Film and Television: Living in an Apartment, Part-Time Soul Ferryman

Page 6

"Sis, what brings you back?"

Lu Zhanbo trembled as he watched the familiar figure walking towards him from the bar entrance, his face turning pale with fright.

However, when his gaze fell behind Hu Yifei, his expression froze, and a look of surprise appeared on his face.

"Brother Bayi, what brings you here?"

Hu Yifei didn't come alone; she was followed by two men.

Li Yang looked over and saw the two men, his expression momentarily stunned.

Isn't this Guan Hongfeng, the criminal investigation team leader from "Day and Night," and Xiao Jiang from "The Story of the Cooking Squad"?

How did these two end up together?

The man, whom Lu Zhanbo referred to as "Brother August 1st" and who resembled "Guan Hongfeng," smiled at Lu Zhanbo.

"Zhanbo, long time no see. I heard from your sister that you came back from studying in the United States?"

Lu Zhanbo nodded, invited the three to a booth, and introduced them to the others: "This is my cousin, Hu Bayi. He's a soldier, a company commander, and has participated in peacekeeping missions!"

"Another..."

Hu Bayi immediately introduced, "This is my buddy Wang Kaixuan."

Wang Pangzi grinned and said, "My friends all call me Wang Pangzi."

then.

Lu Zhanbo then introduced the people from Love Apartment to Hu Bayi.

Li Yang was startled.

Holy crap, Hu Bayi and Fatty Wang?

The world actually has a Ghost Blows Out the Light storyline?

This is unreasonable!

The timeline is wrong!

Hu Bayi and Fatty Wang were both active figures in the 1980s.

Especially Hu Bayi, who participated in the 79 self-defense counterattack war, how did he become Hu Yifei and Lu Zhanbo's cousin?

"By the way, Brother Bayi, shouldn't you be staying in the Southwest Military Region? Why are you in Beijing?"

Hu Bayi's expression turned bitter. "I retired a while ago, and now I'm practically unemployed."

"Retired? You actually retired? With your uncle's connections in the military, your promotion to battalion commander was a sure thing. How could you retire?"

Hu Bayi was unwilling to say more, only saying that some unpleasant things happened during his mission with the peacekeeping force, and he applied for retirement.

Through the conversation between Lu Zhanbo and Hu Bayi, Li Yang deduced that the Hu Bayi in front of him had similar experiences to those in the original novel.

The only difference is that the story's setting has been moved from the 1980s to the present!

"Brother Bayi, what are you doing now?"

Hu Bayi recounted his experiences during this period.

"Fatty and I have a stall in Panjiayuan, where we sell handicrafts to make ends meet..."

"Some time ago, we met an antique shawl enthusiast named Big Gold Tooth. He said that to succeed in Panjiayuan, you need to have a few genuine antiques."

"Then Fatty and I went to a place called Ganggangyingzi Village. There's a mountain called Niuxin Mountain there. I used my feng shui skills to check, and I'm sure there's a big tomb there!"

"But when we got there, we found out that the archaeological team had already visited the large tomb at Niuxin Mountain first."

"However, we didn't come away empty-handed. We discovered a military fortress left by the Japanese during the War of Resistance against Japan in Yeren Gully next to the village. The fortress is connected to a Liao Dynasty general's tomb..."

"Then, we handed over the funerary objects found in the general's tomb to the state and registered as official tomb raiders..."

"Excuse me, just a moment!"

Li Yang suddenly spoke up, turning to Hu Bayi and asking, "Brother Hu, what's the deal with the official tomb raiders you mentioned?"

"As far as I know, the Tomb Raiders are one of the four major schools in the tomb raiding industry, namely the Tomb Raiders, the Mountain Moving Taoists, the Ridge Unloading Warriors, and the Tomb Raider Officials."

"Isn't tomb raiding all done secretly? How could it have an official identity?"

Hu Bayi looked at Li Yang in surprise.

"Brother Li, you also know about our industry? But what you're saying is all ancient history."

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Li Yang's eyes lit up.

Here comes the work!

Hu Bayi explained, "The Tomb Raiders, Mountain Movers, and Ridge Unloading Warriors were still active during the Republic of China era, but they have basically disappeared in this era. Only the Tomb Raiders have not lost their lineage and have been included by the state as one of the '108 unusual professions'!"

