Yi Sa called Ding Xi outside.

Chen Tu also returned to his room and, before leaving instructed Zong Hang to remember to get up early tomorrow – he would send him off before dawn, using the darkness as cover.

Zong Hang quickly nodded.

Everyone had left, with only him remaining in the room. Zong Hang lay down on the floor mattress, but couldn’t stay still for more than a few seconds before sitting up again, his gaze peering through the half-open door crack to the outside.

From this angle, he could see Yi Sa and Ding Xi standing by the platform in the distance.

Zong Hang felt a bit melancholic. He had talked for so long, his mouth dry, but in the end, Yi Sa hadn’t praised him once and instead pulled Ding Xi outside to talk.

Previously when he looked at Ding Xi, he always thought he was a peeping tom who didn’t seem like a good person. Today was strange – he found him talented and mature. Standing there, he even matched well with Yi Sa.

Zong Hang felt dejected but soon became excited again.

At least he had helped, had made an achievement – when Yi Sa listened to him speak, she had been looking at him very attentively.

Zong Hang felt delighted inside, unconsciously resting his chin on his hand.

The moment he did so, extreme pain shot through – wrong move, he had had a tooth pulled, and half his face was swollen!

His mood instantly plummeted to rock bottom: he had no good qualities, his face was the only decent thing about him, and he had shown Yi Sa his swollen side.

Yi Sa hadn’t spoken for a while.

She lit a wooden smoke stick, and smoked for a bit before remembering Ding Xi: “Want one?”

Ding Xi smiled: “No need, not used to it.”

Yi Sa made a sound of acknowledgment, lost in her thoughts. After a while, she frowned and reminded him: “Stand more inside, don’t get dragged down again.”

Ding Xi looked at his feet, realizing he was too close to the edge.

He moved inward a bit.

Yi Sa twirled the smoke stick between her fingers, finally getting to the main topic: “After hearing all that, what do you think?”

Ding Xi said: “Haven’t figured out the thread yet. What about you? You should be more familiar with these things than me.”

Yi Sa pondered for a moment: “Have you heard of Corpse-Nurturing Ground?”

Ding Xi nodded.

In some Chinese horror novels, “Corpse-Nurturing Ground” was written as places where buried people would turn into zombies, but that wasn’t accurate: China is so vast, with soil types, earth qi, humidity, and underground chemical element content varying greatly by region, so naturally buried bodies would be in different states.

In most places, corpses followed natural laws – first decomposing, then turning to white bones, and after more years, the bones would weather and become brittle.

But there were always some almost bizarre places: like corpses buried there would continue growing nails and hair, or wouldn’t rot or decay, with faces remaining lifelike.

Yi Sa said: “I suspect there’s a Corpse-Nurturing Water at the bottom of this lake.”

Corpse-Nurturing Water was essentially an underwater Corpse-Nurturing Ground. The character “yuan” carried both the sound and meaning of “abyss”, implying “water within water”, with the ancient meaning being “whirlpool water”.

Ding Xi looked up at her: “Suspect? You live on this lake, you don’t know?”

Yi Sa sneered: “Look how big this lake is. You live by the Yellow River, have you figured out everything at its bottom?”

There was some impatience in her tone, feeling that Ding Xi’s intelligence probably hadn’t improved since 1996.

Corpse-nurturing water was hard to find. Simply put, it was “water within water” – finding water in water was like finding soil in soil, an extremely difficult task.

The Three Water Ghost Families had a way to determine if an underwater area was Corpse-Nurturing Water – by releasing fish.

Fish swimming underwater would turn back or avoid Corpse-Nurturing Water – unlike in soil, there were many living creatures underwater that could eat corpses. Corpse-Nurturing Water had higher requirements than Corpse-Nurturing Ground: it not only had to ensure sunken corpses wouldn’t decay but also had to prevent disturbance from fish and other living creatures.

So Corpse-Nurturing Water had another nickname called “Where Fish Won’t Go.”

However, this fish-releasing method only worked in small confined water areas. It couldn’t be applied to something as vast as Tonle Sap Lake.

Yi Sa said: “We should have thought of it earlier. Ma You’s clothes were so badly decayed, yet her body was preserved so well – it’s because Corpse-Nurturing Water preserves people but not clothing materials.”

So clothes soaked in water would decay as they normally would.

Ding Xi had a thought: “Then Scarface and his group’s disappearance – could it be they had bad luck, wanted to sink Ma You in the lake, but accidentally stumbled upon Corpse-Nurturing Water during the Yin hours, inadvertently performing a ‘living sacrifice’ and blasting the water void?”

Yi Sa nodded.

In ancient times, some people preferred “water burial” over earth burial.

This water burial didn’t mean building a tomb underwater. Speaking, as earth burial uses soil to bury, water burial uses water to bury, also called coffin-sinking in Corpse-Nurturing Water.

