Lunch was sumptuous.
It had originally been prepared to entertain guests, but the guests had departed.
Still, for most people at their small tables, it only meant a few more varieties of dishes; the portions remained about the same. Only at Runsheng's place did the single large basin turn into two.
Seeing this, Li Sanjiang couldn't help but curse, "Damn it all, why don't you just eat out of a bathtub!"
Runsheng asked with a hint of joy, "Can I?"
Li Sanjiang rolled his eyes, thoroughly choked for words.
Only then did Runsheng realize he had misunderstood. He gave an embarrassed grin, picked up an incense stick in his left hand and a spoon in his right, and began eating with alternating motions.
Li Zhuiyuan looked down at the drunken shrimp before him. The shrimp had been steeped in baijiu and seasoned with scallions, ginger, and garlic to suppress the fishiness.
He picked one up with his chopsticks, popped it into his mouth, and with a gentle press of his lips, the meat slipped free—fresh, tender, and savory.
Next, he picked up a drunken mud snail. Clamping the front end between his teeth, he nudged it outward bit by bit until the snail meat separated from the shell. The morsel was tiny, yet delightfully crisp when chewed.
One had to eat these with care and patience; even the slightest haste risked swallowing the sand trapped inside the shell.
Coastal regions had a widespread tradition of eating raw cured seafood. To those accustomed to it, it was an irresistible delicacy.
To most people from the inland, however, such dishes were nothing short of terrifying.
Which was fair enough—raw cured dishes carried a considerable risk of parasites.
After a few cautious bites, Li Zhuiyuan noticed that Ah Li had no interest in either dish, having left both untouched by her chopsticks. He stood up, lifted both plates, and intended to carry them over to Li Sanjiang to pair with his liquor.
"Give them to me."
Liu Yumei spoke up.
Li Zhuiyuan carried the drunken shrimp and drunken mud snails over to the table shared by Liu Yumei and Auntie Liu.
"Not to your taste?"
"No."
"Good things wasted on someone who doesn't know how to enjoy them."
Liu Yumei popped two drunken mud snails into her mouth in succession and took a sip of yellow rice wine from her cup.
Auntie Liu said with a smile, "Ah Li doesn't care for them either."
Liu Yumei shook her head. "Ah Li just finds them too troublesome."
Right after, Liu Yumei asked Li Zhuiyuan, "What did those people who came by this morning want?"
"To buy a house. They've taken a liking to Big Beard's place."
"Oh? How is that house?"
"Very spacious, and the fish pond is fairly large. They're in a hurry to sell, so it's going cheap. Grandma, are you interested in going over to take a look?"
"Why would I look? I don't have the money to buy it."
"Even if you don't buy, there's no harm in looking."
"If you don't have the money, looking will only make you stew in your own frustration when you lie down to sleep at night. Better not to go. Besides, I'm not from this village; by the rules, I couldn't buy it anyway. In any matter, one must always follow the government's rules."
Li Zhuiyuan knew Liu Yumei was deliberately reminding him: handle this by calling the police, and don't make reckless moves on your own.
"The police officers are busy, too. Besides, isn't that slogan about police-public cooperation painted on the station's outer wall?"
Liu Yumei took a long, searching look at the boy before her. She raised her yellow rice wine, took another sip, and said flatly, "Even in a troop of monkeys, there is a king of the mountain."
Her meaning was plain: among that pack of water monkeys, there was a truly tough bastard.
Li Zhuiyuan replied, "Or it could just be choosing a general among dwarfs."
"Heh." Liu Yumei chuckled and waved her chopsticks. "Go eat, child."
Li Zhuiyuan walked back to his small table.
Auntie Liu lowered her voice and asked, "Should I go check exactly what books Xiao Yuan has been reading?"
The boy's words earlier had subtly alluded to what happened at Sihai's fish pond, hinting that anyone capable of stumbling over a decoy lair couldn't amount to much, no matter how high their skill was supposed to be.
Such insight sent a chill through Auntie Liu—far more than when the boy had asked her for poison that morning.
The latter was merely a child's temperament; the former suggested this boy had truly crossed the threshold into the craft, and had crossed it remarkably deep.
Liu Yumei shook her head. "Earlier, when the child hadn't arrived yet, going down to browse the books in Li Sanjiang's basement could still be justified. Now that the boy has already discerned the mysteries within, poking around will only drag us into the mud. Or are you in such a rush to go join Ah Li's father?"
"How could that be? Someone must stay by your side to attend to you."
"I may have lived a long life, but I still don't know how to cook."
Auntie Liu said, "Looking at it that way, the books in Uncle Sanjiang's cellar really must be extraordinary."
