Shen Yi didn’t answer but instead asked, “Why do you want to know?”
“It could be a key clue,” Yan Pan said, reaching her hand out toward him again. “Take it out and let me see. I won’t snatch it from you.”
She was smiling brightly. Shen Yi looked at her deeply for a moment and then arched an eyebrow, clearly skeptical. Who was to say her previous lack of competitiveness wasn’t just a setup for this very moment?
Shen Yi smiled back at her: “Don’t be in such a hurry to have me deliver the goods, Sister. We agreed on an exchange; let’s see some sincerity first.”
Yan Pan let out a snicker and retracted her hand. “Fine, fine. Let me think, where did I leave off?”
“Three years ago, I was burned to death, and Lin Wu followed suit by committing suicide in the river. Also, that Ghost Groom isn’t the groom who just died.”
“Oh, right, right,” Yan Pan said. “The villagers also mentioned that shortly after Lin Wu died, his biological father died suddenly, and his younger brother disappeared mysteriously. As for his biological mother, she went mad within a few days.”
Mad?
Shen Yi keenly sensed a plot element; the smile on his face vanished instantly, replaced by a somber expression.
“Not only that, he also killed your younger siblings and your uncle.”
“I asked them if this Lin Wu was the Ghost Groom, but they wouldn’t admit it,” Yan Pan continued. “But I think it has to be him. The question is, why did he become like this? A vengeful spirit only becomes one for a fundamental reason. But on this matter, the villagers remain tight-lipped; there must be a hidden story behind it. We need more clues to deduce what happened. Why Lin Wu became like this and what he’s actually trying to do these are the clues that will tell us how to end the evil and clear the game.”
“I think so too,” Shen Yi said. “Shall the two of us go ask around?”
“What could you and I possibly ask?” Yan Pan replied. “They look at you as if they’re seeing a ghost; they won’t say anything that can be said.”
“If we can’t ask normal people, let’s go ask a madman.” Shen Yi put his hands on his hips and smiled. “Isn’t there a saying? A madman isn’t actually mad; it’s just that the world they see is… a bit different from the one you see.”
Yan Pan was stunned, then laughed. “By the sound of it, you’ve run into that madman?”
“Yeah, I was just wondering why she looked a bit familiar,” Shen Yi said. “So that’s how it is. It’s his biological mother.”
Wen Mo stood behind them in silence.
“That works,” Yan Pan said. “If she’s mad, she won’t be as evasive as the other villagers. Let’s go and have a close encounter to see if we can get anything out of her.”
The two of them walked out the door. Just as they left the courtyard, a villager came running toward them. Upon seeing Yan Pan, a look of joy appeared on his face; upon seeing Shen Yi, his old face turned pale.
The flesh on his face trembled as he retreated several steps, falling onto his rear. With a look of terror, he pointed at Shen Yi and screamed: “Shen Yi!!”
Shen Yi: “…” The corner of his mouth twitched.
Yan Pan let out a snicker and stepped forward unhurriedly. “Alright now, your village chief said that the Shen Yi of this village died long ago. He isn’t Shen Yi; he’s just a young man who looks a bit like ‘Shen Yi’.” Yan Pan pointed at him and said, “Besides, his name isn’t Shen Yi. It’s Li Lei.”
Shen Yi: “? What?”
“Fine,” Yan Pan corrected herself, “his name is Han Meimei.”
“…” Shen Yi was speechless. He understood now; Yan Pan was treating him like characters from a primary school English textbook. Those names were just too much, so Shen Yi decided to name himself: “Forget it, just call me Zhang San.”
“Right, his name is Zhang San,” Yan Pan said, taking the out he provided. “He’s an outlaw.”
“…………”
The villager’s expression softened slightly. “That’s right, that’s right, Shen Yi is dead… Oh, you scared me to death; you look way too much like him.”
Shen Yi forced a smile: “Hahaha…”
“So, what is it?” Yan Pan got back to business. “You came looking for us, right?”
“Right, right, right!” The villager finally remembered his purpose. “The two of you, come back with me quickly; all the burial supplies are ready. The young people who came back with you have found everything the coffins, the paper effigies, the joss paper, everything.”
“Eh?” Yan Pan was stunned. “Didn’t the old woman say to go in the evening? Why is the ghost wedding starting now?”
