Chapter 29: Soul Locking Knot

To be honest, my second sister had been tormented to this state, and they hated that female ghost deeply, wishing it would disappear immediately. But there were two complications. First, it involved me. Second, that sentence about most of them being pitiful beings kept striking at their hearts.

For a moment, they could not decide. After a long silence, my father finally said, “Master Jiang, do whatever you think is best.”

As for me, I stood there like I had been struck by a bolt from the blue, my hands and feet ice cold, my mind filled with only one thought. Was my second sister harmed because of me? Did I attract that ghost?

Old Man Jiang glanced at me. He clearly did not have time to comfort me. Instead, he pulled out a roll of red string from his bag. Only then did I notice he was carrying a yellow cloth pouch on his back all along, just that it was not obvious.

After taking out the red string, Old Man Jiang shook it loose. It spread out, and he studied it carefully for a while before beginning to bind it around my second sister according to a special pattern.

The way he tied the red string was extremely complicated. Even a single knot seemed to follow some profound rules. I had no idea what he was doing at all.

What was he going to do next? And would something as ordinary as red string even work?

Old Man Jiang spent more than half an hour on the knots. The entire process was extremely intricate. In the end, all the knot ends gathered at her chest, where he tied the final knot, the largest and most complex of them all, which took him another ten plus minutes.

“All done.”

After finishing, he wiped the sweat from his forehead. It felt as if tying those knots had been extremely exhausting. I also noticed that every time he completed a knot, he would mutter something under his breath, fully focused, not allowing even the slightest distraction.

After he was done, I looked at my second sister again. Her limbs and even her head were wrapped in red string, with a knot every few inches, and a large knot at her chest. She looked as if she had been completely bound up.

I did not know if it was my imagination, but I felt that after this work, her expression seemed a little more stable.

“Master Jiang, tea.”

My mother handed him a cup of tea. He took it, drank a sip, and set it down before speaking slowly.

“This is the Soul Locking Knot. The red string used has also been specially treated. What I am doing is locking in your second daughter’s living soul. During this period, because of everything that has happened, her soul inside her body is already extremely unstable. Even a slight shock could force it out of her body. On top of that, the evil ghost has been entangling her night after night and forcefully invading her living body, making it even easier for her soul to be pushed out.”

My parents listened with heavy hearts. So their daughter had been suffering this kind of torment every single day, and as parents they were completely powerless.

Speaking of this, Old Man Jiang gently patted my second sister’s hair with a trace of affection and sighed.

“This child has quite strong willpower. She has been struggling with that ghost for control of her body all this time. If it were someone with weaker willpower, the three souls and seven spirits would have already been forced out. If that ghost does not intend to fully possess her body, then it is fine. At worst, it would just be the situation I told you about earlier, which could even count as liberation. But if it forcibly takes over her body, then for family and friends, it would be a far greater harm.”

“Second sister…”

Hearing this, my mother could no longer hold back and hugged my second sister on the bed. My second sister had truly suffered, fighting that ghost alone all these days.

“Master Jiang, is that evil ghost trying to take over my second daughter’s body?” my father asked angrily.

“Not necessarily. For ghosts, possessing a body is not an easy matter. Ordinary ghosts cannot do it at all. Take Widow Zhou and Zhou Da, for example. If Widow Zhou does not willingly allow Zhou Da to possess her, he cannot succeed. The moment she resists even slightly, he will be pushed out. Because in the end, Zhou Da is just an ordinary wandering ghost. But an evil ghost born from resentment is much stronger. Even so, it can only possess a body when yin energy is at its peak, relying on timing, location, and its own strength. And even then, as long as the living soul remains inside the body, it cannot stay for long. If the living soul is completely forced out, it still depends on whether the body and the spirit match. If they do not, at best it can only use the body briefly before it must leave.”

At this point, Old Man Jiang paused, took another sip of tea, and continued.

Explaining all this seemed quite exhausting for him. If it were normal people, he would not bother going into such detail at all. It was only because of me that he explained so much. Later he even told me this was what he called giving a novice introduction, first sparking interest, then teaching knowledge.

“Finding a suitable living body is extremely difficult, like reaching into water blindfolded and catching a fish. So in most cases, that evil ghost is not trying to possess your second daughter’s body. It is only seeking revenge.”

“What is it trying to get revenge for?” my father asked, still confused. He could not think of anything in our family that would make a ghost seek revenge.

“Evil ghosts do not need reasons to harm people. The greater their resentment, the more people are affected. But usually they seek out the one who caused their grievance and settle the matter there. However, if that resentment is not caused by a single person but by an entire environment, then it becomes more complicated.”

“But you said the ghost was attracted by Third Child. It was originally in the village market, and nothing happened there,” my mother said, confused.

“This relates to Third Child’s nature. He is highly sensitive to yin and yang. He can naturally perceive the flow of energy in things, or even the state of the world itself. To put it simply, it is like he has a natural heavenly eye. But in this world, when you observe something, it also observes you. When Third Child sees them, they also see Third Child. Ghosts cannot be understood in human terms like having eyes or ears and using them in the same way. Their perception is different. It is complicated to explain…”

He stopped again, clearly struggling to simplify it further.

“So how did it end up targeting second sister?” my father frowned, still waiting for an answer.

But this was already beyond his ability to understand, and he did not intend to fully understand it.

“Ghosts choose their targets based on resentment. Resentment torments the living, but also torments the ghost itself. Releasing it is extremely satisfying to them. It becomes something they are compelled to do. It originally wanted Third Child, but because he has protection from the tiger claw amulet, it could not approach him. So it could not release its resentment. In that situation, the weaker second sister naturally became the target. As for why it did not choose others in the village, that is also simple. You are all Third Child’s family. Your blood ties and shared aura make you easily identifiable to it. Other villagers are safe unless they directly provoke it.”

He smiled at my parents and continued.

“You live in the countryside, so you must have heard many ghost stories. Think carefully. When evil spirits harm people, is it not usually an entire family that is affected? Have you ever heard of it spreading to neighbors? Newly formed evil ghosts have the strongest resentment and are the most dangerous. At that time, they may affect an entire area. After their initial resentment is released, they become unconscious wandering ghosts until something triggers them again.”

By the time he finished explaining everything, it was already around 10 PM.

My mother glanced nervously at the clock and said, “Master Jiang, it is coming. Should we put Third Child’s tiger claw amulet on second sister? He once suggested it, but we remembered your instructions and did not do it.”

“That was the right decision. If Third Child gets targeted, that would be much more troublesome for me. Besides, Daoist practice has the concept of nurturing artifacts. The tiger claw has been cultivated on him for seven years. Taking it off would ruin its effectiveness.”

“Then Master Jiang, it is coming,” my eldest sister said nervously.

Old Man Jiang chuckled. “What is there to fear? With me here, let it come. If I did not care about destroying it, I would not need all these preparations.”

Indeed, he had many methods to destroy this evil ghost outright. With the Soul Locking Knot sealing my second sister’s living soul, he could act without restraint. The reason he went through so much trouble was to accumulate merit, just as he had once performed mass ghost salvation rituals when I was younger, and just as he now deliberately chose a path of compassion.

“Bring a table,” he said to my eldest sister.

My mother quickly brought one over, thinking he was going to perform another ritual. But instead, he casually took out a stack of yellow talisman paper and cinnabar, and asked my father for a small dish of water, then began drawing on the table.

It turned out he was only drawing talismans. And this time, it was far less solemn than before when he drew the blue talismans. The yellow talismans felt much lighter in tone, and he only muttered a few incantations as they were completed. Of course, no one else could understand them.