Staring at Cecilia before me, her gaze cold and unwavering, clearly not joking. I glanced down at the changes in my own body, a strange and indescribable feeling rising inside. I fixed my eyes on Cecilia.
"You must have a way to turn me back, right?"
"There is no way."
Cecilia replied coldly as ever. I let out a laugh.
"You do have a way. You can turn men into women, turn old people and children into women. So restoring me to my original form shouldn't be difficult for you, right?"
Cecilia is lying. I am no longer the Ethan Zhang I once was. As a ghost who has lived for so many years, she would never tell me the truth. She’s only interested because I claimed to know where Victor Fan is.
"There really is no way. Now, tell me—where is Victor Fan?"
Cecilia slowly drifted toward me. Right now, apart from feeling that I am a ghost, I can’t sense any of a ghost’s powers at all. But this isn’t Cecilia’s doing. There’s something here, something far stronger than any ghost, suppressing this space. That’s also why Cecilia can’t leave.
"Then, Miss Cecilia, you’ll have to restore me first. Then I’ll naturally tell you."
I kept a calm face and smiled as I spoke, though inside I was panicking. I had no idea where Victor Fan had gone. By rights, he should have reincarnated after dying, but with his heart still tied to Cecilia, perhaps it wouldn’t be so easy for him to move on. Why didn’t Wu Zheng come looking for this beauty after? That, too, is a mystery.
The Sanzu Force was pressing down on him.
Cecilia was now right in front of me, striking seductive poses, breathtakingly beautiful. I felt my eyes drawn in, unable to look away. With such beauty, it wasn’t just men—even women would be enchanted.
"Let me ask you something else, Miss Cecilia. Back then, what exactly did you do to John Chou?"
As soon as I finished speaking, Cecilia’s face twisted in fury, as if I’d touched on something forbidden. I stood up—my body now female, feeling odd and unsteady on my feet.
The conversation quickly hit a dead end. I knew clearly that if I told Cecilia, or if she realized I was lying, I’d probably become one of her sculpted playthings.
A faint sound of sobbing came; Cecilia began to cry.
"All these years, Cecilia has suffered. She can’t get out, can’t feel anything beyond this place. But inside, she’s still longing for Victor Fan. Sir, if you know, please tell me—where is Victor Fan?"
Watching Cecilia cry, tears like raindrops on a pear blossom, I couldn’t help but feel pity and a desire to help her. But I quickly snapped out of it, forcing myself to look away. Facing Cecilia, it felt as if you were being drawn in, unable to escape, willingly wanting to help her.
After a while, the crying stopped. Cecilia slowly floated up, smiling coldly.
"Anyway, I can’t leave, and you can’t leave either. Even if we knew where Victor Fan is, it wouldn’t matter anymore."
A faint pink glow appeared. Cecilia vanished before my eyes, leaving no trace behind. Only the sound of the river under the moon, and the endless desolate plains all around.
I walked to the riverside and bent down. The two things on my chest felt heavy—I was not used to this at all. I scooped up a handful of river water, feeling its icy chill. It was real water, not ghostly energy disguised as water.
I started trying to use my powers, but nothing worked. I could feel the energy inside me, but I couldn’t release it.
My ghost soul should have died by now. But at this moment, my shattered ghost soul, like broken glass, had somehow fused together again, showing no sign of vanishing.
This was extremely strange. I walked along the riverbank for a while and found myself back where I started. Judging by the terrain, I was sure it was the same place. I tried several times, but I couldn’t get out—always ending up back at the beginning.
No matter how many times I looked at the sky, there was always a crescent moon hanging alone overhead—no stars, no clouds. Helpless, I sat down, intending to use my instincts to investigate everything about this place.
With my eyes closed, I began to sense my surroundings. There really is a presence here, something higher than ghosts. My instincts told me so.
I started thinking carefully. Back then, for Cecilia to seize John Chou, what exactly did she do to end up trapped here, unable to leave?
