Cataclysm Chapter 42: Slasher Cat 2; Ghost Cat

Chapter 42: Slasher Cat 2; Ghost Cat

Translated by Shiya of Exiled Rebels Scanlations 

Editor: Karai

 

Recently, there were no job offers in the Dafu branch office, but many Tianshi came to visit. Some wanted to join the branch office, but they failed in the basic examination. Some people felt that they would be safe if they cooperated with the Dafu branch office, so they discussed cooperating to take orders with them. Chen Yang refused this because, except when the job is above three stars, in which there is a shortage of staff, they might need to cooperate with Tianshis outside the office. So far, there is no shortage of manpower.

What’s more, the people who came to cooperate usually brought three star jobs. Naturally, they refused. Although they didn’t mind lower level jobs, they don’t want to contribute money and effort, but have to give half of the reward to others in the end.

Looking down from a window showed Ma Shanfeng and Du Shuo were sitting at a stone table in the courtyard drinking tea and talking. At this time it was sunset. The sky was like brocade and satin and very colorful. Ma Shanfeng had put a few Koi fish into the lotus pond two days ago. From time to time, they swung their tails to destroy the calmness of the water surface and made some noises. There are also other flowers and plants in the courtyard, which were raised by Ma Shanfeng.

Ma Shanfeng spent a lot of time on the flowers and plants. He often watered and turned the soil. He remembered every kind of flower and plant’s habits. As he put a lot of heart into them, they naturally grew pleasantly. Nearby residents sometimes come inside to see and enjoy the flowers and plants. Sometimes people would ask for a pot or two. Ma Shanfeng would not give them away unless they trade with him.

This method puts an end to the people who are greedy for the looks of the flowers but can’t really raise flowers. Occasionally this would attract others who love flowers and would carefully raise the flowers. Gradually, more and more kinds of flowers were in the courtyard and it became the characteristics of the Branch Office. Nearby residents smell the fragrance of flowers and come to find that there is such a street office in the Shenchun community.

The Shenchun Street office was not in the commute area, so when people knew that there was a street office here, nearby residents came to look for the staff for help. Ma Shanfeng and others were deeply annoyed by this, so they replaced the piece of iron board which was full of loopholes, and replaced it with the sign of the Dafu Branch Office of the Shenchun Community.

As for what their job was? Sorry, but that’s a secret.

Du Shuo suddenly looked up and saw Chen Yang upstairs. He waved to him to come down. Chen Yang smiled and came downstairs. When he saw Zhang Qiudao playing games on his mobile phone downstairs, he said, “Zhang Qiudao, did you give up on the promotion to Wulei Tianshi already?”

Zhang Qiudao did not raise his head, “The Taoist Association has made it clear that I will not be promoted in the next two years.”

“Why?”

“According to the Tianshi community, no promotion is allowed without merit. Even if you have passed the examination, you have to have outstanding merits and virtues. It takes at least eight years for a Mengwei to rise to a Wulei, and it has only been six years since my last promotion. Unless I have a special contribution this year, I cannot get the Taoist Association to promote me earlier on. If not for that, I don’t have to consider getting promoted in these two years.” That’s why he’s depressed playing games.

“Don’t you have enough merit accumulation?”

“Not enough. Before that, we mainly received two star jobs. If the job of the ”Deserted Village of the South” was completed then it would have been just enough to accumulate merits and virtues.” Unfortunately, that failed.

Chen Yang nodded and found that regrettable and walked out. In the hall corridor, he ran into Kou Xuanling with his peach wood sword, his eyebrows furrowing. When he saw Chen Yang, he said seriously, “Director Chen, take charge of the security issues of our branch office. Recently, my private life has been disturbed. I’m very troubled.”

This  matter was related to Ma Shanfeng’s flowers. The flowers were the cause, the development of the latter was unexpected. In the early morning and evening, after worshiping his Zushiye, Kou Xuanling would wear Taoist robes and do sword dances in the courtyard as tribute to his Zushiye. Originally, the gates were closed and few people walked in, so no one could see him.

