Old Man Xiang was all alone now, but he had once had a son.
His son had been a little simple-minded, though not completely witless. He could eat and drink, knew to run home when it rained, and greeted people he knew. He could even buy things from the shops near home without getting lost.
But that was about the extent of it.
If he bought something from a stranger by the roadside, chances were he would get swindled. Sometimes he went out with a little change in his pocket and came back with none of it left. Even in his thirties, he still often ran through the streets with the older children, a stick of stove candy in his mouth.
But Old Man Xiang truly doted on his son. He often said that his fortune-telling stall had revealed too many of Heaven's secrets.
Heaven was cruel. Rather than visiting retribution on him, it struck him where it hurt most, leaving his son simple-minded.
His son had not burdened him; he had brought this upon his precious boy. That was why he lavished even more love on him.
Yet he could not hold on to even this simple-minded son.
A mysterious fever struck. His temperature would not come down, and the boy closed his eyes and died.
Old Man Xiang wailed in anguish and spent the money he had saved for his own coffin on his son's funeral.
On the day they went to the graveyard for the burial, the white-haired father had to see off his dark-haired son. Old Man Xiang cried so hard he could barely move. Even the neighbors wept in sympathy at the sight.
His legs went weak from crying, and the funeral procession had to stop every so often to wait for him. The man overseeing the arrangements came over to persuade him.
"Surely you understand, sir? It's bad luck to keep stopping on the way to a burial! Please hold back your grief for now. Let's bury your boy first, so he can rest in peace."
It was easy enough to say, and that was indeed what needed doing, but Old Man Xiang could not help himself. He fainted from crying three more times.
Everyone was growing frantic, at a loss for what to do.
Then a bird suddenly flew over from somewhere.
Its feathers were black all over, sleek and glossy. It was a rather handsome mynah, and it fluttered down onto the coffin.
The mynah turned around, cocked its head, and hopped a few times on the coffin with fluttering wings. Then it opened its beak and spoke to Old Man Xiang, who had just regained consciousness.
It said, "Daddy, Daddy."
There were plenty of people there, and every one of them heard it clearly. That was exactly what the mynah said.
Only then did they notice that a hawk or sparrowhawk seemed to have clawed out one of its eyes. Somehow, it had escaped and landed on the coffin seeking help.
Since it could talk, it must have escaped from someone's home.
But that cry of "Daddy" went straight into the deepest recesses of Old Man Xiang's heart.
He believed his simple-minded son had returned!
"Tell me, the boy wasn't clever. How much must he have suffered on the road to the underworld, how much torment must he have endured beyond its gates, before he found his way home and came here to see me?"
Cradling the wounded, bloodied mynah, Old Man Xiang asked the funeral procession that question.
Not only the bystanders wept. Even the funeral director, who had seen more than his share of life and death, shed tears.
From then on, Mynah became Old Man Xiang's son. The old man healed his injuries and took him everywhere he went.
Now Mynah was dead.
For Old Man Xiang, it was no different from losing his son all over again.
His grief was beyond words.
The Iron Rhino had been found in the same cabin where Old Man Xiang and Meng Er had been attacked by the Fire Armored Beetles. After comforting Old Man Xiang, the others had searched it carefully as well.
Apart from another chrysanthemum emblem on the wooden wall, they found nothing else.
Cui Jiuyang did not explain that the chrysanthemum emblem implicated the Japanese. He simply thought it over in silence.
In truth, the situation was not as complicated as it seemed. Put everything together, and it amounted to this-the Japanese had sunk the ship, the Japanese had taken the Iron Rhino, and the Japanese had killed Mynah.
The Japanese were fucking rotten.
But why had they done all this...?
What did Shengdelong's shipload of white sugar have to do with them?
What did the great Iron Rhino in the Old Course of the Yellow River have to do with them?
Did those Japanese know a Malevolent Flood Dragon lay coiled inside the great Iron Rhino?
Or... had they come for that very Malevolent Flood Dragon?
Judging by the ghostly entities and the Fire Armored Beetles, the Japanese who had come here were probably occult adepts too...
The reed-leaf skiff sped along the canal, while thoughts darted like arrows through Cui Jiuyang's mind...
Whatever the case, he had to get to Lake Taibai as soon as possible.
The great Iron Rhino was in their hands now. If they awakened the Malevolent Flood Dragon, the consequences would be unimaginable!
Chapter 24: Night raid
It was already late. By the time they returned to the wharf, dusk had fallen. They had planned to go their separate ways and meet again tomorrow, but Meng Da and Meng Er stopped them.
Meng Da was extremely respectful, but his tone left no room for argument. "Before we came, Fifth Master gave us instructions. He was concerned about you having to keep traveling between your homes, the chamber of commerce, and the wharf over the next few days, so he told us to arrange rooms for you at the guildhall. Once this matter is settled, Fifth Master intends to treat you all to a proper banquet."
