here.

“He died right here.” Bai Yue had the moth land on a tree in the grove.

Below, splashes of blood could indeed be seen on the ground.

“There are only bloodstains. Where is the body?” Mo Qingyan asked.

I truly didn’t know what method she was using to synchronize her vision with a Gu bug that didn’t belong to her.

“The killer moved it. It doesn’t matter; he was afflicted by my Gu poison, so I know exactly where he was moved to.”

After Bai Yue spoke, the white moth took flight again.

This time, it flew directly toward Building 13.

The Golden Bee Gu followed the moth into the building.

However, after entering the stairwell, the moth flew downward, appearing to head for the basement.

At the same time, I saw those scribbled “ghost-warding” talismans on the walls again.

They looked as if they had been drawn with blood and then dried by the air.

“Those are Daoist patterns for suppressing ghosts, but by using blood to write them, they’ve turned from the righteous path into sorcery.”

Mo Qingyan recognized these talismans through the moth’s vision.

“What happens if they become sorcery? Will they attract ghosts instead?” I asked.

I had been curious and confused about those eerie scribbles in the stairwell for some time.

“No, the ghost-suppressing effect still exists.”

“But much like a ‘human pillar’ sacrifice, sorcery yields quick results but often requires a much greater price to be paid later.”

“Brother Xiao, what about you guys? Did you see the killer?” Xiao Qing asked somewhat anxiously.

She was the only one who couldn’t see the scene and could only guess the situation through our conversation.

“Almost. They’re just ahead,” Bai Yue said.

As we descended the stairs, we could already see blood dripping on the steps.

The bloodstains formed a continuous trail, and much of it was old, having turned black and clotted.

After reaching the second basement level, the space suddenly widened significantly.

In the darkness ahead, a partially ajar metal door could be seen, with cold white light shining from within.

This wasn’t a mere figure of speech; cold air was indeed drifting out from the crack in the door.

I could feel that the Golden Bee was very reluctant to enter, as insects are naturally afraid of the cold.

However, under Bai Yue’s command, the moth had already flown in ahead of us, and the Golden Bee squeezed in after it.

Inside was a cold storage room filled with frost and ice.

Fresh red meat was hanging everywhere.

The floor was covered in a thick layer of frozen blood and filth, which had turned blackish-red over the years.

In the middle of the cold storage, an old man wearing thin clothing stood there sharpening a knife.

The blade was covered in blood.

On the table beside him lay the tall, thin man; his displaced facial features looked even more horrifying in death.

At this moment, his twisted features were frozen, and his asymmetrical eyes had lost their focus.

There were seven or eight stab wounds on his chest, and blood continued to flow out.

“It’s him! It’s the old man who sells snake-bird meat!”

I recognized the knife-sharpening old man at a glance.