Later, there were some young people who were coming to look at the flowers. They happened to see Kou Xuanling wearing a silk Taoist robe and doing sword dances. The way he moved, his sword was beautiful and powerful, not some fancy shenanigans. Added with the good-looking appearance of Kou Xuanling who didn’t usually talk or laugh, and in the solemn Taoist robe he looked like a young abstinence Taoist priest. Some young people recorded a video and posted it on the Internet. Many others came to watch him under the guise of flower-viewing.

Chen Yang lamented that beauty was a disaster, and then said that the branch office budget was not enough. Moreover, this is a personal problem and will not be included in the work welfare offers. Kou Xuanling’s proposal was rejected and he said, “They are just curious, and after a while they will let it go. Anyway, you’re not a big net star yet. It’s easy for them to get past it. Believe me. Or you can cancel the sword dance in the evening?”

Kou Xuanling frowned, “No way. After offering oblations to my Zushiye, I must do the sword dance to pay tribute. If Zushiye doesn’t see the sword dance, he will be unhappy.” ¹

“Right.” Chen Yang couldn’t help him then, “We can’t raise the walls. Too high a wall is a sign of poverty. And the walls can’t drive all the people away. After all, they will use drones to take pictures.”

Yes, use drones. It just so happened that a girl who was addicted to the beauty and abstinence of Kou Xuanling was a member of the University’s Drone Association. Sometimes she needed to hand in her homework for the club, so she would bring her drone to take photos.

“Why don’t they take pictures of you?” he asked, in his opinion Chen Yang looked better than him. They don’t take pictures of Du Shuo or Zhang Qiudao either, and they all have good looks.

“Because we all hide when we are aware of the drones, so they can’t even take pictures of us even if they want to.”

Kou Xuanling didn’t know that the Dafu branch office has a small reputation on the Internet. Netizens all know that there is a small building in a community with an extremely beautiful courtyard, just like a small heavenly garden. They would feel relaxed just watching the video. What’s more, the people inside were all very handsome and had outstanding temperament. Although they didn’t know why when they took photos, they could never catch others beside Kou Xuanling.

No other people’s faces appeared in the videos. So the netizens could only lick the abstinence Taoist priest on the screen. The video poster vowed that all the staff were handsome and beautiful. Even the middle-aged uncle was also a handsome uncle. He had an inexplicable temperament and seemed like a talented and experienced hermit who was hiding. Later, more and more people affirmed the poster and left comments about their good looks. The reputation of the Branch Office skyrocketed; they all had good appearances but for some reason could never get a clear shot.

“You…” Kou Xuanling was shocked, “You never told me?”

“No. We all thought you knew but were too embarrassed to turn down their enthusiasm. So even though you were bothered, you let them take pictures. We didn’t remind you since we thought you did it out of kindness.”

He didn’t even think of doing this. Tianshis had so many talismans that it is very easy to influence the video shooting, which could easily solve this problem. He didn’t think of this method at all. Other people in the Branch Office were also bad hearted and didn’t take the initiative to tell him.

Zhang Qiudao heard their conversation and he glanced and snickered as he walked past. Kou Xuanling heard him and felt even more depressed. When Kou Xuanling, the abstinence Taoist priest paid respects to his Zushiye that evening, he remembered to complain to him about his colleagues being mean.

Chen Yang sat next to Du Shuo and Ma Shanfeng. Du Shuo poured a cup of tea for him. Chen Yang thought it was bitter tea, so he wanted to refuse it. Du Shuo said, “It’s Four Seasons Health tea, not bitter.”

Chen Yang looked at Ma Shanfeng who laughed and said to him, “You shouldn’t drink tea before dinner. You can only drink some healthy herbal tea.” Chen Yang picked up the cup to drink after hearing that. It was a bit sweet, so he accepted it.

