Chapter 14

Chapter 14: Rat Spirit

Li Yan Er finally let out the breath she’d been holding. The grass spirit clearly didn’t like the fire. It hovered at the edge of the light, pacing in little circles, then crept forward two steps and craned its head toward them, peeking and poking as if the flames might leap up and bite.

Li Yan Er tucked herself behind Great King and peeked out too.

“What’s it doing?”

Gu Shi Yi snorted. “That little grass spirit barely has any skill. It usually hides underground to cultivate. The second it sees people, it flees—hard to find on a good day. It’s afraid of fire, yet it still dares to come closer and spy. That means some higher-level demon in these mountains is probably driving it… so we wait.”

She finished the last of her dried bun. The grass spirit was still over there swiveling its head around, so Gu Shi Yi suddenly gave a low, mischievous laugh. She reached into the fire, yanked out a burning stick, and snapped her wrist.

Whoosh.

“Aaah!”

The grass spirit shrieked and dove into the weeds, disappearing in an instant. Gu Shi Yi laughed and didn’t even bother to chase it. She pulled out the thick bedding she’d bought at the inn, spread it beside the woodpile, then gathered more dry branches and tossed them into the fire.

She stretched, yawned, and announced, “It’s late. I’m going to sleep.”

She sat down, kicked off her shoes, and scooted close to the fire to warm her feet. Li Yan Er was fine—she was a clay doll now, without the five senses, so smells didn’t exist for her anymore. But Great King suddenly sprang out of the broken clay jar, a twig still stuck on its head like a crown, and stabbed the air accusingly at Gu Shi Yi’s steaming feet.

“Gu Shi Yi! Your feet stink!”

Gu Shi Yi rolled her eyes. “I’ve been walking all day. What do you expect?”

To make her point, she wiggled her toes and started scratching like it was her personal mission. Great King recoiled as if she’d thrown a curse at it, hopping farther away.

“Hey—hey—can you not? Can’t you wash them?”

“The water’s cold,” Gu Shi Yi said lazily. “I don’t feel like it.”

Great King retreated to the upwind side and began cursing under its breath. “Lazy woman. No wonder you’re thirty and still can’t get married. Only Niu Da would take you!”

Gu Shi Yi pretended not to hear. She kept warming her feet, toes twitching, eyes sweeping the grass around them. Then she chuckled softly.

“If you don’t come soon, I really am going to sleep.”

Right on cue, a faint rustle sounded in the distance.

Li Yan Er squeaked and slid straight into Gu Shi Yi’s arms. Great King darted behind a rock. Gu Shi Yi didn’t change her expression. She merely glanced at the peachwood sword beside her, then lifted her eyes toward the darkness beyond the firelight.

A figure stepped out from the shadows.

Gu Shi Yi narrowed her eyes and studied him. He looked about twenty-five or twenty-six. Not handsome—small eyes, slightly protruding mouth, that sharp, twitchy look that screamed trouble. He wore a scholar’s robe and cap, and he even carried a book. His gait was stranger still, swaying with each step like an actor on a stage.

When he reached the edge of the firelight, he bowed from afar and spoke politely. “Young lady, I traveled late and missed the inn. Please be kind and let me borrow your fire to spend the night…”

Gu Shi Yi watched him with a faint smile, letting the silence stretch just long enough to make it uncomfortable. Then she nodded. “You’re not bad-looking. I like pretty boys. Come over.”

The “scholar” looked delighted. He bowed again, stepped closer, lifted his robe, and sat with a stiffness that didn’t quite match his gentle manners. Gu Shi Yi kept her eyes half-lidded on him.

“Young master,” she asked lightly, “where are you coming from?”

He smiled, all refined and proper, and performed another bow that was almost comical in how carefully he did it. “I am a venerable from Li Family Market. I’m traveling to Huang Village, but I lost my way in these mountains. By the time I reached this place, it was already so dark. I was panicking, and then I met you, young lady. Truly, I am deeply grateful.”

Gu Shi Yi nodded as if she believed every word. She pulled out another piece of bun and held it up. “Hungry, young master?”

The scholar stood at once and bowed deeply. He sat down about three paces from her, accepted the bun with both hands, and awkwardly warmed it by the fire like he wasn’t sure whether food could bite.

