“The first soul-crossing mission of Sprout-Rank Purifier Su Qingtang: crouching in a ruined shrine, she flashes eight teeth at a red-clad ghost with disheveled hair. ‘Sister, isn’t the moonlight lovely? How about we start by clearing the cobwebs off the rafters?’
No magic artifacts, no spells. She relies entirely on the street smarts she picked up growing up on the streets. She coaxes a resentful old woman away with sugar-roasted chestnuts, persuades a lovelorn scholar to make peace with a witty saying, and simmers the obsessions in every small world into sweet porridge.
Then one day, the System, which is always mocking her for ‘chattering like a sparrow,’ suddenly glitches. ‘When you smile… you look just like the crabapple blossoms that have bloomed by the River of Forgetfulness for three thousand years.’
It turns out every obsession is just
‘I’ve been gone so long, but at last I’ve found my way back to you.’
