Chapter 65: Performing Fuji to Invite Gods to Descend

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Chapter 65: Performing Fuji to Invite Gods to Descend

Given Yu Shenliu’s age, the fact that he had already risen to his current position was undeniably remarkable. So although the officials in Jincheng City were deliberately suppressing Yu Shenliu, many of his elders, including Yu Zhi, believed that holding him back a little at this point was the right thing to do. Otherwise, what position would a man in his twenties be reaching? He was simply showing too much of his brilliance too soon, which really wasn’t a good thing.

On the other hand, Huaxia had always placed great importance on establishing a family before building a career. No matter how outstanding an unmarried person was, in the eyes of most people, they still belonged to the category of “no hair on their lips, unreliable in their work.” Yu Shenliu had previously been considering whether he should get married, but now that he had someone he wanted to pursue, he no longer wanted to marry just anyone. Even so, in Yu Shenliu’s own plans, the time it would take to get Chen Yuan to fall for him still wasn’t going to be very long.

But enough about that. Because of his age and a number of other factors, Yu Shenliu indeed failed to advance toward his beautiful goal of joining the standing committee. Instead, he was entrusted with an important task: dealing with the problem of feudal superstition at Shishi Academy, a millennium-old institution in Jincheng City.

The task itself was that simple. On the surface, it seemed to be nothing more than getting everyone to think in a more scientific direction and carrying out some publicity and educational campaigns. However, the fact that this matter had been handed to Yu Shenliu meant that things clearly weren’t as simple as everyone assumed.

In fact, this was Yu Shenliu’s own problem. Yet at this moment, the innocent bystander who had been dragged into it, Chen Yuan, was sitting beside him, looking through the files Yu Shenliu had brought over.

The founding of Shishi Academy could be traced all the way back to the Western Han dynasty. Having continued for several thousand years, the academy was famous not only in Jincheng City and Xishu Province, but throughout Huaxia as a whole. However, the older an academy was, the more likely it was to encounter certain things that were difficult to explain scientifically.

On the one hand, schools were places filled with students blessed with vivid imaginations. On the other hand, during the day they were full of young people brimming with yang energy, while at night they became eerily empty.

Compared to other academies, the most distinctive feature of Shishi Academy was its ancient history. There were many old buildings on campus, and students often said that even in the sweltering summer, they remained remarkably cool inside without air conditioning. Perhaps this was simply the result of how ancient architecture had been designed, but it also helped fuel the flourishing of campus ghost stories.

Against this backdrop, there had long been a particular tradition at Shishi Academy: Fuji , or spirit writing. Or, to use a term more familiar to most people, the “Pen Fairy.”

At Shishi Academy, students who didn’t know how to play Pen Fairy were likely to be ostracized. Usually, when new students arrived, upperclassmen, classmates, or roommates would introduce them to the game. They would gradually go from fumbling around at first to mastering the technique and becoming what was known as a “veteran.”

In fact, at Shishi Academy, being good at playing Pen Fairy seemed to give a person a higher status. Other students would gather around you, creating a feeling rather like being the campus celebrity or star athlete. As a result, students at Shishi Academy were unusually enthusiastic about Pen Fairy.

However, just as conspicuous as the Pen Fairy phenomenon was the academy’s inexplicable problem with students and teachers dying. The most notable example was a recent incident involving an instrument. A female student had asked the Pen Fairy whether the boy she liked had feelings for her. When she received a negative answer, she killed herself.

The incident caused an enormous uproar in Jincheng City, and in fact, the whole of Huaxia was abuzz over it. Almost everyone was debating whether suicide over love was worth it, but another crucial issue was the fact that the girl had actually believed in the Pen Fairy so deeply. Because the Pen Fairy had given her that answer, she simply accepted it as true and did something foolish.

According to what was said on television, the so-called Pen Fairy was actually a game played by ancient scholars and had no credibility whatsoever. When people played games like Pen Fairy, it was actually their subconscious and psychological suggestions that provided the answers.

The game was played by several people, usually two, holding a pen between their fingers and moving it in circles over a sheet of paper with various words written on it. The answer to a question was determined by where the pen ended up on the paper. Generally, answers such as “yes” and “no” would be written on the paper beforehand.

Because the participants were the ones moving the pen while also being able to see the words on the paper, and because the questions they asked were specific, it created the illusion that they had summoned the Pen Fairy and made it seem as though the answers were genuine. In reality, there was nothing reliable about it at all.

Whatever they said on television was none of Chen Yuan’s concern. If it was merely the sort of Pen Fairy game shown on television, then there was nothing worth discussing.

The Pen Fairy originated from Fuji, which traditionally used a sand tray or a tray filled with rice. Two wooden sticks, usually chopsticks, would be tied together and placed on the tray, after which a deity would be invited to write through them.

Generally, even when people claimed to be inviting a deity, someone would still hold the sticks and guide the writing. Yet in rural areas, there had been more than one or two instances of people witnessing the sticks moving and writing all by themselves, without anyone holding them, producing so many words.

