newbobooks Chapter 055 Cat Corpse Under the Beam
Chapter 055 Cat Corpse Under the Beam
As Lu Zhiyuan finished inspecting the shop and was about to leave, the carpenter chased after her, looking at her with a hesitant expression.
Remembering that he had a seventy-year-old mother, a sick wife, and a newborn child at home, Lu Zhiyuan asked with her hands clasped, "Is your family facing financial difficulties and you want an advance on your wages?"
The master craftsman had never heard of being able to receive an advance on wages for working for someone, and he shook his head in bewilderment.
Lu Zhiyuan then asked, "Do you want me to find you a doctor? What illness does your wife have? I do know Physician Jiang from the palace."
The master shook his head, embarrassed, and said, "My wife fell ill during her postpartum period, and the imperial physicians in the palace can't cure her. Even if they could, we can't afford the money. I'm not looking for the young lady because of my family's situation, but because someone has tampered with the shop. The young lady is a good person, and I can't just stand by and watch her be harmed by bad people."
Lu Zhiyuan unearthed a cat's corpse under the floor tile directly opposite the beam, and discovered a strange painting on the beam above it. Upon seeing the cat's corpse and the painting, the carpenters present all paled; they recognized it as a harmful evil spell, strictly forbidden.
The cat was a common tabby cat, with no external injuries, no obvious signs of being tied up or buried alive, and its characteristics suggested it had starved to death. The painting on the beam, after being rubbed and examined, was confirmed to have been drawn with a bloodstained arrow, somewhat resembling a talisman, but different from the Taoist talismans of my memory, and the central part resembled the character "Lu" from the Lu family.
"Could any master help me explain what this cat and this picture are for? How are they going to harm me?"
“We don’t know the specifics, we just heard our masters mention it when we were learning the craft,” the uncle in charge of repairing the railings said. “Carpenters regard Lu Ban as their patron saint. Legend has it that Lu Ban left behind a book called ‘Lu Ban’s Book’, which is divided into two volumes. The first volume is about Taoist arts, and the second volume is about antidotes and healing magic. But whether it’s the first or the second volume, it’s all related to the carpentry work we do.”
Lu Zhiyuan found it amusing and asked, resting her chin on her hand, "This Taoist art can be combined with carpentry?"
The uncle nodded and told Lu Zhiyuan a story he had heard from his master.
The story goes that a family was building a house, and the homeowner promised to provide meat and vegetables for the workers on the day of the roof-raising ceremony. However, when the workers finished their work and were ready to eat, they found only a few bowls of thin porridge on the table. It was so thin that you could count the number of grains of rice in it.
The craftsmen didn't say anything, they just looked at the homeowner and gave him a cold smile.
Not long after, the house was completed, but a series of strange things happened as soon as they moved in. First, the house was haunted at night, disturbing the entire family. Then, the homeowner was hit by an out-of-control carriage while he was out. He didn't die, but his back was broken, and he would be bedridden for the rest of his life.
Left with no other option, they had to hire a feng shui master. The master was a highly skilled individual; after circling the house once, he declared that someone had placed a curse on the roof beams. He claimed this person's methods were extremely powerful and that within two years, the homeowner's family would be ruined and destroyed.
The homeowner remembered the day the roof beam was raised, and asked a feng shui master to act as an intermediary so that his wife and children could go to the house to apologize to the carpenters. However, the carpenters had already moved away from their original residence.
The middle-aged man pointed at the cat in front of Lu Zhiyuan: "This cat is more vicious than the nightmare creature in the story. Miss, have you offended someone?"
Lu Zhiyuan squatted in front of the cat's corpse, resting her chin on her hand and thinking for a moment: "I'm only eight years old, what kind of people could I have offended? Could it be because I'm rich that I was able to take over such a big shop? But this money was given to me by my mother and my uncle."
Manager Lu pondered for a moment: "Perhaps they are jealous of our business, or perhaps they covet this shop. Miss is still young and doesn't understand the scheming and deceit in the business world. Right now, the most important thing is to deal with these things."
Lu Zhiyuan nudged the old man and asked, "Did this cat starve to death?"
The uncle nodded, pointing to the cat's eyes: "Isn't it terrifying? I only heard about it from an old carpenter; this is the first time I've ever seen it. It's said to be a particularly vicious evil spell. They lock a pet cat in a cage covered with a black cloth. Then they take that cage to a place full of yin energy, like a mass grave. They choose a lonely grave, dig it up, and put the cat cage inside. For the first three days, they feed the cat some food. From the fourth day onwards, they stop feeding the cat, but they let it hear the sound of food. When the cat is starving and on the verge of death, they put the food in the cat cage, and just as the cat weakly crawls towards the food, they tap its head with a special finger technique."
The man pointed to the cat's head: "It won't die immediately, but it will be paralyzed and will let out a weak, resentful wail. It will starve to death in the place closest to its food, and after death, it will have a strong obsession with the food and hate the human who killed it. The painting on the beam should be a cat-trapping talisman, which will trap the cat's soul in this place. The arrow used to carve the talisman was pulled from a dead person, and the blood is also dead blood."
Lu Zhiyuan blinked: "Will this method work?"
The middle-aged man shook his head: "I don't know, I've never seen it, I've only heard it as a story."
Lu Zhiyuan stood up, patted the uncle on the shoulder, and while the uncle was laughing, she pressed a homemade bamboo tube against his neck: "Tell me, who sent you, and what is your purpose in harming me in this way?"
"Miss, you're joking. I'm just a worker. You can't wrong me just because I've heard a lot of stories, can you?" The uncle's eyes flashed with malice, as he tried to take Lu Zhiyuan down as he turned around.
What could a skinny, immature girl with that little gadget in her hand possibly do to him?
His smile froze on his face, and numbness spread from his neck. To his horror, the man discovered that he couldn't move anything except his eyes. He looked at the cat, and he felt as if he had become that cat.
Lu Zhiyuan pulled out the small bamboo tube, moved to the front of the uncle, and picked up the cat that was emaciated from hunger: "Are you going to talk or not? If you don't talk, you'll turn into this cat."
His tongue was a little stiff, and he managed to speak: "Manager Liu sent me. He said you robbed his shop. He killed the cat and taught me how. I was just doing my job for money."
The middle-aged man lowered his eyebrows: "It's all my fault for being too greedy. I thought since you've already discovered this cat, I might as well tell you about it and maybe I can even get some reward money. How did Miss know I was the mole? I think I covered it up quite well."
“Firstly!” Lu Zhiyuan held up a finger: “Someone saw you tampering with the beams and buried a cat under these floor tiles.”
“Secondly!” Lu Zhiyuan held up a second finger: “Among the carpenters hired by Manager Lu, you are the only one who volunteered and always delayed the work.”
Lu Zhiyuan blinked: "I'm so smart, I figured it out right away."
The uncle was on the verge of tears and could only beg Lu Zhiyuan to spare his life, considering that a terrible mistake had not yet been made. Lu Zhiyuan was easy to talk to and told him to find a way to bury the cat in Manager Liu's shop and carve the pattern on Manager Liu's beam. She wanted to see if this magic would work.