Departure

The morning breeze stole a fleeting touch of summer coolness. Standing by the second-floor water crock and brushing his teeth, Li Zhuiyuan happened to catch sight of Tan Wenbin, clad in an athletic tank top and running shorts, bounding down the courtyard terrace with high knee strides to begin his morning jog. Tan Wenbin had maintained this routine for half a year now. Humans truly were creatures of boundless potential. Just a year ago, Tan Wenbin had been a swaggering punk who stole money from his mother to buy handheld video games, wedged adult comic books inside his textbooks, hid lurid magazines under his quilt, and liked to tuck a cigarette behind his ear to mimic grown-ups. Now, he was a disciplined youth who hit the books diligently by day, devoted himself to practice at night, and treated forty minutes of morning jogging as an indulgence and a chance to clear his mind. Due to his own affliction, Li Zhuiyuan sometimes felt a faint daze and a sense of unreality when looking at himself in the mirror. But if Tan Wenbin were to look into a mirror and see himself from a year ago, he would probably stubbornly insist that the reflection was an illegitimate child his father had sired out of wedlock in his wild youth. And then he would surely tack on: "Look at that crooked, hopeless excuse for a face. Clearly inferior pedigree." After washing his face, Li Zhuiyuan returned to his room. Ah Li stood before the painting table, brush in hand. She was painting a landscape. The scene contained not only grand, sweeping vistas, but also a massive dam. This stretch of wall was covered in paintings. The cross-river bridge running from Nantong to Shanghai alone was depicted in four or five variations. In one of them, heavy traffic flowed across the bridge above the river, while down below, Baijia Town was steeped in grim, ghostly gloom—a flawless union of reality and the void. At the other end of the room stood Li Zhuiyuan's desk, piled high with technical books. Beneath it sat several cardboard boxes filled with design plans, documentation, and technical blueprints. And these were merely what he had on hand. A great deal of material that he had already finished studying had been sent to the east room to enrich Ah Li's collection boxes. Over the past six months, Xue Liangliang had basically acted as Engineer Luo's secretary. It so happened that Luo had been in the thick of project runs, frequently attending feasibility evaluations and project presentations all over the country. Whenever his travels brought him anywhere near Nantong, Xue Liangliang would use the excuse of delivering study materials to his junior brother to pry half a day or a full day's leave from Luo. Tan Wenbin's pager was used to receive messages from only two people: one was his old man, Tan Yunlong, and the other was Xue Liangliang. Every time, Liangliang would page Tan Wenbin, leave the items by the Yangtze River, and Runsheng would have to pedal the tricycle all the way out there. Aside from hauling back the documents and blueprints, Runsheng had to bring him a fresh, dry change of clothes. In this manner, the more often Xue Liangliang visited Nantong, the more materials piled up in Li Zhuiyuan's hands. Beyond that, Engineer Luo would periodically mail Li Zhuiyuan academic journals and magazines, along with higher-spec reference materials that did not involve state secrets. At the same time, Luo would pose design problems for the boy, having him draft his own solutions. For convenience, he would send multiple prompts at once, wait for Li Zhuiyuan's completed work to be mailed back together, and then review and return them in a single batch. The two of them seemed almost to be competing—one furiously absorbing, the other relentlessly pulling up the seedling to force its growth. Li Zhuiyuan had good reason to suspect that the "university coursework" he was previewing had already strayed far beyond the standard curriculum. No matter how brilliant a genius might be, achieving mastery in any field required patient cultivation. Over the past half-year, "studying" had indeed consumed far too much of his time and energy. Yet he had little choice. So long as the entity beneath the peach orchard did not die, he had nothing else to do in the village. Nowadays, whenever an ordinary drowned floater turned up, Runsheng, Tan Wenbin, and Yin Meng practically fought over who got to haul it in, leaving even Great-Grandpa to act as a hands-off supervisor. As for the kind of corpse demons that could haul themselves ashore and walk around on their own, none had been seen in a very long time. If he hadn't experienced them firsthand, he might have wondered whether they were merely delusions from his past mental breakdowns. Whenever he grew tired of drawing blueprints, Li Zhuiyuan would stand up and wander over to the girl's painting table, while Ah Li would step away and take his place at the desk. Li Zhuiyuan would pick up a brush to unwind through painting, while Ah Li flipped through the engineering blueprints. She could understand them; otherwise, she wouldn't have been able to paint them. Moreover, she seemed born with a peculiar intuition, able to transform cold technical data and schematics into flowing, living currents within her scrolls. Li Zhuiyuan had even painted a piece with Ah Li as the model. Since he still couldn't bring himself to capture her face directly, he had only painted her from behind. In the painting, the girl stood atop a mountain peak, facing a surging torrent, with a gathering of ancient commoners standing below and behind her. A composition like that was well-suited for a mural in a water burial chamber. It was the boy's way of amusing himself amidst tedious studying. Yet when he woke the next morning, the figure of a boy, also seen from behind, had been added beside the girl. The two of them were holding hands. The artistic style had instantly shifted into something painted on a kindergarten wall. In truth, they were children after all, no different at heart from the kids of their age playing with mud in the village, except that their mud was just a bit more refined. Li Zhuiyuan had already finished deciphering the *Qi Clan Annals*. The further into the text he went, the harder and more time-consuming the process became. He eventually realized that a cipher key had to exist for the book. Otherwise, if even his deductive and computational abilities required such enormous exertion, an ordinary member of the Qi clan wouldn't even dream of learning the techniques; merely understanding the characters on the page would take half a lifetime of painstaking study. That was obviously impossible. The cipher key was likely some ancestral fundamental manual of the Qi clan, akin to the *Liu Clan Qi-Gazing Formula*. Lacking that key, Li Zhuiyuan had been forced to grind through the translation using the clumsiest brute-force methods. The book itself was a kaleidoscope of mechanical arts. Once decoded, it documented spatial secrets and intricate contraptions—the very tradecraft upon which the Qi ancestors had founded their livelihoods. Even within their clan, it had to be kept strictly confidential and passed down through small circles, because it touched upon the secrets of untold numbers of ancient mausoleums. If leaked, it would have provoked the bitter hatred of