Chapter 71: Feng Shui—A Matter of Life and Death?

Bang.

As we stood there in stunned silence, another violent crash sounded from within the coffin. The impact was so strong that the soil piled atop the coffin jumped into the air.

“Ziwu.”

Cao Guangshan, ever the policeman, reacted faster than the rest of us. When I glanced over, I saw he’d already grabbed the can of gasoline, the lid off and ready. His intention was clear. I gave a nod, and he immediately poured the gasoline over the coffin.

Burning the coffin—it seemed there was no other way left to us.

I’d thought that when the oil lamp went out and my grandmother’s coffin touched the earth, I’d fulfilled her last request. But I hadn’t expected things to change so drastically after all.

Burning the coffin, destroying the corpse—was this what Grandmother meant by a doomed end?

In the days I’d been exposed to the arcane, what struck me most was the inescapable web of cause and effect. I’d learned that once you set foot on this path, the more you meddle, the more tangled your fate becomes, and the punishments you face can be as inexplicable as they are severe.

I’d once heard fortune-tellers say that heaven’s secrets mustn’t be revealed, and those who do pay with crippled legs or blinded eyes. I’d always found such talk absurd. But after the months spent learning from Grandmother, I had to admit: some things, unseen, truly do exist.

Some truths, if left unspoken, never disturb the course of things; if revealed, they can change everything, just like the fabled butterfly effect.

The sounds from within the coffin grew more frantic—struggling, pounding. It was clear Grandmother was trying to break out. Xu Buhuo was gone, and though I’d studied for nearly half a year, most of my experience was from books. If she really burst free, I didn’t know if I could stop her.

“Burn it.”

I gritted my teeth and gave the command, knowing there was no other choice.

Gasoline soaked the coffin as Shi Tou tossed in a burning cloth strip, and the flames roared instantly to life. I turned away, counting steps as I went, retreating fifty paces as Grandmother had instructed.

The wind around us suddenly whipped up, wild and fierce.

With my spiritual sight, I saw it clearly: ghostly energies, cold and dense, were surging toward the burning coffin.

Yin energy is frigid. I watched as the once-fierce flames began to wither under the pressure of the ghostly wind, shrinking ever smaller.

Shi Tou and the others looked alarmed, asking if we should go help, since at this rate, the fire would soon die on its own.

The coffin was thick and needed time to burn through. If the fire went out, Grandmother, now risen, would escape all the more easily.

Grandmother had warned that once the flames were lit, we must retreat. But because the lamp had extinguished at the same moment her coffin hit the ground, we’d hesitated—unsure whether to burn the coffin—and missed the best opportunity.

Now it was burning, there was no turning back. I steeled myself, grabbed the gasoline, and ordered the others to gather dry grass and branches.

At the graveside, even standing a mere meter from the blazing coffin, I felt no heat—almost as if there were no fire at all.

Pouring gasoline directly onto the flames was dangerous. I spotted the old cart nearby, doused it with gasoline, and shoved it over the grave. Using the hoe as a hammer, I smashed the cart to pieces. It had served our family for fifteen years, battered by wind and sun, and the wood broke apart easily.

The flames swelled higher. Now, so close to the blaze, I could hear Grandmother pounding desperately within the coffin. The sealed lid was shaking loose under her blows. I saw her fingers reach through the widening cracks.

In just a day, her nails had grown five or six centimeters, like those of a corpse in some horror film. When the flames licked at them, she recoiled sharply.

This was the price of a doomed end.

Every path demands its price. I was grateful that Grandmother had shown signs of unrest before we’d buried her. Otherwise, if she’d broken free after we’d left, I dared not imagine the consequences.

It was winter, and there was no shortage of dry branches and stalks. Cao Guangshan and the others brought armfuls, which I tossed into the grave.

The ghostly wind kept swirling, centered on the grave—a wind that, in defiance of nature, only smothered the flames further.

Taking turns, the four of us scoured the area for anything flammable, feeding the fire and fighting against the ghostly wind’s chill. Every moment was tense, our nerves stretched taut by the constant threat of the fire going out.

As the coffin burned through, Grandmother’s hand burst out, sharp-nailed and blackened by the flames, sending up clouds of oily smoke and a stench so foul it made my skin crawl.

Her shrill, inhuman howls made my scalp prickle. Cao Guangshan gripped his hoe, ready to strike at any moment.

