At noon, in the chaotic burial mound on the eastern outskirts of Ancheng, a small, thin man trembled incessantly. He was looking at his own hand.
The thin man’s gaze was filled with fear—despair, unspeakable fear. His gaze trembled along with his body!
His hand slightly opened, extended flat. In his hand was a softly smiling human face—absolutely gorgeous, captivating. The human face was printed on a fan painting. The fan painting lay in the center of the thin man’s palm, and the thin man’s gaze was fixed on the smile of the exquisitely beautiful woman in the fan painting.
The scorching sunlight was shining directly down, yet cold sweat poured from the man’s forehead. His throat rolled once, his body suddenly convulsed—it moved, it moved, it moved again! In the man’s horrified gaze, the surface of the fan painting rippled with something unusual. The exquisitely beautiful countenance of the woman in the painting slowly, gently turned around. Her slender figure flowed and turned within the man’s pupils. Beyond this, on the back of the woman’s head, a second face appeared prominently. A pitch-black visage, bright red features, deathly pale teeth, a lolling long tongue—this was no longer a human face, but a terrifying ghost face that made one’s heart jump!
The thin man’s face convulsed violently. He struggled to throw away the fan painting in his hand, but no matter how hard he tried, the fan painting seemed to have grown onto his palm and could not be cast off. The thin man’s forehead was covered with cold sweat. He opened his mouth wanting to cry for help, but the words he wanted to say got stuck right at his throat and he could not produce a single sound.
In the thin man’s desperate line of sight, on the fan painting, that ghost face composed of black, red, and white colors grinned hideously. A pair of hands made of white bones spat out from the ghost face’s mouth, piercing through the fan surface, winding like snakes toward the thin man’s neck. The man’s eyes opened wide in rage, but he had no power to resist. The man let out a desperate low roar as a hand gripped his throat.
The hand was ice-cold, yet smooth and delicate, like an infant’s skin. The thin man opened his tightly closed eyes in astonishment. Before his eyes appeared the face of an exquisitely beautiful young woman, wearing an emerald green lotus dress like lake water, her face flushed red as she stared at the man. The man lowered his head again and only then saw that what gripped his neck was not any withered bone hand at all, but his own hand. The man had one hand gripping his own throat, while the other was clutching the slender hand extended by the green-clothed young woman, grasping it tightly.
The green-clothed young woman said coldly: “Won’t you let go?”
The thin man hurriedly released his hand. As soon as his hand let go, something fell and struck his foot—it was that extremely strange fan painting. The man’s heart jumped, but fortunately, at this moment, the fan painting had already closed up.
The green-clothed young woman forcefully wiped her hand with a handkerchief, her face full of bad luck as she said: “How disgusting. I thought you were going to commit suicide in this graveyard, so I kindly reached out to save your life. I didn’t expect you were faking suicide and actually wanted to take liberties with me. But unfortunately, you found the wrong person.”
The green-clothed young woman stepped forward, grabbed the man’s shoulder clothing with one hand, and lifted the man up like an eagle catching a chick. Cold as ice and frost, she said: “Come, follow me to the yamen. I’m going to beat you with the board.”
“No, no, young lady, you misunderstood. I didn’t want to take liberties with you—it’s not like that… please let me explain.” No matter how the thin man explained, the green-clothed young woman paid no attention. The thin man really did not know what else to say and blurted out: “You—who exactly are you?”
Unexpectedly, as soon as these words came out, the green-clothed young woman’s complexion suddenly changed, from cold as ice and frost to radiant as spring. The young woman turned her gaze and smiled: “You’re asking who I am, right?”
The thin man nodded at a loss.
“Remember this—my name is Xue Ling’er, and I’m a constable.” The young woman Xue Ling’er said charmingly.
“A constable? You’re a constable?” The thin man suddenly jumped up, his expression excited as he said: “Constables are good, constables are good! Young lady, quickly save me—there’s… something that wants to kill me. It wants to put me to death! Quickly save me!”
“Who wants to kill you?” Xue Ling’er’s expression became solemn as she asked.
“It!” The thin man pointed with his hand, pointing at his own feet. Xue Ling’er’s gaze fell down. There, there was only a fan.
At dusk, Ancheng was as silent as a giant black beast. One could only hear the violent waves of the Black River outside the city, like the low roar of a black beast.
In the gloomy courtyard, a tall, thin figure seemed like a bat of the dark night, moving lightly and keenly through the garden paths and rockeries. The figure paused slightly, then had already moved several zhang away. Finally, the figure stopped, slightly raising its head. Before it was a pitch-black, cold stone house.
The figure extended its hand, reaching for the door lock. The black house door lock fell to the ground. The figure flashed into the black house, walking straight to a wooden bed in the deepest part of the black house. The wooden bed was covered with a corpse cloth. The figure unhesitatingly lifted the corpse cloth. Under the corpse cloth, a face was smiling right at him.