"Extraordinary indeed. Didn't he say so himself? Back during the Campaign to Smash the Four Olds, several groups of people deliberately entrusted those books to his safekeeping."
"Then it seems those groups were hardly ordinary folks either."
"There's no rule in this world saying only we are allowed sharp eyes while everyone else must be blind."
"You're right."
Liu Yumei kept a few thoughts to herself, unspoken.
No matter how extraordinary a book might be, it was still just a book.
And the more profound the text, the harder it was to grasp.
How many people spent their entire lives without truly mastering a single volume of esoteric lore?
She loved sitting out on the courtyard terrace drinking tea, while the boy sat just above her reading. She remembered how he flipped through those volumes like comic strips, going from one to the next in rapid succession.
If they truly were supreme treasures of the esoteric arts, for him to absorb and master them at that pace was bordering on an outrage against heaven.
Yet the facts stood right before her eyes.
When he first moved in, he was merely a boy frightened by his first encounter with a dead-flipper. Now, he could distinguish between a decoy lair and a primary lair, and could even escort dead-flippers in person.
A child like this, back before the liberation, would have had every sect and family breaking their heads competing to claim him as their true disciple.
Heh...
If the tablets enshrined in her own home weren't just inanimate wood—if they held even a shred of spiritual presence—they would probably have raised an uproar in the night, ordering her to take him as an apprentice on their behalf.
The Qin and Liu tablets might even have brawled over whether he should carry on the Qin line or the Liu line.
Well, we shall see.
Liu Yumei lifted the wine pot and poured herself another cup.
Once Ah Li's illness was cured, as a gesture of gratitude, she might consider passing the Liu Clan Qi-Gazing Formula to him.
Having returned to his seat, Li Zhuiyuan ate his lunch in peace. There were things he had to make clear to Grandma Liu; his stance needed to be stated.
After all, he still needed Auntie Liu as his safety net.
Though the clash would take place at Big Beard's house, if things slipped beyond his control, the fallout might spill over to their home. If that happened, he would have to ask Auntie Liu to return to her hometown as well, joining Uncle Qin to look after Uncle Qin's eldest uncle.
After lunch, Runsheng showed no intention of resting, his belly bulging as he prepared to head straight back to the workshop to work.
Li Zhuiyuan stopped him and handed over a few sketches. "Runsheng-ge, help me craft these pieces first. I need them urgently."
Runsheng took the drawings without even looking at them and replied directly, "All right."
He trusted that Xiao Yuan would never give him a schematic he couldn't understand or build.
Li Zhuiyuan then went to the bedroom with Qin Li.
He continued sifting through the ten taboos, while Ah Li picked up her carving knife and went back to work.
The desk was spacious enough for the boy and the girl to pursue their own tasks without getting in each other's way.
In the end, Li Zhuiyuan selected two taboos.
In truth, the ancient books contained countless taboos, but many lacked the conditions to be carried out. Even among the ten he had carefully preselected, at least half had to be eliminated because the prerequisites were far too convoluted.
Some required materials whose names he could read, yet had no idea what they corresponded to in reality—and their names were often prefixed with "century-old" or "millennium-old."
Others called for specialized implements that sounded like vile artifacts, going so far as human-skin drums with explicit age limits for the boys and girls involved.
Still others required constructing an underground palace in a specific environment, gathering yin-yang fengshui, and then sealing Little Oriole inside.
Frankly, if he had the resources for that scale of undertaking, why would he need to rack his brain to deal with a pack of water monkeys?
He settled on two methods.
The first was using preliminary fengshui shifts to briefly turn the corpse-nourishing land into a clash site—much like splashing cold water into a vat of boiling oil.
The second was wrapping Little Oriole in scripture banners to trigger a boiling surge of her resentful qi. The banner's strength had to be calibrated carefully: like a gust of wind that could snuff out a tiny flame, but when stoked properly, would cause the fire to blaze higher.
Given his current skill, however, he only needed to worry about whether he could raise a breeze at all, not whether the wind would blow too hard.
Practically speaking, these two were the easiest to implement.
Moreover, their effect was like a stimulant: once Little Oriole burned through it, she would immediately sink into deep torpor, preventing her from slipping out of control afterward.
Li Zhuiyuan had already asked Runsheng to hand-forge the materials for the formation poles. As for the precise deployment, he still needed to design the layout and pin down which nodes required fengshui alterations, which demanded extensive deductions and calculations.
He opened a drawer, pulled out a roll of heavy white paper, and cut off a sheet to size.
With pen and ruler in hand, drawing on his memories from that night, Li Zhuiyuan began sketching Big Beard's pond and the surrounding terrain.
Having grown up under the artistic influence of his parents, coupled with an exceptional memory, he completed the sketch in about half an hour.
