Chapter 1 New Sour Plum Juice

"Here, try this, the new version of sour plum juice."

Xu Qinglang placed a cup on Zhou Ze's counter. The color of this sour plum juice looked richer than before. He swirled it in his hand, as if holding a glass of wine.

"What's different?" Zhou Ze asked before taking a sip.

"The taste is richer, a bit like old yellow wine. The kick comes later, so you don't have to wolf down your food like before. It improves your life's happiness index."

"Heh, adulter…y."

The female corpse, organizing the bookshelf nearby, said sourly.

Zhou Ze took a sip. It was different from the sour plum juice he had drunk before. This time it was a bit cool and refreshing, with a sweet aftertaste. The taste was very good.

However, it didn't seem to be the feeling he was looking for.

Just after savoring it for a short while, Zhou Ze felt a sharp pain in his stomach.

"Hiss..."

His body began to tremble uncontrollably.

That lingering sourness,

So domineering.

His fingers curled slightly, then slowly opened again. Zhou Ze nodded, very satisfied.

"You have a good heart," Zhou Ze said.

"You're welcome." Xu Qinglang smiled slightly. "I plan to use this as one of my signature side dishes. It's just a pity that there probably aren't many people who like this flavor."

"Mm." Zhou Ze agreed with this point.

"Creak."

The bookstore door was pushed open, and a group of students walked in. There were quite a few, seven or eight, all looking like "goody-two-shoes."

"Boss, what's the Wi-Fi password?" a girl asked.

Zhou Ze pointed to the wall, where it was written.

"Phew..."

The students found plastic stools and sat down, and the girl took out some homework from her backpack, distributing it for others to copy.

The winter vacation was coming to an end; this was a normal sight.

Zhou Ze naturally wouldn't be so bored as to lecture these kids about the meaning of studying or the bad effects of copying homework. He tapped on the counter, and the female corpse knowingly walked over to pour him a glass of warm water.

The girl leading the group went to the bookshelf and casually flipped through the books, selecting a few before walking to Zhou Ze. "How much?"

"Ninety-five," Zhou Ze replied.

"Here, keep the change."

The girl was very generous, throwing out a hundred-yuan bill.

Zhou Ze took the money and said nothing more.

When it was past five in the afternoon, the students had finished copying their homework and left. The bookstore returned to its usual deserted state.

Xu Qinglang wasn't in the shop; he had gone to customize the signboard, but of course, he wouldn't customize the kind Zhou Ze suggested,

"People eat earth their whole lives; earth eats people once" type of signboard.

Because anyone with half a brain could see that this signboard wasn't suitable for hanging in a place where people eat; it was more suitable for hanging on either side of a grave.

The female corpse was quite efficient, cleaning the entire first and second floors today. Apart from occasionally posing seductively, she basically had no other flaws.

She didn't say where she was going, and Zhou Ze didn't ask.

Of course, Zhou Ze remembered Madam Bai's reminder: "Next Cold Clothes Festival, cremate the corpse with bamboo and wood."

Zhou Ze wasn't sure if Madam Bai knew that her corpse had already developed sentience.

If she did know, but still entrusted it to him, and at the same time told him the method and time to cremate her, what did that mean?

Last night, the female corpse had also admitted that even if Zhou Ze were to kill her, she wouldn't self-destruct to prevent the leakage of baleful aura from affecting innocents and causing Madam Bai in Hell to be implicated.

However,

Madam Bai seemed to just want to cleanly get rid of this trouble of hers.

From this perspective,

This female corpse, whom he regarded as a maid,

Was actually a pitiful person.

"What's your name?" Zhou Ze asked.

"My surname is Bai," the female corpse replied.

"Bai what?"

"Bai Yingying."

"Bai Yingying?"

Zhou Ze nodded. This name was a little strange.

"Actually, you don't have to eat so laboriously," the female corpse stretched lazily, her impressive figure accentuated. "It's like how you can sleep soundly when you sleep with me.

"Your soul is tainted with the aura of Hell, but your body is still that of a living person.

"You need to sleep, you need to eat, to replenish your physical body, but your soul doesn't need these things, so it instinctively feels repulsed and rejects them."

"Continue," Zhou Ze said.

"I can feed you in the future." The female corpse smiled shyly. "Food that has passed through my mouth, carrying my fluids,

"Is equivalent to carrying the aura of a ghost. When you eat it again, you won't feel so uncomfortable."

Zhou Ze suddenly understood why he had found that glass of water sweet last time. It wasn't because the female corpse's mouth was sweet, but because of this reason.

"Thank you."

"You're welcome."

A man wearing a leather jacket walked in from outside the shop. The man's clothes were a bit countrified, his hair was messy, and his face was flushed; he had probably been drinking.

He walked around outside twice before finally pushing open the bookstore door and walking in.

At first, Zhou Ze didn't pay attention, but soon, Zhou Ze's gaze narrowed slightly.

He knew this man.

Sun Tao, his former assistant, a… very promising young doctor.

The female corpse's eyes also narrowed slightly. She reached out and gently poked Zhou Ze's waist, murmuring:

"Lord Above, um, can I eat it?"

Eat people?

Zhou Ze frowned slightly.

"Lord Above, haven't you noticed what's on that person's back?"

After this reminder, Zhou Ze stood up and looked. There was actually a dark, black thing hanging on the man's back.

Ordinary people might not know what it was, because it did look quite abstract, somewhat like a black worm, but with some special humanoid features.

But Zhou Ze, because of his previous profession, recognized it at a glance—a premature infant.

