A Secret (GL) - Chapter 35

As soon as she heard that Shuge had materialized, Shen Juan completely forgot about the “wavy lines” and asked urgently, “When?”

Gu Shuge hadn’t checked the time, so she could only give a rough estimate. She wrote in Shen Juan’s palm: “At dawn, but before the sun was fully up.”

Shen Juan pondered for a moment; that gave her a general window, likely around 6:00 AM.

“How did you discover you had materialized?” Shen Juan asked again.

Gu Shuge was thinking about the connection between the materialization and the blood she drank yesterday. When Shen Juan asked, she blurted out, “It was when I secretly kissed—” Before she could finish, she slammed her hands over her mouth, eyes wide, staring at Shen Juan.

Shen Juan could sense her presence and her movements, so she thought to herself: What does covering her mouth with both hands mean?

Gu Shuge swallowed hard, relieved that Shen Juan couldn’t hear or see her. She lowered her hands and let out a soft sigh, her shoulders relaxing slightly.

And a sigh of relief. Shen Juan continued her observations without showing any reaction.

Gu Shuge struggled to think of an answer that wasn’t a lie but didn’t expose her. She wrote in Shen Juan’s palm: “I touched you then, and that’s when I realized I was solid.”

So she found out because she touched me. Shen Juan reflected on this sentence. The “vibe” she got from the words was quite calm, as if everything was perfectly normal.

Covering the mouth, sighing in relief, and then acting as if nothing happened—these three steps gave Shen Juan the intuition that Gu Shuge was hiding something. If there was a secret, it lay in that answer.

“You touched me then,” Shen Juan pondered internally. Without changing her expression, she asked casually, “Where did you touch me?”

Hearing this, Gu Shuge recalled kissing Shen Juan that morning. Seeing that the older woman knew nothing, she felt a strange mix of guilt and an indescribable excitement; her heart began to race violently again.

Shen Juan was waiting for an answer when, suddenly, she was drowned in countless wavy lines again. She tried to hold it back but couldn’t help saying, “Why do you always surround me with wavy lines?”

What wavy lines? Gu Shuge was confused. She drew a question mark in Shen Juan’s palm and then, quite cleverly, thought of a way to change the subject. She wrote: “It should be because of your blood, though I don’t know the specific connection.”

She deliberately wrote very slowly, taking ten minutes for a single sentence, hoping the topic would pass. Shen Juan’s primary concern was, after all, her materialization.

Sure enough, Shen Juan thought about it and said, “It’s related to the blood, but I suspect it isn’t only because of the blood.” She analyzed it calmly: “If blood alone could give a soul a physical form, the boundary between life and death would be far too blurred.”

Even that “Blood-Nourishing” method had conditions: either a constant irrigation of blood from thousands of people, or a combination of spiritual energy and a thousand years of time. None of those were easy to achieve.

Yet she had only given Xiaoge one cup of blood yesterday, and that allowed for forty-five seconds of materialization. It was far too easy.

Gu Shuge thought she was right. If it were that easy, the Underworld would be empty; every little ghost would stay in the living world, nourished by their loved ones, and death would no longer mean parting.

But she felt a faint sense of stubbornness and wrote: “That’s different. It was your blood.”

It wasn’t just anyone’s blood. Shen Juan’s blood was special to her; it was the only matter she could touch. To her, it was precious.

Shen Juan’s eyes held a smile, but she said nothing.

What could be the reason? Though stubborn, Gu Shuge thought seriously. The blood definitely played a major role, but were there other conditions? The Soul-Nourishing Buddha likely played a part, too, though she didn’t know what it did.

The information they had was still too sparse to deduce the cause.

“So, where exactly did you touch me?” Shen Juan suddenly circled back to the starting point.

Gu Shuge froze. How… how did she get back to that?

Shen Juan didn’t say anything else; she simply waited for an answer. Though her tone wasn’t forceful, it was clear she insisted on a reply.

Gu Shuge knew she couldn’t avoid it. Conflicted, she wrote in Shen Juan’s palm: “Face, brow.” She left out the corner of the mouth. The face and brow were suggestive enough; if she wrote “corner of the mouth,” she really wouldn’t be able to hide it.

Shen Juan lowered her eyes and gave a shallow smile.

Gu Shuge turned red at the smile and quickly added a line: “It was an accident.”

Shen Juan’s smile deepened.

Gu Shuge’s cheeks were crimson, and she was at a total loss. Fortunately, Shen Juan knew when to stop and didn’t ask “What did you use to touch my face?”, saving Shuge’s dignity. She said, “Let’s keep looking through the books for a way.”

Feeling liberated, Gu Shuge hurriedly wrote in her palm: “Okay!”

She was about to go busy herself when she heard Shen Juan say, “Will Xiaoge sleep with Sister again tonight?”

Gu Shuge’s eyes went wide. She didn’t know whether to say yes or no. Then she met Shen Juan’s eyes, which were full of amusement, and she realized: She’s so mean, she’s teasing me!

She wrote a massive NO in Shen Juan’s palm and ran off to search for books in the library.

She drifted between the bookshelves, designating an unsearched area to investigate. After searching for a while, she passed through the floor to see what Shen Juan was doing. Shen Juan was already sitting at the desk flipping through books. Shuge passed back up to the upper floor.

Initially, Shen Juan had wanted to have the entire library photocopied—with enough people and machines, it would only take two or three days. But Bailong Temple had firmly refused, not even allowing photography, claiming it would damage the paper.

