Volume Two: The Secret Burial in the Cliff Valley — Chapter 110: Ghosts Are Visible Three Feet Under

I sensed something was wrong, starting with the time. I had been running after Liang Yue for more than ten minutes, and we weren’t slow. If we were heading in the right direction, we should have already left the village. Yet the path beneath our feet seemed endless, offering no glimmer of hope.

A sudden thought struck me—could this be one of those so-called ghost walls? But then I quickly dismissed the idea. Uncle San had once said that while ghost walls sound eerie, to those versed in Taoist arts, they are merely a common illusion. Moreover, the difficulty of breaking such an illusion depends on the spiritual strength of the ghost setting it. A typical lesser ghost might create a ghost wall, but Uncle San claimed he could break at least thirty-six methods—or even if not thirty-six, at least three.

Uncle San was leading the way. If there truly was a ghost wall, he would have broken it by now. The only plausible reason was that we had taken the wrong direction. But Ma Su was holding a compass—how could we have gone wrong?

Thinking of the compass reminded me of something. At Tianyou Square, the heavy presence of yin energy had distorted the magnetic field, causing the elevator to malfunction. Since a compass relies on the magnetic field, any change might cause its needle to deviate. We were clearly heading in the wrong direction.

It had to be that; the compass was unreliable. With this realization, I resolved to catch up and warn them.

But as I neared Liang Yue, I noticed something else off. Her running posture was awkward, unlike her usual self. When I got closer, I heard only my own footsteps; Liang Yue’s were oddly silent. Instead of the usual scrape of shoes against the ground, there was a rustling sound—like the flipping of pages when reading a book.

“Liang Yue, wait!” I couldn’t help but call out.

She didn’t respond and kept running forward.

That was even stranger. I was less than two meters away; there was no reason she shouldn’t have heard me. Even if she didn’t stop, she should have at least acknowledged me.

Gritting my teeth, I quickened my pace, caught up behind her, and reached out to grab her arm.

What happened next shocked me beyond belief. Despite using little force, I heard a tearing sound as her entire arm came off in my hand.

I was so startled that I nearly fell to the ground. My heart pounded wildly, and a chill ran down my spine.

The figure ahead—Liang Yue—paused and stood frozen like a wooden post as her arm was torn off.

I brought the arm up to my eyes and realized it was made of paper.

Startled, I circled to her front and shone my flashlight on her face.

Under the beam, a ghastly pale face appeared. The features were crudely drawn with colored pens, crooked and unsettling.

This… the Liang Yue I had been following was actually a paper effigy—the kind used in funerals.

After her arm was torn off, strips of bamboo were visible at the shoulder joint, with blackness inside adding to the horror.

At that moment, a gust of cold wind blew, and the paper figure toppled over.

Terrified, I threw the arm away and clasped my chest, trying to steady myself.

“Uncle San, Old Ma… Liang Yue… where are you?” I shouted as I looked around. But besides the thick mist, there was nothing, and my voice seemed to vanish into thin air, receiving no reply.

Wiping the cold sweat from my brow, I realized I had gotten exactly what I feared—I was separated from them.

I stomped my foot and crouched, clutching my hair in frustration.

At times like this, I could do nothing but wait for news.

Unexpectedly, after I crouched, the fog seemed to thin considerably, and visibility improved.

Standing up to test it, I saw the upper half was still shrouded in dense mist, but below my waist, the fog was much lighter.

This difference delighted me, so I crouched again, shining my flashlight around.

Sure enough, I made a new discovery: about ten meters to my right and ahead, a line of over a dozen people was slowly moving forward.

Rubbing my eyes, I noticed at the front of the procession a person holding a spirit banner, guiding the others who followed in step.

Their pace was extremely slow—barely stepping a leg every ten seconds—and their gait was peculiar, tiptoeing.

They wore old-fashioned, loose-fitting clothes in vivid colors.

Where had I seen these clothes before? Suddenly it struck me—they were funeral garments.

Why would living people wear burial clothes? Were these the dead?

Right—Uncle San had said ghosts walk on tiptoe. These weren’t living people; they were ghosts.

Instinctively, I covered my mouth, suppressing a shout. Could I really see ghosts? Had I somehow awakened the Yin-Yang Eye?

I jumped to wild conclusions. Only later did I learn this wasn’t awakening a special sight but a normal phenomenon.

Ordinary eyes cannot see ghosts—unless there are many spirits, and the yin energy grows dense enough to coalesce into visible forms. These spirit forms can be seen by common people only within three feet.

When I crouched, I was within three feet of the ground, fulfilling both conditions.

Of course, at that moment, I had no time to analyze why I could see ghosts; I only cared where they were going, where Uncle San and the others were, and whether I should follow.

As I hesitated, the line of people in burial clothes flickered in the mist and vanished one by one.

Panicking, I kept my low posture and hurried after them.

I reached the spot where the figures had disappeared and found a stone tablet on the ground.

Shining my flashlight on it, I read three red characters: Nanliu Village.

Nanliu Village?

Wasn’t it supposed to be Nanliu Village?

Seeing the inscription, my first thought was that the tablet was carved incorrectly. We had come to Nanliu Village, not Nanliu Village—the carver must have been careless.

But then I reconsidered. That seemed too unlikely. Even if the tablet was wrong, the villagers wouldn’t accept it.

Suddenly, a new thought flashed through my mind: the inscription was correct; we were mistaken.

The characters for “liu” and “liu” sound almost identical, and with local dialects, the difference was negligible.

We had been asking for Nanliu Village but were probably led to Nanliu Village by locals who misheard us.

(End of chapter)