Chapter 216: A Mountain Suspended, A River Submerged (30)
In the dark mountains, there was no moonlight to illuminate the area. Dense, black clouds covered the sky, as if the heavens themselves were blind to the world below, unable to gaze upon the land.
Nanming Mountain’s terrain was treacherous, with steep peaks that seemed to pierce the sky, their imposing, silent forms blocking out everything from the outside, acting as an unbreachable barrier.
The continuous mountain ranges around it only added to the isolation, making the village in the mountains feel like a secluded world, untouched by the intrusion of humans or spirits.
In such a dangerous place, if a master of feng shui were to stand atop a peak and look down, they would be shocked to realize that this was a boundary where the realms of life and death intersected.
It was the very reason for the chaotic magnetic fields in this area.
Long ago, people didn’t know where the boundaries of the universe lay. The limits of their technology prevented them from uncovering the truth, so they claimed that the heavens were round and the earth square, with ends that marked the boundary of everything.
As for the concept of yin and yang, people once believed that even within the mortal realm, there were places where the two realms met.
In legends, it was said that at each change of the seasons, when the twenty-eight constellations rotated and the gods exchanged duties, a momentary rift would occur. During this time, the realms of heaven and earth were at their most vulnerable, without protection.
If someone happened to be at the boundary of yin and yang at this moment, they could cross over from the land of the living into the realm of the dead.
And conversely, the souls from the underworld could return to the world of the living.
Life and death, in that moment, would become a confusing, chaotic mess.
However, this legend had been passed down for so long that the original source had been lost. Over time, it had been embellished and distorted until its true meaning was nearly unrecognizable.
Many, even upon hearing the tale, merely dismissed it as a story told by a traveling storyteller, something to laugh at and forget.
But many sects that still held ancient traditions knew that this legend originated from the southern regions, from the vast mountains.
And the boundary between life and death was indeed located among the towering mountains.
It was said that some people, some villages, still guarded this boundary, like settlements that once protected the borders of an empire.
But no one had ever actually seen such a village. It was often assumed to be a myth, a product of the legend becoming more elaborate over time, with no truth to it.
And in that, there was some truth.
What purpose would a village, with just one or two survivors, serve in guarding anything?
Nan Tian felt himself sinking into darkness, where all the images of small wooden cottages, rotting corpses, coffins, and his grandma faded away into the distance.
When he forced himself to open his eyes again, he found himself standing outside Grandma Nan’s house, as if transported to many years ago.
When he finally recognized his surroundings, Nan Tian’s heart skipped a beat—this was the nightmare that had haunted him for years, now returning.
But he quickly realized that this time, it felt different from the nightmares he remembered.
He was no longer a child, and he didn’t hold any food in his hands.
Instead, he was now an adult, standing there with a bunch of yellow chrysanthemums in his hand.
Suddenly, Nan Tian recalled the white chrysanthemums he had seen atop Yan Shixun’s coffin before he lost consciousness. He shuddered and immediately threw the flowers away.
But in the blink of an eye, the yellow chrysanthemums had returned to his hand.
Nan Tian stared at the chrysanthemums in horror, instinctively trying to run toward Grandma Nan’s house.
In his mind, if he could just lock himself inside the house, he would be safe.
However, when he turned around, he found that his legs wouldn’t move.
Inside the open courtyard, standing like an army, were countless rotting corpses.
Their bodies appeared to have been submerged in water for a long time, swollen like a massive, bloated corpse. Beneath their translucent, sickly skin, Nan Tian could make out the moving, yellowish pus and blood, separated from the bones.
The corpses still wore the tattered remains of clothes that had decayed over time, looking nothing like the style of the outside world, but more like the attire from Nan Tian’s village.
Their bloated, decayed faces were barely recognizable, but their bright red eyes fixed on him, unblinking.
Nan Tian nearly vomited at the sight, the revolting sensation rising in his throat.
He suddenly realized that this must be a dream—if it weren’t, he would have already thrown up.
As Nan Tian stared into the eyes of the corpses, the once unmoving bodies seemed to respond to some unseen signal. Slowly, their eyes lifted, the red pupils burning with resentment as they focused on Nan Tian.
It was as though they were asking:
Why? Why did you survive when we all perished here?
Why? Why should you live while we remain trapped here forever? Come, become like us. Let all the people from our village remain together forever.
The corpses extended their arms stiffly, their legs dragging as they shuffled toward him.
