Chapter 465 - 363: Burning Battleships?
"Too bad a disobedient son like you won’t be so lucky. You and your wife just take care of yourselves up there. I know some things have been happening recently. I may not be able to do much, but I can still protect our Zhang Family."
The moment the words left his mouth, Uncle Zhang and Aunt Zhang saw two copper-colored, paper-like objects floating before them.
The moment they reached out and touched the objects, they vanished with a WHOOSH.
’Did they... enter our bodies?’
"Ordinary soul bodies, or the abominations in the mist, as you might call them, won’t be able to harm you. Not unless they’re at the Ghost King Level."
Uncle Zhang and Aunt Zhang were stunned.
Uncle Zhang, in particular, felt a surge of panic. ’Did I guess wrong?’
’Did the old man really give us the Jade Key so my wife and I would have to venture into that mist at our age?’
’If the old man finds out I gave the Jade Key away, he won’t be upset, will he?’
After a moment’s thought, Uncle Zhang decided to tell him the truth.
"You gave the Jade Key to Wen Ying?"
"Sister Wen? Sister Wen is my benefactor! Sister Wen is the best person in the world!" The little girl standing beside Mr. Zhang suddenly grew excited upon hearing Wen Ying’s name.
"Oh? And what about Grandpa?" Mr. Zhang asked, smiling at the little girl by his side.
"Grandpa, you’re the only family I have in this world. The two can’t be compared. But if it weren’t for Sister Wen, my soul would have been scattered to the winds long ago, and I never would have had the chance to meet you."
Old Sir Zhang laughed. At his age, how could he possibly get jealous over something like this?
He was just teasing the little girl.
But Uncle Zhang and Aunt Zhang didn’t know who this girl was.
She even knew Little Ying, and judging by her words, it seemed Little Ying had saved her?
And what was her connection to the old man?
Mr. Zhang clearly doted on the little girl.
After teasing the little girl, Mr. Zhang turned to his son. "You did the right thing, and your assumptions weren’t wrong. It would have been a complete waste for you and your wife to hold onto that key."
Uncle Zhang: "..."
’What a loving father,’ he thought.
"That thing was meant for the little girl all along. It’s only useful in her hands. You and your wife can just take a stroll through the mist when you’re bored. I don’t need you to accomplish anything grand—just treat it as a way to pass the time."
Aunt Zhang: "..."
’How thoughtful of him,’ she thought.
"If there’s nothing else, you two can head back. And burn a few more space battleships down for me."
Uncle Zhang and Aunt Zhang: "..."
"Oh, right. Making those is a bit tricky. Have that Wen girl help you out."
Before Uncle Zhang and Aunt Zhang could even respond, the scene before them shifted.
They opened their eyes to find the sky slowly brightening.
Uncle and Aunt Zhang exchanged a look of resignation.
The old man was always so demanding. How long had it been, and he was already asking for battleships?
Flying space battleships, no less?!
After getting up and buying a fresh breakfast, Aunt Zhang told Wen Ying all about her dream from the previous night.
"Do you know that little girl?"
Wen Ying nodded. "I do. Actually, Auntie, you might know her too, you just haven’t met her."
"I know her?" Aunt Zhang pondered for a moment; she really couldn’t recall knowing such a young girl.
"Her mother came to my clinic a while ago. After the daughter died from a terminal illness, her grandparents sold her off for a ghost marriage."
Hearing this, Aunt Zhang remembered.
’That family was just asking for bad karma!’
She never would have thought it was that little girl. She was so adorable, and yet, the way she appeared in the dream—dressed in a lavish, ancient-style gown, a short sword in her hand... She had such a presence about her.
’She must be a practitioner of some sort.’
Aunt Zhang sighed with emotion as she listened to Wen Ying recount how she had sent the girl off, hoping she might meet Mr. Zhang in the afterlife.
She never expected it to actually happen.
’This must be fate.’
"Little Ying, about those space battleships..."
Aunt Zhang felt a bit awkward. After all, Mr. Zhang had said that Wen Ying should be the one to handle it.
Burning those things for Mr. Zhang had, to varying degrees, made both her and her husband fall ill in the past.
And now they were asking someone else to do the same.
"Auntie, it’s no trouble at all. Don’t worry."
"How is it not a big deal? Do you know how big those battleships are? How much energy will that consume? You’re still so young. What if it harms you..."
Aunt Zhang was still worried. Though she knew Wen Ying was incredibly capable, these were matters concerning the afterlife, which were bound to be draining on a person’s vitality.
Wen Ying didn’t respond, simply taking a sheet of yellow paper from her pocket and laying it flat.
Her fingers began to fold, moving as nimbly as a butterfly.
After folding the paper into a somewhat three-dimensional shape, Wen Ying set it down.
Aunt Zhang looked at the object. It vaguely resembled one of those battleships—though she’d never actually seen one, so she couldn’t be sure—but it felt like something was missing.
She then watched as Wen Ying took out several more identical sheets of paper from her pocket.
She began folding again.
An hour later, after countless steps of folding, cutting, and pasting, the process looked far too complex for her to remember all the details.
Aunt Zhang knew she could never do it herself; such intricate work was a true test of skill.
An enormous battleship stood before them.
"See, Auntie? It’s done," Wen Ying said with a smile.
Aunt Zhang sighed. The object was complete, but burning something like this was the dangerous part.
Its complexity was dozens of times greater than the trinkets she and her husband had burned before.
’The drain on one’s vitality must be proportionally greater, too...’
Before she could continue her train of thought, she watched as the battleship, with no external force acting on it, simply floated into mid-air.
Not only that, but Aunt Zhang sensed an aura surrounding the battleship—an aura she found somewhat unsettling.
But it was one she had encountered somewhere before.
That’s right... it was like the one from the dream, from Mr. Zhang’s side, wasn’t it?
Aunt Zhang’s heart skipped a beat.
’Could it be that Wen Ying could actually create objects that connected directly to the afterlife without draining any vitality?’
"Auntie, when you and Uncle burn these things, you still expend your own vital energy, even with Mr. Zhang’s protection. For me, though, it doesn’t have much of an effect. Otherwise, why would Mr. Zhang have told you and Uncle to give the key to me?"