Mo Dao ZU Shi

WEI WUXIAN had only just opened his eyes when someone kicked him.

A voice thundered in his ears: "PLAYING DEAD?"

He almost coughed up blood from the kick. His head hit the ground, and with

his face turned up, he thought hazily, You've got nerve, daring to kick me, the

patriarch.

Wei Wuxian had already lost count of the number of years it'd been since he

last heard a live person speak, never mind such awful caterwauling. He was

dizzy, and the cracked voice of a young man was rattling between his ears.

"Think for a moment whose land you're living on, whose rice you're eating, and whose money you're spending! So what if I took a few things of yours? They should've been mine in the first place!"

Soon after, there was the clamoring noise of chests and cabinets alike being

ransacked. It was a good moment before Wei Wuxian's eyes could focus. A dim

ceiling came into view, as did an unfortunate-looking face with a greedy glare.

That face was spraying spittle all over him.

"And you dare go tattle on me!! You think I'm actually afraid of you tattling?! Do you actually think anyone in this house would take your side?!"

Two large men who looked like servants came over. "Young master, everything's smashed!"

"So fast?" the quacking youth questioned.

"There wasn't much stuff in this broken shack anyway," the servant replied.

The quacking youth was extremely pleased. He turned to Wei Wuxian, pointing so hard at the man that he was practically jabbing his finger up his nose and into his brain.

"Go and tell on me, I dare you. Who are you playing dead for? As if anyone would actually give a crap about all this junk and wastepaper. I've smashed everything; let's see what else you've got to go tattle on me with! Think you're all that just because you went to a cultivation sect for a few years? Well, didn't you get kicked out like a stray dog anyway?!"

Presently half dead, Wei Wuxian thought to himself, It's not pretend. I've actually been dead for many years.

Who was this?

Where was this??

When had he ever done something like forcibly possess the body of

another???

After having kicked the man, ransacked the house, and spent all his temper,

the quacking youth strutted out the door along with his two servants, slamming

the door behind him.

He ordered in a loud voice, "Keep proper watch, don't let him come out to

embarrass people!"

The servants outside the door all heeded. Once the man had gone, silence settled both inside and out of the house. Wei Wuxian wanted to sit up, but his limbs would not obey him, so he lay back down and flipped over. His head continued to spin as he looked at his strange surroundings and the mess on the floor.

Next to him was a copper mirror that had been tossed onto the ground, and Wei Wuxian snatched it up. A dreadfully pale face appeared in the mirror. Two large blots of red were smeared unevenly on each cheek; if he were to stick out a long and vividly red tongue, then he'd be the very picture of a hanged ghost.

Wei Wuxian tossed the mirror aside, a little disgusted. He wiped his face and found his hand smeared with white powder.

Fortunately, it wasn't that this body had been born strange, but rather, the penchant of the previous owner. A full-grown man with a face heavily caked in makeup, and sloppily applied at that…

This shocked some energy back into Wei Wuxian, who was finally able to sit up. Only then did he notice the circle of a spell array beneath him. The array was scarlet and crooked, seemingly hand-drawn using blood as the medium. It was still damp, emitting a metallic stench. There were warped and crazed spells drawn within the array that had been somewhat smudged by his body, but the remaining shapes and characters were gruesome in their evil intent.

Wei Wuxian had been called by titles such as the Supreme Evil Lord, the Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation, and whatnot for years, so naturally, he was very familiar with obviously devious arrays such as these.

It wasn't that he had robbed anyone of their body—he had been offered one!

The nature of this "sacrificial ritual" was a type of curse. The caster was to

harm themselves with a weapon, making cuts on their body and using their own

blood to draw the array and write the spells within. They would then sit in the center of the circle and give up their mortal body to evil spirits, using the annihilation of their soul as the price to summon a nefarious, malicious ghost. This was all done in order to request the fulfillment of a wish. Thus, it was the opposite of "possession."

While both were forbidden magics of ill repute, the difference was that the

former was much less popular than the latter. After all, few wishes were so

strongly desired as to make someone willingly sacrifice everything they had.

