Chapter 1 The Unexpected Monk

The bald monk came and went suddenly. Of course, under the old Taoist’s watchful eyes, he paid his bill.

“Is this guy sick, boss?” the old Taoist asked unhappily. “I overheard him saying you shouldn’t catch ghosts. If you don’t catch ghosts, boss, where will your performance and hell money come from?”

After saying that, the old Taoist waved his hand and turned off the store’s lights. Even though it was daytime, the store's brightness decreased a lot. Then, he shouted as if presenting a treasure:

“Monkey!”

The little monkey immediately jumped over, holding two plastic fans in its hands. The fans were dyed with silver glitter, creating a dazzling effect when waved.

The old Taoist and the monkey stood in a row. The monkey and the old Taoist stomped their feet in unison and shouted:

“Our slogan is!”

“Effort! Effort! Effort!” (Squeak, squeak, squeak)

“Our spirit is!”

“Struggle! Struggle! Struggle!” (Squeak, squeak, squeak)

“Our goal is!”

“Hell money! Hell money! Hell money!” (Squeak, squeak, squeak)

“Alright, dismiss!”

The monkey immediately retreated and jumped back to the bar.

Zhou Ze couldn’t help but laugh.

“Hell money is justice; hell money is everything.

Boss, don’t be fooled by him, okay?”

The old Taoist had a scar on his chest, said to be from a knife aimed at his heart that he avoided thanks to hell money. Therefore, he had a deep obsession with it.

Zhou Ze waved his hand, indicating that he understood.

“Oh, it’s you?”

The bookstore door was pushed open, and a young man walked in.

Zhou Ze recognized this young man as an intern doctor from the People's Hospital. Zhou Ze had pretended to be a doctor and helped people there, and he had helped the intern out a few times.

“What are you doing here?”

The young intern was very curious about Zhou Ze. The naturally naive intern hadn’t figured out Zhou Ze's relationship with Doctor Lin and still thought Zhou Ze was a real doctor.

Of course, it was also because Zhou Ze's medical skills were indeed superb, which made it difficult for the young intern to tell the difference.

“Being a doctor has no future; I'm doing business,” Zhou Ze said casually.

“Is this your bookstore?”

“Sort of.”

At this moment, Tang Shi appeared at the top of the stairs, looking at Zhou Ze.

“You sit here for a while; I'll be right back.”

The young doctor sat down next to the bar. The old Taoist enthusiastically served tea, since accepting the tea meant a minimum charge of one hundred yuan.

Zhou Ze walked to Tang Shi and asked, “What’s up?”

“Are you free tomorrow?” Tang Shi asked.

“No.”

“Then what were you planning to do tomorrow?”

“Haven’t thought about it yet.”

Tang Shi nodded, indicating that she understood. “Then let’s have dinner together tomorrow night.”

As soon as she finished speaking, Tang Shi and Zhou Ze frowned simultaneously.

Having dinner together tomorrow night is a normal social expression for ordinary people, but for these two, it was no less than torture.

Having dinner together tomorrow night, in their ears, could be translated as “electric shock together tomorrow night.”

“Let’s have tea instead,” Tang Shi said, changing her mind.

“Are guests coming?”

“Sort of.” Tang Shi looked around and said, “You can relax. I won’t compete with you for a maid anymore.”

Zhou Ze smiled and nodded.

After chatting with Tang Shi, Zhou Ze turned around and walked back to his original position. The old Taoist and the young intern doctor were chatting enthusiastically, as if they were becoming close friends.

Of course, with the old Taoist's experience, he could chat with anyone from all walks of life and become a confidant.

“What’s up?” Zhou Ze asked.

“Boss, he said that the bodies in their hospital morgue are always damaged or missing, but they can’t find out who’s doing it. I just gave him a trick.”

As he spoke, the old Taoist took out a plastic bottle from his pocket, filled with fluorescent powder.

“I’m telling you, it must be someone from inside your hospital. You secretly sprinkle this on the bodies. If you catch the thief, you'll be able to get your official doctor certification.”

