Chapter 114

The things before us seemed like an endless staircase extending downward, step after step, luring us toward a bottomless abyss. The "ghost signals" heard in the night forest, the wreckage of a US Air Force C-type transport aircraft above the canopy, then the "jade coffin" beneath the plane, the elderly corpse inside the coffin, and that "gu snake" stripped of its skin, its body sprouting red flesh-threads that had grown to the coffin's base. The coffin's base, made of special "lang wood," resembled a thick layer of soft tree resin, allowing the red flesh-threads to pass through without leaking a single drop of the coffin's accumulated fluid.

Below that was the large hollow in the old banyan trunk, filled who knows how much with the desiccated corpses of birds and beasts. Without exception, these desiccated corpses were all entwined with the red flesh-like fine threads grown from the jade coffin. These red thread-like flesh growths finally penetrated the mouths of animal and human corpses, as if through these antenna-like flesh threads, sucking their blood dry alive, then conducting it to the jade coffin, hence the coffin's accumulated fluid—a preservative liquid formed through conversion, nourished by fresh blood, maintaining the corpse's freshness and preventing decay.

At the top of the tree hollow lay the skeleton of a pilot wearing a fleece-collared air force jacket. Though long turned to bone, he still retained the posture of his final moment, one hand reaching out from beneath the jade coffin—the very hand bone we had seen gripping the "double-headed clip" earlier. He seemed dragged into the tree hollow by those red flesh-threads, and in his last breath, he continued to struggle, one hand barely grasping the tree trunk beneath the coffin, but could go no further. When he pulled his hand from the rotting wood, those blood-sucking red flesh-threads had already burrowed into his mouth, nose, and ears.

All this is now clear: this is precisely the subsidiary tomb of the "Xian King's Tomb," burying a high priest under the Xian King. He used "gu technique" to skin a gu snake and bury it with his corpse in the jade coffin. The two ancient trees, overgrown with parasitic plants, formed a relatively independent ecosystem; many nearby animals had become "fertilizer" for this jade coffin.

This accidental discovery is highly significant: it not only further confirms the possibility of the "Mourning Dust Pearl" existing in the "Xian King's Tomb," but also allows us, through this subsidiary tomb, to directly verify the main tomb's location built within the "Water Dragon Halo."

The husband-and-wife old trees beneath "Zhelong Mountain," though not a feng shui nodal point, can be inferred as a "rotten bone tomb" for burying the Xian King's water dragon. A "rotten bone tomb" means yin does not meet yang, yang does not reach yin, the boundary is unclear, form is vague, qi disperses and does not gather. Yin and yang qi are defined as: the qi underground at the nodal point is yin, the qi overflowing above is yang. In the jungle, extreme damp heat makes surface and subsurface indistinct—this is called "yin-yang indistinct." To say the earth's meridian qi has no end, no accumulation, and no water interception—burial here makes it difficult to bless descendants; only corpse liberation and bone rot are possible, hence the term "rotten bone burial" or "corpse burial."

Yet this tree-as-tomb method altered the locale's layout, and with the "gu snake" in the coffin draining blood marrow from surrounding organisms, it completely preserved the corpse from decay and rot. Thus, this high priest in life must have been a master of yin-yang arts; this bizarre, wholly unconventional method is beyond ordinary conception.

Had it not been for the US Air Force C-type transport cracking the tree trunk, exposing the jade coffin, who would have thought this tree trunk was a natural outer coffin, actually housing a coffin inside? This can only be attributed to fate—it was destined we would collide with it.

But one thing remains puzzling: if this jade coffin slays nearby organisms, and these two old banyans have gathered countless resentful spirits, why have we never been attacked?

Pangzi clutched a deerskin bag holding four or five ritual items, puffing with pride: "Lao Hu, I see you're scared witless by the enemy—why bother with all this? Follow me: one torch, burn this ghost tree clean, enact the three-all policy—burn all, kill all, loot all."

Shirley Yang examined more closely, hoping to find textual or graphical clues in the jade coffin. Finally, she noticed the inner side of the coffin lid placed aside, covered in many sun, moon, stars, human and animal figures, and various strange markings. Shirley Yang glanced at it and instantly realized, asking us: "What lunar date is today? Whether this gu snake is a transformation of resentful spirits or not, it at least is a latent parasitic fungus plant grown from lang wood and maggots, similar to a man-eating plant, not active every moment—like most forest animals, it sleeps at night, feeds by day, and is most active around the fifteenth of the lunar month."

Pangzi calculated on his fingers: "First, fifteenth, fifteenth, twentieth—I can't quite recall if it's the tenth or so today, but I remember last night's moon was huge and penetrating, round and red."

At this moment, the sky was heavy with leaden clouds, but thunder had ceased. The forest was utterly silent, as if only our three breaths and heartbeats remained. Pangzi's words had barely faded when we simultaneously recalled: last night the moon shone like a painting; even if today isn't the fifteenth lunar day, it must be the sixteenth.

Shirley Yang suddenly drew her "paratrooper knife," pointing behind me and shouting: "Watch your back!"