It was far more precise than an ordinary drawing, stripped of unnecessary clutter; held up by its edges with both hands, it looked almost like a photograph.
Li Zhuiyuan used double-sided tape to stick it to the wall, then stood before it, staring intently.
Yet as he looked, his brow gradually furrowed.
He had chosen to draw it out just like using scrap paper—to ease the burden on his mind. But this drawing... wasn't helping at all.
Fengshui and qi patterns simply could not be represented with rigid, distinct lines. When calculating, he still had to reconstruct the physical scene in his head, mentally layer the fengshui patterns over it, and only then begin his deductions.
This drawing was entirely redundant—taking off his pants just to fart.
He couldn't use this drafting method; he needed traditional ink-wash.
Li Zhuiyuan went downstairs. The household ran a paper-effigy business, so the ground floor had plenty of pigments, palettes, and writing brushes. He selected a set and dashed back up.
He cut a fresh sheet of paper, spread it across the desk, dipped his brush, and began to paint.
Yet after a few strokes, something felt off again.
It wasn't that the method was wrong—the concept was undeniably correct. The crux of the matter was... he didn't know how to paint in ink-wash.
He had seen plenty of prodigies among his classmates, but they were merely fast learners; no one was born omniscient.
On a specialized track, skipping the learning process left a genius no different from a fool.
That was precisely why he could never beat Ah Li at weiqi; she had clearly been taught, whereas he had not.
While the most direct approach would be surveying the terrain on site, the water monkeys already had their eyes fixed on Big Beard's house. Wandering over there uninvited would inevitably draw unwanted attention.
Crucially, this wasn't something a single glance could resolve; it required long, meticulous deduction. Going to the pond was out of the question—the risk was simply too high.
Auntie Liu certainly knew how to paint; he had observed her technique when coloring the paper effigies, and she clearly possessed profound brushwork foundations.
Grandma Liu could paint as well; she often set up a table and picked up a brush to design clothes for Ah Li herself.
Yet neither of them would ever agree to paint this for him.
Li Zhuiyuan sighed, stepped out of the room, and went downstairs to the workshop.
Pushing the door open, he found Runsheng grinding grooves into iron spikes with all his might. These spikes would soon serve as the formation flagpoles.
"Xiao Yuan, you're here."
Runsheng handed Li Zhuiyuan a large porcelain mug.
The mug was slightly grimy, filled with steeped patchouli leaves.
Li Zhuiyuan took it and swallowed two large mouthfuls.
After taking it back, Runsheng gulped down the rest in one breath, picked up the kettle from the small stove, and refilled the mug with boiling water.
"No wonder it feels so sweltering. Runsheng-ge, why did you bring the stove inside?"
"Heheh, sometimes heating things up makes them easier to shape. It gets a bit hot, but drinking more water takes care of it. No big deal."
"You need to take care of your health."
"My health is great, don't worry. I had my fill of food!"
Li Zhuiyuan knew that in Runsheng's world, as long as he had eaten his fill, no problem could ever faze him.
The workshop was indeed crude, and the space was somewhat cramped. If they could set up a proper professional studio in the future—equipped with an electric furnace, a lathe, and a cutting machine—crafting anything would be effortless.
For now, though, that was merely wishful thinking.
"Ge, let me tell you something."
"Sure, Xiao Yuan, go ahead." Runsheng didn't pause, continuing his work without looking up.
Li Zhuiyuan laid out the matter of the water monkeys.
Runsheng asked in surprise, "Xiao Yuan, you didn't tell me when they came this morning because you were afraid I'd give something away?"
"Yes."
"What a shame. I've seen scenes like that on TV; I think I could have acted it out."
"No rush. You can polish your acting skills a bit more, and you'll manage next time."
"Right!"
Runsheng grabbed a graying white towel to wipe away his sweat.
"So, Xiao Yuan, are we going to wait until they start digging that grave, and then jab them right in the rear?"
As he spoke, Runsheng brandished the newly filed iron spike, miming a stabbing motion.
"With any luck, Little Oriole might serve them up for a banquet before we even need to lift a finger."
"That'd be such a waste. It never feels quite right watching someone else fight without getting to jump in ourselves. In movies, it usually goes like this: Little Oriole wipes the floor with them, then some monster of a fighter steps up from their side and pins her down, and right at the critical moment, we make our entrance."
"You've already got it scripted?"
"A guy has to think about something, doesn't he? Makes the work go faster."
"Keep at it, Runsheng-ge. I'm heading back up."
"All right! Don't you worry. Go figure out your plans; leave things down here to me."
