Chapter 7: The Corpse Within the Coffin

If it was deliberate, the truth would be rather terrifying.
But if it wasn’t, then what was the purpose?
It was noon, the sun shining directly overhead. Yet I noticed that, aside from my grandmother, everyone present seemed oblivious to the heat, their bodies shivering uncontrollably.
“Sister Chen, what should we do now?”
The village chief was anxious. On ordinary days, when nothing happened, his life was the easiest in the village. But when trouble arose, he was the one who had to bear the weight.
Already, countless rats had come to kneel around the grave. Now there were eight large rats, kneeling precisely at the eight cardinal points. No one dared to clear them away rashly.
My grandmother was a spirit medium and knew more about taboos than most.
“The grave must be opened,” she said, “but first, drive away these rats. Go find a rooster over a year old and a bucket of ashes from the hearth. Quickly.”
Having a solution was a relief.
The village chief and an uncle rushed down the back hill. The rest, under my grandmother’s guidance, searched the surroundings for branches to whittle into eight wooden stakes.
Even finding the branches had its taboos: they had to come from sun-bleached dead wood facing east. Nothing else would do.
I stayed where I was, staring at the grave encircled by the eight rats, struggling to imagine that I had been born beside this very mound.
I recalled the rumors about me in the village and how, during both previous soul-loss incidents, Jiang Yan had appeared. Now, with a mysterious birthmark having surfaced on my face, I realized perhaps Jiang Yan’s disappearance was truly connected to me.
Before, she had always lurked in the shadows. Now, she had brazenly killed Granny Wang and stolen two of my souls. What was her purpose?
Could it really be as the villagers whispered—that she loved children, and because I was born by her grave, she saw me as her own child and now wanted to take me away?
Once, I’d have thought that idea utterly preposterous.
But now, whether it was the soul losses, Granny Wang’s corpse coming back to life, or the kneeling rats, none of it could be explained by science.
Soon, the village chief and his companion returned with the requested items.
The rooster was beheaded. Its fresh blood was poured into the bucket of hearth ashes. My grandmother sprinkled the bloodied ashes in a circle around the rats, forming a ritual array on the ground.
Under her direction, the sharpened stakes were driven straight through the backs of the large rats, pinning them to the earth.
A piercing squeal escaped the first rat, its pale, cloudy eyes lifting as it was skewered. The sound sent everyone stumbling backward in fright.
Only then did I realize the rats’ eyes were milky and dull, as if they were blind.
Despite being impaled, the huge rat barely struggled, only arching its head with a single cry. At my grandmother’s command, the rest braced themselves and continued the grim task.
“Pull it up,” she instructed.
The village chief lifted the stake, hoisting the rat’s corpse with it.

Strangely, not a drop of blood fell from the massive rat—only earth clung to the tip of the stake.
Nearby, firewood had been prepared. The eight rat bodies were thrown onto the flames, filling the air with a stench so foul it took a long while for anyone to catch their breath.
“Dig,” my grandmother commanded coldly from before the grave.
“Shouldn’t we offer a prayer first?” the village chief asked nervously.
The dead should be respected. Disturbing a grave was considered inauspicious, and before breaking ground, it was customary to offer prayers to appease the spirit and avoid misfortune.
Jiang Yan’s death had been anything but peaceful, and now she was causing trouble again. The village chief was clearly anxious, fearing that their disrespect might provoke Jiang Yan’s vengeance, ending up like Granny Wang.
They expected my grandmother, as the spirit medium, to say something appropriate. But she simply ordered them to dig, unsettling the already fearful men.
“She’s already harming the living—what’s the point in being polite? It’s not even certain she’s inside,” my grandmother replied.
Hearing this, the men exchanged glances, then gritted their teeth and began to dig.
Watching my grandmother, I sensed her anger and suspicion that she already knew something.
The earth was quickly removed, revealing the decayed coffin. Through a hole pried in the lid, I glimpsed a pair of brightly colored embroidered shoes—strangely familiar.
A sudden suspicion crept into my mind.
But I dismissed it. No matter how strange things became, surely it couldn’t be as I feared.
Once the earth was fully cleared, the lid was pried open.
When we saw who was inside, the village chief and the others dropped their hoes in terror and backed away, rubbing their eyes as if unable to believe what they saw.
Even though I’d already suspected, I was still shocked. I wanted to retreat but my legs refused to obey.
Earlier, seeing the embroidered shoes through the hole, I’d realized they were the very same ones Granny Wang had worn.
I remembered so clearly because when I’d awoken last night to find Granny Wang standing before me, I’d been too afraid to look up and had only dared glance at her feet.
Having just seen those shoes, I’d subconsciously wondered: Could the body inside the coffin really be hers?
If the grave had been disturbed, perhaps. But the mound was intact, not a single spadeful missing. Even if Granny Wang’s corpse had risen, how could it possibly have entered Jiang Yan’s tomb?
My thoughts could never keep pace with reality.
For there lay Granny Wang’s corpse, inside Jiang Yan’s grave, the earth above undisturbed.
How the body got there was beyond me. The coffin appeared unbroken, ruling out any way in from the sides.
Suddenly, I recalled something my grandmother had said earlier, suspecting she had known that Granny Wang’s body would be found here.
When the village chief recovered, he approached my grandmother, voice trembling, asking how Granny Wang’s corpse had ended up in Jiang Yan’s coffin.
She gave no explanation, only told them to remove the body and examine the bottom of the coffin.

