Chapter 88

Late, at the end of the hai hour and start of the zi hour, roughly around 11 p. m., I followed Pangzi back to Chen Zheng's ancestral home.

Beside the dug well stood a canopy about five meters wide; inside it was a yellowish-brown table, on which lay various offerings such as ingot-shaped candles.

This was a small ritual site that Pangzi used for his rites, but what rite was he performing? He remained dazed, his lips sealed tight, not letting even a whisper slip to me.

He took a yellow banner from his eight-treasure pouch and planted it in the center of the table. This banner was not a command flag but the Heaven-Scouting Banner that must be planted when laying out a formation and performing rites. Its meaning matches its name: to probe Heaven's will. If the Heaven-Scouting Banner falls before the rite begins, it means Heaven does not consent, the endeavor will surely fail, and the Daoist should promptly desist, not defy Heaven.

At this moment, Pangzi began chanting incantations, treading the Seven Stars Yu Step, his steps slow and rhythmic as he walked circles in the ritual site. Every two minutes he paused for two seconds; each time he paused, he flung a pebble from his hand.

This is the Mysterious Gate Escape art of the Daoist tradition, encompassing the Eight Trigrams Jiazi and Spirit-and-Mechanism Concealment; it is the most enigmatic of the Mysterious Arts. Deploying troops and laying formations cannot be done without the aid of Mysterious Gate Escape. Yet, Mysterious Gate Escape is one of my useless skills. Though I have dabbled in divination, mountain arts, and physiognomy, I simply cannot muster any interest in Mysterious Gate Escape; whenever I pick up a book to study it, I get dizzy and nauseated within half an hour, so I end up tossing the book aside and turning to other arcane arts, and I must admit that I simply lack the aptitude for Mysterious Gate Escape.

Although I am not cut out for it, I can still grasp the basics, for all five arts share a common subtlety, inseparable from the five phases' mutual generation and overcoming, the transformations of yin and yang, and the Zhouyi's eight trigrams.

I could vaguely see that Pangzi's pebbles had formed an eight-gate formation, and under his arrangement the well itself became one of the eight gates—the death gate.

At this point I could no longer hold back; I poked Pangzi and impatiently asked him.

I said, "You damn fatty, won't you die if you don't drop the mystery? Tell me quick—what are you tinkering with?"

Faced with my impatient tone, Pangzi scratched his head and gave a hehe laugh, rubbing the back of his skull as he said four words to me: "Nine Dragons Water Summoning."

Having said that, he produced an object from his eight-treasure pouch. Upon a closer look, it was a Nine Dragons Divine Fire Cup—a round glass lid with nine five-clawed golden dragons coiled around it; even in the night, the splendour of those nine golden dragons could not be concealed.

Under the faintly pallid moonlight, the nine golden dragons emitted a golden-yellow glow; especially after Pangzi bit his middle finger, letting a drop of blood fall onto the cup's center, the dragons' radiance intensified, as if striving to break free of the divine fire cover and soar toward the nine heavens.

Only after Pangzi uttered "Nine Dragons Water Summoning" and I saw the Nine Dragons Cup did I suddenly realize what his rite was all about.

Nine Dragons Water Summoning is a lost secret art; its origins are inseparably linked to the Lu Ban School, one of the three great supreme teachings, and there are rumors that the method was actually invented by Lu Ban himself, the patriarch of the Lu Ban School.

During the Song, Ming, and Qing dynasties, this secret art of Nine Dragons Water Summoning was used by Daoist practitioners to pray to the dragon god for rain, thereby alleviating drought.

In the twelfth year of the Qianlong reign of the Qing dynasty, the northwest suffered a severe drought; at that time, the Governor-General of Liangguang set up a ritual site and summoned a master to perform rites, hoping to beseech the dragon god for rain to ease the drought.

However, the master the governor-general hired was an ignorant charlatan out for profit—he couldn't even pray for a half cup of water, let alone rain.

While that shameless practitioner was on stage, feigning profundity as he collected money from the audience below, a true adept of Mysterious Gate Escape descended from nowhere holding an umbrella, gave the charlatan a sound thrashing, and, using the Nine Dragons Divine Fire Cup to perform the rite, summoned a torrential downpour that relieved the people's drought.

That adept employed exactly the Nine Dragons Water Summoning technique, and the Nine Dragons Cup he held was identical to the one in Pangzi's hand.

However, Pangzi's Nine Dragons Water Summoning was not meant to pray for rain; he was drawing water to turn this dry well into a living one.

As Pangzi ignited the water talisman, stuffed it into the divine fire cup, and slowly lifted the cup upward, the well emitted a rumbling roar, as if water were about to surge forth.

Do not think Nine Dragons Water Summoning is that simple; its success depends on heavenly timing, earthly advantage, and human harmony. First, one must select an auspicious day for the water-summoning. That is also why Pangzi urged Fan Wuchang to have the well dug by tonight.

Secondly, earthly advantage: only when the land aligns with the heavenly timing can the water-summoning be established. Thirdly, human harmony: if any mishap occurs during the water-summoning, or if the Daoist himself is distracted by even one or two things, the Nine Dragons Water Summoning will fail utterly.

