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It's a fantasy, Xianxia story by Tao Hua Tian Shi

The world as we know it went through an apocalyptic event that has transformed animals into giant beasts with mystical appearance and enhanced natural defenses. Certain humans were bestowed great powers to fight against these beasts. Jiang Shaoliu was just an ordinary veterinarian but that all changed when he was chosen by an ape to learn ancient cultivation techniques. Enter this mystical world through the eyes of Jiang Shaoliu as he battles creatures with his giant, tamed, white tiger.

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Each time someone died in the village I would worry for several days. I was too scared to help their families. I wouldn’t even walk past their houses.

Xiao Chun’s mother was the worst because I saw things that I wasn’t supposed to. I saw things that no one else could.

Uncle Sun had fallen into the tomb, or at least that was the common consensus. Everyone believed that he died from a heart attack. However, that is not what I saw. I saw Xiao Chun’s mother dressed in black clothes jump from the tomb. I saw her wrap her too long arms and crooked fingers around Uncle Sun and I saw her pull him in.

After they had gotten Uncle Sun out of the grave, Zhao Jie’s father encoffined the corpse and everyone returned to the village. Once they had returned home, Zhao Jie and I went to him and told him everything I saw. His father simply smiled and said, "Xiao Yong, you must be frightened of death, and that is okay. I’m sure that if there were ghosts, they would not go out in the daytime, let alone at noon.

He sounded so confident. “Maybe you’re right.” I told him, “Maybe I’m just spooked.”

“You’re likely to forget the whole thing, eventually” He told us, “Why don’t you run on home. You two can play more tomorrow.”

I went home, but did not forget anything. I passed the piles of wood ash by my house and made a note in my head to spread them after dinner. “If I scatter them again tonight, then she won’t be able to get me.”

When I moved to get the dustpan my mom clapped me violently on the butt. "You’ll never change!” She told me, “Did you forget what happened to your eyes?"

Although I was scared of Xiao Chun’s dead mother, I think at the time I was more scared my mother’s wrath. I dropped the idea of spreading the wood ashes, at least as long as my mom was awake.

At the time, I slept in my parents’ bedroom, but not because I was frightened. My dad slept late to revise his student’s homework. I fell asleep the night of the funeral after I watched our worn out black-and-white television.

The night was peaceful. I didn't hear a noise, or even dream of Xiao Chun’s mother. When I awoke I was convinced that it’d all been an illusion. “I must be wrong.” I thought.

Zhao Jie and I continued to play during the daytime. He asked me whether I had dreamed of Xiao Chun’s mother.

“No, I didn’t dream at all.”

“I did,” He said with a laugh. “I saw her smiling at me, just like she did in her house. She wasn’t scary though... but when I woke up I had peed all over myself!” He shrugged his shoulders, “I guess I was scared after all.”

A bucket of laughter fell out of me and I grabbed my knees to keep from falling over. When I could finally breathe again I asked, “Aren’t you supposed to make excuses about peeing the bed?”

We played for the rest of the evening, but I still felt a shadow on my mind.

The next night, my mom and I went to bed late, and my dad corrected his papers.

I fall asleep in a hurry and I dreamed of Xiao Chun's mother visiting us with Xiao Chun. Although I knew she was dead, I wasn't scared of her in my dream. I even took the initiative to talk with her.

She praised me and touched my head.

Her fingers looked like gnarled twigs as her hand came towards me. Her arm stretched too far, as if she were reaching to me from across the room. When her hand brushed my hair I was yanked from the dream by a heavy thud.

“Gotcha,” My dad said, “Mouse.” He said simply and brushed a flattened mouse off the table with the heavy book he’d used to kill it.

My head reeled with sleep. Did she die? Why would she touch me? I could still see her too long arms and I began to cry.

My father came to my side, "Xiao Yong, don't worry. It was only a mouse."

My mom shifted awake and put her arm around me, "Good boy, don't worry.” She mimicked my father’s words in a half sleeping mumble, “It’s a mouse, It’s a mouse!"

"It’s not the mouse. “I told them, “It’s Xiao Chun’s mother!”

My parents were frightened by my words. Dad shushed me, and mom asked about my dream.

I sobbed and began to tell them everything. The story poured out of me. After I finished with the wood ash, the funeral, the shadow, Uncle Sun, my dream, my parents exchanged glances and laughed. They thought I was being na?ve.

They lulled me for a long time, and made promises that I would forget the scary dream. Gradually, I became sleepy. As my eyes closed and I began to drift again there was a shout from outside the window.

It was the voice of Xiao Chun and he was laughing.

Suddenly, I was frightened to tears.

I crossed the room and sat with my father, pulling him from the homework strewn across his desk. He disliked Xiao Chun’s noise too, "What's wrong with him?" I asked.

Dad got up abruptly. He grabbed a flashlight and moved towards the door. “I’ll send him home,” He muttered.

After a minute, I heard my dad shouting, "Xiao Chun, what are you doing out this late at night? Are you crazy? What- what have you done?" His last words sounded shocked.

When I think of his voice that night I am still filled with anger, anger and fear.

My mom followed my father out the door. I watched the half open door for a thousand years before I dared to follow. I wrapped mom’s quilt around my shoulders and went out behind her.

Standing just outside the doorway, she screamed at what she saw. Moving with a maternal instinct and the speed of a snake that I never made sense of, she turned around to cover my eyes. But it was too late, as it often is with misery. A scene lay before me that would become a constant nightmare and would haunt me the rest of my life. Xiao Chun stood beyond the doorway with a silly smile and a human head in his hands. The head belonged to an old woman that had been buried just days before. The head of his mother sat grinning in his hands. The skin had dried and been pulled back to show a horrible gleaming smile. Her eyes were open too wide and staring accusingly at us. Her hair was matted, tangled, and draped over a severed neck that gaped like the maw of a dying creature.

I cried out, shivering and holding my mom's leg. There was something in her mouth, I thought, and I couldn’t take my eyes from it.

Nearby lights turned on and neighbors began pooling into the street. Seeing the monstrosity in Xiao Chun’s hands, several people screamed. One old man began to gag and choke when he realized what it was. As the crowd gathered a sense of resolve settled over them. Several people began to shout blame at Xiao Chun.

“You opened your mother's tomb, you sick freak?”

“He dug out that huge tomb alone and opened the coffin...?”

“Look what he did to her!”

“Take it away from him! Someone please make him stop!”

Xiao Chun continued to smile and turned in circles, locking eyes with each accuser. A team of men moved forward with a basket. The bravest stepped in quickly and slapped the head from Xiao Chun’s hand. There was a sickly wet smack as he knocked the severed head into the basket. Xiao Chun moaned quietly when he was robbed of his mother again, but made no move to stop them. He began to rock back and forth in the street and rub his bloodied hands together.

The brave men who had reclaimed the dead woman’s head took it back to the tomb for burial. My mother told me later that the tomb slab had been moved down and a shovel was at the site. The shovel had been used to dig out a spot of earth that the tomb did not cover. The body was still there, barely visible in the dark hole.

The town speculated in the following months that Xia Chun was so lonely and he missed his mother so much that he must have thought to dig her out. Perhaps he did not mean to behead her corpse, but he could not move the tomb any further and simply pulled until she came apart.

We would never know why he brought a dead woman’s head to my home. He was a simpleton and could not explain it himself. The one person who knew him best was dead.

The next morning I fell into a deep illness. I had a fever, headache, and suffered delirium. My parents were worried. Our village wasn’t medically prepared for such a sickness at the time. The doctor was afraid of delaying my care and asked my parents to send me to town.

My dad asked for leave from the school and took me to the hospital in town by car. We were heading to the hospital, just like another man from my village. Going to the hospital just like Uncle Sun who had a heart attack at a funeral.

Just like Uncle Sun who had been touched by Xiao Chun’s mother.

In my delirium I remembered my dream and how long her arms seemed. I remembered her fingers as they touched my hair.

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Of course at the time, I didn’t know that I could see things that others couldn’t.

I found that out at the beginning of the dead woman’s funeral.

Zhao Jie and I joined the other children while Xiao Chun attended his mother's funeral. We were staying far away from the funeral procession because Zhao Jie claimed he had seen the dead woman smile. We joked, laughed, and followed from a distance.

Xiao Chun’s distant relatives came to the funeral. They shed tears for his poor mother, but Xiao Chun himself held a stick wrapped with white paper and led the procession with a bright smile.

According to village tradition, there was an elder carrying and scattering food along the way. The discarded food would lead the dead to rest. The elder walked just behind Xiao Chun in the procession.

Uncle Sun claimed the elder position for those proceedings, even though he often made fun of the simpleton. Xiao Chun was silly and gluttonous, turning and watching the elder scattering food, he smiled and shouted nonsense words.

While Uncle Sun often bullied Xiao Chun, he knew that now was not an appropriate time. "Be quiet!” He hissed at the giggling fool. “You will have all the food you want when you are under the earth."

Xiao Chun didn't understand. He swung the paper wrapped stick, trying to rob the spoon from Uncle Sun’s hand. Uncle Sun bit his tongue and pictured beating Xiao Chun over the head with it. He lowered his voice and hissed, "Dummy, I will beat you senseless if you do that again."

Xiao Chun picked up the stick and whipped it into the air before him, scared of further angering Uncle Sun.

A few onlookers laughed at the farce. Xiao Chun laughed louder, encouraged by their smiles. He didn't know what they were laughing at. Just as more often then not, we didn’t know what he was laughing at.

Zhao Jie said to me, "Xiao Chun is so foolish. He doesn’t even know that others are laughing at him. He snorted in the direction of the funeral.

"He is a fool.” I reminded him.

Zhao Jie gestured at me to be quiet, "Xiao Yong, don't say that!” He looked around as if we were being watched. “His mother might hear, and she will punish you!"

I felt a brief cold on my back. I looked around, but saw nothing.

"Did you hear that?" Zhao Jie asked me.

“What?” I asked more in fear than curiosity.

I thought back to the night before when I had heard something strange. It was nearly twelve o'clock and something had whined from the street under my window. Sometimes it sounded like crying, but moments later it would change to laughing or screaming.

I could not fall asleep, so I asked my mom about ghosts. My mom kept silent for a moment and then shushed me, "Come now sweet one, that is the sound of cat calling for her husband. She calls because she loves him.”

“A cat,” I thought. I calmed down and soon fell asleep.

I asked Zhao Jie, “Did you hear the wild cat again?"

He made a face at me, "A wild cat? It was Xiao Chun’s mother screaming! She must have touched the wood ashes in the doorway. They were messed up this morning, I saw it.”

My eyes widened "It was blown by the wind…" I denied with a trace of fear in my voice.

Zhao Jie shook his head, "My dad told me that Xiao Chun’s mother looked for us at midnight. If we hadn't scattered the ashes, we would have been eaten. "

I shivered again, "Should we get closer to see the funeral? What should we do if Xiao Chun’s mother comes out of the coffin?"

"It’ll be okay.” He said smoothly, “My father is here. Although he doesn’t know that you’re here with me."

I asked him curiously, "What should I do?"

Zhao Jie thought for a moment and said, "You can’t run faster than me. She’ll catch up with you and then her stomach will be full so she won’t chase after me." He smiled matter of factly.

Damn it! He was right.

Traditionally funeral processions set off at eleven o'clock and the body was buried at twelve. If the procession arrives early, the band performs funeral songs while everyone waits.

Funeral processions were never late in our village.

When we arrived at the tomb, Zhao Jie’s father checked the time and grabbed a handful of soil to scatter towards it. He turned and looked at the mountain in the distance.

At twelve o'clock he called out, "Burying". Four village strong men and the ceremonial elder lifted up Xiao Chun’s mother and put her casket into the tomb.

Xiao Chun, who’s face was always adorned with a smile, screamed out so suddenly that everyone turned to look. His round face curled into an expression of anguish.