ancient rulers. It was an excellent book, but for Li Zhuiyuan at present, it was somewhat of a chicken rib—flavorless to chew, yet a pity to discard. His field was hydraulic engineering; he had no need to design "security" or "anti-theft" measures, since military garrisons were stationed near major water conservancy works anyway. Compared to ancient times, when people feared invasions by bands of grave robbers, the defensive threat that mattered today came from aerial missiles. Still, though useless now, it was bound to come in handy later. The retired professors at the family compound had helped him decipher the coordinates inscribed on the bamboo slips. Although three remained ambiguous, their general locations were now confirmed. From the Northeast to Yunnan and Guizhou, from grasslands to the Gobi, from the Hundred Thousand Mountains to the Thousand-Island Lake, from basins to plateaus, and within rivers, streams, and even the sea. The sheer geographical span was staggering; looking at the map, Li Zhuiyuan found it almost unbelievable. Yet if that masked man from the Spring and Autumn period had kept the bamboo slips on his person even after turning into a corpse demon, there had to be a deep secret behind them. Furthermore, one of the coordinates on the slips lay remarkably close to the site in the *Investigation Report on the Ji'an 572 Civil Air Defense Project*—in all likelihood, they were the exact same place. In other words, the unattainable ideal that Engineer Luo had pined over for years was one of the nine coordinates recorded on the slips. This led Li Zhuiyuan to wonder whether the three files Li Lan had tossed to him in Beijing half a year ago—corresponding to the sea, Ji'an, and Fengdu—also held some deeper significance. Having fully succumbed to her illness and believing herself stripped of humanity, Li Lan was nevertheless continuing her work. What purpose was she harboring? It was hard for Li Zhuiyuan to place himself in her mindset, nor did he dare attempt it. But viewed from the outside, there was certainly something far deeper drawing Li Lan onward in her pursuit. Like clockwork, the person who raised the curtain on every single day was Auntie Liu: "Breakfast is ready!" Li Zhuiyuan took Ah Li's hand and walked downstairs. Next to the ground-floor living room door hung a small blackboard originally meant for temporary bookkeeping—such as how many tables and chairs one family needed, or how many paper effigies another family ordered. Most of the time it sat unused. Three months ago, however, Li Sanjiang had solemnly wiped the board clean with water, picked up a piece of chalk, and earnestly written upon it: *Pot hundred days*. After being informed that he had used the wrong character for "one," Great-Grandpa had simply wiped it off, replaced it with "100 days," and continued counting down in Arabic numerals thereafter. The board, naturally, wasn't meant for his great-grandson. After all, the boy had already been admitted early, and the corresponding certificate had been enshrined by Li Sanjiang beneath the statue of Laozi—or rather, Confucius—in the small alcove. Li Sanjiang had written this for Zhuangzhuang. Today, the board displayed a freshly written "3." Tan Wenbin had returned from his morning jog, rinsed off by the well, and changed into clean clothes. It had to be said that even if his corpse-retriever training had only served to build up his physique, that was only when compared to a freak like Runsheng. Coming from a family of police officers, he had solid genetics to begin with. Paired with grueling workouts and a hearty appetite, he was no longer a pale weakling when stripped to the waist, but lean, defined, and visibly tough. Yin Meng's coffin-making craftsmanship was beyond reproach; sleeping inside was truly warm in the winter and cool in the summer. Every night, Tan Wenbin and Runsheng slept in coffins—one meant for Li Sanjiang, the other for Uncle Shan. The reason Shan Pao's burial coffin was still kept here was that Li Sanjiang worried if it were sent to his house, the old gambler might lose money and sell it off. In any case, whenever Shan Pao finally kicked the bucket, they could just have Runsheng haul the coffin over. It wouldn't be too late. Runsheng had heartily agreed with this arrangement. "Why would they give you tomorrow off?" Li Sanjiang asked, puffing on his cigarette with a puzzled look. "The Gaokao is right around the corner!" Tan Wenbin explained, "Grandpa, our school isn't an official test center. We have to go to the assigned school. They're giving us two days off so everyone can get ready, and the day before the exams, the whole class will head over together and stay in their dorms." Li Sanjiang asked, "Can folks deliver meals to you?" "Sure. If you don't stay in the test center's dorms, you can even go home." "Then that's fine." Li Sanjiang tapped his cigarette ash. "I'll have Ting Hou prepare niangao and zongzi, and I'll bring them to you on the morning of the exam." "Heh heh." Tan Wenbin didn't refuse, merely grinning. "Do well on those tests!" Li Sanjiang clapped Zhuangzhuang on the shoulder. "Book learning is good. Truly, book learning is the best." "Don't worry, Grandpa, I've got this. I put down your address for the admission notice. Once you've had a look, I'll take it home to show my parents." "Haha!" Li Sanjiang laughed heartily. "Good lad, Zhuangzhuang! All that food you ate from this old man wasn't wasted after all." After breakfast, Runsheng wheeled out the tricycle, and Li Zhuiyuan and Ah Li climbed aboard. The school was holding its final Gaokao pep rally today, and at the administration's request, the boy had to make an appearance. Arriving at the school, the banner over the front gate and the academic building behind it—*Warmest Congratulations to Our Student Li Zhuiyuan for Winning First Prize in the National Mathematics Olympiad*—remained brand-new. Even the older banners for the "Municipal Prize" and "Provincial Prize" looked bright and fresh. The school genuinely replaced them with new banners on a regular schedule. "Xiaoyuan, Ah Li and I will wait for you nearby." Runsheng pointed toward an alley in the distance. "Okay," Li Zhuiyuan replied. He looked at Ah Li, who was still sitting in the cart. "We'll go shopping in a bit, and after that, we'll get fried skewers." The girl nodded. Though tomorrow was officially the start of the break, once the morning rally finished, the rest of the day was basically self-study. Students were free to head straight home to prepare, and Tan Wenbin would be coming out as well. Carrying a book by Wei Zhengdao, Li Zhuiyuan walked onto campus. Last semester, he would still come in for monthly and midterm exams, but this semester... this was his very first time stepping through the school gates. The school never pressured him to attend class or sit for exams; they merely checked in on his "breathing" through indirect inquiries via Tan Wenbin. The boy walked straight toward the principal's office, drawing a trailing entourage of teachers along the way. Had he been a daily fixture, it wouldn't have been unusual, but this was his first appearance since claiming the national Olympiad prize. Sun Qing seemed to have prepared well in advance; she wasn't waiting in her classroom, but right here. Seeing Li Zhuiyuan arrive, she stepped forward