We all expected bones at the bottom, but it was perfectly clean, as if no one had ever been buried there.
Where was Jiang Yan?
The graveyard fell silent. My grandmother squatted by the open grave for a while, then rose, glanced at Granny Wang’s body, and said, “Since it’s come to this, bury her here.”
Hearing that she intended to bury Granny Wang in Jiang Yan’s grave, the others’ faces changed, and I stared at my grandmother in shock, unable to understand her reasoning.
There are taboos about life and death.
Even with my limited knowledge of folk customs, I knew that only one person should be interred in a grave. Burying two would cause a clash, inviting disaster.
Since this was a graveyard, digging a new pit would be easy—certainly better than putting another body in Jiang Yan’s tomb.
The village chief, having held his tongue, could not restrain himself any longer. He walked over and said that he had personally helped bury Jiang Yan years ago—how could her body simply vanish?
“What’s so surprising about a missing corpse? Didn’t Granny Wang get up and run around just last night?” my grandmother retorted.
The village chief was left speechless, perhaps recalling that Jiang Yan had returned, and her corpse had disappeared eighteen years ago. After steadying himself, he looked at Granny Wang’s body and said, “Sister Chen, burying her here doesn’t seem right. Why don’t we choose a new grave?”
My grandmother was silent for over a minute before she nodded and asked for Granny Wang’s coffin to be brought, along with three roosters and a sheep.
In the blink of an eye, only my grandmother and I remained in the cemetery. Staring at Jiang Yan’s empty grave, I couldn’t help but ask if Jiang Yan had left eighteen years ago. My grandmother nodded, her brows furrowed, as if even she couldn’t understand how Jiang Yan’s body could have vanished.
I was even more puzzled. If Jiang Yan had become a jiangshi, crawling out of the grave, why was the coffin lid and the grave mound still perfectly intact?
At that time, the villagers were wary because of Jiang Yan’s disturbances. If there’d been any opening at her grave, it would have been discovered immediately.
The truth was, Jiang Yan’s body had disappeared into thin air, just as Granny Wang’s corpse had inexplicably appeared in her coffin—impossible to detect without exhuming it.
Soon, the others returned with what was needed.
My grandmother took a rooster to Granny Wang’s corpse, laying it on her chest.
The rooster, sensing it stood atop a corpse, shrieked in terror and leapt away. My grandmother snorted, caught the rooster, pulled a yellow talisman from her cloth pouch, and circled it around the bird’s head, chanting incantations.
When she finished, she stuffed the talisman into the rooster’s beak.
Then she let go. The rooster dropped onto Granny Wang’s chest with a dull thud, lying there motionless like a stone.
“Chicken-binding spell!”
The village chief exclaimed in astonishment.