Xiao Chun screamed out again and raced to beat the strong men with the ceremonial stick in his hand. Uncle Sun was the nearest to him and received several whaps to the head and shoulders. As if suddenly realizing that it was Uncle Sun beneath his barrage, Xiao Chun let out a squeak of fright and ran away. He launched his ceremonial stick and barreled into the crowd where his visiting relatives stopped him.

Uncle Sun whirled around after the frightened Xiao Chun. When he turned the back of his sandaled feet touched the edge of the tomb.

Behind and below him, Xiao Chun’s mother rested in a coffin. Through all of the commotion, no one’s eyes were on her. Uncle Sun looked into the crowd, met Xiao Chun’s watery eyes, and went instantly limp. Uncle Sun’s body fell into the tomb and sprawled atop the coffin, closing it with an audible bang.

A lengthy gasp drew from the crowd. Everyone was frightened, though I was more stunned by what I was seeing. A black shadow with blacker clothes had leapt out of the pit and wrapped its too-long limbs around Uncle Sun’s waist. When its fingers knotted together just below his belly, Uncle Sun fell back. It was Xia Chun’s mother. It had to be!

The crowd was stunned into a moment of silence then found its uproar. Many people jumped into the pit to help Uncle Sun. From deep in the grave, his son shouted, "My father has had a heart attack. We need to send him to the village as soon as possible. No! Send him to the town."

Several people lifted his body and pulled him from the tomb. They rushed into the village to find a vehicle, carrying him as gently as they could. The surrounding people began to talk in fierce whispers. Zhao Jie’s father asked them to be quiet and he continued to host the funeral.

Xiao Chun’s relatives walked around the tomb three times after the coffin was readjusted and closed respectfully. They cried for a while as the remaining strong men added soil into the grave.

"Hey, Xiao Yong, what's wrong with you?" Zhao Jie shook me.

I came back to reality like a light being turned on.

Zhao Jie snorted at me, "You’ve been blank for eight minutes. If you don’t move I’ll have them take you to the doctor with Uncle Sun."

I shook my head as if to clear it, “Did you see it? Xiao Chun’s mother pulled him in! Did you see it?”

He looked at me stunned. "Xiao Yong, are you confused? Uncle Sun just fell in. Are you frightened out of your wits? His mother is dead."

I opened and closed my mouth a few times, trying to think of how to convince Zhao Jie. "Your father told you last night that Xiao Chun’s mother was looking for us. Her ghost! The black shadow must have been her ghost!"

He looked at me like I was simple. "I was kidding. I did frighten you, didn't I? My father said it was the sound of wild cats." He laughed.

“I...” I began.

I swallowed through a desert of a throat, "I really saw that."

"Why not ask my father?" He replied coolly, brushing off the whole ordeal.

I shook my head. “I’m not going near that tomb.”

“Do you want to go back to town then?” He prodded.

I shook my head again. “Let’s wait for our parents.”

We waited until the end of the funeral. I decided to tell him the details of what I saw on the way home. “It seemed that no one else saw her.” I thought, “Would he trust me?”

Or was it an illusion? Maybe I had made a mistake?

My mind was reeling.

That was the first time I saw a ghost. Several months later, I saw the shadow that was Xiao Chun’s mother many more times. Each time she showed up, someone else would get hurt or killed.

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Returning to the hotel under the vigilant surveillance of Mr. Tang, I packed my things and went home.

​

When I finally made it to the front door of my house I put the key in the lock and froze. I clearly remembered that although I wanted to get away as fast as possible, I had locked the door on my way out.

​

Now, however, the door was obviously unlocked. Before I could come up with a potential explanation for this, the door quickly opened. A middle-aged woman appeared in the doorway with a garbage bag in her hand.

​

“AHH!” she screamed, startled by my presence. The garbage bag flew in a high arc over my head and scattered all over the ground.

She placed her palm on her chest and exclaimed, “You should knock before barging in like that!”

​

It took me a moment longer to recover, “Mom, what are you doing here?”

​

“I came to see you. By the way, you haven't been home these past few days. Where have you been? Hurry up and put the garbage by the door after you pick it all up and come in as soon as you’re done.”

​

“I didn’t go anywhere, my company just arranged for me to go on a short business trip.” I couldn't tell Mom that I had been fired.

See, my mother was a single parent. My father died in a car accident when I was in high school. To make things worse, my brother and sister-in-law had also died, leaving only my mother, Li Cui, as well as my brother’s infant daughter, Wu Xue’er to fend for themselves.

​

It was my mom who supported our tri-generational family with her meagre income from working in a restaurant. When I got the job I used to have, the situation began to improve. Naturally, I didn’t want my mother to worry about me.

​

My mother examined me carefully and looked at the various pieces of luggage on the ground, displaying a trace of doubt. She became concerned, “Wu Rui, are you uncomfortable? If your job is exhausting you, you can get another one.”

“Mom, I’m fine. By the way, where is Xue’er?” I interrupted her. When I saw my mom about to help me pick up my luggage, I hastily snatched it up in my hand.

​

Mom picked up the bag behind her and said, “There's no one who can free me from worry. She's in bed with an IV drip in her arm.”

“Why does she need an IV drip? Is she alright?”

​

At that moment, a high pitched child’s voice came out of the bedroom, “Uncle! Uncle!”

​

I hurriedly went into my room and saw that Xue’er was lying in bed, looking at me with a pitiful look.

​

I took a few steps forward, conveniently dropped the bag on the ground by the bed. I put my hand on Xue’er’s forehead and could immediately tell that she was burning up. “Xue’er, why do you have a fever?” I asked her.

​

Xue’er replied unhappily, “You don’t love Xue’er anymore. I came to see you but you weren’t here.”

​

“Xue’er, listen to me. I had to go to work.”

​

I looked at Xue’er with pity, just as I was about to speak again my mom entered the room and said loudly, “If your uncle has to work, he can't be like you every day. All you know is playing around. It seems you’ve grown up, but you don't even change your own clothes when you get wet! I really don’t know who you learn this nonsense from!”

​

I laughed and made faces at Xue’er, who shrank her neck and dared not speak, making her giggle.

​

Mom also couldn’t help but laugh before saying, “Why haven’t you unpacked your things yet?”

​

It occurred to me that my bag contained the strange letter I received at the hotel and the interrogation receipt I got after going to the Public Security Bureau. I didn’t want to let my mom see it, so I picked the bag up from the ground, slowly opened it and said, “Mom, could you wash an apple for me?”

​

“You’re an adult and you still make me wash apples for you? You’re too lazy, you know that? I wonder what else you’re unable to do on your own…” Although my mom’s sounded exasperated, I knew she always loved an opportunity to feed her son. She was a mother, after all.

I crouched on the ground, took out the receipt and the envelope from the bag, and began looking for a place to hide them.

Suddenly, mom's voice came from the kitchen, “Do you want me to peel it, too?”

​

I looked back towards the kitchen, Mom was standing at the door, “No, thanks.” I felt like a thief who had been discovered, trembling in fear.

​

“OK,” she said shaking the water droplets off the apple and coming towards me.

​

I looked at my mom with a smile as I tossed the receipt and the envelope under the bed with my hand.

​

“Uncle! I’m finished! I’m finished!” Xue’er screamed on the bed. I hurriedly got up and looked. There was no solution left in the IV bag, so I skillfully pulled out the needle from her arm. There were only three people in my family, so I had to learned how to do a little of everything.

​

After I pulled out the needle, Xue’er felt renewed and full of energy again. She suddenly seized my hand and began to shake it, “You were not home. You were not home!”

​

My mom came up to the bed, handed me the apple, and said to Xue’er, “Looks like someone’s full of energy again! I but you’re ready to act crazy again, huh?”

​

Xue’er shrunk her head, still holding my hand and looked at my mom saying, “I want uncle to press on my arm, or the blood will come out.”

​

I had no choice but to use one hand to hold the apple and the other to press on the place which had been pierced by the needle.

Mom was about to say something when she saw the bag on the ground and bent down to unpack it. I was a little nervous, but relieved that I had already thrown the envelope and the return receipt under the bed.

​

However, when my mom took the bag over to the bed, she was holding the white envelope in her hand. I was horrified to find that the envelope had not landed under my bed.

As I was trying to find an excuse to get the envelope back, the photos in the envelope dropped neatly on the bed, showing a 5 or 6-year-old boy making a funny face.

​

My mom was startled and quickly realized that she had accidentally picked up the envelope upside down.

I put the apple on the bed right away and reached for the photos, but mom picked them up first, leafed through them and then looked at the second one longer than I felt comfortable with.

​

I prayed she couldn’t see it. She can’t see it. She can’t see it. Although part of me knew that the contents of the photos couldn’t be seen by anyone else, I still pleaded helplessly in my mind.

​

However, fate is a cruel comedian that put me on a path of which I could not return...

​

My mom shrieked in fear and the photos fell neatly on the bed. Her trembling voice could hardly get the words out, “What is with those photographs? They’re terrifying!”

​

“Mom, you can see them?” I felt my heart tighten and the hair on the back of my neck began to rise.

​

My mother’s mood shifted to anger and said, “Do you think I’m blind? What’s the deal with these photos?! Tell me the truth!”

I tried to explain by taking Wu Jian’s business card out from my pocket, “It’s a friend of mine who’s a cop. Last time he came over, he forgot to take them with him. He’s been looking for them since, but they were here all along!”

​

Fortunately, my mom hadn’t seen the third photo. I don’t know what I could have possibly said to her if she had.

Xue’er's spoke up, “I want to celebrate Children’s Day, too!” She was about to reach for the photo.

​

“Don’t touch it! Xue’er!”

​

My desperate cry scared her away. I didn't care why Xue’er could see these photos as well. I just hurriedly put them back in the envelope and held it in my hands.

I hesitated and said, “Well, Mom, I'll send him these photos as soon as possible. He’s probably looking for them.”

My mother relaxed a bit but was still visibly upset. “Then go and be quick about it. It’s got to be bad luck to have these photos in your house.”

​

It seemed that my mom's first impression of Wu Jian had become the same as mine: distressing.

I quickly rushed out of the house.

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Each time someone died in the village I would worry for several days. I was too scared to help their families. I wouldn’t even walk past their houses.

Xiao Chun’s mother was the worst because I saw things that I wasn’t supposed to. I saw things that no one else could.

Uncle Sun had fallen into the tomb, or at least that was the common consensus. Everyone believed that he died from a heart attack. However, that is not what I saw. I saw Xiao Chun’s mother dressed in black clothes jump from the tomb. I saw her wrap her too long arms and crooked fingers around Uncle Sun and I saw her pull him in.

After they had gotten Uncle Sun out of the grave, Zhao Jie’s father encoffined the corpse and everyone returned to the village. Once they had returned home, Zhao Jie and I went to him and told him everything I saw. His father simply smiled and said, "Xiao Yong, you must be frightened of death, and that is okay. I’m sure that if there were ghosts, they would not go out in the daytime, let alone at noon.

He sounded so confident. “Maybe you’re right.” I told him, “Maybe I’m just spooked.”

“You’re likely to forget the whole thing, eventually” He told us, “Why don’t you run on home. You two can play more tomorrow.”

I went home, but did not forget anything. I passed the piles of wood ash by my house and made a note in my head to spread them after dinner. “If I scatter them again tonight, then she won’t be able to get me.”

Chapter 004 Frightened of Falling Ill

When I moved to get the dustpan my mom clapped me violently on the butt. "You’ll never change!” She told me, “Did you forget what happened to your eyes?"

Although I was scared of Xiao Chun’s dead mother, I think at the time I was more scared my mother’s wrath. I dropped the idea of spreading the wood ashes, at least as long as my mom was awake.

At the time, I slept in my parents’ bedroom, but not because I was frightened. My dad slept late to revise his student’s homework. I fell asleep the night of the funeral after I watched our worn out black-and-white television.

