Chapter 96

Everyone looked up together at the strange vat hanging in midair, and each had the same thought: "I've seen a ghost."

I said to Shirley Yang: "Don't worry, I'll go up again to take a look. If I fall into the water again, remember to give me artificial respiration quickly, or it'll be too late."

She gave me a sideways glance, pointed at the militia squad leader, and said to me: "What are you thinking? If you need artificial respiration, I'll also ask those militiamen to do it for you."

I said to her: "Why are you being so distant? If it were you who fell into the water and held your breath, needing artificial respiration, I would absolutely not shirk my duty..."

Shirley Yang interrupted my words and said to me: "I've noticed that it's either you, or that dead fatty Pangzi, who never takes life or death seriously, still joking in any situation. By the way, I ask you: what did you see up there that could scare you into falling into the water? Is Professor Sun inside?"

I've always considered myself Hu Dandan, so this question hit my weakness—how could I answer without losing face? I looked at the strange vat hanging in midair and told Shirley Yang and the others: "This... when I just lifted the vat lid, a string of invisible, linked, deadly golden needles shot out with a swoosh swoosh swoosh—truly a formidable hidden weapon. This is my skill: not flustered, not hurried, calm and composed, I avoided it with a sparrow-hawk flip. Anyone else would have no life left at this moment."

Shirley Yang said helplessly: "Forget it, I don't want to hear you talk anymore—just keep bragging. I'll go up and see for myself." After saying that, she twisted her wet long hair a few times, casually coiled it, and likewise had two militiamen set up a ladder to hoist her onto the vat's top.

The strange vat was still making noise, and the militiamen grew tense again, fearing some monster would suddenly emerge from within. I warned them a thousand times not to fire randomly, then threw the flashlight up to Shirley Yang from below, telling her there was a skeleton inside the strange vat so she could prepare herself mentally, unlike me who fell from above.

Shirley Yang looked up there for a long time, reached out and grabbed something, then jumped down from the strange vat, holding up a bracelet for us to see. I and the militia squad leader took the jade bracelet and examined it, becoming even more puzzled.

I had done business in Panjiayuan for a while, and my eyesight had improved greatly. I could tell at a glance that this jade bracelet was fake—a two-yuan street stall item, worth nothing, and moreover a modern thing. Could the white bones in the strange vat belong to a woman? And not dead long ago? Then how exactly was she placed into this vat? Was she put in after death, or shoved in alive to drown? The jar-coffin burial practice rules this out. Chinese emphasize burial in the earth for peace, never soaking the dead in water—this tangled situation before us truly has no clue at all.

Shirley Yang said to me: "Lao Hu, guess what's making that sound inside the vat?"

I said: "Could it be the skeleton turned into a spirit? In ancient China, there was indeed such a thing as a white bone spirit. But that white bone spirit was already wiped out by Sun Wukong long ago—could there be another newcomer here? Wanting us common folk to suffer twice, to endure hardship again?"

She laughed: "You really let your imagination run wild—it's not some white bone spirit. Just now I saw clearly: there are three human skeletons in the vat, all adults; below them are more than twenty round, strange fish, only two or three feet long, but their strength is extraordinarily great. The pond water in the vat has been drained, and those strange fish are constantly thrashing about inside, hence the sound coming through. Before we hoisted this strange vat up, we saw the iron chain trembling in the pond—possibly also caused by these fish fighting and swimming about inside the vat."

I said to her: "This is strange—what kind of fish are these? How did they get into the sealed vat? Do they eat corpses?"

Shirley Yang shook her head: "I don't know about this—I've never seen such strange fish before. I think these fish weren't put in beforehand; it's possible... possible that these fish naturally grow in the underground cave's pond, and someone deliberately placed corpses into this vat full of fine pores and sank it into the pond—small fish that haven't grown yet can swim in through the vat's fine pores..."

Hearing her words, I was greatly surprised: "I understand what you mean. You're saying they're using human flesh to raise fish? Once the flesh is eaten clean, the fish also grow fat, and big fish couldn't possibly swim out through the holes in the vat wall. But what's the use of raising fish like this? This is too... too damn disgusting."

The militia squad leader suddenly interjected: "Number One and Number Two chiefs, I've looked at this bracelet for a while—I seem to have seen it before, quite like one worn by a woman in the village. She married out years ago, also visited different families, and only returned to her natal home a few months ago. At that time she wore this bracelet to show us, and said she bought it in Guangdong, worth over a thousand yuan—village women all looked at it with envy, went home complaining their husbands were useless, couldn't afford such jewelry."

Hearing this, I sensed something fishy and hurriedly asked the militia squad leader what happened afterward.

