The woman never intended to entertain the priest, wishing only to send him off as soon as possible. But the Taoist priest showed him a wooden chest. “I have kept in this chest a talisman that I have enchanted and sealed. You will only have to pray to it day and night, and the cloud of woe circling your house can easily be dispersed!” The Taoist priest explained. “How much for this wooden chest?” “Three hundred thousand yuan!” The woman bowed to the priest and said, “I am but a poor widow with two more mouths to feed. We do not have much money left!” “How much would you be willing to spare for this means of salvation then, ma’am?” “Well, I had given you 1,000 yuan earlier. I can spare another 2,000 yuan for the chest and your troubles; it’ll be 3,000 yuan altogether, if that’s fine with you, Master Priest.” The Taoist priest pondered quietly for a few seconds. “Very well then,” he said, “So be it, 3,000 yuan. Consider this a show of my benevolence!” With an additional 3,000 yuan in his pockets, he handed the chest to the woman and took his leave. The woman, hardly taking the encounter serious, left the box and its contents yet unknown in the second floor of an annex building at the back of her residence which was used as a storehouse and had forgotten about it.

Flash forward to the present time: it was summer and the heat of the weather had compelled both daughters of the woman—the older sister already in university while her younger sister was now in high school—to move outdoors to study. They laid a table in the garden compound and pored over their homework amid the refreshing breath of the gentle breeze. In a moment of respite, the younger sister raised her head from her book and noticed a little boy on the second floor of the annex building. Shocked and surprised, she shook her sister, urging her to look. Her sister turned, but saw nothing. The sisters began bickering about the younger daughter’s baffling glimpse of the mysterious boy at the upper floor of the storehouse and the commotion they made caused their mother to come out. After another recount of what she saw, their mother said to her, “It must have been an illusion. You have been studying too hard!” She plopped to a chair and accompanied her daughters. Moments passed and the younger daughter stole another look up at the annex building. There he was, the mysterious boy! Her hand shot upward, attracting the attention of her mother and sister. This time, all three of them saw with their own eyes the figure of a little boy upstairs of the annex building. With the blink of an eye in the next instant, he disappeared instantly! No one lived in that building; it was merely a storage unit and no one would go there. Feeling strange, the woman went to the building and searched for signs of any intruders and found nothing but dust and soot. There was hardly any signs of entry.

With a house full of only women, all three of them struggled against fear and panic, knowing that this could only be something paranormal in nature. They commissioned for another old Taoist priest who came to their house with some instruments and laid a table in their compound for a ritual. But when the priest brandished his wooden sword to begin the rites, when things suddenly turned awry: the instruments and utensils on the table began to shake as if they were in quivering with fear and the talismans flared into angry flames, engulfing the table into a ball of fiery inferno that even singed the robes of the old priest. Startled by his close brush with death, the priest fearing for his safety, fled, humiliated and defeated. Bowing his way out of the door, he mumbled as his wobbling footsteps carried him to the gates, saying that he would implore the help of his seniors as he hurriedly left.

The Taoist priest scrambled out the main gates and crashed right into another man! The young man, despite his short stature and blank expression, yanked the older man aside and continued walking calmly through the gates. He took out a calabash gourd and unstoppered it, reciting under his breath some incantations. Immediately, the fire stopped and everything stopped shaking, leaving only a smoldering mass of blackened waste. Smoke rose into the air from the pile of burnt instruments but was swiftly drew into the gourd by a strong suction. As the black fumes were drawn into the gourd, a dark strand of foul energy was also being pulled into the bottle! When everything stopped, the man returned the stopper back to the gourd, sealing it.

