Desolate Temple

Under the force of that violent distortion, Hu Ma obediently followed the little girl in red home for dinner.

The violent shock had completely cleared his dazed mind. Everything he saw had utterly shattered his reason, yet he was powerless to question it...

It was already dark. An oil lamp burned inside the little house, and Old Woman was waiting for him beside the Eight Immortals' table.

The meal in this humble little house was surprisingly hearty.

Hu Ma had just run until he was gasping for breath, and on top of that, those ghostly things had terrified him. He was in a daze and had no idea how long he'd been running. He only saw that a plate of pickled vegetables, two bowls of porridge, and a plate of meat cut into neat little squares had already been set on the Eight Immortals' table.

So Hu Ma obediently sat at the left-hand side of the table, while Old Woman took the seat of honor.

Xiao Hong Tang was crouched on a roof beam, craning her neck to peer down at him.

The lamplight flickered, casting wavering shadows. Outside the house, something seemed to be peering in from the darkness.

Old Woman said nothing, eating quietly. She only touched the pickled vegetables on her plate.

Xiao Hong Tang, still on the beam, said nothing either. She merely blinked at Hu Ma as he sat beside the table.

The atmosphere was strange and oppressive. Hu Ma finally couldn't stand it and cautiously broke the silence:

"Th-those things... what exactly are they?"

"..."

Old Woman and Xiao Hong Tang, playing on the beam, both turned to look at him. The atmosphere inside seemed to grow even more oppressive.

"Evil Spirits."

In the silence, Old Woman slowly spoke. "As soon as dusk falls, those things all come out."

"You were so badly injured that you even forgot the rule about not going out at night."

"..."

"I..."

He would have been better off not hearing that answer; now he felt even more on edge. Hu Ma managed to get out one word, then didn't know what to ask.

"There's no need to be so afraid."

Old Woman glanced at him, then continued in her slow, measured voice. "You've only just recovered, and you're weak. It's perfectly normal to run into Evil Spirits."

"As long as you listen to Old Woman and eat plenty of meat, you'll gradually get better."

"..."

"Eat meat?"

Hu Ma could only look again at the square-cut piece of meat on the plate.

The piece Xiao Hong Tang had eaten was gone. This one looked like it had just been cooked.

But even freshly cooked, it had a chilling air about it. Its grease had already congealed, gleaming a strange white under the oil lamp. It sat alone and cold on the plate.

He'd already been force-fed this meat many times, but he still couldn't tell what kind it was.

He was sure it wasn't pork or beef, and certainly not human flesh. It wasn't any kind of meat he'd ever eaten.

Besides, its shape always made him think of the meat offerings used to pay respects to the dead in his previous life.

His revulsion made it hard to pick up his chopsticks, but Old Woman stopped eating and stared at him with a distant look.

"Don't you trust Old Woman?"

Hu Ma met her eyes and felt a faint jolt of alarm.

"I do!"

He took a deep breath, pulled the plate right in front of him, lowered his head, and began to wolf it down.

Going by his past experience, once he was fed the meat, he'd be subjected to that indescribable torture. There was no escaping it, so he might as well put some food in his belly to help him endure.

He chewed the slippery meat to pieces and forced it down. His ravenous body gradually felt a little more filled.

Maybe it was an illusion, but as soon as the meat entered his stomach, it seemed to start digesting.

It was as if the meat came alive inside him.

It wriggled through his body, seeping into his organs and bloodstream, mending him from within.

The strange sensation lifted his spirits. Even the wounds on his shoulders seemed to ease.

Old Woman watched him finish every last bit of meat. Her expression seemed to soften slightly as she said slowly, "Good boy. Now that you've eaten, go back to your room and get some rest."

"If you need to get up in the night, pee against the wall. Whatever you do, don't go outside, and don't look out. Those things are still out there!"

"Tomorrow, Old Woman will take you to Old Fire Pit. Once you've paid your respects to the ancestors, everything will be fine."

"..."

"Those things?"

Hu Ma still had a lot of questions he wanted to ask.

He vaguely remembered that every night, a torturous ordeal awaited him, as painful as being dragged through hell. But tonight, she was really going to let him sleep just like that?

He wanted to get some answers, but when he looked at Old Woman's face, hidden in the lamplight's shadows, he instinctively shrank back inside.

He stole a glance outside the door and saw nothing but pitch-black darkness—not even a sliver of moonlight. It was so dark he couldn't see his hand in front of his face.

The darkness seemed to press the lamplight inside the house down to a faint glow. In the viscous night, countless strange things seemed to be hiding, staring at him with pairs of eerie, sinister eyes. Before he knew it, a layer of sweat had soaked his back.

