Inside the square cell, the heavy iron door—the sole point of entry and exit—was shut fast. It fit so seamlessly into the frame that it resembled a solid wall rather than a door. The only source of illumination came from a palm-sized skylight in the exact center of the high ceiling.
Bright sunlight spilled through this small window, keeping the room from plunging into absolute pitch-black darkness.
In the middle of the cell floor lay a swath of vivid red silk. Lit by the clear sun, the exposed fabric shimmered with shifting shades of crimson, resembling a pool of liquefied rubies. He Zhuoming was currently curled up beneath this gleaming expanse of “gemstones,” her consciousness thoroughly blurred from days without food or water.
She had no idea when the red silk had been placed over her. Back when she still possessed the strength to search for a way out, plead through the door frame, or scream curses, the cloth had not been there.
Now, she lacked the strength to lift a single finger, let alone speak. Her throat had progressed from a sharp, dry ache to complete numbness. He Zhuoming no longer even had the energy for regret. Her nose caught only the faint, stale scent of damp earth rising from the floor, yet in her hazy vision, phantom feasts began to appear: bucket meals, iced cola, sweet-and-sour pork ribs, potato-stuffed chicken wings, spinach egg rolls…
The more she thought, the hungrier she grew. He Zhuoming felt like crying again, but having wept so much over the past few days, her severe dehydration left her swollen eyes unable to squeeze out a single tear.
Suddenly, the sealed iron door was pulled open from the outside. Peering through the gap between the red silk and the floor, He Zhuoming saw only several pairs of bare, rough feet. In the next instant, she was hoisted straight up along with the red cloth draped over her body.
The person’s grip was as unforgiving as iron pliers. As they lifted her, He Zhuoming’s feet dangled completely off the ground.
Her heart dropped. *I’m done for,* she thought. *After locking me up for so many days, the blade is finally coming down. What are they going to do to me?*
Recalling the vulgar, cliché tropes male-oriented web novels usually reserved for female bystanders, the near-fainting He Zhuoming shivered violently. She was scared half-sober.
Back in her high school literature classes, she had always found the texts tedious; even when the teacher explained their meaning, it had meant nothing to her. Only now, trapped in such dire straits, did a line naturally flash through her mind: *A scholar may be killed, but not humiliated.*
Reading web novels was fine for entertainment, but if she were forced to suffer those degradations in reality, she would rather die immediately.
While her mind raced with frantic thoughts, she was forced down onto a cold, hard wooden chair. The red silk draped over her head slid off. The flickering candlelight in her view was so piercing that He Zhuoming squeezed her eyes shut.
A moment later, she forced her eyes open and realized she was sitting before a vanity table. The red cloth covering her was no ordinary silk either; it was a crimson bridal robe woven with gold thread.
The brass mirror opposite reflected her bewildered face. Her features were still round with youthful baby fat, framed by curved brows and round eyes—the visage of an innocent, oblivious young girl.
Beside her stood several exceptionally tall men dressed in exceedingly plain garments. Their attire was so crude that they resembled savages, and their deeply chiseled faces bore the numb stillness of corpses. Stranger still, none of them uttered a word.
Ever since He Zhuoming was duped into entering this place, she had never heard a single villager speak. They were all like silent stones.
One of the villagers lifted a phoenix crown from the vanity table and placed it onto He Zhuoming’s head. A curtain of beads hung from the front of the crown, the tiny dark-green beads clattering noisily against one another.
The phoenix crown appeared remarkably expensive, glinting with carved gold detailing. Delicate cranes on the frame looked ready to take flight—it was far too grand to belong to a village hidden deep in the mountains. In truth, even the magnificent red wedding attire He Zhuoming wore did not look like something this village could produce.
The villagers themselves wore a mix of coarse hemp and animal pelts. How could they possibly possess such smooth, lustrous silk?
Once the crown was fitted securely, two villagers flanked He Zhuoming, hauling her up by her arms to lead her out of the room under the escort of the others.
The procession traversed through fields of lush green rice seedlings. Loud music blared as the shrill blasts of suona horns and the clanging of gongs and drums made He Zhuoming dry-heave multiple times. Eventually, they came to a halt before a tall, grand temple. Red “Double Happiness” characters were pasted onto the temple walls.