This was why the technique had been nearly lost after centuries of disuse. The

examples recorded in ancient books had only a handful of cases that were

backed by reliable evidence, and every single one of them had been for

revenge. Every malicious ghost summoned by the ritual had fulfilled the caster's

wishes perfectly, in cruel and bloody ways.

Wei Wuxian refused to accept this.

Since when was he categorized as a "nefarious, malicious ghost"?

While he'd had a fairly poor reputation and died an extremely tragic death, he

didn't haunt the living, for one, and he'd never sought vengeance, for two. He

could swear there was not a single wandering ghost in this world who was more

decent and honest than he!

But the tough thing was, the Sacrificial Ritual followed the will of the caster

first and foremost. So it didn't matter how much he objected… He was already

inside this body, which was a silent acknowledgement that both parties had

formed a contract. He had to fulfill the wish of the caster, or the curse would

rebound, destroying the possessor's primordial spirit and extinguishing it

forever.

Wei Wuxian yanked his sash loose and raised his arms to inspect them. Sure

enough, both of his wrists had been slashed with a sharp tool, leaving them

covered in crisscrossing lacerations. The bleeding had already stopped, but Wei

Wuxian knew these were not normal injuries. If he didn't fulfill the caster's

wish, then these wounds would be unable to heal, and they would worsen the

longer this dragged on. If the deadline for fulfillment was missed, then he who

had accepted this vessel would be ripped apart in both body and soul alike.

He triple-checked that there was no mistake and cried This is ridiculous!

mentally ten times before finally rising to his feet with difficulty, supporting

himself against the wall.

This house certainly was big, but it was empty and shabby. The bedding was

emitting a sour smell—who knew how many days had gone by since it was last changed. There was a bamboo basket for trash in the corner that had been kicked over earlier, and both trash and wastepaper were strewn across the floor. Wei Wuxian noticed there seemed to be ink marks on the crumpled

papers, so he picked one up in passing. He opened it to take a look, and sure enough, it was covered in words. He quickly went around to collect all the balls

of paper.

These were probably written by the owner of this body to vent his frustrations. Some of the sentences were incoherent and disordered, but the anxiety and nervousness were abundantly clear. Wei Wuxian patiently

examined each sheet, and the more he looked, the more he felt something was

amiss.

Through some guesswork, he figured out a few things. First, the owner of this body was named Mo Xuanyu, and this place was called the Mo Estate.

Mo Xuanyu's grandfather on his mother's side was from a rich family in this

area. The family wasn't large, and the man was not fated for a son. After years

of trying, he still only had two daughters. The name of the second daughter

wasn't mentioned, but either way, the eldest daughter was born of the lawful

wife. Thus, they were looking for a husband to marry into their family name.

Although the second daughter was exceptional in appearance, she was born of

a servant, which was why the Mo family had originally planned to marry her out

without giving much thought to the groom. Who would've thought she was

fated for a fortuitous encounter?

When she was sixteen, the head of a prominent clan was passing by and fell in

love with her at first sight. The two made the Mo Manor the site of their rendezvous, and a year later, the second daughter gave birth to a son. This was

Mo Xuanyu.

The inhabitants of the Mo Estate would normally have held such an event in

contempt, but people at the time worshiped cultivators. In the eyes of the

mundane folk, cultivation clans that pursued immortality were loved by the

heavens, mysterious and noble. Furthermore, that prominent clan leader would

financially support this new outer family branch of his every so often. So

naturally, these circumstances were special. Not only did the Mo family

consider this an honor, but others were extremely envious too.

However, the good days did not last. That wandering clan leader was only

hungry for the novelty of fresh meat, and he was over it after two years, coming

to visit less and less frequently. After Mo Xuanyu turned four, the man never

appeared again.

In those passing years, the Mo Estate's opinion changed again. The contempt

and mockery returned, now with added disdain and pity. Second Lady Mo

refused to accept this, believing firmly that the prominent clan leader would not

turn a blind eye to his own son. And sure enough, when Mo Xuanyu turned

fourteen, that clan leader sent over a grand party to officially take him back.

Second Lady Mo's head was held high again. Although she could not go with

them, this event swept away all the grievances she had. Feeling proud and

elevated, she proclaimed proudly to everyone she saw that her son would

definitely become a leader of cultivation sects in the future—rise to the top and

bring glory to the ancestors. Thus, the people of the Mo Estate changed their

opinion for the third time.