He said: "After that, nothing happened—she just left without a sound, and villagers thought she had quarreled with her family again and run off elsewhere. Now seeing this bracelet, perhaps that woman was done in by bad people."

We were discussing when suddenly footsteps echoed on the slope of the underground cavity. I thought it was the two militiamen guarding outside, seeing us not return for half a day, getting uneasy and coming down to find us—but who would have thought that, upon looking back, the leader of the few people coming down was exactly Professor Sun.

I was both startled and delighted, hurried over to Professor Sun and said: "Professor, you scared the hell out of me—I came all this way for a major matter, still thinking you'd been eaten by man-eating fish—where did you go play? How did you suddenly appear from behind?"

Professor Sun saw me and was also startled, not expecting me to come looking for him again, and to meet here. After I briefly explained the cause and course of events, he finally understood what was going on.

Professor Sun carefully examined the scene in the cave and said to us: "This vat is a harmful sorcery device—I've seen something like it before in Yunnan. It seems this matter has already gone beyond the scope of archaeological work; we need to involve the Public Security Bureau. This place is not for discussion—everyone, don't disturb the scene. If we have anything to say, let's go up and talk in detail."

So everyone returned by the original route. The village head and others, seeing everyone safe and sound, were naturally delighted. I paid the militia the labor fees I had promised beforehand; though they didn't get any elixir pills, they received their wages, and each was pleased.

Professor Sun asked the village committee to notify the police, then brought me and Shirley Yang to the village head's house for dinner. I had many doubts in mind, so I asked Professor Sun what exactly this underground cavity was about.

Professor Sun told me and Shirley Yang the full story. Originally, he had brought his assistant down into the cavity, also saw the iron chain sunk in the pond. At that time they didn't operate the winch; when coming up, at the end of the first-level tunnel, they discovered another hidden passage, containing many stone steles.

The tunnel's structure is "H (left side one vertical is double lines, one horizontal is double lines, right side one vertical is single line)"—there are two passages in total. One clear passage paired with one hidden passage, with a height difference of two meters; the double lines are the clear passage, the single line is the hidden passage, with a horizontal clear passage connecting them in the middle. The stone steles are all in the hidden passage. So-called hidden passage means it's lower than the clear passage, with a drop, not easy to notice unless you get close. At the ends of the clear and hidden passages each stands a stone room.

Professor Sun and his assistant entered the lower layer of the hidden passage marked by the single line, to check the preservation condition of the ancient stone steles inside. Unexpectedly, due to the lower terrain here, seepage was much worse than above; the section connecting the two tunnels in the middle suddenly collapsed, trapping them inside.

The rescuers who went down didn't notice these two parallel tunnels; fortunately, the collapsed area wasn't large, and Professor Sun and his companion expended considerable effort to move the fallen stones blocking the passage and emerged. As soon as they came out, they happened to meet the on-duty militiamen, who knew someone had gone down into the stone room cavity to rescue them, hadn't returned for half a day, so they followed the two on-duty militiamen down together to check.

After inspection, the tunnel beneath the stele shop belongs to Qin dynasty ruins; there are several such places nearby, all where Qin Shi Huang once sent alchemists to refine medicine. Later it was probably abandoned, and besides some stone steles still remaining inside, there are no other gains. However, these stone steles still have considerable research value.

I asked Professor Sun: "What about those six jade beasts in the stone coffin, and the strange vat suspended in the cave's pond—what were they used for? Could they also be Qin dynasty relics?"

Professor Sun shook his head: "No, the stone coffin jade beasts, plus the underground passage beneath the stone house, including the iron chain suspending the vat, are two separate matters from the pre-Qin tunnel ruins—these were placed here later by people. In Guantian County I've heard that these years, every few days someone goes missing, very possibly related to this matter. I'm not a criminal investigator, but I can give you my inferences based on what I've seen at the scene; of course this isn't any state secret, so telling you is fine."

Professor Sun analyzed it like this: This set of stone coffin jade beasts is worth a fortune, very likely from the ancient Dian Kingdom in Yunnan. The ancient Dian Kingdom is a mysterious kingdom, which historians call the lost state. Records in historical texts are scarce; according to legend, people in the state often practiced sorcery. The book 《Tuo (formerly written as "Tuo", pronounced "tuo") (the right half of "xia" + "qian") drinks strange things》has recorded the six-demons jade beasts of the Offering King—this is a ritual object used in ancient sacrificial ceremonies. The old owner of the coffin shop in Stele Shop Village is one of the few outsiders in the village; from which generation he moved here cannot be ascertained now; he has already passed away, so we cannot know how he obtained this set of treasures.