The villagers dragged He Zhuoming inside. Though it was still a scorching summer day outside, the moment she crossed the temple threshold, a gloomy, freezing gust of wind swept across her face, making her shiver uncontrollably.
Gazing through the bead curtain, she summoned her courage to look up at the altar. Perched atop it was a massive, half-naked deity statue with a face as white as snow.
The statue was neither a Bodhisattva, nor a guardian deity, nor an immortal, nor a Daoist master—it did not belong to any mythological system He Zhuoming knew! Its snow-white face was covered in narrow, jet-black eyes, densely packed like a nest of toad eggs. With just a single glance, He Zhuoming was overcome by terror and began dry-heaving again. Unbidden tears spilled from her swollen eyes as she wished she could simply drop dead from fright right then and there.
There was no kneeling cushion before the altar, but there was a coffin. The lid was cracked open just a sliver, revealing a pitch-black interior.
It looked like a narrow, single-person coffin, carved with numerous patterns He Zhuoming could not comprehend. Gazing at them for more than a few seconds made her dizzy, nauseous, and sick to her stomach.
Had her arms not been held tight by the two villagers, He Zhuoming would have collapsed to the floor vomiting. Even with an empty stomach, she could not suppress the overwhelming wave of revulsion.
Just then, two more villagers entered through a side door of the temple. They, too, were escorting a young man flanked on either side, who was dressed in a crimson silk wedding robe just like He Zhuoming.
*This ‘groom’ doesn’t look very willing either,* He Zhuoming thought. *Was he tricked into coming here just like me?*
This village was truly bizarre. First, they tricked a bride into coming here, and then they tricked a groom…
While her thoughts wandered, the young man was pushed right in front of her. He Zhuoming caught a glimpse of his face through her bead curtain, and her stomach instantly convulsed with terror!
The young man’s face was a pale, sickly blue, his lips drained of red, and his neck was dotted with dark cadaver spots. He… he was clearly a dead man!
Terrified, she tried to struggle, but her starved body lacked any strength. A heavy hand pressed down on the back of her head, forcing her into a bow opposite the corpse. The surroundings were as dead silent as a graveyard; aside from He Zhuoming’s muffled sobs, no other sound could be heard.
She finally understood what these people were trying to do. Even if she had never seen it in person, she had heard of it before—they were forcing her into a ghost marriage!
He Zhuoming had only ever encountered such things in online news stories and Chinese horror games. Facing it in reality filled her with horror and disgust. If she weren’t half-dead from starvation, she would have crawled out of this cursed place on her hands and knees just to avoid looking at the “groom” opposite her for another second.
After her head was forced down to complete the ceremonial bows to Heaven and Earth, He Zhuoming suddenly felt the iron grip on her arms loosen.
Deprived of support, she collapsed limply onto the floor. She failed to notice the bizarre deity statue atop the altar undergoing a sudden transformation—the crowded eyes on its face split open, the pupils within turning and rolling about.
The villagers hastily bowed their heads to avoid looking directly at those eyes, but in the next instant, their heads detached from their necks. As their severed heads rolled across the floor, their faces still bore expressions of utter astonishment.
The “groom” flicked the blood off the blade of his sword, tilting his head up to gaze at the deity statue with a beaming smile.
The sickly blue hue and dead aura on his face rapidly receded, replaced by a healthy, ruddy complexion. With his skin back to normal, his smiling face appeared remarkably sweet, complete with two deep, charming dimples on his cheeks.
The villagers outside charged into the room, only for their heads to detach from their shoulders as well. The young man’s sword was fast—so fast that the dying felt no pain at all.
He leaped into the air, reaching a height that surpassed the deity statue itself. His pitch-black sword sliced the statue clean through from top to bottom. A shower of wet, black eggs tumbled out from inside the statue, splattering everywhere like a heavy downpour of frogs.
The stench of blood was sickeningly potent. The fallen black eggs rapidly withered and shriveled, the sticky fluid surrounding them evaporating into thin air.
The young man landed gracefully with his sword, flicking his wrist. The pitch-black longsword instantly became as pliable as silk, coiling around his waist.
The blade was black, but the hilt was a vibrant red, adorned with red crabapple blossoms that released a sweet floral fragrance amid the sea of severed heads.
In such a scene, the perfume of flowers was far stranger and more unnerving than the smell of blood.
