Chapter 29: The Death of Jihong

The first time gambling, it was natural to feel a bit excited.

But Shui Miao felt an even stronger urge to test whether his gambling luck had changed after absorbing the purple energy.

Soon, a new round began. This time, as Xiong Ying had hoped, Sun Jijun was the dealer.

Xiong Ying placed a bet of one thousand yuan.

Wang Yong also bet one thousand yuan.

The few bodyguards each bet one hundred yuan; for them, that was already a significant amount.

Shui Miao counted the money Wang Yong had given him earlier—there was as much as one thousand four hundred yuan. Without hesitation, he also placed a bet of one hundred yuan. After the cards were dealt, Shui Miao’s hand was just slightly better than Sun Jijun’s. In several consecutive rounds, his cards were just a little higher than Sun Jijun’s, but it was enough to win. Soon, Shui Miao had won six hundred yuan, bringing his total to two thousand.

They played a few more rounds. Sun Jijun had decent luck too, though he won and lost alternately, he ended up ahead overall.

In contrast, Wang Yong lost the most and was soon about to lose all his money. Unwilling to give up, he borrowed five thousand yuan from Xiong Ying to continue playing. Gambling was something one shouldn’t touch at all—once you started, you became addicted. When you won, you felt happy and wanted to win even more. When you lost, you wanted to recover your losses and kept throwing more money in, getting deeper and deeper. The rich could afford to lose, but for those without money, losing too much could lead to ruin and even selling off family members.

After a few more rounds, seeing that Shui Miao hadn’t lost yet, Wang Yong urged him to bet more. “If you have good luck, not betting is just a waste of time.” Xiong Ying nodded in agreement and also thought Shui Miao should bet more.

Persuaded by the two, Shui Miao placed his one thousand yuan winnings as a bet.

And he actually won again. One thousand became two thousand. The speed at which money came thrilled Shui Miao.

Since it was all winnings anyway, Shui Miao placed two thousand yuan as a bet again—and won again!

Winning several rounds in a row, Shui Miao ended up winning over ten thousand yuan! Excited by this huge win, he was convinced it must be the effect of the purple energy. But why did the purple energy work, and how did it change his luck? This was something Shui Miao desperately wanted to understand, though he had no idea where to start. One thing was certain, though—the pleasant feeling continued.

Shui Miao didn’t want to gamble recklessly like his grandfather, so he decided to set aside ten thousand yuan and bet the remaining few thousand yuan in small amounts of one hundred yuan each.

But when the dealer rotated, Shui Miao was assigned to be the dealer.

Encouraged by his grandfather and Wang Yong, Shui Miao used the ten thousand yuan as his stake and put the rest into his pocket.

Being the dealer himself, Shui Miao felt quite uncertain.

But surprisingly, he won several more rounds in a row. Ten thousand became twenty thousand, twenty thousand became forty thousand, until he had taken all the money from everyone else. Xiong Ying lost thirteen thousand yuan, Wang Yong lost ten thousand, including the five thousand he had borrowed, Sun Jijun lost over twenty thousand yuan, and the few bodyguards also lost several thousand.

Watching Shui Miao collect the money, everyone looked extremely gloomy, wondering how his luck could be so good.

Shui Miao, on the other hand, was thrilled. How much had he earned in three years of working hard?

Now, in just one gambling session, he had won over forty thousand yuan. The money came too easily.

“Uncle, you gave me some money earlier, so I’ll give you some too.”

Besides the forty thousand yuan he kept, Shui Miao sorted out the remaining five thousand yuan and gave it all to Wang Yong.

Shui Miao believed in repaying kindness and distinguishing clearly between favors and grudges.

Wang Yong was surprised. He hadn’t expected Shui Miao, so young, to be so generous. Five thousand yuan was no small amount. He felt that for a young person to have such courage was a sign of a promising future.

“Haha, great! Well done! No wonder you’re my godson!”

Although Wang Yong had lost money, he felt very happy inside. However, he didn’t accept Shui Miao’s money. In fact, he didn’t care about such a small amount at all. After all, he would get several ten thousand yuan from Xiong Ying’s twenty thousand yuan. What was a few thousand yuan compared to that?

Xiong Ying was also surprised. He hadn’t expected Shui Miao to be so generous.

But the most unhappy was Sun Jijun. It wasn’t that he couldn’t afford to lose, but he felt frustrated that his luck had been so bad recently. Looking at Shui Miao, he thought, “Xiong Ying is a feng shui master. Could he have some way to change people’s fortune? Maybe this old man couldn’t do it himself, so he brought along a younger one to win my money?”

Thinking this, Sun Jijun decided to find an opportunity to get some information out of Shui Miao.

Looking at the time, it was already past eleven o’clock.

Sun Jijun picked up his phone and called Sun Jihong. The call was quickly connected. But immediately afterward, Sun Jijun suddenly stood up with a “Hmph!” and asked anxiously, “Jihong, what did you say? Are you crazy?”

…

Everyone was startled. It seemed something had happened.

A moment later, Sun Jijun shouted loudly, “Quickly, where exactly are you?”