and took the boy's hand, smiling broadly. "Let your homeroom teacher have a look at you! Oh my, it's been so long—our Zhuiyuan has really grown taller!" For a homeroom teacher to refer to herself so emphatically as "your homeroom teacher" already sounded unnatural, and saying "it's been so long" to a student in her own class was stranger still. Yet the teachers around them cast glances only of envy and jealousy; no one cared about the awkward phrasing. Putting themselves in her shoes, if they had stumbled into the title of homeroom teacher to a top Gaokao scholar without lifting a finger, they would have been far more shameless than Sun Qing. Once that line was etched into her resume, who reading it would ever know that the star student had never attended class? Sun Qing led Li Zhuiyuan into the principal's office, where Teacher Yan, Teacher Su, and all the boy's subject teachers were assembled. A camera had even been mounted on a tripod in the room. Next, Li Zhuiyuan stood dead center, maintaining a steady smile as various combinations of faculty rotated in and out of the frame beside and behind him. By the time the photos were done, Li Zhuiyuan couldn't help but rub his cheeks. Even with his seasoned acting skills, his facial muscles were beginning to ache. Afterward, Wu Xinhan escorted the boy to the school auditorium. At the long table facing the audience below, the center seat belonged to Li Zhuiyuan. The principal and vice-principals sat on either side of the boy. The graduating seniors were filing in. Li Zhuiyuan noticed that many of them wore bright yellow talismans pinned to their clothes—the lucky charms from the *Zhuiyuan Secret Papers*. When he had failed to draw proper talismans back then and racked his brains over what use they might have, he truly had never anticipated this kind of effect. A group of boys in the first two rows had gone so far as to slap the talismans flat against their foreheads, hoping to soak up a bit more of the prodigy's good fortune right then and there. The scene made them look like two rows of stiffly seated corpse demons. When their own interests were on the line, young people's superstition could make the older generation look downright secular. Li Zhuiyuan spotted Tan Wenbin sitting below, making a funny face at him. Then Zhou Yunyun walked over, and the boy sitting beside Tan Wenbin tactfully gave up his seat. The principal and several teacher representatives began their speeches. Unlike the Hundred-Day Pledge Rally, which aimed to fire up morale—sometimes even paying outside "motivational speakers" to inject cheap adrenaline—this gathering focused entirely on stress relief. They reassured the students that the Gaokao was not the only path in life, while subject teachers offered last-minute tips for the exam. Wu Xinhan turned his head and whispered, "Xiaoyuan, would you like to say a few words?" Li Zhuiyuan gave the closing remarks—a very brief joke: "Everyone, remember to write 'Solution' before starting your calculation problems." A collective pause fell over the crowd, followed by a roar of laughter and thunderous applause. Many waved their *Zhuiyuan Secret Papers* and talismans in the air. When the rally ended, Li Zhuiyuan walked toward the school gate, flanked by Wu Xinhan and the rest of the school leadership and teachers. The boy could sense the tinge of sadness in the air. Everyone knew that once they walked out of campus this time, it would be difficult to meet again. He felt genuinely grateful for the special treatment the school had shown him, so he paused beside the flowerbed near the main gate. Ignoring the sign that read *Keep Off the Flowerbed*, the boy stepped inside, bent down beneath a ginkgo tree to pick up a few fallen leaves, and pressed them between the pages of his book. That was precisely why he had brought the book with him that morning. Wu Xinhan took off his glasses and wept. The subject teachers' eyes grew red. Seeing the principal cry, the other teachers and administrators quietly joined in, dabbing at the corners of their eyes. Though their feelings were neither profound nor intensely felt, the tears were not entirely fake. Sometimes, tears fell simply to leave a damp crease on the pages of life, so that one might more easily find the spot when looking back. The senior classrooms had gone completely wild. Students tore up exam papers and notebooks, showering the confetti out the windows. Underclassmen on the floors below and across in the junior high building leaned over the balcony railings, watching their senior peers lose their minds with a mix of envy and longing. The teachers, for once, did not step in to maintain order. The cleaning ladies were only too happy to scoop up the scraps into burlap sacks to sell as scrap paper. With his hands pillowing his head and his feet propped up on his desk, Tan Wenbin reclined, watching his shouting, screaming classmates. If he hadn't met Brother Xiaoyuan, if he hadn't lived through the events of half a year ago, he would still be the Left Hand Protector, leading the charge as the wildest troublemaker in the room. While others kept a shred of sanity amid the chaos, he probably would have shredded his textbooks as well, reducing himself to a fool with nothing proper to read for the final two days. Now, however, he simply found his classmates utterly endearing. He could savor the atmosphere, yet couldn't be bothered to jump in. With Brother Xiaoyuan's help, his mock exam scores had stabilized near the top of the class. The Gaokao three days from now felt like nothing more than a routine hurdle he had to clear—nothing to be nervous about. Zhou Yunyun sat in Li Zhuiyuan's former seat. The surrounding noise was deafening, drowning out everyone's voices. The class monitor mustered her courage, leaned close to Tan Wenbin's ear, and said, "Tan Wenbin, I like you." Tan Wenbin heard her. His first instinct was to pretend he hadn't. But thinking that wouldn't be right, he turned his head to look at Zhou Yunyun. The girl showed no embarrassment, no urge to retreat; she met his gaze with complete candor. Tan Wenbin instinctively wanted to play the scoundrel—to flick the class monitor's chin and mimic the lecherous tone of Young Master Gao from the classics: *"Come on, babe, give your lord a smile."