"No. We didn't keep in touch much back then. It was more than half a year after he made his fortune that he came to see me again. You've probably done your research. That was around the time his mother passed away."
"Yes."
"His wife's condition was under control by then, so he'd finally put his mind at ease. He never expected his elderly mother to pass away so suddenly. He lamented to me how unpredictable life could be. Later, I heard his business kept growing, but rumors started swirling around him. His relatives and friends were dying one after another, and some people began to wonder if he was up to something."
"Up to what?"
"Rituals, feng shui, that sort of thing. The rumors got ridiculous. They said he'd set up a feng shui formation in his factory, and that anyone who came in would have their fate marked. Then, every so often, someone would die and become a ghost, which would be sucked into the formation to bring him wealth. Just a bunch of nonsense."
"Did those rumors have a source?"
"A source?"
"Maybe one of his enemies or business rivals spread them to undermine him. Or perhaps someone really saw some unusual feng shui arrangements inside his factory."
"How could that be? People were just making wild guesses at the time. They were only rumors, and nobody took them seriously."
"The rumors spread, but nobody believed them?"
"China had already opened up and embarked on reform. The campaign to eliminate the Four Olds had ended ages ago. Who would believe in that sort of thing?"
"But it was true that Mr. Lin's friends and relatives were dying one after another. Wasn't anyone frightened? Did no employees leave his factory? And did none of his friends or relatives distance themselves from him because of it?"
"Well... no. Nobody did that back then."
"Mr. Sun, didn't you find the situation strange?"
"I... I didn't think of it that way... I never gave it much thought, but... Ah, now that you mention it... Those rumors did have a source. When Lin Yifan first opened his factory, he brought two people from our research institute over to work there. There was a young Wu... Wu Ze. He was the first to say those things."
"Wu Ze? What kind of person was he?"
"He was a very ambitious young man. He got into college from a rural village, then was assigned to our institute as soon as he graduated. After working there for a year or two, he went to Lin Yifan's factory. He was a hard worker. Nobody expected him to say something like that. I heard the rumor from him, too. He'd just found a new job and was leaving People's Celebration City. Before he left, he came to the institute to say goodbye."
"Was that rumor also circulating at Mr. Lin's factory, and was Wu Ze the one who started it there, too?"
"I heard later that he was. Some people called him a traitor, but Lin Yifan didn't mind and even stuck up for him. Anyway, nobody believed the rumor."
"So when you first said Mr. Lin was pitiful, you meant his wife was ill and he'd been forced into business?"
"Yes. His wife died in 1999, and his son had died before that. I went to the funeral. He was completely numb, like there was nothing left in him. The factory was doing well right up until he died, but I could tell something was wrong. His mind wasn't on the factory anymore. He once told me he wanted to shut it down and return to the research institute. But the business kept growing, and there were more and more people working under him. He couldn't just close up shop. Finding a new owner would take time, too. From what he told me, he'd been trying to do it since 2000, but even when he killed himself, he still hadn't managed to get rid of that burden. The factory had become a burden to him by then."
"I see."
"So, he had no interest in running the business, but the factory kept progressing?"
"Yeah. If you ask me, once the factory got that big, it hardly mattered whether he was around as its owner or not. Didn't the ancient emperors sometimes stop holding court while the country carried on in peace?"
"That makes sense. Do you happen to have Wu Ze's contact information?"
"No. He didn't tell me much about his new job."
"All right. Sorry for the trouble today."
"Don't mention it."
July 4, 2010. Contact made with Wu Ze. Audio file: 06620100704.wav.
"You want to ask me about Factory Director Lin?"
"Yes. From what we've learned, you noticed something was wrong with Mr. Lin's condition at the time—or that something was wrong with the factory he'd opened?"
"You... You want to ask about that?"
"Yes. We're from Strange Tales and Oddities magazine, and we're very interested in supernatural events."
"Oh... Strange Tales and Oddities... I suppose this could indeed be considered the sort of supernatural event you're talking about."
"Could you tell us more?"
"Since you work on this magazine, have you ever met anyone who could see spirits?"
"You could see spirits?"
"I could see that sort of thing. But that was when I was a child. I grew up in the countryside, with a huge mountain right beside our village. I saw spirits and monsters in the mountains. Heh, you probably think I'm making it up, but I really did see them. It wasn't a trick of the eye. I truly saw those things."
"That's incredible. Could you still do it when you grew up?"
"No. I stopped being able to sometime after I started middle school. The last time I saw one was in my final year of elementary school. I went up the mountain to play with some village kids, and I saw a ghost in the cemetery. It was an old man from our village who'd just been buried."
"You don't seem afraid of those things."
"They never hurt me, so why should I be afraid? The ghosts on our village's mountain were all people from the village when they were alive. The villagers also left offerings for the mountain spirits and monsters. They didn't hurt anyone from our village."
"What about Mr. Lin's factory?"
"...That was when I got scared. Sigh... So many people around Factory Director Lin were dying back then. There were funerals all the time, but nobody seemed to notice. They didn't even say, 'How did someone else die?' It was as if... as if I was the only one who realized so many people had died, and that more were still dying. I was truly scared, so I found a new job and left People's Celebration City."
"Did Mr. Lin notice?"
"He did. When he attended funerals, he didn't look sad. He looked numb, and worried. Also, after I told someone what I'd noticed, Factory Director Lin came to see me. He didn't warn me not to talk about it. He just asked if I'd noticed that people around him kept dying."
"So you and Mr. Lin were the only ones who sensed something was wrong?"
"Yeah. We were the only ones who noticed. When I quit, Factory Director Lin even smiled. He... I think he wanted everyone around him to leave."
"Did you notice anything else strange besides all those deaths? Where did the rumor about the feng shui formation come from?"
"That wasn't me. I only thought the frequency of those deaths was... abnormal. The rumor about the feng shui formation might have been spread by Factory Director Lin himself."
"He wanted to drive the people in the factory away?"
"That's what I thought."
"Couldn't he shut down the factory directly?"
"The factory expanded too quickly. It wasn't just the people who worked there—lots of suppliers and retailers depended on it for their livelihoods. If he shut it down all at once, a lot of people would be left with nothing. To put it bluntly, more people might die that way. The impact would be too great."
"Did you hear about Mr. Lin's death later?"
"I saw it in the newspaper. It was pretty ironic. He died, and only then did everyone realize all his friends and relatives were dead. It was as if a ghost had blinded them. Before that, nobody noticed anything was wrong."