Grandpa's funeral was simple.
He was from out of town, having fled to Chenjia Village years ago, with no relatives or friends. Aside from a few elderly people who had received his kindness and weeping, only I, his adopted grandson, was there, dressed in mourning clothes, breaking basins and waving banners.
The villagers helped dig the grave, burying him in a "dragonfly skimming water" burial site that Grandpa had chosen himself on the back hill. At the burial, I placed his compass, soaked in water but with its needle still firmly fixed, on his chest.
"Grandpa, may you rest in peace." I kowtowed three times, handfuls of yellow earth falling, my heart feeling empty.
From this day forward, I was truly alone.
On the seventh night after his death, I knelt before Grandpa's memorial tablet, burning paper money. The flames licked the yellow paper, flickering and casting an eerie glow in the main room. I remembered that strange dream again, that mountain of red-eyed women. "Grandpa, if you have any unfinished business or things you want to say, please appear in my dream tonight," I murmured.
After the paper money burned, there was no sound except for the creaking of the door in the night wind.
I sighed and got up to go back to my room. Just as I turned, I seemed to catch a glimpse of Grandpa's memorial tablet swaying slightly, and the flame of the eternal lamp in front of it suddenly leaped towards me.
My heart skipped a beat. I looked again, but everything seemed normal.
"It must be my imagination," I rubbed my sore eyes. I hadn't slept well for several days, and the restless energy of adolescence had left me feeling a bit dazed.
Back in my room, I lay down, the hard copy of *Dragon, Tiger, and Leopard* under my pillow pressing against the back of my head. I pulled it out, intending to "study" one last time by the moonlight, but found I couldn't concentrate at all. My mind kept replaying images: Grandpa's swollen face, Zhang Cai'e's pale legs, and then that enormous, scarlet eye.
"Damn it!" I irritably threw the magazine into the corner and pulled the covers over my head.
How long had passed? In my half-asleep, hazy state, a suppressed, intermittent sobbing faintly drifted into my ears.
The sound was soft and delicate, like a woman struggling to suppress her grief.
I jolted awake, mostly conscious. I listened intently; the sobbing seemed to be coming from behind the house, or perhaps from the far west end of the village. In the quiet of the night, it sounded particularly eerie.
"Who's there?" I called out, my voice echoing in the empty room, trembling slightly.
The sobbing stopped abruptly.
After a while, there was no more sound. I breathed a sigh of relief; I guessed it was some auntie longing for her man, grieving in the middle of the night. Just as I was about to fall back asleep, the crying started again! This time it was clearer, and seemed to be mixed with indistinct mutterings like "My life is so hard," "Nobody cares," and "It's so cold."
My hair stood on end. I suddenly remembered Grandpa saying that the seventh day after a child's death is the night when the spirit returns, the night with the heaviest yin energy, and when wandering ghosts are more likely to come out. Could it be... Grandpa came back to see me? But this crying didn't sound like Grandpa.
Or perhaps, it was coming for me, this "orphan" without adult protection?
I touched the small peach wood sword Grandpa had left me by my pillow, gripped it tightly in my hand, and only then did I feel a little more at ease. For the rest of the night, the crying came and went, and I barely slept.
At dawn, the crying stopped. I got up with dark circles under my eyes, and as soon as I opened the door, I saw a figure lingering outside—it was Zhang Cai'e.
Her eyes were red and swollen, her face even paler than yesterday. Filled with panic, she rushed over to me as if seeing a savior when I opened the door: "Cha Nan! Cha Nan, you're finally up!"
"Aunt Cai'e, what's wrong?" Seeing her strange expression, my heart skipped a beat, remembering the plump figure in her house last night.
"I...something really happened at my house!" Zhang Cai'e grabbed my arm, her hand icy cold and trembling slightly. "Last night was your grandfather's seventh day memorial, I didn't dare come over. Last night...last night my stove was emitting black smoke again! Not the kind used for cooking, but thick, billowing black smoke, with a fishy smell! It filled the whole house, making me cough. I went to check, the stove was ice cold, there was no fire at all! The smoke was just seeping out from the cracks in the bricks!"
She gasped for breath, her eyes filled with fear: "That's not all, I...I last night..." "I keep feeling like someone's standing by my bed when I go to sleep, breathing heavily and hoarsely, like...like they want to touch me! I wake up startled and turn on the light, but there's nothing there. As soon as I turn the light off, the feeling comes back! It's been happening several times throughout the night, I'm going crazy!"