We waited, tense and silent, as her screams slowly faded, until at last the hand itself caught fire. The ghostly wind ebbed away, and the blaze flared up, burning hotter and brighter.

At last I felt the searing heat. I let out a long breath, staggered back, and collapsed to the ground, dazed and spent.

By the time the fire died down, the sky was tinged with dawn. Exhausted, we buried the ashes and left the mountain.

Back home, my mother had not slept all night. When we returned, she greeted us with relief, hurried to boil water for us to wash, and then set about preparing food.

After eating, Cao Guangshan left on urgent business. Fatty and Shi Tou collapsed into bed at my house, sleeping until afternoon before heading home.

Mother had gathered offerings for the grave, and together we climbed the mountain again to pay respects. On the way, she asked what had happened the night before. I told her everything. She looked at me, uneasy.

“Ziwu, I don’t object to you learning these things from your grandmother. But I still hope you won’t get too deeply involved. It’s better to find a stable job, get married, live a peaceful life.”

I nodded, resigned. How many could truly understand?

Who doesn’t long for a quiet life? If I had never studied fate, I might have believed it was possible to escape. But now I had to admit—destiny is written, and heaven’s will is hard to defy.

Some things, once written into your fate, cannot be avoided. If it’s meant to happen, it will find you no matter how you hide. If not, all your toil and struggle will be for nothing.

For eighteen years, though I’d watched Grandmother summon spirits and deities for others, I’d never wanted to learn her craft. Yet in the end, one single event set me irrevocably on this path.

I understood Mother’s worries. I had my own plans, too: if ever I could withdraw from all this, I certainly would. But for now, it was impossible. There was still no word of Xu Buhuo.

Six months had passed since his disappearance, not a single clue. I couldn’t guess if he was alive or dead, but I told myself there had to be an answer, one way or another.

Before, I’d been unable to search because I had to learn from Grandmother. Now that she was gone, I’d spent half a year at home—I knew it was time to leave and look for him.

I told Mother my intention. She said nothing, but the next day she handed me a bank card. Inside was all the money Grandmother had earned over the years helping others and the family’s savings—one hundred thousand yuan—for me to use as I started out.

A thin card, yet it weighed heavily on my heart.

In the end, I didn’t take it with me. I withdrew five thousand for travel and living expenses, leaving the rest for Mother. These were hard-earned, even life-bought, and I didn’t know how long I’d be gone.

The world is unpredictable, and this path is fraught with dangers. One misstep and it could all be over. But I was an adult now, able to earn my own way.

Fatty and Shi Tou knew I was leaving to search for Xu Buhuo. On my last night home, we drank and talked deep into the night, not sleeping until dawn.

“If you need anything, just call.”

Those were their parting words. I nodded and walked away, never looking back.

My first stop was the town’s police station to find Cao Guangshan. Since Xu Buhuo vanished, I’d asked him to investigate, hoping for any clue—just a direction to start would be better than searching blindly.

When I arrived, he and his colleagues were in a meeting. I waited in the courtyard, and when he came out, I saw at once that he looked exhausted.

“There’s a strange case,” he told me, his face pale, as if he’d lost a night’s sleep over it.

A strange case—the official term for incidents riddled with inexplicable elements that defy logic and stall investigation. Grandmother had once explained that such cases often involved wrathful spirits or dark arts.

“Is it related to that... side of things?” I asked, curious. Grandmother had told me that now, what I needed most was hands-on experience. Out in the world, if I heard anything odd, I should investigate—not necessarily intervene, but at least observe and learn.

Cao Guangshan knew exactly what I meant. He hesitated, then said, “I’m not sure. It feels like it is, but also like it isn’t.”

His uncertainty only convinced me more—this must be connected to the supernatural. I pressed for details. He seemed eager for my input, so he began to explain.

The case was bizarre because of the impossible manner of death.

The deceased was Zhou Shun, a layabout from the north end of town, twenty-five years old. The coroner determined he had drowned.

If Zhou Shun had been found in a pond, there’d be nothing odd about it. But he died at home.

The doors and windows were shut tight. From the evidence, he’d been alone in the house, lying on the sofa—drowned. As if someone had covered his head with a bag of water.

Alone, on his own sofa, drowned, with the room sealed.

Instinctively, I thought of deadly feng shui.