His heart sank as such a secret past was exposed. He asked in a deep voice, “Which fortune teller is this? What do you think? Can she help us solve this problem? Oh, and tell her that if she can solve this problem, she will be rewarded handsomely.”

Brother Zhang didn’t dare to neglect his father and immediately turned to look at the computer, “My father is asking if you could help us solve this problem. There will be a generous reward.”

He thought money would tempt people, but An Rugu’s expression was surprisingly calm. “You didn’t even properly relocate the grave of the deceased, and you stole his burial objects, adding another coffin to his grave. This is a very bad omen. You will bear your own fortunes.”

Brother Zhang was anxious and said angrily, “Why are you like this? Aren’t you in this industry? Why don’t you help us solve it?”

An Rugu ignored him. After memorizing the ghost’s appearance, she casually said, “Your family runs a casino. This is illegal. I don’t want to get involved. Please find another way.”

Then, she changed the subject, “But I can help you catch that ghost, since you paid me for the divination.”

She didn’t want to chat any longer with this person who had such a bad temper and poor character, so she directly pressed the end call button and the person disappeared from the screen.

The audience in the livestream channel suddenly felt very happy.

[I thought they were some kind of wealthy heir. Opening a casino is illegal in many areas of mainland China. They are definitely a criminal family.]

[These days are becoming more and more complicated.]

[The son is shameless, and the father is also shameless. They deserve it.]

[The fact that she hung up the call really made my day. I don’t want to see that ugly face at all.]

[The light of righteousness shines upon the earth.]

An Rugu did some calculations and checked the information online. She found that the area mentioned by this destined person was indeed not allowed to open casinos, and it was considered illegal gambling¹.

His father ran an illegal casino.

After sending the message to the police, she put away her phone and said, “That’s the end of today’s livestream. The next divination livestream will be in ten days. See you.”

An Rugu hung up the phone, returned to her room, and took out a talisman to summon the soul of the ghost behind the third person she had been destined to meet in today’s livestream.

This soul was in a daze, without any consciousness. He held a handful of soil in his hand, lowered his head and gnawed on it, and the corners of his mouth were full of dirt residue.

He had stayed in the human world for too long and didn’t know how to gather yin energy to maintain his sanity, so his soul was about to be torn apart.

Moreover, no one made any offerings for him, and his tomb was robbed, which made him become a pauper, so poor that he was now reduced to eating dirt.

He didn’t mean to harm anyone, but he subconsciously followed the family that caused him to suffer grievance, hoping to get some offerings, thus causing the other party to suffer bad luck.

An Rugu considered this her doing one good deed a day and helped the ghost be liberated before his soul is completely torn away.

After completing the salvation ceremony, her yin emissary mission began shining brilliantly, and the title page now displayed: 

Number of souls received: 6 
Current level: ordinary yin emissary.

Three of these were the ghosts the yin emissary Bai Ye helped her send to the Underworld; two were ghosts around the destined person Chu Zhe from last time, and the other was the ghost with its desecrated grave just now.

The more work the civil servants in the Underworld do, the more they earn. The more tasks they took on—that is, the more ghosts they guided—the higher their rank would be; and the higher their title, the greater their power.

An Rugu flipped through the Yin Emissary Rulebook to read the promotion rules. A living yin emissary was equivalent to a government contract officer; the treatment was still not as good as that of a regular civil servant yin emissary.

While living yin emissaries only had ten ranks, ghost emissaries has thirty and could eventually be promoted to City God, controlling an entire city. The highest rank is Ghost King, a rank equivalent to the Ten Kings of Hell.

She seemed to be lost in thought, thinking that if she could accumulate good karma now and have a good life in the future, she might be able to become a little ghost king.

…………..

In a private middle school in Nancheng.

Qian Weilai and his friends were walking out of the school gate when his cell phone suddenly rang.

He opened it and his eyes dimmed. He said to the person next to him, “I have something to do. I’ll leave first.”

“No, no, the karaoke room is already booked.”

“No, I have something to do,” Qian Weilai said decisively. He took a step forward, separated from his friends, walked into the alley, and came to a secluded corner.