“I’ve been waiting for you for a long time.” Li Si performed a kite flip from the bed, leaped up, swung his fist, and struck toward the figure’s chest.
The figure had not expected there to be a living person under the corpse cloth. In just a brief moment, the figure had recovered its senses, avoided Li Si’s fist momentum, and the entire person jumped backward like a stiff corpse, fleeing toward the outside of the black house, escaping from the corpse-storage room.
The figure had just jumped out of the corpse-storage room when a person slowly walked out from the nearby bushes, his face ice-cold, golden light slightly flashing at his waist. Xuan Yuanshan was never a talkative person. Seeing the figure, his golden blade was drawn out, covering the figure’s head like heaven splitting and earth cracking.
The figure turned and leaped onto the roof of the corpse-storage room, its form jumping like an agile monkey onto a tree not far away. With another jump, it landed on top of a rockery. But once Xuan Yuanshan’s golden blade was drawn, it would not be sheathed without seeing blood. The golden blade seemed alive—no matter how the figure fled, it always remained within the blade’s range.
The figure drew closer and closer. Xuan Yuanshan glimpsed his withered, thin back. Xuan Yuanshan gave a cold shout, and the golden blade finally slashed out. With a loud “bang,” the golden blade shattered a crescent moon wall.
The figure that had attacked at night stood quietly at a short distance away. Xuan Yuanshan’s gaze looked at him, growing colder bit by bit, then becoming disbelieving. Xuan Yuanshan saw a door—a pitch-black door. The door slowly opened, and the figure merged bit by bit into the door and disappeared.
When Li Si caught up, Xuan Yuanshan was still in a daze. Li Si asked: “Where’s the person?”
“Escaped.”
“Escaped? How is that possible? He couldn’t possibly escape from under your golden blade.”
Xuan Yuanshan shook his head, pointing at a white wall before him and said: “Because a door suddenly appeared, and he escaped through the door.”
“A door?” Li Si turned his gaze, looking at the empty white wall. In his heart, he suddenly recalled what Yu Laotou had said about that door—that ghost gate!
“I don’t know exactly what happened, but I won’t see wrongly. It was a door—a pitch-black door.” Xuan Yuanshan raised his head, gazing at the starry sky, slowly saying: “Li Si, now we’re really in trouble.”
Li Si let out a heavy sigh.
Li Si sat steadily. Xuan Yuanshan looked at him, slowly saying: “Treating me to noodles again?”
Li Si shook his head. He and Xuan Yuanshan had come again to Yu Laotou’s noodle shop—right behind the corpse-storage room. Li Si looked at Yu Laotou bringing noodles from behind and said: “It’s eating noodles, but it’s not me treating you—it’s you treating me. Because you, this fellow, didn’t help me catch the person.”
“I already said, that figure hid inside that black door.” Xuan Yuanshan said indifferently.
Yu Laotou, bringing the noodles, heard the two words “black door” and his body trembled. The noodles he was holding nearly tipped over. Li Si hurriedly took them. Yu Laotou wiped the sweat from the tip of his nose and turned back to the counter.
Li Si placed the noodles before himself and Xuan Yuanshan, saying: “Naturally, I can’t blame you for this. But if it had been me at the time, I definitely would have chased into that black door. Even if there really were ghosts, I would catch them and ask why they keep appearing in this world again and again to harm people.”
Hearing this, Xuan Yuanshan was stunned. After a long while, he said: “That’s right, you would do that. We two are different. Sometimes, I really envy your lack of scruples.”
“I also envy you—forever so calm.” Li Si said with a smile.
“Forget it, let’s eat the noodles, or they’ll get mushy.” Xuan Yuanshan suddenly smiled. This time, Li Si felt his smile didn’t look so bad. So this ice-cold fellow could smile too.
Xuan Yuanshan ate noodles very slowly and very carefully, as if wanting to taste every single noodle strand. He ate a few mouthfuls, didn’t raise his head, and asked: “There’s one thing I don’t understand. Did you know early on that the killer would come to steal the corpse?”
Li Si swallowed the noodles, gulping down almost half a bowl in one bite, wrapping them in his mouth and chewing vigorously. After a while, he said: “After this killer seized the skin of the first victim, I kept my attention on it. When Zhan Xin was killed, although I wasn’t certain he would come, I made preparations. If we could catch a turtle in a jar, that wouldn’t be bad.”
“The first victim—that was the swordsman called Nan Jian?”
“That’s him. He really was miserable enough. Not only was he literally scared to death, but after death, even his skin was peeled off by the killer.” Li Si shook his head slightly, swallowing noodles in large mouthfuls.
“This doesn’t quite make sense. Since the killer killed the victims, why didn’t he peel off the deceased’s skin at the first opportunity? Why wait until it was discovered by the county yamen, then steal the corpse from the corpse-storage room to peel the skin? Moreover, why does this killer want to peel off the deceased’s skin? Can’t figure it out.”