* In the end, though, the boy merely reached out one arm, drew her into a half-embrace, and patted her gently on the back. Many classmates nearby saw this, yet no one catcalled or jeered. The gesture was too clean—so clean it felt like an early farewell between old friends. "Good luck! Let's both get into great universities!" He neither accepted nor rejected her; it wasn't a promise, but more like a blessing. Zhou Yunyun returned the hug generously. For a fleeting instant, each caught the scent of the other. Youth, once spoken aloud, left no regrets. Immediately after, Tan Wenbin grabbed his backpack, vaulted cleanly over the desk, headed over to an empty desk to tuck a potted plant into his bag, and then pushed his way through the shouting crowd. After indulgence, a low mood inevitably followed. When they finished strolling through the small-goods market with Brother Xiaoyuan and sat down for fried skewers, Tan Wenbin held a bamboo stick, absently mutilating the two remaining pieces of fried tofu on his plate. Li Zhuiyuan picked up a napkin and gently wiped a trace of sauce from the corner of Ah Li's mouth. Then he turned to Tan Wenbin, teasing, "Confessed to the class monitor and got rejected?" Tan Wenbin muttered, "Yeah." Runsheng glanced at Binbin without a word, bit off a piece of incense, and went back to eating his chicken skewer. The skewer stall sat at the corner of a street, and their table was tucked into the most secluded spot. Only here could Ah Li sit quietly and eat in peace. Li Zhuiyuan said, "Since it was your own choice, just don't regret it." "I don't regret it." Tan Wenbin took a swig of soda and let out a burp. "Brother Xiaoyuan, our future lies with the corpse demons in the vast ocean! Only that can do justice to the biceps I worked so hard to build!" Li Zhuiyuan's gaze fell on the visibly overstuffed backpack beside Tan Wenbin. Inside was the potted plant that had always sat on Zheng Haiyang's desk. Some things Binbin had never forgotten. This was what Li Zhuiyuan admired most about Tan Wenbin. After all, emotionally detached as he was, he had been able to cut ties even with his own mother. Just then, several whistling punks walked up and shoved their hands onto the table of two young students next to them, claiming they were short on cash and asking to "borrow" some pocket money. Tan Wenbin picked up the plate of sauce in front of him and slammed it upside down onto the head of one of the punks. The moment the punk turned around, Tan Wenbin planted a kick squarely into his chest, knocking him flat on his back, followed by another kick that sent him rolling across the ground. These were moves meant for corpse demons; used on living people, the force was terrifying. Seeing this, the punk's two companions scrambled for makeshift weapons—one grabbed a bottle of citric acid, the other a handful of bamboo skewers. Runsheng looked at Li Zhuiyuan. Li Zhuiyuan took a bite of the starch sausage Ah Li handed him and nodded. Runsheng stood up and walked over. Spouting profanities, Tan Wenbin retreated behind Runsheng. It wasn't that he was scared or thought he couldn't take them; his exams were right around the corner, and he couldn't afford to hurt his hands. Before long, the punks were pummeled to the ground by Runsheng. Gone was the arrogant swagger they had shown while shaking down students; spitting blood and foam, they wailed that they were going to call the police. Runsheng used the tip of his shoe to count the teeth scattered on the ground. Finding the tally short, he stomped directly onto the mouth of the one with the best teeth. *Pfft! Pfft!* Only after the man spat out his teeth did Runsheng finally feel satisfied. Just then, a police cruiser pulled up nearby. It hadn't been dispatched for this call, but happened to be passing by on official business when the officers spotted the brawl. Tan Wenbin picked up his backpack, patted it gently, slung it over one shoulder, blew a whistle, and nudged Runsheng with his elbow: "Move! The heat is here!" Runsheng glanced over and replied, "That's your dad." The cruiser door opened, and Tan Yunlong stepped out. As he approached, Tan Yunlong took off his police cap and delivered several swift kicks to Tan Wenbin. He had no choice. He had just pointed out the window to his colleague in the car and said, "That's my son." And then, even through the car window, he had clearly read his son mouthing the word "cops." "Ow! Ow! Ow!" Tan Wenbin dodged repeatedly. Fortunately, his old man had restraint; his kicks stayed low, striking only the shins—painful, but harmless. Having vented his irritation, Tan Yunlong asked, "What happened?" Tan Wenbin said, "Local thugs shaking kids down for protection money." "And you beat them into this state?" "We were acting bravely for a just cause, contributing to a harmonious society!" The two students who had been cornered earlier had initially slipped away, but seeing the police arrive and question Tan Wenbin and Runsheng, they ran back immediately to testify so their defenders wouldn't be wrongly accused. Tan Yunlong said, "Your mother and I are coming to Grandpa Li's house tonight to bring you niangao and zongzi. She even dug out the qipao she wore when she was young." "Can Mom still fit into that qipao?" "I secretly took it to a tailor beforehand to have it let out." "Not bad, Captain Tan." "Still getting cheeky?" "I'm not being cheeky at all—I'm just grateful you had such clever moves, or a miracle like me would never have been born." "Do well on your exams." "Yes, sir!" ... The exam center was at Pingchao Middle School. The night before, Tan Wenbin had gone to his school to board the bus arranged for his class, staying overnight in the temporarily vacated dorms of the younger students. Early the next morning, Tan Wenbin ran to the school gate. A large crowd of parents had already gathered, each bringing breakfast for their children. Munching on niangao and zongzi, Tan Wenbin mumbled, "Grandpa, did you have Runsheng pedal the tricycle all this way to bring you here so early? It's pretty far." "No, Principal Wu drove by to pick up Xiaoyuan for the exams, so I hitched a ride." "Where's Xiaoyuan? Has he eaten? Oh, wait, Xiaoyuan doesn't need to eat this." "Of course he does! I made sure he ate some this morning. It's an exam, after all! Even Principal Wu brought his own." "Alright, I'm full, Grandpa." "Good luck, Zhuangzhuang! If a question is too hard, skip it. Just do everything you know how to do. Do your best, that's all that matters..." Tan Wenbin listened patiently to Li Sanjiang's nagging. Li Sanjiang had only heard other parents say those few lines, yet the brat didn't wave his hand dismissively or complain, "I know, stop nagging." Instead, he took the encouragement right in stride. "Alright, Grandpa Li, I understand." Tan Wenbin opened his arms and gave Li Sanjiang a hug, then turned to find his homeroom teacher. Li Sanjiang smiled. His favorite would always be Xiaoyuan Hou, but Xiaoyuan Hou was so sensible and obedient that in daily life, it was Zhuangzhuang who best matched the old man's temperament. Seeing Zhuangzhuang walk off into the distance, Li Sanjiang waved at his back again: "Do well on the tests, child!" In other classes, the homeroom teachers personally handed out the admission tickets. For Li Zhuiyuan, Principal Wu managed everything himself, handing the boy his stationery bag and exam ticket as they got out of the car. The first subject in the morning was Chinese. Li Zhuiyuan took a little longer than usual because he wanted his handwriting to look neat. When it came to the second subject, Mathematics, Li Zhuiyuan finished the paper rapidly. Before turning it in early, he tried reviewing the test from the perspective of the questions he usually set for Tan Wenbin. Then he blinked. He realized that from Tan Wenbin's perspective, this math paper was absurdly difficult. No—for this entire graduating class, the difficulty was egregiously over the top. Li Zhuiyuan was somewhat puzzled: *Who wrote these questions? Do they have a personal vendetta against students?