Then he picked up his book again and turned it slightly toward Gu Shi Yi, as if presenting a treasure. “Young lady, I’ve been studying the Four Books and Five Classics. The wisdom inside is endless. When I pass the provincial exam next year, I will surely become a great official!”

Gu Shi Yi stared at him, then at the book, then back at him.

Something about him felt… off. Like a cat trying too hard to meow like a mouse.

She smiled anyway. “Then I’ll congratulate you in advance, young master. May your name end up on the list.”

Out here in the wilderness, a scholar appearing out of nowhere with nothing but a book was suspicious enough to make any ordinary person wary. And Gu Shi Yi was hardly ordinary.

The scholar, however, looked even happier. He set the book down and leaned closer, blinking those tiny mung-bean eyes. His voice went thin and soft, almost coaxing. “Young lady, you are so beautiful. And I… I am not without talent. We would be a perfect match. Young lady, would you marry me as my wife?”

As he spoke, his pupils began to swell, swallowing the whites like ink spreading through water. Within moments, his eyes were almost entirely black.

Gu Shi Yi met his gaze—and her focus slipped. Her expression turned dazed, her eyes unfixed. She murmured, “Marry you… as your wife?”

The scholar’s face lit up with greed he couldn’t quite hide. He leaned in, voice syrupy. “Yes… come home with me. We’ll marry. You’ll be my new wife, all right?”

He reached for her arm and tugged. Gu Shi Yi didn’t resist, letting him pull her closer. His arms wrapped around her, and his mouth drifted toward hers—

Smack!

A sharp slap cracked through the night, clean and loud enough to echo down the valley.

The “scholar” shrieked and sprang back, clutching his face as if he’d been struck by lightning. He stumbled three steps, nearly stepped into the fire, and only saved himself by glancing back at the last instant.

“You… you… you didn’t… didn’t…”

He stared at Gu Shi Yi’s suddenly clear eyes, panic rising. Gu Shi Yi gave him a cold, amused smile.

“I didn’t what?”

She shook out her right hand. A faint milky glow clung to her palm. She lowered her head, blew on it once, and grimaced.

“Ugh. Black fur all over my hand.”

A few thin strands drifted down.

The scholar froze. His own hand flew to his cheek. He felt it—the coarse prick of fur spreading under his skin.

“You… squeak—”

That was all he managed.

His face warped in an instant. His mouth and nose stretched out, black fur erupted across his skin, his eyes remained small and beady, and pointed ears pushed up through his hair. He opened his mouth and let out a shrill, frantic squeal.

Gu Shi Yi laughed, bright and sharp. “So it’s a rat spirit.”

The rat spirit stared, bewildered, then snapped back to itself and screeched, voice high and furious, “Y-you’re a cultivator?”

Gu Shi Yi clapped her hands together as if dusting them off, smiling sweetly. “I wouldn’t dare claim that. This little Daoist priest just knows a few tricks. Calling myself a true cultivator would be embarrassing.”

The rat spirit’s eyes spun wildly as it measured her—alone, just one peachwood sword at her side. It swallowed, mind racing.

A cultivator’s essence was far richer than a mortal’s. If it could bite down and steal even a little—

It didn’t get the chance to finish the thought.

Gu Shi Yi moved first.

Her footwork was so fast the rat spirit’s vision blurred. Then—

Slap. Slap. Slap.

Her palm snapped left and right across its face like she was keeping rhythm for a song. White light flashed with each strike, and the rat spirit squealed, spinning in place.

And as it spun, it shrank.

After five or six turns, the scholar’s robe fell limp to the ground, and a huge black-furred rat burst out of it, all muscle and teeth.

Gu Shi Yi shouted, “Don’t run!”

The rat spirit bolted for the grass. Gu Shi Yi chased two steps and caught up easily, planting her foot on its long tail.

The rat spirit whipped around, snapping its jaws wide. Four long fangs gleamed in the firelight as it lunged straight for her head.

Gu Shi Yi tilted her head aside, ducked its claws, and drove her shoulder up into its belly with a brutal, rising slam.

The rat spirit flipped onto its back, legs flailing.

Gu Shi Yi bent down and seized its tail—thick as her forearm now. “Up!”