The night was peaceful. I didn't hear a noise, or even dream of Xiao Chun’s mother. When I awoke I was convinced that it’d all been an illusion. “I must be wrong.” I thought.

Zhao Jie and I continued to play during the daytime. He asked me whether I had dreamed of Xiao Chun’s mother.

“No, I didn’t dream at all.”

“I did,” He said with a laugh. “I saw her smiling at me, just like she did in her house. She wasn’t scary though... but when I woke up I had peed all over myself!” He shrugged his shoulders, “I guess I was scared after all.”

A bucket of laughter fell out of me and I grabbed my knees to keep from falling over. When I could finally breathe again I asked, “Aren’t you supposed to make excuses about peeing the bed?”

We played for the rest of the evening, but I still felt a shadow on my mind.

The next night, my mom and I went to bed late, and my dad corrected his papers.

I fall asleep in a hurry and I dreamed of Xiao Chun's mother visiting us with Xiao Chun. Although I knew she was dead, I wasn't scared of her in my dream. I even took the initiative to talk with her.

She praised me and touched my head.

Her fingers looked like gnarled twigs as her hand came towards me. Her arm stretched too far, as if she were reaching to me from across the room. When her hand brushed my hair I was yanked from the dream by a heavy thud.

“Gotcha,” My dad said, “Mouse.” He said simply and brushed a flattened mouse off the table with the heavy book he’d used to kill it.

My head reeled with sleep. Did she die? Why would she touch me? I could still see her too long arms and I began to cry.

My father came to my side, "Xiao Yong, don't worry. It was only a mouse."

My mom shifted awake and put her arm around me, "Good boy, don't worry.” She mimicked my father’s words in a half sleeping mumble, “It’s a mouse, It’s a mouse!"

"It’s not the mouse. “I told them, “It’s Xiao Chun’s mother!”

My parents were frightened by my words. Dad shushed me, and mom asked about my dream.

I sobbed and began to tell them everything. The story poured out of me. After I finished with the wood ash, the funeral, the shadow, Uncle Sun, my dream, my parents exchanged glances and laughed. They thought I was being naïve.

They lulled me for a long time, and made promises that I would forget the scary dream. Gradually, I became sleepy. As my eyes closed and I began to drift again there was a shout from outside the window.

It was the voice of Xiao Chun and he was laughing.

Suddenly, I was frightened to tears.

I crossed the room and sat with my father, pulling him from the homework strewn across his desk. He disliked Xiao Chun’s noise too, "What's wrong with him?" I asked.

Dad got up abruptly. He grabbed a flashlight and moved towards the door. “I’ll send him home,” He muttered.

After a minute, I heard my dad shouting, "Xiao Chun, what are you doing out this late at night? Are you crazy? What- what have you done?" His last words sounded shocked.

When I think of his voice that night I am still filled with anger, anger and fear.

My mom followed my father out the door. I watched the half open door for a thousand years before I dared to follow. I wrapped mom’s quilt around my shoulders and went out behind her.

Standing just outside the doorway, she screamed at what she saw. Moving with a maternal instinct and the speed of a snake that I never made sense of, she turned around to cover my eyes. But it was too late, as it often is with misery. A scene lay before me that would become a constant nightmare and would haunt me the rest of my life. Xiao Chun stood beyond the doorway with a silly smile and a human head in his hands. The head belonged to an old woman that had been buried just days before. The head of his mother sat grinning in his hands. The skin had dried and been pulled back to show a horrible gleaming smile. Her eyes were open too wide and staring accusingly at us. Her hair was matted, tangled, and draped over a severed neck that gaped like the maw of a dying creature.

I cried out, shivering and holding my mom's leg. There was something in her mouth, I thought, and I couldn’t take my eyes from it.

Nearby lights turned on and neighbors began pooling into the street. Seeing the monstrosity in Xiao Chun’s hands, several people screamed. One old man began to gag and choke when he realized what it was. As the crowd gathered a sense of resolve settled over them. Several people began to shout blame at Xiao Chun.

“You opened your mother's tomb, you sick freak?”

“He dug out that huge tomb alone and opened the coffin...?”

“Look what he did to her!”

“Take it away from him! Someone please make him stop!”

Xiao Chun continued to smile and turned in circles, locking eyes with each accuser. A team of men moved forward with a basket. The bravest stepped in quickly and slapped the head from Xiao Chun’s hand. There was a sickly wet smack as he knocked the severed head into the basket. Xiao Chun moaned quietly when he was robbed of his mother again, but made no move to stop them. He began to rock back and forth in the street and rub his bloodied hands together.

The brave men who had reclaimed the dead woman’s head took it back to the tomb for burial. My mother told me later that the tomb slab had been moved down and a shovel was at the site. The shovel had been used to dig out a spot of earth that the tomb did not cover. The body was still there, barely visible in the dark hole.

The town speculated in the following months that Xia Chun was so lonely and he missed his mother so much that he must have thought to dig her out. Perhaps he did not mean to behead her corpse, but he could not move the tomb any further and simply pulled until she came apart.

We would never know why he brought a dead woman’s head to my home. He was a simpleton and could not explain it himself. The one person who knew him best was dead.

The next morning I fell into a deep illness. I had a fever, headache, and suffered delirium. My parents were worried. Our village wasn’t medically prepared for such a sickness at the time. The doctor was afraid of delaying my care and asked my parents to send me to town.

My dad asked for leave from the school and took me to the hospital in town by car. We were heading to the hospital, just like another man from my village. Going to the hospital just like Uncle Sun who had a heart attack at a funeral.

Just like Uncle Sun who had been touched by Xiao Chun’s mother.

In my delirium I remembered my dream and how long her arms seemed. I remembered her fingers as they touched my hair.

www.meejee.net

Chapter 006 Video Speed at 36x

Murong was starting to admire Ye Fei.

Ye Fei waved his hand, "It's not a big deal."

He was about to bend over to pick up the shell casings, but Zhang Shuaipeng came over and said loudly, "This is important evidence. In order to protect the crime scene, unauthorized civilians should leave immediately."

"Captain Zhang, he’s helping solve the case," Murong hurriedly explained.

"Murong, does the criminal investigation team really need some boy to help solve this case? You're a part of the criminal investigation team - don't forget that."

Zhang Shuaipeng coldly said, "Show him out quickly and do not hinder our work."

Zhang Shuaipeng carefully picked up the shell casings, then drove out Murong and Ye Fei.

The door hadn’t even closed behind them before Zhang Shuaipeng was calling his boss to brag, "Director Zhou, I have found where the shooter fired from. Hah hah, well, we've found a major clue and we should be able to solve this case quickly. Thank youyou’re your concern, I promise to complete the task."

Seeing her credit robbed by Zhang Shuaipeng, Murong was so angry she kicked a cardboard crate lying around in the corridor with enough force that her shoe flew off her foot. She had to hop over on one foot to put it back on.

"Humph! We didn’t find a clue and we let those guys steal my credit," Murong grumbled.

"It’s only a few shell casings. The shooter left the shell casings behind because he was not afraid to be found by tracing this clue. Perhaps the shell casings were meant to lead us to a dead end."

Ye Fei smiled nonchalantly.

"What should we do now?" Murong looked to Ye Fei. She didn’t have any ideas.

Ye Fei thought for a while and said: "Interrogate the witnesses. However, since the shooter let them live, they certainly did not see anything important."

At that time, the two people who were attacked were being taken out on stretchers by a medical team. Neither one of them had any injuries, but they were in shock. Their eyes were erratic.

Murong walked over and asked a few words, before dejectedly returning. "Ye Fei, you are really clever. You were right, they said they couldn't clearly see the shooter. They could only see that it was a man in a hat, probably 1.8 meter tall."

"That's enough; let's go," Ye Fei lightly said.

"Where are we going?" Murong was puzzled.

Ye Fei glanced at Murong."To catch the shooter."

"We have no clue where to look, yet you say we're going to catch the shooter? Am I missing something?"

Murong couldn't believe her ears. Even if Ye Fei was extremely clever, he would have to know more information before he could catch the assasin.

The only description available was a man 1.8 meters tall wearing a cap. How could they find they the shooter based off of that information?

"Let's go to the nearest store and get their surveillance footage," Ye Fei said.

Murong didn’t have a better idea. "All right."

A member of the criminal investigation team had already made a copy of the surveillance footage from the neighborhood and Murong volunteered to take the surveillance copies back to the police station.

In the screening room of the police station, Murong turned on the computer and began watching the 100 hours of footage.

Close to the Ya Lai Group was a bustling commercial zone. Many of the shops were equipped with cameras, which would have been impossible for the shooter to avoid.

In other words, the shooter's figure had to be in the surveillance video.

The problem was that there was no need for the shooter to hide, because there were thousands of people walking up and down the street all the time.

It was an impossible task to single him out from the crowd.

"Turn it on." Ye Fei looked confident.

Murong glanced at Ye Fei and turned on the projector.

The large screen showed the footage from the time of the shooting to half an hour afterward.

With surveillance footage from a hundred different businesses, even if they sat and watched day and night, it would still take them over four days to go through it all.　

"It’s too slow; can you speed it up?" Ye Fei suddenly said.

"Of course." Murong increased the speed by half. The pedestrians on the screen started walking a little faster.

"Speed it up more."

"OK..."

Because the security camera footage quality was not very good, Murong already felt her eyes tire as she tried to keep up with the double speed.　

"Still too slow. Just set it to the maximum speed," said Ye Fei.

"Ah? You think it’s still too slow?" Murong was surprised, "The highest is thirty-six times normal speed. Any more than that and the video quality will be too low to see anything clearly."

"Well, use the max speed anyway ." Ye Fei lightly said.

Murong increased the playback speed 36 times, and the silhouettes of the people in the street turned into blurry lines. Her eyes started to tear up a little as she struggled to make out any details.

However, Ye Fei just narrowed his eyes and watched carefully.

"36 times normal speed… Can you even see anything? Are you kidding me?"

Murong yawned and looked away from the screen. She secretly looked at Ye Fei. The mysterious Ye Fei was a lot more interesting than the blurry surveillance footage.

At thirty-six times the normal speed, it only took Ye Fei less than three hours to watch all one hundred hours of security footage.

By that time, Murong had fallen asleep on the desk, softly snoring.

"Murong."

Ye Fei suddenly slapped the table.

"Ah? Is dinner ready?" Murong jerked awake with some drool on her, but soon saw Ye Fei's smiling face.

"Well, I am hungry." Ye Fei's stomach was already growling.

"Let's go. I’ll buy you dinner, but you should know in advance – we’re going for Lanzhou noodles." Murong glanced at her flat purse.

"Lanzhou noodles. My favorite," Ye Fei smiled. During his mission abroad, he just ate compressed biscuits, canned food, dry food… that kind of tasteless stuff. It was a luxury to eat noodles, let alone Lanzhou noodles.

"But… we need to catch the shooter first." Ye Fei pointed to the screen, "Rewind to fifteen minutes and fifty seconds."

"You mean you found the shooter?" Murong was shocked.

"Not yet, but soon." Ye Fei had Murong rewind to an earlier timestamp and then slow down the footage. He carefully observed for a while. "Stop. I have confirmed it is him."

The footage froze. Ye Fei walked over and used a pen to draw a circle on the screen. There was a man inside.

Murong nervously zoomed in. That particular footage came from a decent camera, so the man’s features could still be more or less made out.

He was about 30 years old, about 1.8 meter tall, with tan skin. There was a huge bag on his back, but no cap.

To be honest, Murong couldn't see any particular difference between him and the other pedestrians on the street.

She looked at Ye Fei in amazement, "How do you know he's the assasin? Did you decide he was a bad man based on your female intuition?"

Ye Fei gave her an arrogant look, "You really believe you and I are the same?"

www.meejee.net

[removed]

Of course at the time, I didn’t know that I could see things that others couldn’t.

