The next morning, sporting huge dark circles under our eyes, all the staff of Huangliang Yimeng welcomed the second day of business.
Even though the dine-in set meal price had returned to 55 yuan on the second day, the shop’s business hadn’t become bleak at all. Starting from 10:30 AM, all six tables were full, and by noon the queue had reached number 25. Han Sha, who hadn’t slept all night, was still efficient at collecting money, but his complexion was far from good when taking photos with customers—clearly suffering from kidney overdraft. Even so, the young girls in the shop secretly called it “Master Daoist putting on airs.”
Standing in the back kitchen, listening to the commotion up front, my mood was very complicated.
Huangliang Yimeng had become internet famous. Within a day, the news of “haunted house owner taken away while performing ritual on opening day” had spread across Weibo. My social death had brought endless streams of customers, but…
“The saying ‘rooster’s crow drives away evil spirits’ means that during the day, her activities won’t be very frequent. As long as we don’t enter that bathroom, there shouldn’t be big problems. However, vengeful spirits lingering around malevolent sites all hate strangers. In other words, the more people come during the day, the more restless it will be at night.”
Remembering Han Sha’s words, I absentmindedly placed two cakes on the serving plate. After hesitating for a while, I pulled out an old photo from my phone. The woman in it was smearing cream on five-year-old me’s nose, laughing heartily.
Having come this far, it would be too much of a waste to give up now, right… Mom?
As I put the photo away, the last impulse to give up in my heart also died down. Of course, the final reason I decided to keep the shop running wasn’t just this. Besides the big heart I’d developed from seven failures, the rest of the story has to start from last night.
Song Nanshi’s objection came quite suddenly. For a moment I even suspected she had studied Daoism, because being this much of a blockhead, I’d believe it if someone told me this girl had spent the first half of her life drinking dew on mountains.
Han Sha also hadn’t expected Song Nanshi to suddenly speak up and was stunned: “How so?”
Song Nanshi said: “When I worked at the funeral home, privately everyone would tell stories they’d experienced or heard about. That story was told by my master—about a corpse he handled when he was young… also a haunted house.”
If it were anyone else telling me such a story at 3 AM in a haunted house, I would have wanted to press their head into the stand mixer and whip them to dry peaks. However, this person happened to be Song Nanshi.
If Bai Liu had eight hundred schemes, Song Nanshi had at most two. Even the cat I used to have was better at lying than her.
Concerning the life and death of Huangliang Yimeng, despite the very inappropriate timing, the four of us still had to sit down at the table. Song Nanshi then began speaking somewhat nervously.
She said her master’s surname was Liang, who could be simply called Old Liang in the story. When Old Liang taught Song Nanshi, he was already over sixty, a retired employee rehired by Yu Jiang Funeral Home, and quite a famous “tailor” in the industry.
Obviously, a mortician who only knew makeup couldn’t be called a tailor. Old Liang earned this glorious title because he was extremely skilled at handling fragmented corpses. In his forties, he had even spent over ten hours piecing together remains from a wood chipper, showing his superb craftsmanship.
As a mortician, Old Liang’s courage was naturally unquestionable, but even so, if you asked Old Liang what the most terrifying thing he’d encountered in his career was, his answer was always the same.
It was still the 1980s when Old Liang was assigned to Yu Jiang Funeral Home not long ago. One deep night he suddenly received a call from Batou Branch, requesting him to collect corpses at a private residence.
According to the criminal police on the phone, there were five deceased: the male head of household, the female head of household, their two children, and the man’s mother. The data showed the deceased weren’t Yu Jiang locals and had just moved into this house recently. The cause of death was hanging, and the time of death was most likely that morning.
From the beginning, Old Liang felt something was wrong. After all, adults might have many reasons to hang themselves, but how could children follow suit in suicide? Moreover, with five family members all dead, no one discovered it for an entire day, but someone reported it in the middle of the night?
With a belly full of questions, Old Liang followed several people working the night shift to the scene. As soon as he entered, he immediately felt a chill run straight up his spine and couldn’t help but look away.
In the house, the bodies of the family of five hung quietly from the living room beam. Except for the youngest girl, everyone’s hands and feet were tied behind their backs with electrical wire. Because of this, when death came, they couldn’t use their fingers to claw at the noose like ordinary hanging victims. Unable to move their limbs, they could only violently shake their bodies. Due to the intense struggling, the entire beam was crisscrossed with black marks left by the electrical wire sheathing.
After seeing the scene, Old Liang’s feeling of wrongness became overwhelming. He couldn’t help asking: “Are we sure this was suicide? No autopsy needed?”
The detective at the scene shook his head wearily: “Three groups of people have looked at it. We only called you after confirming it was suicide.”
Old Liang persisted: “Are we sure the children also committed suicide? They weren’t forcibly carried up by their parents?”
The detective said helplessly: “Master, the places you find problematic, we definitely also find suspicious, but the fact is, these two children died last. The reason only the little girl’s hands and feet had no wire was because she was the last to hang herself up, with no coercion.”
“What do you mean?” Old Liang’s heart turned cold.
