Chapter 29: Moving into a New Home, There Are Customs to Follow

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Chapter 29: Moving into a New Home, There Are Customs to Follow

It was the weekend again.

“I even gave Rong Yan the ‘ Song of White Hair ,’ and he still won’t leave me alone!” Huo Shu grumbled, looking thoroughly displeased. Sitting in the armchair, she complained to her uncle.

Because history had changed, girls in this era were still rather elegant even when breaking up with someone. It was common for someone like Huo Shu to give the man a copy of “Song of White Hair” as a way of ending things. Once the poem was presented, the man would generally feel too embarrassed to keep pestering her.

By all rights, since Huo Shu had gone so far as to give him “Song of White Hair,” Rong Yan should have taken the hint and stopped bothering her. But reality had turned out quite differently from what Huo Shu had expected. Rong Yan simply refused to let up.

Sitting beside Yu Shenliu and listening to Huo Shu complain, Chen Yuan remained remarkably calm. He had already seen some hints of Rong Yan’s temperament when he read his physiognomy back then, so he knew that getting rid of this man easily would not be so simple.

“What has he done?” Seeing how troubled Huo Shu looked, Chen Yuan asked.

“It’s really nothing,” Huo Shu pouted. “It’s not like we work together, and his usual social circle doesn’t really overlap with mine anyway. Besides, I haven’t told him much about myself, so it wouldn’t be that easy for him to track me down.”

Hearing Huo Shu’s words, Chen Yuan immediately understood. After all, Huo Shu and Huo Jian were both children of an official family, and they knew to exercise restraint in many matters. Although Huo Shu had previously been blinded by so-called love, even under those circumstances, she would never have revealed all her cards.

Or perhaps Huo Shu actually trusted her family deep down? So even at a critical moment, she never told him whose child she was, lest he really turn out to be a Zhongshan Wolf and keep taking advantage of her.

No matter how deeply you love someone, you must leave yourself a bottom line. You absolutely must not forget your self-respect, family ties, friendship, and sense of duty because of love. Just as Chen Yuan had always believed, the Huo family’s two children had both been raised very well.

Following Chen Yuan’s line of questioning, Yu Shenliu asked, “Then what exactly is he pestering you about?”

Huo Shu irritably tugged at the hair in front of her chest before saying, “I don’t know much about his life in reality, but this guy knows my personal email, my Fei account, and Weibo and stuff like that.”

A Fei account was actually something similar to a QQ account, an instant-messaging account commonly used for online chatting and social networking.

“At first, I thought that even though we’d broken up, I should still leave him some dignity, so I didn’t completely delete him from my friends list. But after I gave him the Song of White Hair, he started saying all kinds of incredibly self-important things to me online.

“Things like, ‘I know you still love me. It’s okay, I forgive you for not thinking things through. Let’s start over,’ and ‘Although a lot of girls think you’re not good enough for me, you’re still the one I love most,’ and ‘Come to my house tomorrow and I’ll forgive you,’ and things like that. He’s absolutely shameless!”

As she spoke, Huo Shu furrowed her brows. “I never realized before that he was actually this kind of person. Who does he think he is? Does he think I can’t live without him? Three-legged toads may be hard to find, but there are plenty of two-legged men!”

The way she put it was rather crude, and Yu Shenliu could not help coughing twice. This prompted Huo Shu to cover her mouth with her hand and pretend she hadn’t said anything.

After fake-coughing twice, Huo Shu continued, “Then I deleted him from my friends, but he started adding me every day. It was so annoying! And he kept sending all kinds of nonsense to my email.

“At first, it was still those self-obsessed messages. I was so angry that I replied with what I just said. But then, hmph! What kind of man is he? After I’d made it that obvious, even someone as thick-skinned as him should have understood, right?

“But instead, he directly replied with an email containing more than a dozen photos of him killing chickens, and they were really gruesome ones. The whole screen was covered in blood! Then he cursed at me…”

When it came to some of the more unsavory things he had said, Huo Shu glossed over them. “He said that if I didn’t go back, I’d better watch out because he wouldn’t be nice!”

“He wouldn’t be nice? I think I’m the one who won’t be nice!” Yu Shenliu’s temper flared when he heard this. Although Huo Shu was only a few years younger than him, Yu Shenliu was still her elder and her uncle. If his niece had been wronged, of course he had to help her get even!

“Alright, alright.” This time, the roles were reversed, and Huo Shu comforted Yu Shenliu. “Someone like him? I was just blind enough to fall for him before. Let him say whatever he wants. Can he really do anything to me? Just ignore him. I’m actually only a little annoyed. Besides, a lot of people need to contact me through my personal email, so it would be inconvenient to change it.”

Chen Yuan spoke up at this point. “You want to cut ties with him completely?”

“Ah, yes!” Huo Shu nodded at Chen Yuan. After thinking for a moment, she remembered what Chen Yuan was capable of and asked, somewhat excitedly, “You have a way to solve this?”

Chen Yuan blinked mysteriously. “What do you think?”

Yu Shenliu laughed from the side. Seeing Huo Shu’s instantly dumbfounded expression, he knew Chen Yuan was teasing her.

“Come to my shop.” Chen Yuan stood up and suggested this.