Du Shuo pinched Chen Yang’s nape, “Still dizzy?”

Chen Yang shook his head, “When I just got up, I was a little dizzy. I stood at the window for a while. Now after drinking the tea, I feel awake.” He took a short nap today. He always feels dizzy after his nap. Du Shuo asked if he was still experiencing dizziness. Chen Yang took two sips of tea and said, “I’ll cook later. What did you buy today?”

Ma Shanfeng replied, “Zhang Qiudao and Kou Xuanling went to buy groceries. One of them likes chicken leg meat and the other likes fish. Mao Xiaoli went with them, too, and she likes meat in general, so she bought a pile of pork. They only bought some vegetables reluctantly after I told them to.”

He shook his head. Young people like to eat meat, not vegetables. Being picky with food was not good. Vegetables are good for health, and eating more vegetables is good. However, Vice director Ma did not notice that he always likes to stare at the delicious meat at dinner. As a matter of fact, Du Shuo was the only one here who really liked to eat vegetables. He prefers vegetarianism over meat.

Chen Yang looked up and saw Mao Xiaoli, riding on her bike and bursting in. With a sudden brake, she stopped in front of several people, then threw down her bicycle and ran over.  “Uncle Ma, brother Chen, brother Du, hi.” After greeting them, she took the tea handed to her by Ma Shanfeng and drank it all.

Chen Yang, “School is over?”

“Every time brother Chen asks me this sentence, I feel like I’m a high school student.” Mao Xiaoli was actually a sophomore in university. She sat down and said, “I didn’t have classes in the afternoon. I went to join the club activities. I told you before that I joined the news club. In my spare time, in addition to selling charms, I also have to go interview people and take my underclassmen with me.

By the way, last time I mentioned that someone saw cats worshiping the moon at school, do you still remember that?”

Chen Yang nodded, “You weren’t able to get them to hire us?” Last time, Mao Xiaoli suggested to the school leaders to hire Tianshis. They had a similar talk, but then it collapsed. The reason is that a school leader decided to cancel the case and denounced ghosts and gods as nonsense. 

“Now the legend of a cat demon has come up again, and it has made people panic.”

Ma Shanfeng became interested and asked, “What’s the matter?”

Mao Xiaoli, “Last night, a girl was running on the sportsground and was attacked when taking a path back to her dormitory at about 10:30PM. Her neck was slashed and she lost a lot of blood. According to the student who was behind her, she heard cats meowing from very far away, the sound was especially sad and infiltrating. When she ran over to see, she found that the girl fell down unconscious. After she was sent to the hospital, she was in a coma. Some witnesses said they saw the injuries were from a cat’s paws. Combined with the past moon worshiping incident, the school’s arguing about a cat demon killing people.”

Ma Shanfeng thought, “demon” immediately he shook his head, “It’s not easy to become a demon. Most of the animals that could become demons have had big chances involved. Only a fool would not cherish the opportunity and get into debt by killing people.”

Since ancient times, it has not been easy for plants and animals to become demons. It’s very difficult and requires great fortune to even gain intelligence. One would need a great opportunity. Once gotten, it would cherish it. Why would it do bad deeds and waste the great chance?

“I only know that there is a demon who has lived in Changbai Mountain for decades. It concentrated on cultivation, and occasionally rescued the lost travelers in Changbai Mountain. Later, he was affectionately called the mountain god of Changbai Mountain.” Ma Shanfeng said, “Anyways, it’s not likely that the cat demon would kill people.”

Mao Xiaoli asked, “Is it human then? But the injuries seemed to have been inflicted by a cat’s paw, and someone saw the cats worshiping the moon. In other words, cats have a strong demon nature. They know to worship the moon and that would open up their intellect.”

Ma Shanfeng, “Cats remember hate and would take revenge. You should find out if that girl has done something immoral to cats, like abusing them and hence got revenged upon.”