The detective’s brow was deeply furrowed, his expression equally ugly: “According to evidence left at the scene, the electrical wire on the ceiling was hung by the father. Based on each person’s different height, the wire lengths also varied. The wire on the father’s, mother’s, and grandmother’s hands and feet all had the 13-year-old older daughter’s fingerprints. The older daughter should have helped them tie their hands first, then tied their feet after standing on a stool. After that, the older daughter’s rope only had the little girl’s fingerprints, meaning the little girl helped her complete the binding. Finally, the little girl herself stood on the stool…”
These few sentences chilled Old Liang to the bone. He opened his mouth and asked one last question: “So there were no traces of a sixth person… who reported the police?”
The detective looked at him meaningfully: “A real estate agent.”
Because it was so late that night, all the police officers at the scene were exhausted. Old Liang couldn’t ask more questions and could only transport the bodies back first.
Originally they said family members would come the next day to discuss funeral arrangements, but the next day the funeral home received a call saying the family members were too grief-stricken from losing five relatives at once and couldn’t come. They hoped the funeral home could go directly to get photos of the deceased from their lifetime to help with makeup.
Old Liang was still young then, so naturally he couldn’t escape this errand work. However, for some reason, after Old Liang’s master took the call, his expression became very ugly. As soon as he hung up, Old Liang heard his master say to someone nearby: “That house again.”
“That house?” Old Liang was stunned.
His master didn’t explain much to Old Liang, only saying he would go together. The two went out and took a public bus, finally arriving near Shuanglong Ridge in Batou District.
This place was only one or two kilometers from the residence where they’d collected corpses last night. Old Liang originally thought these were two families living nearby, but on the way his master told him this place was the old house of that family of five. They had just moved recently, and even old photos were still stored in the original house.
Who moves and then has the whole family commit suicide?
Old Liang became more puzzled, but his master’s expression was poor, so he didn’t dare ask more questions. They walked all the way to the door of a bungalow. Old Liang was about to knock, but his master suddenly stopped him, bent down to pick up a stone, and threw it at the wooden door of the bungalow.
“Master?”
Old Liang had never seen his old-fashioned master do something so outrageous and was stunned. Before he could react, his master threw two more stones.
Thud thud.
A woman’s voice came from inside: “Master, please come in and talk. I’m not well so I won’t come out to greet you. The door isn’t locked, just push and it will open.”
After speaking, there were two coughs. Old Liang felt bad and wanted to go forward, but once again, his master stopped him.
“Can’t go in.”
His master said quietly: “I brought you here to learn. In the future, if you encounter such suspicious deaths and family members insist you come to their door, you must make them come out of the house. Don’t go in yourself.”
“What do you mean…”
Old Liang still didn’t understand. Then the woman in the house spoke again: “Master, please come in quickly. I’ve already poured water, and it’ll get cold if you don’t come soon.”
This time, Old Liang finally heard something wrong.
This woman’s voice was really strange… clearly she had asked them to come because of overwhelming grief, but her tone had no sadness whatsoever, nor any enthusiasm. From beginning to end, she sounded like she was reading from a script.
Unable to resist, Old Liang glanced at his master. The old master’s brow was tightly furrowed as he threw another stone at the door and shouted: “If it’s inconvenient for you, just pass the photos through the door crack. We have other work today too. You can just call later to tell us the specific requirements.”
This time, no one spoke inside the house.
After waiting a while, a leather envelope was thrown out from the door crack. His master gestured for Old Liang to get it. He walked forward nervously, and when he bent down, he couldn’t help glancing into the door crack.
It would have been fine if he hadn’t looked, but one look made Old Liang’s blood run cold.
Through the door crack, there was a pair of eyes staring straight at him, full of bloodshot veins.
In an instant, Old Liang screamed in fright and crawled back to his master’s side. The old master didn’t ask what he’d seen, just grabbed him and quickly left the house.
It wasn’t until they were on the bus back that Old Liang, still chilled by the memory of those eyes, couldn’t help asking: “Master, just now I saw…”
“You should have seen someone guarding the door, just waiting for us to go in.”
The old master was looking through the photos in the leather envelope—a family portrait of five people. What should have been a happy memory now seemed ominously sinister with their smiles.
Old Liang didn’t understand: “Why did she insist we go in?”
The old master glanced at him lightly and suddenly said: “Do you know this is already my third time coming to this house? I think it’s also for this reason that the real estate agent reported to the police.”
Old Liang was stunned, then got goosebumps: “You mean…”
The old master said: “The previous two times were two years ago and three years ago… The people in the house all died unnatural deaths. Some say this place is unclean, that tenants die from time to time. Locals don’t dare live there, so the landlord was planning to sell the house to outsiders. Do you remember this family of five’s situation?”
Old Liang swallowed: “They moved to Yu Jiang a year ago…”
The old master nodded: “A family came to the local area to make a living. They finally bought a house, so why would they easily sell it? Moreover, they hadn’t even sold this old house yet when they hurriedly moved into the new home.”
Old Liang couldn’t speak anymore. After choking for a while, he asked: “Then why do you think that family of five died? Was the person inside the door just now… a family member?”
The old master put the photos back in the leather envelope, was silent for a while, then asked him a question in return.
“Do you think that thing inside just now was more frightening as a person, or as a ghost?”