At weddings and joyous occasions, when the hosts are rushed off their feet entertaining friends and relatives until their bellies stick to their ribs, it is perfectly common for them to pull up a seat at the tail banquet to grab a bite.
Yet no one had ever heard of the deceased at a funeral getting up to sit at the table and feast on their own banquet.
Only now did Li Zhuiyuan recall that earlier, as he and Runsheng were walking toward the tables, Runsheng had called out from a long way off, "Uncle, they're packing up the feast! Let's go home!"
At the time, Li Zhuiyuan had merely felt something was off without thinking deeply about it. Only now did it dawn on him.
Under normal circumstances, if you saw an elder from your own family drinking at a table with other people, you would at least walk over, greet everyone at the table, and only then lead your elder home. Calling out from a distance was practically treating the others at the table as if they didn't exist.
Brother Runsheng might be simple and honest, but he still understood manners and propriety. Could the reason he had acted that way be that in his eyes, Li Sanjiang was the only person sitting there drinking?
Li Zhuiyuan glanced to the side at Runsheng, who had already turned his back to Li Sanjiang and squatted down, prepared to carry the old man home on his back.
Yes, it was confirmed: Runsheng couldn't see the two people.
Out of habit, Li Zhuiyuan instinctively wanted to pretend he couldn't see them either, but he quickly dismissed that habitual impulse.
Although he hadn't spoken directly to them, the way he had walked up to the table and how he stood beside his great-grandfather, turned halfway toward those two, were all silent admissions that he could "see" them.
Playing dumb now would only make him look like a true fool.
Just then, Li Sanjiang took hold of Li Zhuiyuan's hand again and smiled at the other two men at the table.
"Look at that. See how fair and clear my eldest great-grandson is? One look and you know he's good scholar material, bound to make something of himself in the future."
Runsheng was already used to this. His Uncle Li praised Xiao Yuan many times every single day, and now that he'd had a drink, the praise was practically nonstop.
Brother Bao nodded and said with deep meaning, "This child really does look very sharp."
Today's host, the deceased Zhao Xing, chimed in, "Anyway, he looks a lot smarter than I did when I was a kid. I was never any good at studying."
Delighted by such praise, Li Sanjiang chuckled. "Ha, hear that, Little Yuan? They're praising you!"
A wave of helplessness washed over Li Zhuiyuan. He had just been trying to think of a way to escape this predicament, never expecting his great-grandfather to drag him straight into the drinking party.
For now, Li Zhuiyuan could only lower his head, putting on a bashful, shy face.
"Come on, Little Yuan, sit down and eat a bit more."
Although Li Sanjiang was advanced in years, he was still remarkably strong. If he weren't, he wouldn't be able to haul corpses out of the water, let alone carry them ashore. On top of that, the alcohol had gone straight to his head. Unable to contest the old man's grip, Li Zhuiyuan was pulled firmly into a seat.
"Here, Little Yuan, Great-Grandpa will get you some ribs. These are your favorite."
Li Sanjiang picked up several sweet-and-sour ribs with his chopsticks and piled them onto the small plate in front of Li Zhuiyuan.
Waiting nearby, Runsheng turned around in confusion and scratched his head. Hadn't Xiao Yuan said they came to carry his uncle home? How had Xiao Yuan ended up sitting down at the table and eating too?
If he'd wanted a late-night snack, he should have said so earlier. Runsheng could have brought some incense sticks from home and joined them for a few bites at the table.
"Xiao Yuan..."
"Brother Runsheng, wait for us over there for a bit."
"All right, Xiao Yuan."
Grandpa Shan had told him that Xiao Yuan was smart and that he should listen to him, and Runsheng felt the same way. So he simply turned his back to Li Sanjiang and Li Zhuiyuan, squatted down on the ground, rubbed his eyes, and yawned.
Li Zhuiyuan breathed a quiet sigh of relief. As long as there was still room to maneuver and ease through the situation peacefully, he wasn't willing to risk an outright confrontation.
If it had been an actual floating dead-flipper with a solid body, Runsheng's raw strength and experience meant they could have put up a fight.
But the problem before them was far more complicated. The two before them were not corpses—or at least, they didn't have physical bodies present—and Runsheng couldn't see them at all.
How could they fight? Fight a ghost?
He picked up his chopsticks, lifted a sweet-and-sour rib, and popped it into his mouth.