"In ancient times, tomb raiders were people who robbed tombs, but now tomb raiding is illegal and strictly controlled by the state, so today's tomb raiders mainly focus on exploration and treasure hunting!"

"We do explore tombs now, but they're mostly haunted tombs!"

"These haunted tombs either contain zombies, eerie and ferocious tomb guardian beasts, or other strange and unusual things."

"We, the tomb raiders, explore haunted tombs and eliminate these dangerous evil creatures inside, lest they one day appear outside and cause great trouble!"

"As a reward, experts will appraise the value of the artifacts in the haunted tombs, and then the government will give one-tenth of the value of the artifacts as a reward... This is the main source of income for us tomb raiders."

"Of course, the authorities turn a blind eye to the occasional hoarding of one or two artifacts that are not particularly valuable."

"Like the Liao Dynasty general's tomb in Yerengou that we explored this time, it was a haunted tomb. The tomb owner turned into a giant zombie, invulnerable to swords and spears. It took us a lot of effort to barely destroy it!"

"Afterwards, we took the general's pair of jade belt buckles with moth-shaped designs. The jade was of average quality and not very valuable."

"We didn't touch the gold mask and porcelain in the tomb, which are even more valuable!"

Then, Hu Bayi explained his purpose for coming to Love Apartment.

"Fatty and I came to see Yifei this time because we wanted to ask her for two sword talismans for protection!"

"Through Big Gold Tooth's introduction, we joined an official archaeological team, led by a professor surnamed Chen, to explore the legendary ancient city of Jingjue in western Xinjiang!"

Chapter Seven unveils the secrets of the Sixteen-Character Yin-Yang Feng Shui Technique! Hu Bayi is shocked!

Jingjue Ancient City!

Li Yang's eyes lit up.

He knew this part of the story!

According to the original plot, after exploring the Japanese Kwantung Army fortress, Hu Bayi and Fatty Wang head to the Jingjue Ancient City.

However, according to the plot of the web series, Hu Bayi and his group need to go to the Kunlun Glacier to retrieve a notebook before heading to the Jingjue Ancient City.

Hu Bayi continued:

"This archaeological excavation of the ancient city of Jingjue is a semi-official activity. Professor Chen is a full-time doctoral student at the Beijing Museum. He and his students are responsible for providing archaeological knowledge and technology, while the project funding for the archaeological team is provided by a beautiful Chinese woman named Shirley Yang!"

aside.

Lu Zhanbo asked in bewilderment, "This is clearly an archaeological project of our country, so why is it funded by a foreigner? Our country is not short of money right now."

Hu Bayi sighed, "I heard Professor Chen mention the reason. He applied to the authorities a long time ago for archaeological excavation of the Jingjue Ancient City, but the authorities did not agree."

"Because a fortune teller once divined the location of the ancient city of Jingjue, which is a rare and extremely inauspicious place. If we are not careful, it could have a serious impact on the entire Taklamakan Desert!"

"If you want to explore the ancient city of Jingjue, the fortune teller only gave you a twelve-character divination: full of dangers, inviting trouble, and not worth the effort!"

"Therefore, the authorities are not keen on excavating the Jingjue Ancient City, so they let it remain buried in the desert and naturally will not provide funding to support Professor Chen's team's archaeological activities."

"But with the appearance of that woman named Shirley Yang, things took a turn for the better!"

"The fortune teller cast another divination, and this time the divination result was different... Perilous, uncertain, and ultimately futile!"

"That master bluntly stated that the Jingjue Ancient City is a huge time bomb, and now is the best time to deal with it. If we miss this opportunity, we will have to pay ten or a hundred times the price to resolve this huge problem!"

"So the authorities tacitly approved Professor Chen's archaeological activities in the ancient city of Jingjue, but that fortune teller said that Shirley Yang must be involved in this archaeological activity in order to have a chance to reverse the crisis!"

"But Shirley Yang is a foreigner after all, and it is not appropriate to let a foreigner participate in major domestic archaeological research. So we thought of asking her to provide project funding as a pretext to bring her into the archaeological team."

"According to Professor Chen, Shirley Yang's father disappeared while exploring the Jingjue Ancient City, so she has always wanted to go to the Jingjue Ancient City to find her father. Therefore, she did not hesitate to take out a full ten million US dollars to participate in this archaeological activity!"

