Chapter 78: The Fake Shaman Captured

Fang Si Ting pulled Xiao Fen along as they walked out of the Inspection Office. Wang Wenfang, who had been anxiously pacing at the entrance, spotted them and immediately blocked their path in a fury.

A large group of hostile townsfolk followed her, gathering from alleys and streets on all sides, armed with hoes, machetes, and wooden sticks.

The vice squad officers in the courtyard saw that things were turning bad. They blew their whistles and jogged over to form a human wall at the door, eyeing the crowd warily.

Not far away, the Program Crew was at their wits’ end.

They had been criticized back home for inaction and were constantly on guard against official scrutiny. Fine, they came to the neighboring country, and now the conflict had escalated into a clash between officials and civilians, potentially even a diplomatic incident.

Wang Ze was practically yanking his hair out.

“Where’s the shaman? Where did you take him?” Wang Wenfang shouted shrilly, her face twisted with rage.

“He’s been sent to the county hospital,” Fang Si Ting said.

“What did you do to him?”

“We have a clinic right here. Why not send him there?”

If they sent him to the clinic, it would be much harder to get the shaman out later.

The shaman’s family had already committed serious crimes of fraud and rape. Whether they could ever return to Tengcha was a huge question.

The townsfolk chattered noisily.

Xiao Fen felt the voice sounded familiar. He followed the sound and spotted Zhong Houwang fuming in the crowd.

“If anything happens to the shaman, you won’t leave Tengcha alive!”

“Exactly!”

Fang Si Ting said, “The real shaman was already killed by Wu Lifu.”

Everyone was stunned at those words.

“Impossible. I just saw him a few days ago.”

“That was a fake. The height was padded with shoe inserts, the beard was fake, and the age and identity were all fabricated,” Xiao Fen explained.

“How could he possibly be dead? Isn’t the shaman immortal?”

“You gonna believe their nonsense? It’s definitely a plot by these foreigners to kidnap our shaman and use his powers against us.”

Xiao Fen said, “Because Wu Lifu had superior sorcery. He used Five Elements techniques to suppress him, stripping the shaman of his magical protections temporarily, and that’s how he killed him. The fake shaman was just a stand-in he found. He planned to manipulate the fake one to make all of you obey him.”

The townsfolk exchanged glances.

“You got no proof,” Zhong Houwang said.

“Yeah, who believes your bullshit?” The villagers chimed in.

“You think we’ll buy it?”

“Even if Wu Lifu killed the shaman, we could deal with Wu Lifu too. Go ahead and piss us off—then when you run into evil spirits, you won’t have anyone to exorcise them.”

The crowd half-believed it but gradually dispersed.

Fang Si Ting dismissed the vice squad officers as well.

As they were about to leave, Xiao Fen called out to him, raising his voice even louder than before. “Don’t you think it’s kinda shady hiding the fact that the shaman’s a con artist?”

Fang Si Ting stopped in his tracks and casually glanced around. In the corner of his eye, he caught a flash of clothing—it was Wang Wenfang, who had doubled back. She clearly didn’t believe them and was eavesdropping from hiding.

“If the people of Tengcha found out the shaman had been scamming them for money all these years, they’d react just like they did earlier—thinking we’re up to no good. No matter how we explain, they won’t listen and might even fight us,” Fang Si Ting continued smoothly. “This shaman had ulterior motives for making money. He deliberately kept his household registration in the city. When the elders died, he’d secretly bury them in Guiwu Forest without announcing it. The next generation would inherit the family business and identity. They only appeared as one person each time out—grandfather, father, son all looked the same face, half-hidden by a beard. Who would guess it wasn’t one person but several generations?”

They had interrogated the fake shaman. The one Wu Lifu killed—supposedly the real shaman—was his older brother, nearly fifty years old. The fake shaman was actually under thirty, raised in the city. After coming of age, he returned to the countryside to learn the scam techniques from the old shaman. He stayed cooped up at home every day, never even leaving the building, preparing to take over in a year or two once his brother retired to the city.

The shaman family lived pampered lives and aged slowly. With the beard covering their faces, and red paint smeared on during spirit-jumping rituals, it was hard to tell. They rarely appeared in public to build an air of mystery, mimicking speech patterns and mannerisms. The younger generation looked much like the older ones anyway. Especially in recent years, they’d even used technology—people looked almost identical.