Inside the room, it fell silent. They faintly heard a strange laughter coming from the other end of the phone…

The call was cut off. Sun Jijun hurriedly walked out, followed closely by his bodyguards.

“Boss Sun, what’s going on?” Wang Yong rushed out after him.

Xiong Ying and Shui Miao also followed.

Sun Jijun suddenly stopped and frowned. “Jihong seems to have gone crazy, or maybe possessed. Master Xiong, why don’t you and the others come with me to find Jihong?”

“Sure, sure, that’s only right.” Xiong Ying naturally couldn’t refuse such a matter of life and death.

“Thank you!”

Sun Jijun nodded heavily and hurriedly ran toward the road, calling friends for help as he ran.

Sun Jijun had a wide network, with connections in both the underworld and the authorities.

After making over a dozen calls, the entire city was stirred up. The police were alerted, and the city’s surveillance systems were activated…

Half an hour later, Sun Jijun received a call. They had found the person at the entrance of the highway.

When they arrived at the scene, Shui Miao was shocked to find that Sun Jihong had already died in a car accident!

Sun Jihong had driven into the barrier at the highway entrance, and the front of the car had fallen directly to the ground.

What was hard to understand was that Sun Jihong was wearing women’s clothes. Shui Miao and Wang Yong recognized them immediately—they were the clothes retrieved from the wooden basin in the room. Why had Sun Jihong worn such clothes? But even more shocking to Wang Yong and Shui Miao was that Sun Jihong was holding a red bag in his hand. This was exactly the red bag Wang Yong had given to Shui Miao for the ginger king!

“How could this be…”

Shui Miao suddenly recalled Sun Jihong’s words before leaving. A chill ran through his heart. Those words didn’t sound like Sun Jihong’s at all. The tone, the expression—it was exactly like a woman’s!

Now, Sun Jihong was dead here, wearing women’s clothes…

Could it be…

A sudden thought flashed through Shui Miao’s mind—that the female ghost hadn’t been killed by his grandfather after all. Instead, she had entered the red bag. Thinking back, he vaguely remembered the bag moving slightly at the time…

The police and Sun Jijun pulled Sun Jihong out of the car.

Sun Jijun pried open his brother’s hand, opened the red bag, and poured out a dried ginger root…

Sun Jijun had originally thought the bag might contain drugs or something similar, but it was only ginger. He was slightly taken aback. He picked up the ginger, examined it closely, smelled it, and then looked at Shui Miao: “What’s going on here?”

Earlier upstairs, Sun Jijun had seen Shui Miao holding this red bag.

Shui Miao was startled and quickly explained, “This is a treasure given to me by my godfather. It’s the ginger king that can ward off evil spirits. Your younger brother was scared and specifically asked to exchange it with me. My old phone was given to me by your brother.”

Indeed, Sun Jijun had seen Shui Miao use this to ward off evil before.

Seeing that the red bag wasn’t involved, Sun Jijun put it aside and called a friend who was a forensic expert, asking him to come immediately to help investigate and determine the exact cause of his brother’s death.

“Let me take a look…”

At this moment, Xiong Ying stepped forward. He squatted beside Sun Jihong, gently pulled open his eyelids to examine, and touched his neck. Then he stood up and shook his head. “It shouldn’t be some evil spirit. It looks more like an accident.”

Hearing Xiong Ying’s words, Sun Jijun also thought it was an accident. He sighed and said, “Master, thank you for your trouble. You can go back first. There’s no need to go to the villa anymore.”

“Alright then. If you need anything, just call me.”

Xiong Ying said his goodbyes and turned to leave.

Wang Yong called a taxi, and the three returned directly to his house. No one spoke on the way.

Back in the house, Wang Yong closed the door and entered the living room. Seeing Xiong Ying’s gloomy expression on the sofa, he curiously asked, “Dad, what’s wrong? This matter has nothing to do with us, right?”

“Nothing to do with us?”

Xiong Ying glared at Wang Yong angrily. “Just pray that no expert notices. Otherwise, Sun Jijun won’t let the three of us off the hook.”

“What do you mean?” Wang Yong immediately became tense.

Shui Miao also felt nervous. “Grandpa, what exactly happened?”

“Ai!” Xiong Ying sighed heavily. “Sun Jihong was killed by an evil spirit. I lied earlier just to protect you two.”

“What… What… What do you mean this has to do with us?” Wang Yong was shocked.

Shui Miao was also stunned. Could it be that his grandfather and he had come to the same conclusion?

“What do you mean what’s the connection?” Xiong Ying repeated Wang Yong’s words, then angrily said, “It’s all because of your bag. Who would believe such a stupid lie that dried ginger from decades ago can ward off evil spirits? That bag was the cause of Sun Jihong’s death. Back at the pool, I thought I had killed that female ghost, but in fact, she wasn’t dead. That ghost was extremely powerful. She directly entered the bag and hid inside. Then Shui Miao gave the bag to Sun Jihong, which led to this tragedy. If you look closely at Sun Jihong’s pupils, you can see a kind of aura—that’s the yin-spirit energy left by the female ghost.”

…

Hearing these words, both Wang Yong and Shui Miao were stunned into silence!