In the rainy season in Zhouzhuang, a water town, the carved door panels of Shen's Embroidery Workshop ooze dark red. Tang Ren walks over the green board with an oil-paper umbrella, and the tip of the umbrella touches something soft - a dragon-and-phoenix jacket swollen by rain, with twin lotus flowers embroidered with gold thread stained with brown spots.
"This, this is the color of oxidized human blood!" Qin Feng's glasses misted up as he squatted. Su Chen lifted the corner of his jacket with tweezers, and the inner lining was embroidered with small characters in the style of a fly head: "A treacherous person has a red string wrapped around his neck; a heartless man has a silver needle piercing his heart."
Suddenly, the sound of a loom was heard from the top floor of the embroidery workshop. When the three rushed over, they saw only the empty embroidery frame shaking on its own. Tang Ren kicked over the embroidery cushion, and half a top needle with black silk entangled rolled out. The inside of the needle hoop was engraved with "Shen Yue'e, the 23rd year of the Republic of China".
"Yue'e is the great grandmother of the Shen family!" The mayor, who rushed over upon hearing the news, shuddered, "She hanged herself in the embroidery building on her wedding night, and later this house..."
There was a loud thunder outside the window, and the faded paper-cut of the word "happiness" fluttered in the wind like a spirit-calling flag.
--
The night rain knocked on the boat awning, Tang Ren huddled in the black-awned boat and ate some water chestnut cake. Qin Feng's hand, flipping through the Zhenzhi, suddenly stopped: "In 1934, the Shenjia Embroidery Workshop murder case, the groom disappeared, the bride tied herself up, and the ten embroidery screens of "Ten Hairpins of Jinling" that came with the dowry disappeared."
The old boatman at the bow suddenly spoke: "The moon picked up a floating corpse, holding a half-embroidered handkerchief in her hand." In the dim lantern, the pale handkerchief revealed a half-line of poetry: "A strand of fragrant soul is scattered by the wind." Su Chen moistened the corner of the handkerchief with tea, revealing dark patterns - it was the unique double-sided different-color embroidery technique of the Shen family.
"Dock!" Qin Feng suddenly pointed to the riverside building. A finished wedding dress was floating in the window, with silver needles arranged in the shape of a Big Dipper on the cuffs, and the needle tips were stained with fresh blood.
---
The dilapidated Kunqu opera stage was covered with dead leaves. Tang Ren stepped on a loose floor tile. Inside the tile was a dried black cat corpse curled up in a pottery jar, with a faded red ribbon tied around its neck. The ribbon was stained with ink: "Those who betray me will be doomed forever."
"This is a sacrifice for a ghost marriage!" The town chief tapped the ground with his walking stick, "Shen Yue'e's ghost is still lingering, and a replacement must be found every thirty years..." Qin Feng suddenly opened the stage curtain, revealing the densely packed marks on the back - all of them were counted with the word "positive", and the latest one was covered with sawdust.
Su Chen discovered something fishy in the beams: "The mortise and tenon structure has been altered, the stage is a sound-amplifying coffin!" Tang Ren kicked the secret compartment, and out rolled a rusty bronze key with a cross-necked bird carved on the handle.
There were cries of mourning in the distance, and a funeral procession carrying a paper-decorated sedan chair passed through the rain.
---
When Tang Ren found the ancestral tomb of the Shen family following the paper money, his cloth shoes sank into the mud. In front of the newly erected tombstone without words stood a pair of cracked dragon and phoenix candles, with nail fragments mixed in the wax. Qin Feng used a key to open the secret compartment of the tombstone and pulled out a blood-soaked hemp rope - the rope knotting method was exactly the same as the one used to embroider the hanging beams of the building.
"The tomb is empty!" Su Chen knocked on the base of the tombstone, "behind the scenes is a brick-built secret room." When the three men reached the cellar, Tang Ren knocked over a pottery urn, and out of the ashes rolled a pair of gold-inlaid jade earrings - exactly the same as the ones Shen Yue'e wore in her posthumous photo.
In the middle of the dark room stood a gilded lacquer coffin, with seven mahogany nails nailed to the coffin lid. Qin Feng counted the scratches on the coffin: "There's a living thing inside!" The sudden scratching sound extinguished the oil lamp, and Tang Ren's scream startled the night owl.
---
When the flashlight illuminated the coffin, everyone gasped - the embroiderer A-Bi, who had been missing for half a year, lay in the coffin with her eyes closed, her hands folded and pressing a yellowed book. When Tang Ren sniffed, she suddenly grabbed his wrist and said, "Embroidered souls... must collect ten..."
Su Chen flipped open the book and found it was Shen Yue'e's embroidery diary. The last page was written in blood: "The treacherous man turned into a son of the Zhao family, and he must pay for his life in the cycle of sixty years!" Qin Feng suddenly remembered that the Zhao clan ancestral hall in Zhen was preparing for a grand sacrifice held every thirty years.
Suddenly, flames shot up into the sky from the direction of the ancestral hall, and the smell of burning was mixed with sandalwood.
---
Tang Ren kicked open the side door of the Zhao Family Ancestral Hall and was choked to tears by the thick smoke. On the altar lay the unconscious eldest grandson of the Zhao Family, with embroidered red silk wrapped around his neck. From the beams hung ten torn embroidered screens, each missing a beautiful woman's face.
"Behind the screen!" Su Chen waved away the smoke. A white-haired old woman was curled up in the hole in the wall, piercing her fingertips with a silver needle and dripping blood on the embroidery. The mayor exclaimed: "Grandma Shen? She died ten years ago!"
Qin Feng snatched the embroidery, and the white silk was the face of the young master of the Zhao family. The old lady laughed madly: "Miss Yue'e is looking for a groom..." Suddenly she threw out an embroidery needle, and the red string at the end of the needle was tied with a jade ring - the same one worn by the missing groom that year.
---
When the rainstorm destroyed the foundation of the Shen family's embroidery building, the buried altar was exposed. Nine pottery urns surrounded the bronze mirror, each containing a male corpse, with clothes from different eras. Su Chen pulled out the latest one: "It's the tailor Lao Chen from the town!"
Qin Feng found a layer on the back of the mirror and took out a marriage certificate - Shen Yue'e and Zhao's young master's names were listed side by side, but the date was 2014. Tang Ren suddenly pointed at the mirror: "This bronze mirror can't reflect grandma!"
Lightning struck the ancient locust tree, splitting it open to reveal a hollow hole. The corpse of Grandma Shen sat in the tree, holding the intact "Ten Hairpins of Jinling" embroidery screen in her hands. The faces of the ten beauties were exactly the eyes and eyebrows of the man who had been missing in Zhen for many years.
"She sewed herself into the thirteenth person." Qin Feng opened the corpse's collar, and inside was densely sewed with townspeople's pictures. The old mayor sat paralyzed on the ground: "It turns out that these years, it was the living who arranged ghost marriages for the dead..."
When the morning mist dissipated, the blue board was left with traces of blood, winding like an unbroken red thread. Su Chen found half a top needle in the ruins of the embroidery workshop, with a line of small characters newly engraved on the inside: "Outside the city of Suzhou, the cold bells are ringing."
(The case ended in a folk tragedy, with new clues pointing to an ancient temple in Suzhou.)