How could something like that be explained by science? Even if some mechanical principle could explain how two chopsticks tied together in a cross shape, without being stuck into the sand or rice, could somehow remain standing on their own, it still couldn’t explain why those two chopsticks could write poetry. Fuji in ancient times was capable of producing poems, and the same was still true in many remote areas today.

There was also a famous saying: “It’s easy to invite a god, but difficult to send one away.” It actually summed up the problems involved in Fuji rather well. Inviting a spirit to answer questions was easy enough, but once the questions had been answered, figuring out how to send this unknowable being back was another matter entirely.

The slightest carelessness could lead to trouble. And if something did go wrong under such circumstances, it would definitely be serious. The fact that no such major incident had occurred at Shishi Academy over all these years showed that their Pen Fairy sessions definitely weren’t the kind where they had genuinely summoned something with disastrous consequences.

Essentially, they could only be considered games. And if that was the case, then they had nothing to do with gods or ghosts, so there was no reason for them to have any particularly high degree of accuracy.

“The Master did not speak of strange things, of force, of disorder, or of spirits.” So Chen Yuan was unwilling to make any claims about whether supernatural phenomena actually existed.

Simply speaking, Fuji and Pen Fairy were indeed forms of metaphysics. And for ordinary people who wanted to try them, the safest method really was the sort of purely recreational version shown on television. Looking at it from the less pleasant side of things, having someone take charge of the process could help avoid many of the dangers.

“Playing Pen Fairy…” Yu Shenliu sighed as he looked at the words in the case file. He glanced at Chen Yuan, who was sitting close beside him. “Yuanyuan, what do you think?”

“How far do you want to take this?”

The fact that Pen Fairy had become this widespread was strange enough to make Chen Yuan uneasy. The method these students used to summon the Pen Fairy genuinely couldn’t have much accuracy, yet he found it strange that they were still so enthusiastic about it. Perhaps there was something else going on that he didn’t know about?

“Anyway, since the task we’ve been given is to resolve the problem of feudal superstition, we should at least get the people at Shishi Academy to stop placing so much faith in Pen Fairy, right?” He naturally raised an arm, reached it around Chen Yuan’s shoulders from behind, and pulled him close.

Chen Yuan’s body stiffened slightly before relaxing again. He ignored Yu Shenliu’s actions. The events of the past few days had taught him that even if he struggled, Yu Shenliu would shamelessly refuse to let go anyway, so he might as well save his energy.

This way of thinking had gradually become the norm in his interactions with Yu Shenliu. And as it turned out, someone as calm, or perhaps overly mild-tempered, as Chen Yuan would only keep lowering his own boundaries, allowing his personal space to be encroached upon little by little.

How many of the boundaries he had originally drawn had he already given up by now?

In the beginning, outsiders could still reasonably say that the way these two interacted seemed like that of friends. But now, who could say this was the sort of atmosphere friends were supposed to have? No matter how you looked at it, there was something decidedly ambiguous about it!

Tragically, Chen Yuan was still completely oblivious to how far his boundaries had fallen.

He was thinking about something else entirely. “Actually, I just think there’s something strange about the situation at Shishi Academy.”

“Oh? What’s strange about it?”

Chen Yuan understood these matters better than he did, so if Chen Yuan thought something was strange, there had to be something genuinely wrong. Yu Shenliu picked up on what Chen Yuan was saying and asked him.

Chen Yuan touched his lower lip. “Well, how should I put it? Generally speaking, for Pen Fairy to become this popular, the first requirement is that it has to be accurate. But looking at these people who play Pen Fairy and the methods they use, logically speaking, there’s no way it should be that accurate.

“So there should be some things missing from these files, things that haven’t been recorded. We won’t know what’s really going on unless we investigate.”

“Is that so?” Yu Shenliu raised an eyebrow. In fact, when he first saw these records, the first things that came to mind were things even less scientific than metaphysics. Gods and spirits, for example.

But looking at Chen Yuan, it was obvious that he didn’t think this had anything to do with such things, so Yu Shenliu naturally set aside his own thoughts and continued thinking along Chen Yuan’s lines.

After all, whenever something involved this sort of thing, there was basically no problem as long as he listened to Chen Yuan.

“Then how about we pick a time to go to Shishi Academy and take a look?”

Unlike Zhuowen Academy, Shishi Academy wasn’t open to the public. It only had designated days when parents could visit. Going there undercover and simply walking into the academy the way they had at Zhuowen Academy was basically impossible.

So the only option now was to go through official channels and enter the academy to investigate. Of course, there was still a possibility that they might not be able to find the right answer.

Since Yu Shenliu had suggested it, Chen Yuan nodded without objection. “All right. Pick a time, and I’ll let the people at the shop know.”

The implication was that he would have to rearrange his schedule according to this trip.

There was something vaguely reminiscent of a husband singing and his wife following along. Yu Shenliu let a strange expression flicker across his face before quickly hiding it. If Chen Yuan knew what he was thinking, he would definitely get angry.

And yet Yu Shenliu was secretly delighted once again.

“Then let’s go on Friday. That gives us a few days to arrange everything else. I’m worried someone might try to interfere.”

Yu Shenliu made the suggestion, and Chen Yuan nodded.

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