After Victor Wu chased after them, he found John Chou’s soul and body, separating out the yin part. He didn’t find Cecilia’s ghost, meaning that at that time, Cecilia did something that caused her to be sealed in the Belle Blade, not following the infant out.
At this moment, I thought of John Chou. He too seemed to have done something, his original power stripped away, leaving only a tiny bit. The Sanzu Force was pressing down on him.
I remembered that when Mona Tong died in an accident, I once begged John Chou for help. He said the Sanzu Force is pressing on him, and he doesn’t want to provoke the Divine Law again.
"Divine Law?"
I muttered, then stood up. Something seemed to click in my mind. I looked at the flowing river, all the tangled thoughts in my heart constantly rearranging themselves.
"Miss Cecilia, are you suppressed by the Divine Law? If so, please answer me."
I shouted, but after a long time, there was no response. Then I remembered my cousin’s experience—how Lady Violet forced him to marry her. But humans and ghosts cannot be joined. So John Chou once said, Lady Violet found two infant spirits that belonged neither to humans nor ghosts, to serve as a medium, blending human and ghost, hiding from the Divine Law to unite them.
Even the wedding between Yuna Ji and Luna Quay—Tan Tian’s solution was to hold the ceremony in a time that doesn’t exist in this world, thus evading the Divine Law.
Yin and Yang are forever opposed. Yin cannot be Yang, and Yang will never be Yin. If you violate these things, something called Divine Law will block you, even suppress you.
Ghost weddings are a form of defiance against the Divine Law. Now, I completely understand. After all I’ve experienced, my mind is clear about everything.
Humans and ghosts can never truly unite. For a ghost wedding, the medium must be a corpse. John Chou has mentioned this to me more than once.
Rather than calling it Divine Law, it’s more like a rule that exists in this world—a rule that absolutely cannot be violated.
Even the Yellow Springs is part of these rules. Once they break the rules, the people of the underworld will never let them go. As for Rachel Lan’s return, I still can’t quite understand it.
Just as I was growing restless, Cecilia appeared beside me, her face melancholy as she gazed at the flowing river.
"What is meant by ‘the outrage of gods and men’ is just this. I truly did provoke something I shouldn’t have. When that child was born, my soul and body were forcibly split in two. Normally, no matter what defects a newborn has, their body and soul are both new and whole. But I made that child’s Yin and Yang separate."
I nodded, looking at Cecilia. She smiled.
"When I first arrived here, I had no idea what had happened. But over these long years, I learned: the Divine Law is deep and distant, ghosts and gods are lost and confused. No matter how powerful you are, there’s always something above you that can suppress you. Once your power reaches a certain point, an even stronger force will come to suppress you."
"Can you take me to see it, Miss Cecilia? The Divine Law is here, right?"
Cecilia nodded. A pink mist, like clouds, wrapped around my body. I slowly floated up, with Cecilia leading me toward the cold crescent moon in the sky.
At that moment, I vaguely felt that my ability to come here, and Rachel Lan’s rescue, were both related to my instincts—instincts I’ve had since birth.
We moved farther and farther from the ground, but the distance to the moon never changed. The river below was now a thin silver thread, but Cecilia kept taking me higher.
"We’re at the top."
Cecilia stopped, slowly raising a hand and pointing upward. There was nothing there, only the moonlit night.
I couldn’t see anything, but inside, I felt as if I were gazing at someone far above me, someone I could never reach. I was awed and afraid.
"Birth is the law of Heaven and Earth. Those infants who die in the womb—why do you think they become infant spirits, able to reincarnate and skip the cycle?"
"Is it the Divine Law? As long as they haven’t been born, they never die. That’s inevitable. They suffer the pain of reincarnation, but never get to be born. So under the Divine Law, they must be born, become human."
"Heh, it’s strange, isn’t it? This so-called Divine Law, this endless cycle, this unerring retribution—why does it exist? The ones who hurt me never suffered any punishment. Instead, they basked in glory, praised by future generations. But me? After centuries, I’m left with nothing but the infamy of ruining a nation. Is that fair? Divine Law—is it fair?"