After all, this was a genuine feast prepared for real people, unlike the paper-effigy banquet the Cat-Faced Old Woman had laid out, so Li Zhuiyuan dared to eat it. He chewed slowly.
Yet in such an atmosphere, no matter how delicious the food was, it tasted like wax.
Right now, what worried him most was whether Brother Bao still remembered him.
"Xiao Yuan, is it? Have we met somewhere before?"
Li Zhuiyuan looked toward Brother Bao with a hint of puzzlement. "Have we?"
Li Sanjiang spoke up, "Doubt you've met. This is the lad's first time back in his ancestral village, and he hasn't been here long. He doesn't know many people."
Brother Bao continued, "Really? Looking closely, he just seems familiar. You went to the town market yesterday, didn't you?"
Li Zhuiyuan nodded. "Yeah. I went to the grocery shop to buy snacks and stationery."
"Oh? Which grocery shop?"
"The one next to the firecracker shop. I even sat there drinking soda and watching people play billiards for a long time."
To the west of that grocery shop was the firecracker shop, and to the east was Sister Mei's Video Parlor.
Li Zhuiyuan deliberately avoided mentioning the video parlor. For one thing, he didn't want to agitate Li Sanjiang. Li Sanjiang knew what had happened there the previous day, and in his drunken state, he might let something slip. For another, Li Zhuiyuan was betting: betting that when Brother Bao possessed that woman yesterday, he could only manipulate her movements without accessing her memories, and betting that when the grocery shopkeeper ran in to warn them, the high had overwhelmed him before he could explain anything clearly.
Li Zhuiyuan felt the odds were in his favor. If Brother Bao knew it had been him who called the police, he would never be treating him with such calm.
Pausing briefly, Li Zhuiyuan added, "Hehe, yesterday an auntie even wanted to invite me over next door to sit, but I liked watching billiards more. Besides, Brother Runsheng had taken the lady boss next door to the health clinic, and he told me to wait right there until he got back to take me home. I have to be a good boy and listen to my older brother. Right, Brother Runsheng?"
"Huh?" Runsheng was scraping his left fingernails clean with his right. "Uh, yeah, that's right."
He vaguely felt the words sounded a bit strange. Whenever he was with Xiao Yuan, even though he was the older one, Xiao Yuan made all the decisions. Why did Xiao Yuan's words make it sound like he was the big brother who called the shots?
Wait, that wasn't right either. Who on earth was Xiao Yuan talking to?
"Xiao Yuan, you..."
"Brother Runsheng, be quiet for a bit, will you? After we sit for a little longer, we'll go home. Don't make noise, and don't talk."
"Oh, okay."
Obediently, Runsheng went back to picking at his nails and fell silent.
Brother Bao said, "Then that explains it. I bought a pack of cigarettes at that shop yesterday. I must have seen you then, but you probably don't remember me."
"Mm..." Li Zhuiyuan lowered his head slightly and said with an apologetic tone, "I must have been too engrossed in the billiards."
It seemed Brother Bao truly didn't know he was the one who had called the police. Furthermore, from the looks of it, he didn't seem to remember Runsheng, who had rushed him to the health clinic either.
Was it because he had still been in a coma back then, not yet dead?
Yet after dying at the clinic, Brother Bao's spirit must have walked out of the clinic and headed toward the video parlor. Had he not seen Runsheng there either?
Li Zhuiyuan recalled Runsheng saying he had wanted to leave, but the clinic staff had stopped him to demand medical fees. Unable to get away, Runsheng had waited outside Sister Mei's ward for her to wake up. Had their paths simply crossed without meeting?
Brother Bao asked again, "I just heard you say she was taken to the health clinic. How is she?"
"The doctor said she's fine. She just needs some rest."
"Oh."
Li Zhuiyuan noticed that the look in Brother Bao's eyes softened somewhat.
That had been his exact purpose in deliberately mentioning that Runsheng had taken Sister Mei to the clinic.
In truth, there was still another issue: the fact that he could see them right now was a glaring flaw. Yet that flaw seemed masked by Li Sanjiang's presence, since it was Li Sanjiang who had seen them first and started drinking with them.
Moreover, Li Sanjiang had a rather peculiar identity as a corpse retriever. Ferrying between the yin and the yang naturally carried its own uniqueness; it was not only the living who sought a corpse retriever's help, but also the dead.
Similar accounts were recorded in the Jianghu Zhiguai Lu.
