18: Refining the Body with Corpse Oil

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Jiang Yan.

Though the light was dim and I couldn’t see clearly, her red dress let me know that the person standing at the doorway was Jiang Yan. The red silhouette floated forward like a wraith, and in the blink of an eye, she stood at the entrance to the mourning hall.

A red dress and long hair—the very same figure I encountered that sleepless night. Only now, the ugly birthmark on her face had vanished.

Without the birthmark, Jiang Yan was beautiful, so much so that I found myself staring at her absentmindedly.

She gazed at me, wanting to enter. She approached the threshold but, sensing some invisible barrier across it, paused and stepped back.

Our eyes met.

This was my first proper meeting with Jiang Yan. The last time, startled by her, I only caught a fleeting glimpse.

Looking into her eyes, I felt a strange sensation in my chest, hard to describe. Her gaze was reminiscent of my mother’s doting look, as if I truly were her child, and an inexplicable warmth emanated from her eyes.

When nervous, it’s best to breathe deeply. I did so, reciting the verses I’d read in Grandma’s hidden books. After chanting them twice, my anxiety eased.

“Ziwu, do you still remember me?” Jiang Yan spoke, her voice crisp yet chilling.

“Why did you do this to me? Why put your birthmark on my face? Why harm others? Why did you try to draw away my soul?”

Though this was my first direct confrontation with Jiang Yan, countless questions burned inside me.

From the way she looked at me, I felt she might truly see me as her godson, just as the village rumors said—otherwise, why would there be such affection in her eyes?

“I never hurt anyone. I’ve always tried to protect you. Someone else wants to harm you.”

Protect me?

Drawing my soul and putting her birthmark on my face—these were acts of protection?

Hearing her claim she hadn’t harmed anyone, I recalled a line from Grandma’s notebook: “Never trust the words of ghosts.”

It warned that spirits’ words are never to be believed.

Remembering that, I suppressed the influence of Jiang Yan’s words and couldn’t help but speak: “You say you haven’t hurt anyone? Wasn’t Old Lady Wang frightened to death by you?”

“Old Lady Wang?” Jiang Yan seemed puzzled. “If I wanted to harm her, I would’ve done so eighteen years ago. Why wait until now? Come with me, I can protect you. The one who wants to harm you is too powerful. If you don’t leave with me now, I truly won’t be able to protect you.”

Jiang Yan grew increasingly anxious, as if sensing something. She spoke while glancing nervously behind her.

Ghosts’ words are not to be trusted.

I repeated this mantra in my mind as I edged backward.

“Ziwu, come with me, please. I really don’t have much time, you—”

Before Jiang Yan could finish, a black shadow swept in from outside the courtyard, colliding with her. Jiang Yan’s eyes reddened as she looked at me, then vanished.

The flame of the Soul-Calming Lamp returned to normal.

I wanted to move, but my legs refused to budge.

Reflecting on what Jiang Yan said, there was a certain logic. If she’d been present during the soul-summoning ten years ago, she could have killed Old Lady Wang at any time; there was no reason to wait until now.

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Could it be that Old Lady Wang wasn’t killed by her?

This question made me wonder: if Jiang Yan didn’t kill Old Lady Wang, how could I explain the black handprint on the window glass? If she wasn’t the one, then whoever controlled Old Lady Wang to draw my soul wasn’t her either.

If not her, then who?

If she was trying to protect me, why didn’t she come forward sooner? Why wait until now, only to vanish before finishing her explanation?

Thinking back to the look in Jiang Yan’s eyes, even as I reminded myself not to trust the words of ghosts, I couldn’t shake the feeling that she genuinely wanted to protect me. Her gaze was identical to my mother’s when she cared for me during illness.

Who was trying to harm me?

Jiang Yan was not human. From her frightened demeanor, she seemed to fear the person who meant me harm. For someone to scare even a ghost, they must be at least as formidable as Grandma or Xu Bu Huo.

Outside, the sky gradually brightened.

Just as I was about to go find Xu Bu Huo, he stumbled in from the yard, looking as though he’d survived a fierce battle. His clothes were torn in several places and stained with fresh blood.

Seeing the claw marks on Xu Bu Huo’s body, I knew his opponent must have been Old Lady Wang.

I fetched clean water to help him wash. He then asked me to gather the ashes from the incense burned on the coffin lid and apply them directly to his wounds.

When the ashes touched the bloody marks, it was like branding flesh with a hot iron; white smoke immediately rose.

Seeing my confusion, Xu Bu Huo explained that Old Lady Wang had become a corpse-fiend, capable of producing a mild corpse poison. The incense ashes could draw out the poison. If scratched or bitten by a corpse, medicine was useless; only glutinous rice or incense ashes would work.

Fortunately, the wounds weren’t too many, and the incense ashes sufficed.

