37: The Sealed Corpse Kiln

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Xu Buhuo had never flinched before the corpse-changed Madam Wang. He hadn’t retreated before the corpse demon either. Yet now, faced with a perfectly ordinary-looking well, he was truly panicked.

I didn’t know exactly what Xu Buhuo had realized, only that he wasn’t joking with me at this moment.

The water level was nearly three meters deep—not too deep—my toes could just touch the bottom. I plunged in, hands searching blindly along the floor, and soon grabbed hold of something. Upon closer inspection, it turned out to be an iron chain.

When submerged, anything one grabs is followed to its source. I didn’t know why there would be an iron chain at the bottom of the well. Pulling at it, I felt something attached at the other end, so I traced it upwards, quickly coming upon a cold, stiff foot. My heart tightened.

Brother Li?

After confirming the chain was fastened to a foot, I was bewildered. Did Brother Li, after jumping into the well, lock himself in with an iron chain?

What unsettled me further was that Brother Li seemed to have shrunk—the foot bound by the chain wasn’t large at all, more like a child’s.

My breath held, I tugged at the chain but it wouldn’t budge; the other end was fixed to the well floor. Unable to pull it free, I surfaced, ready to tell Xu Buhuo to find tools to unlock the chain.

“Hurry!” he urged impatiently before I could speak. I replied, “He’s locked in with an iron chain. We need tools.”

“Locked in?” Xu Buhuo muttered, as if something had struck him. Then he said, “Search again. That’s not Brother Li.”

Not Brother Li?

Was there another corpse at the bottom of the well? Remembering the smaller foot, realization dawned—it wasn’t that Brother Li had shrunk, but that the foot bound by the chain belonged to a child, long dead.

Why was there a child’s corpse chained at the well’s bottom? I had no idea. Xu Buhuo’s urgent prompting forced me to dive again.

This time, I quickly found a larger body. Feeling it carefully, I confirmed it wasn’t the child from before. I grabbed the corpse and surfaced, relieved to see it was Brother Li.

A corpse altered by death, so long as it’s daytime—even in darkness—will appear lifeless. This was something I’d read in the old texts, so I wasn’t worried Brother Li would suddenly awaken and strangle me.

Just as I tied Brother Li’s body with rope, bubbles suddenly surged from the well’s depths. At first, I thought it was from stirring the water, but soon the well boiled over with bubbles everywhere.

Panic struck me, recalling Xu Buhuo’s earlier anxiety.

“Hurry, get out first!” Xu Buhuo saw the turbulent water as well. I didn’t hesitate, scrambling onto Brother Li’s body, using the rope to climb with all my strength.

At that moment, I understood the extraordinary potential one can unleash when shrouded in danger and fear.

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After being in the freezing water for so long, my body was numb. Normally I’d never have managed to climb out, but this time I darted straight to the well’s rim.

After escaping, I glanced down. Beneath the surface, a pale, delicate hand was coming into view—my scalp and back tingled with dread.

The child chained below, somehow, had revived. I realized that if I’d tried to pull Brother Li up first, I’d have been doomed.

Catching my breath, I helped Xu Buhuo pull Brother Li’s corpse from the well. I slumped by the edge, replaying the scenes from below, feeling as though it all hadn’t been real.

Brother Li’s corpse was now out, dusk was falling, yet Xu Buhuo didn’t proceed with the suppression rites. Instead, he hovered by the well’s edge, staring inside with a grim expression. Curious, I joined him.

What I saw left me speechless.

There wasn’t just one pale hand beneath the water, but four.

Delicate hands weakly grasped at the surface, as if trying to climb out, but their feet were chained, and the hands could only reach the water’s edge.

Four hands—meaning there were two children below.

I’d thought there was only one, but now realized there were two.

After a while, the four hands seemed to sense they couldn’t escape, and slowly withdrew beneath the water.

Staring at the now-calm surface, a chill seized my heart, and my whole body trembled. Had I known there were two dead children below, I’d never have descended.

“Old man, why are two children’s corpses chained below?”

Xu Buhuo didn’t answer right away. He walked to Brother Li’s corpse, inspecting it as he said, “Your grandmother was clever. At first, even I didn’t notice anything wrong with this well, otherwise I wouldn’t have let you go down.”

“This well always looked normal,” I said, gazing at the ordinary structure. I didn’t blame Xu Buhuo; before descending, I too had no inkling of its strangeness.

This explained why my grandmother was so fierce when she saw me about to drink from the well—because even then, two children’s corpses were chained below.

Water steeped in corpses can’t be drunk; that’s why she was so harsh.

“Amateurs see the spectacle; experts see the underlying craft. Look closely—what do the cracks in the stone around the well resemble?”

I stepped aside. At first glance, nothing stood out, but on second look, the stone cracks around the well seemed oddly familiar—like the patterns of a ritual array.

Soon, I was certain—the cracks formed a ritual array. The patterns were chaotic, invisible to those unfamiliar with such magic.

And the well itself lay at the center of the array.

“Look at the well’s rim,” he said.

I leaned in to find densely inscribed runes along the wall, faded by time and hard to notice unless examined closely.

A ritual array and runes—now I understood the well’s purpose: corpse suppression.

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Before I was born, the water in this well was drinkable. Something happened, and my grandmother altered the well, locking two dead children below.

“This well is called the Corpse-Sealing Kiln. The bodies placed inside are ones with intense evil energy. If your Brother Li had stayed in there too long, even I wouldn’t have been able to destroy him except by risking my life,” Xu Buhuo explained.

I couldn’t quite grasp it—if corpses grow so dangerous inside, why keep such a well? I voiced my question.

“It wasn’t aimed at your Brother Li, but at the two children below. After they died, their bodies were tainted by evil; your grandmother couldn’t handle them, so she sealed them below. Over years, the evil energy intensified, making the water so cold. Any newly corpse-altered body placed inside would be corroded by the evil, becoming even more monstrous.”

Understanding at last, I couldn’t imagine how dangerous those two children must have been, if even my grandmother couldn’t destroy them—only seal them away.

I wondered whose children they were, and then remembered something my grandmother once told me, confirming my suspicion.

It happened days before I was born.

Grandmother said that after Jiang Yan committed suicide, villagers claimed to have seen her. Around that time, a boy and a girl—both eleven—vanished from the village.

When the missing children weren’t found, villagers speculated Jiang Yan had taken them. Their disappearance led to rumors linking me and Jiang Yan.

I never imagined that the two missing children had been sealed at the well’s bottom for eighteen years.

If their corpses had become evil spirits, it meant they hadn’t just disappeared—they died, likely in torment, for their bodies to be so tainted.

I wondered, could it be as villagers said—were they killed by Jiang Yan? Otherwise, why would their corpses bear such evil?

The suspicion made me rethink my belief in Jiang Yan. Whenever I recalled her words and demeanor, it felt as if she truly wanted to protect me.

But the old texts warned: ghostly words are not to be trusted.

If the children really were harmed by Jiang Yan, then her promise to protect me was nothing but ghostly lies, spoken with such sincerity and emotion only to win my trust.

My thoughts in turmoil, I couldn’t decide whether to believe Jiang Yan or not, nor understand why, if she meant to protect me, she had vanished completely these days.

A sudden sound startled me—Xu Buhuo was driving the corpse-suppressing nail into Brother Li’s brow, at the location of the celestial gate.

Seeing him struggle with the task, I rose to fetch a brick.

But at that moment, Brother Li’s corpse suddenly shuddered.

His tightly shut eyes snapped open.