My Journey to Immortality Begins with Hunting-Chapter 155 – Stuck with the Carpenters Workshop, A Dangerous Steward - Part 2

Chapter 155 – Stuck with the Carpenter's Workshop, A Dangerous Steward - Part 2

By now, Li Yuan and Yan Yu both understood. No one knew exactly how ghosts were born, but each ghost’s nature was governed by a core obsession. The ghost of the black market ghost domain had taken shape from Feng’er’s obsession; she never harmed anyone with the surname Yan, always brought ghost money to Yan Yu, and lingered silently by Yan Yu’s side. It was easy enough to guess why.

“She must have wanted to see me at the very end, but she never got the chance,” Yan Yu said, tears glimmering in her eyes. “I...I didn’t love her the way she loved me. I can’t imagine what she went through before she died. Sometimes I wish the ghost really was her, rather than just her obsession.”

Li Yuan stopped walking, and Yan Yu halted beside him. He wrapped her in his arms.

A light night breeze brushed past, and after a long silence, she murmured, “I’ll figure out how that ghost works, and then...” She trailed off, leaving the thought unfinished.

Li Yuan had no idea what else she intended to say. He knew she had something on her mind, but he didn’t press her for details. He had no idea that what she really wanted to say was, Then, I’ll create a world she’d have loved...a world where our family, and everyone we care about, can live happily.

She stayed silent because it felt far too grand and unrealistic. She was certain her husband would try to stop her, and with enough persuasion, her resolve might crumble. But the seed was already planted, watered by tears and regret until it grew into anger, compassion, and...a grand wish.

“Ghosts are too dangerous,” Li Yuan cautioned, worried. “Try to keep a balance. Don’t go pushing your luck. As long as you and Sheng’er are safe, that’s all I care about.”

Yan Yu nodded gently. “Mhm. I’ll listen to you.”

They walked on for a while longer. Then she said, “You should go see Nian Nian. She’s been really anxious about you ever since you got cursed. She’s been so distracted, throwing herself obsessively into her puppetry research. She lost her birth father; she doesn’t want to lose anyone else. She can’t think of any other way to help, so she’s clinging to those puppets, researching them and trying to grow stronger at any cost.”

“Mhm...” Li Yuan nodded in agreement, already feeling troubled by the matter of the carpenter's workshop. But he wouldn’t allow his wife to risk her life testing ghosts.

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A few days later.

A horse-drawn carriage stopped outside the small gate-tower at the entrance to Hundred Lotus Manor. Out stepped two unannounced visitors.

The first was a tall, sword-bearing woman wearing a veiled straw hat. She carefully lifted a wheelchair from the carriage and set it on the grassy ground. Seated in the wheelchair was a young woman wearing the same style of straw hat, her cheek resting on her hand as she gazed listlessly into the distance.

Her long legs, covered by snow-white sword robes, drooped without strength; she had no feeling in them at all.

“My lady, we’ve arrived,” the swordswoman, Pang Han, said.

The wheelchair-bound young woman was Pang Yuanhua. Snapping out of her reverie, she fixed her gaze on the manor in the distance and said calmly, “Please inform them that the occupant of the 14th room in the west wing has come to visit.”

A short while later, this mistress and servant were invited into Hundred Lotus Manor’s inner hall. Pang Yuanhua lifted her veil and bowed to the young man, thanking him softly, “My gratitude to you, Senior, for saving my life.”

Li Yuan smiled. “How do you know it was me who saved you?”

Pang Yuanhua answered, “Aren’t you the one who told me yourself?”

Then she added, “Everyone knows the Blood Blade Patriarch rarely enters into town. Word spread that you returned to Silver Creek without hiding it, and it happened on the exact same day I was saved. If it wasn’t you, who else could it have been?”

In response, Li Yuan took a damaged wooden figurine from his equipment slot—it was labeled Pang Yuanhua’s Wooden Doll—and handed it to the girl. “By the time I arrived, it was in the furnace already. The legs had been completely burned away.”

Pang Yuanhua accepted the doll silently.

“All of my supplies came from Pang Han,” she began. “On that day, I met her out in the wilderness. After she left, I wandered the hills with the food she gave me, trying to get back into the Clock Mansion. But...Pang Han was being tracked by one of the carpenter’s ghost servants—and it was Pang Dantai leading them.

“Once Pang Han left, Pang Dantai attacked me. I could tell she wanted to capture me and throw me into that door. I knew immediately. The carpenter ghost doesn’t just sit by and let people jam up its rules. If someone’s stalling its curse, it sends its ghost servants to force the victim through the door.

“By some miracle, I managed to escape, because a ghost servant stands out like a beacon to me. Just like how the spiritual links of your white finches connect to you, Senior, I could see a line floating above the heads of ghost servants. I ended up playing cat and mouse with Pang Dantai in the wilderness until I finally slipped onto the ancient street and made my way back to the Clock Mansion.

“Later, I went outside again... But not long after, I collapsed. My legs went numb. They were still attached, not rotting, and my blood was flowing fine, but I couldn’t feel them at all. I remembered how Shen Jiliang died and realized I was living through his death.