Chen Yuan didn’t need to have the shop elaborately decorated. He could simply use screens to form a circle and create a partition inside, give the place a quick cleaning, put out some flowers and plants, and prepare the things he normally needed in the cabinets. That would basically be enough to open for business.

However, Chen Yuan had said that the previous few days were not auspicious, so he had never gone there.

When Chen Yuan mentioned going to his shop, Huo Shu was still confused about what he had in mind, but Yu Shenliu had more or less figured it out. Chen Yuan was planning to use metaphysical means to help Huo Shu.

So he stood up. “Okay.” As he spoke, he gave Huo Shu a meaningful look.

Although she still didn’t quite understand, Huo Shu was perceptive enough not to ask a silly question.

Before leaving, Chen Yuan went back to his room and brought out a small bag. Yu Shenliu and Huo Shu were both curious about what was inside, but they would probably find out soon enough, so neither asked.

The three of them soon arrived at the shop.

Chen Yuan took out his key, unlocked the rolling shutter, and pushed it up. But instead of immediately inviting Yu Shenliu and Huo Shu inside, he asked them to wait.

Standing at the entrance, he opened the bag he was carrying and took out a handful of something. He first scattered a handful in the corner on the left side of the shop, then another handful in the corner on the right.

The action caught Yu Shenliu and Huo Shu by surprise. Looking closely, they saw that what Chen Yuan had scattered was a mixture of rice grains, soybeans, and fine white powder.

What was he doing?

For a moment, they were both extremely curious.

Chen Yuan scattered the last handful of the mixture into the corner, then walked back to the entrance. Facing inward, he called out loudly, “A new master has arrived. All honored guests should leave!”

The whole thing was so mysterious that it left them utterly bewildered. If someone else had witnessed it, they probably would have thought Chen Yuan was crazy. Huo Shu and Yu Shenliu knew what he was capable of, so they simply watched without saying anything.

After repeating the words three times, Chen Yuan let out a quiet breath. He turned to Yu Shenliu and Huo Shu and said, “All right, come in,” before stepping inside.

Huo Shu followed Chen Yuan into the shop and looked around. Most of the shop was enclosed by a screen, with only an opening along the wall for people to enter and exit. Up close, they could see that the bottom of the screen had been fixed in place, forming a circle.

Inside the circular space enclosed by the screen were the tables and chairs: several grand armchairs, a few small tables, and several cabinets arranged along the screen. Though simple, the calligraphy and paintings on the screen gave the place an elegant air.

“What exactly did you scatter just now?” As soon as they sat down, Yu Shenliu eagerly asked Chen Yuan.

Chen Yuan placed the small bag on the table, opened it, and motioned for Yu Shenliu to look inside. “Here.”

Yu Shenliu leaned closer. Inside were glutinous rice, soybeans, and salt.

“A broom can sweep away dust, while these things clean the room on another level,” Chen Yuan explained without going into detail. “Although I’m only opening a shop and not moving into a new home, there are still some things that need to be done. In my line of work, there’s no need to set off firecrackers or anything, but the place does need to be clean.”

“The three lines I recited just now were to inform the unseen occupants that this place already has a master, so they should move out.”

“You mean—” Huo Shu was about to say the word, but Chen Yuan raised a finger to stop her.

“Don’t say it!” Since it was the first day of opening the shop, some words were taboo.

Chen Yuan then explained, “Actually, I’ve never seen one, so I can’t tell you whether they exist or not. But since this is a custom, following it won’t hurt. It doesn’t take much effort, right?”

In fact, metaphysics was often connected to these unexplained spiritual matters. In rural areas, those who practiced physiognomy or feng shui often had to deal with things like spirits and strange phenomena. Feng shui itself had methods for dealing with or preventing spiritual disturbances.

Chen Yuan had never seen anything spiritual, but if certain practices had been passed down for generations, there was naturally a reason for them. Following the rules was also simply how Chen Yuan had always done things.

Huo Shu nodded in agreement. She had already witnessed Chen Yuan’s abilities, and some of the things she had once questioned now seemed to perhaps have a reason after all.

Even so, thinking about it still made her feel a chill run down her back. In modern society, people often said that certain things did not exist, yet at the same time, all kinds of inexplicable things existed. The unknown was frightening.

Seeing Huo Shu’s expression, Chen Yuan comforted her. “It’s fine. As the saying goes, if you haven’t done anything to feel guilty about… Besides, we only need to have the proper respect for the unknown, and naturally nothing will happen.”

After all, if spiritual beings really did exist, they and humans belonged to two different worlds, and in most cases, they would not actually come into contact with each other.

Huo Shu was still somewhat unsettled, so Chen Yuan changed the subject. “I brought you to the shop because of the matter with Rong Yan.”

“It’s actually not difficult for you to cut ties with him completely.”

“Not difficult?” Huo Shu’s attention was drawn back to the matter. In her eyes, a man like Rong Yan was like mud. Once it got on you, not only was it hard to wash off, it was also dirty and smelly.

Chen Yuan nodded. “Metaphysics was once deeply woven into all aspects of people’s lives. Any little matter could be connected to it, and matters between men and women had their own corresponding methods as well. Just like how Miao women could use gu to make someone fall in love with them, or use methods to make that love unwavering. Techniques like these weren’t limited to the Miao people.”

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