Twilight Boundary-Chapter 585 - 576: Rolling Heads of Murder

BANG! With a kick, Hu Ma burst through the main gate and rushed directly into the Manor.

With a quick glance, he saw that this was a very lively estate, brightly lit all around, with servants coming and going. On the endless banquet tables were dishes of chicken, duck, and pig legs, along with exquisite delicacies. Servants wove through the tables, offering drinks, and on the sides, Blowers puffed their cheeks, playing with great effort.

At the tables and chairs sat numerous well-dressed and elegantly groomed wealthy gentlemen and ladies. They held their wine glasses, toasting an old white-bearded gentleman at the head table. He was surrounded by charming young women, who showered him with compliments and smiles.

Hu Ma's sudden entrance carried an imposing air of murderous intent, causing the lively scene to fall silent. Everyone at the banquet turned to stare at him in surprise and suspicion.

The white-bearded old gentleman celebrating his birthday was momentarily stunned. Setting aside the two women in his arms, he slapped the table and shouted, "I am celebrating my birthday! Who dares to intrude?"

Hu Ma, his face hidden behind a smiling mask, gave a sinister grin and strode forward. "The Great Sword-Catching Sect of Zhensui Mansion is here to kill."

"AH..."

The white-bearded old gentleman was startled and exclaimed, "Friend, let's talk this over…"

But Hu Ma didn't stop. The old man waved his wide sleeve, and instantly, tables, chairs, and even the guests at the banquet were swept by that sleeve toward Hu Ma's face. Simultaneously, the old man himself leaped up, intending to flee towards the back door.

"Hmph! You dare claim to be friends with us?"

With a sneer, Hu Ma lifted the Punishment Officer's Great Saber in his hand and blew hard on the black bone at the handle. Instantly, a surge of murderous energy erupted forward.

WHOOSH! 𝘧𝓇ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝘣𝓃ℴ𝓋𝑒𝑙.𝑐𝘰𝑚

As the murderous energy swept through, the large residence descended into chaos. Lanterns extinguished one by one, crashing to the ground. Guests scattered, some bursting in mid-air into fragments—revealing themselves to be paper men.

The once lively banquet transformed. There were no elegant tables and chairs, only a mixture of decayed wood and moldy straw that had been composting for who knew how many years, haphazardly arranged around a few stones.

There were no exquisite delicacies. What lay on the stones were merely rotting or half-rotted arms, legs, hearts, livers, and entrails.

It turned out that these were the remains of hungry ghosts who had previously caused trouble in Mingzhou and had all been killed. Their bodies had been buried in a nearby burial mound by local residents, who feared a plague. Unexpectedly, this had benefited these solitary, wild evil spirits, who had dug up the corpses and were now holding a feast of flesh and blood.

And as for that white-bearded old gentleman celebrating his birthday, looking at him now, tattered pieces of cloth slipped from his body, and he horrifically transformed into a peculiar, bearded python. Seeing no escape, it coiled among the scattered stones, its strange eyes glaring, hissing, its panicked shouts barely coherent:

"Hold on! Even Zhensui Mansion must follow reason! You set up an altar, call my name, and expect me to come? Isn't that unreasonable?"

Hu Ma interrupted coldly, "You went to the feast when invited; that was your choice. Now that my sword has come for you, what's left to say?"

"WAAAH..."

The strange python roared with anger and lunged from the rubble at Hu Ma's face. An eerie mist seeped from beneath its scales, causing dizziness upon inhalation.

Hu Ma took a deep breath, inhaling all the eerie mist into the mask. This startled the strange python for a moment, then it rejoiced, "You dare to inhale my immortal qi? Aren't you afraid of death?"

Before it finished speaking, Hu Ma pushed the mask up, revealing his mouth, and let out a sudden, loud shout. The inhaled strange mist, now infused with immense firepower, erupted out like cannon fire, striking the strange python directly.

The strange python screamed miserably as it was sent flying, writhing and terrified.

"Don't you know that I, a walking ghost of the Great Sword-Catching Sect…"

Hu Ma seized the moment, taking a step forward, shouting fiercely, "...am actually of the Shousui Path?"

This, the strange python truly did not know. It had never approached the battle formation outside Mingzhou City. Now, suddenly heavily injured, its serpentine body thrashed as it tried to escape, but Hu Ma caught up in a few quick steps, stomped on its neck, and decapitated it with a single stroke.

He picked up a nearby grass rope, tied the head, then wiped the blood off his Punishment Officer's Great Saber on the sole of his shoe before sheathing it. He then summoned the Heaven Measuring Boots and strode purposefully back.

CRASH!

Before the Magic Altar, Aunt Zhang was anxiously waiting, her mind unsettled. Unexpectedly, within just an hour, Hu Ma returned. He tossed the snake head, as big as a calf and bearded, into the basket, followed by a lengthy list which he handed directly to her.

"Aunt, continue summoning the spirits on the altar. Let's call up every single one in Mingzhou Prefecture who dares to defy our altar's command!"

Aunt Zhang glanced at the strange snake's head, her heart trembling slightly. Beside her, Seventh Aunt observed, and the whitish hairs on her head stood on end in fear.

Continuing with the altar rituals, chanting incantations, names were called one by one. Some were willing to come, some were not. Some were forcibly brought to the altar, materializing from a wisp of black smoke into human form, and hurriedly kowtowed, "This little one pays respect to the Inquiry Lord. May I know why the great Lord has summoned me?"