Corpse-nurturing water was an enclosed “water mass” in the deep waters. You couldn’t see it because no one could distinguish water from water. Fish could help identify it, but even after identification, people couldn’t enter it because the “water void” was a natural barrier that rarely accepted living things. If you tried to dive in, this water mass would suddenly create whirlpools, even move and migrate. If you tried to sink a coffin from the water surface, it would slide off the edge of the water mass.

However, these difficulties couldn’t stop the Three Water Ghost Families. After years of exploration and attempts, they finally devised a method – using living sacrifice to blast the water void.

The operation was quite complex.

The timing had to be chosen on an auspicious day suitable for “setting the bed,” during the calm Yin hours of midnight.

On the water surface, they would use “frame-pulling” to mark out the safe range corresponding to the Corpse-Nurturing Water.

The frame-puller was a wooden tool with many joints that could be folded when not in use and extended into a square floating frame when needed. Lead weights at the four corners were used for fixing, and the upward-facing wooden surface had connected grooves – pour in oil, light it with fire, and it would burn into a fire frame.

The area enclosed by the fire frame was like crime scene tape, all boats had to stay outside the fire frame for safety.

Once everything was prepared, they would first float a clay bowl made from riverbed mud into the fire frame, containing the blood of the person to be used as a living sacrifice. When the bowl floated to the center, they would shoot it with an arrow with its head removed, letting the blood spill into the water.

If the blood diffused normally in the water, it meant this wouldn’t work. But if the blood was absorbed and sank underwater, it meant the Corpse-Nurturing Water had accepted it, and they could proceed with the living sacrifice.

When the living sacrifice entered the water, there would be roaring like thunder underwater, and the water surface would instantly cave into a rapid whirlpool, lasting no more than a minute. People on the surrounding boats had to use this moment to accurately position and slide the coffin in using wooden poles and boards, only then would the water burial be considered complete.

Moreover, this water mass wasn’t permanently fixed underwater – with water surges and waves, it would migrate with the coffin, moving deeper and deeper, becoming safer the deeper it went.

This method of sinking coffins in Corpse-Nurturing Water, Yi Sa had only heard about but never seen. It was said that in the early Ming Dynasty, the Three Water Ghost Families had established family rules to no longer accept water burial jobs: firstly because Corpse-Nurturing Water was too hard to find, and even when found, you couldn’t be sure when it would “run away”; secondly, the ancestors felt that exchanging one life for another – killing one person to bury another – was too cruel and would harm their karma.

She said: “Let’s assume Scarface planned to sink Ma You alive in the lake, but by accident, the position where they stopped the boat happened to be right above a Corpse-Nurturing Water.”

Ding Xi continued: “They might have tortured Ma You beforehand, her blood dripped into the lake first, then she was sunk – coincidentally following the living sacrifice procedure, blasting the water void.”

At the time, that boat was stopped in the center. With the instantaneous power of a water void blast, tearing apart and crushing a small fishing boat wasn’t difficult.

The process was very short, and quickly returned to calm. Even if people nearby heard the commotion and came over, they might not know what had happened.

Ding Xi pondered: “But the problem is, if Ma You died then, how could someone who’d been dead for almost a year manage to attack me?”

Ordinary people might let their imagination run wild, guessing she had turned into a zombie or was a case of soul possession, but the Three Water Ghost Families, having dealt with water for over a thousand years and seen all kinds of dangerous situations, tended not to think in supernatural directions when encountering problems.

Yi Sa hesitated: “Have you considered that the woman who attacked you, the one with scars on her arms, might not have been Ma You?”

What if, from beginning to end, Ma You was just a dead prop, a smokescreen?

That woman, after attacking Ding Xi, might not have gone far, and probably saw them release the black ghost.

To hide herself, she took Ma You from the Corpse-Nurturing Water, because Ma You was also a woman with long hair, similar in appearance to her. She placed Ma You on the riverbank of the peat swamp forest and created similar stab wounds on Ma You’s back, making them assume Ma You was the one who had attacked Ding Xi.

But she forgot about the scars on her arms – perhaps thinking that in such a chaotic scene, in such a brief glimpse, no one would have noticed.

Ding Xi listened and then gave his opinion: “What’s the reasoning behind this speculation?”

Yi Sa gestured toward Wu Gui, who stood like an old wooden post at the platform’s edge: “Remember that night when Wu Gui was leading us, there was a time it suddenly stopped and started circling aimlessly in the water. We didn’t pay much attention then, but thinking about it now, it was probably being interfered with by someone.”

He remembered – it was like hitting a ghost wall. At the time, he had even suspected Wu Gui might be a local breed, with reduced effectiveness.