* Though everyone faced the same brutal paper, students with fragile nerves might suffer a complete psychological collapse right after math. Li Zhuiyuan handed in his paper early and walked out to Principal Wu's car. Principal Wu opened a thermal container to let him eat lunch. "Principal Grandpa, the math was a bit difficult this time." "Eh?" Wu Xinhan froze for a moment. If a national Olympiad first-prize winner called it difficult, just how terrifyingly hard was this exam? "For ordinary students, I mean." "Oh, alright, I see." Wu Xinhan breathed a sigh of relief, but then immediately realized the implications. "Xiaoyuan, you go ahead and eat. I'll go ask around." After eating, Li Zhuiyuan lay down in the car and took a nap. He was eventually awakened by the sound of weeping outside. Looking out the window, he saw countless students crying their eyes out after finishing the math exam. Even more unsettling, a few students were laughing—laughing like the eccentric monk Ji Gong, as if they had seen through the vanity of the mortal world. Wu Xinhan returned to the car, wiping sweat from his brow and cursing, "I found out what happened. Some bastard student stole a copy of the exam and got caught, so they had to roll out the backup contingency paper at the last minute. "The difficulty of this backup paper is downright insane. I've already told the teachers to go comfort the students in their classes." "Principal Grandpa, who wrote the backup paper?" "Nobody knows yet, but mark my words, that guy will probably be cursed by students for decades." After finishing the afternoon exams, Li Zhuiyuan was driven home. The next day before dawn, Wu Xinhan came by again to pick him up. When the afternoon exams finally concluded, at Li Zhuiyuan's request, they waited for Tan Wenbin to emerge. "Ah, the beds in the dorm really aren't as comfortable as the coffins at home." Wu Xinhan glanced in the rearview mirror, assuming Tan Wenbin was just cracking a joke. Tan Wenbin added, "The other subjects were fine, but that math paper was ridiculously hard! I had no idea how to do several of the big calculation problems, so I just did what you told me: wrote 'Solution' first, and then crammed down every formula that looked remotely relevant." Li Zhuiyuan said, "They'll award points for that." "Really?" Tan Wenbin blinked in disbelief. "This is math, not Chinese or politics!" Wu Xinhan pricked up his ears too. He was the principal, but he didn't oversee specific grading operations. Li Zhuiyuan explained, "The questions were far too difficult this time. The Gaokao is about ranking. When grading, they will try to stretch the score distribution and look for ways to piece points together for you. Writing 'Solution' on a major problem might earn you quite a few sympathy marks." Tan Wenbin grinned. "Then our school hit the jackpot! Almost every classmate I know followed what you said at the rally—the second they got the paper, they wrote 'Solution' for all the calculation problems!" Wu Xinhan cheerfully leaned on the car horn: *Honk, honk, honk, honk!* ... With the exams over, all that remained was waiting for the results, since college preferences had already been submitted before the Gaokao. Li Zhuiyuan also formally began preparing for his university life. The first order of business was hauling out all the dozen or so boxes of books from Great-Grandpa's basement to air them in the sun. Over the past six months, he had been swamped with so many technical books, documents, and blueprints that he hadn't visited the basement for reading material in a long time. Now that he was heading to Jinling, he certainly needed to select a few sets to take along. Runsheng, Yin Meng, and Tan Wenbin bustled up and down, carrying all the boxes up to the second floor and laying the sets out one by one for Li Zhuiyuan to choose from. The courtyard terrace was more spacious, but Granny Liu was sitting down there drinking tea; Li Zhuiyuan didn't want to spread out any Qin or Liu clan manuals in front of her. That would have been too embarrassing. Yet what Li Zhuiyuan hadn't expected was finding something even more awkward. *General Outline of the Qi Sect*. The boy flipped through a few pages, then stood rooted to the spot for a long time, holding the book. He had spent so much time and effort painstakingly deciphering that entire set of texts, only to discover that the cipher key had been sitting in his own basement the whole time? Fortunately, he didn't find a plain-text version of the *Qi Clan Annals* down there, or he truly might have broken down. For now, he could only console himself with the thought that the brute-force deciphering process had been a learning experience in itself, deepening his understanding and speeding up his grasp of the Qi clan's spatial and mechanical arts. Books on cosmology, morality, health preservation, harvesting yin to supplement yang, extracting yang to nourish yin... These categories made up the vast majority. They were actually quite important—precious, even—but for an adolescent boy, they could all be swept aside for now. Li Zhuiyuan primarily wanted practical manuals. In the end, he selected three sets: *Classic of Miasma Methods*, *Essentials of Qi and Form*, and the *Ksitigarbha Bodhisattva Sutra*. Although Wei Zhengdao's books touched on methods for breaking miasma, and both the Qin and Liu families taught qi-gazing, those were akin to abstract formulas—somewhat detached from practical application. The first two books were like concrete sample problems worked out under those formulas, helping him build a firmer foundation. The *Ksitigarbha Bodhisattva Sutra* dealt with walking the yin path. The Yin Family Twelve Arts he had learned were basic methods for traversing the yin realm, whereas this text was far more advanced. The title page boldly declared: *He who masters this method may tread the underworld and step across the Yellow Springs, reaching the seat of the Bodhisattva to hear the Buddhist Dharma.* Naturally, that was an exaggeration, but it highlighted the book's profound utility. In any case, none of the books in Great-Grandpa's basement were utter nonsense. To Li Zhuiyuan's slight disappointment, he found no more books by Wei Zhengdao, nor any from the Qin or Liu families. Moreover, Li Zhuiyuan vaguely sensed that his previous method of improving solely through "reading" had reached a plateau. Ultimately, lineage and inheritance relied on living people. Even in the modern industrial age, technical trades faced generational gaps that led to skills being lost. For instance, the materials Engineer Luo was mailing him had long since transcended the realm of textbooks; behind every piece of data and design document lay the painstaking toil of countless contemporary experts. Afterward, Runsheng and the others repacked the sorted books into the boxes and carried them back down to the basement. These books were treasures. They were already worth a tidy sum now, and once the antique boom arrived in the future, their value would skyrocket—especially Wei Zhengdao's works, written on Buddha skin paper, which was exceptionally rare and precious. One could say Great-Grandpa had always lived atop a mountain of gold. Yet... Great-Grandpa didn't seem to lack money. Even if his wealth were multiplied tenfold overnight, he would still live the exact same life. Returning from washing his hands at the well, Li Zhuiyuan saw Li Sanjiang sitting on a chair in the corner of the terrace, pen in hand, staring at a notebook as if tallying accounts. "Great-Grandpa, what are you calculating?" "Your Great-Grandpa is setting aside your tuition money." "Great-Grandpa, my tuition is waived." "What about room and board, and books?" "Those are waived too." "Living expenses..." "I have scholarships." "So you're saying, Xiaoyuan Hou, you're going to college without costing the family a single cent?" "I might even turn a profit." "Hmph!" Li Sanjiang tossed the pen aside and crossed his arms. Putting his great-grandson through college was a burden, but an even greater source of joy. Now, his joy had been stolen from him. He had envisioned going to the postal office on a set day every month to remit money to his great-grandson. When passersby asked what he was up to, he would sigh with exaggerated pride while waving the remittance slip: *"Ah, just sending money to our Xiaoyuan Hou!"