"No matter how we burned those spirit tablets, they wouldn't catch fire. In fact, the more we burned them, the more water seeped out!"
"Everyone said it was because Mo Li had dragged everyone who killed her into the well, turning them all into water ghosts. Water ghosts couldn't be burned to death. They could only be thrown back into the water."
"But there was a terrible drought that year, and that well was the only place with any water left, so everyone threw their spirit tablets into it."
"But the people in the village who were doomed to die kept dying. Everyone was dying!"
"One after another!"
"The village chief was terrified, so he invited the old hag back again. This time, she said Mo Li had become the Dragon King's child bride, and as a deity, she needed a temple where people could worship her. Her spirit tablet also had to be placed above those of everyone in the Huang Household. Even the deity's mother had to have her name cleared and her place restored in the family genealogy!"
"But the ridiculous thing was, just as the village's temple was completed, the old hag died too! She'd only taken a single mouthful of well water to spray over willow leaves as she consecrated the temple!"
"It turned out that what had been killing people all along wasn't a vengeful spirit. It was the water!"
"The water that Mo Li's corpse had been soaking in. That water became water steeped in resentment, poisoned water. Everyone in the village who drank it eventually died!"
"Only I couldn't die, no matter what. After all these years, I reckon Mo Li hates me. She hates her father for not saving her back then, for letting her die at the hands of those