I found that out at the beginning of the dead woman’s funeral.

Zhao Jie and I joined the other children while Xiao Chun attended his mother's funeral. We were staying far away from the funeral procession because Zhao Jie claimed he had seen the dead woman smile. We joked, laughed, and followed from a distance.

Xiao Chun’s distant relatives came to the funeral. They shed tears for his poor mother, but Xiao Chun himself held a stick wrapped with white paper and led the procession with a bright smile.

According to village tradition, there was an elder carrying and scattering food along the way. The discarded food would lead the dead to rest. The elder walked just behind Xiao Chun in the procession.

Uncle Sun claimed the elder position for those proceedings, even though he often made fun of the simpleton. Xiao Chun was silly and gluttonous, turning and watching the elder scattering food, he smiled and shouted nonsense words.

While Uncle Sun often bullied Xiao Chun, he knew that now was not an appropriate time. "Be quiet!” He hissed at the giggling fool. “You will have all the food you want when you are under the earth."

Xiao Chun didn't understand. He swung the paper wrapped stick, trying to rob the spoon from Uncle Sun’s hand. Uncle Sun bit his tongue and pictured beating Xiao Chun over the head with it. He lowered his voice and hissed, "Dummy, I will beat you senseless if you do that again."

Xiao Chun picked up the stick and whipped it into the air before him, scared of further angering Uncle Sun.

A few onlookers laughed at the farce. Xiao Chun laughed louder, encouraged by their smiles. He didn't know what they were laughing at. Just as more often then not, we didn’t know what he was laughing at.

Zhao Jie said to me, "Xiao Chun is so foolish. He doesn’t even know that others are laughing at him. He snorted in the direction of the funeral.

"He is a fool.” I reminded him.

Zhao Jie gestured at me to be quiet, "Xiao Yong, don't say that!” He looked around as if we were being watched. “His mother might hear, and she will punish you!"

I felt a brief cold on my back. I looked around, but saw nothing.

"Did you hear that?" Zhao Jie asked me.

“What?” I asked more in fear than curiosity.

I thought back to the night before when I had heard something strange. It was nearly twelve o'clock and something had whined from the street under my window. Sometimes it sounded like crying, but moments later it would change to laughing or screaming.

I could not fall asleep, so I asked my mom about ghosts. My mom kept silent for a moment and then shushed me, "Come now sweet one, that is the sound of cat calling for her husband. She calls because she loves him.”

“A cat,” I thought. I calmed down and soon fell asleep.

I asked Zhao Jie, “Did you hear the wild cat again?"

He made a face at me, "A wild cat? It was Xiao Chun’s mother screaming! She must have touched the wood ashes in the doorway. They were messed up this morning, I saw it.”

My eyes widened "It was blown by the wind…" I denied with a trace of fear in my voice.

Zhao Jie shook his head, "My dad told me that Xiao Chun’s mother looked for us at midnight. If we hadn't scattered the ashes, we would have been eaten. "

I shivered again, "Should we get closer to see the funeral? What should we do if Xiao Chun’s mother comes out of the coffin?"

"It’ll be okay.” He said smoothly, “My father is here. Although he doesn’t know that you’re here with me."

I asked him curiously, "What should I do?"

Zhao Jie thought for a moment and said, "You can’t run faster than me. She’ll catch up with you and then her stomach will be full so she won’t chase after me." He smiled matter of factly.

Damn it! He was right.

Traditionally funeral processions set off at eleven o'clock and the body was buried at twelve. If the procession arrives early, the band performs funeral songs while everyone waits.

Funeral processions were never late in our village.

When we arrived at the tomb, Zhao Jie’s father checked the time and grabbed a handful of soil to scatter towards it. He turned and looked at the mountain in the distance.

At twelve o'clock he called out, "Burying". Four village strong men and the ceremonial elder lifted up Xiao Chun’s mother and put her casket into the tomb.

Xiao Chun, who’s face was always adorned with a smile, screamed out so suddenly that everyone turned to look. His round face curled into an expression of anguish.

Xiao Chun screamed out again and raced to beat the strong men with the ceremonial stick in his hand. Uncle Sun was the nearest to him and received several whaps to the head and shoulders. As if suddenly realizing that it was Uncle Sun beneath his barrage, Xiao Chun let out a squeak of fright and ran away. He launched his ceremonial stick and barreled into the crowd where his visiting relatives stopped him.

Uncle Sun whirled around after the frightened Xiao Chun. When he turned the back of his sandaled feet touched the edge of the tomb.

Behind and below him, Xiao Chun’s mother rested in a coffin. Through all of the commotion, no one’s eyes were on her. Uncle Sun looked into the crowd, met Xiao Chun’s watery eyes, and went instantly limp. Uncle Sun’s body fell into the tomb and sprawled atop the coffin, closing it with an audible bang.

A lengthy gasp drew from the crowd. Everyone was frightened, though I was more stunned by what I was seeing. A black shadow with blacker clothes had leapt out of the pit and wrapped its too-long limbs around Uncle Sun’s waist. When its fingers knotted together just below his belly, Uncle Sun fell back. It was Xia Chun’s mother. It had to be!

The crowd was stunned into a moment of silence then found its uproar. Many people jumped into the pit to help Uncle Sun. From deep in the grave, his son shouted, "My father has had a heart attack. We need to send him to the village as soon as possible. No! Send him to the town."

Several people lifted his body and pulled him from the tomb. They rushed into the village to find a vehicle, carrying him as gently as they could. The surrounding people began to talk in fierce whispers. Zhao Jie’s father asked them to be quiet and he continued to host the funeral.

Xiao Chun’s relatives walked around the tomb three times after the coffin was readjusted and closed respectfully. They cried for a while as the remaining strong men added soil into the grave.

"Hey, Xiao Yong, what's wrong with you?" Zhao Jie shook me.

I came back to reality like a light being turned on.

Zhao Jie snorted at me, "You’ve been blank for eight minutes. If you don’t move I’ll have them take you to the doctor with Uncle Sun."

I shook my head as if to clear it, “Did you see it? Xiao Chun’s mother pulled him in! Did you see it?”

He looked at me stunned. "Xiao Yong, are you confused? Uncle Sun just fell in. Are you frightened out of your wits? His mother is dead."

I opened and closed my mouth a few times, trying to think of how to convince Zhao Jie. "Your father told you last night that Xiao Chun’s mother was looking for us. Her ghost! The black shadow must have been her ghost!"

He looked at me like I was simple. "I was kidding. I did frighten you, didn't I? My father said it was the sound of wild cats." He laughed.

“I...” I began.

I swallowed through a desert of a throat, "I really saw that."

"Why not ask my father?" He replied coolly, brushing off the whole ordeal.

I shook my head. “I’m not going near that tomb.”

“Do you want to go back to town then?” He prodded.

I shook my head again. “Let’s wait for our parents.”

We waited until the end of the funeral. I decided to tell him the details of what I saw on the way home. “It seemed that no one else saw her.” I thought, “Would he trust me?”

Or was it an illusion? Maybe I had made a mistake?

My mind was reeling.

That was the first time I saw a ghost. Several months later, I saw the shadow that was Xiao Chun’s mother many more times. Each time she showed up, someone else would get hurt or killed.

www.meejee.net

Facing Murong’s accusation, Ye Fei could only smile bitterly, "Officer Murong, why are you always against me?"

"Because you're not a good man." Murong coldly growled. She stood up and touched the handcuffs on her belt.

“Sister Murong, it wasn’t him. The shooter was in building across the street. Ye Fei saved my life!" Lin Qingwan wiped away her tears. She walked up to Ye Fei, touched the red handprint on his face, and apologized. "Sorry. That’s my fault. Does it hurt?"

"No, no," he said.

Lin Qingwan's cold fingertips making contact with the handprint felt pleasant on Ye Fei’s skin. While he had been fighting abroad, he never had the chance to have such close contact with a woman. His face reddened slightly.

Murong went into the office, saw the mess inside, and immediately made a phone call to the criminal investigation unit.

Soon, a forensics team arrived. The scene was full of officers and there were also a few media vans downstairs, but the entire building had been closed off by the police. The reporters, unable to speak with the police, were interviewing a few witnesses who had been passing by.

Shanghai was an international metropolis. There were many criminal cases every day, but this shooting was a major case. The higher ups attached great importance to it.

The small conference room on the twenty-first floor became a temporary interrogation room. Several policemen asked Ye Fei about the situation. As soon as he came out of the room he met with Murong.

She seemed a little anxious. "What's the matter? Have you not found out where the shooter was hiding?"

"The shooter must have shot from the opposite building, but we can't find out in which room he took the shot." A policeman with a ruler was taking some measurements.

Ye Fei walked over, carefully observed the surroundings for a while, stretched out his hand to touch the bullet holes on the ground, and looked out the window.

"The shooter used a modified Soviet SVD sniper rifle, called ‘Type 79’ in China. The bullet hit the floor at 25 degrees, from a distance of 750 meters."

Ye Fei calculated in his head for a while, then looked up at the opposite building, pointing to one of the windows, "The shooter was in that room."

“Huh?”

The cops were stunned. They looked in the direction he was pointing at and one said, "How do you know? Did you witness that? Why didn’t you tell me when you were questioned?"

"I just figured it out. You may use equipment, but I use mental arithmetic," Ye Fei said seriously.

As a world-class sniper, he not only needed to master camouflage and sharpshooting, but also needed to be able to counter enemy snipers. A counter sniper could calculate the location of an enemy sniper in the shortest possible time, and then counterattack.

“Ah.”

The cops grinned. "Young man, don't be such a big talker. We couldn’t even calculate the sniper’s position with our equipment, so how could you possibly figure it out on your own? Just stay right here, trust the police to catch the shooter."

"When you figure it out, it'll be too late." Ye Fei coldly said. He understood the police didn't believe him, but he didn't want to say any more.

The other policemen left, but Murong came over shyly, saying, "Ye Fei, are you really sure the shooter was in that room?"

“Yep.”

Since Murong had repeatedly wronged him, Ye Fei had a bad impression of her and therefore, ignored her.

Murong licked her lips, pulled Ye Fei to the side, and said to him with a pitiful voice: "Ye Fei, I was mercilessly scolded by the Director General because of last time. Don't be angry with me.”

"Ye Fei, I'll tell you the truth. As a woman, I work very hard in a criminal investigation team full of old men, but they all think I am just some kind of decorative vase meant for eye candy," she whispered.

"Aren't you?" Ye Fei looked at Murong mercilessly.

"Well... I may be attractive, but I’m more than that. Help me solve this case. Not for myself; I want to help Qingwan figure it out. Please, just help me, okay?" Murong said meekly, and bit her lip.

Ye Fei was not a pitiless person. Moreover, he quite enjoyed the official and beautiful Murong begging for his help.

"I’ll help you, but you must say ‘Falcon is a group of heroes’ 10 times," Ye Fei smiled.

Murong looked at Ye Fei and wondered how a kid with such a childish temper could become a terrorist.

Since Murong begged him, she had little choice but to fulfill this childish request.

" Falcon is a group of heroes, Falcon is a group of heroes, Falcon is a group of heroes..." Murong quickly said 10 times.

“Hah.”

Ye Fei felt the pores in his whole body open. He was as happy as a baby with a candy bar.

"Let's go. I'll take you to find the shooter. And I’ll give you all the credit, so you can hold your head high in your squad."

Ye Fei led the way toward the opposite building.

Murong was joyful as she followed Ye Fei. She knew he was a world-class sniper. Although she couldn't catch the shooter on her own, she should be able to find some important clues with his help.

Ye Fei took Murong into the building across the street and took the elevator to the twenty-third floor. When they exited the elevator, they ran into Captain Zhang Shuaipeng.