At the very least, neither Brother Bao nor Zhao Xing had expressed any surprise at the fact that he could see them.
Even Runsheng, under his cover, was kept in a state where it seemed as though he too were part of the scene.
"Sss... ah!"
Li Sanjiang downed another cup of liquor, wiped his mouth, and picked up a mouthful of food with his chopsticks to wash it down.
Li Zhuiyuan sighed inwardly. While he was wracking his brains trying to patch up every loose seam, his great-grandfather was drinking and eating with gusto.
Zhao Xing asked, "How's today's food? Are you satisfied?"
Li Zhuiyuan kept his head down and ate another rib. "Delicious."
Li Sanjiang nodded and said, "You Zhao folk are decent people. The food at this feast is truly not bad."
Li Zhuiyuan guessed his great-grandfather must have mistaken Zhao Xing for some nephew of the Zhao family.
"That's good. As long as everyone eats and drinks well, that's all that matters. I was just worried it wouldn't be done well and we'd slight everyone."
A smile appeared on Zhao Xing's face. But his complexion was deathly pale to begin with, so the smile only made him look all the more chilling.
Li Zhuiyuan picked up a slice of cured pork, dipped it in the dish, and put it into his mouth.
Only the cold appetizers on the table were still edible; the rest of the dishes had gone stone cold.
Still, this host truly seemed to care about the banquet's reception.
Then again, at any funeral feast, if the host who was supposed to be lying in the coffin climbed out in person to ask, hardly anyone would dare say the food was bad.
Brother Bao spoke up, "If I didn't know your feast was good, would I have rushed over to eat?"
Zhao Xing smiled. "All right, won't I have to go over to your place for a feast in a couple of days anyway?"
Brother Bao replied, "Yeah. But my feast definitely won't be as good as yours. Your Zhao family runs a big business, while mine is just small-time. Day to day, after expenses, there isn't much left over. But when you come, I'll definitely keep you company properly, just like you're doing for me today."
Zhao Xing waved his hand. "The food and drink are secondary; it's the atmosphere that matters. Between the two of us, there's no need to stand on ceremony."
Li Zhuiyuan picked up another mouthful of cold spinach salad. This conversation, where two dead men invited each other to attend their own funeral feasts, was truly a novelty.
Still, how could he bring this drinking session to an end in a natural way?
Furthermore, had the two of them appeared to drink with his great-grandfather out of loneliness, or did they have business with him?
Li Sanjiang looked toward Brother Bao. "What's this? Your family's holding an affair soon too?"
"Yeah, soon. Once my wife feels a bit better, we'll get it started."
"Then that's no good. Your wife is sick, and you're still staying out drinking this late? Shouldn't you go back to take care of her? That's far too irresponsible. Besides, putting on a feast is a messy business. Since your wife is sick, you ought to be the one running things. You can't just shirk your duties."
Li Zhuiyuan immediately nodded in support. "Whenever I'm sick, I always want someone to stay with me."
Brother Bao shook his head helplessly. "I did something wrong by my wife, and her illness was brought on by anger at me. So it's not right for me to go home right now. Counting today, I'll hide out for another six days, and on the seventh day, I'll head back. By then, her anger should have cooled."
"Heh." Li Sanjiang pointed his chopsticks at Brother Bao. "You young people really are something. Either don't get married, or if you do, stop messing around outside."
"Uncle speaks the truth." Brother Bao picked up his chopsticks and twirled them in his hand.
Li Zhuiyuan noticed that Brother Bao was growing angry.
As a town hoodlum, how could he tolerate someone pointing a finger at his nose and lecturing him? In the past, whether you were old or young, he would have struck you right then and there.
Yet now, he was holding back.
Zhao Xing took over the conversation. "Uncle, look..."
"Bah! How old are you, boy? You look twenty at most, and you call me Uncle?" Li Sanjiang pointed toward the mourning hall. "Old Zhao would barely be old enough to call me Uncle, and that's only if I didn't hold it against him. You look about the same age as the guest of honor who passed away today."
Seeing Li Sanjiang turn to look at the portrait in the mourning hall, Li Zhuiyuan was terrified that the tipsy old man would realize who was sitting right beside him under the light.
He quickly grabbed the liquor bottle to pour for his great-grandfather, deliberately letting it overflow.
