Shen Gun finally stopped fixating on the bird that was prettier than national liberation. He looked up at the sky in a daze, as if he could see through the tent ceiling: “Fog is rising, such thick fog.”
That wasn’t wrong—fog frequently rose in the Xiangxi mountains. With mountains, forests, and marshlands, the moisture was too abundant, making fog inevitable.
But Shen Gun’s subsequent mutterings made Jiang Lian feel bewildered: “Billowing in clumps, like rolling gray waves, covering half the sky…”
At this point, his body gave a shudder, and his scattered gaze finally returned, his eyes regaining their light: “I remember now, I remember!”
He finally recalled why he thought this box had been stolen.
Because when the dense fog covered the sky, those people who were originally by the bonfire or the pile of boxes became agitated. They shouted, some running in this direction, some climbing to higher positions on the box pile to get a better view.
Then, from the dense fog emerged a pair of hands—only hands, and human hands, skinny and bony—suddenly grabbing the edge of the outermost box, and with a swoosh, dragging that box into the thick fog.
So furtive—if not stealing, then what?
Jiang Lian felt Shen Gun’s description was somewhat exaggerated and distorted. Xiangxi was indeed foggy, but describing it as “billowing in clumps, like rolling gray waves” seemed far too fantastical. On second thought, it was a dream after all, which would naturally have distortions and bizarreness beyond reality.
A group of people VS. a group of bandits.
A pile of boxes VS. a pile of boxes the Kuang family carried when fleeing.
It matched up fairly well. There was an eight or nine out of ten chance that they were looking for the same box, or more precisely, the items they were both looking for originated from that pile of Kuang family boxes.
Shen Gun swallowed and continued describing the dream scene to Jiang Lian: “Then there was pursuit. All I could hear was the huffing and puffing of people running. The feeling was strange, and my perspective was strange too. In the dream, I wasn’t just an observer; it seemed I was among those giving chase, desperately pursuing, but…”
At this point, Shen Gun looked a bit lost.
As they chased, the fog dispersed, clearing completely to reveal a wilderness illuminated as if it were white ground. Looking up, the moon was large, white, bright, merciful, and gentle. A massive mountain shadow stood on the horizon, silent and weighty.
That was the entirety of the dream. Compared to before, it didn’t provide much more useful information: regarding the box, he still hadn’t seen its style, only knew its approximate length and width, and that there were many piled together; there were many people, but he only saw silhouettes—how they were dressed or even their gender remained unknown; there was a giant, distorted bird shadow, but that was an effect of firelight projection, its true form unknown—perhaps it was woven from bamboo strips; he also saw a hand reaching from the dense fog and snatching away a box, but this only further corroborated that the box had been stolen.
Jiang Lian didn’t miss the most crucial word: “Wilderness?”
Shen Gun said: “Mm-hmm.”
Jiang Lian found this word choice quite intriguing: given Xiangxi’s terrain and landforms, with nine parts mountains, half water, and half fields, how could there be a wilderness?
He tentatively asked: “Do you think… the place in your dream was in Xiangxi?”
Shen Gun firmly denied it: “No, certainly not.”
He gestured as he described what he saw in the dream: “Even at night, you could feel the sky’s transparency and vastness, the boundlessness of the land, and the mountains—magnificent, imposing, and endless… I’m not saying southern mountains aren’t magnificent, but it’s a completely different style.”
Finally, he concluded: “Northwest! One hundred percent of the mountains of the Northwest. I have experience with that feeling of the supreme mountain among all mountains, the central pillar of heaven…”
At this point, he seemed to recall something and muttered to himself: “Supreme among all mountains… could it be the Kunlun Mountains? Come to think of it, I’ve been to the Kunlun Mountains, and the atmosphere does indeed resemble that…”
The Kunlun Mountains—Jiang Lian’s heart settled back to reality. Although they were both looking for boxes, one was in the Northwest and one in Xiangxi, separated by no less than ten thousand li. It seemed they weren’t related after all.
So they would each rely on their abilities to find their respective boxes.
…
He picked up the empty dinner tray and made his way to the cooking area. This meal was already eaten late, and being delayed further by Shen Gun, it was now deep into the night. Many tents had turned off their lights, and the kitchen area was deserted—in the darkness, only clean pots, bowls, and utensils were neatly arranged.
Jiang Lian put down the tray but felt it wasn’t right to just walk away. After a moment’s hesitation, he found some dish soap and a cloth, scooped up some water, and squatted in a low spot to clean the tray.