“Get official certification to go to the Public Security Bureau?” Zhou Ze looked at the old Taoist. “Don’t give other people random ideas.”

At this moment, the young intern doctor answered a call, probably urging him to return to the hospital. After hanging up, he smiled at the old Taoist, shook his hand, and left the bookstore.

“Boss, are there really people who steal corpses?” the old Taoist asked curiously. He knew that Zhou Ze was a doctor in his previous life and must know some inside information.

“Yes, there are,” Zhou Ze replied.

“What for? To steal corpses for organ transplants?” the old Taoist immediately asked.

“Do you think organ transplants are that simple? The conditions for organ transplants are very demanding. It’s basically impossible to steal corpses from the morgue for organ transplants.

Generally speaking, in the past, they could be sent to some medical schools or research institutes for dissection experiments. After all, human corpses aren’t lab rats; experimental subjects are very scarce.

There are also some people who are more superstitious and steal corpses to arrange ghost marriages. In addition, some people believe that drinking powder ground from corpse skulls can cure diseases. In short, there are all kinds of claims, so corpse theft is actually quite serious, but now it’s much better after the promotion of cremation in China.”

“Grind skulls into powder and drink it? Like pearl powder?” The old Taoist made a vomiting gesture.

Zhou Ze sat back down in his seat by the window. A Nissan parked in front of the bookstore, and a person got out of the car, a person who had previously returned to his hometown.

“You’re back!”

The old Taoist was very excited to see Xu Qinglang’s figure. He was tired of take-out food, so he especially missed the days when Xu Qinglang was in the store.

Zhou Ze was very calm but also breathed a sigh of relief in his heart. His sour plum juice was almost gone.

Xu Qinglang didn’t come in but waved to Zhou Ze and then squatted down at the door of the store.

He looked like he had something on his mind.

Zhou Ze walked out of the store, stood next to him, thought for a while, and also squatted down.

“What’s wrong?” Zhou Ze asked.

Xu Qinglang didn’t rush to answer but handed Zhou Ze a cigarette, then sighed and said:

“I went home for a blind date.”

“A happy occasion,” Zhou Ze said.

“Sigh.”

“Didn’t like them?” Zhou Ze asked.

Xu Qinglang shook his head. “They liked me too quickly.”

“How fast? Did you sleep with them?”

Xu Qinglang glanced at Zhou Ze but didn’t deny it.

“That’s fast,” Zhou Ze said with emotion.

“I’m not like you; I’m still normal,” Xu Qinglang reminded him.

“Then why are you looking so glum?”

“The problem is, after it was over, she left some money on my bedside table and left.”

“You were prostituted?” Zhou Ze was a little surprised.

Xu Qinglang was a little depressed and said:

“We originally agreed to meet at a coffee shop for the blind date, but the blind date had something to do and couldn’t come. I didn’t get the notification, so I mistook someone else for my blind date. Then I sat down in front of her and chatted, then I asked her to go see a movie, then I went shopping with her, and then in the evening, she asked me to open a hotel to show me the script she had just written. She’s a screenwriter.”

“I bet it was a fluorescent script, the kind you have to turn off the lights to see.”

Xu Qinglang was a little helpless and reached out to scratch his hair.

“She left three thousand yuan on my bedside table after she left. I treated her as my blind date and was a little surprised that she was so open and avant-garde, or was this love at first sight that couldn’t be controlled?”

“Most love at first sight is actually lust at first sight.”

“It turned out that wasn’t the case,” Xu Qinglang said, feeling tangled.

“She treated you like a gigolo?”

“Can you shut up?” Xu Qinglang looked at Zhou Ze with a resentful expression.

“You took the money, you slept with her, you didn’t lose anything.”

“That’s true, but I feel like my self-esteem has been hit. I’m a man with more than twenty properties, and I was prostituted by a woman as a gigolo!”

“Actually, some things might be more comfortable if you think about them from a different angle.”