“I crawled desperately, trying to get back to the Clock Mansion. One by one, my calves went numb, then my knees, then my thighs, all the way up to my waist. I truly thought I was finished. But suddenly, it stopped.

“So...the carpenter ghost won’t just wait for a jam to clear up. It moves on to a new phase. In phase one, it sends a ghost servant after you, to force you inside its door. If that doesn’t work, it’ll move onto phase two and burn your doll. Whether or not that’s a victory for the ghost doesn’t matter to it. Once that doll’s destroyed, it can jump to the next target.”

“A jam?” Li Yuan repeated, thinking the word was oddly fitting.

Indeed, it was tough to completely shut down a ghost domain or eliminate a ghost; those blood-red question marks above their heads, so to speak, suggested they were impossible to truly vanquish. But they could be stalled. And once a ghost domain got jammed over and over, it was effectively out of commission.

He studied the pale-faced young woman before him. Her vitality must have been damaged by the burning of her doll’s legs, leaving her weak. Steering the conversation onto another track, he said, “When you hold your own doll in your hands, you can access true undying husk power. Want to try?”

Pang Yuanhua agreed, then clasped her wooden doll and released it again. “My ability is seeing the lines of spiritual connections.

“In the past, I could only vaguely sense them but couldn’t trace them to their source. Now, all I have to do is hold the doll, and I can follow those connections directly.”

She gazed at Li Yuan in silence, her eyes suddenly going dark and hollow, as if her irises disappeared into a wash of ghostly white. A moment later, her vision returned to normal. In a calm tone, she said, “Your two white finches—one is near Antelope Pass, the other...seems to be in Autumnlake. Besides those two, you have five more spiritual connections.”

At first, Li Yuan thought, That doesn’t sound like much of a power. But the moment she rattled off details about his two white finches, he realized he’d seriously underestimated her. This tracing ability was almost like having a seer at his side.

“Still,” Pang Yuanhua added, “using it too much tires me out. I can’t abuse it. But as long as I don’t actually trace a connection, I can see the lines themselves without spending any energy.”

She slowly wheeled herself out of the inner hall and looked toward the courtyard. Then she froze.

“What is it?” Li Yuan asked.

“There’s lines,” Pang Yuanhua murmured. “Not attached to you, Senior...”

Li Yuan glanced toward the private quarters. “Is it that way?”

She nodded. “Yes.”

“No need to check over there,” Li Yuan said. That must be Sheng’er.

“You really are remarkable, Senior,” Pang Yuanhua remarked in admiration. She tilted her pale face upward, scanning the sky. Then something made her suddenly tense up. “Wait, there’s another line. It’s high—very far away. But it lands somewhere around Gemhill.”

Li Yuan paused, startled. At the same time, he recognized Pang Yuanhua’s obvious strategic value; she could pinpoint ghost servants like a living radar, presumably because her power was linked to the same strange tracking force the carpenter's workshop used. With that kind of ghost-servant radar, he could ensure his surroundings stayed safe.

But why would there be ghost servants in Gemhill County, of all places?

“Can you get a closer look?” he asked.

Pang Yuanhua’s eyes went blank again. Moments later, she snapped back to consciousness, gasping for air as sweat beaded on her brow. Her lips trembled soundlessly before her vision spun and everything went black; she fainted. Li Yuan caught her as she slumped forward.

When evening came, Pang Yuanhua woke in a guest bed. A beautiful woman sat at her bedside.

“You’re awake?” the woman asked gently. “I’m Li Yuan’s wife.”

“Mada...” Pang Yuanhua started.

“No need for such formalities.” The woman simply smiled.

Before long, Li Yuan came to check on her. “Are you all right?”

“Yes, I’m fine. I just suddenly burned through a huge amount of energy and blacked out,” Pang Yuanhua admitted. “All I managed to see were rows of tents, and the line was inside one of them. There was a person...dressed in a steward’s uniform.

“But it isn’t a servant of the carpenter ghost; its line stretched north, incredibly far north, so distant that I didn’t even dare look all the way to the source.”

“A steward... Are the tents here in the county?”

She nodded. “Yes, around Silver Creek, I think.”

A chill ran down Li Yuan’s spine. It was bad enough dealing with the black market ghost domain and the carpenter workshop ghost domain; now there was yet another lurking presence in their midst?

He gritted his teeth. “First, let’s settle the matter with the carpenter ghost.”

Then he turned to the ghost-servant radar, Pang Yuanhua, and said in a gentle tone, “Miss Pang, get some proper rest. Your health is the priority. Don’t go tracing those lines every chance you get.”

Fortunately, Pang Yuanhua wasn’t some lovestruck girl who might misinterpret his kindness. She smiled and readily accepted her role as a handy tool, replying, “I’ll do whatever you say. If you ask me to trace, I’ll trace.”

She knew perfectly well that she was nothing more than support gear. Sticking close to Li Yuan was her only hope for a secure life. Everything else could be handled in due time.