The night watch, Mountain Ghost, was quite alert. Seeing a figure moving in the cooking area, he immediately came over to investigate. Upon seeing Jiang Lian washing dishes, he was both relieved and perplexed, still concerned that Jiang Lian might be planning some mischief. He decided not to leave and instead stood at a distance, watching him wash.
Jiang Lian felt mischievous and deliberately washed very slowly. Finally, he even used a dry cloth to wipe the tray completely dry before turning to leave.
He hadn’t gone far when he suddenly stopped and looked toward a large tent surrounded by many smaller tents in the distance.
There were noticeably more night watchers there, and it was Meng Qianzi’s tent. Most of the surrounding small tents had gone dark, but the large tent still had its light on. Jiang Lian instinctively felt that the light wouldn’t be turned off so soon.
As the head of the Mountain Ghosts, in that position, whether willing or not, she had to fulfill her responsibilities. With so many unexpected events these past few days, Meng Jinsong was only an assistant and, no matter how capable, couldn’t overstep her. Big matters and small, they probably all needed her final decision.
It was indeed… quite tiring.
Meng Qianzi had indeed been extremely tired these days, and with her injuries, she desperately wanted to collapse and fall into a deep sleep.
However, it wasn’t possible—there was a pile of matters that needed to be decided and settled. Fortunately, Meng Jinsong was one of her people, so it didn’t matter if she lacked decorum. She crawled into her sleeping bag with three inflatable pillows supporting her back, keeping only her eyes open, her ears alert, and her mind awake—all other parts of her body were resting.
But Meng Jinsong’s discourse about the “Cave Deity” made her perk up: “‘Deity’? Behind her is a ‘deity’?”
Meng Jinsong laughed: “Don’t get excited. This is just a local Xiangxi expression. Shen Gun said that in Xiangxi, deities and ghosts aren’t distinguished—in my view, it’s possibly a force that can influence people’s minds and actions.”
Meng Qianzi was struck by a thought: “Like the Water Ghosts’ family… ancestral tablets?”
A few months ago, two generations of leaders from the Water Ghost family, one old and one young, had come seeking her help and told her about a complex and confusing matter. They mentioned that the Water Ghost family had three ancestral tablets, simply called “ancestor tablets.” After a Water Ghost went underwater, they would attach the ancestral tablet to their forehead, and the entire person would seem possessed by ancestral spirits, becoming like a puppet, swimming back and forth underwater, busy nonstop, but after regaining consciousness, they would have no memory of what had happened. The Water Ghost family had tried various methods, attempting to have people follow underwater or conduct underwater video recording, but all had failed.
Meng Jinsong shook his head: “I thought of the ancestral tablets too. It’s somewhat similar, but not quite the same. The Water Ghost family’s situation resembles a brief brain occupation, or simply possession; Bai Shuixiao is more like being brainwashed—not just Bai Shuixiao, I inquired with Shen Gun about the situation regarding the Cave Flower Women.”
Rather than being crazy, it was more like being brainwashed into obsession: the Cave Flower Women weren’t insane; they interacted with people quite normally. They just firmly believed in the existence of the Cave Deity and the love pact between themselves and the deity.
Shen Gun again—Meng Qianzi frowned: “Has this person become an expert? Is his word reliable?”
Meng Jinsong was prepared: “I haven’t been idle these past two days. I had people investigate Shen Gun’s background. The mountain dweller from Chongqing specially went to pay respects to Wan Fenghuo, and Master Wan vouched for Shen Gun.”
“They said this person has no family, no sect, no school, seeks neither fame nor fortune. He has wandered his whole life, from the prime of youth to past middle age, half a lifetime drifting, truly just for the sake of his research.”
Looking at the current Shen Gun, it was really hard to imagine him in his “prime of youth.” Meng Qianzi smiled: “Your choice of words, coming in strings like that.”
Meng Jinsong corrected her: “Just repeating, these are all Wan Fenghuo’s words. You can see he quite admires this Shen Gun. I also contacted Seventh Aunt, and she’s not someone who believes everything she hears. She had already sent mountain dwellers from the Yunling area to investigate Foggy Town.”
“There is indeed a Ming-Qing dynasty mansion in the town, originally inhabited by an old lady in a wheelchair, which later became Shen Gun’s residence. They say the rooms are filled with either books or printed materials, and countless aged notebooks numbered by year. Judging from the yellowing of the paper, comparison of handwriting, and so on, they were indeed accumulated over twenty or thirty years. He also has someone living with him, seemingly a person with a deformity, with a very frightening face, who rarely goes out and has nothing particularly special about them.”
“In a word, this person is basically clean, can be trusted, and indeed has some substance, so I brought him along.”