* If the boy ran short on cash and phoned Aunt Zhang's store, the old man would happily scrape together whatever he could and wire it over right away. Well, now that dream was shattered. Li Zhuiyuan had no choice but to step forward and wrap his arms around Great-Grandpa's neck. "Great-Grandpa, that money won't be enough. I need to buy books, I need reference materials, I need new shoes and clothes, and I have to keep up with the other kids in class." The corners of Li Sanjiang's mouth began to twitch upward. "I can't live worse than the city kids. I can't let them laugh at me for being from the countryside. So, Great-Grandpa, you still have to send me money every month." Li Sanjiang nodded vigorously in agreement. "Right! That's the spirit!" In the distance, Liu Yumei, who was sipping tea, nearly spat it out. The old lady wiped her mouth with a handkerchief and murmured to Auntie Liu beside her, "That brat has mastered the art of coaxing his great-grandpa to pure perfection." Auntie Liu quietly reminded her, "Here comes the brat." Li Zhuiyuan walked over, noticed the tea had gone lukewarm, and brewed a fresh pot first. "Granny Liu, after I leave for university, will you keep living here?" "You go to your college—what does that have to do with me?" "But..." "'But' what? Do you really think you're some sort of indispensable big shot? Hah." "Yes, yes, you're right." "People shouldn't think too highly of themselves, or they'll trip and fall on their faces." "Thank you for the guidance. I'll keep it in mind." "Off with you. Don't bother me." "Alright." Li Zhuiyuan jogged away. Liu Yumei gently turned the lid of her teacup and whispered to Auntie Liu, "Ah Ting, do we have property in Jinling?" "We do, but it's a bit far from Haihe University." "Then buy one nearby." "Understood." "Sigh, I'm doing this for Ah Li's condition. Over the past year, Ah Li has improved so much in every way. It's natural for a child I raised to be on the quiet side, and I don't expect her to turn into some bubbly, lively girl, but why can't she speak yet? "Whatever it takes, that brat has to cure our Ah Li until she can talk." "Do you plan to take him on as a nominal disciple, then? We're about to leave this place." "No rush. Right now we're asking a favor of him; taking him as a disciple right now wouldn't sit well. "Once we're in Jinling, find a moment to leave the *Liu Clan Qi-Gazing Formula* on his desk. Let him read and study it on his own. Once he runs into things he can't understand, he won't be able to resist coming to ask me for guidance. When that happens, we can step down the ladder smoothly." "You truly think of everything." "Heh, no matter how clever a child is, he's still a child. How many schemes could he possibly have?" "Heh, that's certainly true." Auntie Liu covered her mouth with a soft chuckle. As a bystander, she saw clearly that the boy had deliberately run over just now to invite a scolding. The old lady laughed at Li Sanjiang for being played like a fiddle, yet she herself was being handled just as deftly. At dinnertime, the postal carrier came pedaling on his bicycle, shouting from across the rice paddies: "He got in! He got in!" In these times, families threw banquets when their children were admitted to vocational schools or technical colleges, let alone a prestigious university. Tan Wenbin set down his chopsticks at once. Just as he was about to dash out, Li Sanjiang called him back, pulled two packs of cigarettes from his pocket, and tossed an unopened pack to Tan Wenbin: "Go on, quick!" "Right!" Tan Wenbin retrieved his admission letter: he had been admitted to Haihe University. In truth, he wasn't overly thrilled. Even though the math paper had been brutal, it hadn't rattled his nerves or affected his performance in the other subjects. This admission notice had arrived as a matter of course. Still, as he passed the cover of the rice fields and was about to appear before everyone on the terrace, Tan Wenbin held the admission letter high and sprinted forward with wild excitement, hollering: "I passed! I made it!" Dinner concluded amid laughter and cheers, and the gathering chatted late into the night. Afterward, those who belonged in bed went to bed, and those who belonged in coffins went to coffins. Having bathed, Li Zhuiyuan pushed open his great-grandpa's door and walked in. Li Sanjiang sat on the bed, counting paper money. "Great-Grandpa." "Ah." Li Sanjiang nodded. "This is congratulatory money for Zhuangzhuang." "Mm." "Runsheng Hou and Meng Hou are going to Jinling with you too, right?" "Yes." "Then we need to set aside money for rent. I can scrape together a bit more here—it won't be a problem." "Liangliang has already rented an apartment off campus. I'll live in the dorms, and they can stay at his place. He doesn't go home often anyway." "Still, staying at someone else's place is inconvenient after all." "Uncle Tan is going to rent an apartment for Binbin. That was Binbin's condition before the Gaokao." "That works then. Zhuangzhuang isn't an outsider." "Great-Grandpa, after we leave, will you be lonely?" "You're going to college—it's not like you won't come back on breaks! Child, don't worry about your great-grandpa. When you're young and have energy, you ought to go out, explore, and see the world. When I was young, I was a rover who never stayed home either." "What about things at home..." "I've already spoken with your grandparents. They'll move in to live with me. Your grandfather's health is decent enough to help with chores and farming. Your grandmother's craft is terrible—the paper effigies she makes are so hideous even ghosts wouldn't want to look at them. "We'll just have your grandmother handle the cooking. Guiying Hou can cook well enough." "Great-Grandpa, you knew Auntie Liu was leaving?" "She pickled several large crocks of salted vegetables and paste ahead of time, and churned out an extra batch of paper effigies for the house. The meaning couldn't be clearer. She'll probably bring it up with me in a few days. "I'll just need to find another deft, hardworking hand. Tsk, I'll ask around in a bit." "As long as you have a plan, Great-Grandpa." "Xiaoyuan Hou, don't worry about your great-grandpa. In this world, no one truly can't live without someone else." Li Sanjiang reached out and patted the boy's head. "When you're out there, have your fun. Don't fret over me. If your great-grandpa ever gets sick or takes a turn for the worse, I won't hide it—I'll call for you." "Mm, I understand." "Oh, right, there's one more thing to settle. Everything here was willed to you in front of the village chief and the