However, Mo Xuanyu was driven out before he managed to cultivate acclaim

and succeed his father. And driven out in the most shameful way: Mo Xuanyu

was a cut-sleeve, a male homosexual, and he was so audacious as to harass his

fellow peers. With this scandal exposed, and the fact that he possessed only average talent and no real achievements in cultivation, the sect had no reason

to keep him.

Adding frost to snow, something had upset Mo Xuanyu. When he returned home, it was as a madman. His mental state had been upended, as if he had

been scared silly.

Having read to this point, Wei Wuxian's brow twitched a couple times.

The cut-sleeve matter aside, the man was a lunatic too. No wonder he had

smeared enough powder on his face to look like a hanged ghost. No wonder no

one thought it strange that there was such a large, bloody spell array on the

ground. Mo Xuanyu could probably smear blood all over this house, from the

floor tiles up the walls and to the ceiling, and no one would think it weird. Because everyone knew he was crazy!

After Mo Xuanyu returned to his old home, he was bombarded with ridicule.

This time, it seemed, the situation was unsalvageable. Unable to take this blow,

Second Lady Mo was choked to death by her own unappeasable outrage.

At this time, Mo Xuanyu's grandfather had already passed, and the one

managing the household was First Lady Mo. This Madam Mo had never been

able to stand her little sister, and she scorned that sister's bastard son. She had

a single son herself by the name of Mo Ziyuan—the one who had just ransacked

Mo Xuanyu's house. When Mo Xuanyu first left with such impressive fanfare,

First Lady Mo had felt they now possessed something of a family tie to that

prominent cultivation sect and had hoped the cultivator envoys would bring Mo

Ziyuan along with them too. Of course, she had been rejected, or rather, ignored.

Duh. This wasn't like selling cabbage in the markets: buy one, get one free!

Who knew where this family got its confidence? But they all possessed a

bizarre idea: they firmly believed that Mo Ziyuan had potential, that he had

talent, and that if he were the one who had gone with the cultivators, then he

would have been recognized for his worth for sure, unlike his failure of a cousin.

Although Mo Ziyuan had been young when Mo Xuanyu left, he had been

repeatedly indoctrinated to believe this nonsense without a single doubt. Thus,

he caught Mo Xuanyu every other day to humiliate him, cursing him for having

robbed him of his path to cultivation. Yet he remained enamored with the

talismans, the pills, and the little spiritual devices that had been brought back

from the cultivation sect and would take them all for himself, breaking them as

he willed. While Mo Xuanyu was often in the throes of madness, he knew when

he was being humiliated. He tried his best to endure it, time and time again, but

Mo Ziyuan's behavior only worsened, practically emptying the entire house. At

last, Mo Xuanyu had enough. He finally stammered a complaint to his uncle and

aunt, which was why Mo Ziyuan had come knocking today, looking for trouble.

The words on the paper were tiny and cramped. Wei Wuxian's eyes were sore

from reading all this, and he thought to himself, What kind of hellish life was he

fucking living? No wonder Mo Xuanyu had preferred to end it, offering his body

to summon malicious ghosts to avenge himself.

After his eyeballs started feeling better, it became his head's turn to ache. Technically, the caster of the array had to mentally recite their wish. As the evil spirit summoned, Wei Wuxian should have been able to hear the details of his request. However, this forbidden magic had probably been secretly copied off a book with missing pages; it was incomplete, and Mo Xuanyu had missed that step. Although Wei Wuxian could guess that he most likely sought vengeance

against the Mo family, how exactly did he want it done? To what extent? Take

back what was taken? Beat up the family?

Or…wipe them out entirely?

It was most likely wiping out the family, eh! After all, anyone who had been in

the cultivation world would know the words most often used to describe Wei

Wuxian: treacherous, mad. Was there anyone who better fit the description of

"fiendish"? Since the man had dared to summon him by name, his wish was

definitely not something easily granted.

Wei Wuxian said helplessly, "But you've got the wrong person…"

At first, he wanted to wash his face and gaze with reverence upon the dead

countenance that had once belonged to its former owner. However, there was

no water inside this house, not even drinking water. What's more, Wei Wuxian

figured the only container around was for lavatory purposes and not for

washing up.

