VL Chapter4

Yan Jiang had spent his entire life within his own small, familiar territory. This was his very first time coming to Yuesan Village, only to discover that it was an even poorer place than his own hometown, though fortunately, the houses here were clustered closer together. By the time the last traces of twilight were fading with the setting sun, he had finally hurried his way to a farmhouse and knocked on the door. Claiming to be a traveler from another town merely passing through, he requested lodging for a few days.

The door was opened by an old couple who looked kind-hearted. Seeing that the visitor was a refined and fair-skinned scholar, they warmly and busily welcomed him inside and swept out an empty room for him. Yan Jiang breathed a sigh of relief. When he offered to pay for the accommodation, they only accepted two copper coins from him.

By this time, the sun had completely vanished, and another night had arrived, bringing a surge of dread into his heart along with the darkness.

Ordinary farming families rose with the sun and turned in at dusk; their simple way of life was nothing like the county town, where silver vanished as quickly as water poured into a bottomless pit. In a place like this, even a single red candle was a precious luxury, something people were reluctant to take out and burn without good reason. Yan Jiang understood that well enough, so he was too embarrassed to ask for one. Fortunately, the room the farmers had cleared out for him was decent enough; it caught the sun during the day, and a cozy warmth still lingered into the evening, keeping it from feeling eerie.

Later that night, the old couple’s two sons returned home under the moonlight from their day of hired labor. They settled into the room next door for the night. Yan Jiang caught a glimpse of them through a crack in the window, and his heart settled a bit further.

He curled back into his dry, warm bedding on the floor, trying to coax himself to sleep while his thoughts drifted aimlessly.

—He had escaped so far; surely, he should be safe now, right?

Both he and his long-deceased parents were extremely honest, law-abiding people. The family of three had never harmed anyone in their lives, and there was nothing in their home worth coveting either. No matter how he racked his brains, he could not think of a single reason why an evil spirit would set its sights on him.

The spirits of his parents in heaven would surely bless him with peace and safety.

Yan Jiang closed his eyes, relaxed his body, and exhaled a heavy breath from his chest.

Perhaps because he was exhausted, or perhaps because self-hypnosis truly worked, the unease weighing on his chest gradually faded with his breathing. His heart, which had been anxious and restless for days, settled down bit by bit along with his drowsiness, and his consciousness also unconsciously began to blur.

Unlike the bustling pleasure quarters of the county seat, the countryside fell into an uncanny stillness after nightfall. There was neither wind nor cloud in the sky, and the silence was so complete that even time itself seemed to stand still.

Half-conscious and drifting in and out of sleep, he vaguely heard the rustle of wings beating outside the window, followed by the occasional low, muffled caw of a raven, distant and indistinct. Yan Jiang mumbled in his sleep, rolled over, and sank into a deeper slumber.

He dreamed of the year he was twelve, when his parents were still alive. Unable to afford rice for dinner, the family sat around the table, chewing on coarse-flour steamed buns. As they ate, the couple discussed selling their land. It was the last remaining half-plot of land the family owned, and his parents wanted to exchange it for coins to send him to a better academy in the county seat to study.

Since ancient times, pursuing an education has always been an expensive undertaking. Yan Jiang had started his education late; at that time, he had only spent a few years learning characters under an old scholar in the neighboring village. Even though the teacher did not charge much tuition, the brushes, ink, paper, inkstones, and books had already consumed the last of the family’s silver. To support his studies, life at home had grown harder and harder with each passing day over those few years.

Yan Jiang was young, but he understood how things worked. He kept everything his parents did and said for him close to his heart. Seeing that the very last bit of land at home was about to be sold, he was instantly overcome with guilt. He carefully set down his bowl and chopsticks, knelt before his parents, and gave them a solemn, heartfelt kowtow. Through clenched teeth, he declared that he had no desire to continue studying and wished only to spend the rest of his life tending this small patch of land.

His mother was startled, while his father slammed his chopsticks down on the spot, “Say that one more time!”

“How can a son of the Yan family be as spineless as you? Our ancestors are watching from above; the hope of restoring the past glory of the Yan family rests entirely on your shoulders alone. You rascal, don’t you dare humiliate your father!”