others. "But Big Beard's place—bah, Da Linzi's place—that house and the peach orchard are under my name, but they weren't included in the notarized will that day. "In a couple of days, I'll treat the village chief and the others to another meal and have that notarized as well. "I figure Da Linzi has been gone for so long without a single phone call or letter—he's probably dead and gone." Li Zhuiyuan knew that Ding Dalin and his crew had been dead for nearly a year. Li Sanjiang blew a smoke ring and smacked his lips. "Though doing this looks a bit greedy, you're heading far from home after all. In case something happens to me—spit, spit, spit—anyway, we have to prepare for the worst. "In the village, if you don't lay out every detail clearly in advance, it's easy for disputes to break out. "Besides, I had an agreement with Ding Dalin. The house and land are in my name; he could live there, and after he was gone, it would go to you, Xiaoyuan Hou. If he ever comes back someday, you can just let him keep living there." Three days later, Li Sanjiang hosted a small feast at Big Beard's house, inviting the village chief and elders to draft a new will, followed by drinks for everyone. Li Sanjiang was in high spirits and drank too much. Runsheng carried him back home, then pushed a cart over. The cart carried candles and yellow spirit paper. On the terrace facing the peach orchard, they set up an offering table. Even though Wei Zhengdao's friend had harbored ill intentions, what he had actually done was a good deed. No matter how many times everyone had cursed him in their hearts, he had genuinely kept the locality safe for a whole year. Presumably, he would keep doing so year after year. Heaven only knew when he would finally breathe his last. In this world, purely flawless things were exceedingly rare. Many of the "guardian beasts" in local myths and legends, when examined closely, hadn't originated as noble creatures at all; what mattered were actions, not intent. What Li Zhuiyuan conducted today was a minor investiture ritual. With "minor" attached to the front, it had very little to do with an actual investiture. In essence, it was no different from villagers tossing a pig's head into the river to worship the Dragon King. Whether you like it or not, I'll place this high hat on your head first; that way, even if you want to stir up trouble in the future, you'll be too embarrassed to act out. Burning paper, chanting incantations, reciting sutras—Li Zhuiyuan carried out the entire ritual with utter seriousness. This sequence had zero substantive effect; it was pure formality, far less potent than lying flat on the ground in the peach orchard to walk the yin path. Yet this was a performance staged for the corpse demon, primarily to demonstrate an attitude. With the rites concluded, Li Zhuiyuan stood at the front, holding a bowl of yellow rice wine in his left hand and incense sticks in his right, tracing three circles through the wine with the lit ends of the incense. Behind him, Runsheng, Tan Wenbin, and Yin Meng held the same items and performed the same motions. "Offer the wine." The three stepped forward together, held their bowls out past the edge of the terrace, and poured the wine into the mud below. Then Li Zhuiyuan stepped forward alone. Below the terrace, three damp patches were clearly visible. Yet when Li Zhuiyuan poured his wine down, the liquid was instantly absorbed into the earth; the ground dried immediately, without leaving behind the faintest stain. It was truly drained dry. Li Zhuiyuan could almost imagine the hideous laughter of the thing beneath the ground—it truly wanted to see him practice the arts from Wei Zhengdao's black book, only to end up in the same wretched state as itself. Unfortunately, it was doomed to disappointment. He had long since mastered the black book and used its methods several times, yet not a trace of corpse-demon parasitism remained on him. Suddenly, a possibility struck Li Zhuiyuan. Perhaps, while they had been cursing it, the thing underground had also been cursing them. From its perspective, because of its presence, no corpse demons dared appear nearby, meaning that even if Li Zhuiyuan learned the black book, he had no corpse demons to manipulate and couldn't contract the "illness." Yet it insisted on clinging to life, wanting to witness his miserable demise. But the more stubbornly it held on, the fewer corpse demons he would encounter, so long as he didn't leave the village. It was a deadlock that frustrated both sides. However, this could be turned to his advantage. Stepping outside the realm of formal chants and sutras, there were a few other things he could say. Li Zhuiyuan splayed his toes slightly outward, planted his feet, and looked straight ahead. *Snap!* He snapped his fingers, walking the yin path with open eyes! In his vision, one half was reality, the other a hazy gray. Back when he hadn't learned the fundamentals, he had assumed that walking the yin path required falling asleep every time. Later, he had gradually worked out a half-dreaming, half-awake state. But in reality, one could maintain both at once. Otherwise, if Daoist priests or Buddhist monks had to fall asleep just to see dirty things, how could they ever resolve them once asleep? Looking back on the road he had traveled, Li Zhuiyuan couldn't help admiring himself a little. Much like deciphering the *Qi Clan Annals*, he had always relied on his sharp mind to brute-force clumsy solutions. The boy didn't see "it," but beneath the former pond in the peach orchard, he could discern a faint layer of black. "Before I met you, I ran into corpse demons all the time. After meeting you, I couldn't find a single one. "Now, I'm leaving home for my studies. Out there, I'll definitely encounter plenty of corpse demons, and I'll use the methods from the black book you gave me. "But I don't believe I'll end up an inhuman monster like you. I'm more gifted than you, I'm smarter than you, and above all, I have better fortune than you. "Don't believe me? "In a few years, we'll see. "Oh, right. "If nothing happens at home, I won't be coming back." As he finished speaking, the black soil gradually took on a blood-red hue, which soon faded away. Li Zhuiyuan snapped his fingers again, ending the trance, and his vision returned to normal. Standing behind him, Tan Wenbin mimicked the snap. Of course, he was merely imitating Brother Xiaoyuan's posture; if he wanted to walk the yin path intentionally, he still had to burn incense and chant sutras just to increase his chances of success. Li Zhuiyuan had said his piece. The subtext was clear: *If you don't want me to stay safe and holed up here, then keep ensuring my hometown remains peaceful. That way, I can run wild out there, ruin myself into a wretched state just like yours, and come back crying to see you, granting you your wish.