The reason was legitimate and reasonable; many museums forbid flash photography to protect cultural relics. Yet they had turned around and allowed Shen Juan to live there for five days.

Their previous concern was clearly hypocritical. They simply felt that photocopying was too grand a gesture and would attract public criticism, whereas Shen Juan living there alone was a much smaller affair. As long as they didn’t publicize it, no one would know.

The day brought no breakthroughs, but they did learn a lot about the Underworld. Ksitigarbha Bodhisattva made the vow, “Not until the hells are empty will I become a Buddha,” so the Underworld and Buddhism share deep roots.

The texts also mentioned that soul-catchers use “Yin Malice” to find ghosts and take them to the Underworld for judgment. They also mentioned that ghosts fear neither sunlight nor moonlight. However, moonlight generates Yin Malice, which attracts soul-catchers. Weak ghosts without specific techniques will come out by day and hide by night to avoid the moon. Powerful ghosts, however, do not fear soul-catchers and instead use the Yin Malice to increase their cultivation.

By the end of the day, the only discovery Gu Shuge made was that she was a “weak ghost” with no techniques at all.

Around 6:00 PM, her presence vanished. Now, the time she could be sensed was longer than the time she couldn’t. Shen Juan was in a good mood.

Gu Shuge, however, was dejected by the lack of progress. She muttered to Shen Juan: “Otherwise, let’s just buy Bailong Temple. Then the library would be ours, and we could hire people to help search.”

After muttering it, she even wrote the sentence down.

Shen Juan was helpless: “What nonsense are you talking? Bailong Temple is among the first batch of National Key Cultural Relics Protection Units. Who would you even buy it from?” If it weren’t for that status, Bailong Temple wouldn’t have dared to bargain with the Gu family.

Hearing “National Key Cultural Relics Protection Unit,” Gu Shuge shut up and went back to flipping through books obediently.

At night, when Shen Juan went to rest, Shuge stubbornly refused to go with her, claiming she didn’t need sleep and wanted to use every second to finish the remaining books. Shen Juan didn’t insist; after all, Shuge’s physical body was the most important matter.

However, once Shen Juan fell asleep, in her half-dreaming state, she felt a little ghost lying beside her. The ghost had a very proper sleeping posture, not moving an inch, yet continuing to drown her in wavy lines. Shen Juan fell back into a peaceful sleep.

She had a dream about the year she graduated university. Xiaoge was holding a camera, taking graduation photos for her. She was standing in the sunlight with the library behind her. Xiaoge’s smile was brighter than the sun that day as she said, “Sister, smile for me.”

She smiled as requested, and time froze. After that photo was developed, it sat by Xiaoge’s bed for years. When Xiaoge went abroad, she took the photo and the frame with her. Because of that, Shen Juan had held onto hope, calculating the time difference to talk to her on the phone for a whole year.

In Shen Juan’s dream, there was no subsequent separation or distance—only the bright sunlight of that day and the image of Xiaoge following behind her, tugging at her sleeve.

When she woke up, it was just dawn, and Gu Shuge was no longer beside her. She reflected on the dream, thinking how adorable Xiaoge was back then. She was still adorable now—a bit harder to understand, perhaps, but Shen Juan was starting to get her.

Shen Juan sat up and walked out of the lounge. Sensing Shuge wasn’t in the immediate area, she guessed she was back in the library.

Shen Juan didn’t mind and went to wash up. Suddenly, Gu Shuge charged down from above, came to a halt beside her, and poked her with a finger. Shen Juan guessed she had found something, so she held out her palm.

“I found a hidden compartment on the third floor,” Gu Shuge wrote.

A hidden compartment? Shen Juan steadied herself. “Lead the way.”

Gu Shuge nodded and took two steps forward before stopping. She didn’t realize that the time she could be sensed had been extended significantly; she thought Shen Juan wouldn’t know where she was going and couldn’t follow.

Shen Juan noticed her hesitation. “I can sense you’re there.”

Only then did Gu Shuge continue.

She had found the compartment by accident. The library was old, and some parts showed signs of disrepair. Walking around, she noticed a spot on the floor where the wood grain didn’t match the surrounding planks—it wasn’t the same piece of wood. She had loved detective novels as a child and was familiar with hidden compartments. Taking advantage of being a ghost, she reached her hand through the floorboards and felt a box-like object with her fingertips.

On the upper floor, Gu Shuge stood by the compartment. She suddenly remembered that it was almost seven o’clock, and Shen Juan could still feel her. Usually, Shen Juan would tell her the duration she was sensed, but she hadn’t mentioned it yesterday, and they hadn’t discussed it.

She stopped and wrote in Shen Juan’s palm: “How long was I sensed for yesterday?”

Shen Juan was thinking about what might be in the compartment when Shuge asked this. She felt a bit awkward but told the truth: “Until 6:00 PM.”

That’s so long! Gu Shuge was thrilled, feeling hopeful. But the memory of yesterday morning’s incident quickly resurfaced—that meant Shen Juan had sensed all her actions, like covering her face.

And she hadn’t told her.

Shuge’s pupils shrank slightly as she looked at Shen Juan in shock, her expression saying: I didn’t think you were that kind of person.

Shen Juan calmly added fuel to the fire: “And last night, when you secretly lay down beside me… I felt that, too.”