"That's it."

Chen Yi looked at the trail of rice grains stretching across the ground and knew he had found the right path. Clapping his hands together, he said:

"Let's transform, turn into mice."

Yin Weiyin's face revealed a trace of shock, but after hesitating for a moment, she chose to trust Chen Yi. She pulled a talisman from her sleeve and stuck it onto Chen Yi.

"Transform."

With the chanting of the spell, smoke began to billow and bubble up. As the white haze dissipated, a clothed male mouse appeared on the ground.

Seeing his appearance, Yin Weiyin blinked in amazement and studied him intently for quite a while.

Chen Yi tilted his head up at the female crown. She now appeared as a colossal figure, her face filled with curiosity as she observed him. Worried about delays, he urged:

"Squeak squeak!"

The female crown couldn't help herself and burst out laughing.

The tiny mouse was somehow… endearingly cute.

But faced with his sharp glare, even though he was now a mouse, Yin Weiyin shrank back slightly out of habit. Finally, she stuck a talisman onto herself, white smoke rising again. As the haze cleared, she appeared as a female mouse dressed in a Taoist robe.

"Why so slow?" Chen Yi muttered in complaint.

The female crown let out a soft laugh; at this moment, she could finally understand the squeaking sounds Chen Yi made.

Chen Yi was mildly surprised by this mouse-like laughter and turned his head, only to lock eyes with hers.

Mouse to mouse, they stared at each other for a while. At this moment, she wasn't as frightened of him and instead thought he seemed… kind of cute.

After quite some time, Chen Yi turned his head away and noticed the scattered rice grains on the ground. He had no idea how much time they had wasted or how far the mouse wedding procession had traveled, and he silently berated himself:

"Why am I so slow too?"

With that thought, Chen Yi stopped dawdling and followed the trail of scattered rice.

Yin Weiyin followed closely behind, her mouse paws clutching at the corner of Chen Yi's small three-to-four-inch robes.

The rice had a faint smell of burned offerings, reminiscent of the sacrifices left behind in cemeteries.

It seemed these mice were shadow mice, specialized in stealing human offerings to the deceased. These offerings were meant for the dead, and as the mice consumed them, they gradually blurred the boundaries between the worlds of the living and the dead. In places of intense negative energy, they gained the ability to traverse both realms.

This explained why in many areas, no matter how hard people tried to eradicate mice, they could never fully wipe them out.

The trail of rice carried on until, finally, they spotted a large gathering of mice in the distance. Each mouse was dressed in meticulously detailed clothing, their attire looking absurdly comical.

In cemeteries where paper money, paper houses, and paper figurines are often burned, the shadow mice mimicking human customs by wearing clothing felt entirely natural.

Rice kept spilling out from a massive rice sack, marking the tradition of mice weddings. It was a way to display their abundance of food and an invitation for other mice along the trail to join the festivities.

At the front of the wedding procession was a bright red sedan chair, carried with fanfare. The mice moved their heads in rhythmic motions, clanging iron plates and striking porcelain cups. The robust mice carrying rice sang a wedding song in harmony:

"Good mice~ good mice~, today~ is the wedding day! Who's the lucky family for the bride?"

The squeaking song rang out jubilantly, creating an overwhelmingly festive atmosphere as Chen Yi and Yin Weiyin followed at the back.

Though initially reserved, they eventually grew more composed and at ease.

The path ahead, too rugged for humans, became smooth and effortless for the mice—a shining, heavenly boulevard.

Suddenly, a voice spoke beside them.

"Little brother, little sister, your clothes are so exquisite!"

Not far in front of Chen Yi, an elderly mouse scrutinized them for a moment, then exclaimed in wonder:

"They look like clothing worn by humans!"

The elder mouse seemed to act as a leader of sorts. Most of the mice roaming the cemetery wore attire crafted from paper money, yellow parchment, or paper ingots.

Yin Weiyin grew visibly uneasy, but Chen Yi responded calmly:

"We come from a wealthy family that used silk in ancestral offerings, crafting intricate little garments for paper effigies. Each one is meticulously detailed!"

"Huh, wealthy families really are different," the elder mouse marveled, "Even in death, they have so many rituals. When I used to steal temple offerings, the monks would always say we come into the world bare and leave it the same way. But no, death isn't the same for everyone. From birth to death, it's all different! If you ask me, being a mouse is better…"

And so, Chen Yi casually made conversation with the elder mouse, exchanging stories of the mortal world. In return, he gleaned valuable information from the elder.

These mice had adopted human traditions: it was the will of their parents and the arrangement of a matchmaker. They had found a grand marriage match for the young mouse bride.

The bride was to marry someone on the other side of the mountain, a figure known as "Uncle Impermanence." Though Uncle Impermanence was actually a ghost messenger who had retired from the esteemed Black and White Impermanence, he was an extraordinary match to these shadow mice. Even if the young mouse bride was heading there merely to become a concubine.

Chen Yi was tagging along with this mouse wedding procession precisely to seek out this so-called Uncle Impermanence.

Yin Weiyin, listening keenly on the side, found the situation thoroughly fascinating. Despite years of Taoist cultivation in her family's lineage, her world until then had been confined to the size of a meditation mat. Even with her expanded experience this past year, she had not left the Capital Region. Participating in a mouse wedding was unprecedented.

If not for Chen Yi, she might have never understood the reasons behind such eerie traditions.

From a distance, she spotted the young mouse bride inside the bright red sedan chair, draped in a crimson wedding robe. Every so often, the bride poked her head out, seemingly eager in expectation.

The mighty mouse wedding procession crossed hills and bridges, rice grains scattering like shimmering pearls along the path—all lively and joyous.

Suddenly, a towering shadow blocked the faint light ahead.

A horde of mice froze in place as though they had seen a ghost, each one stiff and motionless.

In the distance, a pair of eerie blue eyes glimmered against the darkness, narrowing and shifting, radiating an ominous intensity.

The creature stood as mightily as some ancient fierce beast.

The mass of mice remained frozen in fear until one squeaking voice pierced through sharply:

"It's a cat!"

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.