As she spoke, tears streamed down her face: "Cha Nan, your grandfather is gone, you can't abandon your aunt! Everyone in the village says you've received Master Chen's true teachings, you have to help me! My husband isn't home, I'm a woman alone, if I'm harmed by something evil, how will I live..." Her body went limp, almost leaning against me.
A scent mixed with cheap face cream and a woman's body wafted into my nostrils, and her soft body pressed against my arm. Normally, I would have been aroused. But now, looking at her terrified face, remembering what I saw in the tree last night and that eerie crying, I felt a chill run up my spine.
Grandpa just passed away, and this thing is already getting worse? Did they think they could act recklessly now that no one could keep them in check?
I steadied myself, trying to recall what my grandfather had taught me. The stove deity talisman was useless; it wasn't an ordinary stove deity. It could manifest and harass the living; it must have become a powerful "filth," clinging to the energy of the stove fire in the house.
"Aunt Cai'e, don't worry," I said, supporting her and trying to make my voice sound calm—though my heart was pounding. "This might be a bit troublesome. Just drawing the talisman probably won't work; we'll need to perform a small ritual at your house to cleanse it."
"Perform a ritual?" Zhang Cai'e's eyes lit up, then she hesitated. "Just...just you alone? Can you manage? Should we get some elders to help?"
Her words struck a nerve. I was only eighteen; my grandfather had just passed away. In the eyes of the villagers, I was still a teenager, and a "bad" one at that. Find someone? Who? Who would believe me?
A surge of youthful stubbornness and a thrill of being needed welled up inside me. I puffed out my chest: "I've learned about 70-80% of Grandpa's skills! That's enough to deal with this kind of thing! Too many people will just create too much yang energy, which is actually bad. I'll go by myself!"
Zhang Cai'e was skeptical, but she had no other choice at the moment, so she nodded: "Then...when?"
"Right now!" I decided immediately. During the day, the yang energy is stronger, and that thing will usually be less bothered. Besides, I needed to prepare some things.
I went back inside and found a faded canvas bag that Grandpa had left behind. It didn't contain much: a small jar of ink mixed with cinnabar, a few worn-out calligraphy brushes, a stack of neatly cut yellow paper, a small copper coin sword (a bit more sophisticated than a peach wood sword), and a small packet of pungent incense ash wrapped in oiled paper—supposedly scraped from the incense burner at the City God Temple.
With the bag on my back, I followed Zhang Cai'e to her house. Along the way, the early-rising village women whispered and pointed at us, their eyes filled with curiosity and inquiry. I held my head high, pretending not to see them, but my palms were sweating slightly. This was my first battle, I couldn't back down!
When we arrived at Zhang Cai'e's house, the courtyard was the same as yesterday, but as soon as I entered the main room, I felt something was off. It wasn't cold, but a stifling, greasy heat, and a faint, fishy smell lingered in the air.
I first asked her to open the front and back doors and windows for ventilation, then went to the stove. The old-fashioned brick stove in the countryside was large, and the image of the Kitchen God with the inscription "Report good deeds to Heaven" was somewhat faded. I carefully examined the stove opening and the brick seams, but found nothing obviously abnormal. However, when I concentrated and tried to "sensitize" using the method my grandfather had taught me, I seemed to detect an extremely faint "qi," carrying greed and evil intent, lingering deep within the stove.
"Prepare a bowl of water, three chopsticks, and your usual cooking spatula," I instructed.
Zhang Cai'e quickly went to do so. I laid out yellow paper on the stove, ground the cinnabar ink, and tried to recall the stroke order of the "house-cleansing and exorcising talisman" my grandfather had drawn. I was unsure of myself, and my brush trembled slightly. I ruined three drawings in a row before the fourth one finally looked somewhat decent; the lines of the talisman were crooked, but at least it was legible.
I pasted the finished talisman above the image of the Kitchen God. Then, I stood the three chopsticks upright in the bowl of water, chanting incantations (actually, just repeating my grandfather's incantations over and over), trying to make the chopsticks stand—this was the simplest method of "asking the ghost by standing chopsticks," to see what was causing the trouble.
The chopsticks wobbled and didn't stand up.
I tried again, but still no luck.
Zhang Cai'e watched anxiously from the side. Seeing my repeated failures, the hope in her eyes gradually turned into disappointment and a deeper fear. I felt a little embarrassed, inwardly berating myself for my lack of skill. Just as I was getting anxious, my gaze swept over the spatula, and suddenly an idea struck me! Grandpa seemed to have said that items from the stove, constantly exposed to smoke and fire, absorbed the essence of "home" and "fire," sometimes making them more effective than ordinary magical implements.