Infected by Runsheng's high spirits, Li Zhuiyuan gathered his resolve, determined to head upstairs and crack the problem. Even if he couldn't sketch it on paper, he could brute-force the calculations in his head—at worst, he would suffer another nosebleed.
Before going upstairs, however, Li Zhuiyuan stopped by the kitchen. It was the hour Auntie Liu brewed his medicinal decoction.
"Xiao Yuan, you're here. Heh, this bowl is for you, and that bowl is for the dog."
"Thank you, Auntie Liu. This one is mine, right?"
Li Zhuiyuan double-checked; he didn't want to drink from the wrong bowl.
"Yes, that's the one. Drink up."
The brew was intensely bitter. Li Zhuiyuan drank it at a steady pace, managing to finish the whole bowl with effort.
"Auntie Liu, is this medicine very expensive?"
"Hardly costs a thing. Just common tonics. The trick is coaxing out their properties during the brewing and harmonizing them, which brings out the efficacy. Still, Xiao Yuan, by your own account, you suffer frequent nosebleeds and dizziness. You must take good care of your body and avoid draining yourself prematurely, or you'll damage your primordial vitality."
"I understand, Auntie Liu."
"Also, it's best to take this decoction in the morning—right when you wake up. Taking the brew along with the rising morning qi as the body revives yields the best results. How about this: starting tomorrow morning, I'll have Ah Li bring it up to you. She goes to your room every morning anyway."
Li Zhuiyuan nodded. "All right."
He didn't refuse, recognizing that Grandma Liu and the others wanted to speed up Ah Li's progress, using him as a pretext to assign her extra tasks.
Though imagining the scene felt slightly bizarre.
Opening his eyes each morning to find a girl holding a bowl of medicine by his bedside...
Still, for the sake of his health and her continued recovery, he had to drink it.
Back in his old class, some students had indeed been sickly and prone to frequent ailments. Li Zhuiyuan had assumed he was immune to such frailty, since Li Lan shared his condition yet remained hale and hearty, enduring wind and sleeping rough on excavation sites.
The difference was that he had now immersed himself in these esoteric arts; calculating them was vastly more complex and exhausting than any mathematical problem.
The little black dog was asleep in its kennel. When Li Zhuiyuan approached with the medicinal bowl, it cracked an eye, let out a yawn, paddled over, and lapped up every drop. Then, with its belly swollen with fluid, it flopped onto its back and went right back to sleep.
After a stretch of good food, clean water, and rich tonics, the pup's coat had grown even glossier and darker. Li Zhuiyuan had noticed that even its tongue was black; the only white anywhere on its body was its teeth.
This was a dog Auntie Liu had handpicked and purchased; its pedigree was bound to be uncommon.
Ascending the stairs and stepping into the bedroom, Li Zhuiyuan intended to roll a few paper plugs for his nose before forcing his mind through the calculations. But he noticed that Ah Li, while still at the desk, had shifted over to his seat.
Instead of her carving knife, she was holding a writing brush.
Drawing closer, he confirmed she was indeed painting, and was already near the final touches.
Taking a closer look, Li Zhuiyuan's eyes widened in amazement. She had modeled her piece after the pond map he had taped to the wall, yet she had successfully rendered the qi patterns into the scene.
The dilemma that had tormented him, the cost of another nosebleed—the girl had resolved it all.
With the final stroke finished, Ah Li set down the brush, dipped her fingertips into a cup of water, and lightly, evenly flicked droplets across the paper. The ink bloomed further, making the qi patterns sharper and more distinct.
Done.
The girl turned around and looked up at the boy.
"Ah Li, you really are a genius."
Hearing the praise, her eyes seemed to curve slightly.
Then she rose to her feet and reached out, looping her arms around the boy's neck.
Li Zhuiyuan felt he really ought to find a more suitable way of acting spoiled toward Great-Grandpa in front of Ah Li next time, or quietly advise Great-Grandpa to change his customary response.
Otherwise, every time this happened, it felt rather jarring.
For now, he could only pat the girl's head gently and say:
"Whatever Ah Li wants, I'll buy it for you. I have money—plenty of money!"
Ceremony complete.
Ah Li released her hold with quiet satisfaction and returned to her seat.
Li Zhuiyuan sat down, fixed his gaze on the painting, and began his deductions.
Every twenty minutes or so, he picked up a pen and marked a dot on the painting—the position where a flag needed to be planted.
In the end, he marked twelve dots in total.
Even with all twelve formation flags planted, the array would still lack an eye. But that wasn't a concern—the eye would be Little Oriole herself.
Next came the materials for the formation flags. Runsheng could handle the poles, but the flag surfaces were tricky and complex. Ordinary fabric would flutter in the wind, which disrupted the formation's focus; they required rigid planes, preferably fine-quality yin-natured wood. Only then could carved sigils maximize their efficacy over a short duration.
