Chapter Ninety-Eight: Corpse Refinement

Perhaps all of this was truly orchestrated by fate. The Ghost Scholar spent merely two days composing the manuscript, and upon sending it to the publishing house, he immediately received their approval. The very next day, the publisher provided him with the printed sample, which was rushed into an overnight print run of over a thousand copies, selling remarkably well.

It was precisely because of this that Peng Li, a fan of all things supernatural, managed to obtain one of the first physical editions. This explains why Peng Li’s household possessed a copy of the Ghost Scholar’s work.

Even then, the Ghost Scholar remained unaware of his own bodily condition. One day, fate intervened again when he encountered Wang Lun on the street and noticed that Wang’s skin exhibited the exact same strange symptoms as his own.

Driven by curiosity, the Ghost Scholar approached Wang Lun and soon discovered that Wang, too, shared his amnesia, unable to recall the events of a certain day—the very day Wang was gruesomely torn to pieces by that monstrous creature.

Only then did the Ghost Scholar begin to piece together a terrifying possibility: was he, like Wang Lun, actually dead? Was the day he lost his memory the day he was murdered?

The real Ghost Scholar had long since perished; this current entity might not even be himself.

Originally, the Ghost Scholar hoped to learn more about his condition through Wang Lun. But fate dealt another cruel blow—the day they met, Wang Lun was brutally struck on the head with a beer bottle by a group of assailants at a karaoke bar.

As the Ghost Scholar recounted this, I felt the threads of this story intertwine in uncanny ways. Following these events, desperate to uncover the truth behind his physical form, the Ghost Scholar began to secretly observe us. By chance, he discovered Peng Li—the supernatural detective.

Perhaps because the Ghost Scholar had previously written about the paranormal, he had heard of the eccentric detective at the police station. With a tentative hope, he sent Peng Li an email, which led Peng Li to Water Rat.

In the ensuing days, the Ghost Scholar realized that his body was rapidly deteriorating. With no other recourse, he wrapped himself entirely in plastic wrap, only to horrify himself further when he discovered that his body was made of paper.

This revelation meant that even the version of the book we had seen was incomplete. The Ghost Scholar himself had not known the true nature of the carpenter’s wife until he realized his own body was paper-thin. Only then did he release a revised edition, revealing the final conclusion and bestowing the title: “Puppet Paper Man!”

I took a deep breath as the story unfolded clearly before me. The Ghost Scholar was never the driver; he did not even know them. Yet, he was a victim in this sinister plot. Although unaware of the reasons, it was certain that on some previous day, he too had been killed by that driver and transformed into a paper puppet.

His face contorted in intense agony, distorted by the plastic wrap that clung to him, the Ghost Scholar’s visage was truly horrifying.

“Save me... please, save me!” he begged repeatedly, his voice trembling.

From within his body came a series of cracking sounds, like bamboo splintering under pressure.

I turned quickly to Wang Feiyang, asking if there was any way to save the Ghost Scholar.

Wang Feiyang shook his head plainly. “A paper puppet is someone who’s already died once. This paper body is corroded beyond repair. Not even a deity could save it now. Moreover, the existence of a paper puppet defies the natural order of the underworld’s cycle of death and rebirth. So even if his soul descends to the netherworld, it cannot re-enter the cycle.”

No sooner had Wang Feiyang spoken than the Ghost Scholar let out a piercing, anguish-filled scream. His body emitted a cacophony of cracking noises, his suffering escalating to unbearable levels.

Without hesitation, I summoned flames to my fingertips. The moment the fire touched the Ghost Scholar’s paper flesh, it burst into a towering blaze. Fortunately, the room contained only an iron bed and a computer, so the flames did not spread further.

Soon, his body turned to ashes, and his soul drifted out, still writhing in torment. Without delay, I intoned a Taoist passage for the departed, and Qin Yu, standing behind me, joined in unconsciously.

When the incantation concluded, the Ghost Scholar’s soul vanished. We had done all we could. Whether the ritual would allow his soul to enter the underworld’s cycle remained a matter of fate.

After leaving the Ghost Scholar’s place, Peng Li immediately summoned the police officers lying in wait outside to clean up the scene. Our group then proceeded directly to Qin Yu’s Sanhua Mystical Hall.

Along the way, silence prevailed, each of us lost in our own troubled thoughts. My mind was a chaotic storm—clearly, we were entangled in something far greater than we had imagined.

Qin Yu had requested the visit. After what we had witnessed, the weight on her heart was evident. Perhaps it was because she was a descendant of the Maoshan sect, whose sacred mission was to exorcise demons and eradicate evil spirits. The current situation was undoubtedly the work of dark forces. Though Qin Yu wished to avoid involvement, she could not turn away.

She had already learned about the paper puppets from us and understood our initial theories. The immediate imperative was to uncover the true nature of those who had transformed the Ghost Scholar and Wang Lun into paper puppets—their identities and their motives.

Once at the Sanhua Mystical Hall, Qin Yu made a phone call. We did not know to whom, but afterward, her expression grew grim.

She must have contacted a Maoshan master and learned unsettling information.

Qin Yu then instructed Peng Li to investigate all recent case files at the police station, searching for any large-scale disappearances or bizarre deaths.

Peng Li grasped the gravity of the situation immediately and called his uncle, Peng Lei, requesting assistance in reviewing the entire city’s police records—not just their district, but all of Bashu City.

About an hour later, Peng Lei returned the call with troubling news: police across various counties had compiled reports of missing persons and unexplained deaths, and within these cases, anomalies had surfaced.

Peng Li asked, “What sort of anomalies?”

Peng Lei replied, “Among the missing, eight cases involved the victims dying within a month or two after being reported missing. Some deaths were strange—two stood out in particular. One was spontaneous human combustion. Another involved a missing person who reappeared on a chaotic street a month later, only to be swept up by a gust of wind, pinned to a high-voltage line, and burned to death.”

More unbelievable still were cases like Wang Lun’s—individuals who had died twice within a single month.

Upon hearing this, our faces fell. It seemed the paper puppet phenomenon was not limited to Wang Lun and the Ghost Scholar but was a widespread plague throughout Bashu City.

As we struggled to comprehend the situation, Qin Yu, who had remained silent, suddenly spoke: “Detective Peng, I need the birthdates and times of those suspected paper puppet victims.”

“Yu Jie, why do you need their birth data?” I asked, puzzled.

“I believe I now understand what those people want,” she replied.

We all turned to her in surprise. “What do they want?”

Qin Yu paused for over ten seconds before speaking two chilling words: “Corpse alchemy.”