Shen Yi pulled out his phone; it was only a little after 1:00 PM.
“She said evening just in case the others were slow, but who knew everything would be gathered so quickly?” the villager said. “The paper effigies were gone, so they followed the old woman’s words and made them themselves. The gold ingots and joss paper were the same; no one knew where they’d been put, so they searched for ages. Those who went for the coffins were even more…”
At this point, the villager lowered his voice and trailed off. He gave a couple of forced laughs and slapped his own mouth, as if he had said something foul that he needed to swat away.
“In short, hurry up and go; they’re all there,” the villager said. “Don’t miss the auspicious hour.”
Shen Yi and Yan Pan exchanged a look.
The rain continued to fall in front of the old woman’s house. Droplets struck the puddles in the courtyard, creating ripples.
“What!?” Shen Yi’s face contorted in shock. “You dug up a coffin with a dead person in it!?”
“Shhh!”
A player quickly covered his mouth. Her movements were too broad, and since she was shorter than Shen Yi, he had to bend down as she covered him. He stumbled, nearly falling.
Holding him, the player glanced around. The villagers had all stopped what they were doing, their eyes some cloudy, some vigilant and scrutinizing darting over.
The player quickly let out a couple of forced laughs: “Nothing, nothing. Everyone’s busy; it’s good to be busy, good to be busy!”
The villagers retracted their suspicious gazes and went back to their work they were preparing for the upcoming ghost wedding. Following the old woman’s orders, they scattered white paper scraps on the ground, hung white silk flowers high, and placed many paper effigies on both sides of the courtyard.
The player let out a sigh of relief, released Shen Yi, and whispered a scolding: “Don’t be so loud! Ghost knows which word of yours might be wrong and trigger these NPCs to attack us!”
“Sorry, sorry.” Shen Yi scratched his head sheepishly and gave a forced laugh.
His gaze then landed on this player judging by the voice, it was a girl. He couldn’t be blamed for not recognizing her gender; she was wearing sunglasses and a black mask, with a baseball cap pulled low, hiding her entire face. She wore a loose black leather jacket over a black T-shirt, with several silver chains around her neck. Below were tight black jeans and studded boots. The jeans had deliberate cut-out designs, making her look very rock-and-roll.
She gave Shen Yi the impression that at any moment, she might toss aside the hat and mask, grab an electric guitar, and start shredding.
“So,” Shen Yi said, lowering his voice cautiously, “you really dug up a dead person’s coffin?”
“Couldn’t be helped; that old hag told us to,” the girl said. “The old woman said that since the newlywed couple was murdered on their wedding day, there’s a high chance they’ll become vengeful spirits. We couldn’t use normal coffins; we needed ones with heavy Yin energy to offset the ghost’s resentment.”
“So, she sent us to the graveyard in the west to dig up some occupied coffins. We had to let the dead out and bring back two empty coffins.”
“You actually moved them?”
“Could there be any fakes?” The girl jerked her chin toward the distance. “They’re right over there the two coffins we brought back.”
Shen Yi looked in the direction she pointed and saw two empty coffins sitting there. This place was getting more and more mysterious using coffins dug up from someone else’s dead for a ghost wedding. Shen Yi had a bad premonition.
Suddenly, he felt something odd. Shen Yi turned his head and saw that the other players were gathered in small groups, whispering amongst themselves, several of them casting even more vigilant looks at him.
Though it had been like this before, the vigilance in their eyes now… seemed much stronger. Shen Yi was confused.
“There’s one more thing.” Just as he was wondering, the girl leaned in closer, whispering into his ear. “In the graveyard… there’s also a coffin for you.”
“!?” Shen Yi jumped back, staring at her in horror.
The girl adjusted her sunglasses, her tone calm: “Of course, we dug it up to have a look as well.”
“You—” Shen Yi instinctively raised his voice. Mid-shout, he realized he couldn’t speak too loudly. He quickly covered his mouth and looked toward the villagers. Fortunately, since he’d only just started, the sound wasn’t too loud and the villagers didn’t react.
Shen Yi let out a sigh of relief, lowered his hand, and after steadying himself, spoke again with suspicion: “You dug up mine too?”
As the words left his mouth, his lip twitched it really didn’t sound right no matter how he heard it.