Ding Xi said: “The hypothesis makes sense but doesn’t hold up under scrutiny.”

Yi Sa didn’t give him a chance to continue: “I know.”

This hypothesis led to a dead end.

First, while Ding Xi’s toothbrush handle used for self-defense had no blood on it, it did have a putrid smell.

Second, aside from living sacrifices, Corpse-Nurturing Water didn’t accept living things. How could that woman have managed to take Ma You out of it?

If there was such a woman behind everything, she didn’t seem like a living person either, which brought the question back to square one – how could a dead person attack Ding Xi?

Yi Sa had a headache and could only warn Ding Xi: “Be careful these days, don’t wander off alone. I still feel there’s no such thing as an unmotivated attack. With so many people here, you were just here on your first day, yet she chose you instead of others. It doesn’t seem random. If you are her target, there will be a second time after the first…”

She suddenly became suspicious: “Did you offend someone?”

Ding Xi didn’t know whether to laugh or cry: “How did this turn back on me? If someone had a grudge against me, they could kill me anywhere. Why come all the way here? I think this person is targeting you. After all, you’re the host, I’m the guest. If I die on your territory, it would be hard for you to explain when the Ding family investigates.”

What he said made sense – before the truth was clear, anything was possible.

When they parted, Yi Sa watched Ding Xi walk back to the storage room and reminded him once more: “Lock the door well at night.”

Ding Xi turned around, walking backward, and raised his hand in salute to show he understood.

Yi Sa was annoyed – she didn’t buy into this kind of behavior, probably because she had seen too many men of various backgrounds and was used to it: too many people in this world mistake boredom for interest, frivolity for charm.

She walked to the ladder, about to climb up, when suddenly a low voice came: “Yi Sa…”

She immediately identified the source: the storage room, Zong Hang.

But the storage room door was only open a crack, he was speaking from behind it, not showing his face.

What was this, playing hide and seek?

Yi Sa said: “What is it?”

Zong Hang’s voice continued floating out: “Mr. Chen told me we’re leaving before dawn tomorrow. You’ll probably still be asleep then, but…”

“Can’t you come out to say it?”

“I’m afraid someone might see.”

Yi Sa looked behind her.

It was late, lights were out everywhere, no one would see, and she was confident her preparations were thorough – Suocai wouldn’t notice either.

“It’s fine, come out.”

Zong Hang hesitated, then noticed a bamboo hat hanging on the wall, took it down to cover his face, and carefully came out.

Yi Sa watched him approach.

She quite liked his conscientiousness and self-awareness. Even after being allowed to come out, he still knew to be careful with concealment. She hated those who deliberately did what they were told not to do, treating recklessness as personality.

Zong Hang came up to her, trying to keep his unswollen side facing her, then finished what he was saying: “But you saved me, I can’t leave without thanking you. Also… how should I repay you in the future?”

Such a great kindness deserved money or even a house in return.

Yi Sa said: “It’s fine. The Angkor Grand Hotel isn’t growing legs and running away. I’ll drop by sometime when I think of it.”

Zong Hang nodded: “Then I’ll tell Long Song… when you think of it, I might be back in China already. I’ll leave all my contact information with Long Song. If you need any help, just call me…”

He spoke with decreasing confidence: what help could Yi Sa possibly need from him? She had capabilities, a career, and even international connections…

Having said what he needed to say, he ran out of words.

Zong Hang stood awkwardly for a while, then suddenly held onto the ladder: “Go up, I’ll hold it for you.”

His tone was like someone desperately urging others to eat at a dinner: “Come on, eat, don’t be polite.”

But crucially, the ladder was nailed down – it didn’t need holding at all.

Yi Sa climbed up two rungs, suddenly remembered something, and looked down at him: “One more thing…”

Zong Hang quickly looked up, expression very serious, like an elementary school student about to take final exams, piously listening to the teacher’s key points.

“Did you see anything strange underwater today?”

Yes, he saw a person hanging under the boat, like floating seaweed.

He said: “I saw…”

Halfway through, he suddenly realized and immediately changed his words: “No, no, I didn’t see anything.”

Yi Sa’s eyes flickered slightly, corners of her lips curling, looking at him with an ambiguous smile.

Zong Hang instantly became flustered: “I won’t tell anyone, absolutely won’t.”

Yi Sa smiled, seeing he truly had no ulterior motives: “Alright then, good that you didn’t see anything.”

When she reached the top of the ladder, she looked down again.

Zong Hang was still standing there, looking up, continuously watching. Suddenly seeing her look down, he was both surprised and delighted, quickly waving to her.

The farewell kind of wave, non-stop.

His face was still swollen, but his smile was genuine.

Yi Sa nodded to him in response.

In this world, some people live in the sunlight, others in the shadows.

Someone like Zong Hang really shouldn’t appear in a place like this.