Everything makes sense.

aside.

Fatty Wang added smugly, "You guys don't know, for this archaeological expedition, Professor Chen and his team approached many tomb raiders for collaboration, but they weren't satisfied with any of them after the interviews, until Old Hu and I went..."

"I'm not bragging, but Lao Hu is really damn awesome. He talked about everything from mountain ranges and water features to the sun, moon, and stars, leaving Professor Chen completely dumbfounded. And what was that celestial star technique again?"

"Celestial Feng Shui Technique!" Li Yang mentioned.

Fatty Wang slapped his thigh suddenly, "That's right, it's the Celestial Star Feng Shui technique! As soon as Lao Hu said that, Professor Chen immediately decided to let Lao Hu and me join the archaeological team... Wait a minute, how do you know about the Celestial Star Feng Shui technique?"

Everyone looked at Li Yang.

Hu Bayi, in particular, looked shocked.

"Brother Li, do you also know the art of celestial feng shui?"

[Happiness percentage +1%]

Li Yang shook his head. "I've only heard of the Celestial Star Feng Shui Technique, also known as the Celestial Azure Bag Technique, which comes from the 'Heavenly' section of the 'Sixteen-Character Yin-Yang Feng Shui Secret Technique'!"

"Legend has it that these sixteen-character Yin-Yang Feng Shui secret techniques are divided into sixteen volumes: Heaven, Earth, Man, Ghost, God, Buddha, Demon, Animal, Awe, Suppression, Escape, Object, Transformation, Yin, Yang, and Emptiness!"

"However, it is said that only the sixteen-character Feng Shui secret technique has been passed down, while the Yin-Yang secret technique has been destroyed!"

"And the person who destroyed the Yin-Yang secret technique was Zhang Sanlianzi, the grandmaster of tomb raiding during the late Qing Dynasty and early Republic of China!"

"This person has an exceptionally noble destiny. He wears three tomb raiding talismans and his life story is truly legendary."

"He had four disciples: Feitian Chuanchi, Jin Suanpan, Tie Motou, and Sun Guofu."

"Master Zhang handed three tomb raiding talismans to his first three disciples, warning them that tomb raiders would live together and die apart, but unfortunately..."

"As for that sixteen-character Yin-Yang Feng Shui secret technique, Master Zhang destroyed the Yin-Yang secret technique, saying that the Yin-Yang secret technique revealed heavenly secrets and that leaving it in the world would surely cause great harm to people. The only right thing to do was to burn it and offer it as a sacrifice to heaven."

"Therefore, he left the only remaining half of the Feng Shui secrets to Sun Guofu, and said frankly that the Feng Shui secrets were incredibly mysterious and had explored all three major dragon veins in the north, south and central regions. He left this half-finished book in the world, so that it might still have a use in the future."

After saying that, Li Yang stared intently at Hu Bayi.

[Happiness percentage +1%]

Hu Bayi was deeply shocked.

He never expected that Li Yang, an outsider, would know more about the origin of the Sixteen-Character Yin-Yang Feng Shui Secret Technique than he, the inheritor of this secret technique!

Seeing Li Yang looking at him, he readily admitted, "That's right, the feng shui knowledge I've learned comes from the Sixteen-Character Yin-Yang Feng Shui Secret Technique!"

"Brother Li, the Sun Guofu you just mentioned is my grandfather's master!"

Li Yang nodded with a smile.

"Alright, now that we've finished discussing these feng shui secrets, let's talk about the ancient city of Jingjue!"

"You even know information about the ancient city of Jingjue?"

Hu Bayi stared at Li Yang in shock.

[Happiness percentage +1%]

Fatty Wang curled his lip. "I just don't believe it. Even Professor Chen, a big name in the field of archaeology, only has a superficial understanding of the Jingjue Ancient City. How could a young man like you know anything about it?"

aside.

Hu Yifei knew Li Yang's background.

Soul Ferryman!

Information that is considered top secret in the mortal world may not be a secret in the underworld.

"I advise you to trust what Li Yang says. With his help, your archaeological expedition to the ancient city of Jingjue will be much more successful!"

Hu Bayi didn't know Li Yang's background, but he knew how capable his cousin Hu Yifei was.

Since Hu Yifei has unwavering faith in Li Yang, he naturally chooses to believe in Li Yang as well.