"Whoa, whoa, whoa! That's enough, that's enough! What a waste, ruining good liquor!" Li Sanjiang's attention snapped back. He steadied the bottle, then leaned down to slurp up the puddle of spilled liquor from the plastic table cover with a loud *slurp*.
"My hand shook, Great-Grandpa."
Zhao Xing and Brother Bao exchanged a glance before Zhao Xing altered his form of address. "Old Uncle, the two of us would like to ask a favor of you."
"Let's hear it first."
"Old Jiang from Shigang Town owes the two of us a debt, and he keeps dragging his feet without paying."
"Old Jiang?" Li Sanjiang tapped his forehead, trying to push through the alcohol haze to remember. "Sounds a bit familiar... Ah, is it that Old Jiang from Shigang Town who runs the karaoke parlor and the bathhouse? That guy's real famous around those parts. Heard he started out in the earthworks business back in the day?"
"Yes, that's him."
"Then that's a tough one. If he owes you money, why don't you go demand it yourselves? Do you have an IOU?"
"He has something on us, so it's not convenient for us to go see him."
"Ai, I can't meddle in that kind of business." Li Sanjiang shook his head at once. "I'm no big shot, just a corpse retriever who hauls floaters from the river. How could I help with something like that? If I had that kind of capability, would I still be coming out to take jobs? I'd be lying at home enjoying my retirement long ago."
"In the middle of the pond at his house, there's a water vat. Inside that vat is a large piece of taisui. He dredged it up from the river many years ago. Because he tricked us into eating some of it, the two of us are in terrible misery now. Not only do we not dare go confront him, we have to keep working under him."
"What kind of taisui flesh fungus?" Li Sanjiang was completely baffled. "Is it poison? Did he drug the two of you?"
"We only ask that you help us destroy that vat of taisui at his house. Burn it, take it, bury it, throw it away—anything works, as long as that vat of stuff doesn't stay in his house."
"I say, what on earth are you talking about? Aren't you asking me to steal something? I'm an old man; how could I do that sort of thing? You've got the wrong—"
From beneath the table, Zhao Xing brought out stack after stack of Great Unity ten-yuan notes, nine stacks in total.
Every stack consisted of crisp, brand-new bills bound with white paper bands.
Li Sanjiang swallowed hard, his breathing turning rapid.
"Uncle Li, as long as you agree to help, all of this money is yours."
The hand Li Sanjiang used to hold his cup was already trembling. One had to remember that back then, for money, even knowing the Niu family had something dirty in the house, he had dragged his injured body over anyway.
Yet this time, even though he was drunk, Li Sanjiang forced his head down. At the same time, he slammed his cup heavily onto the table and said with ringing resolve:
"Not doing it!"
Immediately after, Li Sanjiang slapped the tabletop repeatedly and cursed, "You two blind little bastards, you think your grandpa is the kind of man who would commit petty theft for a bit of money? Bah!"
Brother Bao and Zhao Xing froze. A sickly greenish hue began to surface on their faces—a sign of rising wrath.
The surrounding air turned icy cold.
Even Runsheng, who was squatted nearby half-asleep, couldn't help shivering.
Li Zhuiyuan asked, "Did that Old Jiang commit any crimes?"
Seeing both pairs of eyes turn toward him, Li Zhuiyuan explained, "I wanted to ask clearly on my great-grandpa's behalf."
Zhao Xing shook his head; he didn't know.
Brother Bao said, "I've seen it. In the mud beneath that vat in the pond, a man is buried. One of Old Jiang's enemies, surnamed Zhou."
"What, a murder too?" Hearing this, Li Sanjiang's drunkenness faded a little, but his first reaction was, "You damn bastards want me to go steal from a murderer's house?!"
Zhao Xing turned to Brother Bao and asked, "When did you see that?"
Brother Bao answered, "Because I was the one who helped him bury the body. Old Jiang said burying a corpse there would nourish the taisui."
Zhao Xing was astonished. "So you were working for him that early on? You didn't tell me sooner! If you had, I wouldn't have ended up so miserable."
Brother Bao gave a cold chuckle. "Did you forget? We left one right after the other."
"Right, I really forgot about that. What a pity, all my family's wealth..."
Zhao Xing looked around in deep regret. His family was well-off, and his father was capable of earning money, so he could have continued enjoying life. When he grew tired of playing around and wanted to settle down with a wife, there was no match within ten li and eight villages that his father couldn't secure by throwing money at it.