Originally, Li Zhuiyuan had planned to visit the graveyard with Runsheng tonight. There was no need to dig any graves; broken, exposed coffin boards could often be found lying about.
But now...
Li Zhuiyuan glanced toward the wood shavings scattered before Ah Li, and down at the half-chopped memorial tablets beneath her feet.
It seemed a far superior wood was already within reach.
Namely,
these ancestor boards.
***
Around dinner time, the village chief arrived.
Beaming from ear to ear, the chief kept saying that Uncle Sanjiang had stumbled into good fortune.
He pulled out several handwritten documents stamped with the village committee's seal, bearing the signatures and thumbprints of Big Beard's wife and eldest son.
Li Sanjiang marveled at how fast that Ding Dalin worked—buying a retirement home already?
Looking down at the text, however, his expression stiffened. "Why did he buy Big Beard's house?"
The village chief, clearly having pocketed a go-between fee, said with a laugh, "A free house and a fish pond—just tell me whether you want them or not! He's already cleared the payment. Once you sign this, if you had a slightly darker conscience, you could turn right around and throw him out. Even if he wanted to take you to court, he wouldn't win."
"But I warned him not to buy Big Beard's place."
"It's cheap! From what I can tell, he might be a returned overseas compatriot, but he probably didn't strike it rich. If he had real money to invest back home, the township would have approved a fresh residential plot for him directly."
"That does make sense."
Though he found Big Beard's house unlucky, following the principle of never turning down free property, Li Sanjiang signed his name and pressed his thumbprint.
At worst, after Ding Dalin passed away, he could just have Xiao Yuanhou turn around and sell the place.
"Then it's settled! He seems in an awful rush to settle down in his old home. Said he's hiring people to clean tomorrow and moving in officially the day after. He's even hiring an opera troupe to play music day and night, and inviting the whole village over for a grand feast!"
"That certainly will be lively. That terrace at Big Beard's has hosted one feast after another lately."
"Haha, that's just talk between us. When we go over the day after tomorrow to drop our gift money and join the fun, we'd better keep our mouths shut. I'll remind the rest of the villagers when the time comes."
"I know the drill."
"Oh, right. He said when he invites the village to eat, he won't accept gift money."
"I'll still give some."
"Yes, you should—consider it a gift for your own house."
Li Sanjiang nodded and pulled out two cigarettes for the chief, who took the inner one.
"Right then, that's all. Uncle Sanjiang, I'll be on my way. Enjoy your meal."
Li Sanjiang lit his cigarette and turned to Li Zhuiyuan. "Xiao Yuanhou, your Great-Grandpa just earned you a house!"
"Thank you, Great-Grandpa."
"This is nothing! Just you wait—Great-Grandpa will scrape together some more cash and secure an apartment for you in the city before I close my eyes, so you'll have it ready when you get married."
As he spoke, Li Sanjiang shot a sidelong glance toward Old Lady Liu sitting at the far table eating.
As if worried she hadn't heard, he raised his voice higher:
"When our Xiao Yuanhou gets married, he has to live in the city, without a doubt!"
Hmph. Let that worldly old woman look down on folks now.
Liu Yumei raised her wine cup and took a sip. She couldn't be bothered to squabble with this show-off old man.
Her Qin and Liu families owned ancestral estates across Suzhou, Huai'an, and Yangzhou; in earlier years, they had even donated several mansions to the state as cultural preservation sites.
Besides, the two children getting along well now didn't mean they were destined to follow the childhood-sweetheart track all the way to marriage.
Liu Yumei's only goal was to see her granddaughter cured; she had never seriously entertained the notion of taking the Li boy as a grandson-in-law.
Since ancient times, when wealthy families took in a matrilocal son-in-law, they sought not brilliance, but honesty and duty.
If you picked someone shrewd and capable whom you couldn't control, the entire family enterprise would eventually fall into his hands. He would swallow it whole, leaving not even your surname behind.
After dinner, Li Zhuiyuan sketched the patterns for the formation flags.
Then he went down to the kitchen, cooked ten packs of seafood noodles, and carried them to Runsheng in a washbasin.
Runsheng was still pulling an all-nighter filing iron. Seeing the massive basin of noodles crowned with two thick sticks of incense, his grin split his face from ear to ear.
After urging him once more to rest early, Li Zhuiyuan headed upstairs to bathe and sleep.
When he woke the next morning, Li Zhuiyuan stretched, then turned his head.
He saw the girl sitting on a chair by the door, cradling a bowl of medicine.
In that posture, she looked unexpectedly sweet and innocent.
Ah Li stood up, carried the bowl to Li Zhuiyuan's bedside, sat down, and slowly moved the rim toward the boy's lips.
