I didn’t dare waste a second—I ran outside. Passing by Alex Johnson’s room, I saw the door was open. He was tied up like a roast, lying on the floor.
"Are you okay?" I rushed in to untie him.
"They took Tưởng Sương! Everyone in this village is sick! I heard a commotion, went out to check, and they jumped me. I heard them say they want to stuff Tưởng Sương into a coffin—they said she’s the last one they need for the Five Ghosts Bring Wealth Formation to work…"
I understood. I told Alex, "Find somewhere safe to hide and call the police right away!"
Leaving the inn, I saw the van was empty—the five coffins were gone.
It was late at night, and the village wasn’t big. I headed deeper in and saw an old man leading a few other men into a house, as if to fetch something, then quickly coming back out.
I quietly followed. As I passed the house, I glanced through a door that hadn’t been fully closed—and was startled to see a familiar face.
The woman inside looked exactly like the innkeeper’s wife, but I was sure she wasn’t the same person.
She was soothing a baby, with three diapers of the same size laid out in front of her. Suddenly, I realized—this village had a lot of twins, even triplets.
The supermarket owner from the service area was probably also a woman from Cooperstown who’d married out.
I remembered what the old man said before I blacked out: Khuy Thien Dai had abandoned them.
So, twenty years ago, why did Khuy Thien Dai choose this remote village?
The villagers were lazy—if they hadn’t been supported, how could they have ever been wealthy?
These thoughts sent a chill down my spine. My mind flashed to the five coffins buried in front of Jiaxing Center, the Five Ghosts Bring Wealth Formation…
Those things kept appearing before my eyes, all bearing faces that looked like Tưởng Sương. So, could the so-called "five ghosts" actually be five sisters, all born in the same year?
I followed them to the edge of the village, where there was an ancestral hall with a wide courtyard.
The five red coffins were set in a corner of the yard, arranged in a circle just like when they were unearthed.
Tưởng Sương was tied up, hands and feet bound, lying in the middle of the courtyard. I saw the innkeeper and Morgan Morgan—he was standing alone in a corner of the courtyard, smoking.
There were a lot of men and women in the yard, and I noticed many faces looked alike.
Sure enough, this village really did have a lot of twins and triplets.
The old man I’d been following seemed to be the village chief. He forced Tưởng Sương to kneel, holding a book of village rules, and put on a stern face: “Twenty years ago, the Tưởng family broke the rules, secretly swapped out a ghost fetus, letting you live another twenty years and making the village suffer in poverty for two decades. Now, with the ancestors watching, the Tưởng family must pay for their past sins. Today, we’re returning you to the coffin. Maybe, after this, your name will be added to the ancestral hall, and future generations will honor you, and you’ll enjoy wealth in your next life.”
Tưởng Sương spat out the rag stuffed in her mouth, her eyes red: “You’re the ones who destroyed my family, left me with no home to return to. You freaks, you monsters! I don’t want to be in your filthy ancestral hall! You all deserve retribution. Even if I die today, I’ll become a ghost and drag you all down with me.”
They stuffed the rag back into Tưởng Sương’s mouth. She must have overheard the truth on the way here.
Her family had been used as materials for the Five Ghosts Bring Wealth Formation. The five coffins were sold to Jiaxing Center, traded for the village’s prosperity and support.
The village chief’s face didn’t change. He ordered someone to bring wine and forced Tưởng Sương to kneel before the ancestral hall.
Villagers lit torches, illuminating the inside of the hall. I saw, right in the center, a female statue sitting cross-legged, hands forming a lotus seal, with five children around her belly.
Even more horrifying, beneath the statue were countless spirit tablets. Someone approached with a strip of white cloth and wrapped it tightly around Tưởng Sương’s face.
I couldn’t wait any longer. I grabbed a wooden bar leaning nearby and charged into the courtyard. The villagers barely had time to react before I knocked down the man wrapping cloth around Tưởng Sương, then grabbed the village chief by the collar and hoisted him up. "Nobody move! We've already called the police!"
Morgan Morgan was stunned to see me appear, frozen in the corner of the courtyard.
The innkeeper was the first to jump out. "If we fail, we die! Forget the chief—get the girl in the coffin first!"
I hadn't expected these villagers to be so cold-blooded. A few of them, ignoring the village chief's safety, rushed straight for Tưởng Sương.
I had no choice but to let go of the chief, kicked one of them down, and pulled Tưởng Sương up. The ropes binding her weren't tight; a few tugs and they loosened.
But there were too many of them. I took a hard blow to the back. Tưởng Sương was dragged away—no matter how fiercely she struggled, they twisted her arms behind her and wrapped the white cloth over her face.
Suddenly, a ghostly wind swept through, carrying the stench of blood and the distant screams of a woman echoing from the mountains.
The torches and lanterns in the courtyard flickered wildly. For a moment, I saw a woman in labor lying on a bed, thrashing in utter despair.
What kind of medical care could this remote village have had twenty years ago?
Giving birth to five children meant the mother would die.
All at once, the five coffins in the corner of the courtyard stood upright. Four of them let out the cries of newborns, while the woman's moans grew even more agonized.
One by one, the five children left her body, but not a single one drew breath.