Yet what he didn't realize was that it was precisely because his father was too good at making money that someone of meager fortune like him had burned out and died too young to enjoy it.
Li Sanjiang was about to say something more when his stomach suddenly churned violently. He leaned aside and began to vomit.
Li Zhuiyuan patted his back while keeping his peripheral vision fixed on Brother Bao and Zhao Xing.
Brother Bao pressed, "Do you agree or not? Give us a straight answer quickly! For my wife's sake, I don't want to make things too ugly for you."
Li Sanjiang had just finished vomiting and was catching his breath. Hearing this, he asked in bewilderment, "What does your wife have to do with me?"
Having asked, Li Sanjiang began to vomit again, harder than before, his entire body curled up sideways on the long bench.
Li Zhuiyuan continued patting Li Sanjiang's back and said, "We'll do our best to help, but we won't take the money. If it can't be done, you can't blame us either. How's that?"
At that moment, the two men, who had barely retained a semblance of human form, suddenly sat bolt upright in their seats.
Their faces turned an iron-gray hue, and dark livid corpse spots surfaced across their skin. Their eyes were completely overtaken by solid white.
Their lips opened and closed rapidly as though they were speaking, yet no clear words could be heard.
Li Zhuiyuan strained to catch any useful information, even if it was a threat. But to his dismay, he couldn't understand a single syllable; his ears felt filled with the relentless *buzz-buzz-buzz* of countless flies.
What was going on?
Hadn't they been communicating fine just a moment ago?
Had something gone wrong on their end, or had something gone wrong on his?
*Snap! Snap!*
Two pairs of chopsticks were thrust upright into the bowls of rice before the two men.
Their mouths continued to twitch rapidly, yet nothing could be heard.
In the blink of an eye, both stood up.
In another blink, they were away from their seats.
By the third blink, they were outside the awning.
When Li Zhuiyuan focused his eyes into the distance, he saw them out in the distant fields, their figures exceedingly faint and blurry.
Then, both vanished entirely.
Yet in the end, Li Zhuiyuan still couldn't tell whether they had agreed to his proposal.
Most likely, they hadn't. Otherwise, they wouldn't have said so much before leaving. Even if he hadn't understood a single word, they had spoken plenty.
At the very least, it wasn't a simple "all right, goodbye."
Li Zhuiyuan looked toward Li Sanjiang and discovered the old man had fallen asleep on the bench.
When had he fallen asleep?
It seemed to have happened right around the time those two began speaking incomprehensibly.
"Brother Runsheng." Li Zhuiyuan went over and nudged Runsheng.
"Ah, done eating?"
Runsheng stretched. He had genuinely fallen asleep just now, and in his dream, he had suddenly felt a chill.
"Yeah. Great-Grandpa is drunk. Brother Runsheng, carry Great-Grandpa on your back."
"Sure thing."
Runsheng got up, grabbed Li Sanjiang's arms, and swung him up. Li Sanjiang was hoisted onto his back in a textbook posture.
It was indeed textbook—a textbook posture for carrying a corpse.
Li Zhuiyuan turned his gaze to the nine stacks of money on the center of the table. He reached over, picked them up, and shone his flashlight on them.
The bundles of Great Unity notes had turned into spirit money.
"Are we going, Xiao Yuan?" Runsheng asked.
"Wait a moment."
Li Zhuiyuan fished a box of matches from Li Sanjiang's pocket, took the spirit money from the table, and walked over to the mourning hall, where an extinguished brazier sat.
Placing the joss banknotes inside, Li Zhuiyuan struck a match and lit them. Picking up a half-charred wooden stick beside the brazier, he stirred the pile to ensure it burned completely, then spoke to the portrait:
"The money you left behind has all been returned to you."
Regardless of how things ended, severing ties with such unclean things as thoroughly as possible was never a bad move.
Having done this, Li Zhuiyuan turned to leave. Passing the dining table, his flashlight beam swept across the spots where Brother Bao and Zhao Xing had sat, catching an unusual reflection.
He stepped closer to inspect it: water stains.
Ignoring the disgust, he touched it with a finger; it was slick and greasy.
He shone the flashlight under the benches and found that beneath the seats, a pool of water had gathered, as if a brief drizzle had just fallen.
Because the ground was uneven, the water hadn't flowed toward the side where he and his great-grandfather had been sitting.
"Wet... so much water..."
Li Zhuiyuan immediately retraced the spots where the two figures had paused during those rapid blinks.