The boy understood: she wanted to mimic the way her family elders used to feed her medicine.
Li Zhuiyuan accepted it gladly.
And then,
first thing in the morning, Li Zhuiyuan went down to wash his hair.
Li Sanjiang came out of his room yawning, spotted Li Zhuiyuan by the water vat, and asked:
"Xiao Yuanhou, what's this? Did a bird drop business on your head today too?"
"Great-Grandpa, my hair felt a bit greasy, so I'm washing it."
After breakfast, Li Zhuiyuan returned to his room and handed the design to Ah Li, leaving her to carve the patterns onto the boards.
He, meanwhile, set about inking the scripture banners. With his past experience drawing talismans, this proved relatively straightforward.
Moreover, the "potency" of his talismans reassured Li Zhuiyuan that his scripture banners would never overshoot their mark; they would merely rile Little Oriole up without truly pinning her down.
By midday, the materials were fully prepped, and Runsheng had finished filing the flagpoles.
The afternoon was spent on assembly, completing the twelve formation flags.
Li Zhuiyuan attached a long cord to the scripture banner, allowing Runsheng to fling it into place from a distance when the time came.
Li Sanjiang had assumed that with the housewarming tomorrow, Ding Dalin would stop by tonight to chat and catch up. To his surprise, Ding Dalin never showed; instead, Tan Yunlong arrived in the dark.
Tan Yunlong rode his motorcycle, with Tan Wenbin perched on the back.
Father and son carried several gifts. Strapped to the motorcycle's rear carrier were a rolled mattress and quilt, along with a bag stuffed with toiletries.
As it turned out, the municipal education bureau was conducting an inspection, forcing the town high school to suspend its summer classes and give students a week off until the inspection blew over.
Tan Yunlong explained that he was swamped with work and his wife was heading out on a business trip, so he had no choice but to leave his son here for safekeeping—the perfect chance for him to study hard alongside Xiao Yuan.
Li Sanjiang interpreted this as Tan Wenbin coming to tutor Xiao Yuanhou.
Still, except for the occasional bout of feigned foolishness, Li Sanjiang was sharp as a tack. He firmly pushed back the living expenses Tan Yunlong tried to offer and patted his chest, promising to look after the boy well. Everyone knew the importance of maintaining good ties with the police station.
Tan Yunlong walked over to Li Zhuiyuan, bent down, patted his shoulder, and murmured:
"Those two who were unconscious—they're waking up soon."
Li Zhuiyuan nodded. That meant the water monkeys would be digging soon.
"Binbin, I'm leaving him in your hands. If he doesn't listen to you, page me and I'll beat him within an inch of his life."
Li Zhuiyuan turned to look at Tan Wenbin standing behind his father. Tan Wenbin flashed him a knowing grin.
Tan Yunlong departed.
Hugging his bedding, Tan Wenbin asked, "Xiao Yuan, where's your room? Can I sleep with you?"
Li Zhuiyuan glanced at Runsheng. Runsheng immediately stepped to Tan Wenbin's side, took the bedding, set up another round table beside his own, briskly spread out the quilt, and patted it:
"Come, you sleep here with me tonight."
Far from being displeased, Tan Wenbin nodded with a spark of excitement. "Great!"
Once night fell, Li Zhuiyuan went to bed early. Tomorrow night would require staying up, so he had to conserve his strength today.
Having finished his tasks, Runsheng could finally watch television in peace.
Tan Wenbin sat with him until the screen dissolved into static. Then, Tan Wenbin produced a handheld game console and taught Runsheng to play Tetris; the machine also came with a fighter plane game.
Runsheng played with great delight, but before long, the batteries died.
"Ah, I forgot to bring spare batteries."
"Doesn't matter. Let's sleep, then." Runsheng switched off the light and climbed onto his makeshift table bed.
Across from him, Tan Wenbin lay down as well.
In the pitch-black ground floor, a neat row of paper effigies stood across from them, illuminated by the pale moonlight.
Tan Wenbin found the atmosphere thrilling—a little frightened, but thoroughly excited.
He turned on his side toward Runsheng, pulling the quilt halfway over his face. Speaking through the blanket, he asked in a muffled voice:
"Runsheng, do you know about dead-flippers?"
"Yes."
"They're the kind of corpses where people die and float facedown in the water, right?"
"What else would they be?"
"And they're the kind that can climb ashore and walk on their own after dying, right?"
"What else?"
Hearing that answer, Tan Wenbin's eyes lit with excitement, even as he quietly pulled his exposed feet under the covers.
"Runsheng, have you ever retrieved one?"
"Yes."
"You're incredible."
"Xiao Yuan is more incredible."