When daylight fully broke, my mother came to take over. Xu Bu Huo changed clothes and took seven copper nails from his bag, instructing me to grab a hoe and follow him straight to the cemetery behind the mountain.

“Did you kill Old Lady Wang?” I asked.

“She died long ago—no need to talk about killing now.”

That made sense; Old Lady Wang was already dead. Xu Bu Huo merely helped her rest in peace.

At the cemetery, I saw blood and flesh scattered on the ground, unable to imagine how fierce the battle had been.

Old Lady Wang’s corpse lay in the center, a broken peachwood sword thrust through her chest.

Though she could move, her body had rotted a great deal in these days. Her facial skin hung from her chin, and only bone remained in her arms.

Xu Bu Huo held the copper nails, bending down with a grimace of pain.

“I’ll do it, just tell me where,” I volunteered, feeling a surge of courage.

He looked at me and asked, “Are you sure you can?”

“A man should never say he can’t,” I replied with a smile, taking the nails. Xu Bu Huo pointed to Old Lady Wang’s brow, instructing me to drive a nail there.

I found a stone and hammered the nail in with a squelch, then proceeded to her shoulders, hands, and feet.

When digging the grave, Xu Bu Huo told me to choose whichever spot seemed right.

“What’s the point of nailing these in?” I asked.

“To seal and subdue the corpse.”

Xu Bu Huo sat beside me, explaining that Old Lady Wang’s death was unnatural. From their earlier encounter, he sensed she’d been refined while alive, which led to her rapid transformation into a living corpse after death.

“How does one refine a living person?”

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“There are many methods. Judging by her condition, she was probably fed specially prepared corpse oil over a long period. Eventually, the body changes, and even the person herself can’t tell.”

Feeding corpse oil for refinement?

The thought was sickening, yet oddly, I swallowed involuntarily. Could eating corpse oil while alive really cause immediate corpse transformation after death?

Such evil methods made me think of the person Jiang Yan said wanted to harm me—the one who tried to snatch my soul in her cemetery, intending to turn me into a puppet. Only he could be capable of such things.

Though Old Lady Wang could no longer move, Xu Bu Huo said she would stir again at night unless thoroughly sealed and suppressed.

Driving a nail into her brow was called sealing the Heavenly Gate; into her shoulders, sealing the Earth Gate and Life Gate. Generally, to subdue a living corpse, nailing these three spots would rob it of mobility.

To destroy it completely required fire, but if burning wasn’t practical, then sealing the Four Paths—the hands and feet—was the only option. Once sealed, the corpse would die entirely; even if a malicious spirit entered, it couldn’t control the body.

Grandma’s books had opened a strange new world to me, but Xu Bu Huo’s explanations gave me a sense of the unexplainable by science.

No wonder the books said: “The end of science is theology.”

Science can explain many things, but theology can explain what science cannot.

As we descended the mountain, I brought up Jiang Yan’s visit.

“Is what she said trustworthy?” I asked.

Xu Bu Huo smiled indifferently. “Whether it’s trustworthy depends on you. If you want to believe, no one can stop you. If you don’t, nothing anyone says will matter. As for ‘never trust the words of ghosts,’ do you think those ghosts are really as you imagine? Sometimes, people are scarier than ghosts.”

His words left me baffled.

“So is there a powerful person hiding in the village?”

That was my real concern. If the powerful person wasn’t Xu Bu Huo, it was probably Grandpa Qin; the thought chilled me.

“Isn’t it just the Grandpa Qi you mentioned? If he could tamper with the jade pendant I gave you, directly corrupting it, then his skills aren’t weak.”

So it really was him?

A surge of impulse made me want to tell everything about Grandpa Qin, but the words caught in my throat. Having dealt with Xu Bu Huo for a while now, I sensed he was shrewd—perhaps fishing for information from me.

No one can be fully trusted, but no one can be completely distrusted.

That was my solution: trust neither Xu Bu Huo nor Grandpa Qin entirely, but don’t discount them either. At least so far, Xu Bu Huo hadn't harmed me, and Grandpa Qin seemed harmless as well.

Back at the old house, Xu Bu Huo gave some instructions and returned to the new house to rest. I deliberately made an excuse not to accompany him. Once he left, I headed straight for Grandpa Qin’s home.

Grandpa Qin was highly suspicious, so I felt compelled to test him. I slipped a knife into my pocket just in case.

When I arrived, the door was open but no one was in sight. I called out twice before a weak voice from inside answered.

Entering, I found Grandpa Xu lying pale on the bed. He tried to sit up when he saw me, but after a couple of attempts, he broke into a violent cough.

He lifted his handkerchief, revealing fresh blood. I hurriedly asked what had happened.

“I was tricked,” Grandpa Qin wheezed, needing three breaths for every sentence. After a while, he continued, “There’s a third person in the village who knows all this. He’s the most formidable.”

A third person really exists?