Chapter Ninety-Four: The Finale

A note: we are about to enter the main storyline, the tale of the twelve members of the Yin-Yang Studio. Second Senior Sister Zhou Linger and Fourth Junior Sister Lin Xiaoyue are about to appear, along with the interference of Xu Daheng’s faction from North City. Fang You’s fortune-telling shop will welcome new faces, and the Morgan Sect will ultimately grow into the largest divine cult. The four great powers are about to gather. Please look forward to it.

“Ha!”

On the bridge, Fang Meiqi stubbed her cigarette out against a pillar and let out a long breath. “Since then, I discovered that I also had the ability to hear the voices of ghosts. But I was too desperate to finish publishing my novel. On top of the manuscript I already had in reserve, I started writing to the end again, kept revising, and kept writing until now, nearly to completion.”

“I truly do not want to be like this ring of smoke, drifting through the world only to vanish without a trace, leaving nothing behind at all.”

“I sympathize with what happened to you, but your novel has already cost lives. As a disciple of Mount Mao, I still hope you will stop. Do not keep lending power to ghosts just for fame, and do not keep hurting others,” Fang You urged earnestly.

Fang Meiqi sat on the bridge, gazing up at the star-filled sky, exhaling a few more wisps of smoke that hovered in the air before slowly dispersing.

Just moments ago, her computer had automatically updated a chapter of her novel, foretelling that she would die here tonight. But she did not mind. At least she had finally left something in this world. There had once been a very famous novelist named Fang Meiqi. That alone was enough.

“You’re a Daoist, aren’t you?” Fang Meiqi looked at Fang You. “Daoists are very good at catching ghosts, aren’t they?”

“To drive out evil, uphold the Way, and cleanse away corruption is the duty of a Mount Mao Daoist.” Fang You looked at her and said, “Though the chapter in your novel foretells that you will die here tonight, I am Fang You, the third disciple of Mount Mao’s closed-door line. I will absolutely not let anything happen to you.”

But Fang Meiqi only smiled. “Don’t Daoists always speak of cause and effect? Of retribution that never fails? I am tired. I do not want to run anymore. Tonight, you do not need to save me, and you do not need to protect me.”

“If I am to die tonight, then let me follow heaven’s will. And if I do not die, then my novel will end here as well. One sufficiently famous novel is enough for this world. I am not a greedy person.”

“But—”

“Sir!”

Fang You was about to say more, but Fang Meiqi cut him off directly. “Please let me quietly bear my own karma. This is my respect for myself. I want to take responsibility for my past. I hope you will not interfere. This is my request, and it is also my wish.”

Fang You let out a sigh. “Very well. Since the one involved has asked for it, it would be improper for us Daoists to force ourselves into another’s karma. Let nature take its course.”

After saying this, Fang You slowly departed. After all, since the victim was willing to bear the punishment of her own karma, if he insisted on intervening, he would instead be the one disturbing the balance of cause and effect.

After Fang You left, Fang Meiqi was the only one left on the bridge, smoking in silence.

After some time, a chill wind began to rise around her, making one shiver involuntarily.

Gradually, a pair of ghastly pale hands appeared and closed around Fang Meiqi’s throat.

Fang Meiqi did not struggle. Instead, she smiled in relief and said, “An Ran, do you know? Sometimes mediocrity really can kill a person.”

“My father was also a novelist. He wrote all his life and never amounted to much. One day, when my mother pushed open the bedroom door, she found he had hanged himself in the room. He left behind a suicide note and some money on the desk.”

“In the note, he admitted that he was an ordinary writer with very little talent and no ability to earn money. He had had enough. The ten thousand yuan on the desk was the total bonus he had earned from writing novels over the past five years.”

“He could no longer bear to rely solely on my mother to support the family. But he had no other choice. Because he was so mediocre, no one paid any attention to his work. Relying only on a full-time writer’s attendance bonus was nowhere near enough to survive.”

“He could no longer endure that mediocre life, or the hopeful look in my mother’s eyes. He knew he might never write the kind of work that could make him famous overnight. Perhaps he could only keep dragging his family through poverty forever. He could not bear it anymore. He could not bear any of it. He was sorry, and could only say farewell to us in this way.”

The pale arms around Fang Meiqi’s neck slowly tightened. Her breathing gradually became difficult, and her face began to turn ugly.

Fang Meiqi made no attempt to resist. She merely fumbled out another cigarette, lit it with trembling hands, took a deep drag, and continued, “Mother did not seem especially surprised. It was as if she had already anticipated this ending.”

“After all, as a writer, if you cannot create work that people love, then all that remains is poverty and humiliation. Mother held Father’s funeral, and at the funeral Mother collapsed, because by then she had already taken far too many sleeping pills, enough to kill a person.”

“Mother loved Father very much, but life always requires one to bear the consequences of one’s own choices. And so what awaited me next was a long life in an orphanage.”

Fang Meiqi greedily took two more puffs of her cigarette, even though the pale hands around her neck had nearly robbed her of breath.

Yet she seemed to be savoring her final moments of freedom, desperately drawing in the flavor of that cigarette.

“Do you know what is the most tragic thing of all?” she said. “The most tragic thing is that I, too, fell in love with novels. I became a novelist like my father, and at the same time I became as mediocre and useless as he was.”

“No one liked my work, and no one was willing to accept it. If I cannot earn enough through my writing to support myself, then my ending will be just like my father’s: to vanish without a trace inside the world I created.”

“As though I had never existed at all, leaving not the slightest mark behind. After countless failures, I made up my mind to give up. But heaven had to let me meet you. You were like a gift bestowed upon me by the heavens, a manuscript with the story I had always wanted.”

“Do you know? I think you helped me escape the predicament my father once faced. Even now, full of hatred and wanting to drag me away from this world, I do not regret it, and I do not hate you. Even if what I did was wrong, I accept it. At the very least, I can leave my name in this world. There was once a novelist named Fang Meiqi. That is enough. Thank you, Lin Anran. Being with you was truly my good fortune.”

With a smile on her face, Fang Meiqi closed her eyes and waited for what was about to come.

Suddenly, the hands around her neck hesitated for a moment, then released her.

Fang Meiqi opened her eyes in confusion and looked back, but there was nothing behind her at all, only a few strands of gentle wind passing by.