Mao Xiaoli shook her head, “No way. The path the girl took was the famous Liyuan in the school, it is full of fruit trees. There are many wild cats in the garden. Many stray cats live there and give birth to kittens. Many students love cats. They often bring cat food with small bowls. That girl is one of the cat lovers. She often goes there to feed and pet cats. That night, she also went to feed the cats while jogging. But there were no street lights in Liyuan, and it was not easy to find people if someone was hidden in the trees. Maybe it’s just plain murder, and they planted the act on the cats.”

Chen Yang asked, “Before the truth was found, the rumour of a demon cat harming people was spread?”

“Yes. So I have to find out, at least to suppress the rumors. I’m worried that if this goes on, the school will get rid of all the cats in the Liyuan. Because now some parents who heard the rumors, began to ask the school to clean up all the cats, and some cat phobic students also made these requests too. How can they deal with so many cats in Liyuan? They are used to being free. If they were sent to a shelter, they would surely run away and wander about.”

Although Mao Xiaoli is not a fanatic cat lover, she can’t bear to think that so many cats in Liyuan will be cleaned up. Some of them grew up in Liyuan, it is their home. It’s cruel to drive them out of their homes.

Du Shuo suddenly said, “Cats are hard to tame. They are treacherous and sly. If you harm them, they will definitely take revenge. So it is rare for a cat to cultivate and ascend.”

Chen Yang was surprised that Du Shuo used so many bad adjectives, which showed that he didn’t like cats. However, cats are beings with a lot of spirituality, they are often associated with supernatural events, slyness and deceitfulness. Cats can be darlings if you like them, but for people who don’t like them, they are often seen as the most evil thing. Besides, cats worshiping the moon and cats with spirituality are not the righteous path, so no wonder Du Shuo didn’t like it.

“People often say that the cat demons are actually cat ghosts, also known as Gu cats.”

“What is this?” asked Mao Xiaoli.

Du Shuo stopped answering, and Mao Xiaoli turned to Chen Yang. Chen Yang answered, “Cat Ghosts are literally the souls of cats. It’s also called a Gu Cat. It’s a fierce and evil technique to make an animal Gu out of the soul of a cat. It’s often used to harm people. Once they attack the person will die. After being made successfully, the Gu Cat is usually used to steal money. The evil part is that for a Gu Cat to successfully steal money, it will have to take the victim’s life.”

In other words, if the Cat Ghost is forced to go to a certain house to take money, it must first kill that family and then seize the money. Cat Ghosts were very popular in the Sui and Tang Dynasties. Many families secretly raised Cat Ghosts. There were many Cat Ghosts incidents in the Sui and Tang Dynasties, they often caused a lot of turmoil. The biggest incidents happened during the Sui Yang emperor’s and Tang Gaozong emperor’s reign. In order to kill the cat ghosts, Emperor Yang of the Sui Dynasty implicated thousands of families in the capital. During the reign of the Tang Gaozong emperor of the Tang Dynasty, laws were directly promulgated to prohibit people in the country from keeping cat ghosts, and those who are found would be killed directly.

Therefore, after the Sui and Tang Dynasties, there were very few large-scale Cat Ghost incidents. However, most ancient books still recorded about Cat Ghosts, moon worshiping, and Cat Ghost harming people. The images of cats in those records were rather horrible.

“Those who keep cat ghosts need to kill old cats, and then cultivate their souls. Every midnight, the cat ghosts would be ordered to steal money. Anyway, they are very vicious. The longer a cat lives, the easier it is for them to develop intelligence and spirituality but that was about it. It’s easy to become a JingGuai, but to ascend is difficult.” Chen Yang turned his head and asked Du Shuo, “but why did you mention Cat Ghosts all of a sudden?”

Du Shuo, “I suddenly remembered.”

Chen Yang didn’t believe it. There was no way he would just suddenly think of it and even say it out loud. However, if he asked him now, he doubted he would get an answer from Du Shuo. “I’m going to cook.” Then he got up and went to the kitchen.

