The Yin-Yang Accountant

Lin Yan studied modern funeral services and worked night shifts at a funeral home. He thought he’d spend his life dealing with the dead and earning a modest living through hard work. That changed during one night shift, when he was cleaning the body of an elderly person who had died of natural causes. He saw a red ledger wrapped around the deceased’s wrist, visible only to him. It read: One life owed, due tonight. That was when he learned that death doesn’t erase debts. Debts of gratitude, life debts, debts of promises, debts of incense: unresolved obligations settle into vengeful spirits that come to collect from the living. Wherever people are, there are debts; wherever there are debts, there are loan sharks hiding in the shadows, extending people’s lives on credit, and a secret government bureau called the Debt Settlement Office, which specializes in settling accounts for others. When other people run for their lives after encountering evil spirits, Lin Yan takes out his ledger: “Don’t panic. Let’s settle the books.” He audits, reconciles, records, and balances accounts, using rules to defeat rules and settling karma with karma. As he uncovers one old account after another, he sees the dead whose names have been erased, the people an entire era has wronged, and an entire city repaying a master debt that no one will admit to owing. And weighing on Lin Yan himself is an old debt of staggering size, one he knows nothing about. Everything is an account, and only the living can settle it. This novel and its characters are entirely fictional. Any resemblance to real people or events is purely coincidental. Do not imitate.