Chapter 19 Indeed...

"Indeed..."

Hu Ma understood. No wonder this nun was called Da Zou Gui (Great Ghost Walker). Her eyesight was extraordinary. She could tell even without opening the coffin.

He had originally wanted to hire a Zou Gui to take care of things on the road, pretending to escort the coffin back. Telling her the truth wouldn't hurt. Since she had already seen through it, he smiled and said directly, "Now that you've seen it, are you still willing to help me?"

"You are a good person."

Zhang Agu mustered her courage and glanced at Hu Ma. "I know about the Qingyi ghost incident. Everyone in the village says you are a good person. Of course I have to help you when you need it."

"Besides, you are from the Blood Food Gang. You people are in contact with a lot of Jianghu (martial world) matters. It's not strange what you do."

"However, I still have to ask... You are using a coffin to hold a living person, and you are using the method of escorting a coffin to transport the person away. You are not doing this to harm someone, are you?"

"..."

"Reputation is indeed important..."

Hu Ma sighed and said sincerely, "Of course not."

"To be honest, the girl in the coffin has Dissociative Fugue. I need to send her back to her hometown and ask her parents to help her heal. I am worried that there will be trouble on the road, so I am going back in the manner of escorting a coffin."

"Letting her sleep in the coffin is nothing to worry about. She was seen by a Siming (Life Controller) from the Herb Heart Hall. She will be fine within a month or so."

"..."

"That's good. The Blood Food Gang is hard to say, but the Herb Heart Hall will definitely not help to harm people."

Zhang Agu's eyes widened as she listened to Hu Ma's explanation, and she breathed a sigh of relief. "I heard it was escorting a coffin, so I originally prepared a corpse-suppressing talisman. This was to prevent the corpse from being restless on the road, or encountering lightning, wild cats, or something that would cause it to rise."

"But since there is a living person sleeping inside, I changed it to a ghost-repelling talisman to avoid attracting evil spirits and disturbing people's peace."

"..."

"That's great."

Hu Ma then understood her intention of changing the talisman just now. After thinking about it, he quickly said, "In that case, can you put another layer of corpse-suppressing talisman on top of the ghost-repelling talisman?"

"This is to prevent people in the Jianghu (martial world) with sharp eyes from seeing through it and adding trouble!"

"..."

Zhang Agu was stunned for a moment when she heard this, turned her head to look at Hu Ma, and said, "It is doable."

"It's just that you people from the Blood Food Gang have so many tricks up your sleeves..."

"..."

Hu Ma was speechless. It seemed that the Blood Food Gang did not have a good reputation in the eyes of some people...

This Zhang Agu looked honest, but she also had opinions about the Blood Food Gang. If it weren't for the good reputation he had left behind during the Qingyi ghost incident, he might not have been able to invite someone like her to help him.

"Then let's eat first!"

Hu Ma smiled and said, "It's not too late to prepare after eating. Do you need to go back and bring anything else, Auntie?"

"No!"

Zhang Agu tightened the bag on her back and said, "I only brought this little bit. Zhao Laodie (Old Man Zhao) told me that we will set off today."

"This shows that she is really willing to help me."

Hu Ma breathed a sigh of relief. He immediately invited her over and gave her the seat of honor. The steamed white buns that were rarely steamed in the village were brought up. Four drawers were steamed in total. Eat one drawer, take two drawers, and leave one drawer for the guys in the village to eat.

Hu Ma had already told Zhou Datong and others earlier. Now that he was about to leave, he naturally had to give them another round of instructions. Zhou Datong could make his own decisions on small matters. If he was not sure about evil matters, he should look for Li Waizi. If there were any major matters, he should go to Yang Gong in the city. He should look for Xu Xiangzhu (Master Xu) for matters of money and food. He made them remember everything.

After thinking about it again and making sure there were no omissions, he said goodbye to Zhao Laohan with Steward Zhou, the coachman he hired, the two errand boys, Zhang Agu, and others. They pulled the coffin out of the village.

Logically speaking, the village was full of helpers. It would be convenient and save money for Hu Ma to call two of them along, but on the one hand, the affairs in the village also needed manpower to handle while he was away. On the other hand, the journey was long and there were many things to do.

Therefore, Hu Ma also struggled for a while, but in the end, when hiring a coachman, he hired these two errand boys.

They were also used to traveling far away. They were diligent, observant, and more knowledgeable than the helpers in the village. Bringing them along could save a lot of worries on the road.

Of course, at first, the coachman and the two errand boys were a little resistant to the job of transporting the coffin back to their hometown, but Hu Ma immediately offered three times the market price, and they immediately became enthusiastic. Running this trip, they would be able to have a prosperous New Year when they returned.

And this time, only the donkey was used to pull the coffin, but they didn't ride horses, which was also their idea.

Logically speaking, based on Hu Ma's friendship with Xu Xiangzhu (Master Xu), he could have brought two horses from the village to ride, but in the Jianghu (martial world), horses themselves were valuable and easily attracted trouble.

Therefore, they should try to walk as much as possible along the way. If there was a real emergency, they would have enough money to buy one.

They left the village at noon and headed north all the way.