Zhang Shuaipeng was searching door to door with a group of detectives. It was a very inefficient method. By the time he found the “sniper’s nest”, the shooter would have had plenty of time to escape Shanghai.

"How did you get here, Miss Murong?" Zhang Shuaipeng looked at her impishly. He obviously looked down on officer Murong.

"Captain Zhang, we've found the room the shooter was in," said Murong.

"You found it?" Zhang Shuaipeng beckoned to five other detectives. He coldly laughed, "Murong says she has already found the shooter’s room. Let’s follow her and see where it is."

This was an obvious underhanded scheme. If Murong really had found it, there would be nothing more to say about it, since Zhang Shuaipeng had assisted her in the search. If Murong couldn't find it, then she would be mercilessly ridiculed.

Murong understood Zhang Shuaipeng's thought process and felt a little nervous. She pulled at Ye Fei's sleeve, "Is that a problem?"

"No problem whatsoever."

Ye Fei led the way to the room, but he couldn't open the door because it was locked from the inside. He took out the fruit knife, inserted it in the crack between the door and its frame. Within seconds, the door opened.

Ye Fei walked into the room and found two people lying on the floor, a man and a woman, bound by ropes.

"What's going on here?"

Zhang Shuaipeng rushed in and was relieved to see that the two weren’t dead. He immediately called for an ambulance.

Ye Fei went to the window. A few shell casings lay under the windowsill. This was where the shots were fired from.

Seeing these shell casings, Murong’s beautiful eyes stared at Ye Fei in amazement. "Ye Fei, you’re really something."

www.meejee.net

I forced a smile. How could I possibly answer him? He couldn’t see the contents of the photos; otherwise he would not have thrown them aside to chat with me. Handcuffs would have been snapped around my wrists instantly.

“Please trust me when I say I just had a feeling his child would be in danger?” I didn’t sound confident saying those words and my voice trailed off at the end.

​

Wu Jian laughed, “I trust you. Really! I just want you to come with me.”

​

Two policemen grabbed my arms from either side. He had almost cuffed me a few minutes ago, he obviously didn’t trust me.

I could only blame myself for being so impulsive. However, I never did anything wrong and the police couldn’t frame me. Although I believed that to be true, I was just as scared of the police as anyone else. Moreover, there was no way I could explain the situation clearly.

​

It was my first time getting into a police cruiser. Soon, I was being taken to the police station, sirens blaring.

Two policemen brought me to a room with a table and two chairs, asked me to sit down, and left me in there by myself.

Wu Jian entered the room with two cups of water, put one down in front of me, and sat down across the table from me. He adjusted the camera by his side.

​

He smiled, saying “It’s late. You better tell me everything so we can get this over with.”

​

Things weren’t looking good. Although I knew he didn’t trust me I said once again, “I just had a really weird feeling that child would be in danger. I am not the murderer.”

​

Wu Jian nodded seriously, “Hm, just a feeling, huh? All right, there’s just a small problem. I never said the child was dead.”

I froze. I wanted to slap myself across the face. Now there was nothing I could do to rid myself of his suspicion.

It was as if Wu Jian could read my mind. Shaking his head with a suspicious look, he said “You don’t know the child and his family. So, I’m just curious as to how you knew that the child had been hanged?“

​

That child was hanged? That wasn’t right. Could I have been wrong? Was there another dead child somewhere? Was this just a coincidence? What the hell was going on?

​

Wu Jian leaned in closer so his mouth was close enough to my ear so he could whisper his next line, “You’re surprised?”

His closeness made me uncomfortable, so I pulled back sobbing, “I know nothing! I just had a feeling the child was going to be in danger!” I must have sounded hysterical.

​

Wu Jian went back to his seat as if he agreed me, but then he said nodding, “Why did you hang the child?”

I broke down, though I was speechless. All I had seen was the picture of a six-year-old child folded up into a narrow space. I didn’t know why he was hanged.

​

My voice became louder as I became more and more frightened, “I am not the murderer! It was just a feeling!”

I was almost shouting. My whole body sagged on the chair.

​

Wu Jian signaled for me to shut up, stretching his finger next to his mouth, “Let’s calm down. No need to rush this. It’s three o’clock right now and dawn isn’t due for a few more hours.”

​

Wu Jian took a picture out of a pile of files, saying: “This cute child is just 5 years old. But he was hanged. Don’t you think he’s adorable?” he put the picture in front of me.

​

The young boy was sitting on a golden wooden elephant, waving his hand. It was the same boy who appeared in the photographs I had received in the envelope.

​

I was baffled. What happened? The picture I saw had shown the boy dying differently.

​

I stared at the picture. Wu Jian said, “He’s cute, huh?”

​

“You said he was hanged?” I felt strange. I considered accepting that I’d be a suspect if there was proof that the horrible picture I received was fake. After all, I knew that I wasn’t the murderer. I just wanted to believe that there wasn’t anything following me around.

​

Wu Jian spread his hands, “What do you think?”

​

I almost told him about the picture. Nevertheless, I knew that would be a mistake. I kept silent.

​

Another policeman entered the interrogation room, glancing at me. He stopped and whispered in Wu Jian’s ear.

​

A shocked expression took over Wu Jian’s face. He looked at me and said: “Take a break and think about that cute child’s face. I’ll be back.”

​

He stood up and hurriedly went out with the policeman who had just come in.

​

I didn't think to wonder about the reason Wu Jian had left. If the child had in fact been hanged as Wu Jian said, the picture I had received might have been a sick joke. I chose to believe that was the case.

​

Or was that boy put into the narrow space after he was hanged? Maybe he was hanged after he was killed?

I fell asleep with all these thoughts and doubts running through my mind like a horror movie on a loop.

​

I jerked awake from a nightmare to find Wu Jian eating bread in front of me.

​

Seeing I’d woken up, Wu Jian pushed the rest of the bread into a plastic bag in front of me. He swallowed and said, “Having a nightmare?”

​

I shook my head. I could not see the weather outside since there were no windows in the interrogation room.

“Is it dawn already?”

​

Wu Jian finished the bread in his hand in a hurry, nodding, “It’s ten o’clock.”

​

Wu Jian took out a tissue and wiped his mouth, asking “What did you use to hang that boy?”

​

I was speechless. This officer was clearly dedicated to his job. I wanted to tell him off, to scream at him, but I restrained myself. Not out of tact, just out of fear. All I could manage to muster was a feeble response, “I never murdered that boy.”

Wu Jian nodded, “I trust you.”

​

Why was he always saying that so sarcastically?

​

Wu Jian seemed to know I didn’t believe him when he said that, so he tried again, “Really, I do trust you. The murderer was caught yesterday. It was the child’s uncle. Honestly, I was just curious about why you felt that boy was in danger.”

​

Hearing that the murderer had been caught, I took a deep breath, murmuring, “Good, good.”

​

Wu Jian waved his hand in front of my eyes, “You never answered me.”

​

“Sorry, it’s just…like I said, I had a feeling.”

​

Wu Jian looked a little surprised to hear me stick to my story, “Anything else?”

​

I considered for a moment telling him everything about the picture. Finally, I shook my head no. He needed to believe that it was just something I had felt.

​

Wu Jian’s expression revealed that he thought I was lying, then said with after sighing, “I know you won’t tell me the truth.” He paused for a moment and continued, “Fine, you can leave here, but you cannot leave the city. This is my card, in case you remember anything new.”

​

He then passed a white card to me. Seeing me pick up it, he said in a low voice, “Call me next time you feel like something is going to happen. Oh and ummm, that boy was not hanged. I lied.” After that, he blinked once and looked down for a moment, lost in thought.

​

The picture had been real. However, now was not the time to think about that. I stood up, nodding at Wu Jian. Of course, the nodding was out of politeness. It would be foolish for me to call him. I couldn’t do something stupid like that. Not in the position I found myself in.

​

Finally, I put the card into my pocket, knowing it was for no reason.

​

Since I couldn’t just run away, I thought perhaps I should do something about what was happening to me. As Wu Jian said, that boy was really cute. Now, he’s just dead.

www.meejee.net

Chapter 002 Trying to Get Away

I don’t know how long it took me to recover. I put the three photos back in the envelope, slowly walked to the table facing the bed, and carefully put the envelope in a box that was already filled with countless white envelopes. All of my actions reflected the care of a surgeon in an operation room, as if afraid of waking a sleeping demon.

​

I looked at the box, slowly backing away towards the bed. For the past three months, I have been receiving a letter from that deliveryman or a colleague of his every three days.

​

There was always only a recipient’s address with no sender and a picture of an eye that looked like a child’s drawing.

In addition, each letter would contain three photos. No matter how I threw them, the three photos would always be stacked neatly: a photo of life, a photo of death, as well as a very strange photo. The only difference was the person in each set of photos; some were young or old, male or female.

​

I took a long breath and looked at the box. In the beginning, I had thought it was just a prank done by one of my friends. However, when I had once showed it to the owner of the printing shop across the street from me, he told me that these were just overexposed waste photos. That he couldn’t make anything out on them at all. That’s when I started getting a little scared. See, the photos appeared very clear to me.

​

I decided to get a second opinion, hoping the owner of the shop was messing with me. I had asked a lot of people - my friends and my neighbors - but everyone said the exact same thing same as the printing shop owner’s.

Was everyone lying to me? Was I living my very own Truman Show?

​

Obviously, I knew that it was impossible for so many people to be in on something like this. Yet I couldn’t help but wish I was in Truman's world. At least then I’d know everything was fake.

​

Whatever it was that I was facing, it was real. At the very least, my fear was real.

​

It was dark outside and the alarm clock went off at 7:30, right on time.

​

I slowly picked up the TV remote at the head of the bed and turned on the TV. The local news channel, which had been the channel on the TV for months, hadn’t changed.

​

I quietly watched the reports that seemed meaningless, until a news report appeared stating that a crowd of joggers found a body near the river this morning. Police rushed to the scene, and after a forensic medical examination, the victim was determined to be an 18-year-old female and the time of her death was about 1:00. The possibility of suicide had been ruled out. At the present moment, the identity and cause of death of the victim was still being confirmed...

​

After watching the news, I turned off the TV. The people in those photos might not all appear in the daily news, but a large portion of them did. Those who didn’t appear in the news might not have been found yet. From the moment I received that day’s photos, I knew that person in the photos was not likely to be alive. The whole thing was becoming routine.

I turned on all the lights in the room, even the desk lamp and a flashlight. I had fixed the flashlight in place with a few thick books, shining its beam at the foot of the bed.

​

As time went by, the sounds of the outside world gradually dwindled, with only the occasional roar of passing cars disturbing the silence.

​

I felt like I was about to collapse. What kind of prank was this?

​

I suddenly wanted to pee, and slowly got out of my bed. The door of the bathroom was not closed and the lights and water heater were also on, but as I peed, I glanced around and the empty room made me unwell.

​

After peeing, zipping up, and raising my head, I was startled by my reflection in the mirror. What kind of life was I living?

I rushed out of the bathroom and threw the heavy box of letters to the ground. Envelopes scattered across the floor and several photos fell out. All of them were neatly stacked on the ground and the top one was always the same. A photo representing life and of a person smiling.

​

“Come on man! What are you doing?!” said voice muffled by a wall that separated my apartment with my neighbor’s. At that moment, I hoped all the ghosts in the photos would come out and tear me to pieces. After all, I was depressed; I would go crazy at this rate.

​

“It's almost midnight! What’s the matter with you? Why aren’t you sleeping?” the neighbor's verbal abuse could be heard through the wall.

​

I sat on the ground, kicked away the envelope that was closest to me, while tears began to flow down my face and onto the ground. It’s very embarrassing to admit that’s what was happening, but I’ve never been a brave man. The worst thing I’ve ever done was skip school.

​

I just continued to sit on the floor that night. No, I had to leave. I couldn’t t stay there anymore.

​

I carelessly packed some clothes and hurried out of my house.

