Tống Phỉ Phỉ and I tried to sneak in and investigate, but the moment we entered the courtyard, she spotted us. She didn’t hold back—she grabbed a feather duster and charged at me.
“Pretty as you are, you still dare barge into someone else’s home? I’ll teach you a lesson!”
Tống Phỉ Phỉ and I turned and ran. Trần Viễn Chương was a beat too slow and got whacked several times. Since we couldn’t get into the house, we decided to head up the mountain.
Trần Viễn Chương was right. The feng shui of this grave was only moderately auspicious.
The mountain was steep but not treacherous, with lush, dense trees. It looked less like a cemetery than an ideal camping spot.
Trần Viễn Chương wiped his sweat and plopped down on the ground.
“My dad was afraid something might go wrong with this grave relocation too, so he didn’t bother with an elaborate headstone. He just put Thái Công’s bones in a golden urn and piled up a small mound of earth.”
In the direction he pointed, a low mound came into view. A gentle breeze blew by, dispelling the heat. It was strange—no matter how I looked at it, there seemed to be nothing wrong with this place.
No, something was wrong!
Grass usually grows on the east side of a man’s grave, with deep roots and blades that grow straight up.
On a woman’s grave, grass grows on the west side, with shallow roots and blades that grow haphazardly.
This was a woman’s grave!
I was startled.
“Thái Công of yours is a woman?”
Trần Viễn Chương shot to his feet, furious, and shouted.
“Your Thái Công is the woman!”
When I told him a woman was buried in the grave, he refused to believe it.
I had no choice but to patiently explain. A feng shui master can tell who’s buried inside by examining the grass on the grave.
If the grass on the right leans toward the left foot, an old woman is definitely buried there.
If the grass on the left leans toward the right head, a white-haired old man is buried there.
If the grass on the left leans toward the left head, a young man is buried there.
If the grass on the right leans toward the right head, a beautiful young woman is buried there.
A grave without grass contains dried bones.
A sunken grave holds someone who died swollen and yellow.
If grass grows on top of the mound but not beneath it, the person buried there definitely had tuberculosis or lived alone.
No grass on the left means a man died of tuberculosis.
No grass on the right means a woman died in poverty.
Parasitic grass on both sides means the person buried there was adopted.
“In short, your Thái Công wasn’t just a woman—she was an impoverished woman who’d been adopted and died in her forties, before reaching fifty.”
Trần Viễn Chương crumpled, clutching his head and howling like a horse. “Nonsense! You’re talking gibberish! Thái Công died of an illness at the age of ninety. How could she be a woman? If he was a woman, then what am I?”
I rubbed my chin thoughtfully. “So he was adopted?”
Tống Phỉ Phỉ couldn’t take it anymore. She sighed and looked at us as if we were idiots.
“Could the Trần family have moved the wrong grave?”
I didn’t believe it. How could anyone be so stupid as to mistake their own Thái Công’s grave?
To prove he wasn’t adopted, Trần Viễn Chương took out his phone and showed us a family photo.
He, his father, his grandfather, and Thái Công—all four looked exactly alike: square faces, strong brows, bright eyes, and tall, broad-shouldered builds.
Thái Công was over six feet two, too.
“Exhume the grave and collect the bones. Your Thái Công was so tall, the bones must be long too. There’s no woman in that grave—just look at the bones and you’ll know.”
Trần Viễn Chương hesitated.
I understood, too. For the Hakka people, exhuming a grave and collecting the bones was a serious matter.
Tống Phỉ Phỉ was losing patience. “What are you hesitating for? There’s nothing wrong with the feng shui here, so the only possibility is that the wrong person was buried. Who knows where your Thái Công is now? Maybe the grave flooded or caved in!”
Before she could finish, Trần Viễn Chương stamped his foot.
“Dig!”
I covered my forehead and looked up at the sky.
“The auspicious hour has passed. We shouldn’t break ground now. Let’s go and come back tomorrow.”
On the way back, Trần Viễn Chương asked admiringly,
“Linh Châu, how did you know the auspicious hour had passed? I’ve read a lot of supernatural novels. Is it because it’s nearly dusk and the yang energy is weak, so we shouldn’t open the grave?”
Tống Phỉ Phỉ rolled her eyes. “Weak what? She’s hungry and wants to go down the mountain for dinner!”
Even if we weren’t relocating a grave, we couldn’t just dig one up carelessly.
The ancients believed in “resting in the earth in peace.” Digging up someone who had already been buried could disturb the ancestors, so none of the rituals could be skipped.
Three kinds of offerings, incense and joss paper, and a bath and change of clothes.
But I underestimated Trần Viễn Chương’s bad luck. I’d barely finished setting up the altar when, before I could even light the incense, he stumbled into the table and scattered the offerings everywhere.
Annoyed, I ordered him to set everything up again.
As soon as he’d finished, he trampled the bundle of incense I’d brought.
Broken incense couldn’t be used. I picked it up and smacked it against his chest.
“You jinx! Stay away from me! Get lost, get lost!”
The grave relocation had a major impact on the Trần family.
Trần Viễn Chương’s father was hospitalized after an accident, his mother’s personality changed, his grandfather lamented his hard lot in life, and Trần Viễn Chương seemed to have bad luck clinging to him.
That day was a wasted trip, too.
The next day, to be safe, we prepared three sets of offerings, along with incense and candles.