"Heheh. When I told my dad I wanted to come study here, I really just wanted to see if I'd get a chance to see a dead-flipper."
The school's unexpected break was real, but his mother's business trip was pure fiction. The moment he suggested the visit, his parents had agreed instantly.
In the eyes of Tan Yunlong and his wife, Li Zhuiyuan was no longer just someone else's exceptional child—he was a prodigy sent from heaven!
Tan Yunlong was thorough; he had specifically phoned the town high school to inquire about transfers and skipping grades. When the other end asked where the boy had studied previously and what grade he was in, Tan Yunlong recalled what he had seen in Li Zhuiyuan's file and mentioned the Special Class for the Gifted Young.
At first, the person on the line politely acknowledged it and hung up, treating it like a routine favor.
An hour later, the call came back, the voice trembling with excitement. A chorus of voices shouted in the background, demanding to know whether Tan Yunlong was certain about the Special Class.
They added that if it were true, the boy could come complete transfer procedures immediately, accompanied personally by the principal and directors, with a whole suite of preferential perks.
Tan Yunlong knew Li Zhuiyuan wanted to enjoy his summer vacation, so he withheld the boy's name and address, saying he would bring the child in before the new semester began.
Even so, Tan Yunlong had confirmed one thing: this Special Class was nothing like the affiliated primary school he had imagined.
Runsheng was ready to sleep. He felt the guy across the table was somehow even dimmer than himself.
Tan Wenbin chuckled to himself again:
"Hey, you know what? When Xiao Yuan first told me he liked retrieving dead-flippers, I was silly enough to ask if it was some kind of street snack."
Hardly had the words left his mouth when Tan Wenbin saw Runsheng's eyes seem to light up.
Immediately after came a resounding voice filled with lingering relish:
"Delicious! A true delicacy!"
That night, Tan Wenbin remained curled tightly under his blanket, too terrified to even get out of bed to pee.
***
The following morning, Tan Wenbin groggily caught sight of a girl in a red dress carrying a bowl of medicine past him, making her way up the stairs.
When he arrived the night before, Ah Li had already been coaxed to sleep by Li Zhuiyuan, so this was his first glimpse of her.
"That little girl is so pretty. Even the stars on posters can't compare to her."
Runsheng sat up, rolled his neck, and cautioned, "Don't go near her."
"Why not?"
"Except for Xiao Yuan, nobody can get close to her."
"Is that a house rule or something?"
With daylight streaming in, Tan Wenbin didn't find Runsheng quite so frightening anymore.
"It's not a rule."
Runsheng had always been sensitive to such things. He still remembered the first time he went up to the second floor and tried to step toward Xiao Yuan and Ah Li, and how the girl had trembled.
At that moment, the aura radiating from the little girl had felt more terrifying than the most frightful dead-flipper he had ever seen.
"Breakfast!"
Auntie Liu's voice rang out right on schedule, like an alarm clock.
Li Zhuiyuan and Ah Li came downstairs. Today, he hadn't let Ah Li feed him the medicine, so he hadn't needed to wash his hair.
Tan Wenbin grinned and tried to sidle over to join them for breakfast.
"Binbin-ge..." Li Zhuiyuan quickly took Ah Li's hand, about to issue a warning.
"Come eat with me!"
Runsheng seized Tan Wenbin by the nape of the neck, hauling him like a little chick over to his own dining corner.
How breakfast went down, Tan Wenbin couldn't recall. All he knew was that afterward, his eyes were stinging and red, thoroughly smoked by the incense.
Early on, the air around Big Beard's house erupted with the clatter of gongs, drums, and blasting loudspeakers.
The village chief had notified everyone the day before: an overseas compatriot originally from the village had returned to settle down and was hosting a housewarming feast for everyone.
It was explicitly stated that everyone should simply come and enjoy the food; no gift money would be accepted.
At that, the entire village—men, women, young, and old—flocked over early to watch the spectacle.
Li Zhuiyuan and Runsheng went over as well, followed by Tan Wenbin, who insisted on tagging along.
"What about him tonight? He's curious," Runsheng asked, miming a knife-hand chop toward Li Zhuiyuan. "Knock him out?"
Li Zhuiyuan's eyelids twitched. He was genuinely afraid that Runsheng-ge might get carried away by his acting, misjudge his strength, and chop the boy to death.
"No need for that. Just tie him up."
"All right."
Li Zhuiyuan began observing the layout of today's banquet.
Because of the massive crowd, the courtyard terrace and ground-floor rooms couldn't possibly hold everyone. Tents had been pitched extending out into the surrounding fields.
The opera troupe's stage had been erected right by the edge of the fish pond, with loudspeakers, audio equipment, and large drums all clustered there.
