Chapter 110: The Capital Prefecture Yamen Delivers a Corpse; Greed Blinds the One-Eyed Snake

At dawn, Bright Street was already awash with the rise and fall of human fortunes; through countless killings, it had gathered countless layers of dust.

Now that a death had occurred before their very eyes, the crowd that had gathered to watch the spectacle scattered like birds and beasts.

Zhou Da stood frozen, gripping the short-handled hatchet stained with blood. Then, as though his soul had left his body, he dropped heavily to the ground.

Lying there was the unmistakable corpse of a man whose throat had been hacked open. It was One-Eyed Serpent.

Though a man had died in the middle of the street, everyone had seen what happened clearly. One-Eyed Serpent had been the one to extort money first, and he had provoked Zhou Da again and again. Even his death had been entirely of his own making.

There were plenty of onlookers, but not one of them was willing to come forward. After all, keeping out of trouble when it had nothing to do with you was practically a cherished tradition in the Jian’an capital.

Only after a long while did Zhou Da recover his senses. Terror covered his face as he threw the murder weapon aside and muttered, “It wasn’t me. It wasn’t me. He ran into it himself. Truly, he ran into it himself.”

But there was no one left to listen. His face grew ashen.

Fortunately, Song Mo, Xia Yu, and Siya’er had not yet departed.

“You two go back first. I’ll take him to the Capital Prefecture yamen,” Xia Yu said gravely.

Song Mo nodded. He trusted Xia Yu well enough. At the very least, Xia Yu would see that Zhou Da received a fair judgment.

Siya’er hesitated for a moment before suddenly lifting her head. “I—I can testify for him.”

It was probably the first time Siya’er had witnessed such a bloody scene. Her little face was deathly pale, and even her voice trembled faintly.

Song Mo and Xia Yu exchanged a smile. The girl might have been timid, but she was kindhearted.

“Come on. Your Brother Xia can handle it,” Song Mo said.

Siya’er thought it over, then nodded and left with Song Mo.

At the street corner, she thanked him once more before departing with her bamboo basket.

Song Mo had lost his appetite for going to a restaurant. He bought a bowl of wonton noodles from a roadside stall, wolfed them down, and swayed his way back to Mortuary Room Seven.

…

Idle moments passed in a sudden rush, leaving only the ache of parting.

When Song Mo awoke and stretched, it was already six in the evening.

He was in no hurry. After washing his face with water from the well, he went to the old street and ordered a few simple dishes.

Because of his ill reputation after joining Xia Yu in teaching Niu Baldy of Mortuary Room Twenty-One a lesson, Song Mo had thoroughly fallen out with the other corpse handlers.

The moment they saw him approaching, the group scattered as though they had seen the King of Hell. They were terrified.

Song Mo did not take offense. Most of those corpse handlers had been afflicted by the five misfortunes and three deficiencies, and years of exposure to yin energy had left few of them entirely normal.

Constantly stitching corpses and dealing with the dead had given them one psychological problem or another.

Song Mo felt only pity and sorrow for them, not much resentment or disdain.

While Song Mo was eating, a carriage from the Capital Prefecture yamen slowly entered the offices of the Southern District Mortuary Bureau.

August had already passed. The mortuary clerks He Yiming and Wu Wanlin had returned to the Demon Suppression Bureau after completing their shifts, and two new clerks, Zhang Zhe and Jing Yuepeng, had taken their places.

Candles had been lit early inside the Mortuary Bureau.

Zhang Zhe was looking through the corpse dispatch register. After some time, he said solemnly, “This Song Mo from Mortuary Room Seven seems rather unusual.”

Jing Yuepeng nodded. “When we came to take over, Old He and Old Wu repeatedly told us to look after him. He must be someone with considerable influence and social skill.”

With a sharp snap, Zhang Zhe closed the register. “I hear the Mortuary Bureau is no simple place—especially the man in Mortuary Room One. He is a ruthless character. Back then…”

Seeing that Zhang Zhe was about to continue, Jing Yuepeng’s expression changed drastically.

“Chief Zhang, be careful what you say.”

Zhang Zhe stopped. After a long pause, he lowered his voice. “It doesn’t matter. There are only the two of us here.”