He tried pushing the door, but it was barred from the outside, probably to

prevent him from running amok. There was not a single thing that could allow

him the slightest bit of joy in being reincarnated!

He might as well meditate for a while and get used to the new body.

An entire day passed this way. When he opened his eyes once more, there

was sunlight seeping into the house through the cracks of the window.

Although he could get up and walk, his head was still spinning, and it didn't

appear to be getting better. Wei Wuxian was puzzled.

This Mo Xuanyu's cultivated spiritual power is so minuscule, it might be

completely overlooked. There's no reason why I can't manipulate this body. So

why is it so difficult to use?

It wasn't until a strange noise sounded from his stomach that he realized it

had nothing to do with spiritual power; it was simply that this body, not trained for fasting, was hungry. If he delayed seeking food any longer, he might just

become the first malicious ghost in history to die of hunger immediately after

being summoned.

Wei Wuxian took a deep breath and raised his foot. But just as he was about

to kick the door open, there was suddenly the sound of footfalls on the other

side, drawing near. Someone gave the door a kick, which was followed by an

annoyed call:

"Meal time!"

While those were the words, it didn't appear the door was going to open at

all. Wei Wuxian looked down just in time to see a small bowl be heavily set

down before a small slat at the bottom of the door.

The servant outside then added, "Hurry up! What's the holdup? Put the bowl

out when you're done!"

The slat was smaller than a dog flap, not large enough to allow people to go in

and out, but bowls could be passed through. There were two dishes and one

bowl of rice that looked awfully disgusting. Wei Wuxian bitterly stirred the

chopsticks that were stabbed into the rice.

The Yiling Patriarch had returned to life—only to be kicked down and yelled

at. The first meal to welcome him back was cold leftovers. Who would believe

him if he told them? What had happened to his bloody reign? His absolute

massacres? His unadulterated annihilation of the sects? Truly, out of the

mountains a tiger can be bullied by a dog, in shallow waters a dragon can be

mocked by a shrimp, and a plucked phoenix is lower than a chicken. Stripped of

their privileges, the strong will be belittled by the weak.

Just then, the voice of the servant outside the door was heard once more. But

this time, it was a laugh that sounded as if it came from a completely different

person.

"A-Ding! Come over here."

A delicate and frail feminine voice answered from a distance, "A-Tong, did

you come to deliver food for that person in there again?"

A-Tong clicked his tongue. "Why else would I come to this miserable courtyard?!"

A-Ding's voice was at the door, much closer now. "You only make deliveries

once a day, and no one scolds you even if you slack off every now and then, so

why are you frowning at being so free? Look at me, so busy with errands that I

can't even go out to play."

A-Tong complained, "It's not like delivering meals is the only thing I do! And

you still dare go out right now? There are so many walking corpses roaming

about that every household has their doors firmly shut."

Wei Wuxian was crouched down by the door, pushing around the contents of

the bowl in his hand with two chopsticks of different lengths, listening as he

ate.

Seemed like things hadn't been peaceful here at the Mo Estate. Walking

corpses, as per their name, were the walking dead: reanimated corpses that

were low-level and commonplace. Their eyes were usually glazed, their

movements sluggish. They were fairly harmless. Nonetheless, that was enough

to terrify average folks, and their putrid smell alone was enough to make one fill

a pot with puke.

However, to Wei Wuxian, they were the easiest to manipulate and the most

obedient of puppets. In fact, it even felt somewhat endearing to suddenly hear

about them.

A-Tong appeared to have winked. "You have to take me along if you want to

go out, so I can protect you…"

A-Ding cut him off dismissively. "You? Protect me? Please. Can you actually

fight those creatures off?"

"If I can't fight them off, then no one can," A-Tong grumbled.

A-Ding laughed. "How do you know if other people can't fight them off? Let

me tell you, delegates from a cultivation sect have already arrived at our Mo

Manor today. I hear they're from an incredibly prominent clan! The madam is

receiving them in the main hall right this minute. Everyone in town has

gathered to watch, they're all so curious. You hear that noise? They might order

me around again in a bit. I don't have time to play with you."