Chapter 44

But here in the dungeon now, her grandmother looked quite young.

Liu Zhiyi quietly worked out the era of her grandmother's youth: back then it was still the planned economy, little movement of people between city and country, and the villagers hadn't yet gone away.

She looked at the somewhat bare hills.

That must be it — all the firewood on the hills had been cut clean.

Liu Zhiyi thought of coming back to the old home as a child, how at night the brush and trees crowded together looked like clump after clump of twisted, writhing ghosts — terrifying.

This was better, in a way.

The hills a little barer, the view wider — it didn't look so frightening at night.

Liu Zhiyi comforted herself.

While her mind wandered, a whole swath of the rice had already gone down.

Liu Zhiyi looked at the heaped ears of grain and ran over to help spread them out flat.

Yindi: "Gently, my little ancestor — drop it too hard and all the grain on top shakes loose."

Liu Zhiyi quickly eased the force in her hands.

"Do we dry the grain now?"

Yindi shook her head. "First cut it and lay it in the field to dry out a bit; the next day you bundle it and haul it to the threshing ground to dry."

So there was this much to bringing in the harvest, Liu Zhiyi thought.

But just in the time she spent helping spread out the ears, Liu Zhiyi felt her face and shoulders burning, stung raw by the sun.

And so she kept on — taking the ears, spreading them flat — until the sun had nearly set completely.

Liu Zhiyi: "Aren't we going back? It's almost dark."

Yindi straightened up and rubbed the small of her back.

"I've got a bit more to cut. Cutting the rice goes better once it's dark."

Liu Zhiyi was a little surprised, wondering — could she even see at night?

Sure enough, once it went fully dark, the swish, swish of cutting rice kept coming to her ears.

Liu Zhiyi turned on the flashlight for a look, and found Yindi could cut a patch and lay it behind her even without seeing.

Yindi: "That light of yours is good. Wait a bit longer, I'm almost done."

Liu Zhiyi hadn't imagined that going into a dungeon would mean cutting rice with someone a whole afternoon.

But honestly, this farming life was nothing like she'd pictured — it was terribly hard work.

Yindi: "There, let's head back."

Liu Zhiyi glanced at the time on her watch; it had just gone seven.

Yindi packed up her things and shouldered a bamboo basket.

Liu Zhiyi wanted to help carry a few things.

Yindi: "A little frame like yours — don't go crushing yourself."

The road back to the village was pitch dark, and Liu Zhiyi huddled close to Yindi's side.

"Don't you turn on a flashlight going back to the village?"

Yindi laughed. "Where would I get one of those? Besides, walk it enough and you get used to it — light or no light, it's all the same."

No knowing how Yindi had gotten used to it; even with the flashlight on, Liu Zhiyi could light at most a small patch of dirt road ahead, both sides pitch black.

Her foot came down and she couldn't tell where she was stepping — it just met empty air.

Yindi grabbed her. "You walk in front. The field ridge is narrow."

—Rustle.

Liu Zhiyi flinched the moment she heard it.

Yindi: "Don't be scared, it's just the wind blowing past."

The rustling came from behind and swept forward, carrying a thread of cool air that stung her face and shoulders.

That situation again — can't see, wind blowing from every direction.

Liu Zhiyi's scalp prickled, the hot sweat from cutting grain going cold on her body.

Every few steps she'd turn her head to look back, making sure Yindi was following.

"Don't you go running off alone at night."

Yindi said it plainly.

It sounded just like the wind-up her grandmother used in her childhood before telling some village ghost story, meant to scare her out of running around the village.

Liu Zhiyi: "Wait — save whatever it is for when we're back!"

"Aren't we passing the spot just now?" Yindi said. "Might as well tell you on the way."

Liu Zhiyi: "Passing what?"

Yindi: "There's a bamboo grove behind our village."

—Rustle.

The rustling again, but different this time — mixed with a fine pattering, like leaves clapping against each other.

Yindi: "You saw it too — only trees left on the hills, so to cut firewood you have to go a long way off, and sometimes fight over it. So one night I thought I'd sleep in the bamboo grove, and be able to run over and cut wood first thing in the morning."

Yindi: "But the bamboo grove is where all the young ones who died early are buried, so it stirs something fierce."

Liu Zhiyi: "Don't, don't, don't…"

—Rustle.

The wind grew louder and louder.

Liu Zhiyi tripped over something underfoot; she reached out for support and touched a slender, jointed, smooth thing.

It was bamboo.

Yindi: "So I was drowsing, half asleep, and heard someone calling me…"

A calling voice suddenly burst out.

"Zhizhi."

The voice mixed with the rustling, forming waves of echo, one rolling in after another, surging toward Liu Zhiyi.

"Zhizhi…"

"Zhizhi…"

Hearing it, Liu Zhiyi spun around at once to find Yindi.

But she grabbed at empty air.

She swept the flashlight around in circles; the emerald bamboo had turned narrow and sharp in the night, like ghost claws opening one after another.

She didn't find Yindi, but Yindi's voice was still there.

"I was muddled with sleep then, hadn't come to my senses, and then I heard a lot of people talking…"

—Rustle, rustle.

The bamboo grove shook, a soft whispering, like the babble of many people speaking.

Liu Zhiyi heard someone laughing, and heard crying too.

Yindi: "Couldn't make out what they were saying, only that they were crying, and laughing. I was scared to death, put my head down and ran…"

A gust of wind blew over from behind.