Jing Yuepeng could only change the subject. “Since Old He and Old Wu hold this man in such high regard, he must have something exceptional about him.”

Zhang Zhe nodded. “Then why not assign this carpenter’s corpse to him?”

“That was precisely my intention,” Jing Yuepeng replied gravely.

Thus, another entry was added to the corpse dispatch register:

“First day of the ninth month, thirteenth year of Jian’an: corpse recovered from Four Looms Street; assigned to Mortuary Room Seven.”

…

After dinner, Song Mo happened to encounter the Capital Prefecture carriage as it was leaving the Mortuary Bureau.

The two yamen runners inside were talking animatedly, and Song Mo happened to overhear them.

“Our master is truly just and incorruptible. Even a case of accidental killing like this was investigated with perfect clarity, and justice was restored to the victim,” one of them said.

“Indeed. Our Master Tang is a true upright magistrate. Besides, wasn’t that fat man from the Six Fan Gate a witness to everything? And it wasn’t as though One-Eyed Serpent had entered the yamen only once or twice before.”

The runner continued, “Yes. The world is cleaner now that such a beast is dead.”

By the time Song Mo heard this much, he understood.

The two men were discussing Zhou Da’s accidental killing of One-Eyed Serpent. The “fat man from the Six Fan Gate” was undoubtedly Xia Yu.

After a moment’s hesitation, Song Mo stopped the two runners and asked with a smile, “Gentlemen, are you talking about the case that occurred on Four Looms Street by Listening Rain Studio?”

The runners were courteous enough. One of them nodded. “That’s right. It’s that very case.”

Song Mo asked again, “And how is Zhou Da, the man who killed him by accident?”

“He was frightened, but he’s fine now. Master Tang is a fair man. He’s already allowed Zhou Da to return home.”

Seeing that the matter had been resolved satisfactorily, Song Mo thanked them and returned to Mortuary Room Seven.

Just after the evening attendance check, Uncle and nephew Wei Xi and Wei Chen knocked on the mortuary’s door.

Song Mo helped carry the corpse inside. After exchanging a few jokes with Wei Chen, he closed the door.

He lit the soul-summoning lamp and set it in the corner, washed his hands, and brought out his tools.

When he lifted the white cloth covering the corpse, Song Mo froze.

By an absurd coincidence, the corpse beneath it was none other than One-Eyed Serpent.

The body was otherwise clean. There was only a three-inch wound across the throat, the torn flesh red and white and horrifying to behold.

Threading his needle, Song Mo skillfully stitched the flesh beneath the wound with thick thread, then closed the skin with a finer one.

The sea never reveals its depths, and Song Mo did not bother stitching the wound so perfectly that not a single seam could be seen.

After a brief spell of dizziness, the soul-summoning banner appeared, the Record of Guiding Souls emerged, and the corpse’s revolving scenes began to play.

…

The corpse’s name was Yang Shen. He had grown up in Dark Moon City and, through years of scraping and clawing his way through life, had mastered every kind of shameless trick.

As a child, he would steal a scallion from a vegetable seller or snatch a piece of meat from someone’s bowl.

When he grew older, he became even more brazen. If a carriage happened to pass before him, he would somehow find a way to extort two nails from its owner.

After coming of age in Dark Moon City, Yang Shen made his living collecting rents for Yu Mofan, the leader of the River Transport Gang.

But Yang Shen had been a scoundrel from childhood. Whenever he collected the gang’s monthly dues for Yu Mofan, he would quietly pocket a few coins.

At first, Yu Mofan noticed nothing. After all, a few coins were hardly worth mentioning.

But Yang Shen soon tasted the sweetness of easy money, and eventually grew bold enough to conceal a full ten taels of silver.

As the saying went, anyone who stood by the river long enough was bound to get their shoes wet. On that particular day, Yu Mofan happened to audit the accounts—and traced the missing money back to Yang Shen.

When the truth came to light, Yu Mofan flew into a rage. He ordered his men to pluck out one of Yang Shen’s eyes, punishing him for his blindness to right and wrong.

After losing an eye, Yang Shen’s temperament became even more twisted. The people of Dark Moon City gave him a nickname: One-Eyed Serpent.

When life became impossible to endure, Yang Shen began working as a carpenter with a group of others.