Li Zhuiyuan knew this was arranged to mask the noise of tomb raiding during the night.
An all-day banquet meant twenty-four hours of continuous music and performance—singing for the living by day, and for the dead by night.
The custom was meant to properly settle both yin and yang, ensuring smooth fortune in the days to come.
Nowadays, however, all-day banquets were rare in rural areas because nighttime performance fees were several times higher than daytime rates; ordinary families were unwilling to squander good money performing for ghosts.
With drums, horns, and blasting speakers, no matter how much commotion broke out tonight, the villagers wouldn't suspect a thing.
Li Zhuiyuan couldn't help admiring their professionalism in his heart. They certainly spared no expense, buying the house and treating the entire village to a feast.
The troupe's performance had already begun, surrounded by dense rings of spectators. Pretending to be curious, Li Zhuiyuan led Runsheng on a stroll around the stage, then deliberately headed with him to a deserted spot on the far side of the pond to relieve themselves.
This was done to establish the coordinates for planting the flags.
"Did you remember them all, Runsheng-ge?"
"Don't worry, got them all memorized."
"When the time comes, I'll carry two flags to plant. The rest will depend on you."
The formation flags were somewhat heavy; for now, Li Zhuiyuan could only sprint while clutching two.
"What about me? What about me?"
Tan Wenbin caught up, undoing his belt as well.
"How many do I carry?"
Li Zhuiyuan consoled him, "Don't worry, the rest are all yours."
"Mission guaranteed!" Even though he had no idea what the mission was, he was desperate to participate.
Lunch was served at noon.
Li Zhuiyuan and Tan Wenbin followed Li Sanjiang to a table inside the ground-floor room.
Tan Wenbin asked curiously, "Where's Runsheng? Why isn't he eating?"
"Runsheng-ge eats at home. And don't talk."
"Understood."
Tan Wenbin flashed an "OK" sign.
Runsheng needed burning incense with his meals, a quirk that would draw far too much attention. Usually, when he attended banquets with Great-Grandpa, the old man would dish out a separate portion for him to eat alone in a quiet corner.
Under today's circumstances, they could least afford to arouse the water monkeys' suspicions.
The feast was of high quality, prepared by local cooks. Once Tan Wenbin stopped chattering, he ate until his lips gleamed with grease.
After the banquet, many villagers felt uneasy about not paying gift money. Rebuffed when they tried to offer cash, they hurried home to fetch small gifts to present instead.
The entire afternoon was dedicated to watching performances. The night shows were taboo for the living; aside from the performers themselves, no one would linger.
The troupe boasted remarkable skill: singing, dancing, acrobatics, bone-shrinking techniques, and shattering stone slabs on chests.
Li Zhuiyuan noticed that the latter acts... were genuine martial arts.
From the performers' habits and technical nuances, their moves followed routines specifically developed for fighting dead-flippers.
In that light, had the initial pair leasing the pond not been blindsided by the Earthly Yin Red Fiend in the decoy lair, catching them would have been no easy feat for the police, given their physical prowess.
This also confirmed Grandma Liu's assessment of this band of water monkeys.
They were by no means a makeshift crew cobbled together on the fly; they were a consummate, professional syndicate.
After all, common scoundrels bent on raiding graves wouldn't bother mastering combat arts specifically tailored against dead-flippers.
Against them, it was truly hard to say whether Little Oriole would prevail.
Yet gazing at the bustling, noisy spectacle before him, Li Zhuiyuan felt a twinge of melancholy.
The first time he had seen Little Oriole, it was amid a scene just like this, when she had been performing on stage.
It was she who had delivered to him, newly arrived from the city, a jarring taste of raw, rustic aesthetic wonder.
Li Zhuiyuan's gaze drifted toward the surface of the fish pond. Was Little Oriole beneath the water watching the performance right now?
Deep down, she had to harbor resentment toward the funeral troupe that had taken its money and abandoned her to her fate, didn't she?
Just then, Secretary Jin, dressed in a black form-fitting outfit after finishing a song, walked to the edge of the stage with the microphone and called out to the crowd below:
"What song would everyone like to hear? Just let me know!"
Villagers were generally shy; on the first call, no one had the nerve to step up and request a song.
Li Zhuiyuan was the first to raise his hand.
Recognizing him, Secretary Jin smiled and waved him over toward the stage. "Come, little boy, tell me—what song would you like to hear?"
She crouched down, bringing the microphone to Li Zhuiyuan's lips.
Li Zhuiyuan stood angled toward the stage, facing straight toward the waters of the fish pond. In a clear, ringing voice, he said:
"Um...
"I want to hear...
"'Thousands of Songs.'"
Chapter 38