“Well, your name was written clearly on it. We were curious, so we dug it up.” The girl put her hands in her jacket pockets. “But that coffin isn’t among the two we brought back. Yours was nailed shut; we couldn’t get them out.”
Shen Yi froze: “Nailed?”
“Yes, seven nails.”
“Seven nails?” Yan Pan was drawn into the conversation. She frowned and pulled a book from her bag. “Let me see. Is the method of those seven nails in here?” She pulled out a “Complete Guide to Feng Shui.”
Shen Yi was stunned: “Where did you get another book?”
“From the old woman’s room,” Yan Pan said. “It was sitting on the table by the door. I saw no one was watching it, so I just took it. It looked like a useful item.”
“…” Yan Pan ignored his shocked “is that allowed?” face and began flipping through the book. “It has all sorts of things in here how to read Feng Shui, how to arrange objects, even how to conduct a burial. Look, these pages are precautions for burials. This page says that if something happened during the deceased’s life and there’s a fear they’ll become a ghost due to resentment, you can drive nails into the coffin to let them rest peacefully.”
“Different nailing methods have different effects. Some let them rest; some ensure they stay dead; some can completely lock them inside the coffin so they can’t even go into reincarnation; and some… make their soul dissipate.”
Shen Yi shuddered as he listened.
The girl in the leather jacket pulled out her phone and opened her photo gallery she had actually taken a photo of Shen Yi’s coffin. She began to carefully compare it with the illustrations in the book. Curious, Shen Yi leaned in as well.
He saw his own coffin. It was a wooden outer casket that had just been lifted from the earth, covered in mud. Seven nails were driven into the top, each gleaming silver in the photo. The distances between them were uneven.
After comparing for a bit, the girl let out an “oh” and pointed to a diagram: “Is it this one?”
Shen Yi tilted his head to look at the book. There was an example of coffin nailing, and the arrangement was indeed identical to the nails on his coffin.
“This is the one,” Yan Pan said. “This… this is the method to lock him inside so he can’t even go to reincarnation.”
Shen Yi fell silent. Yan Pan and the girl in the leather jacket looked back at him simultaneously. Yan Pan arched an eyebrow, and the girl cleared her throat, both silently signaling for him to explain.
Shen Yi gave an evasive cough: “My name is Zhang San.”
“…”
“What does your search for Shen Yi have to do with me?” he said. “Besides, if it’s nailed shut, if I really were him, would I be able to wander around like this?”
“Fair point,” the girl said, taking the book from Yan Pan. “Perhaps this clue is meant to tell us that he isn’t the Shen Yi of this game, because the real Shen Yi is already locked inside?”
“Probably,” Yan Pan said. “Of course, there’s other information they used these nails because they were afraid Shen Yi would turn into a ghost.”
The girl realized: “Exactly!”
“If he really just died in a fire, why would they do this?” Yan Pan took the book back, closed it, and jerked her head toward Shen Yi. “And they look scared out of their wits when they see this ‘Zhang San.’ If it were just a simple accidental death, they wouldn’t act like this. There’s a hidden story behind this ‘Shen Yi’s’ death as well.”
“This hidden story is enough to make all the villagers fear him,” the girl mused. “Could it be that the villagers actually murdered Shen Yi and then nailed him in the coffin? Because of this, Lin Wu committed suicide and then came back as a vengeful spirit for revenge?”
“No, that doesn’t make sense,” Yan Pan said. “Why would they murder Shen Yi and nail him in? At that time, Lin Wu hadn’t become a ghost, and there were no hauntings; why would they need to do that?”
“True…”
“There is a reason.”
As the girl was responding, a voice suddenly cut in. She flinched, and the three of them turned to see the Old Village Chief. He had arrived at some point and was standing behind them with his cane, followed by two or three villagers. His eyes were cloudy and his expression somber as he looked at them.
“Chief!” A village woman ran over from the house. “Why are you here?” she asked.
The chief let out a long sigh. He looked at the sinners, his voice filled with melancholy: “I still can’t hide it from you after all.”
“But then again, after such a major event, even if I wanted to hide it… you would surely investigate until the truth came out. After all, it’s about your own hometown; everyone wants to know the full story.”
“Since things have come to this, I won’t hide it from you anymore,” the chief said. “I’ll tell you the truth.”
“Shen Yi was indeed killed by our own hands.”
“Because at that time… he was possessed by an evil spirit.”