"Lemme tell ya, our Double Happiness Town is the biggest town for miles around. Look anywhere else, and all you'll see are poor little backwaters. You won't find another town as big as ours!"
A hoarse voice rasped like a brush scraping bark, chattering cheerfully beside them as wooden oars slapped the water with a steady splash.
Qi Si opened his eyes to find himself sitting on a raft. At the front stood a skinny old man in a straw rain cape and bamboo hat, laboriously rowing with a wooden oar.
The raft drifted slowly and steadily over the dark green river.
The old boatman was quite the talker. He hadn't stopped yammering the whole way. "Lemme tell ya, our town's got the best feng shui around. Water brings wealth, and wealth stays hidden. This river's got a knack for keeping things in. It lets you in, but won't let you out, so once the money comes in, not a bit of it leaks away. Ordinary folks can't come here, and they wouldn't dare even if they could!"
So this was Chinese-style horror?
Looking at the chattering old man, who was so thin he was little more than skin and bones, Qi Si suddenly felt like giving him a shove to see if he could swim.
He was only thinking about it, of course.
The black-haired young man slipped a hand into his trouser pocket and gave the old man a gentle, harmless smile. "Sir, isn't this river a little too narrow? If two boats meet, one going in and the other going out, wouldn't they get stuck?"
As he spoke, his gaze dipped to the name tag hanging around his neck. It read "Folklore Investigator"—presumably his identity in this instance.
The thick plastic sleeve around the name tag bulged