The sky above the sea gradually brightened. I stared in surprise at the golden hue spreading across the horizon. Looking back toward the village, I saw that many people had disappeared. The commotion in the village stopped abruptly, and I rushed toward it in a panic.
When I arrived at Uncle Lee's house, I pushed the door open. The coffin under the floorboards was about to be closed.
"Uncle Lee, are you afraid of the sun?"
I asked, but Uncle Lee didn't answer. He simply shut the coffin. I swallowed hard and ran outside. Suddenly, my eyes widened—there was no sun at all, just darkness. But I was certain I had just seen the pale sky and the rising sun. In confusion, I hurried back to the seaside.
Now I noticed a few people still on the street. I hurried over and saw a little boy sitting dazed on the roadside.
"Hey kid, do you ever have daytime here?"
The little boy turned his head. His eyeless sockets stared at me quietly for a long while, then he shook his head.
"What is daytime?"
My eyes widened. I squatted down on the ground.
"It's when the sun comes out," I explained.
But the little boy shook his head.
"I've only heard adults talk about it, but I've never seen it. Since I was born, there's only been night."
The boy stood up and quickly ran off. I looked around—everyone wore the same lost expression. At that moment, a woman approached.
"Miss, you'll get used to it after a while. Here, the only time people find peace is when they're inside their coffins—it's like sleeping, a brief escape from consciousness. Those who don't want to sleep go swimming in the sea instead."
"Swimming?"
I looked at the woman in confusion.
"To see if they can swim out of this place."
Then I asked her about the sunrise, but she said that ever since she woke up after dying, she had never seen the sun rise. There was only night here, and they had all become living dead. Many of the children here had been born after the living dead appeared, and in just a month or two, they had also become living dead.
I felt uneasy. Although these people had betrayed John Chou, in those times, it was impossible to argue right or wrong. I didn’t fully understand the situation, but it seemed unbearably cruel for the children here.
Compared to the darkness I’d seen elsewhere, this place was even more hopeless. The people here only knew what their era allowed them to see. They knew nothing else. Though they could fish in the sea and gather wild vegetables from the mountains, eating and drinking was just a fixed habit, nothing more.
"John Chou, if you're here, answer me."
Back at the seaside, I called out again. My stomach was already growling with hunger, but I knew John Chou wasn't joking with me. I sat weakly by the shore, feeling terrible. I had to find John Chou's corpse as soon as possible—this was the only way.
I stood up, planning to check the mountain top. My stomach ached from hunger. I had eaten some grass earlier, which helped a little. When I reached the edge of the woods, I grabbed some more grass and stuffed it into my mouth, slapping my cheeks.
"What exactly does John Chou want to do!"
I couldn't understand John Chou's actions, nor the curse Uncle Lee had told me about. I had never heard of such a curse. But thinking carefully, could John Chou use curse power?
I had never seen John Chou use curse power—this I was sure of. All these years, he only used ghost energy, sometimes a little deathbane aura, but I’d never seen him use curse power. So maybe these living dead aren’t his doing after all.
The woods here were a bit different from the ones I’d seen before in this village—sparser, the ground more even. Under the moonlight, I examined the ground and saw all kinds of footprints, overlapping. I noticed people in the woods—not just one or two, but more than ten villagers. I was starting to get used to their appearance, but seeing them in the woods still made me uneasy.
I gave them an awkward wave, but no one responded. I kept heading for the mountain top. All these years, their only territory had been this island, surrounded by sea, small and unremarkable.
I continued up the mountain. A foul smell drifted on the wind. When I reached the top, I saw the same black pool from my dream, reeking of death and decay.
I looked around at the trees—willow, locust, elm, mulberry, and pear—arranged in a scattered but orderly pattern. The forest was dense. In my dream, I’d only seen a mass of dark shapes, but now, looking closely, I realized all the trees here were the five major types of yin trees.
Which meant there wasn’t a trace of yang energy here. I didn’t know what such a place would produce, but I did know that this was an extremely yin place. Strangely, I couldn’t sense any ghost energy—just death energy floating on the lake’s surface.
I glanced back at the island. Oddly, there was a ring of vitality around the village’s edge, and plenty of vitality in the woods, but this place was thick with death energy. The eastern cove also had a ring of vitality.
What puzzled me most was that there were many spots in the woods full of vitality, some clustered together in my mind.
Vitality and death energy are like yin and yang—if death energy outweighs vitality, the vitality gets swallowed and turned into death energy. If vitality is stronger, it can purify death energy. But here, the amount of both seems equal, forming a giant cycle.
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I pinched my nose, unable to stand the stench from the dead pool. Looking at the pitch-black water, I thought John Chou's corpse must be down there. But what about the corpse I saw when I first came to the island—what was it, and what was that skeleton?
Now I was sure—John Chou was lying. He must have a reason for it. And that skeleton I fought for four days definitely wasn’t his body.
The more I looked, the more this place seemed like some kind of formation. John Chou wanted me to find his body, but the only clue was the dead pool behind me. I glanced again at the dark water, then shook my head.
"Impossible."
I would never jump in. First, I couldn’t accept it mentally. Second, I was just a woman.
Although I couldn’t jump in, I had an idea. I planned to find some rope in the village and make a long pole out of branches. First, I’d test the depth of the pool, then try some techniques—ideally, I’d use paper spirits. With my mind made up, I went down the mountain. My hunger had eased a bit, but I needed to find John Chou’s body before I was too weak to move. He’d made it clear he couldn’t come to this world himself.
After more than an hour, I made a pole over ten meters long, tied securely with rope. I returned to the mountain. Some villagers wandering nearby gathered around, watching me as if I was about to fish out a corpse. They didn’t stop me, just came to the lakeside to watch.
I held the long pole and pushed it into the water—almost ten meters long. I stirred the water at the edge, quickly reaching the center, about four meters deep. Not very deep. I began probing along the shore, but the bottom was all soft mud, not even a stone. I searched carefully.
Next, I found some paper and decided to fold some frogs. They might be ruined in the water, but this time I planned to infuse them with my vitality.
After folding more than ten frogs, I bit my finger and smeared blood on the paper frogs. With a thought, a crimson flame ignited in my hand. Exclamations rose around me as I began infusing the paper frogs with fire.
Under my will, the paper frogs came alive, jumping around me. The paper grew larger, the frogs reaching half a meter, their surfaces patterned like flames.
"Go!"
With a wave, the frogs plopped into the dead pool, diving in easily. I closed my eyes, sensing the bottom—over ten frogs, still swimming, not wet at all.
There was nothing at the bottom. When the frogs ran out of yang energy, they disappeared, turning back into paper and floating to the surface. Soon, I couldn’t sense anything.
Looking at my bleeding finger, I gritted my teeth and grabbed some paper. This time I planned to cut out fish—the more, the better.
Soon, dozens of fish jumped into the water, searching everywhere. This time it was a thorough sweep, but there was nothing like a corpse at the bottom. I could only direct hundreds of fish to burrow into the mud, hoping to find something.
"Miss, what are you doing?"
I noticed a crowd coming up from the foot of the mountain, led by Uncle Lee. He stared at me stiffly.
"I'm investigating, Uncle Lee. Maybe I can do something—maybe I can help you all find relief."
As I spoke, Uncle Lee came over and suddenly grabbed my wrist like a pair of pliers.
"Don’t do anything. Just live here in peace!"
As he spoke, I was dragged straight down the mountain, surrounded by the living dead.
"Wait, Uncle Lee!"