A Business Empire Across Hong Kong: I Started with a Sign-In at the Paper Effigy Shop

Chen Huaisheng runs “Huaisheng Paper Offerings” on Temple Street. He makes paper effigies, sells paper ingots, and sends off departed souls: an ordinary craftsman by every measure. Until the midnight hour, when he binds to the Underworld Sign-In System: Sign in at the Temple Street back courtyard to receive a century-old willowwood core; Sign in at an empty shop on Portland Street to receive a House-Cleansing Talisman; Sign in at five locations in total to receive a copper coin sword; Sign in on the night of the full moon to receive lightning-struck jujube wood… Paper Effigy No. 1 has a body of black sandalwood. It runs errands, scouts the way, and carries messages in secret. It’s especially good at scaring the living; Paper Effigy No. 15 has a heart of lightning-struck jujube wood and wears a Vajra Talisman to Suppress Evil. It specializes in beating up yin spirits and vengeful ghosts. When ghosts haunt Cui Xiaoxiao’s sauna, he acquires a shop; When Ah Hui, Chen Haonan’s old comrade from the battlefield, has a change of heart, he trades for a favor from Hung Hing; When a cursed coin causes trouble at Big Head Kun’s mahjong parlor, he trades for a piece of territory from Wo Hop To; When three families go in together to open a bar, they ask him to check the feng shui and clear out the yin energy. He also picks up the lucrative business of Mong Kok’s ghost market along the way. While others fight over territory by hacking at one another, Chen Huaisheng handles supernatural troubles for the gangs and, in return, secures the rights to run ghost markets on their respective turf. Paper offerings, paper ingots, spirit money, incense and candles, ritual services: one shop becomes two, and two become an empire. When every gang across Hong Kong and Kowloon owes him a favor for “sending off a soul,” Chen Huaisheng wipes the cinnabar from his hands and gazes at the lights of Victoria Harbour. “From today on, I alone decide the prices for the underworld business in Hong Kong.”