Breath Flowing, Bones Pinched, Suspicions Rising

Xu Feng said, "All right. I'll try."

His master said, "Imagine I'm a corpse with one last breath still trapped in my mouth. Draw it out for me."

"Got it!"

Xu Feng was not afraid of being tested on this move.

Throughout their journey, he had been learning the method his master had once used in the West Room to force the harmful air from the belly of the man they had brought out of the Yellow River.

It was not a skill unto itself.

According to his master, it was one part of a larger craft.

Strictly speaking, it belonged to the Depiction Method, one of the Four Methods.

In fact, it was only one part of a complete set of techniques within the Depiction Method. Xu Feng had asked about that before. He was curious, too: a corpse sewer undoubtedly needed to learn a great deal, but actually mastering so much was no simple matter.

Natural disasters, human calamities, wars without end, not to mention dangers that could not be explained and the darkness in people's hearts.

By rights, these arts should have gradually withered away, just like Incense Divination.

So how had the Four Great Skills survived to this day?

His master had not explained it then. He had only said, "You'll know someday," which was no less evasive than "You'll understand when you're older."

"Begin!"

Before Xu Feng's thoughts could wander further, his master spoke. Xu Feng positioned his hands, using his fingers as measures for his strokes, and began searching for the acupoints.

From the abdomen to the chest, then up to the throat.

He checked them against the map in his mind.

Then he acted!

"Drill," "thrust," "twist," "strike," and "smooth"—these were the hand techniques Xu Feng had learned on the road. Each place and each acupoint called for a different technique. His master's explanations had been complicated, but Xu Feng had listened closely, and now he performed them without the slightest error!

This knowledge...

If no one had told Xu Feng it was for releasing gas from a corpse,

he would have thought it was a therapeutic massage for the living!

More importantly, this attempt to smooth the breath required only three gestures: "drill," "thrust," and "smooth."

His master had taught him the others without explaining their uses, so Xu Feng had memorized them and set them aside for now, concentrating on the task at hand. The strength he put into it was astonishing—but then, the technique was meant for corpses, and corpses could not cry out in pain.

"Twist"!

His master felt the boy muster all his strength and wrench down in one motion, then follow with a "thrust" and a "smooth."

The dead had breath trapped inside them.

How could the living not?

Fortunately, the dead stayed still, while the living could move.

Xu Feng put real force into it. Sensing trouble, his master hurried two steps backward to bleed off the force, then caught Xu Feng's hand. "Enough. That fish wasn't wasted on you after all! Since you've learned it, I won't test you further.

"When we get back, I'll teach you how to feel bones."

Seeing his master's reaction, Xu Feng knew he had "yielded."

He withdrew his hand and asked, "Feel bones? Master, do we need to do that to sew corpses?"

"Of course. Bone-touching is used not only in the Depiction Method, but also in the Filling Method. The intricacies are exceedingly complicated.

"Besides, what I'll teach you is merely the Bone-Touching Method for corpses.

"And bone-touching itself?

"The world is full of extraordinary people!

"Some can feel a living person's bones to read their features, or a dead person's bones to read their remaining years in the underworld.

"Some can even feel Buddha bones, immortal bones, and ghost bones. If you have the will, and fate gives you the chance to learn one of those methods and add it to our craft, that would be a great and virtuous deed!"

Depiction and bone-touching...

Xu Feng thought for a moment, then asked, "Master, what sort of corpse would require us to both feel its bones and use the Depiction Method?"

His master said, "That brings us to the most exquisite part of our trade. You wouldn't understand if I told you now, and I know only the surface of it myself.

"Once you have a needle, you'll understand. Bone-touching and depiction, together with a medicinal bath, are what allow us to deal with a Demon Corpse!"

Even after all that, the answer still felt like scratching an itch through a boot.

But his master said no more.

Not because it was a secret, but because the time had come.

He looked at the three sticks of incense beside them and said solemnly, "All right. The incense has burned long enough. Get ready!"

He took out a thread and tied it to his little finger, then tied the other end to his disciple's middle finger.

"Come with me. I'll walk in front, and you'll follow. Nothing can go wrong this time.

"Be careful."

"Got it!"

Xu Feng could not tell exactly what his master did. He went to the three incense sticks offered to the Land God and lightly brushed their tips with a finger.

An invisible flame appeared. His master "caught" it on the red thread between them, laid his finger on the thread, and swept it along!

It was like a magician's flash paper catching fire.

In an instant, the flame raced from one end to the other. Before Xu Feng could blink, the red thread on his middle finger had vanished.

Yet as his master moved,

Xu Feng could still feel something invisible tugging at his middle finger!

The red thread could no longer be seen.

But it was not gone!

His master, meanwhile, continued the ritual.

As though plucking something from empty air, he extended a finger before himself and Xu Feng and twirled it.

He traced a loop in the air before the three sticks of incense for the Land God.

It was as though he had fastened the invisible red thread to the incense sticks.

Only then did he stop.

Xu Feng could no longer feel the thread tugging at him.

His master said, "All right, let's go. We won't have to worry about getting lost this time."

He gripped the shovel in one hand and the broken blade in the other.

Master and disciple entered the Lost-Trace Forest together.

This time, Xu Feng felt no panic. Having seen it once before, he found it quite ordinary.

That change

seemed like a necessary step toward becoming an old hand.

Elsewhere,

Qian Dayou had sent people to find the "possessed."

Four pairs, eight people. With so little time and so much to do, the Qian Family's people mounted donkeys rather than horses and set off to search.

Apart from the butcher who met the requirements and lived in town,

none of the others lived within its walls.

Looking at the sky, the Qian Family's people feared they would not make it back through the rain before nightfall and might end up in a wolf's jaws.

So, cautious as they were,

every one of them acted as though facing a formidable enemy.

None of this disturbed Mr. Zhou as he prepared his ritual. The rite he intended to perform was called the Iron Pot Food Offering. In truth, however, all it shared with the proper rite was its name.

If he had known how to perform that Ritual Ceremony, he would never have wasted his years in Luoyin County.

He placed handful after handful of rice into the pot before him. Two incense sticks burned nearby, their flames whipped about by the wind and rain blowing in from outside.

A great many footsteps sounded outside, as though people were streaming into Qian Dayou's estate.

Mr. Zhou paid them no mind.

Fa Ming came in through the door and said to his master, who was sifting rice, "Master, the rear courtyard has been covered with talismans."

Mr. Zhou nodded. "Good. As long as they're in place, there's no need to rush. Midnight is still a long way off! By then, the rain should have stopped.

"Then we'll wait for the appointed hour and watch the soldiers cut off their heads!"