Chapter 332: Brain Teaser

I'd had that fleeting sense of familiarity before, and it always gave me goosebumps. Books say it's a kind of illusion, but this time was different, because I saw that even Poker-face's expression had changed—the same puzzled look, though I couldn't tell if he felt the same way I did.

Where was it? Where had I seen this scene before, or something similar to it? I racked my brain, turning memories over and over, but I couldn't recall. I only knew I should have seen this scene not long ago. And along with that feeling of familiarity came a sense of "something off." Clearly, the impression in my memory was still slightly different from what was here.

Fatty, carefree as ever, stripped down to his shorts and started swimming in the lake. Agui told him to be careful—mountain lakes were unlucky, and he shouldn't mess around too much. Fatty, who had seen all kinds of situations, splashed water at Agui to shut him up.

Back on shore, we took off our wet shoes and pants. Fatty helped Agui set up a tarp, Agui went to chop firewood, and Yuncai helped cook. As I drank some water, I finally remembered where I had seen this mountain terrain before.

The shape and feel of these mountains were remarkably similar to the view we'd seen when we were playing in the creek by the village—the lines of the mountains, the way they stretched, all exactly the same. The only difference was that back then we were in a stream, and now we were in a lake. So the reflection in the water and the shape of the mountains startled me. But here the mountains were covered in dense forest, whereas by the stockade the trees had been cut down, so there was a slight difference.

When I was resting with my eyes closed, I had carefully observed the scenery around the creek. Poker-face might have seemed distracted, but he must have taken it all in too. Fatty's attention was on those village girls at the time, so no wonder he didn't notice.

This was really interesting. Nature was truly a master craftsman. I wondered if it was pure coincidence or some geological cause. It seemed like a kind of feng shui terrain called "Fish-scale Ao"—where all the mountains layer like fish scales, with very similar contours. This kind of terrain is unsuitable for burials, because it's said that under the scales, filth gathers. Geologically, fish-scale terrain is prone to erosion and severe water accumulation. The ancient tomb we saw at the mountain pass was one example. But if there's a spring-fed lake within "Fish-scale Ao," that's completely different. It's called "Fish Finds Water"—water within the scales, allowing the fish to live without drying out. Then it's not a fish but an unformed young dragon. If there's a young person who died early, they should be buried here.

If that was the case, the possibility of an ancient tomb here was really high. Unfortunately, I didn't know the burial details for this kind of terrain. From what I could see, none of the surrounding mountains were suitable for burials.

Yuncai and the others finished setting up the shelter and started gathering firewood. Me, Fatty, and Poker-face didn't need to help, so we began circling the lake to get a general sense of the surroundings.

The lake was only the size of two football fields, so we finished walking around quickly. As I walked along the shore looking into the lake, I felt that the bottom was also all stones, and the drop-off was steep. In shallow areas you could see the bottom, but further down it quickly faded into darkness, suggesting the water might be extremely deep. The beach was covered with stones of all sizes, just as Pan Ma had said, with big differences in size. What caught my attention was that the beach was very clean—no debris at all. Maybe the recent heavy rains had washed everything into the lake.

I've always had an inexplicable fear of very deep lakes. As the saying goes, "Shallow water hides no dragon; deep water must have monsters." When water is deep, it means the lake's capacity is much larger than it appears from the surface, so there might be strange things inside. Many large lakes around the world known for water monsters aren't very wide but are extremely deep. Even without monsters, very deep water tends to harbor huge fish. When large reservoirs are drained, they often find fish of enormous size.

After circling once, we didn't see any obvious traces of bones. But most of the stones on the beach were fine gravel. Over the past forty-plus years, the water level had fluctuated and rocks had tumbled down, so the remains might be buried under the stones.

We tried to reconstruct the scene. Under normal circumstances, the archaeological team would have camped on the south side of the lake like we did. The other side was against a mountain, which posed a risk of falling rocks and mudslides. So the area we should search was the south side of the lake.

It was a big job. Luckily we had brought several dogs, though we weren't sure if they'd be useful. After soaking in water for so many years, the bodies must have turned to white bones, which might not look much different from stones.

After lunch, Agui went to scout around to see what he could hunt. We started searching in designated zones. Yuncai washed our sweat-stinking clothes. The lakeside area was large, so Fat, Poker-face, and I each took a big section and began.

All we had to do was move stones one by one by hand. The stones here seemed to have rolled continuously from near the shore toward the lake center. But the water level had gradually dropped, and the accumulation of stones itself helped prevent rainwater erosion (rainwater seeps into the lower layer of the stone beach, forming groundwater, rather than flowing across the surface—part of the Dujiangyan irrigation system uses this principle). The lake bottom slope was steep. In those days, Pan Ma couldn't have walked very deep into the lake, so the place where the bodies were thrown must have been near the shore. And since the water level had dropped a lot, the remains would be on land, not in the lake.