“For example?”

“For example, you are the gigolo with the most houses.”

“…………”

“Or, you are the person with the most houses who looks the most like a gigolo.”

“…………”

“Sorry, I’m not very good at comforting people,” Zhou Ze patted Xu Qinglang on the shoulder and continued:

“Cheer up.

The bed is the most decadent place in the world. Why take a relationship that starts from the bed seriously?

By the way, did you go back to your hometown specifically for a blind date?”

“Not really. The ancestral grave at home is going to be relocated, so I went back to relocate it. By the way, there was also a strange incident. I’ll tell you about it in a few days. Now I want to go upstairs and rest.”

Xu Qinglang stood up, pushed open the bookstore door, took a bottle of red wine from the bar, and went upstairs to his room.

The whole afternoon was relatively leisurely and relaxed. It wasn’t until eight o’clock in the evening that Zhou Ze perked up. Generally, at this time, the real customers would start to arrive.

Xu Qinglang was probably drowning his sorrows in alcohol and didn’t come downstairs, so he ordered take-out for dinner.

The old Taoist and the little monkey sat on a stool. The two of them were drinking peanut snacks with small sips of wine, and the little monkey’s alcohol tolerance had also been cultivated by the old Taoist.

The bookstore door was pushed open, and the curtain made a crisp sound.

The person who pushed the door open and came in was the intern doctor.

The old Taoist was a little drunk and reached out to invite the intern doctor to have a drink together.

There was no other person in the entire bookstore who could drink with him, so he could only drink with the monkey. Now that a living person had arrived, he was naturally happy.

“I just got off work and forgot that I didn’t pay for coming here today. By the way, I still have to pay you for the fluorescent powder.” The intern doctor was still so dull and honest.

“Don’t worry about it. It’s just a hundred yuan for the tea, and adding the fluorescent powder is only a hundred and fifty.”

The old Taoist said, pretending to be very generous.

The other party handed over the money. The old Taoist took it very angrily, then patted the intern doctor on the shoulder and said:

“If you really want to thank me, take me out to a restaurant, and we brothers can have a good drink and chat.”

After saying that, the old Taoist glanced at Zhou Ze with some guilt.

Zhou Ze nodded, considering it a vacation.

The intern doctor didn’t refuse. He wasn’t a local, and because of his personality, he didn’t have any close friends here. Immediately, he and the old Taoist hooked their shoulders together and left the bookstore to find a tavern.

It was already dark, and the streetlights were still bright.

The old Taoist and the intern doctor walked for a while. When they were almost at the tavern ahead, the old Taoist turned into a dark alley next to them, unbuckled his belt, and said:

“I’m sorry, I need to take a leak first.”

The intern doctor wasn’t polite and stood side by side with the old Taoist, also unbuckling his belt.

“Hey, kid, you’re down to earth. I like it!”

“Haha, it’s quite exciting, urinating anywhere,” the intern doctor was obviously corrupted by the old Taoist.

“What’s this? It’s human nature. By the way, did you rub the fluorescent powder I gave you at noon on the corpse?” the old Taoist asked.

“I rubbed it, but the corpse was lost again today. The hospital has called the police, but the police still haven’t found any clues.”

“It didn’t work?” the old Taoist asked with some apology.

“Yeah, it didn’t work,” the intern doctor nodded.

“Then forget it. Let’s go Dutch on the wine tonight.”

“It’s okay, I’ll treat you,” the intern doctor said.

“Okay, you kid have face. I like you!”

As he spoke, the old Taoist didn’t wash his hands and directly patted the other person’s shoulder to encourage him!

“You’re older, it’s appropriate.”

The intern doctor smiled,

The old Taoist suddenly froze.

He hadn’t noticed it before because there were lights in the bookstore and streetlights on the road,

But in this dark alley,

The old Taoist suddenly saw that when the intern doctor smiled,

On the teeth in his mouth,

There was a faint layer of,

Fluorescence.