A pale glow flared over her hands. With one fierce heave, she swung the rat spirit off the ground.

Whoosh—whoosh—whoosh!

A hundred pounds of fur and rage became a flailing blur. The wind howled. The firelight stuttered over spinning black fur. Gu Shi Yi’s stance was solid as iron—legs apart, knees bent, waist driving the motion—whipping it around like wind-fire wheels.

The rat spirit had cultivated for eight hundred years in these mountains. After finally managing to take human form, it came down to seduce travelers and steal their essence. Men got a beautiful village woman; women got a scholar.

This was its first time using the scholar disguise—and of course it ran straight into a nightmare.

Held by the tail, its whole body went numb. The world spun. The sky and ground swapped places over and over. Even with its tough hide, it saw stars. Foam gathered at the corners of its mouth.

In desperation, it squealed wildly.

Gu Shi Yi barked, “What are you squealing for?”

The rat spirit remembered it could speak. “Spare me! Spare me!”

Gu Shi Yi laughed and slammed it down.

Boom!

The impact punched a crater into the earth. Gu Shi Yi yanked its tail again, stepped forward, and planted her foot on its belly.

“Do you submit?”

The rat spirit trembled, not daring to struggle.

Gu Shi Yi raised an eyebrow. “Is that a yes, or are you just making noise?”

“I submit… I submit!” the rat spirit choked out.

Gu Shi Yi lifted her foot, but she didn’t release the tail. “Good. Now tell me honestly—how many travelers have you harmed in these mountains?”

The rat spirit gagged, then forced the words out. “Daoist, this place is remote. Not many people pass through. I… I ran into two groups of bandits hiding in the mountains, and one thief fleeing the government office… Sometimes—sometimes when there was no one at all, I sneaked into the village…”

It confessed every ugly detail, breath hitching as if it couldn’t stop itself.

Gu Shi Yi listened, eyes flat. When it finished, she snorted. “Any lies?”

“I wouldn’t dare. I wouldn’t dare!”

She looked it over from head to toe, weighing something in silence. Then she said, “Fine. If you’ve told the truth, I won’t take your life.”

The rat spirit nearly burst into tears. “Thank you, Daoist! Thank you!”

“But…” Gu Shi Yi’s smile sharpened. “Death may be spared. Punishment won’t be.”

The rat spirit stiffened.

Gu Shi Yi pointed toward the mountain path ahead. “The roads here are a mess. I’m losing time. Since you’re the local snake, you’ll lead the way. You escort us out of this mountain range, and I’ll let you go.”

The rat spirit nodded so hard it looked like its neck might snap. “Yes, yes! I’ll lead the way for you, Daoist!”

“Good.”

Gu Shi Yi finally released its tail and walked to the stream to wash her hands. When she came back, the rat spirit was still sprawled on its back like a dead fish. She nudged it with her foot.

“Get up. Are you waiting for me to carry you?”

The rat spirit scrambled upright and then, in a burst of wriggling motion, transformed into a naked man on the spot.

“Hey!” Gu Shi Yi snapped, slapping a hand over her eyes. “Put your clothes on!”

A rat was still a rat. Human form didn’t fix the problem—if anything, it made it worse.

The rat spirit hurried to grab the scholar’s robe and fumbled into it, smiling nervously. “Daoist, I’m… dressed.”

Gu Shi Yi pointed at a rock. “Sit.”

Then she yawned again, long and unbothered. “It’s late. I’m going to rest. You stay here and keep watch.”

She pointed at the broken jar beside her. “If you run, I’ll catch you and skin your rat hide.”

The rat spirit shook its head furiously. “I wouldn’t dare! I wouldn’t dare!”

Satisfied, Gu Shi Yi sat cross-legged and began to cultivate. She ran her qi through thirty-six full circuits before opening her eyes again.

The rat spirit was still there, obediently guarding the fire, even tossing in branches now and then. Gu Shi Yi nodded once, pleased, and leaned to the side as if to sleep.

She wasn’t actually foolish enough to sleep without caution in front of a rat spirit. But she had Great King and Yan Er. Neither of them needed sleep. They could absorb moonlight essence—and keep their eyes on the rat spirit all night long.