Thus, in just half an hour the Daoist must concentrate several times his usual effort; the intricacies are lost on laypeople, who see only the bustle and remain unaware of the hardship and danger. Merely looking at Pangzi's flushed face, one can tell he is exerting every ounce of strength—as if suckling—showing how arduous the water-summoning is.

Pangzi's left hand gripped the divine fire cup, lifting it from the table to chest level. This is the final step of the Nine Dragons Water Summoning; only when the cup is raised to align with the forehead's heavenly peak is the rite deemed completely successful, yet lifting it above the forehead is no easy feat.

How so? Because in Nine Dragons Water Summoning, the water's weight is invisibly contained within the Nine Dragons Cup; for every inch you lift it, the water feels heavier by a fraction, the weight multiplying exponentially—no mere strongman would dare attempt this.

As Pangzi grew ever more strained, he switched from one hand to both to move the cup, and from exerting too much force, veins stood out in relief along his arms and forehead.

Watching him, I thought of a constipated man straining to defecate but unable to, his effort painfully excessive. Just as I was wondering whether to lend him a hand, Pangzi shouted at me first.

"You damn old man, stop staring and come help me quick!" Pangzi's face flushed red, he clenched his teeth and bellowed at me in pain.

I… you damned second uncle, how am I supposed to know whether to help if you don't tell me? What if I can't help and my interference causes the water-summoning to fail?

I rolled my eyes, cursed Pangzi silently, rolled up my sleeves, took a deep breath, and walked over to him.

I grasped the Nine Dragons Divine Fire Cup, only to discover its weight comparable to a stone of several hundred pounds. Even with Pangzi and I together, moving it remained extremely difficult, and the upward crawl was agonizingly slow.

"Holy shit, how can this thing be so heavy?" I blurted out. Pangzi and I both summoned every ounce of strength, yet the cup only rose to neck height and could go no further.

Pangzi held his breath, gripping the Nine Dragons Cup with all his might; he now had no strength left to answer my question.

This is a crucial step in the Nine Dragons Water Summoning; rather than saying it is summoning water, it is more like drawing water. If one lets go or the divine cup drops, all previous effort will come to naught.

Pangzi was clearly at his limit, unable to lift the Nine Dragons Divine Fire Cup any further.

A bright idea flashed in my clever mind.

I swear, this idea is truly excellent; I have never before experienced such a flash of insight that made me feel so smart.

"Pangzi, hold on, it'll be fine soon," I reassured him with two sentences, then slipped behind him, picked up a stone, walked to his front, and, under his astonished gaze, slammed it hard into his foot.

"Ah—" a pig‑squealing scream echoed in the silent night; at the same instant, Pangzi dared not drop the divine cup, so he gritted his teeth, channeled the pain into a burst of strength, and forcibly lifted the cup.

In an instant, the well rumbled with the sound of flowing water; unlike before, I could now hear the water splashing against the well walls. This showed that Pangzi's Nine Dragons Water Summoning had finally succeeded.

Recalling the scene of Pangzi, in pain, heaving the Nine Dragons Cup up in one go, I couldn't help but feel moved.

I recall someone saying that when a person suffers pain, they can unleash tenfold their potential; I used to doubt it, but after experiencing it myself, I must admit that the statement is absolutely true and profoundly insightful.

"You little sister's Hai Sheng, you actually grabbed a stone to smash my foot!" Pangzi gasped, holding his foot, then turned and cursed at me with a grin.

I shrugged, stifling a laugh, clapped his shoulder, and consoled: "The process no longer matters—look, the Nine Dragons Water Summoning has succeeded."

Pangzi crawled to the well's edge and peered inside; seeing the formerly dry well now gurgling with water, he couldn't help but beam, forgetting all his earlier pain.

"It's done—I'm a freakin' genius; my first Nine Dragons Water Summoning succeeded. Looks like I can now head to disaster zones to pray for rain and earn a meal." Pangzi drooled, lifted his head to the sky with a foolish grin, lost in lewd daydreams of stuffing wads of cash into his pockets.

"Come on, what era is this? Even if you truly had rain‑calling powers, you'd likely be hauled off by the police for promoting feudal superstition before you even reached a disaster area." As for Pangzi, especially the Pangzi who is pleased with his current success, I never hold back my criticism—and I even enjoy it.

Pangzi gave me a sideways glance, curled his lip, and said, "You really have no sense of fun; besides being a buzzkill, I can't think of anything else you're good at."

I shrugged, looked down on Pangzi, and said, "Actually I know quite a lot; you just don't realize it."

"Hey, Pangzi, you've been digging wells, splashing water, and doing Nine Dragons Water Summoning—what exactly are you up to, and does it have anything to do with geomancy?" After bustling about all day, I simply couldn't fathom what Pangzi was doing.

Pangzi let out a hiss, glanced furtively around the room to make sure no one was there, then grabbed me firmly and whispered in my ear: "I'm doing this to capture the malevolent spirit of this house; if the spirit isn't expelled, the house's geomancy cannot be changed."