Translator's note: curious about why I'm working on the earlier chapters? You can find an explanation in the translator's note on the ninth chapter . - The cloak of the night was like a giant, satiated animal, and within Sijiucheng, [1] the lamp-light had scattered away, and Li Shiyi and Tu Laoyao each returned to their own homes without exchanging words. The winter wind whistled against the wood door, and Li Shiyi, holding Song Shijiu, entered the room, pushing the door open with her foot, and put Song Shijiu on the wooden bed; from within the willow wardrobe, took out a camphor-scented buckwheat pillow, putting it beneath her head, then fetched hot water and sat at the bedside and washed her body; seeing she didn’t make any sound, rather clever and obedient, she couldn’t help but reach out her index finger to tip up her chubby, pouting chin, and said to herself, “What sort of person are you?” Song Shijiu opened her eyes wide, and blew a perplexed bubble of spit. Li Shiyi...

Translator's note: curious about why I'm working on the earlier chapters? You can find an explanation in the translator's note on the ninth chapter . Life is picking up a bit, so from now on out I'll endeavour to post a chapter per month. - Suddenly, the narrow space was quiet, and it was then that the coldness and eerieness of the stone tomb appeared. The slow sound of the water’s movement, the circling of the ripples subsiding, seeming as if to ebb and gather towards the back of the coffin. The gathered water scattered in every direction, revealing the dingy white [1] flagstone of the floor beneath, and from near the corner of the coffin, light pooled secretively from where the smoking pipe had been washed out by the water. With a sudden, clear expression in her eyes, Li Shiyi moved forward hurriedly and gathered it, still not straightening her body, listening to the gurgling from within the coffin, the sound vibrating in waves. The groaning sounds seemed as if to be...

Translator's note: curious about why I'm working on the earlier chapters? You can find an explanation in the translator's note on the ninth chapter . Now that there's a couple of chapters in succession, I've put in links to last and next chapters, as well as a link to the entire list of currently-translated chapters. Hopefully this will make reading easier in the future! - “En.” Tu Laoyao nodded his head, picked up the branches, and followed Li Shiyi in walking back, but only upon standing up did he realise that something was wrong and said with a slight stutter, “That, that, that…that, this thing, if it isn’t put it back, how can I know that my wife will be okay?” Li Shiyi cast him a cold look and returned her smoking pipe back to her bag. Tu Laoyao saw that she was stubbornly pursuing this, [1] not anxious in the slightest, and so he headed towards the southeast end of the tomb by himself, his right foot digging into the dirt before it exposed a piece of oilcloth...

Translator's note: curious about why I'm working on the earlier chapters? You can find an explanation in the translator's note on the ninth chapter . This chapter took much less time to translate than the first one I translated, so hopefully if I can keep up this pace, I should finish with these first few chapters fairly quickly, and then I can get to the later, untranslated ones soon. - The cloudy, overcast sky was wet, and it was hard to tell if it was fog or the smoke exuded from the bamboo steamers. The scent of coal was heavy in the air, and the smell of the baozi [1] was no longer fragrant. Tu Laoyao lifted the bamboo steamer and stretched his neck to take a look, and shook his head. “This face of yours, it really has become thick.” The old baozi seller, who’d been on the corner of the street for twenty years, let out a scoff, and hit the cover of the bamboo steamer. “Too thick, you say, Tu Laoyao—get, get, get!” Tu Laoyao grinned and moved his face back, tucking his...

Translator's note (08.09.2023): Hi everyone, I've been informed by members within the fantranslation community of etiquette surrounding fantranslation I wasn't previously aware of. In light of this, I'm making this note to add some information. First of all, I've taken down the links to Earless Translations' translation of Wen Guan on my Wen Guan project/chapters page, and I'll be going back and starting my translation from chapter one, rather than "continuing" Earless Translations' work. However, I still want to acknowledge the work that was put in there, and link that translation of novel, which can be found here. This may take me a while, but I greatly admire those involved in that translation, and do not intend to offend. Secondly, I want to mention douqi, the editor for Earless Translations' translations, as the title for this chapter, as well as the English-language title for this novel, are her work. As I want to respect that, I w...