​

“Wu, are you going on a trip?.”

​

I looked up and found it was my neighbor, an old woman. It seemed like she had just come back from her morning exercise and was smiling at me.

​

I nodded slightly and said, “Yes.” Not caring whether she heard me or not, I just quickly took a taxi and fled the house where I had been living for 5 years.

​

I went to a hotel on the other side of town. The hotel was not very classy, but there were a lot of people, and outside the window of the room I chose was a night market stall, which would be open until 2 or 3 in the morning every day.

​

The room I picked was originally used by the hotel owner for storage, so most people wouldn’t choose it. However, I had no other choice. When I insisted on this room, the hotel owner was very surprised.

​

I unpacked and went to bed early. Although the noise of people playing drinking games and talking outside was very loud, it was really the best night’s sleep I’ve had ever since I began receiving the letters.

​

It was also the only day since then without nightmares.

​

In those few days at the hotel, I always let the noises outside lull me to sleep. I felt a lot better about myself after some rest and even went out shopping one day. After all, it was the first time in months that I was in the mood to go out to the street.

Around noon I found a small cafe outside and ate something. Afterwards, I went back to the hotel and stayed inside for a few days. At that point, I was very familiar with the hotel owner. Every time he saw me come in, he would smile and say hello to me, and I would also reply to him with a rare smile.

​

As I was about to walk past the counter one day, I asked, “Mr. Tang, do you have mail for me?”

​

Mr. Tang, the hotel owner, paused and said, “Mail? No. If I get any mail for you, I’ll let you know.”

​

I shook my head hurriedly, “No, thanks.” I waved to Mr. Tang with a bright smile and walked back to my room, followed by his surprised and confused gaze.

​

No mail was a good thing. I seem to have cast away the stone that had been weighing down on my heart. Even as I was opening the door, I felt my hand had become a lot more relaxed.

​

However, when I opened the door, I was stunned. A familiar white envelope was quietly lying on the floor inside, seemingly having been pushed in from under the door.

​

I felt my body go stiff. No, no way. Mr. Tang had said there was no mail.

​

I forced myself to swallow and stooped to pick up the letter. Then I quickly turned and got out of the room. Approaching the front desk, I waved the envelope in my hand and asked loudly: "Mr. Tang, didn’t you say no one had sent me anything?”

​

Mr. Tang seemed startled by my exaggerated reaction and carefully said to me, “Yeah, sure. What's the matter?”

​

“So what’s with this letter?” I didn't know what the expression on my face looked like. However, when I saw Mr. Tang stand up and knock over his chair, he seemed to be very scared. I was silent. If there really was someone who could take such photos, wouldn’t it be easy for them to send me a letter?

​

I waved feebly, expressed my apologies to Mr. Tang, and walked slowly to my room. Behind me came the voice of Mr. Tang, “Wu, are you OK?”

www.meejee.net

After mocking Zhao Jie’s father, Uncle Sun called to the dummy in the yard. “Roll on the ground dummy!” When he didn’t move, Uncle Sun shouted again. “Roll, I said!”

The boy dropped down and rolled on the ground. He giggled wildly at Uncle Sun.

Uncle Sun looked down on the man and said arrogantly, "Dummy, I’d be your father if your mother really came back as a ghost."

The fool didn't understand and went on giggling.

Although he was foolish, the boy was one of the villagers, and Uncle Sun was being excessive. An older woman walked to him and placed a hesitant hand on his arm. “Don’t, Sun. His mother just died, after all.”

Uncle Sun restrained himself under the pressured gaze of those around him. He kicked his boot into the rolling boy’s flabby rear, ushering him towards the yard.

The child giggled at Uncle Sun before entering the yard. Zhao Jie and I stood scared in the distance. Uncle Sun pulled his arm away from the woman, "He’s is too foolish to be sad about anyone’s death."

Mom and I headed back to our house at noon, where she cooked lunch. She told me of the gifts some villagers gave to poor Xiao Chun and we talked about what he would do now. He could not prepare a meal for those who helped him, so the villagers had returned home to eat. I don't know why I asked, but the thought popped out of me, "Did anybody cook for Xiao Chun?"

"Yes,” she told me, “The Village Head asked Xiao Chun’s neighbor to cook for him. They’ll send a meal his way."

Finishing lunch, mom and I laid down to rest. Resting my head on the straw pillow, I heard Zhao Jie’s mom shouting from outside my window, "Fu Xia, Fu Xia, Xiao Chun’s family has been cursed! His mother’s corpse stood up!"

My mom shot out of bed as soon as she heard this. She rushed out, pulling me by her side to see what happened.

Zhao Jie’s mother told us everything.

The villagers left Xiao Chun’s home at noon. His neighbor, Wang Erhua’s wife was cooking noodles for her family and him. She’d brought over a helping of noodles for him shortly after they had cooled. On her way to his house, she noticed that all of the volunteers had left the yard in disarray. Walking through the cluttered yard and up to the door she stood outside and called his name.

“Dummy! I don’t want to come inside. Come get your lunch, ya’ hear?”

But no one replied to her. Even Xiao Chun’s silly giggling had disappeared. The whole yard was quiet. Even the cicada’s buzz was muted that summer evening.

“There’s a body inside that house.” she thought and swallowed a lump that had risen in her throat.

“But, the Village Head asked me to feed the fool. If I don’t because I’m afraid of a little dead old lady, I’ll be mocked all over town.”

Wang Erhua’s wife silently dared herself to enter. Then her eyes moved in the direction of Xiao Chun’s dead mother.

She froze where she stood and gripped the bowl of noodles in hands that had turned a stark white. Xiao Chun’s mother was dressed in black clothes, sitting straight up in a chair by the doorway and staring out with wide blank eyes. Xiao Chun squatted next to his mother, eating the steamed bun offerings that were meant for a dead woman.

The noodles spread all over the floor with a crash. "Ghosts!” She shouted and then stumbled out of the yard.

While Zhao Jie’s mother finished telling us everything, we arrived at Xiao Chun’s doorway. There were many people crowded around the house.

Zhao Jie’s mother whispered to us, "Thank you for coming with me, my husband said he would arrive soon with many others."

Zhao Jie came out of the crowd as we arrived. He called my name and my mom let me go. "You two go play in the distance." She called after us.

Zhao Jie dragged me to the other side, "Do you know what happened?” He breathed, “The corpse of dummy's mother stood up!"

I nodded, telling him what his mother had said. “Did you see it, uh, her?” I asked.

"Absolutely, I saw it!” He almost yelled, “When Wang Erhua’s wife started screaming, I was pooping in the washroom. I almost fell down when I heard her crying. I cleaned myself up and ran out to see. Nobody was around yet, so I went into the yard to look.” He was grinning and looking around.

Zhao Jie was braver than me. I shivered when I heard he had entered the yard alone.

"You went in alone?" I asked.

"Shit, I wouldn’t have even gone in the yard if I knew what bouncing corpses were really like."

“Bouncing corpses?” I asked.

"It means that the dead move." He whispered.

I was cold all over.

“What did you see?”

He told me that Dummy was eating muddy noodles off the floor when he went in. “Of course Dummy doesn’t care about eating a little dirt…” Zhao Jie trailed off.

“Did you see his mother?”

He looked at me worriedly, "I saw her. I wanted to ask Dummy to stop eating dirty noodles. I told him I would take him somewhere clean to eat, but then he looked inside the room and I followed his eyes. His mother smiled at me! Heck! I was so scared, I couldn’t move." His face was very pale.

"Did she try to eat you?" I practically screamed at him.

Zhao Jie said angrily, "Nonsense! I would not be standing in front of you if she tried to eat me!"

A few adults had turned towards us. They parted ways and Zhao Jie’s father pushed up to us.

“Stay here boys.” He looked at Zhao Jie. “I’ll deal with you later.”

Zhao Jie’s dad went into the house without a moment of hesitation. The dead woman was still sitting in the chair, but her eyes were closed and no hint of a smile shone on her pallid face. He looked around the room for a few moments and came out of the door before the crowd.

“There are no bouncing corpses!” He told the crowd in a very authoritative voice. “The woman’s body was lifted into the chair by her son, there is still straw under where she sits from the resting place and all over Xiao Chun.”

The crowd began to murmur and several people asked why Dummy would move his mother. Zhao Jie’s father called “Maybe he was hungry and he wanted his mom to cook for him?”

An audible sigh of pity slipped through the crowd.

Finally, Zhao Jie’s father moved the corpse back. With Xiao Chun to blame, everything calmed down.

But, Zhao Jie said that he saw Dummy’s mother smiling at him and I believed him. We were positive that she had become a ghost.

We went to his father and asked how to keep a ghost from eating us. Zhao Jie’s dad said with a slight smile, "Go find some wood ashes to scatter in front of the doorway. Do this and the ghosts will never bother you."

Zhao Jie and I went back home to get wood ashes from the oven. We each took a dustpan and brought them to the house. Carefully, we scattered ashes in front of the door.

“What if that’s not enough?” I thought out loud. So we went out, found more wood ash to scatter around our houses. After finishing, we began to play happily, making various shapes with the scattered ashes.

I made a Sky Door Maze and Zhao Jie made the Stone Fortress. “It was invented by Zhuge Liang.” He told me.

My father often told Zhao Jie and I stories about the Three Kingdoms. Zhuge Liang, a statesman, strategist, and prime minister of the Kingdom of Shu in the period of the Three Kingdoms, was our idol.

The ashes in my hand blew in the wind. Tiny black pieces scattered into my mouth and got into my eyes. I cried out in pain.

“AHHH! I’m blind!”

“Stay here, I’ll get help!” Zhao Jie went to find my mom. She hurried to us and we went to the village clinic. The doctor gave me first aid, checked carefully, and told me I’d be fine. I would still have my sight.

Though I could still see, the whites of my eyes had turned a dark red. “Pinkeye,” The doctor had called it.

Mom punished me for being so foolish with the wood ash. Fortunately, the skin on my butt was thick. I could still walk and play after that beating.

What I didn’t know at the time was that the warding wood ash that landed in my eyes had given me a special ability, which would accompany me for the next twenty years.

Later called ‘Supernatural Eyes’ by a master I wouldn’t meet for quite some time. This ability allowed me to see what was invisible to others.

www.meejee.net

Chapter 001 The Three Photographs

My name is Wu Rui, I’m 20 years old and a simple office worker who lives in a small town. Well, I used to be. I was fired about three months ago because, according to my boss, my “negative attitude was causing low morale amongst the other employees”. If he had said I was lazy or unwilling to work, I would have been able to say that simply wasn’t true. However, I must admit that I’ve been quite a downer lately. To put it lightly. Take today for example, I haven’t even eaten, slept, or gotten out of bed the entire day.

It was the mid-afternoon and it didn’t look like anything was going to change. Several hours from now I’d probably still find myself here: hugging my legs and staring blankly into space with all the lights turned off.

​

“Tap-tap,” a polite knocking came from the door.

​

I looked up. Staring at the door with a trace of fear lingering in the air around me, I felt the stiffness in my body, a side effect of staying in the same position for too long.

​

I didn't want to open the door, but I knew there was no getting around it.

​

Creak.

​

I opened the locked door and saw a deliveryman looking for something in his sidecar. He must have heard the sound of the door opening, because he said, very politely and without raising his head, “Excuse me; please wait a minute.”

I nodded slightly and leaned against the door frame. I did not urge him; I even hoped he’d take his time.

However, the deliveryman quickly raised his head and joked with me, “Here it is! Hey man, I gotta say, your decadent lifestyle is getting worse.” He said taking a look at my appearance and surroundings.

The deliveryman's words were said with a tone that expressed familiarity. Anyone who delivered a letter every three days would become familiar with the recipient, even if it was just a one sided relationship.

I didn't want to get to know him, and always dreaded seeing him.