The stench of rot and dampness mixed in the air, overwhelming Nan Tian’s senses.
The acrid, pungent smell shot to the top of his head, and only then did he realize the severity of the situation. He immediately turned and started running.
However, it wasn’t just his family’s courtyard that was filled with corpses.
As he sprinted past the other houses along the village road, the smell of the living seemed to disturb the restless souls, and the corpses began staggering out of every courtyard, their arms reaching out in pursuit, wanting to catch him.
The swollen corpses in front of them hindered their movements.
Among the dense crowd of rotting corpses, a few were knocked over or tripped on the ground. The mindless corpses behind them kept moving forward, stepping right on the fallen ones.
“Pop!” A sound echoed.
Blood and flesh splattered everywhere.
When Nan Tian heard the noise and instinctively turned around, he watched in horror as the swollen mass of flesh burst open, with blood and meat splattering in all directions. The original corpse quickly transformed into a piece of human skin, shriveled and lying in the pool of blood.
However, the intense visual shock also caused Nan Tian’s long-forgotten memories to resurface. He suddenly recognized the face on the piece of human skin.
It was the face of a neighbor who had died when he was young.
Nan Tian’s pupils constricted.
He suddenly realized that if this corpse was indeed his neighbor from years ago, then were the other corpses also people who had died in the village many years ago?
That year was the “Ghost Year,” when many people had died in the village… Could it be that all those who passed away had now, years later, re-entered his dreams?
Nan Tian’s mind was a mess. His steps slowed down, his thoughts distracted as he kept glancing behind him.
But as Nan Tian slowed down, the corpses chasing him from each household along the way never ceased their pursuit.
By the time Nan Tian realized the danger and snapped back to his senses, he was horrified to find that a corpse had already caught up to him!
He watched in terror as the decaying, grotesque hand reached out toward him, the stench of rot growing stronger. Though his heart raced with urgency, the corpse blocked his path, making it impossible for him to speed up.
Nan Tian felt a deep sense of despair and desolation. As the corpse got closer, almost pressing against his face, he couldn’t help but wonder if he would really be killed by these things, and what would happen to him after he died in the dream? Would he turn into one of these grotesque beings?
Just then, Nan Tian heard a loud shout from behind him.
“Get away!”
The voice was old but filled with an incredible force, causing the corpses surrounding Nan Tian to scatter in fear, looking back over their shoulders toward the source of the sound. They then all turned and headed back to the courtyard they had come from.
For a moment, Nan Tian stood alone on the empty village road, still in disbelief, unable to process what had just happened.
If it weren’t for the remains of blood and flesh on the dirt road from the exploded corpses, Nan Tian might have even doubted whether everything had truly happened.
Who… had helped him?
Nan Tian turned around in a daze, and when he saw the person who had been standing behind him, his eyes slowly widened.
A hunched old woman stood at the end of the village road, hands clasped behind her back. Her wrinkled face was stern, fierce enough to exterminate evil spirits.
A light breeze lifted the white hair at her temples, gently blowing it into the air.
The image of the old woman gradually overlapped with Nan Tian’s memories.
Though she was much older than he remembered, looking like she had been stripped of all vitality, Nan Tian still recognized her. She was his beloved Grandma Nan, whom he had longed for but hadn’t seen in his dreams for decades.
“Grandma!” Nan Tian shouted with joy, running toward her.
He stretched out his arms, eager to embrace her.
But to his surprise, Grandma Nan’s stern face didn’t soften at all when she saw him. Instead, it revealed anger.
“What are you doing back here?”
Grandma Nan asked sharply, “Didn’t I tell you, once you leave Nan Village, you should never come back!”
Nan Tian was stunned. “Grandma…”
He wanted to explain that it wasn’t intentional, that he had never been able to enter Nanming Mountain.
If it weren’t for Director Zhang Wubing, he might have never returned.
He wanted to say how much he missed her, how after all these years, he hadn’t dreamed of her, and how even her voice and face were starting to fade from his memory.
There was so much he wanted to say.
It was like a child returning home after a long journey, all the strength he had been holding in crumbling into tears as he wanted to be comforted by an elder.
Seeing Nan Tian like this, Grandma Nan was momentarily moved, her eyes growing misty.
She moved her lips, trembling, as if wanting to say something. Her hand, which had been behind her back, reached out, as if to touch the grown-up child, to have one last look at the child who hadn’t grown up by her side.
But then, Grandma Nan seemed to think of something.