“Oh man, if they didn’t make people think he had some immortality secret technique, how could they keep swindling? How else would they get folks to buy his talismans and magical tools? How would they afford houses, cars, and shops in the city? How would they seduce all the pretty girls and housewives from the surrounding villages?” Xiao Fen said loudly.

“Yeah, to pass down that ugly ancestral face, they tricked so many women who looked like him into bearing a bunch of illegitimate kids. Only the ones who hit the genetic jackpot could inherit the business—the rest got nothing. Those duped women are truly pitiful.”

“The fake shaman was actually the younger brother of the so-called real shaman that Wu Lifu killed. When he realized his big bro was gone, he stepped in to fill the role, pretending his brother never existed, and kept up the scam. But no matter what we say, they flat-out refuse to believe it.”

“Better not say too much. If the townsfolk overhear, they’ll accuse us of spreading rumors.”

The two sang in perfect harmony. Feeling they’d said enough, they watched Wang Wenfang sneak away.

Xiao Fen looked up and exchanged a grin with him.

By dinnertime, new gossip was spreading through town.

Wang Wenfang had torn down the shaman’s front gate and barged in with a few relatives. They hauled off everything valuable inside; what they couldn’t carry, they smashed on the spot.

Villagers from Purple Gold Village charged in too, and the two sides broke into a brawl.

As they argued fiercely, a man came down from upstairs—it was the shaman.

The villagers rushed to complain that Wang Wenfang had offended the immortal.

Wang Wenfang froze for a moment but quickly snapped into full rural housewife berserker mode. Like lightning, she lunged forward and yanked off the shaman’s beard.

Everyone was dumbfounded.

“Is the shaman really that young?”

“I’ve always looked like this,” the fake shaman reacted quickly. “I was afraid you’d think I was too young, so I wore a fake beard.”

“Lies! Your voice is totally different!” Wang Wenfang glared with bulging eyes. “Your whole family scammed us so bad! You said dual cultivation with you would grant immortality, and those talismans were a favor to me so we could sell them—they’re all bullshit! We busted our asses peddling talismans and magical tools while you sat home counting the cash. No justice in this world! Your witchcraft is all fake! Sell this worthless paper if you want—now my man’s dead because of it, and I ain’t done with you!”

Wang Wenfang alternated left and right hands, her strength from years of feeding pigs and hauling feed battering the young fake shaman until he howled. She dragged him by the hair, parading him through the village streets, proclaiming his whole family con artists and their immortality claims pure crap.

That night, the entire town and village lay sleepless.

Later, in a locked drawer at the shaman’s house, they found IDs from three generations: grandfather, father, sons, brothers, nephews—all strikingly similar in appearance. Except for the heir, the rest lived it up in the city off the blood and sweat of Tengcha’s people.

What they thought were miracles turned out to be fakes.

The people of Tengcha looked as disgusted as if they’d swallowed flies.

Worst of all, over the years, whenever they had spare cash, they’d bought magical tools, held rituals, and donated to the temple.

The audience laughed their asses off, crowding into the live stream chats of the vice squad officers and guests who had watched the chaos. The fake shaman’s street parade was as lively as the annual temple fair.

It wasn’t until the townsfolk banded together to storm the Five Directions God Temple, toppling the idols and heading to loot the homes of the Five Directions Divine Temple Committee members that the local vice squad stepped in to maintain order.

Lu Kaiyu had been highly respected in town for years without a whiff of scandal because he was genuinely devout and hadn’t profited much—he handed most of the money to the shaman.

These minor disturbances didn’t require Fang Si Ting’s personal oversight. At that moment, he was back in the dorm, still pondering Xiao Fen’s case.

His roommate grumbled, “There are over twenty fugitives still at large, and you’re fixated on me?”

Only two days remained until the show ended.

“You’re right in front of me,” Fang Si Ting said matter-of-factly. “Once I find evidence, I can arrest you on the spot.”

“…Then I’ll leave?”

“Where to?” He immediately set down the photo and looked up.

Xiao Fen turned. “Bai Zhu’s dorm. He invited me to game.”

“Aren’t you getting too chummy with the vice squad?” Fang Si Ting’s gaze darkened slightly.