He made a finger gesture and set up a soundproof barrier before dialing the number. His voice was filled with subtle excitement, “…Zhu Xiu, what do you want to talk to me about? Finally, a mission?”

Zhu Xiu’s rank in Youdu could only be considered as mid-level, but he was extremely important because he was the overall dispatcher. He was the one who assigned tasks to everyone.

He was clearly favored by the leader for being able to undertake such a core task.

Qian Weilai felt a surge of jealousy when he thought of this, and a dark light flashed in his eyes. He was the leader’s adopted son, and all his skills were taught by the leader himself. He should be the one so favored.

As a result, he had been sent to Nancheng, which was far away from the headquarters, and had not receive any mission for 1,800 years.

Last time, he couldn’t bear the loneliness and wanted to take in two ghost servants to work for him. However, someone unexpectedly broke the curse, and he still hasn’t recovered from the backlash.

He instantly thought of the righteous person who ‘acted in a swaggering manner’ and gritted his teeth.

The Cloud Rise Temple was extremely popular now. Many people in Nancheng have heard that there was a very spiritual Daoist temple in the suburbs. Just ask passers-by and they would readily tell you where the Cloud Rise Temple was.

If he hadn’t been afraid to act on his own, he would have knocked on those temple doors long ago.

Seeing him so impatient, Zhu Xiu smiled and said, “Don’t worry, isn’t this a mission for you?

“What mission?”

Qian Weilai was very excited. His father finally thought of him!

“The gu witch has developed an insect-bird heart Gu, which is both rare and powerful and can control people’s hearts. Find a way to get it onto her.”

Qian Weilai’s eyes were practically twinkling with stars. The organization was finally going to take action against that troublesome person. He was doubly happy and immediately agreed, fearing that the other party would change his mind and rescind the mission. “Okay.”

Seeing this, Zhu Xiu chuckled, “We didn’t take action until now because we wanted to observe her strength. This time, you are being sent to find out. She has ghosts with her and a jiangshi that is almost of the bone-destroying cultivation. You won’t fail, will you?

“Don’t get risk yourself and jeopardize the insect-bird heart Gu.”

Qian Weilai was furious when he saw him questioning him. “Even if you fail, I won’t. They’re just ghosts and jiangshi, right? I’m not afraid of anything. I’ll be fine tonight.

I Livestream Divination to the World translated by Maela @ whitemoonlighttranslations.com

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T/N: ‘Number of ghosts received‘. The ‘received’ here is not like getting a letter from the mail; it’s ‘receive’ as in standing in the lobby and greeting a guest. It comes from a Buddhist phrase which means ‘receive into the Pure Land’. 

This relates to how they are called yin emissaries. While they do capture runaway ghosts, they are more often than not representatives, tasked to greet souls of the dead and usher them to the Underworld.

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Yincha (yin emissary) vs Guicha (ghost emissary). It seems to be used quite interchangeably in East Asian folk beliefs but since An Rugu is making an distinction between them… I think a yin envoy just means someone who works for the Underworld, so even a living person can be one. A ghost envoy can only be, well, a ghost. That is, a dead person.

That’s why An Rugu says maybe in the future, after she has accumulated merit in this life, she can be a ghost officer. The ‘cha‘ here can also be ‘staff’ (as in office staff/worker) or an officer. Man, the Underworld is really just one big bureaucracy 😂 

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For ‘gu witch‘, the word used here is technically ‘old woman’, but they mean ‘witch’ and not just any old woman walking down the street. 

Gu witchcraft is traditionally ascribed to women and those caught to be practicing them were subjected to horrific deaths. One test to determine if a woman is a gu witch is to cut open her belly upon death after which the gu (insects) would crawl out. If none came out, well, then she wasn’t a gu witch after all 🤷‍♀️ 

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FOOTNOTE:

1. Gambling is strictly illegal in mainland China except for 2 state-sponsored lotteries. In practice though, many secretly make use of underground online gambling sites and play in Macau and HK (where gambling is allowed). ↩︎