72: Borrowing Life Through the Five Elements

Feng shui can nurture life, but it can also claim it. Most people have heard this saying, yet few truly understand how feng shui nurtures or destroys. Though intangible, feng shui undeniably exists.

The simplest method involves the arrangement of various objects to alter the energy field of a place, subtly influencing the fortune of those who dwell within. The process is gradual, only erupting once the accumulated force reaches a certain threshold.

A more profound approach requires interventions beginning at the ancestral graves, then harmonizing with the household. Properly aligned, such arrangements can bring harmony and prosperity to a family. If mishandled, however, they can sow ruin, disease, and ultimately, a tragic fate.

Feng shui can kill with invisible hands.

The most insidious is when the chosen victim feels unwell—perhaps just a minor cold at first—but under the influence of manipulated feng shui, the illness worsens, spiraling out of control until it takes a life.

More direct methods resemble the bizarre death of Zhou Shun. Such a demise can be attributed to lethal feng shui, but could also be considered an occult killing—different in some respects, yet similar in result: a death that defies understanding.

A man locks himself indoors and drowns while seated on his sofa. Based on these details, I concluded that Zhou Shun’s death was linked to an occult method. Purely lethal feng shui would have caused him simply to die where he sat, with the cause given as a heart attack or some other acute illness—not drowning, which makes no sense in context.

As I pondered, two words crystallized in my mind: drowning death.

If the perpetrator understood these arts, they could have easily made Zhou Shun’s death appear ordinary. Yet, they deliberately ensured he drowned while seated—an outcome so illogical that anyone encountering it would sense something amiss.

After discussing my analysis with Cao Guangshan, he suddenly mentioned another case. “There’s another incident, though it’s already closed. Still, something about it doesn’t sit right with me.”

Nothing happens without reason; if something feels off, there’s a problem. I asked him to tell me the details.

The deceased was Hu Chun, a man in his thirties who ran a restaurant on the town’s western edge. Business was good. His wife found the body. She’d spent the previous night in the village with their children, and returned early to find the restaurant closed. Unable to find him, she went upstairs and discovered his room locked from the inside.

After receiving no answer to her calls, she fetched help to pry the door open. Inside, they found Hu Chun with a fruit knife plunged into his chest.

Initially, the case was classified as homicide. But after forensic analysis and investigation, only Hu Chun’s fingerprints were found on the knife. The window was monitored by surveillance—footage showed no one entering or leaving through it. The case was closed as a suicide.

What troubled Cao Guangshan was information he’d gathered from Hu Chun’s wife—Hu Chun had no reason to kill himself. The restaurant was thriving, he had two children, and his home life was happy. In fact, the day before his death, he’d booked tickets for a seaside vacation with his wife, to make up for their missed honeymoon.

Hu Chun’s family was adamant—he would never take his own life. Yet the investigation revealed no evidence to the contrary.

Hu Chun died the day after Zhou Shun. Zhou Shun perished first; Hu Chun followed.

“Think about it,” Cao Guangshan said to me. “Doesn’t this suicide seem strange? There’s no reason at all for him to do it.” I nodded.

A man with a happy life and no history of depression has no reason for suicide—especially in such a gruesome way, stabbing himself in the heart. It’s easy to kill someone else, but to drive a knife into your own chest? Most would falter at the first prick of pain.

The more I thought about it, the stranger this death seemed. Still, my focus remained on Zhou Shun—his death was the most bizarre.

“Can we visit the scene of Zhou Shun’s death?”

Feng shui, when arranged with intent, always leaves traces if a death is involved. Science cannot detect these marks; only occult methods can reveal them.

I decided to visit the site because my grandmother once told me that the presence of lethal feng shui or occult harm can be detected through special means—by sensing the altered energy of the surroundings.

If the energy field has been tampered with, I would be able to tell, thus determining the cause of death.

“Yes, I’ll go get the paperwork,” Cao Guangshan replied, running off, his spirits lifted by my involvement—hopeful, perhaps, that the case might finally be solved.

Though I had some theories and a plan, I couldn’t be sure. Along the way, I stopped at a funeral supply shop to buy incense and yellow paper.

Upon entering Zhou Shun’s house, Cao Guangshan explained how Zhou had died—seated as if in mid-repose, with drowning listed as the cause. It defied understanding.

I was new to this field, lacking my grandmother’s experience. She claimed that if an energy field was manipulated, she could sense it immediately upon entry. I had to rely on occult methods.

