Seeing that the cooked duck was about to fly away, I grew anxious. Just then, another beautiful woman appeared outside the door.
This beauty wore her hair in a fresh ponytail, dressed in a white t-shirt and jeans, with a pair of white canvas shoes on her feet. Her look was pure and sweet, and she appeared about the same age as me. She had a lollipop in her mouth, occasionally licking it with a mischievous tongue.
"What the hell is this place? It's run-down, shabby, and remote. What kind of idiot would open a shop here?" The pretty girl muttered as she eyed the rickety Tattoos of Gods and Ghosts sign.
I felt a little upset. What kind of person is this, cursing as soon as she arrives? If she weren't a tattoo customer, I'd have chased her out with a broomstick dipped in shit. So what if she's good-looking?
"Are you Roger?" The beauty stepped inside and stared at me curiously.
"Yes. May I ask if you're here for a tattoo?" I nodded in reply but studied her with equal curiosity. How did she know my name? I didn't recognize a beauty of this caliber.
In terms of figure and looks, she outshone Chloe by miles—and you have to remember, Chloe was the nightclub's head hostess.
"Nonsense. Of course, I'm here for a tattoo. Did you think I came to blind date with you? Pfft!"
This beauty seemed to have a bit of a temper, but it didn't matter. A paying customer was a paying customer—I could treat her like a goddess if needed.
Just then, Chloe stood up to leave. She said since I had a customer, she wouldn't keep me. She'd go back and reconsider the tattoo.
But before she could take more than a few steps, the pretty girl called out to stop her. Chloe looked puzzled—she didn't know this girl, so why was she being stopped?
Turning back, Chloe asked, "What is it?"
The pretty girl didn't answer immediately. She swirled the lollipop in her mouth, then circled Chloe three times.
"Tell me… have you recently slept with a dead man?" she asked abruptly.
"You—you're the one who's slept with dead people! What the hell do you mean by that?"
Words like these were far from friendly, and Chloe grew furious upon hearing them.
Unfazed by Chloe's anger, the beautiful girl suddenly slapped Chloe's forehead.
I panicked. How did they start fighting within two sentences? And they didn't even know each other.
But what shocked me was that where the girl had struck, a greenish mark appeared on Chloe's forehead—divided into two distinct patches that looked like… eyes. A faint black haze also lingered around her brow, though it was barely visible.
Chloe couldn't see it herself. As she was about to explode in rage, I quickly pulled her aside and handed her a mirror. When she saw it, she froze in horror—but the strange phenomena vanished almost instantly.
"What… what is this?" Chloe stopped arguing with the pretty girl and instead asked her for an explanation.
"This is corpse resentment. If I'm not wrong, someone used corpse revival to harm you. The one you slept with wasn't a person—it was a long-dead corpse."
"If that corpse was resentful, and the revived corpse had skin-to-skin contact with you, the corpse's resentment would linger on you."
The pretty girl said it all as if it were no big deal, but Chloe was still half-doubting, while I listened intently. Grandpa had only taught me the Tattoos of Gods and Ghosts and how to calculate birth horoscopes—I basically knew nothing about the rest.
"Hey, sis, don't scare me if you're telling the truth." Chloe's expression began to shift.
The beautiful woman asked Chloe another question: "At the time, didn't that man's eyes refuse to roll?"
Chloe thought for a moment before nodding desperately. She said she'd assumed the man was drunk—sometimes drunk people's eyeballs lock up—but now that she thought about it, it didn't make sense. Would someone that drunk really be so fierce in bed?
The beauty pressed further: "Recently, have you felt like something's been following you, but you just can't find it?"
This time, the girl had hit the mark again. Chloe nodded frantically. How is this beauty so accurate? What is she?
The beautiful woman said, "That's right. The corpse resentment has covered your eyes, so you can't see the thing following you. Seven days from now, that corpse-reviving ghost will take your life!"
She added that to prove her words, Chloe could simply check the man she'd slept with—he must have been dead for a long time.
Long dead? Didn't he die that night with Chloe?
A look of realization crossed Chloe's face. Without another word, she hurried out—I couldn't even call her back.
Damn it! After all that, she still ran off!
I turned back to ask the beautiful woman who she was and how she knew so much.
"My name is Stella. Philip is my senior brother. He's the one who recommended you to me." The beauty licked her lollipop and continued.
Philip? This guy already knew the address of my tattoo shop? And he had such a pretty senior sister?!
So this girl was also a Celestial Master—no wonder she had a few tricks up her sleeve. Well, I wasn't worried then. Chloe would come back sooner or later.
Stella then added, "But ah, this senior brother of mine doesn't seem very reliable. This shitty place, plus a tattoo artist whose hair hasn't even fully grown in—what could he possibly be capable of?"
This was something I didn't like to hear. You could question everything about me, but you couldn't question my skills. I said to Stella, "If the tattoo isn't done well, I'll give you a full refund plus compensation."
"Really? What if I'm getting Tattoos of Gods and Ghosts?" Stella looked at me challengingly.
Tattoos of Gods and Ghosts were of course no problem—there was even more money to be made, and I couldn't be happier! I reassured her that I would give her a full refund even if it didn't work. I just didn't know why she wanted Tattoos of Gods and Ghosts.
Stella was a Celestial Master herself. If it were just a normal evil spirit, she could handle it on her own—she wouldn't need Tattoos of Gods and Ghosts.
When it came to the reason for getting the tattoos, Stella's playful expression immediately turned cold.
Since the age of five, Stella had been having the same dream—a dream of a black carbon coffin.
Normally, coffins are red. Black coffins are only used for those who died in wars, by suicide, or from untimely deaths. And a coffin made of carbon? That was even more unusual—it was only used for evil zombies.
In her dream, Stella would open that coffin, and inside lay an old woman wearing a black burial shroud.
The old woman's face was bizarre—not a human face, but a fox's, covered in white fur, with the corners of her mouth slit wide open as if she were grinning.
Every time Stella got close to the coffin, the old woman would stretch out her sharp claws and drag Stella inside with a sneer. Each time this happened, Stella would wake up drenched in sweat.
This dream had been recurring for over ten years, identical every single time.
A Celestial Master could interpret dreams but not break them. Stella's master was at his wits' end, though he had said that Tattoos of Gods and Ghosts were mysterious and unpredictable—so maybe they could help!
Stella's dream was truly strange. To have the same dream for over ten years—what was going on?
Before performing the Tattoos of Gods and Ghosts, I asked a stream of questions out of curiosity. After giving me an exasperated look, Stella still explained the basics of her dream with a bored expression.
Her master had told her that the dream was called "The Face Veiled by a White Fox."