The Reborn Zombie Priest Mao Xiaofang

The moonlight on the fifteenth night of the seventh lunar month carried an indescribable chill, spilling over the mottled wooden doors of the funeral home. The copper bell beneath the eaves chimed softly in the night breeze, but could not dispel the heavy scent of mugwort and old timber hanging in the courtyard.

Mao Xiaofang suddenly opened his eyes, his nose brushing the rough inner wall of a coffin.

“Master?”

“Daoist Mao?”

Two alarmed voices came from beyond the coffin lid. Xiao Hai’s voice was choked with tears, while Da Chu sounded so anxious he was practically stomping his feet. Mao Xiaofang moved his fingers. His stiff joints gave a soft crack, and the breath in his chest felt as if it had been blocked for a full ten years. When he spoke, his mouth tasted of rust. “…What are you yelling about?”

The coffin lid creaked open, and moonlight fell straight across his face. The oil lamp in Xiao Hai’s hand wavered, illuminating a few new strands of white at his temples, but his eyes remained clear and bright, as calm as ever. Da Chu still clutched a yellow talisman. When he saw Mao Xiaofang sit up, the paper slipped from his hand and fell to the ground. “M-Master, weren’t you…”

“Wasn’t I what?” Mao Xiaofang braced himself against the edge of the coffin and climbed out. Only when his fingertips touched the cold wood did he realize that his bones felt as if they had fallen apart. He remembered the searing pain when Lei Gang’s peachwood sword, soaked in black-dog blood, pierced his chest. He remembered the warmth of the blood splashed across his face when Black Rose leaped in front of him to shield him. Most of all, he remembered how the blinding golden light had surged into the sky when he crushed the sect leader’s token, sweeping Lei Gang and the surrounding corpse aura away with it.

And yet here he was, alive. Even the Daoist robe he wore was the same one he had on when he confronted Lei Gang that day. Only around the hole in his chest, a ring of pale gold had congealed