"If you are asking why this little one did not obey the previous order, then this little one has an explanation. It is not that this little one was unwilling to come, but I was under orders to guard a specific location and dared not leave without permission. I beg the Inquiry Lord's forgiveness…"

Aunt Zhang was taken aback. Being an honest person, she didn't know how to handle such a situation. Hu Ma, standing by the altar, gave a cold snort and asked in her stead, "Whose orders?"

"It was…" The spirit hesitated. "It was an order from a Lord…"

Hu Ma's expression suddenly changed, and he roared, "You obey a Lord's order but ignore Zhensui Mansion's? In front of the Inquiry Officer, you still dare to spout nonsense?"

Saying this, without any hesitation, he stepped forward. With a chop of his Punishment Officer's Great Saber, which surged with baleful energy, he beheaded it on the altar. Hundreds of miles away, a corresponding spirit screamed as its head was suddenly severed.

No matter, Little Hongtang could go fetch it back.

Similarly, another was summoned and knelt on the altar, crying, "It's not that this little one disobeyed the order! The Zhensui Mansion Order summons the spirits and evil spirits of Mingzhou, but I am sustained by Donkey Eggs Village, and Donkey Eggs Village isn't part of Mingzhou…"

Hu Ma shouted, "Nonsense! Why does our Hundred Demons Record state it's in Mingzhou?"

The spirit said, "Heh heh, it was part of Mingzhou twenty years ago. But then the village experienced a great flood and moved ten miles west, so now it belongs to Gunzhou, not Mingzhou…"

"You still dare to 'heh heh'?" Hu Ma's eyes widened as he sneered, "So, you belong to Mingzhou according to the Imperial Decree, but geographically, you belong to Gunzhou?"

"Then I won't make it difficult for you. We'll cut you in half. The Gunzhou half can be considered justified, so you'll live. The Mingzhou half will be killed immediately, as a warning to others!"

Thus, time and again, several more were summoned and interrogated one by one. Those who lied were killed. Those with disrespectful attitudes were killed. Those who showed signs of rebellion were killed. As for those who refused to come, Hu Ma immediately went out, saber in hand, and chopped off their heads with a single stroke.

By the time the night was over, the basket already held more than a dozen heads of various forms—spirit-beasts, severed human bones, paper men, and plant-like figures—filling it to the brim, radiating immense resentment. Even Aunt Zhang, looking at it, felt her heart soften.

In her entire life, she had never done anything so arrogant and domineering. She couldn't help but feel a sense of doubt. "Shopkeeper, is what we're doing… really okay?"

Hu Ma turned to Aunt Zhang and patiently explained, "Aunt, you still don't fully understand. Our Zhensui Mansion borrows the wishing power of all living beings to enact the rules of yin and yang. You can think of Zhensui Mansion as the world's Old Fire Pit, sheltering everyone under heaven."

"We walking ghosts of Zhensui Mansion act on behalf of the people of the world, burning incense and performing sacrificial ceremonies for the Old Fire Pit, and are also responsible for cleaning out the filth within this Old Fire Pit."

"Those recorded in the Hundred Demons Record who refuse to obey our altar's command are the filth in the Pit. They were supposed to come immediately when summoned, yet they harbored dissent. If we don't cleanse them, how can the Old Fire Pit better protect the people?"

"Cleansing the Old Fire Pit?"

Aunt Zhang, known as a great walking ghost, was certainly experienced; her character was not one of blindly enduring in the past. But doing this sort of thing now, her understanding couldn't quite keep up. Listening to Hu Ma's explanation, she began to understand. "It's not that I haven't encountered such matters before."

"The Old Fire Pits in villages can sometimes suffer from bad feng shui, or be bewitched by demon people or evil skills, causing ancestral grievances and karmic debts to rebound upon the descendants. These things all require us Ghost Walkers to step in and manage."

"However, since they didn't come at first, even now that I'm setting up the altar again to summon them, not many listen to persuasion. This whole night, I've observed that among those who refuse to come, some are those I cannot sway, and others seem to be obscured by something, hidden away…"

"Shopkeeper, even if you go looking for them one by one, how could you possibly find them all?"

"Perhaps, only by invoking Zhensui Mansion itself, with a formal decree, can they be forcibly detained and brought to the altar for questioning…"

Listening, Hu Ma shook his head and said, "Aunt, such matters shouldn't involve Zhensui Mansion. The noble one in the mountains… Heh, he himself finds it inconvenient to intervene."

"So, for now, this matter can only be handled by us, the lower-ranking members of Zhensui Mansion. But there's no need to rush. You just continue to go through the Hundred Demons Record and summon them one by one."

"If they're defiant, let them try to reason with Seventh Aunt. Those who don't come, or refuse to listen to persuasion… just have their names sent to me."

Saying this, with the Punishment Officer's Great Saber tucked under his arm, a hint of anticipation appeared on his face. "Right now, we're not afraid of having too many heads to chop. To be honest, I still think there aren't quite enough…"

These murderous words left Aunt Zhang stunned; she felt he was being a bit too ferocious.

Glancing aside, she saw her headless little ghost staring at the basket in a daze. She hurriedly scolded it to move away. Hu Ma, however, smiled at the little ghost and said, "No need to be shy. Choose whichever you like. We have plenty of these things now."