Fatty said that if the bodies hadn't been tied up, they would first bloat and float, then sink and be eaten by fish and shrimp. The bones would be scattered—the head here, the ass maybe a hundred meters away. Searching like this would definitely fail. And if the bodies hadn't been thrown into deep water, they might have been dragged ashore and eaten by animals.

I said that no matter what, it was unlikely that not a single trace remained. Chairman Mao said, "What we fear most is taking things seriously." Let's search first. If we really find nothing, we'll analyze the reasons later.

The three of us kept turning stones until sunset, still with no results. The hunting dogs played by the lake, completely ignoring us and not wanting to help. The sun by the lake was brutal; after a whole day of exposure, my scalp was burning. Agui's gun went off twice in the woods, and he came back with a wild chicken. Soon the smell of roasted chicken made us unable to hold back.

Fatty was a bit discouraged. During our break, we huddled together to smoke. Fatty said it looked hopeless, and I'd better find where a fat tomb might be—that was more reliable. The dead bodies were probably impossible to find. I knew he was still fixated on his ancient tomb theory, so I comforted him by saying we had several days anyway, so take it slow. If we really couldn't find the bodies, I'd help him find that fat tomb.

For once, I wasn't feeling impatient. We drank some rice wine and sat around the campfire by the lake. Being by the lake and in the mountains, it was wonderfully cool. Yuncai had also changed into a light T-shirt, washed her hair, and looked a lot like a city girl. After dinner, she even danced for us. Yao ethnic dances have lots of spins and backward kicks, and Yao girls have especially nice calves. Fatty's jaw nearly dropped. He insisted on learning, but he looked like a shaman performing a ritual. I laughed so hard I nearly fell over.

It had been too long since I laughed that freely. In the end, I couldn't laugh anymore. But when I turned to look at Poker-face, I saw him leaning against a rock, not a trace of relaxation on his face. At a glance, you could hardly notice he was there.

I thought to myself, maybe coming here to search for his past was a mistake. Judging from the clues we'd gathered so far, strategically we'd come to the right place. For us, the journey here had been easy, but for him, everything we encountered was knocking on the door of his past. It would be really hard for him to relax. This guy was a typical self-exiled personality—heart outside the peach orchard, smiling alone in the spring breeze. No one could get into his heart.

Feeling a bit sorry for him, I picked up a small stone and tossed it at him. "Don't overthink it," I said. "Take it from me, thinking hard won't help. Right now we're just putting together a puzzle. Before we've gathered most of the pieces, try not to dwell on things." I handed him the rice wine.

Poker-face silently took it and set it aside. I was a little drunk, sighed, and said, "Can't you take just one sip?"

He shook his head and looked toward the darkness.

I had to shift my attention back to Fatty. Fatty was giving us riddles to guess. He asked Yuncai, "What battle is 'kill a hundred enemies, lose three thousand of your own'?"

I was afraid Fatty might tell a dirty joke to the young girl. She was very innocent, and I felt that kind of stuff would be a pollution, so I scolded him. Fatty said, "Don't worry, this riddle is totally clean."

Agui was also drunk, giggling foolishly. He guessed and guessed but couldn't get it. Finally, the answer was revealed: It was a fight between a "Pee Hu" and a "Thirteen Orphans" — in mahjong, when you fire a cannon, you win a hundred from the player below but lose thirty fan to the middle cannon.

The Yao village didn't play mahjong, so Yuncai didn't understand at all. I cursed, "Aren't you just messing with her? Do you have any riddles with a more rustic flavor?"

Fatty said, "Sure." He asked us again: "Guess: What battle is 'kill one enemy, lose three thousand of your own'?"

"Wasp!" Yuncai immediately raised her hand.

Fatty clicked his tongue. "You little brat, are you trying to provoke me?"

We all laughed. I said it must be a battle between cavalry and tanks. Fatty said if it were cavalry and tanks, you couldn't kill even one even if you lost ten thousand.

Then we guessed: some said playing cards, some said ants, some said eating abalone. Fatty said no to all, looking smug, as if he were insulting our intelligence.

I said angrily, "Then what the hell battle is it? If it's far-fetched, I'll beat you up."

Fatty said, "This one's too easy. Ah, your Fat Master is truly gifted. There's always a gap between me and you ordinary mortals. Listen carefully: 'Kill one enemy, lose three thousand' describes the battle between bananas and an elephant."

I was furious. "What nonsense are you talking? The battle between bananas and an elephant? What kind of crap is that? Explain to me how a banana and an elephant fighting could result in killing one enemy and losing three thousand?"

Fatty said, "The elephant gets stuffed to death."

We all burst out laughing. Yuncai couldn't breathe from laughing. But after a few laughs, we gradually quieted down, because I saw that while we were in chaos, Poker-face had silently stood up and walked toward the lake, then sat down far away where the campfire barely reached.

There was a hint of fear in Yuncai's eyes as she looked at us: "Is he saying we're too noisy?"

Fatty sighed, took a drag from his yellow tobacco leaf, and comforted her: "It's fine, don't mind him, he just went to take a shit."

I looked at Poker-face and was about to stand up, but Yuncai stepped ahead of me and walked toward him.