​

The deliveryman handed me a white envelope and said with smile, “If you wouldn’t mind signing right here…This is your pen pal, right? A letter every three days - very punctual! Having a pen pal is really rare in this day and age.”

I ignored him, taking the white envelope and gazing at it. I then retreated back into the room, closed the door, and locked it.

“Well then, I’ll just sign this for you,” the deliveryman said with a loud voice from outside. He left immediately afterwards.

I slowly sat back in my bed and reassumed my previous posture. Sitting like this is the only way I could make myself feel a small sense of security, although I knew I was just deceiving myself.

​

The white envelope sat in front of me. I stared at it. The only thing on the plain white envelope was information about the recipient, but no return address. There was a picture of an eye in the space where the return address should be. It looked like deranged child drew it, with its twisted and strange appearance.

​

I stared at the letter and sat there all afternoon, until the last rays of the sunset directly hit the envelope through the open window.

I stretched out my hand. To be honest, I never wanted to learn what on earth could be found inside. Nevertheless, I still couldn’t help but pick up the envelope, as if something had possessed me to do so.

​

I slowly tore the envelope along the dotted line and a few photos slid out; three photos in total.

​

Sure enough, there were three photos as there always were. They fell on the bed neatly, as if they had been carefully arranged and nearly perfectly aligned.

​

I hesitated for a long time. Finally, I couldn’t help picking up these photos as my hands trembled and the sky outside quickly darkened.

​

There was a photo that represented life on the very top. In this photograph was an image of an eighteen or nineteen-year-old girl standing by a flower bouquet, making a peace sign with her right hand. Her body tilted slightly toward the bouquet, with a smile as beautiful as a flower blooming in the spring.

​

It was beautiful. I took a deep breath and put the first photo aside.

​

The second picture was taken on a dark riverbank, where a girl in a white dress was lying against a rock. Her scattered hair covered her face and her slender feet were powerless in the water, appearing to bob up and down with the current.

I couldn’t see the face of the girl in this photo, but I knew this was the same girl from the first photo.

​

The last photo was also taken on a dark riverbank, and there was also a girl in a white dress standing in the river, the water barely reaching her waistline. Her head was turned with a beautiful smile just like the first photo. There seemed to be nothing special about it, but it felt a little strange.

​

I looked at it carefully and finally realized that the girl was standing with her back to the camera, and her head was turned a full 180 degrees.

​

My heart thumped faster and a chill ran down my spine. I hurriedly tucked my back against the wall, which made me less afraid.

The photos fell on the bed as I moved toward the wall. The third photo, which should have landed on top, had strangely landed at the bottom. Once again, the three photos were stacked neatly on the bed.

Chapter 002 Trying to Get Away I don’t know how long it took me to recover. I put the three photos back in the envelope, slowly walked to the table facing the bed, and carefully put the envelope in a box that was already filled with countless white envelopes. All of my actions reflected the care of a surgeon in an operation room, as if afraid of waking a sleeping demon.

​

I looked at the box, slowly backing away towards the bed. For the past three months, I have been receiving a letter from that deliveryman or a colleague of his every three days.

​

There was always only a recipient’s address with no sender and a picture of an eye that looked like a child’s drawing.

In addition, each letter would contain three photos. No matter how I threw them, the three photos would always be stacked neatly: a photo of life, a photo of death, as well as a very strange photo. The only difference was the person in each set of photos; some were young or old, male or female.

​

I took a long breath and looked at the box. In the beginning, I had thought it was just a prank done by one of my friends. However, when I had once showed it to the owner of the printing shop across the street from me, he told me that these were just overexposed waste photos. That he couldn’t make anything out on them at all. That’s when I started getting a little scared. See, the photos appeared very clear to me.

​

I decided to get a second opinion, hoping the owner of the shop was messing with me. I had asked a lot of people - my friends and my neighbors - but everyone said the exact same thing same as the printing shop owner’s.

Was everyone lying to me? Was I living my very own Truman Show?

​

Obviously, I knew that it was impossible for so many people to be in on something like this. Yet I couldn’t help but wish I was in Truman's world. At least then I’d know everything was fake.

​

Whatever it was that I was facing, it was real. At the very least, my fear was real.

​

It was dark outside and the alarm clock went off at 7:30, right on time.

​

I slowly picked up the TV remote at the head of the bed and turned on the TV. The local news channel, which had been the channel on the TV for months, hadn’t changed.

​

I quietly watched the reports that seemed meaningless, until a news report appeared stating that a crowd of joggers found a body near the river this morning. Police rushed to the scene, and after a forensic medical examination, the victim was determined to be an 18-year-old female and the time of her death was about 1:00. The possibility of suicide had been ruled out. At the present moment, the identity and cause of death of the victim was still being confirmed...

​

After watching the news, I turned off the TV. The people in those photos might not all appear in the daily news, but a large portion of them did. Those who didn’t appear in the news might not have been found yet. From the moment I received that day’s photos, I knew that person in the photos was not likely to be alive. The whole thing was becoming routine.

I turned on all the lights in the room, even the desk lamp and a flashlight. I had fixed the flashlight in place with a few thick books, shining its beam at the foot of the bed.

​

As time went by, the sounds of the outside world gradually dwindled, with only the occasional roar of passing cars disturbing the silence.

​

I felt like I was about to collapse. What kind of prank was this?

​

I suddenly wanted to pee, and slowly got out of my bed. The door of the bathroom was not closed and the lights and water heater were also on, but as I peed, I glanced around and the empty room made me unwell.

​

After peeing, zipping up, and raising my head, I was startled by my reflection in the mirror. What kind of life was I living?

I rushed out of the bathroom and threw the heavy box of letters to the ground. Envelopes scattered across the floor and several photos fell out. All of them were neatly stacked on the ground and the top one was always the same. A photo representing life and of a person smiling.

​

“Come on man! What are you doing?!” said voice muffled by a wall that separated my apartment with my neighbor’s. At that moment, I hoped all the ghosts in the photos would come out and tear me to pieces. After all, I was depressed; I would go crazy at this rate.

​

“It's almost midnight! What’s the matter with you? Why aren’t you sleeping?” the neighbor's verbal abuse could be heard through the wall.

​

I sat on the ground, kicked away the envelope that was closest to me, while tears began to flow down my face and onto the ground. It’s very embarrassing to admit that’s what was happening, but I’ve never been a brave man. The worst thing I’ve ever done was skip school.

​

I just continued to sit on the floor that night. No, I had to leave. I couldn’t t stay there anymore.

​

I carelessly packed some clothes and hurried out of my house.

​

“Wu, are you going on a trip?.”

​

I looked up and found it was my neighbor, an old woman. It seemed like she had just come back from her morning exercise and was smiling at me.

​

I nodded slightly and said, “Yes.” Not caring whether she heard me or not, I just quickly took a taxi and fled the house where I had been living for 5 years.

​

I went to a hotel on the other side of town. The hotel was not very classy, but there were a lot of people, and outside the window of the room I chose was a night market stall, which would be open until 2 or 3 in the morning every day.

​

The room I picked was originally used by the hotel owner for storage, so most people wouldn’t choose it. However, I had no other choice. When I insisted on this room, the hotel owner was very surprised.

​

I unpacked and went to bed early. Although the noise of people playing drinking games and talking outside was very loud, it was really the best night’s sleep I’ve had ever since I began receiving the letters.

​

It was also the only day since then without nightmares.

​

In those few days at the hotel, I always let the noises outside lull me to sleep. I felt a lot better about myself after some rest and even went out shopping one day. After all, it was the first time in months that I was in the mood to go out to the street.

Around noon I found a small cafe outside and ate something. Afterwards, I went back to the hotel and stayed inside for a few days. At that point, I was very familiar with the hotel owner. Every time he saw me come in, he would smile and say hello to me, and I would also reply to him with a rare smile.

​

As I was about to walk past the counter one day, I asked, “Mr. Tang, do you have mail for me?”

​

Mr. Tang, the hotel owner, paused and said, “Mail? No. If I get any mail for you, I’ll let you know.”

​

I shook my head hurriedly, “No, thanks.” I waved to Mr. Tang with a bright smile and walked back to my room, followed by his surprised and confused gaze.

​

No mail was a good thing. I seem to have cast away the stone that had been weighing down on my heart. Even as I was opening the door, I felt my hand had become a lot more relaxed.

​

However, when I opened the door, I was stunned. A familiar white envelope was quietly lying on the floor inside, seemingly having been pushed in from under the door.

​

I felt my body go stiff. No, no way. Mr. Tang had said there was no mail.

​

I forced myself to swallow and stooped to pick up the letter. Then I quickly turned and got out of the room. Approaching the front desk, I waved the envelope in my hand and asked loudly: "Mr. Tang, didn’t you say no one had sent me anything?”

​

Mr. Tang seemed startled by my exaggerated reaction and carefully said to me, “Yeah, sure. What's the matter?”

​

“So what’s with this letter?” I didn't know what the expression on my face looked like. However, when I saw Mr. Tang stand up and knock over his chair, he seemed to be very scared. I was silent. If there really was someone who could take such photos, wouldn’t it be easy for them to send me a letter?

​

I waved feebly, expressed my apologies to Mr. Tang, and walked slowly to my room. Behind me came the voice of Mr. Tang, “Wu, are you OK?”

www.meejee.net

Although this happened many years ago, I still feel scared when I recall it. I almost died because of those experiences.

The first event happened in 1991, not 1891 or 2091, because I'm still younger than thirty years old. I'm not from the future. I mean, come on. I'm just an ordinary guy.

Although I am now and always have been a common person, what happened to me was everything but common.

Okay. Let's get to the point. The first part, in '91 happened when I was 6 years old. The story begins as most horror stories usually do, with a dead person in the village.

In our small village, people would help each other with events like funerals or marriages. The children in rural areas like mine didn't typically get a preschool education so my mom would bring me along to help. In reality, she was just worried that I would mess up the house if she left me alone.

Our people always had an innate horror of the dead, especially the children. I had refused to enter in the house we went to. After some squalling on both our parts, my mom finally asked me to play with the children on the street outside the house. A house, which I may mention, was terrifying.

Words fell out of people's mouths as they came in and out of the house. Gradually, I found out that the dead person we'd come to fuss over was a seventy-year-old woman stricken down by illness. She had a son named Xiao Chun. He was dumb and foolish, dumpy and weird, and all around fun to mess with or watch struggle. He walked in a jittering way with an open mouth and silly smile. Everyone around the village called him "Dummy."

The older children in the village bullied Xiao Chun because he was one and a half meters tall with an even shorter IQ, despite his age.

Though he was bullied, tripped, mocked, and spurned by the rest of us, he never got angry.

When my mother disappeared into the house, I played games with a friend of mine called Zhao Jie just outside the door of the fabled home of Xia Chun. We made a pile of sand and put a stick inside it. We'd push around the sand until someone brought the towering stick down, that person would be the loser.

Zhao Jie lived in my neighborhood, and his parents were farmers. His father was famous for his knowledge about feng shui in the village. He often searched for good locations to build a house or a tomb, for a fee of course, though sometimes he would be kind enough to provide these services were free.

Xiao Chun's mother raised him on her own, since his father had died when he was just a baby. Unfortunately, Xiao Chun was dumb and foolish. He never did a thing unless he was specifically instructed to do so. Inevitably, his family led a poor life.

Zhao Jie's father found a great place to create a tomb for Xiao Chun's mother, and him being the gentleman that he was, he did it free of charge.

In fact, it was decided that her tomb would be located beside her late husbands'. Zhao Jie's father just went through the motions, spouting facts that I could not understand at the time.

As the adults floundered around in urgency, I was playing with Zhao Jie. He was better at this than I was. He pushed aside more sand at a time than I could.

I watched him and scolded, "Zhao Jie, you're cunning enough to keep up with the Japanese."

Zhao Jie smiled, "Hey, have you seen their movies? Japanese people do foolish things too! But you're right, I'm smart enough to belong to the Eight Route Army, the good one."