A pool of water.
Another pool of water.
Two pairs of watery footprints.
The fourth spot was out in the fields, so Li Zhuiyuan didn't bother heading out into the dirt to look.
Now, recalling what the two had said about the vat holding the taisui sitting in the middle of a pond, with a corpse buried beneath the mud—along with their dread of the taisui in that vat, which clearly suggested they were controlled by it—Li Zhuiyuan's gaze gradually darkened.
*Could the two of you be linked to a dead-flipper?*
Runsheng turned around, about to urge him along, but when he saw Li Zhuiyuan standing there holding the flashlight, his words caught in his throat for some reason, and he didn't dare speak.
He suddenly felt that the Xiao Yuan before him was so unfamiliar, and so terrifying.
The more pure and simple a person's nature was, the more acute their perception of the outside world often was. Everyone around considered Li Zhuiyuan well-behaved and sensible, praising and adoring him. Yet ever since Runsheng had gone up to the second floor of Li Sanjiang's house that first time, he had never gone up again.
The rest of the family assumed it was because of the girl up there, who didn't like interacting with outsiders.
Only Runsheng knew that far more than the girl, what he dreaded was Xiao Yuan. He didn't dare disturb him unless Xiao Yuan sought him out first.
Li Zhuiyuan lifted his head, and Runsheng immediately looked away, not daring to meet his eyes.
"Let's go, Brother Runsheng. Time to head home."
"Mm."
Along the narrow path through the night fields, Runsheng walked ahead with Li Sanjiang on his back, followed by the young boy.
The boy walked with half-lidded eyes and a bowed head, his hands clutched lightly into fists.
Li Zhuiyuan was furious right now.
Because once again, he felt that suffocating sense of powerlessness.
Earlier, he had wondered whether the frequency with which he encountered such bizarre affairs was abnormally high.
Yet looking at his great-grandfather, who had managed to share a table with two unclean things over a simple drink, Li Zhuiyuan felt his own rate of encounters was quite normal.
Besides, although several people had died in these incidents, in the eyes of ordinary folk, every one of them had died of accidents or illnesses.
Indeed, for an ordinary person, encountering or even hearing about one such incident was exceedingly rare. But if you viewed them as ordinary accidents, they suddenly seemed everywhere.
He was merely able, through a few extraordinary turns of fate, to see past the facade of normal accidents and recognize what he had truly encountered.
It was like bacteria in the real world: they were everywhere, but because human eyes couldn't see them, people considered everything normal. Put them under a microscope, however, and they were all over the place.
Li Zhuiyuan actually enjoyed this transformation, and he liked exploring and studying this path. But he despised these sudden, recurring ambushes, and he loathed his own recurring helplessness even more.
He could accept being a poor student, but that didn't mean he was willing to accept someone shoving his failing report card in his face every few days.
Even poor students had their dignity.
Once home, after settling Li Sanjiang into his bedroom bed, Li Zhuiyuan walked into his own bedroom and switched on the desk lamp.
The fatigue from earlier had been wiped out by the recent shock. Holding a pen, he made swift strokes across the drafting paper.
Beneath the lamp, the boy's eyes were set with fierce determination.
He looked like a student who usually neglected his studies, making a desperate last stand before an exam.
Never in Li Zhuiyuan's life had he entered such a rigorous, focused state of study.
Finally, when the clock struck five in the morning, Li Zhuiyuan finished the drafts in hand.
He stood up to organize them, only to find that his shoulders and legs had gone completely numb. He swayed, and had his hands not braced against the desk in time, he might have crashed straight to the floor.
It took a long while for the numbness to fade.
Without resting, Li Zhuiyuan gathered and organized the drawings. These, of course, were far from everything in Zhengdao Fumo Lu; in truth, they were merely the tip of the iceberg.
Yet these were the tools Li Zhuiyuan had selected for himself: the easiest to craft under current conditions, and relatively practical.
He sorted through the raw materials prepared the previous day once more.
Next came the assembly and manufacture.
Just then, the door was pushed open gently, and Ah Li stepped inside.
Usually at this hour, Li Zhuiyuan would still be asleep in bed.
The girl walked up to the boy, squatted down, and looked at him. She reached out and touched his forehead.
Her grandmother had done this to her countless times; in her mind, it was a gesture of care.
"Ah Li, you're here. I'm fine, but I'll have to trouble you again today. Let me explain the steps on these drawings."
