The Evil Deity's Second Career - Chapter 7

Chapter 7

Ji Lanci and I began a difficult life of scraping by.

I was fine, but Ji Lanci clearly wasn’t. She was a mere mortal of flesh and blood, and after a few days of hunger, her face took on a sickly, sallow hue.

I started scouring the Cold Palace for anything edible and eventually found several brightly colored mushrooms growing at the base of a wall.

I had seen how poor families lived before, and they always said that mushrooms made for an incredibly delicious broth.

Following their example, I prepared a bowl of mushroom soup for Ji Lanci.

Though she lacked the strength to speak, the gratitude in her eyes was unmistakable.

Ji Lanci’s lips were parched, and she seemed to want to say something, but I cut her off.

“Between us, there’s no need for words.”

I told her to lie down and rest. “The deity you invited back isn’t just here to consume incense offerings.”

In the middle of the night, Ji Lanci suddenly began to talk in her sleep, her arms flailing wildly in the air.

“So much gold!”

“Hahaha, it’s all mine, hehehe…”

Gold? Where was there any gold?

“One piece, two pieces, three pieces… it’s all mine.”

Ji Lanci’s hands grasped at the empty air before she carefully tucked her ‘treasures’ under the covers.

Just as she pulled back the blanket, she let out another loud cry: “Why has my gold turned into mud?”

Was she possessed? Or had she gone mad?

“What manner of evil spirit is this? How dare you stir up trouble in my presence!”

This place was definitely haunted!

Ji Lanci acted as if she were possessed, uttering gibberish I couldn’t understand, and even reached out to grab at me.

“Gold!”

It had to be an evil spirit!

I slapped Ji Lanci across the forehead. Her eyes widened, filled with utter disbelief, and then she collapsed back onto the bed.

Watching her peaceful sleeping face, I finally breathed a sigh of relief. It seemed the evil spirit had left her body.

I kept watch by her bedside all night.

Ji Lanci didn’t slowly wake up until the following evening.

“I feel like I’ve been asleep for a very long time.”

I remained noncommittal. “You were asleep for quite a while, but it’s not your fault. It’s all thanks to that wretched evil spirit.”

“An evil spirit?”

Ji Lanci looked confused, clearly having no memory of being possessed the night before.

I recounted the events of the previous night in great detail, focusing heavily on how heroically I had slain the evil spirit and how devoted I had been in guarding her all night.

Ji Lanci was deeply grateful, declaring that once she regained her status, she would surely build fifty temples in my honor.

I set a bowl of soup down in front of her. “Eat something first.”

“Thank you, Great One!”

Ji Lanci smiled and picked up the bowl, ready to drain it in one gulp, when she spotted the mushrooms settled at the bottom.

“What is this?”

She pinched a mushroom between her fingers and held it up to me.

“A mushroom. Don’t you recognize it?”

Ji Lanci sucked in a sharp breath. “I recognize it… I’m just wondering where it came from.”

I jerked my chin toward the base of the wall. “Over there. There are plenty more. I plan to make some more for you to try tonight.”

Ji Lanci’s lip twitched as she set the bowl down, clutching her chest as if she had just heard something terrifying.

“Great One, now that I think about it, I feel like I’m incredibly hard to kill.”

“Isn’t that the truth? It’s lucky you ran into me, otherwise you wouldn’t even know how you died.”

Ji Lanci gave me a wry, unreadable look for a long time before finally whispering:

“You’re right about that, Great One.”