* In truth, his family back home was just Great-Grandpa, his grandparents, and a few relatives. If one looked strictly at household registration, only Great-Grandpa was in the family. Yet Great-Grandpa possessed abundant fortune; he hardly needed the blessing of the entity below. Even after they left, Great-Grandpa would only need to hire another worker to continue living his comfortable life of good food and wine. Even in the worst-case scenario, if real trouble arose, Uncle Shan could step up to shield Great-Grandpa. After all, Uncle Shan's burial coffin was still held firmly in Great-Grandpa's hands. After leaving Big Beard's house, the group didn't head straight home, but stopped by Aunt Zhang's store to page Xue Liangliang. Before long, the phone rang. Li Zhuiyuan asked about the living arrangements, and Xue Liangliang gave his full assurance that everything was taken care of and settled. Once they confirmed the date for arriving early on campus, Xue Liangliang offered to drive a freight truck from Jinling to pick them up, noting that they had plenty of luggage. Over the phone, Engineer Luo's voice could be heard in the background. Xue Liangliang replied, "Teacher, I'm going to borrow a truck in a while to pick up my junior brother. He has a lot of luggage—a mountain of books and blueprints. Taking the train or long-distance bus would be awkward, and he's still young. "No, no trouble at all. My junior brother comes first! I have that driver's license—got it for convenience on construction sites, heh heh. When the time comes, help me borrow a truck, alright? Great, wonderful!" Li Zhuiyuan knew that Liangliang's eagerness to drive out himself wasn't just brotherly affection; he was desperate for an excuse to wring leave from Engineer Luo. Looking back now, it was fortunate that Uncle Qin had been a step too slow back then and failed to punch through Baijia Town in time. Hanging up the phone and returning home, Li Zhuiyuan mentioned the departure date to Auntie Liu in the kitchen. Auntie Liu asked in surprise, "Isn't there still plenty of summer break left? Why enroll so early?" "Yeah. Can't wait to get onto campus." "Alright then. Once your great-grandpa sleeps off the wine, I'll let him know." "Okay, thank you, Auntie Liu." "What's there to thank me for over a little thing like this? It's no trouble at all." After Li Zhuiyuan went upstairs, Auntie Liu wiped her hands on her apron, left the kitchen, and headed to the east room to convey the date to Liu Yumei. "So early? Is our house settled?" "Settled long ago." "Alright, pack our things as well. Mainly Ah Li's clothes and the patterns I designed—don't leave any behind." "Don't worry about that." "Oh, right—Ah Li's collection boxes too. Number every single one of them. Don't let them get bumped or scraped; those are her treasures." "I understand." The east room was a single-story wing. Since they didn't cook here and the kitchen was elsewhere, it was laid out as a sitting room with two bedrooms. Liu Yumei and Ah Li shared the north bedroom. Auntie Liu walked to the door of the south bedroom and opened it, freezing for a moment. Boxes were stacked high, piled all the way to the bedroom doorway. "Goodness, there are this many?" Liu Yumei sighed helplessly. "You have no idea how much space those engineering blueprints take up. And that matrilocal son-in-law of the Bai family delivers them so diligently." "Don't worry, I'll arrange for people to move them. The house in Jinling has a basement that can store them all. As for these memorial tablets..." Liu Yumei looked toward the offering table. At first, the tablets had been aged heirlooms; gradually, old had been swapped for new, and now, every single one was brand new. "Once we reach Jinling, buy some thunderstruck wood and carve another set. No, make two sets—we can't let our Ah Li run out of crafting materials." "Wouldn't it be simpler to just give Ah Li the raw thunderstruck wood directly?" Liu Yumei shook her head, stood up, walked to the table, pulled open a drawer, and drew out a painting, unrolling it slowly. "This is Ah Li's painting." Liu Ting walked over and saw a house depicted in the scroll. The threshold was exceptionally high. Outside the door, grotesque spirits clustered; inside, the oil was drained and the lamps extinguished on the offering table, and every memorial tablet was cracked. "They are willing. Whenever Ah Li stops carving them down, it will mean she no longer blames them in her heart." ... Xue Liangliang arrived behind the wheel of a freight truck. To avoid blocking the village road, he drove half of it onto the field; it was Great-Grandpa's land anyway, so no one would complain. Runsheng and the others began loading the luggage. There was indeed an enormous amount; an ordinary pickup truck wouldn't have held it all. Li Zhuiyuan and Ah Li had already said their goodbyes in their room. Boy and girl shared an unspoken understanding, without a trace of sorrow over parting. Yet when they came downstairs together in front of Liu Yumei, the boy put on an air of reluctance, while the girl lowered her eyes with a forlorn expression. After climbing into the truck, Li Zhuiyuan asked Xue Liangliang with a hint of concern, "Brother Liangliang, can you still drive?" "Sit tight and relax." Xue Liangliang started the engine, spinning the steering wheel around to turn. "Xiaoyuan, hand me that cushion on your side. I need to prop up my lower back." ... A few days after Li Zhuiyuan and the others left for school, Auntie Liu formally gave notice to Li Sanjiang. Li Sanjiang had seen it coming. Everyone shared a simple farewell meal, and when settling her wages, Li Sanjiang prepared two extra red envelopes. "One is for you, and one is for A-Li." Auntie Liu looked toward Liu Yumei, unsure whether she should accept them. Liu Yumei nodded. "Keep them. It's Uncle Sanjiang's goodwill." Next, Li Sanjiang pulled out an even thicker red envelope, carefully offering it to Ah Li. Although Li Sanjiang had witnessed the girl's changes over the past year, he was still somewhat wary of her, especially when Xiaoyuan Hou wasn't at her side. Liu Yumei's gaze narrowed. "Old man, what are you thinking?" "This is for the child. Our Xiaoyuan Hou is a poor thing—his parents divorced and left him here all alone. Luckily, there was a little girl here to keep him company and play with him." Seeing that Li Sanjiang hadn't uttered words like "for my great-granddaughter-in-law," Liu Yumei felt a warmth in her heart. She reached out and took it. "I'll accept it on Ah Li's behalf. When we see Xiaoyuan in Jinling, I'll return an even bigger one to him." ... After Liu Yumei's household moved out, Li Weihan and Cui Guiying moved in immediately. With Li Weihan to drink and chat with him, Li Sanjiang's days were not lonely. For Li Weihan, this was the start of honoring his promise to care for Uncle Sanjiang in his old age, even though Uncle Sanjiang was still hale and hearty. Still, using this as an excuse, he had his four sons take back all the grandchildren who had been boarded with him. Caring for the elderly came before pampering the young; Li Weihan knew his priorities. Soon enough, someone came knocking, looking for work making paper effigies. It was a woman in her thirties who looked honest and dutiful. Hailing from Shigang, her husband had passed away and she had no children. Having left her in-laws' home, she found little welcome from her brothers in her maiden family, and hoped to find work here in exchange for room and board. Li Sanjiang had her craft a paper effigy as a test. To his surprise, the woman had remarkably deft hands, finishing one in no time. The paper figure looked lifelike. "Alright, you'll do. You can stay. By the way, you only said you're called Ying Hou—what's your full name?" "Xiao Yingying."