Mao Xiaoli also stood up and decided to visit the school’s Liyuan in the evening. She needed to get her things ready so she also went into the building.

Ma Shanfeng took a sip of tea and said, “I remember there was a Fur Ghost God incident in the Chengji province, and many people died.”

The ancient Chengji province was located in Tianshui, Gansu Province. Fur Ghost God, also known as the Cat Ghost God, is a folk belief of the people from Northwest Gansu, and the Qinghai regions. It is worshiped as the God of wealth, but regarded as an evil God by the orthodox Taoism. In Chengji province, many relics of the Fur Ghost God were excavated. The Fur Ghost God and the Cat Gu were in many ways similar. They both pursue wealth in the wrong way, it carries other people’s property away and harms other people’s lives.

Before Ma Shanfeng was the Vice Director of the Branch Office, he once went to Chengji province to solve the murder incidents. At that time, some people raised Cat ghosts and sent them to steal other people’s property. Insatiable greed had killed many people and continued to do evil. What’s terrible is that the man who raised the Cat ghosts was a famous entrepreneur and philanthropist in the country. Ma Shanfeng and other Tianshis formed a team, and only after two Tianshi died could they solve the problem.

Because of the cunning people who raised them, the Cat ghosts were even more cunning, so they were tricked by them again and again. After that time, Ma Shanfeng transferred to the post of director of the Branch Bureau and he no longer took jobs. So strictly speaking, Ma Shanfeng didn’t like Cat Ghosts very much either.

Du Shuo said, “Mn.”

He didn’t make any further comments.

Ma Shanfeng laughed and did not say more. He drank tea quietly.

For a long time, Du Shuo said, “Yang Yang is young and lacks foresight. Please take care of him.”

“They are all members of the Branch Office. It is my duty to take care of them.” Ma Shanfeng replied with a smile, indicating his attitude towards the members of the Office. He was the one who chose jobs for everyone in the Branch Office before. He was responsible for excluding the jobs that were beyond the ability of each person, and tried to ensure that everyone’s life would not be in danger.

Recently, however, he has deliberately let go and let them choose jobs on their own. He can’t choose for them for their entire lives. They had to choose by themselves eventually. They need to gradually learn how to protect themselves. “Director Chen’s potential is endless. He may be more capable than you think,” Ma Shanfeng said.

Du Shuo didn’t answer. He didn’t take that to heart. Chen Yang is naturally the best in his heart, but it is impossible for him to completely let go of him completely.

After dinner, Mao Xiaoli ran back to her room to do some work. After a while, she secretly pulled Chen Yang, “I’m going to Liyuan in the school to ambush the enemy. Do you want to go with me?”

Chen Yang shook his head, “No.”

Mao Xiaoli, “aren’t you interested in cat ghosts?”

Chen Yang was not interested of course, but thinking about Du Shuo’s attitude towards cats, he quickly changed his mind, “Yeah, I’ll go.”

Mao Xiaoli’s University was not far away from the branch office. You can get there with a 40 minutes bike ride. Chen Yang rode on a rented bike with Mao Xiaoli and told Du Shuo before he left.

When they entered the school, Mao Xiaoli spoke to the guard at the door, who did not check their student cards. After going in, Mao Xiaoli said, “The security is not so strict at ordinary times. Last night, when something happened, the school leaders preferred the idea of the murderer being an outsider.”

To be honest, only young people believe that the cat demon killed people. Young people were always quick to accept things. They were more afraid that the world was boring so the rumors about the cat ghost were only spreading among young people. The school leaders still didn’t believe it, but in order to stabilize the people’s mind, they might invite Tianshis.

Liyuan was far away from the school gate. They only reached it after half an hour’s cycling. They followed the path the injured girl took, then parked the bike at the intersection of Liyuan, turned on the flashlights and checked while walking.