It was Yuan Chongxi whose timely appearance had saved the day! Saying nothing to the girls and their mother, he bolted across the garden compound towards the stairs of the annex building. At the door of the building, he pointed to the locked door and barked at the woman, “Open it!” The woman rushed forward obediently and took out her keys, hastily fumbling with the lock until the door was opened. Yuan Chongxi tore off the cap of the gourd and pointed it inwards, chanting a series of invocations and another strand of dark fume was sucked into the gourd. Yuan Chongxi sealed the gourd. He turned to the woman. “A Taoist priest had come to you with a wooden chest two years ago! Show me the chest!” The woman’s expression betrayed a hint of realization. She darted up the stairs and came back with the wooden box. Yuan Chongxi pried opened the chest with a key and found two paper figurines inside. He took out both paper figurines and tore them into shreds before promptly leaving!

Despite being able to speak and express himself freely before us, Yuan Chongxi was truly a dull and slow-witted person especially when it came to strangers! Everything from the moment of his opportune appearance to his demeanor during his attempt to subdue the ghosts and until the end turned out to be strange and, in some ways, comical! He was too straightforward a person that he wanted to leave immediately when his work was done! But the woman pulled him back, showering him with repeated words of thanks. “Thank you so much, great master! Which mountain sanctuary are you from, or what monastery do you dwell at?” With a queer and blank poker face, Yuan Chongxi replied, “I’m from the De Chang Center for Paranormal Studies. My name is Yuan Chongxi, and I’m not a Taoist priest!” The eldest of the sisters came over too, adding to her mother’s bombardment of praises, “I see! So the master’s name is Yuan! Could you be the descendant of the famous Yuan Tiangang, the renowned seer of the Tang Dynasty?” “I know nothing of that nature!” Yuan Chongxi replied, his face still deadpan although he added, “I’m neither a priest nor a master! And this gourd belongs to a brother of mine!” The younger daughter tugged at her mother’s sleeve and whispered something into her ears, and the woman immediately cried, “Oh, Heavens! We’ve forgotten to entertain our savior with tea! Please forgive our poor manners! Do join us for lunch today!” With that, the eldest daughter placed a call to make reservations…

Apparently, the eldest daughter enjoyed trying out Chinese ouija boards with her dormmates in university; she was an avid enthusiast in the supernatural and paranormal. The common impression of a medium to them was no different from the Taoist masters and priests as commonly seen in Hong Kong horror films and dramas! The impression of such figures would stray no further from middle-to-old age seniles to unsure and no-good ruffians. Yuan Chongxi’s poise and presence had completely shattered their stereotypical notion; his direct and frank methods of handling the horrific deadlock when the old priest had fled alone, and his derring-do in delivering the mother and her daughters from their fate had won their favor and had them impressed! It was a common Chinese belief that those who wielded true skill and powers were often reserved and silent; hence the three women were drawn by his enigmatic presence and grew eager to know more about him! As a pragmatic person, the mother of the daughters had never believed in matters of the supernatural, until now, and Yuan Chongxi’s appearance and prowess had impressed upon her the significance of having a man in the house. She began to appreciate that there would eventually come a day when she would need help in handling the two business of the family. Aware that Yuan Chongxi’s abilities might even help the family businesses in the future, coupled with her fondness for his honest demeanor, she nudged her daughters, hinting them to entertain him during the course of the dinner.

On the other hand, Lin Feng’s and my attempts to recollect the souls were successful and we met as promised at the restaurant. We ordered some dishes and waited for Yuan Chongxi. Lin Feng called him to check on him. “Hey, Brother. How are things at your end? Is everything all right? Do you need our help?” “Everything’s fine! I’ve collected the two children spirits!” “Do you need me to come to pick you up with the car?” “No. I’m already eating, in fact, with the family involved!” “Ah?!” One could hardly imagine the surprise when we heard this. We were waiting for him like fools when he was already being treated to a meal! What luck! “Tell him to come back early. We have two more souls here waiting for the Gourd!” I told Lin Feng. “We need to conduct a ritual to send the souls down to the Underworld to be reborn!” Lin Feng nodded his agreement and relayed what I said to Yuan Chongxi. Even when we were finished, Yuan Chongxi’s meal was still far from over. As the driver, Lin Feng could not drink while I myself was hardly a drinker; hence we settled only with a simple lunch and returned to the Center.