Her brows furrowed sharply, and the hand that had reached out didn’t meet Nan Tian’s embrace. Instead, she slapped him hard on the chest.
“Wake up!”
Grandma Nan spoke harshly. “Look where you are! Crying like a baby when you’re about to die!”
The slap was merciless, sending Nan Tian flying, landing at the intersection of three roads.
He stared in shock, his eyes wide, watching as Grandma Nan grew further and further away from him.
The next moment, Nan Tian suddenly snapped his eyes open.
He gasped for air desperately, his heart pounding so violently it felt as though it might leap out of his chest.
Before he could fully collect himself, he suddenly noticed that the spot on his chest where Grandma Nan had slapped him in his dream was burning painfully, making him grit his teeth in agony.
It felt like a piece of red-hot coal had been pressed against his chest.
Nan Tian didn’t even have time to assess his surroundings before quickly reaching into his shirt to grab something from his chest.
Then, he held up a glowing object in his hand.
Narrowing his eyes, Nan Tian realized it was a piece of folk fabric.
As his mind slowly pulled away from the nightmare, he quickly recognized this as the life-saving item Yan Shixun had given him.
With the help of this glowing object, Nan Tian could finally see where he was.
It was cramped, dark, and damp.
The ceiling was above him, the ground beneath him, and everywhere he reached, there were wooden planks around him.
He was… in a coffin.
The coffin swayed as though someone was carrying it on their shoulders, and the chilling mountain breeze seeped through the wooden planks, chilling the coffin’s interior to a temperature like that of a freezer.
Nan Tian forced himself to steady his racing heartbeat, listening carefully. Outside the coffin, the mountain wind howled, wailing like a pack of ghosts, echoing through the air.
On the steep mountain peak, there was only one narrow path leading away from the mountain, winding upward along the rock face.
Beyond the path, a bottomless abyss stretched out, and occasionally, stones would fall and tumble down the cliff, but there was no sound of them hitting the bottom.
The path was so narrow, barely wide enough for one person to pass.
The dirt road, worn down by footsteps, was full of pits and flaws, making one worry that if they weren’t careful, they would step wrong and fall off the cliff.
Yet, despite the narrowness of the path, there was a pale white light slowly moving forward.
The white light gathered into a long trail, stretching endlessly along the mountain path.
Each villager held a lantern.
Their faces were stiff and slow, their expressions vacant, not resembling living people at all.
With one hand gripping the lantern, the other was used to hold the heavy burden slung over their shoulder.
Each pair of villagers had a coffin resting on their shoulders.
They moved in silence, their movements mechanical, following the leader in front of them. The long line stretched out so far it seemed to have no end.
At the very front, a silver-white robe dragged along the ground, glowing with a light as bright as moonlight under the pale lanterns.
Ritual Master’s hands were crossed in front of him, his face wearing a calm smile, but his eyes sparkled with barely contained excitement.
It was as if the task they were about to complete was his lifelong dream.
…….
Yan Shixun remembered clearly, standing off against Ritual Master, trying to save Nan Tian, but helplessly watching as Nan Tian was shoved into the coffin.
When he regained consciousness, he suddenly flipped over and sat up, instinctively getting into a defensive stance, remembering that he had to save Nan Tian.
However, a soft voice came from beside him.
“Big brother?”
Yan Shixun turned towards the sound.
To his shock, a child was staring up at him, looking confused.
And that face… it looked almost identical to a younger version of Nan Tian.
Yan Shixun’s pupils contracted.
He quickly looked around, surprised to find that he was no longer outside the village chief’s small wooden cottage in Longevity Village. There were no corpses or Ritual Master around him.
Instead, he found himself in an ordinary residential home, with everyday items hanging on the walls, and the air was filled with a strong sense of life.
The environment was peaceful and quiet, with the blazing sunlight filtering in, and the faint sound of cicadas singing in the summer.
It felt as though he had simply had a nightmare, and everything that had happened earlier was just a scene from that dream, a false vision.
Only what he was seeing now was real.
Yan Shixun closed his eyes, then opened them again. The confusion in his eyes had been replaced with a firm resolve.
He lowered his gaze and asked the child next to him, “Where is this place?”
The child blinked and said, “This is Nan Village.”
“Big brother, don’t you remember? I’m Nan Tian.”
Yan Shixun whispered, repeating the child’s name.
He knew Nan Tian.
But, it shouldn’t have been this one.
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