Gong Fugui stopped here and said, "Got another smoke?"

I lit a cigarette and handed it to him. He took a few puffs before continuing:

I saw blood outside the tent, and followed the trail all the way down the slope, finally finding the man at the bottom.

That sapper who was dragged away was like a wolf had gotten to him, his belly torn open, his guts all pulled out. It was a gruesome sight!

I took two looks and couldn't bear to look anymore. I quickly had the body buried and went back to the Twisted Dragon Tomb.

Yiyan Tong and the strategist were both there. A large chunk of the Twisted Dragon Wood under the tree had also been removed, and all the corpses Yiyan Tong had placed under the tree had turned into bones.

The teeth of those people's bones were all chipped. It looked like they had broken their teeth trying to gnaw on the tree.

I asked Yiyan Tong: What happened to that sapper who died?

Yiyan Tong cursed at me, saying, "He deserved to die. I told him again and again, don't light a fire, don't let there be light, and he still dared to smoke. He attracted one of the corpses gnawing on the wood, and it dragged him away. Almost ruined my plan."

"That dead man tore out his intestines. If he hadn't come back, wouldn't the people under the tree have died for nothing?"

At the time, I felt that the deaths of those people gnawing on the tree must have been related to Yiyan Tong. I wanted to ask what was going on, but the strategist stopped me. He said: We have to rely on Yiyan Tong to save our lives now, so we can't offend him. When we go back and report, we'll have men and guns. Are we still afraid of not being able to kill him?

I thought about it and went to the side.

Yiyan Tong asked the sappers for a shovel, and crouched down to dig a hole under the severed tree trunk. He worked at it for most of the day, and only managed to dig a hole big enough for a person to enter in the afternoon.

Yiyan Tong himself took a black cloth and rope and climbed into the tomb. After fiddling around for a long time, he had people pull the coffin out with a rope. After he had people lift the coffin up, he wrapped the coffin in layers of black cloth. Only then did he have people carry the coffin down the mountain.

Before leaving, he specifically told the sappers to blow up the tomb.

He also instructed the sappers who were staying behind to blow up the tomb thoroughly, until the tomb pit was open to the sky. If blowing it up once wasn't enough, then blow it up several times. Don't be afraid of trouble. If you don't do this job well, we'll suffer in the future.

At that time, I left a platoon to blow up the tomb and followed the strategist and the others down the mountain.

I interrupted him here and said, "Was that tomb blown up?"

"It shouldn't have been!" Gong Fugui shook his head and said, "At least, I didn't hear an explosion."

I nodded and said, "Did Yiyan Tong bring the black cloth from the beginning, or did he have someone get it later?"

It's not uncommon for people in the art to carry red or white cloth, but it's very rare to carry black cloth.

Black cloth doesn't have much effect other than blocking light. Moreover, black cloth, unlike red cloth, can't suppress wronged souls when blocking light.

Gong Fugui said: Yiyan Tong wrapped the coffin in several layers of black cloth. This shows that he must have brought a lot of black cloth. Maybe one bolt of cloth wasn't enough. Did he know in advance that he would be carrying the coffin down the mountain?

Gong Fugui said: "Yiyan Tong brought the black cloth from the beginning. I was wondering at the time what he was going to do with the black cloth? Later, I heard the strategist say that Yiyan Tong liked to use black cloth when doing business. So I didn't think much about it."

I turned to look at Feng Ruoxing, who transmitted his voice to me, saying: "Those skilled in controlling corpses and raising ghosts use black cloth more often. That Yiyan Tong is probably not a genuine feng shui master."

I then said, "Continue with your story."

Gong Fugui continued:

At that time, I saw that it was getting late, and the coffin was so heavy that it was hard for more than a dozen people to carry. We still had to travel more than ten li (Chinese miles) of mountain road to get down, so I said: Why don't we wait until tomorrow morning to leave?

Yiyan Tong was determined to go down the mountain as soon as possible, and said that if we didn't get out of the mountain pass before dark, something big would happen.

I was scared by what he said, so I followed him down the mountain.

Yiyan Tong would draw a few strokes on the black cloth after walking a certain distance. I didn't know what he was drawing, and the strategist wouldn't let me ask.

Nothing happened along the way. It wasn't until we were about to pass the mountain pass that Yiyan Tong panicked.

If we wanted to get out of the mountain, we had to cross a bridge first. The bridge made of bluestone slabs wasn't long, only about five meters. However, the bridge was too close to the water surface. The water surface was less than two chi (Chinese feet) away from the bridge surface. If it was the rainy season, the water could overflow the bridge surface.

When we went up the mountain, the water hadn't crossed the bridge, but when we went down the mountain, the water had already overflowed the bridge surface in a thin layer.

There wasn't much water, not even covering people's feet, but Yiyan Tong panicked, squatted by the bridge and almost cried, muttering to himself: Is this heaven trying to abandon me?

He also said that he shouldn't have been greedy for those few silver dollars and come up to do this life-threatening job.

The strategist persuaded him for a long time, and finally said, "It will be dark if you don't leave."

Yiyan Tong looked at the sky, gritted his teeth and stood up, and shouted in a shrill voice: "Carry the coffin up. Even if your legs break, you can't drop the coffin. You must not let the coffin touch the water. If the coffin touches the water, all of us will be finished!"