Yesterday, Ah Li had shown an extraordinary talent for crafting. Li Zhuiyuan only had to explain the drawings once, and she could fashion the parts from existing materials.
Today, Ah Li wore a black, form-fitting training outfit. Li Zhuiyuan suspected Liu Yumei had learned from yesterday's lesson and figured black wouldn't show dirt as easily.
After explaining everything to Ah Li, Li Zhuiyuan joined her in the work. Before long, daylight broke.
"Ah Li, keep working on these. I have to step out for a bit."
With that, Li Zhuiyuan scooped up a stack of drawings and a medicinal prescription and headed downstairs.
"Xiao Yuan, breakfast is almost ready," Auntie Liu said as she came out of the kitchen.
"Auntie Liu, could you help me brew this medicine?"
Auntie Liu took the prescription, glanced over it, and looked back at Li Zhuiyuan.
"Please, Auntie Liu. This is for Great-Grandpa. He's been feeling weak lately and said he needs a tonic. This is... part of your job."
"All right, I understand. I'll brew it for you."
Brewing medicinal herbs was a tedious and delicate task. If Li Zhuiyuan did it himself, it would consume too much time and energy without guaranteeing the proper potency, so he could only ask Auntie Liu for help.
Although it was somewhat inappropriate to semi-coerce her like this, Li Zhuiyuan was severely pressed for time. Those two would at most give him three days; once they saw nothing had been done, they would surely come looking for him again.
"Thank you, Auntie Liu."
"Hey, breakfast is about ready! Where are you going?"
"I need to go out for a while."
Li Zhuiyuan ran over to the village's old carpenter's house. It was a handsome two-story building.
The carpenter had previously been a full-time worker at the Xingren Machinery Plant. Although he was now retired at home, he still took on odd jobs from time to time. Furthermore, his two sons both worked at the machinery plant, making his household one of the better-off families in the village.
When Li Zhuiyuan arrived, the old carpenter was having breakfast.
"Are you... Li Weihan's grandson?"
"Yes, Grandpa. My name is Li Zhuiyuan. My great-grandpa, Li Sanjiang, sent me. He said there's a batch of tools he needs you to make as quickly as possible. The sooner, the better."
The old carpenter took the drawings, looked through several sheets, and asked in astonishment, "Who drew these?"
The hand-drawn diagrams were meticulous and professional, and exceptionally considerate from a fabricator's perspective.
In fact, drafting wasn't something Li Zhuiyuan had just picked up. In his mother's study in the past, drafts like these had covered the desk and floor; he had crawled over them since he was a toddler.
"I don't know. My great-grandpa gave them to me. He said it's urgent and that he'll owe you a big favor."
A favor from Li Sanjiang carried considerable weight in the village, especially among the elderly.
In this life, no one could escape that ultimate destination, and everyone would eventually need Li Sanjiang to preside over their funeral rites.
Li Zhuiyuan didn't feel he was abusing his great-grandfather's favor either. After all, those two had targeted his great-grandpa, so getting these tools made quickly was also helping him.
"Fine, leave it to me. No problem at all. I'll start rushing it right away. We have plenty of wood and materials at home, all ready to go. It's just that a few components on these drawings need to be turned on a lathe...
"I'll have my son take them to the plant and use the machinery there to make them for you."
"Thank you so much! About how long will it take?"
"That urgent?"
"Yes!"
"Come pick them up tomorrow morning. I'll call my two apprentices over to help; it'll go fast."
"Thank you for your trouble. I'll come by tomorrow morning."
After thanking him, Li Zhuiyuan ran home. Just as he was about to head upstairs, Liu Yumei called out, "Xiao Yuan, call Ah Li down for breakfast. We can't get through to her."
"It's fine, we won't eat. We have snacks."
Working while snacking wouldn't slow down their progress.
Seeing Li Zhuiyuan dash up to the second floor, Auntie Liu asked in surprise, "Xiao Yuan's been in such a rush since early this morning. What's gotten into him?"
Liu Yumei, who was sitting nearby sipping congee, gave a quiet huff.
"Who knows? Maybe he ran into a ghost."
"Should we call Ah Li down, then?"
"If that boy doesn't say the word, who could possibly get Ah Li to come down for a meal?"
"True enough." Auntie Liu had just gone to call her, but Ah Li hadn't responded in the slightest. "I wonder what Ah Li is doing in that room."