I always carried cinnabar with me. After preparing it, I drew a ritual array at the spot where Zhou Shun’s feet rested at the time of death, then placed eight talismans within the circle and tied them with red thread.

I gathered some of Zhou Shun’s personal items—his toothbrush among them—winding the eight red threads around it and fixing an unlit stick of incense in the center.

I then performed a ritual with both hands—a sequence of thirty-six gestures I had mastered after months of practice.

As the final gesture concluded, I lit the eight talismans clockwise. When they had nearly burned out, I ignited the incense.

After signaling to Cao Guangshan to shut the doors and windows, I pulled him aside.

“What does this do?” he asked, curiosity piqued.

“It reveals if anything has been deliberately arranged here.”

The object used to instigate a bizarre death can’t be too far from the victim—such is the limitation of the occult arts. The array itself was a method. The smoke from the incense, guided by unseen forces, would trace the source. If Zhou Shun’s death was manipulated, the smoke would find the evidence.

At first, the smoke rose and dispersed, but halfway through, the blue tendrils ceased to scatter, drifting instead toward a nearby room.

I followed, Cao Guangshan telling me it was Zhou Shun’s usual resting place.

Inside, the smoke formed only the faintest wisp—almost invisible unless you watched closely. I saw it slip beneath the bed and signaled Cao Guangshan to lift the mattress.

Expecting something beneath, I was surprised to see nothing. Yet, as I doubted the smoke’s guidance, Cao Guangshan pointed at the underside of the bed frame. “Is this what you’re looking for?”

On the bed slats, a ritual array drawn in black ink was clearly visible. At its center, a folded yellow talisman was nailed down. Since Zhou Shun was dead, the occult spell had lost its power. I took the talisman, unfolded it, and found a lock of hair inside, along with a birthdate and a blood-red incantation.

By working backwards from the birthdate, I read out the specific time and asked if it matched Zhou Shun’s. Cao Guangshan confirmed the date but was unsure of the hour.

From this, I concluded the eight characters belonged to Zhou Shun.

I set aside the birthdate for now, focusing on the incantation, which struck a familiar chord. After some thought, I had the answer.

“He was sacrificed.”

The word unsettled Cao Guangshan, but I continued, “If I’m not mistaken, Hu Chun’s death is connected as well. Both men were killed by the same hand.”

“How is that possible?” He found it hard to accept. After all, the two victims had nothing in common beyond dying in sealed rooms.

I took a deep breath and went on: “It isn’t over. If I’m right, three more people will die in strange ways.”

Cao Guangshan fell silent, his face darkening.

After some thought, he fixed his gaze on me. “Ziwu, are you sure the two deaths are connected? If you are, I’ll have to report this.”

Instead of answering at once, I asked, “Think carefully—when Hu Chun died, was his head facing due west?”

Zhou Shun died in the north, seated on the sofa facing south, death attributed to drowning. Hu Chun died in the west; if my deductions were correct, he died with his head to the west.

“Yes, to the west,” Cao Guangshan replied.

I nodded firmly. “Then you should inform your superior.”

I had a strong premonition that more deaths would follow. “If possible, send people to check the east and south sides of town. Either someone has already died, or it’s about to happen.”

Cao Guangshan photographed the ritual array and talisman for evidence, then we returned to the precinct. On the way, he asked how I was certain there would be more deaths in the east and south.

“The method is a sacrificial borrowing of fate through the Five Elements. The incantation on the yellow paper is a fate-stealing charm.”

Seeing his confusion, I explained, “In life, everything has an elemental attribute—metal, wood, water, fire, earth. Directions correspond to these elements, as do body organs, even certain written characters.

North is water, west is metal, east is wood, south is fire, center is earth.

Zhou Shun lived in the north, seated facing south when he died—drowning was his cause, meaning water took his life.

Hu Chun lived in the west, died with his head to the west. The cause was suicide, but the instrument was a knife in his chest.

A knife is made of iron, and iron is metal.

One death by water, one by metal. With the fate-stealing charm, I’m certain someone is using the occult arts to take others’ lifespan and transfer it elsewhere.

The person who dies in the south will be killed by fire, the one in the east by wood, and the one in the center by earth—the last to die.

As I explained all this, we arrived at the station. Just as we reached the entrance, all the officers rushed out, one man’s face full of anxiety as he raced toward the southern part of town.

Cao Guangshan and I exchanged glances, knowing instantly—someone had just been burned to death.