The villagers couldn't bear it—they knew exactly what they'd done. To reap benefits without working, they'd sacrificed countless women and children.
The torches in the courtyard went out, the last traces of light vanished.
The villagers stampeded for the ancestral hall's door, trampling the fallen underfoot like a carpet of flesh, no one willing to stop.
But for the sake of profit, some still refused to give up. The village chief, the innkeeper, and a few other men kept trying to drag Tưởng Sương into the coffin. I grabbed the wooden latch and charged forward, knocking down a few men, but Tưởng Sương was still dragged in front of the coffin.
At that moment, the woman's moans grew weaker, and the cries of infants from the four coffins also fell silent.
The pale moonlight shone down, casting the bizarre statue's shadow long across the ancestral hall.
Suddenly, the lid of the empty coffin burst open. A shadowy figure wrapped itself around Tưởng Sương's neck and pulled her inside.
"Tưởng Sương!"
I shoved the men aside and rushed to save her, but the coffin lid slammed shut. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn't pry it open.
I spotted Morgan Morgan still standing in the corner of the courtyard. I grabbed him by the collar and dragged him to the center of the five coffins, shouting, "Talk! How do we save Tưởng Sương?"
Morgan tried to struggle, lips pressed tight in silence. I noticed something in his hand and snatched it away.
His face instantly drained of color. "No, don't!"
I gripped the object tightly. "Are you going to talk or not? This is your protective talisman, isn't it? Lose it, and I'll throw you in the middle of the five coffins—let's see if your master can save you in time!"
That faint scent rose again. Morgan turned ghostly pale. "I'll talk, I'll talk, but I'm not sure. Tưởng Sương was always part of the Five Ghosts Bring Wealth Formation. Unless you break the formation's core and destroy it completely, once she's trapped inside, there's no way out!"
"The formation's core?"
This Five Ghosts Bring Wealth Formation was probably set up by Khuy Thien Dai, but how was I supposed to know where the core was?
The longer Tưởng Sương was trapped, the more anxious I became. I scanned the courtyard and suddenly noticed the female statue forming a lotus mudra, seated atop a row of ancestral tablets.
The statue looked familiar.
I remembered the dream—the woman repeating that same pose, the same hole in her belly.
I understood!
I picked up the wooden latch. The village chief saw me charging toward the statue, screamed, and scrambled up to block me, but I kicked him aside. "No!"
I rushed into the ancestral hall and swung the wooden latch hard at the statue's belly. But it was as if something was protecting the statue’s belly—no matter how hard I struck with the wooden latch, it left no mark. Refusing to give up, I hit it harder and harder.
Suddenly, I heard children crying. The children gathered around the statue opened their mouths wide and bit into it. This time, I smashed open the statue’s belly!
A loud bang echoed from the corner of the courtyard—the five coffins exploded all at once! By the time the police arrived, half the villagers had gone mad. The village chief and the innkeeper were the worst off, tearing out their own hair until their scalps bled.
I managed to save Tuong Suong.
She cried for a long time in front of the five coffins. The four shriveled corpses inside were her family.
In their final moment, it was they who destroyed the evil statue and saved their only surviving sibling.
Afterward, I helped Tuong Suong cremate the four children. Her mother was buried on the mountain behind the village, and Tuong Suong brought her remains back to be buried together with her siblings in the public cemetery.
Once her loved ones were laid to rest, Tuong Suong recovered quickly, like a wild blade of grass that refuses to be trampled.
She told me that now she had a family and was no longer alone. She was deeply grateful and wanted to give me all the money she’d earned from her part-time jobs, but I refused.
Not long after, Tuong Suong returned to university. Her friends and roommates didn’t shun her—they cared for her deeply.
After that, we worked with the police on the investigation for several days.
In summary, it seemed this village had a genetic issue that often resulted in multiple births.
The villagers exploited this for their superstitious rituals.
This investigation led to many villagers being sentenced to life in prison.
Tuong Suong’s mother died before she finished giving birth. Of the five children taken from her womb, only Tuong Suong survived.
But not everyone in the village was bad. There were people like the woman at the inn, or the one who secretly switched Tuong Suong and took her away, causing the Five Ghosts Bring Wealth Formation at Jiaxing Center to fail, and a few years later, the place went bankrupt. Khuy Thien Dai was always lurking in the background. After their failure twenty years ago, they abandoned this village.
The police couldn’t track them down, but Taylor Turner and Morgan Morgan were arrested.
Taylor Turner heard that Jiaxing Center was being demolished and tried to scavenge, secretly taking the five coffins. Before he met Tuong Suong, he had planned to use the construction workers as scapegoats.
I requested to meet Taylor Turner once, hoping to ask about Khuy Thien Dai, but he was so terrified of the organization that he refused to say anything.
I pressed further: “Why did Morgan Morgan say Khuy Thien Dai forbade anyone from touching me?”
Taylor Turner thought for a moment, then shook his head. “I don’t know much. All I know is that the spirit-striking whip in your hand belongs to Khuy Thien Dai—it’s one of their three greatest treasures.”
I didn’t know what that meant, but I did know that the grudge between me and Khuy Thien Dai was far from over.
—END—