Chapter 28 Ledger

All four teammates had left, leaving Wanli Fengdao alone in the vast courtyard. Night had fallen, the moon shone dimly, and stars were sparse. Chilled winds swept through intermittently, making the vague shadows of trees sway abruptly, as if something lurked in the dark, dense forest, spying on him.

Gathering dry branches, he piled them up. With his longsword in hand, Wanli Fengdao took out a bottle of high-concentration alcohol from his inventory and carelessly sprinkled it on the wood pile. Then he reached into his pocket for his Swiss army knife and used its flint to ignite the fire.

A player's inventory could hold a maximum of twenty items, separate from the equipment slots. Therefore, each slot in the inventory had to be carefully utilized. High-concentration alcohol, capable of igniting a large fire and erasing traces of corpses, earned its place in his inventory, while the versatile Swiss army knife was carried on his person, not occupying an inventory slot.

As the flames rose and their light burst forth, providing warmth and dispelling the chill, Wanli Fengdao's eyes reflected the firelight, softening the rigidity on his face significantly.

The crackling of the firewood masked the wind's howl, as well as the faint moaning coming from outside the temple courtyard.

"Ehhhhhh...."

It was clearly the moan of a woman, but it had nothing to do with springtime charm.

If it had to be described, it was like the desperate, hoarse sound that emanated when one's throat was completely torn open and blood bubbled up from the trachea.

It was eerily reminiscent of Kayako's sobbing in "Ju-On."

Wanli Fengdao had carried out many missions and reached Lv5. Moreover, to detect danger early and protect himself, he had deliberately stacked up his agility and perception attributes to 7 points.

Even with the sharp wind and explosive crackling of firewood filling his ears, he still detected the strange moaning from outside the monastery immediately.

Wanli Fengdao placed the longsword in front of him and was about to shout for his teammates to come and provide support when the moaning quickly became louder and closer,

Crack—

The bluestone floor tiles at the base of the wall split in two, and the crack in the stone slabs stretched from the wall towards him, like ripples on water when swimming, attacking Wanli Fengdao.

Before Wanli Fengdao could cry out, he saw a pallid, flawless arm suddenly emerge from the dirt beneath his feet, brutally forcing the stone tiles apart.

That arm, reaching a height of two meters, had delicate, slender forearms and upper arms, not resembling a human shape. Its five fingers, slender and delicate as a scallion, topped with nails varnished with red rouge made from crushed petals of balsam—just looking at the hand, it would have been more than adequate as a hand model on Taobao.

Wanli Fengdao wasn't obsessed with hands, and even if he was, the sight of this serpentine, snow-white arm suddenly in front of him would probably not have stirred such feelings.

With the longsword in hand, a killing instinct arose spontaneously, and Wanli Fengdao swung down with the might of thunder, only to see the snow-white arm twist and wriggle as if boneless, effortlessly dodging the blow like it had eyes of its own.

As Wanli Fengdao was about to swing his sword in retaliation, the supple, boneless arm struck like lightning, wrapping around his waist, arms, and throat—constricting like a python squeezing its prey, tightening powerfully and slowly.

The chilly, plump, and slippery palm cupped his face, stroked his beard, and blocked his mouth and nose.

There was nothing enticing about it, only pure fear.

In an instant, Wanli Fengdao felt his ribs were about to break, bloodshot eyes filled with strain, and his lungs seemed like they were about to explode.

"Ugh—"

He moaned with difficulty, using the last of his strength to let go of the longsword in his hand.

The longsword fell towards the ground, but just before it hit, Wanli Fengdao's shoe tip sharply flicked it back up, and he ended up grasping it in a reverse grip.

Wanli Feng Dao reversed his grip on the longsword and thrust it fiercely into the ground, where the pale white arm originated from.

His sword tip hit something, and scarlet blood violently seeped out from the muddy earth. A scream rang out as the snakelike arm swiftly loosened its grip and retracted into the soil.

Ka-ka-ka-ka-ka-ka—

The flagstones within the temple once again cracked, and this time, the cracks spread in the direction of the outside of the temple.

The arm buried in the ground tried to flee.

"Where do you think you're going?!"

A furious shout emanated from in front of the Daxiong Bao Hall. Xing Hechou, who had been holding various scriptures in his hands, dropped the sutras and drew out the Bronze Halberd. He leaped down from the front steps of the hall,

The Bronze Halberd suddenly flared up with flames, tracing a circular fiery frontline in mid-air, before ferociously crashing onto the flagstones.

Shattered stone splattered, dust flew up, and from underground, another scream was heard.