We presented the offerings, informed the ancestors, and waited for the incense to burn down before breaking ground.
Trần Viễn Chương carefully dug into the mound and unearthed a golden urn. By custom, an old urn couldn’t be used again once it had been exposed to daylight.
A piece of red cloth had been prepared beside it. An elder or the eldest son had to collect the bones, starting with the skull, then laying them out neatly in order from head to toe, with the head pointed in an auspicious direction.
No small bones, such as those from the fingers or toes, could be left behind, or it would show disrespect to the ancestors.
Only after confirming that none were missing could the bones be arranged from the feet up to the head and placed in the new urn.
Trần Viễn Chương’s father was in the hospital, and he was the eldest grandson, so he could just about do the job.
After he arranged the bones according to my instructions, an eerie silence fell over the scene.
Once the bones were laid out, the skeleton stood no more than five feet tall. The thighbone was even shorter than Trần Viễn Chương’s arm. Unwilling to accept it, he made one last desperate attempt to argue.
“Could my Thái Công have shrunk?”
I raised my hand and smacked the back of his head. “You could shrink, but your Thái Công couldn’t! Come on, put her in the new urn. If we’ve dug up the wrong grave, we have to return her to her own.”
But first, we had to ask whether she wanted to go back.
I bowed respectfully before the golden urn and burned incense to summon her spirit. Three streams of gray-white smoke rose straight up, then dissipated into the air.
Trần Viễn Chương held his breath and watched me anxiously.
“What does that mean?”
I looked up toward where the smoke had vanished and sighed. “This woman isn’t home.”
Trần Viễn Chương scratched his head. “If she’s not home, where’d she go?”
Tống Phỉ Phỉ crossed her arms and looked toward the south side of the city.
“She went to your house.”
On the way back, Trần Viễn Chương was worked up.
“See? I told you my mom was possessed by a female ghost! Otherwise, how could she change so suddenly when she’s always been so gentle and virtuous? But it’s strange—why isn’t there any yin energy around her?”
This time, we went into the house with Trần Viễn Chương openly.
His mother seemed to be sleeping in her room, so we had time to look around.
It was a typical old house, with a tiny courtyard so cramped that a single cinnamon tree filled it.
The interior was done in a traditional Chinese style. In the dim light, the wooden tables and chairs looked bleak and forlorn.
The whole house seemed like a decrepit old man, rotting and lifeless. Two distinct patches of moss clung to the wall in the northwest corner. Outside, the sun blazed, but inside it felt like the rainy season, and the smell of musty wood was overpowering.
“Who’s there?”
I was staring at the picture on the wall when I jumped at the sudden appearance of a dark figure.
“Hạ Hạ, this is my friend.”
The dark figure was Trần Lục Hạ, Trần Viễn Chương’s younger sister. She was only eighteen, dressed in a black robe that revealed nothing but her bright black eyes.
“My sister’s into cosplay. Lately she’s been dressing up as an Arab woman.”
Trần Viễn Chương looked at his sister, a trace of sorrow passing through his eyes.
After the family went bankrupt, his sister developed severe depression, dropped out of school, and shut herself away in her room.
“Sorry, my sister’s a little shy around strangers.”
When Trần Lục Hạ saw us, she immediately turned to go upstairs.
I grabbed the girl’s robe.
“Wait!”
“Ah!”
Trần Lục Hạ shoved me angrily and let out a piercing scream.
Trần Viễn Chương fumbled, wanting to soothe her but afraid to get any closer. He could only stand nearby, worried.
“Hạ Hạ, it’s okay. Linh Châu isn’t a bad person. I’ll take them away right now. Don’t get upset.”
Trần Lục Hạ acted as if she couldn’t hear him. Clutching her head, she screamed nonstop, her cries seeming loud enough to pierce the roof.
The living room was in an uproar, yet the other rooms remained quiet.
Trần Viễn Chương broke into a sweat and waved his hands helplessly in the air.
“Hạ Hạ, don’t be scared. I’m right here.”
Trần Lục Hạ stopped screaming and lowered her head, swaying like a blade of grass beneath the water. He hesitated, then took a couple of steps toward her. She suddenly jerked her head up, her eyes blazing with menace, and spoke in an old man’s voice.
“You spineless coward, all you do is run around all day! Where’s that bastard Trần Xương Lâm? Where’d he run off to now?”
Trần Viễn Chương gave a wry smile. “Hạ Hạ, are you pretending to be Grandpa again? Dad’s still in the hospital. Don’t joke around.”
He awkwardly explained to us, “My sister likes to imitate the way Grandpa talks. She’s been getting even better at it lately.”
I stared at Trần Lục Hạ.
“She isn’t imitating your grandfather. She is your grandfather.”
Trần Lục Hạ flinched, warily backed away two steps, and hid behind her brother.
Trần Viễn Chương was stunned.
“How can she be my grandfather? If she’s my grandfather, then who’s the one in the room?”
Good question. While Trần Lục Hạ wasn’t paying attention, I pulled her out from behind her brother.
Without hesitation, Tống Phỉ Phỉ took out a soul-suppressing talisman and slapped it onto the girl’s forehead with a sharp swish.
With the talisman stuck to her forehead, Trần Lục Hạ seemed to have been frozen in place. She let go and stood perfectly still.
Trần Viễn Chương came to his senses, screamed, and leaped onto the coffee table.
“Aaaah! A living corpse!”
“What do you mean, a living corpse!”