“If you can’t figure it out, don’t think about it, or your head will hurt.” Li Si said this, paused, then said again: “However, I did think of one reason.”
“What reason?”
“The killer may have already had the plan to peel off the deceased’s human skin. As for why he waited until the county yamen got involved, then committed the crime from the corpse-storage room, I speculate… it might be to make things bigger, to make people who might not notice this matter notice it.” Li Si ate noodles quickly, but his speech slowed down.
“To attract attention—whose attention?” Xuan Yuanshan said, full of questions.
“That, I don’t know.”
Li Si finished the noodles before him. Xuan Yuanshan looked at his own bowl—he had only eaten a small half—his expression helpless.
The more Li Si felt at a loss for solutions, the hungrier he felt. This was a not-good, not-bad habit he had developed since coming to Ancheng. He turned around to call Yu Laotou, wanting another bowl of noodles. But after calling several times, Yu Laotou never responded.
Li Si’s face darkened as he stood up and said: “Something’s not right.”
Li Si lifted the curtain and walked out through the back door of the noodle shop, discovering Yu Laotou standing dumbly in the center of the courtyard, his back to him. Xuan Yuanshan also followed out. Li Si asked: “Yu Lao, what’s wrong with you?”
Yu Laotou seemed not to hear, his gaze fixed on a certain spot, murmuring: “This… how is this possible?”
Li Si came to Yu Laotou’s side, standing shoulder to shoulder, and also looked in the direction of Yu Laotou’s gaze. The dead tree where the black door had suddenly appeared last night, at this moment, like fireworks, had burst forth with new buds all over its body. Li Si looked at the vigorously growing green life and felt an inexplicable fear in his heart. In just one day, in just one day, how had this tree that had long become deadwood regained new life? Moreover, at this time when winter was not yet over, tree buds were appearing—how could this be understood? The dead tree was now full of vitality. It seemed that every moment, new tender green buds would emerge. In this increasingly dense mass of green buds, Li Si hazily glimpsed two high black doors hidden within, quietly opening…
“Smack!” A hand abruptly landed on Li Si’s shoulder. Li Si jumped slightly in fright. Turning his head, he saw it was Constable Feng Cheng. Feng Cheng looked at the somewhat tense Li Si and asked: “Head Constable Li, what’s wrong with you?”
Li Si smiled bitterly: “Nothing. You came to find me—did something happen at the yamen?”
Feng Cheng smiled and said: “Actually, it’s not really a county yamen matter. It’s just that tomorrow is the great joyous day when our Ancheng’s magistrate, Lord Huai Cheng, marries off his daughter. Lord Huai specifically asked me to deliver an invitation to Head Constable Li, requesting that Head Constable Li absolutely must honor us with your presence tonight no matter what. Head Constable Li, this is the invitation.”
Li Si received the invitation from Feng Cheng’s hand and said definitively: “A good thing. These past days, I’ve been frantically busy with the murder case. I should indeed use this joyous event to dispel some bad luck. Constable Feng, I will definitely go. Not only will I go, but my friend from the capital will also go along.”
Hearing this, Xuan Yuanshan shook his head with a bitter smile.
Feng Cheng received a satisfactory reply, turned to leave, walked two steps, then turned back and said: “Oh yes, there’s one more thing.” Feng Cheng shifted his gaze from Li Si to Xuan Yuanshan and said: “It’s about Head Constable Li’s friend here. Just now, an old man came to the county yamen, saying he wanted to find Head Constable Li’s friend here, and asked me to pass this to you.”
Xuan Yuanshan received the item Feng Cheng handed over. The item was wrapped in black silk. Unwrapping it, inside was a small silvery badge. On the badge, four characters were engraved in dignified ancient seal script—Liufeng Hall · Sui.
Xuan Yuanshan stared at the characters on the silver badge. Even his steady, ice-cold countenance could not help but change color as he said: “He’s come.”
“Who’s come?” Li Si leaned over and asked.
“‘Shattered peace, all under heaven at peace.’ The Crown Prince’s residence, one of the four great masters of Liufeng Hall—’Sui’—Ge Chong.”
“Ge Chong—how did he arrive in Ancheng so quickly?” Li Si’s expression tightened, but then he smiled and said: “That’s fine too. This matter can’t be hidden from them anyway. It’s better to let these people get involved. Perhaps we can stir up this muddy water even muddier and make those fish hiding in the water come up to the surface and blow some bubbles.”
The group of people left in a hurry. Yu Laotou also returned to the noodle shop. In the empty courtyard, only the tree that had died and come back to life remained. The tree struggled, straightening up bit by bit its originally bent waist. A cold wind blew, and the tree buds all trembled together, like countless opened mouths laughing eerily.