Hui Bin, the Mage who followed closely behind Xing Hechou, made no sound as he stomped his cloth shoes on the ground, propelling himself forward. In an instant, his delicate body swelled dramatically, transforming into a muscular hunk, his shining tendons and muscles comparable to those of Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Boom!

The Muscle Saint Monk Hui Bin's fists hammered the ground like pile drivers, causing visible ripples of tremors across the entire plot of land. The powerful aftereffects continued to strike the arm buried deep within the earth.

Crack.

A clear sound of breaking bones rang out. The monk Hui Bin was ready to deliver another heavy punch but realized that the arm had already burrowed away from the courtyard, sprinting into the dense forest outside the temple.

"He-he-he-cough-cough-cough-cough-cough...."

Wanli Feng Dao stood bent over at the waist, unable to stop coughing from the stifling pain. Fresh air had never seemed as sweet and charming as it did now.

"Are you all right?" Xing Hechou's brow furrowed deeply, patting Wanli Feng Dao on the back while the monk Hui Bin, whose muscles had returned to normal, also came back.

"I'm fine." Wanli Feng Dao's face shifted from red to pale, embarrassed that he, being the second highest-ranked in the team, almost died obscurely at the hands of that burrowing lean arm.

He forced himself to stand straight, while pulling at his collar to ease his breathing, he complained angrily, "Who said it wasn't dangerous for me to pick up firewood alone? Where's that Li fellow?! Where is he?"

"Why are you calling me?"

From the west side of the courtyard, Li Ang strolled over, holding a wooden box, with Liu Wu Dai following behind him, also carrying an identical wooden box.

Wanli Feng Dao, holding his longsword, said with a grim expression, "I told you we shouldn't split up. Do you realize I almost died?"

"Well, you didn't die, did you?" Li Ang quipped, setting down the wooden box, "That monster couldn't even finish you off, and now that we're all here, it's even less likely to kill us.

Moreover, now that we know its method of attack, we can take more targeted precautions in the future."

Wanli Feng Dao's face remained dark as he privately suspected that this seemingly foolish "ally" might have deliberately let him face the attack alone in the yard to gather information on the enemy.

Li Ang ignored him, placing the wooden box on the ground, then took two or three steps to leap onto the steps of the Daxiong Bao Hall, picking up the heap of sutras discarded by Xing Hechou and others, and returned to the bonfire.

"The Surangama Sutra, Lotus Sutra, Heart Sutra, Diamond Sutra, Lankavatara Sutra, Journey to the North, Fengshan Compilation, Yamaan Miscellanies... The scriptures in the Gu Han Temple Sutra Depository are no different from the ones I have read before."

Hui Bin, upon seeing Li Ang casually browsing through the Buddhist scriptures, pressed his palms together and said, "This is not some fabricated otherworld; it must be the ancient history of the real world, and it has to be no later than the Ming Dynasty."

"During the Jiajing era of the Ming Dynasty," Li Ang added offhandedly, "to be precise, it's the fifteenth year of Jiajing, which is the year of Bing Shen. By the modern calendar, that would be the year 1536."

"How do you know that?" Xing Hechou asked.

"I looked at the ledgers," Li Ang said, pointing to the wooden box beneath his feet, "This box contains the financial records of the Solitary Cold Temple kept by Dao Zhi, the Abbot of the temple. The most recent entry is a list of tenant rents from the Buddhist fields in the village to the east,

dated March of the Jia Wu year, 1533. Counting three years from then, it's now the year 1536."

Ming Dynasty Jiajing...

Xing Hechou and Wanli Fengdao were both somewhat bewildered. Although both had undergone compulsory education, and the latter was a bona fide post-90s college-educated monk, their knowledge of history was pretty weak.

The Jiajing era of the Ming Dynasty was not as famous as the Jianyuan era of the Han Dynasty or the Zhenguan era of the Tang Dynasty, nor was it like the Qing Dynasty, which had many TV dramas made about it.

This period of history was a mystery to them; being able to name Wang Shouren, Qi Jiguang, and Hai Rui was quite impressive, let alone the Ren Yin Palace Coup or the Geng Xu Rebellion.

Seeing the blank expressions on the faces of Xing Hechou and Wanli Fengdao, Li Ang's face revealed a mysteriously content smile,

He sat on the ground, placed various books in front of him, and, as if no one else was around, picked up a ledger to read by the light of the fire.

"What are you doing?" Wanli Fengdao said with wide eyes and a stunned expression, "Shouldn't we be sitting together, on guard against a ghost attack?"