Yan Jiang was terrified. He raised his head in panic, only to see the furious glare of his father. He had never heard these words before. He had always believed his parents supported his education simply because they loved him, which was why he never wanted to become a burden to them. Only now, looking back, did he begin to understand the deeper meaning behind it all.

His father, who had never raised a hand against him in his life, grabbed a broom in his towering rage and was about to strike. Startled back to her senses, his mother hastily got to her feet and moved to stop him.

“Ah Fu, don’t be willful. Mother knows you just feel bad for your parents. Quickly apologize to your father and go back to studying properly. In the future, earn a bit of official merit and go to the capital. Even if your parents starve to death, we will also be happy in the underworld.”

“Ah Fu” was Yan Jiang’s childhood nickname; his parents had called him that since he was small.

Everything after that suddenly seemed to become blurry. The chaotic noises grew distant, and the scene before his eyes slowly faded. A wave of bitterness rushed into Yan Jiang’s heart, and he suddenly remembered that it had been a very, very long time since anyone had called him by that name. Clinging to a fleeting moment of lucidity, he realized that everything before him was nothing more than a dream.

When he focused and looked more closely, he found that his mother’s youthful face was indeed veiled by a grayish-yellow pallor, like an aged, yellowed scroll. It was nothing like the vivid image preserved in his memory.

Yan Jiang’s chest heaved.

Having studied diligently without pause over these years, he had traveled to the ends of the earth through books, yet the physical world he inhabited was still very, very small. His parents carried too much weight in his life, making him miss them day and night. Without hesitation, he threw himself toward his mother in the dream while burying his face longingly against her lap.

“Ah Fu?”

Whether it was due to the distortion of the dream or something else, his mother’s voice sounded a bit strange. The hand that patted his shoulder and back to comfort him was also somewhat cold, not at all warm and soft as it was in his memory.

Suppressing his tears, Yan Jiang replied muffledly, “En, your child is here.”

“Mother knows, Ah Fu is a good child of our Yan family.”

His mother’s body was gradually fading. It was a dream after all—impossible to grasp, impossible to keep. Overcome with sorrow, Yan Jiang gripped the corner of his mother’s cloth tunic like a child, openly revealing his longing and reliance as he called out softly, “Mother…”

“But a good child must be obedient, you see. Ah Fu abandoned Mother and Father’s spirit tablets and fled to a foreign land, making Mother heartbroken.”

Yan Jiang’s heart gave a violent jolt, and he forgot to breathe. Startled, he snapped his head up; and to his horror, realized the person standing before him was not the gentle mother of his memories at all.

She was still smiling, but the skin on her face was cracked into pieces like crisp, dried snakeskin after long exposure to the sun. The moment she opened her mouth, the skin flaked and fell away in patches, revealing the raw, bloody red flesh underneath.

Her voice had changed too, turning into a shrill, piercing screech, “Come home, Ah Fu. Mother is still waiting for you…”

Terrified by the horrific sight before him, Yan Jiang turned deathly pale and could not make a sound. Originally half-squatting and half-kneeling, he lost his balance, landed heavily on his backside, and scrambled backward in panic while retreating step by step.

He had only retreated a few feet when a heart-wrenching, agonizing pain shot through the top of his foot as if his flesh and blood were being violently chewed to pieces by a wild beast, and a pool of fresh blood spilled out in an instant. Curled up and crying out from the pain, he hurriedly looked down, only to see a black snake the thickness of a pinky finger forcing its way out through his skin and flesh from inside his already healed scar. It wriggled as it crawled outward, and the moment his blood touched its black scales, it was instantly absorbed clean.

“—!”

Yan Jiang sat up with a start from his bedding with his face pale and his heart pounding wildly. The fine hairs at his temples were already soaked with cold sweat.

Before him was the farmers’ small room. Everything was normal, there were no parents, and no ghosts or monsters. Sunlight poured into the room, mingling with the old woman’s voice as she fed the chickens outside, its familiar rhythm gradually calming his disturbed and uneasy heart.

It turned out to be just a nightmare. Clutching the corner of the quilt, Yan Jiang gasped for breath for a long time before finally coming to his senses.

The old woman came to knock on the door, calling softly for him to wake up. He gave a word of agreement and opened the door; outside, the daylight was bright and beautiful.

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