Hu Ma took out two maps and compared them to determine the route. One map was drawn by the mule and horse shop for him, and the other was drawn by the镖行 biao hang (escort agency) that escorted goods. The two maps had different focuses, one on business and the other on escorting goods, but they were roughly similar.

Comparing them, they were roughly the same.

In one afternoon, they had traveled dozens of miles. Seeing that it was almost dusk, they had to find a place to settle down first.

At this time, Zhang Agu, who had been silently carrying her bag all the way and following the donkey cart, refused to sit in the cart or put her bag in the cart, had a different opinion.

According to Hu Ma's plan, they could go to the town a few miles away to find an inn to stay, but Zhang Agu said, "We are escorting a coffin, so it's not good to stay in an inn. We have to follow the rules of escorting a coffin."

"Escorting a coffin on the road, you shouldn't live in a place for the living, because the dead are prone to attracting disasters and epidemic diseases, and also attract evil spirits. The living also dislike it."

"So we who escort coffins on the road all have our own way of living. If there is a charitable mortuary, we stay in a charitable mortuary. If there is a corpse-driving shop, we stay in a corpse-driving shop. Ancestral halls and wild temples can usually be borrowed for the night. If there is really nothing, we will just make do in the wild for the night. If we drag the coffin directly into the inn, we will be looked down upon."

"..."

Hu Ma was curious when he heard this, "Isn't it easier to attract evil spirits if you stay in the wild with a corpse?"

Zhang Agu said, "It's good to follow the rules!"

Hu Ma nodded and immediately listened to her arrangement.

He came out this time to learn secretly, so he would ask more questions about various problems, but it was good to ask clearly and see clearly, but he would not interfere.

As for that Steward Zhou, he had already deeply felt Hu Ma's kindness earlier, and now he also listened to him and obeyed him. He put away the arrogance in his bones and refused to go to the town to stay in an inn, only guarding Xiang Yatou (Fragrant Girl).

On the first day out, the master lived in the wild, and he lived in an inn, which didn't seem right. The coachman and the others didn't go either.

They stopped the donkey cart together with Hu Ma and others under a barren slope outside the town, preparing to camp out.

While Hu Ma and the old housekeeper were preparing to boil water and cook, Zhang Agu picked up some dry firewood and surrounded the coffin in a circle, leaving an opening, and specially placed a somewhat thick piece of firewood there as a threshold.

Hu Ma vaguely remembered that Second Master had also done this before. This was to draw a Yang house in the wild to avoid attracting rude evil spirits.

He patiently watched Zhang Agu lay it out one by one. After setting up the Yang house, he lit incense and prayed in a low voice towards the wilderness. He only saw that the incense was burning very quickly. A gust of Yin wind rolled in, blowing the fire on the incense into a cloud of smoke.

Zhang Agu knelt in the smoke and bowed a few times towards the wilderness.

Vaguely, Hu Ma felt like he saw some vague shadows floating around, coming to the incense burner one after another, squatting or kneeling, greedily sucking on it.

Hu Ma looked at this scene in surprise. Steward Zhou, the coachman, and the helpers around him were all taken aback.

It was scary enough to bring a coffin to live in the wild at night. Why did Zhang Agu light incense first and attract so many wandering souls?

They didn't dare to breathe loudly and kept watching. These wandering souls slowly drifted away and returned to the darkness after eating their fill. The surroundings were quieter, and then they asked in a low voice.

"Although we can build a Yang house when we live in the wild, we are also occupying other people's land..."

Zhang Agu said, "When you arrive in someone's place, first offer a few sticks of incense to pay your respects and feed the enemies, so that you can have peace at night."

The crowd listened as if they understood, but they didn't dare to interrupt.

Turning their heads to look at the row of incense, they only saw that it was about to burn out. When the smoke was hazy, Hu Ma's eyes blurred, and he suddenly saw a headless ghost suddenly appearing in front of Zhang Agu, slowly reaching out two pale little hands towards her body.

"Here comes a tough one?"

Hu Ma was suddenly startled and took out the red sandalwood sword with a "Shua" sound.

But before he decided whether to stab it out, he heard Zhang Agu scolding, "Where's your head? Why did you lose it again? Go pick it up quickly."

The headless ghost embarrassedly retracted its two outstretched pale little hands and disappeared in a gust of Yin wind. After a while, it came back, carrying a paper doll's head in its hand.

Zhang Agu looked at it and said, "Put it on!"

So the little ghost put the paper doll's head on its neck, with two bright red blushes painted on its pale face, and the outlined lips exuded a creepy smile.

"It looks better this way..."

Zhang Agu praised it and specially took out a bundle of incense, lit it, and stuck it in the ground, letting it smell it there.

Turning around, she saw that Hu Ma and Steward Zhou had strange expressions. She then explained embarrassedly, "This is the little ghost I raised. He was killed by bandits during his lifetime and has been looking for his head."

"I was afraid it would scare people, so I made one for him with a paper doll, but the paper doll's head is too heavy for him, and he often loses it..."

"..."

"So that's how it is..."

Hu Ma thought to himself, "But wearing a paper doll's head, it doesn't look good anywhere..."

"...The key is, how can your little ghost speak without a head?"

(End of this chapter)