Liu Yumei sighed.
"What else? Working for that boy."
...
Back in the bedroom, Li Zhuiyuan opened the snacks and set them between himself and Ah Li. The two ate while continuing the work in their hands.
Ah Li never spoke to begin with, and today Li Zhuiyuan had no time for words either. The room was filled only with the rhythmic sounds of pounding and tapping.
Under the hands of the boy and girl, various materials were processed methodically, and small components were fashioned one by one.
Neither of them went down for lunch; whenever they were hungry, they ate snacks.
By evening, all the work at hand was practically finished.
Li Zhuiyuan slumped on the floor, while Ah Li gazed at the fruits of their two days of labor. She didn't seem tired at all, perhaps even looking as though she hadn't had enough.
Just then, Auntie Liu called from downstairs, "Xiao Yuan, it's done brewing!"
Auntie Liu hadn't called the great-grandpa down to drink it.
Li Zhuiyuan walked out of the room. Having stayed up all night, he felt light-headed and had to steady himself against the wall as he went down the stairs.
Tomorrow morning, he would simply pick up the finished parts from the carpenter and perform the final assembly with the materials already prepared, completing the entire set.
Today, only the final step remained. Once that was done, he could sleep soundly.
Downstairs, Li Sanjiang was sitting with Runsheng watching television. Seeing Li Zhuiyuan come down, Li Sanjiang asked, "Little Yuan, what were you doing in your room all day? You didn't even come down to eat!"
"Great-Grandpa, last night at the banquet table..."
"Last night I drank too much and had a dream. In the dream, someone brought me piles of money and told me to break the law, but I turned them down.
"Ai, it still aches my heart even now! That dream was so real, I almost thought it wasn't a dream. Luckily, I asked Runsheng, and he said that when he went to pick me up last night, I was drinking all by myself."
Li Zhuiyuan: "..."
At that moment, Li Zhuiyuan suddenly felt deep empathy for Grandpa Shan.
Li Zhuiyuan went to fetch the medicine.
Li Sanjiang sniffed the air and asked, "Is that Chinese herbal medicine? What's wrong, are you feeling unwell?"
Li Zhuiyuan took a sip from the rim of the bowl and replied, "No, Auntie Liu was worried I'd exhaust myself studying, so she brewed a brain tonic soup for me."
"Oh, then you should drink plenty of it."
Carrying the medicine back to his room, Li Zhuiyuan had barely set the bowl down when the little black puppy trotted over on its own, lapping it up with eager slurps.
The medicine didn't taste terrible, but it certainly wasn't pleasant either. Li Zhuiyuan had originally planned on forcing it down the pup's throat.
After finishing every drop, the little black dog wobbled back to its cage, looking slightly bloated around the belly.
Li Zhuiyuan took out a small syringe, walked over to the cage, and beckoned.
The puppy sat with its belly against the cage bars, gripping the wire with one paw while extending the other paw out through the gap toward Li Zhuiyuan.
Li Zhuiyuan had seen this posture before: back when his parents had taken him to the zoo as a small child, he had seen a giant panda undergoing a physical checkup in the exact same manner.
Li Zhuiyuan took hold of the paw, inserted the needle, and drew a small amount of blood.
Then he swabbed the spot with a cotton ball.
The puppy didn't yelp or fuss; it waited quietly for Li Zhuiyuan to finish. Once certain it was done, it flopped onto its back and went to sleep.
"Why are you so well-behaved...?"
Li Zhuiyuan felt that if Wei Zhengdao were brought back to life and saw such an obedient black dog, he would probably drool with envy.
After dispensing the black dog's blood in measured drops into each prepared component, the final phase of preparation was swiftly completed.
All that remained was tomorrow morning's final assembly, which would be straightforward.
"Ah Li, thank you."
Ah Li walked over to Li Zhuiyuan, reached out to pat his head, and pointed toward the wooden bed in the room.
Previously, Li Zhuiyuan had coaxed her to bed in the very same way.
"All right, I'll go to sleep."
Li Zhuiyuan truly couldn't hold out any longer. He would wash up after he woke. Falling onto the bed, though beneath him was only a hard bamboo mat, his body felt as comfortable as if he had sunk into soft cotton.
Before closing his eyes, Li Zhuiyuan looked up at the canopy above and murmured to himself:
*The counterattack begins now...*
Chapter 28