I spent the afternoon perusing the interrogation statements to see if we had left out anything while planning our next move.

It was late in the evening when Yuan Chongxi finally came back, and Lin Feng was earnest in bombarding him with a litany of rebukes for his lateness! As they quibbled and wrangled with one another, I quietly took the gourd from him and went off to perform the required rituals to send the souls on their way, barely following the contents of their verbal diarrhea.

As it turned out, they were both still simmering over what happened at the graveyard on the hill! They were feeling bad for having me to fend alone against two Jiangshis even though they were actually humans in disguise. As the eldest of us three, Lin Feng was the one who felt the most shame. After their short row, they came to me. “Let us spearhead the charge whenever we have anything to do in the future,” they said. “You’ll stand behind to support us. We two should work on bolstering our own courage. What say you?” “Very well!” I chirped, “In fact, we just received a job. But I was worried if you both lacked the nerve for it!” “What job is that?” Lin Feng and Yuan Chongxi both asked in unison. “There’s an abandoned brick factory in Lijiawa (Location in Hubei, China; literally, the Li Family Lagoon) that we have to go to. There was a lawsuit concerning the death of a laborer there many years ago and the investigations led to the discovery that the management of the plant was involved in shady businesses; hence the entire factory was closed down and its workforce disbanded. There is nothing there now but ruins. The furnaces and kilns have all collapsed; so are some of the hostels and other buildings there. Somehow, it was recently discovered that someone had left a coffin in the compound of the factory. No one knew if it was one of the creditors or some hooligans or gangsters with a vendetta who was responsible for leaving the casket there, but it is obvious that ill intent is meant for the owner of the factory!

Rarely does anyone venture into the wreckage of the factory buildings since it is quite some distance between it and the nearby village and the enclosed area of the rubble now teems with weed and finger-grasses. So one day, a middle-school student walked past the now-dilapidated factory complex on his way to school. The sky was yet to turn bright then, but she saw a woman in red appearing amidst the battered-down debris. She was terrified and afraid, screaming all the way home where she began telling everyone of her experiences. From then since, no one has dared to use that road. A bunch of kids, out of a spiteful rebellious streak, had crept inside to play; but all of them returned, each afflicted with a strange fever. Since then, the site of the ruins became off-limits to everyone living nearby. Superstitious villagers would use the word “Cursed” to describe the place! But we have just been commissioned to help solve the case. Going there under broad daylight would accomplish nothing but needlessly alerting anyone hiding there of our presence, assuming the entire affair was nothing but another hoax. Hence, I have decided to infiltrate the place under the cover of night. Do you have what it takes to go, the both of you?”

Somehow what I said, appeared to have stirred their courage. My two companions immediately sprang up. “Delay no more! We’ll go at once!” Their individual successes in recapturing the children souls, paired with their eagerness to salvage their pride had emboldened them, spurring them forward! The both of them set off that night, opting not to drive for they could not afford to rouse any attention. The evening sun was sinking down when they began their trek, armed with Bug-repelling Charms. Once reaching the designated spot, they realized that there were hardly any good hiding spots they could use for the surveillance. It was a good thing that the moon was hardly bright that day; they crept into the shadows of some broken walls and crouched there, using the grasses and weeds to conceal themselves, whilst immersing themselves into the nocturnal acoustics of the insects that came active at night.

Time passed at a glacial pace as they waited. But they felt no fear, although fatigue beckoned every now and then, trying to beckon them to sleep. Still, the apprehension of being bitten by mosquitos filled them with the drive to keep their eyelids open, despite how heavy they grew. The buzzing of mosquitos wafting through the air around them constantly rang in their ears, breaking the tune of the enticing lullaby that never ceased to prod.

It was close to midnight when strange sounds began to come from the coffin in the compound…