"You keep watch, I'll look at the accounts of the Solitary Cold Temple first," Li Ang replied leisurely, "The ghosts already attacked earlier and were seriously injured. It's likely they won't take any action again for a while."

After that, Li Ang began skimming through the ledger with great speed, occasionally picking up a Buddhist scripture and tossing it to Hui Bin saying, "Here, read this, Mage Hui Bin. These are ancient Buddhist texts from five hundred years ago, usually kept in museums."

Hui Bin took the scripture with a wry smile and sat down as well.

As Li Ang read the accounts, he spoke aloud.

"In the year of Ren Chen, imperial grain taxes paid... water carrying fees... cartage fees... provisions fees... warehouse inspection fees... reed basket fees... bamboo basket fees..."

"In the month of March of the Gui Si year, tidying up the tenant rents... twenty-five dan and five dou of rent grain collected, eleven dan and three dou of profit grain collected, two dan and five dou for repayment of principal and interest on loans..."

"... borrowed twenty taels from Long You Book Merchant Gong Shisan with Chen Zheng acting as guarantor, an annual interest of two percent on the principal..."

The sound of Li Ang reading off the accounts was like a demonic chant in Xing Hechou's ears, clouding his mind. He would sooner face ghosts in battle for three hundred rounds than listen to this incomprehensible drivel.

"Can you stop reading out loud?" Wanli Fengdao couldn't help but say.

"Flowers will wilt, grass will wither, people will lie, clues will fade, but the numbers in the ledger will not deceive. No matter how clever the bookkeeper, no matter how embellished the accounts, the real issues will reveal themselves through simple numerical games.

The sooner I finish these accounts, the faster I can find the anomalies of the Solitary Cold Temple, and discover the reasons behind the hauntings here."

Li Ang flicked the ledger and said casually, "These ledgers from the Solitary Cold Temple use the original Longmen account bookkeeping method,

dividing all accounts into 'income' (all income), 'expenditure' (all expenses), 'assets' (all assets), and 'liabilities' (all debts), four major categories,

and employing the 'income - expenditure = assets - liabilities' balance method for accounting, setting up a general ledger for classification, compiling income and expenditure statements (profit and loss statement), and asset and liability statements (balance sheet), and implementing a dual-standard calculation of profits and losses.

This method of bookkeeping is also called the 'combined Longmen' approach."

Li Ang glanced at his teammates, "It sounds complex, but it's actually quite simple to calculate. Do any of you have a business management background? Help me check the accounts."

"....."

Damnit, business management.

Xing Hechou and Wanli Fengdao exchanged looks, their eyes expressing their frustration and tension.

The training for field agents at the Special Affairs Bureau mainly dealt with how to handle demons and monsters, not cultural lessons like those they confronted now.

Liu Wu Dai sat down beside Li Ang, picked up a ledger, and began to slowly browse through the cryptic classical Chinese and the complex, vertically arranged accounts as if she understood them.

Rather than reading through it verbatim, she translated the classical Chinese on the spot, applying modern accounting methods to reorganize the accounts directly.

The interest rates on loans from the Gu Han Temple Longevity Warehouse to tenants, landlords, and merchants, the sum of principal and interest, compound interest calculations, annualized interest rates, accumulated interest...

Li Ang's eyebrows raised in surprise as he exchanged a look with Liu Wu Dai, "You understand this too?"

With an expressionless face, Liu Wu Dai responded, "MSc, MBA."

Wow, a Master of Science and a Master of Business Administration, truly a high-caliber talent.

Li Ang nodded and started to reconcile the accounts verbally with Liu Wu Dai,

The two of them went back and forth like a cross-talk duo, with Xing Hechou and Wanli Fengdao feeling like they were in agony,

Eventually, the well-coordinated Li Ang and Liu Wu Dai simply started spouting seemingly gibberish terms and numbers to each other.

They discussed the Gu Han Temple's financial ins and outs of past years: cash flow, savings, inventory, purchases and sales, administrative expenses, details of tangible assets, details of intangible assets, details of liabilities...

Soon, nearly an hour passed, and Li Ang and Liu Wu Dai finally finished going through nearly two large boxes of all the Gu Han Temple's account books from the past ten years.

"Hehehe, hehehehe, hehehehehe."

Li Ang tapped the ledger's cover with his knuckles, laughing enigmatically,

Liu Wu Dai's brow furrowed slightly, her face covered with a layer of dissatisfaction.

Taking a deep breath, Xing Hechou, who had never felt an hour could be so long, asked Li Ang, "Did you find anything?"

"A blind spot."

Li Ang said ominously, "I think, I might have guessed the identity of the armless female ghost we encountered earlier."