Yet the sword’s master maintained a perpetual smile, his lashes curved gently as he strolled through the pile of corpses.
There seemed to be no living souls left; every headless corpse lay sprawled on the ground. As the young man walked through the hall, he did not step on a single head, nor did he tread upon a single body.
He completed a full circuit of the temple, resting his hand on the hilt at his waist. A trace of confusion flickered across his smiling face.
The young man murmured to himself, “How strange. Where is my bride?”
He Zhuoming was hiding inside the coffin.
From the moment severed heads began rolling across the floor, she realized she was in grave danger. At first, she had wanted to crawl toward the temple entrance and escape during the chaos, but villagers kept rushing in from outside. Starved and weak, He Zhuoming was trampled several times in the frenzy.
Fearing she would be crushed to death, she altered her course and climbed into the coffin to hide.
Whether the current situation was a zombie fighting villagers or a male ghost battling monsters remained unknown, but He Zhuoming knew both sides were lethal to her. She had no desire to take sides, nor did she want to be discovered!
She had long abandoned any fantasy of being the heroine of a redemption story and recognized that this world was not just a lighthearted novel. To her, this was now a very real world—a world filled with terrifying supernatural forces. A nameless bystander like her had no chance of handling the villain and no right to judge the male lead. As an ordinary person, her chances of slipping and dying in these deep mountains were far higher than joining the main party.
She was exhausted, starving, and dehydrated. Extreme terror had drained what little strength she had left.
She had intended to stay alert and monitor the noise outside the coffin, but the moment she lay down, her body forced her to sleep.
She had no idea how long she slept. By the time the bead curtain digging into her cheek woke her, the light filtering through the cracks of the coffin had dimmed significantly.
She scrambled up with great effort and peeked through the gap, noticing it was already night.
It was dead silent outside. The groom—whether he was a ghost or a zombie—seemed to have departed. After weighing her options, He Zhuoming decided to wait until daybreak before venturing out.
During the day, the sun would be out, so ghosts and zombies presumably wouldn’t be roaming around. With all the villagers dead, she could search for food without worrying about being captured again.
Decision made, He Zhuoming took off the heavy phoenix crown on her head and squeezed it. It felt solid—it looked like real gold.
At the thought that this might be genuine gold, her weak, starved limbs suddenly surged with newfound strength. She rolled up her sleeves and used all her force to flatten the delicate, openwork carvings. Once she escaped this village, she would need money in the outside world—this would be her starting capital for survival!
This bridal robe felt silky smooth, too; it might also be worth a decent sum.
With that thought, He Zhuoming worked even harder. She huffed and puffed for half the night, successfully hammering the massive phoenix crown into a fist-sized lump of gold. As for the other pearls and gemstones on the crown, she pried them off one by one and wrapped them tightly inside a bundle made from the bridal robe.
Once finished, He Zhuoming hugged her bundle and drifted off into a lovely sleep, a smile gracing her lips. She dreamed of leaving this desolate, godforsaken place to enjoy fine food and drink in a prosperous city.
As for sleeping inside a coffin, she no longer felt any fear.
Compared to being forced into a ghost marriage, sleeping alone in a coffin was a luxury! Besides, coffins symbolized fortune—perhaps it was a good omen!
When she awoke, bright daylight illuminated her surroundings. Though she still hadn’t eaten anything, He Zhuoming felt surprisingly refreshed.
Peering through the gap in the coffin lid, she saw that the outside was quiet, save for flies buzzing over the corpses.
The grand temple doors stood wide open, allowing the noon sun to pour inside. Even inside the coffin, He Zhuoming could feel the warmth, a far cry from the previous eerie chill.
She pushed the coffin lid open with all her strength and used the edge to pull herself up shakily. Severe hunger instantly washed over her, leaving her short of breath and trembling at the knees.
At that exact moment, a voice sounded from behind her: “Good morning~”
Frightened out of her wits, He Zhuoming fell straight back into the coffin. Drenched in a cold sweat, she turned her head back to look.
A young man in a red robe was sitting cross-legged right on her coffin lid.
He had short hair, and his left earlobe was pierced, adorned with a two-inch-long chain of pink pearls.
He looked very young and completely harmless, his eyes curved into a warm smile and a charming dimple showing on his cheek. Beneath his thick, straight eyelashes, a friendly and gentle gaze rested upon He Zhuoming.