Before anyone could argue, the rickshaws were already waiting, ready for them to climb aboard.
Cui Jiuyang was a bachelor with no mouths to feed but his own. He thought staying at the guildhall sounded rather nice. It was bound to be much better than his rented house.
Spirit Medium Wei and Mama Liu were old enough not to mind. Their families had people to look after things without them, so they were happy to stay.
Ninth Lady was a little troubled... Although she belonged to a nuo opera troupe that traveled far and wide, and people of the martial world did not stand on so much ceremony, she was... still an unmarried maiden.
If she stayed somewhere like the chamber of commerce's guildhall... people who knew the circumstances would know she was there for work... and people who didn't would think she was there for "work" too!
It was innocent enough, but it would not sound good...
Spirit Medium Wei was a shrewd woman. Seeing Ninth Lady silently pinch the edge of her skirt, she understood at once and took the matter in hand. "Mr. Meng, could you send someone to let my family know? Tell them Ninth Lady from the nuo opera troupe and I want to rehearse together for the midyear community performance, and we need to go over our lines tonight. Ask my family to pass word to the troupe too, so the troupe master and the others won't worry. I'll take full responsibility for her."
Ninth Lady thanked Spirit Medium Wei gratefully before climbing into the rickshaw.
Old Man Xiang proved more difficult. He insisted on going home, no matter what. He wanted to find a little coffin and bury his son, Mynah.
Faced with this, Meng Da and Meng Er did not dare force him to stay. Even if it was not quite a funeral, it was at least halfway to one. Nobody would make trouble for someone arranging a burial.
But if they let him go home and word leaked out...
It would look bad if the whole city started buzzing with rumors that Shengdelong was haunted.
Still, seeing Old Man Xiang's pitiful, grief-stricken state, neither of them could find anything to say. They waved a hand and had a rickshaw take him home.
The guildhall had guest rooms on two floors.
Cui Jiuyang stayed downstairs, while Mama Liu, Spirit Medium Wei, and Ninth Lady stayed upstairs. Claiming that her old eyes could not see clearly at night, Spirit Medium Wei had Ninth Lady share her room.
Cui Jiuyang lay on the guildhall's soft, comfortable bed, his head spinning with thoughts of the Iron Rhino, the Malevolent Flood Dragon, and the chrysanthemum emblem. As they spun, he fell asleep.
At some unknown hour, a sudden clamor woke him.
He opened his eyes and lay still, but beneath the covers his fingers worked frantically through divination gestures.
Danger, but no great calamity.
The enemy comes from the south.
A friend lends aid.
He let out a long breath and got out of bed.
Even after getting up, his fingers kept calculating out of habit...
A false alarm.
Lovely as peach blossoms.
Something to be gained.
Wait...!
No, back up a little... Wasn't there a strange result just now?!
Lovely as peach blossoms... How did a romance reading get mixed in?
He hurriedly put on his underclothes and grabbed his outer robe.
Blue cloth robes really were convenient in this day and age. He could simply throw one on and button it as he headed out. He did not even need to put on trousers; the robe covered everything anyway.
He opened the door and looked up. A vicious ghost with a blue face and protruding fangs stood right in front of him, apparently about to enter his room!
Fuck!
Cui Jiuyang hastily backed away, slipping his hand into his sleeve to grip several paper talismans!
But the ghost spoke. "Look at you, scared shitless! We've got company. Grab a weapon and fight!"
With that, the ghost turned and headed down the corridor. Only then did Cui Jiuyang notice that it was holding a... fishing spear?
Thinking it over carefully, that ghost just now... seemed... seemed to be Ninth Lady wearing a nuo mask?
Why did Ninth Lady sound so... rough?
Hadn't she been quite demure during the day?
And now she was brandishing a fishing spear and brawling at night?
Was she cranky because someone had woken her up?
Then I'd better never wake up beside her...
"Oh, come on... It's the middle of the night. Why fight instead of sleeping...?" Cui Jiuyang put his talismans away.
"Telling me to grab a weapon and fight... Honestly... Your Majesty, your humble servant is a scholar." Muttering to himself, he found a feather duster in the room, picked it up, and charged out.
He rushed into the guildhall's central hall to find that Mama Liu had knocked down a man in black and was sitting on him, pinning him down as firmly as a mountain.
Meng Da and another man in black were fighting fiercely in the middle of the hall, trading blows that landed solidly on flesh.
Hearing a commotion upstairs, he looked up and saw one person running and another giving chase.
The fleeing man was an enemy whose dark stealth clothes had been torn in several places. The vicious ghost chasing him was none other than Ninth Lady.
The fishing spear danced up and down in Ninth Lady's hands, whipping through the air with a forcefulness rivaling the Six Harmonies Spear.
The man in black kicked off the upstairs railing to turn into the corridor. Unable to check her momentum, Ninth Lady struck the railing with her fishing spear.
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