He immediately obediently cleared away his dishes and slipped into the side room.

The room was cramped, with only a wooden plank bed and a thick, stiff cotton quilt that looked newly stuffed.

He didn't dare sleep. Huddled in the narrow, pitch-black side room, he strained his ears, focusing on the main room.

Outside, Old Woman's murmured chanting rose and fell, faint and mysterious, its words obscure.

"Creak, creak..."

Beyond the chanting, another strange sound mingled in. He leaned over to peer through the crack in the door. Xiao Hong Tang was gnawing on some kind of bone.

His unease rose to a peak. Clutching the quilt, he silently tapped his own head.

After that fright, his mind was noticeably clearer than before. That dizzy feeling seemed to be gradually fading.

But aside from the horror, his mind was filled with endless questions and suspicions.

So I was reborn in the body of a boy who also happened to be named Hu Ma?

His sinister grandmother's grandson was murdered by an enemy, and she wanted to summon his soul back, but somehow summoned me instead?

And the torture I went through before... was that really a cure?

But the key is... she still thinks I've only just woken up and can't remember anything. She doesn't know I'm not her grandson at all...

"..."

It was all too absurd and bizarre to believe at once. Yet after witnessing the bizarre, fantastical nature of this world, he somehow felt that anything could happen and still make sense.

He desperately wanted to figure it all out, but right now he didn't even have the courage to look up at the window.

It was as if the night had imprisoned him on that little wooden bed.

In a world like this, Hu Ma hadn't dared to sleep. But he'd dragged his weak body around for so long that perhaps exhaustion had caught up with him. Or perhaps Old Woman's chanting and Xiao Hong Tang's gnawing had some strange, hypnotic effect.

He stayed on guard only a little longer before drifting off, without even realizing it.

In a daze, he seemed to arrive at a dark, deep place, its surroundings shrouded in a murky red mist.

His body quietly parted the fog as he walked forward, then suddenly slowed.

Up ahead stood a dilapidated platform, with a broken incense burner on top and a vast expanse of darkness behind it.

He could just make out the shadow of some kind of statue in the darkness, but it was too indistinct to see clearly.

Hu Ma instinctively walked a few steps forward. His footsteps made no sound.

As he approached the platform, he realized it looked like an altar in a temple. Indeed, the whole space resembled an abandoned temple, battered and broken, with no incense burned there for who knew how many years. Several plates for offerings sat empty on the altar.

The incense burner held only half a brazier of cold ash. The place was bleak and silent; no incense had burned there for who knew how long.

But strangely, beside the incense burner lay half a stick of red incense, about as long as a little finger.

It looked brand-new, and carried a familiar scent.

Hu Ma stood motionless before the incense burner for who knew how long. Something stirred faintly inside him, and for some unknown reason, he instinctively picked up the half-stick of red incense, gently placed it inside the burner, then slowly withdrew his hand.

"Hiss..."

As soon as the incense touched the burner, it began to burn for no apparent reason.

That dim red glow seemed to breathe a little life into the whole ruined, desolate space.

Thin wisps of smoke drifted away, like a slender, hazy snake, floating lightly into the empty space around him.

Hu Ma sensed that something was happening and held his breath.

He watched the wisp of smoke drift away in silence, feeling that something might happen.

But nothing did. The incense continued burning quietly, perhaps a little faster than ordinary incense.

Even when the stick was almost burned down, nothing had happened.

But just as he relaxed a little, thinking his tension had been pointless, he suddenly saw the drifting incense straighten as if it were solid, stretching into the depths of the dark red mist.

The clearly impossible sight silenced Hu Ma's breathing.

The next moment, a voice rang out: "Code name Erguotou, calling the Reincarnator from Old Yin Mountain. Can anyone hear me?"

"..."

"This..."

The unexpected words jolted Hu Ma. He stumbled backward, trembling.

He looked toward the direction of the voice, too shocked to answer.

Just then, a sudden chill touched his ankle.

A strange sensation surged through him. Hu Ma woke with a start and saw that he was lying on the narrow wooden bed. The little girl in red was gripping his ankle with her cold little hand. Her eyes shone with an unnatural brightness as she stared intently at him.

Like he'd been jolted by electricity, he came to his senses and yanked his ankle back.

"What are you doing?"

"..."

"You're such a scaredy-cat."

Xiao Hong Tang glanced at him and giggled. "Brother Hu Ma, get up! Old Woman's taking us to Old Fire Pit!"

"Old Fire Pit?"

Hu Ma turned his head in confusion and saw daylight streaming through the little window overhead.

It was already morning.