"Wuu wuu wuu... wuu wuu wuu..."

As if because Zhou Ze had noticed him, the infant let out a soft cry.

This voice was somewhat familiar. Zhou Ze began to search his memory for relevant sources. Finally, he found the familiar origin.

Nurse Chen.

To be precise, it was the sound that had once come from Nurse Chen's stomach, though at that time only Zhou Ze could hear it.

Zhou Ze didn't feel any secret joy at being able to do a "paternity test."

What surged in his heart was only sorrow.

That child, he still couldn't keep him?

The female corpse said she wanted to eat him, not referring to the person, but to the infant's soul.

Zhou Ze glared at her. The female corpse pouted and didn't dare to say anything more, only swallowing her saliva unwillingly to the side, while also reaching out to support her heavy breasts aggrievedly:

"I don't eat the food of living people, and every night I have to be picked and gathered baleful aura like a furnace top.

"If I don't replenish myself, these will shrink, and then you won't be able to peek at me when I'm working."

Zhou Ze was stunned for a moment. She had actually been paying attention to his gaze the whole time?

"You naughty ghost," the female corpse said coquettishly.

"Boss, do you have wine?" Sun Tao called out.

"Go next door," Zhou Ze replied, but still stood up and poured him a glass of water.

After all, he was a little brother he had brought along before. He had grown up in an orphanage, and Sun Tao had grown up in a single-parent family. Back then, he had been blind to even the likes of the infatuated Dr. Lin, but he had been very caring towards this little brother named Sun Tao.

For no other reason than that the two were very similar in personality. Their childhood experiences made them understand the meaning of struggle and effort, and they both wanted to strive to live and fight to prove themselves.

"Pfft... hahahahaha..." Sun Tao took the water, took a big gulp, and then laughed. "Boss, why are you looking at me like that? I'm not interested in men."

"Oh," Zhou Ze responded.

With such a beautiful man living next door, I wouldn't be interested in you.

Sun Tao sat down on the plastic stool, bit his lip, and then shook his head.

"Boss, do you have children?"

"We're not ready yet, he thinks I'm too young," the female corpse interjected from the side, desperately adding to the drama.

Sun Tao looked up at the female corpse. Although the female corpse had a full figure and was tall, she looked to be only a high school student in age, and immediately laughed:

"You are indeed still young."

The female corpse turned her face away unhappily, and then swallowed another mouthful of saliva.

"I originally had a child," Sun Tao said with some emotion.

Zhou Ze really wanted to say, you do have a child, your child is hanging on your back.

With the development of modern medicine and the "modernization" of people's thinking, abortion and induced labor are no longer such glaring words, but few people understand that the resentment of infants who fail to be born is actually the greatest.

These types of aborted infants are also the easiest to turn into ghosts, but of course, their ability to seek revenge is actually very weak.

At most, because of resentment, they will entangle their so-called parents for a period of time, and then they will dissipate.

The female corpse said she wanted to eat him, because these types of infants, because they weren't completely born, are like seeds that haven't sprouted, and have extremely high "nutritional value" for existences like the female corpse.

"What happened?" Zhou Ze asked. "Your girlfriend didn't agree?"

Zhou Ze remembered that although Nurse Chen was very uneasy and surprised at the time, she had said that she would keep the child.

"No, she was willing, but I wasn't. I chickened out. I made her abort the child."

For some reason, Sun Tao really wanted to talk to this bookstore owner. He found a familiar feeling of an older brother on this bookstore owner.

And that older brother had passed away more than half a year ago.

"Chickened out?" Zhou Ze asked.

"Her parents originally looked down on me. Heh, their family is in very good condition." Sun Tao raised his head, seemingly trying to suppress his tears.

"But what's done is done," Zhou Ze said.

"But I didn't want to use this to blackmail their family. I didn't want my colleagues, my friends, to think that I had entered their family's door by this means;

"I didn't want others to think of me as a phoenix man.

"I don't covet their family's money, or anything else.

"I don't want to have a father-in-law and mother-in-law who look down on me after I get married, or even their relatives.

"I grew up in a single-parent family, so I understand even more that dignity is earned by oneself."

"Even if she was willing?"

"Her willingness is her willingness, but I'm not willing. I want to live with dignity.

"Heh, when I first started out, an older brother told me that dignity and how others treat you are earned with your own hands. I haven't achieved anything yet, so, I don't want..."

Zhou Ze took a deep breath and then asked, "Did that older brother ever tell you another sentence?"

"What?" Sun Tao asked in surprise.

"That is, when you're enjoying yourself, don't forget to wear a con…dom."

After saying that, Zhou Ze directly raised his fist and punched Sun Tao in the face.

"Bang!"

Sun Tao inexplicably took a heavy punch and fell to the ground, looking dazed.

"Don't look for excuses, don't talk about dignity, don't say anything else,

"You're just selfish, completely and utterly selfish."

After saying that,

Zhou Ze kicked Sun Tao, who was lying on the ground.

"Bang!"

Sun Tao curled up, he was in great pain, and he was also drunk, but he still shouted angrily:

"Are you sick, hitting people!"

"Yes, I'm sick, I was just freaking blind to have thought about cultivating and giving you a hand!"

Just at this moment,

The curled-up mass that was hanging on Sun Tao's shoulder crawled to Zhou Ze's feet,

Making "squeak squeak squeak" sounds,

The female corpse heard it,

Zhou Ze also heard it,

But Sun Tao couldn't hear it,

His unborn child, who hadn't truly seen this world,

At this time, was actually baring its teeth,

And howling angrily,

At the person who hit his father...