Chen Yang, “There are no street lights.”

Mao Xiaoli, “In fact, the school has always stressed that students should not be lazy and take shortcuts. There are trees and hillsides around, so installing street lamps is too troublesome.”

When they entered, they heard a few meows along the way. Chen Yang stopped, “don’t you say there are a lot of cats in Liyuan? Why do I only hear a few cats? “

Mao Xiaoli was stunned for a moment, “Really. Why don’t we go and have a look?”

Chen Yang shook his head, “Let’s go to the place where the girl was attacked first.”

“It’s not far ahead.”

After walking for about five minutes, they finally arrived at the site of the incident, there were warning signs around it. White lines were drawn on the ground, showing where the victim laid. There were still traces of blood splatter on the stone ground. The scene looked rather creepy.

Because of the incident, no one took this path in Liyuan tonight, which made it very quiet. At the same time, there were no street lamps, and even the moonlight was blocked by the branches and leaves of trees, so it was dark and cold.

Mao Xiaoli, “By the way, brother Chen, would you like to go to the cat’s grave here?”

Chen Yang, “Cat’s grave?”

“Mn,” Mao Xiaoli led the way, nodded and said, “there are so many cats in the school, so they aren’t taken care of well. Therefore, there are occasional deaths of cats such as death from old age and accidental deaths. Of course, there are victims of abuse as well.” She said with a wry smile, “Don’t think that those cat abusers are far away from us. In fact, sometimes they are very close by. There are always some cat phobic or cat hating people who would take out their anger on cats. Fortunately, cat abuse is strictly prohibited by the school so only one or two cat abuse incidents occur occasionally.”

If the victim was not a cat lover, Mao Xiaoli would have suspected it was the cat’s revenge.

Going through the Liyuan forest, they reached a more remote part of the woods where they could see many bags hanging on the trees. There were cat carcasses in those bags. As the saying goes, dogs should be buried in water, and cats are buried with trees. It is tradition to put the cat’s body in a bag and hang it on a tree to prevent it from becoming a JingGuai. At the moment, seeing the cat corpse bags tied on the trees, it felt ominous and evil.

Chen Yang hissed and said, “Your school kept this cat’s grave and did not eradicate it? That’s quite rare.”

“Who said they did not try removing it?” What school will keep these things on the campus? What’s more, the tree burial of cats is regarded as a folk superstition. In order to establish its own academic image, the school can not let the cat grave to exist. “The school tried to remove the cat grave during one summer vacation, but every time the workers came, all the cats in the school would stop them and stare at the workers. Who dares remove the grave with that?”

Cats were evil and revengeful by nature. The cat graves were equivalent to their ancestral graves, if someone harmed their ancestors’ graves, it was obvious that they would take revenge on at least three generations of your family.

Chen Yang heard the faint sound of a cat meowing, so he raised his finger to his mouth and motioned for Mao Xiaoli to be quiet. He followed the sound. After walking up a small slope, Chen Yang held Mao Xiaoli back, asking her to hide and look down the hill.

Mao Xiaoli looked down and saw a small pit below the slope. There were dozens of cats, large and small, gathered in the pit. There were various kinds of cats, fat and thin. They all bowed to the moon, and then looked up and breathed deeply, as if absorbing the essence of the moon. It’s like they had just witnessed a cat’s cult. It’s very strange.

The cats were worshiping the moon!

Chen Yang’s eyes were bright, he was staring at an extremely fat black cat in front of all the cats. The fat cat’s ears trembled slightly, it seemed to have noticed Chen Yang’s gaze, it turned its head and its heterochromic eyes stared back at Chen Yang.

Meow——

Shrill cries from the cats suddenly echoed in the woods.

The author has something to say:

When it comes to tree burial of cats, there used to be a large bamboo forest behind my home in my hometown, many bags with cat corpses were hung there.

Anyway, I dared not go into the bamboo forest at night.

 

 

 

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