Before I could turn, I swung my mountaineering pick backward, instantly severing three red threads already extended onto my body, chopping them into six segments on the tree trunk. The cut points immediately oozed black-red fluid; the three short segments fell onto the canopy, instantly withering and shrinking, while the three segments that had drilled out from the tree hollow instantly healed, splitting and rolling toward us.

I followed the motion downward and saw countless red flesh-threads slowly moving along the entire tree trunk, having already cut off our retreat. Unexpectedly, the red flesh-threads parasitic from the jade coffin into the old tree were so numerous—like fine red capillaries suddenly bursting from the tree hollow. Shirley Yang and Pangzi were each using their tools to chop countless writhing red flesh-threads.

However, no matter how we struck, those earthworm-like flesh-threads seemed to multiply—cut one, three more emerged from deep within the tree hollow, each thicker than before, like blood-filled roundworms, ceaselessly writhing and advancing, nauseating enough to make one want to vomit.

The canopy's space is limited, leaving little room to maneuver. If one missteps, though the safety rope prevents a fatal fall, once suspended on the trunk, one would instantly be invaded by these red gu snake flesh-threads, burrowing into the body's seven orifices—a death of agony comparable to being made into a human cocoon while alive.

Shirley Yang had now been driven to the tip of a branch, which was slender and prone to snapping; she could only barely support herself with her paratrooper knife. Seeing her isolated and in danger, I wanted to rush to her aid, but could not disengage. Pangzi on the other side was likewise overwhelmed. I burned with anxiety, wanting to sweep fire with the "Chicago Typewriter" to help her break free, yet feared breaking the branches and causing her to fall as well. Helpless, I could only shout loudly at Pangzi to hurry and rescue her.

Shirley Yang heard our shouts from afar; amidst the chaos, she glanced our way and shouted: "I'll jump down to get the propane spray canister, burn this tree—I'll light it, and you two figure out how to climb down from the tree."

My heart leapt: how could one just jump from a tree over twenty meters high? The safety rope from the canopy only reaches halfway; jumping down would not only risk death but also break arms and legs. I urgently told Shirley Yang: "Are you scared silly? Jumping from this height isn't that seeking death? Don't do foolish things—don't just focus on displaying American individual heroism; collective strength is truly greatest. Hold on—we're coming to meet you."

Pangzi, however, fanned the flames, shouting at Shirley Yang: "Jump down! Jump down and you'll melt into the blue sky."

Shirley Yang said no more, cut her waist safety rope with the paratrooper knife, and leapt from the tree. I watched, eyes wide, my heart seeming to fall with her from over twenty meters up.

Pangzi also gaped: "Ah? Damn, she really dared to jump—Americans really play rough." Only then did I see Shirley Yang mid-air, already holding the "Diamond Umbrella" in hand, using it like a parachute, drifting slowly downward.

Had it not been for the "Diamond Umbrella's" sturdiness, an ordinary umbrella would by now have been blown into a "trumpet flower" by the updraft from below. Unexpectedly, Shirley Yang's risky move succeeded.

Yet we rejoiced too soon—just as Shirley Yang had descended seven or eight meters, a thick vine suddenly shot from the old banyan trunk. From the treetop, I saw clearly: several red flesh-threads clung to the vine.

This vine directly coiled around Shirley Yang, suspending her in midair. Faced with this sudden attack, Shirley Yang could do nothing but use the armor-piercing cone at the tip of the "Diamond Umbrella" to stab the vine.

These red flesh-threads grown from the gu snake corpse are formidable precisely because they are so numerous, and like earthworms, can survive even when chopped into segments—there's simply no point to grasp. My skin had already been speckled with their juice, which smelled bitter and foul, but seemingly non-toxic, for otherwise I would have succumbed to poisoning long ago.

What I smelled was nothing but bitter stench. Suddenly, a thought flashed: this dark red fluid might be the blood of those people and animals dead in the old banyan; those red flesh-threads resemble blood vessels. As the saying goes, "strike the snake at seven inches, capture the bandit by seizing its leader"—why not try smashing the jade coffin directly? Continuing to entangle on the tree is no solution; otherwise, with time, a moment's laxity would mean being entangled and defeated. Today I've staked my life—I'll fight once.

I had Pangzi cover me for a moment, then raised my Thompson submachine gun and sprayed the jade coffin inside the tree. The powerful American submachine gun instantly turned the coffin into a sieve, draining all its blood completely dry.

As the last blood drained from the jade coffin, the writhing gu snake red threads, as if suddenly bereft of soul, fell en masse, then withered and shriveled.

Shirley Yang also descended from midair to the ground, having clung to the old vine, so she was unharmed, merely frightened, her face slightly pale. Pangzi and I hurried down from the tree; after the shock subsided slightly, this encounter—sudden as it came—had lasted only a few minutes, yet to us it felt intense and protracted.

I was about to speak to Shirley Yang and Pangzi when suddenly the entire ground gave a violent jolt. The two old banyans trembled incessantly; their roots and stems were pulled out, the cracking sounds of breaking roots unceasing, as if some huge beast underground were about to burst forth, lifting the entire two-thousand-year-old tree, roots and all. Thunder above grew more violent, and black smoke curled from the fissures in the ground. Black wind, black smoke, ground cracks—forming a vortex centered on the old tree, encircling us completely.