I grabbed the blackened spatula; it was surprisingly warm to the touch. Without thinking, I plunged the spatula into the bowl of water, using it as chopsticks, and simultaneously held my breath, letting out a low shout: "What filthy thing is causing trouble here! Show yourself!"
Strangely enough, the spatula stood firmly in the center of the bowl of water!
Almost the instant the spatula settled, the crooked talisman stuck to the stove, with a "poof," spontaneously combusted, igniting a green flame with a fishy smell! At the same time, a very faint, extremely venomous "humph" seemed to come from deep within the stove, like an old man's voice.
Zhang Cai'e screamed and hid behind me, clutching my clothes tightly.
My heart was pounding, but I forced myself not to move. The green flame quickly burned away the talisman, and ashes fell. The oppressive heat in the stove seemed to dissipate, and the lingering fishy smell in the air faded.
The spatula clattered into the bowl of water.
"Is...it over?" Zhang Cai'e asked, trembling.
I wiped the cold sweat from my forehead and said uncertainly, "It...it should be suppressed for now. But this thing has some roots; just driving it away won't work. You need to move this stove."
"Move the stove? How?"
I walked around the stove, pointing to a slightly darker brick above the stove opening. "There's probably something unclean buried behind this brick, or something was disturbed when the stove was built. We need to remove it, mix some cinnabar with the incense ash from the City God Temple I brought, refill it, and then put up a talisman to ward off evil spirits."
"Remove the brick? I...I don't know how to do that by myself!" Zhang Cai'e looked troubled.
I looked at her, then at the brick. A surge of youthful impetuosity and inappropriate thoughts resurfaced: "I'll help you."
No sooner said than done. I found a hammer and chisel and carefully began to pry open the brick. Zhang Cai'e helped by holding a stool and handing me things. She was very close, her breathing rapid from the tension and effort, her chest rising and falling slightly.
I tried not to look, focusing on my work. The brick loosened, and I reached in. Sure enough, in the crack behind the brick, I felt something cold and slippery! Pulling it out, I saw it was the tip of a blackened, foul-smelling, greasy pig's trotter! A small lock of gray hair was still wrapped around it!
"What...what is this?!" Zhang Cai'e's face turned green.
I pinched my nose, suppressing my nausea: "Someone's up to no good! They put a dead pig's trotter and an old man's hair under your kitchen shrine. They're trying to attract evil spirits to your home, ruin your feng shui, and bring unrest to your household!" I immediately remembered the gossip of the village women; some said Zhang Cai'e's husband sent a lot of money, making others envious.
I cleaned up the filth, filled the shrine with incense ash and cinnabar, and pasted on new talismans. After all that work, it was almost noon. The strange feeling in the house had completely disappeared, and even the light seemed brighter.
Zhang Cai'e let out a long sigh, her whole body going limp. Her eyes were filled with gratitude and lingering fear as she looked at me. "Cha Nan, thank you so much today! If it weren't for you, I really wouldn't know what to do… You've truly learned your grandfather's skills!"
As she spoke, she pulled a handkerchief pouch from her bosom and stuffed it into my hand. "I don't have much money, take this first, buy some paper, pens, and ink, consider it a donation."
I squeezed it; inside were a few small bills, probably only about ten yuan. But I didn't refuse. My grandfather had said that this line of work couldn't be done for free; one had to receive something to settle the karmic debt.
"Aunt Cai'e, you're too kind." I put the money in my pocket, packed up my tools, and prepared to leave.
As I reached the door, Zhang Cai'e suddenly called out to me again, her face slightly flushed, her voice lowered: "Cha Nan... tonight, that thing won't come again, right? I... I'm still a little scared being alone."
Looking at the vulnerability tinged with fear on her still-attractive face, my heart warmed, and I blurted out, "Don't worry, it should be alright. If... if you're still scared, lock the door and leave the lights on tonight. If it really doesn't work... I'll come back to check on you tonight?"
As soon as the words left my mouth, I regretted them. What did that mean? Come back to "check on you" tonight?
Zhang Cai'e didn't get angry or scold me as I expected. She just gave me a deep look, her eyes complex, nodded, and said in a voice as soft as a mosquito's buzz, "Um... well, thank you in advance, Auntie."
I practically fled from Zhang Cai'e's house.
Walking back home, the sunlight was blinding. I touched the few crumpled bills in my pocket, my heart filled with mixed feelings. My first time performing a "ritual" alone—it seemed to have succeeded, yet something felt off. Grandpa just passed away, and I used the skills he taught me to take on a "job" and even collected the money. Should I go "check it out" again tonight?
I glanced back at Zhang Cai'e's tightly closed gate, took a deep breath, turned around, and my steps inexplicably became lighter.