“We’re already roommates. How much closer can it get?”

Fang Si Ting chuckled.

“Inspector Fang, get back to overtime and report the case’s latest progress to me when you return.” Xiao Fen waved and shut the door.

The dorm air turned chilly in an instant.

Fang Si Ting shifted uncomfortably, unable to focus on the case files for the longest time.

He got up for a shower to clear his head. As he stepped onto the balcony with his dirty clothes, he spotted Xiao Fen and Ou Yu downstairs, talking about something.

Then, the two ducked into the bathroom.

Fang Si Ting: “…”

Twenty-four minutes and eighteen seconds later, they emerged. Ou Yu looked even more solemn than before, his dark pupils fixed like a predator on the hunt.

Xiao Fen stretched lazily and noticed Fang Si Ting perched on the balcony, timing them.

“Mr. Black Cat, what are you looking at?”

Fang Si Ting pulled his head back.

Two minutes later, Xiao Fen sauntered back into his room and plopped onto his desk, munching the snacks he’d prepared.

“Seeing a criminal like me hanging around you all day must be tough,” Xiao Fen said cheerfully.

“Mm.” Fang Si Ting replied, “You’re sitting on my photo.”

Xiao Fen hopped off the desk and saw it was Lu Jin’s photo. He grinned even wider.

“Keep at it. Crack the case soon.” He tossed out the cheeky remark from the side.

He was really pushing his luck.

“Don’t eat too much. Brush your teeth later.”

“Got it.” Xiao Fen cracked open a bottle of chubby gamer soda and sprawled on the bed, gaming and snacking.

Fang Si Ting picked up the photo.

If he were Xiao Fen, why do it that way?

He closed his eyes, imagining himself as the killer striking at Lu Jin.

According to the autopsy, Lu Jin had died from hyperthermia-induced dehydration.

Tang Shen had also found a severed motor wire in his sports car—seemingly aged and melted, but the wire’s condition clearly pointed to sabotage.

Lu Jin had been locked in the car and roasted alive, matching the dehydration symptoms.

The car was the true primary crime scene.

Afterward, he moved Lu Jin to the entrance of the Refectory Hall and called Wu Lifu to stage the scene.

And he took photos at the door.

He ordered Wu Lifu to dump the body into the massive hotpot, hang the scavenged human skin in front of Lu Jin, write Lu Jin’s bazi on the wall, light the stove, fill the pot with water, set out incense burner and candles, scatter newspapers, snap the final photo, and leave the film at the scene.

Wu Lifu had arranged the entire crime scene—he himself never stepped foot inside.

Now he could claim Wu Lifu wielded the knife, and he even had photos documenting the setup.

No fingerprints on the film, and it wasn’t available in town—did Xiao Fen bring it himself?

And the newspapers—if bringing a camera on vacation was normal, why carry gossip news about Lu Jin? They had no idea about the show beforehand, so why prepare props for it?

If he’d already “killed” him in the car, why risk moving the body to the Refectory Hall and staging such an elaborate scene? Just to pin it on Wu Lifu?

But the film suggested someone else was there taking photos.

He recalled the First Episode: Li Cunhou had also “killed” Lu Jin in Jiang Xu’s Villa, then gone to great lengths to move the body to the Abandoned Villa for a second scene.

If the First Episode had misdirection with the killing method, this time, the straightforward method left only a puzzling motive.

Xiao Fen didn’t just want Lu Jin “dead.” It was more than that.

Candles, incense burner, movie posters and newspapers standing in for paper money—it all looked like some kind of ritual.

A…

“Nice!”

His train of thought shattered with the excited shout. Fang Si Ting snapped back, rubbing his nose bridge.

Xiao Fen pumped his fist at the air triumphantly.

Then, the cola on the bedside table toppled, rolling onto the bed.

A shallow brown stain seeped into the mattress and sheets.

The screen beside his hand still echoed with the sounds of victory as Xiao Fen looked at Fang Si Ting awkwardly.

Both men’s gazes turned simultaneously to the only remaining bed in the room.

Fang Si Ting’s bed.

【Ah oh.】

【What to do, what to do? So excited.】

【Is something about to happen?】

【A, go on up! Hurry!】

【I’m not sleeping tonight!】

Fang Si Ting’s lips curved up almost imperceptibly at the corner.