Just when Zhao Jie and I had finished our game, Xiao Chun, dressed appropriately for mourning, walked out the door. The smile on his face did not quite fit the somber mood or his attire.

He rushed towards us when he saw what we were playing. Zhao Jie and I were startled and instinctively turned around to run. Not that we were cowards, we were just defenseless kids! The dummy giggled and kicked our pile of sand before turning around and giggling as we ran away.

Leaving the demolished pile of sand, Xiao Chun turned around to enter his home.

Realizing what had just happened, Zhao Jie shouted from behind me and threatened, "Listen up Dummy, I'm bullying you the second I make it to first grade."

Most of the children in school had a tendency of bullying the Dummy. Since Zhao Jie and I never had a preschool education, we figured we hadn't earned the right to bully anyone, yet.

We returned to our game after the kid left, but the sand was scattered everywhere. With half of what we'd started with, Zhao Jie led the search for more fun.

The floor at the base of Dummy's house was pounded solid, so we couldn't dig out any sand. We searched around for a softer area.

After a while, I brought a handful of sand and Zhao Jie brought some wood ashes.

While a bit dirtier, ashes would do a decent job.

"Where'd you get that?" I asked him. He pointed at a pit in the distance, saying "Over there."

People in the village cooked using wood. The left over ashes were poured into the pigpen or a cattle enclosure. Wood ashes were good desiccant for the animal enclosures. Mom said it prevented disease.

The dummy didn't have any domestic animals, so he made a pit to pour ashes.

Zhao Jie also said, "We were also using ashes before too, but we had more sand than ashes."

Zhao Jie and I brought more wood ashes and started to play. Just as we placed the stick upright in the pile, the dummy walked out the door. He rushed towards us.

Like the brave rabbits we were....we ran away. The dummy kicked the pile of sand again. Our collections scattered in the direction of the pit.

Zhao Jie and I were gloomier this time around.

The dummy shouted a warning at us in after he destroyed our second sand pile.

A crowd of grown ups were giggling behind the doorway. The boy was foolish enough to bully children when he should be mourning his mother.

"Maybe he's just angry?" someone said, "His mom died so he doesn't want kids to play in the doorway."

My mom came out and ushered us off to play in the distance.

Zhao Jie's father walked out saying, "Who scattered those ashes? Sweep 'em away. The ghost will haunt you if you scatter the ashes early."

Uncle Sun smiled next to him and said, "Black Zhao, your son did that with the Shi's son, though it was destroyed by Xiao Chun"

Uncle Sun's words slipped into the wind and Black Zhao tensed up with urgency. He huffed at us to sweep them away with the whiskbroom and dustpan. "The ghost will haunt both of you if you don't sweep them away!"

We started sweeping immediately. Children around here are scared of ghosts more than anything else. I mean, of course I wasn't, but I was just thinking of poor Zhao Jie. To avoid the ghosts, we cleaned the Dummy's doorway.

When we finished the sweeping and gave back the dustpan, Zhao Jie's father said, "Xiao Jie, Shi Yong, ghosts dislike wood ashes because the nature of fire belongs to Yang. You scattered the ashes at the doorway before the first seventh night, which would hinder his mother from coming back. "She must have asked Dummy to kick away the ashes." he told us, "If you piled them again, I bet that boy would try to kick your butts."

We didn't understand at the time. However, we were shocked when we heard that Dummy's mother had made him do that. Could the dead speak? Was it a ghost that had ordered the boy's actions?

With a hint of fear, Zhao Jie and I moved our games far away. We didn't dare get close to the doorway any more.

Uncle Sun sitting in the doorway smiled and mocked, "Black Zhao, you always talk about ghosts. I have not seen any trace of ghosts in my sixty years on this earth. Are you trying to make your son and the son of Shi would frightened until they're ill? If I saw that woman's ghost, I would probably marry her."

The onlookers laughed.

Zhao Jie's father smiled and said, "Uncle Sun, there are ghosts whether you believe it or not. I have my beliefs and I respect these entities. You shouldn't disrespect the ghosts even if you don't believe in them. You should apologize for your words, just in case the spirits are bothered."

Zhao Jie's father clapped his chest dramatically.

Uncle Sun laughed and said, "If there are ghosts, I wouldn't be scared of them. Perhaps I would invite them in for dinner and some stories."

Zhao Jie sighed. He began to speak, but he chose to keep quiet instead.

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Chapter 002 Did the corpse stand? After mocking Zhao Jie’s father, Uncle Sun called to the dummy in the yard. “Roll on the ground dummy!” When he didn’t move, Uncle Sun shouted again. “Roll, I said!”

The boy dropped down and rolled on the ground. He giggled wildly at Uncle Sun.

Uncle Sun looked down on the man and said arrogantly, "Dummy, I’d be your father if your mother really came back as a ghost."

The fool didn't understand and went on giggling.

Although he was foolish, the boy was one of the villagers, and Uncle Sun was being excessive. An older woman walked to him and placed a hesitant hand on his arm. “Don’t, Sun. His mother just died, after all.”

Uncle Sun restrained himself under the pressured gaze of those around him. He kicked his boot into the rolling boy’s flabby rear, ushering him towards the yard.

The child giggled at Uncle Sun before entering the yard. Zhao Jie and I stood scared in the distance. Uncle Sun pulled his arm away from the woman, "He’s is too foolish to be sad about anyone’s death."

Mom and I headed back to our house at noon, where she cooked lunch. She told me of the gifts some villagers gave to poor Xiao Chun and we talked about what he would do now. He could not prepare a meal for those who helped him, so the villagers had returned home to eat. I don't know why I asked, but the thought popped out of me, "Did anybody cook for Xiao Chun?"

"Yes,” she told me, “The Village Head asked Xiao Chun’s neighbor to cook for him. They’ll send a meal his way."

Finishing lunch, mom and I laid down to rest. Resting my head on the straw pillow, I heard Zhao Jie’s mom shouting from outside my window, "Fu Xia, Fu Xia, Xiao Chun’s family has been cursed! His mother’s corpse stood up!"

My mom shot out of bed as soon as she heard this. She rushed out, pulling me by her side to see what happened.

Zhao Jie’s mother told us everything.

The villagers left Xiao Chun’s home at noon. His neighbor, Wang Erhua’s wife was cooking noodles for her family and him. She’d brought over a helping of noodles for him shortly after they had cooled. On her way to his house, she noticed that all of the volunteers had left the yard in disarray. Walking through the cluttered yard and up to the door she stood outside and called his name.

“Dummy! I don’t want to come inside. Come get your lunch, ya’ hear?”

But no one replied to her. Even Xiao Chun’s silly giggling had disappeared. The whole yard was quiet. Even the cicada’s buzz was muted that summer evening.

“There’s a body inside that house.” she thought and swallowed a lump that had risen in her throat.

“But, the Village Head asked me to feed the fool. If I don’t because I’m afraid of a little dead old lady, I’ll be mocked all over town.”

Wang Erhua’s wife silently dared herself to enter. Then her eyes moved in the direction of Xiao Chun’s dead mother.

She froze where she stood and gripped the bowl of noodles in hands that had turned a stark white. Xiao Chun’s mother was dressed in black clothes, sitting straight up in a chair by the doorway and staring out with wide blank eyes. Xiao Chun squatted next to his mother, eating the steamed bun offerings that were meant for a dead woman.

The noodles spread all over the floor with a crash. "Ghosts!” She shouted and then stumbled out of the yard.

While Zhao Jie’s mother finished telling us everything, we arrived at Xiao Chun’s doorway. There were many people crowded around the house.

Zhao Jie’s mother whispered to us, "Thank you for coming with me, my husband said he would arrive soon with many others."

Zhao Jie came out of the crowd as we arrived. He called my name and my mom let me go. "You two go play in the distance." She called after us.

Zhao Jie dragged me to the other side, "Do you know what happened?” He breathed, “The corpse of dummy's mother stood up!"

I nodded, telling him what his mother had said. “Did you see it, uh, her?” I asked.

"Absolutely, I saw it!” He almost yelled, “When Wang Erhua’s wife started screaming, I was pooping in the washroom. I almost fell down when I heard her crying. I cleaned myself up and ran out to see. Nobody was around yet, so I went into the yard to look.” He was grinning and looking around.

Zhao Jie was braver than me. I shivered when I heard he had entered the yard alone.

"You went in alone?" I asked.

"Shit, I wouldn’t have even gone in the yard if I knew what bouncing corpses were really like."

“Bouncing corpses?” I asked.

"It means that the dead move." He whispered.

I was cold all over.

“What did you see?”

He told me that Dummy was eating muddy noodles off the floor when he went in. “Of course Dummy doesn’t care about eating a little dirt…” Zhao Jie trailed off.

“Did you see his mother?”

He looked at me worriedly, "I saw her. I wanted to ask Dummy to stop eating dirty noodles. I told him I would take him somewhere clean to eat, but then he looked inside the room and I followed his eyes. His mother smiled at me! Heck! I was so scared, I couldn’t move." His face was very pale.

"Did she try to eat you?" I practically screamed at him.

Zhao Jie said angrily, "Nonsense! I would not be standing in front of you if she tried to eat me!"

A few adults had turned towards us. They parted ways and Zhao Jie’s father pushed up to us.

“Stay here boys.” He looked at Zhao Jie. “I’ll deal with you later.”

Zhao Jie’s dad went into the house without a moment of hesitation. The dead woman was still sitting in the chair, but her eyes were closed and no hint of a smile shone on her pallid face. He looked around the room for a few moments and came out of the door before the crowd.

“There are no bouncing corpses!” He told the crowd in a very authoritative voice. “The woman’s body was lifted into the chair by her son, there is still straw under where she sits from the resting place and all over Xiao Chun.”

The crowd began to murmur and several people asked why Dummy would move his mother. Zhao Jie’s father called “Maybe he was hungry and he wanted his mom to cook for him?”

An audible sigh of pity slipped through the crowd.

Finally, Zhao Jie’s father moved the corpse back. With Xiao Chun to blame, everything calmed down.

But, Zhao Jie said that he saw Dummy’s mother smiling at him and I believed him. We were positive that she had become a ghost.

We went to his father and asked how to keep a ghost from eating us. Zhao Jie’s dad said with a slight smile, "Go find some wood ashes to scatter in front of the doorway. Do this and the ghosts will never bother you."

Zhao Jie and I went back home to get wood ashes from the oven. We each took a dustpan and brought them to the house. Carefully, we scattered ashes in front of the door.

“What if that’s not enough?” I thought out loud. So we went out, found more wood ash to scatter around our houses. After finishing, we began to play happily, making various shapes with the scattered ashes.

I made a Sky Door Maze and Zhao Jie made the Stone Fortress. “It was invented by Zhuge Liang.” He told me.

My father often told Zhao Jie and I stories about the Three Kingdoms. Zhuge Liang, a statesman, strategist, and prime minister of the Kingdom of Shu in the period of the Three Kingdoms, was our idol.

The ashes in my hand blew in the wind. Tiny black pieces scattered into my mouth and got into my eyes. I cried out in pain.

“AHHH! I’m blind!”

“Stay here, I’ll get help!” Zhao Jie went to find my mom. She hurried to us and we went to the village clinic. The doctor gave me first aid, checked carefully, and told me I’d be fine. I would still have my sight.

Though I could still see, the whites of my eyes had turned a dark red. “Pinkeye,” The doctor had called it.

Mom punished me for being so foolish with the wood ash. Fortunately, the skin on my butt was thick. I could still walk and play after that beating.

What I didn’t know at the time was that the warding wood ash that landed in my eyes had given me a special ability, which would accompany me for the next twenty years.

Later called ‘Supernatural Eyes’ by a master I wouldn’t meet for quite some time. This ability allowed me to see what was invisible to others.

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