Liu Zhiyi's small body was buffeted, staggering forward at a run.

She couldn't see; she could only feel cold, faintly sharp leaves scraping over her — bamboo leaves, they had to be.

Yindi: "I ran and ran, and saw a ball of green fire."

As if someone had struck a match in the dark, a flame surfaced in the blackness.

A small ball of it, looking green, and also blue.

The flame was better than her watch's flashlight — it even lit the road underfoot.

Not that it could be called a road, really; just a blank little track worn by feet, winding through the dense bamboo.

Yindi: "The fire lit up a path — the one back to the village."

Was her grandmother telling a ghost story?

Hearing this, Liu Zhiyi had a faint impression that her grandmother had told a similar story when she was little.

But she'd been too small then, and too frightened, and hadn't heard her grandmother finish it.

She only remembered that her grandmother had run along this path.

Liu Zhiyi drew a deep breath, and first raised her arm to open the camera on the watch.

Some things could only be seen through the camera function.

The little track looked no different in the camera, only the blue-green fireball was a bit brighter.

So Liu Zhiyi walked forward.

As she advanced, Yindi's voice sounded once more.

"No knowing how long I ran, I saw the lights come on in the village."

Yindi: "The village burned candles."

Liu Zhiyi had felt out a bit of the pattern now, and moved her gaze ahead.

Not far off, a few points of light had come on.

It was too dark to see clearly, but the height of the lights should be at the foot and the middle of the hill.

And her grandmother's house was at the foot of the hill.

It seemed she'd made it back to the village.

Liu Zhiyi lowered her arm.

Did the story end here?

Liu Zhiyi broke into a run.

Yindi: "I ran faster and faster, faster and faster, just wanting to get back to the village quick."

Liu Zhiyi's own pace quickened bit by bit; she ran out of the bamboo grove, the track underfoot slowly widening.

As the distance closed, she could make out the outlines of brick houses — the roofs round, curving into the walls in one line, the windows too rounded on top and straight below, like a half-circle set on a rectangle.

Yindi: "I got into the village, but it wasn't quite like usual."

Liu Zhiyi noticed the firelight coming through the windows shift in color from yellow to blue, the wicks tinged with green.

Yindi: "That was no candle-fire of the human world."

Figures showed on the windows.

Liu Zhiyi saw one beckon to her.

Yindi: "There were people in the houses, their shadows showing through the windows, and they spoke to me."

Liu Zhiyi heard a figure say —

"Whose child is out so late? Come, come, come…"

Yindi: "These roofs, the shape of these windows."

Liu Zhiyi stared at those round roofs and round windows.

Yindi: "Aren't they grave mounds and headstones?"

Liu Zhiyi turned the watch toward the houses again.

On the watch screen, grave mound after grave mound stood on both sides of the road — the round mounds like the roofs, the half-round headstones set right before them, like a little house with a window cut in it.

In an instant, a ghost-wind rose on all sides.

All kinds of human voices came up, thick and lively.

"Mountain roads are dangerous at night — spend the night at mine."

"I've got honey at my place, come have some?"

"Child, come over…"

Liu Zhiyi's mind went blank; she hugged her arms and turned in circles where she stood, but grave mounds were on every side.

What to do?

The cat wasn't with her, and Yindi wasn't either.

Liu Zhiyi lost her nerve, and the red heart on the watch began to flash again.

Her heart rate had climbed.

Calm, stay calm.

Liu Zhiyi closed her eyes and worked to steady her feelings.

This dungeon was tied to her grandmother telling ghost stories.

She forced her mind to turn.

What had her reaction been, hearing these stories as a child?

The question suddenly popped into Liu Zhiyi's head.

A child, of course, is frightened by a ghost story.

So… the child she'd been had cried.

Liu Zhiyi didn't know whether this was right; the thought had come out of nowhere, as if purely on feeling.

But she still worked up the emotion, thinking of her mother.

Too easy — one thought of her mother and the tears wouldn't stop.

Liu Zhiyi cried out, weeping.

"Grandma, Grandma, I'm so scared…"

The words weren't even out before she heard an "eh?" come from far off.

And then it burst right by her ear.

At once, her body dropped.

Like suddenly waking from a dream.

When she opened her eyes again, she felt her cheek pressed to a warm shoulder, and a pair of strong arms holding up her bottom.

Yindi: "Bad dream?"

Liu Zhiyi blinked, and realized she was being carried on Yindi's back.

Yindi: "Scary story, wasn't it?"

Liu Zhiyi gave an "mm," reached out and hugged her neck, and grumbled softly — she didn't know whether to the grandmother of the future or the Yindi of now.

"You just love scaring me."

The watch screen lit up.

The first task was complete.

[Bamboo Grove Ghost Encounter: children mustn't go running around outside at night.]

"And then?" Liu Zhiyi pressed her face to Yindi's neck. "How did you get away?"

Yindi: "Just kept running — running and calling for my mama."

Her way of saying "mama" was a little different — the village dialect, like a calf's moo with a rolled ending after it.

It sounded rather sweet.

Yindi: "And then I ran out, ran back to the village."

At the end of the little path, yellow candlelight came on, and the smell of rice drifted over.

Liu Zhiyi caught the smell of woodsmoke too.

She hadn't felt hungry before, but now, with the smell of cooking, her stomach growled.