Chapter 80, "Half-Opening the Door to the Way," reveals its core essence.
The excavated burial site resembled a torn rift, slowly releasing impure air that was not visible to the naked eye.
Hearing the wind and knowing the fragrance, yet being blind, seeing only the shadows and not the light, one can naturally see a thin, transparent, half-open door faintly appearing and disappearing in the rising turbid air. Because the turbid air is narrow and not high, one can only glimpse a corner, somewhat similar to a mirage in the fog.
Door openings are commonly seen in tomb chambers, ancestral halls, and stone gate paintings.
A half-open door is a door that is half open and half closed, and some are carved with a man or woman leaning out from inside.
Bai Yuan clearly also noticed the half-open door amidst the murky air: "What a joke, could there be a tomb in a place like this?"
Generally speaking, only people of high status and wealth would build mausoleums and tombs. However, such people would never place their tombs in such inauspicious places as mass graves, as it would not only disturb their own souls but also be extremely detrimental to their descendants. Unless some wicked geomancer had malicious intentions and kept the tomb owner and his/her family in the dark.
Without knowing the truth, we cannot draw any conclusions.
"This tomb is no ordinary one; it's enclosed within a sacred site." If the constables hadn't accidentally dug it up onto the foundation of the formation, causing the ominous energy to leak out and rise, they wouldn't have been able to discover this opening in the mass grave.
"What kind of Taoist temple? Yin Sui?" Bai Yuan strode straight toward the unclear doorway, saying as he walked, "This is the tomb entrance? I want to see which wealthy and powerful woman is recruiting husbands every night, and how many underground tomb chambers she's dug, and whether they can all fit in."
They'll carry any old, crooked, or deformed person into the graveyard whenever they get the chance to cause trouble. They're like people who've been starving for so long they'll eat anything, even excrement, without any discrimination.
Zhou Yaren didn't expect her to say "wait, be careful..."
With Yin Sui here, she would brave any danger, let alone a mere tomb. Bai Yuan never hesitated: "If you have any concerns, just wait outside."
After saying that, he disappeared into the half-open door.
Zhou Yaren didn't finish her sentence. Never mind, she's incredibly audacious and seems to have no idea how to avoid danger and act cautiously.
Seeing that Bai Yuan was not delayed at all, Zhou Yaren could only hurriedly say thank you to Liang Youyi, and told him that it was not advisable to stay here for long, before following Bai Yuan into the gate.
Liang Youyi was dumbfounded. With his ordinary eyes, he could not possibly see the door open. He only saw Bai Yuan stepping on the grave pit. Logically, he should have stepped into the pit and fallen in, but the other party had vanished into thin air.
Liang Youyi listened to the conversation between the two men with only a vague understanding, and then witnessed them disappear into thin air one after the other. In his surprise, he immediately thought of the men from Fengkou Village who were carried into the mass grave. Were they really all dead?
The answer was unknown. Liang Youyi's heart was clenched tightly by a large hand. He seemed unsteady on his feet and staggered towards the void where the two had disappeared.
The half-open door led to complete darkness, so dark you couldn't see your hand in front of your face; you might bump into a wall or a ghost at any moment.
The air was filled with a stale and foul smell of blood. Bai Yuan lit a talisman lamp, and the area illuminated by the light was empty, beyond which lay impenetrable darkness.
This place is no ordinary tomb passage. Bai Yuan walked forward unhurriedly, and in the middle of the road stood a man dressed in a bright red wedding robe.
The man was less than seven feet tall and had a slightly stocky build. He stood motionless with his back to Bai Yuan.
She took the lantern and stepped forward silently, moving to face the man. His face, which resembled a vengeful ghost, looked as if it had been covered with half a pound of lead powder, deathly white, with bluish-black veins covering his face and neck like a spider web. His open eyes were completely corroded and blackened by resentment—it seemed that this was the son-in-law summoned by the woman of sorrow. Obviously, this man was no longer alive at all.
As Bai Yuan was observing, a chilling aura suddenly rushed towards her from the side. Without dodging or flinching, she grabbed the attacking evil spirit with her bare hand—hmm, so light.
Without even looking, one could guess what it was by its feel. Bai Yuan glanced at it sideways, then gently hooked a blade of grass with her finger. As if hitting a vital spot, a shrill scream rang out, and the Chuling dressed as a bride was instantly torn apart, turning into a pile of broken grass.
Bai Yuan continued forward, passing two grooms whose deaths were identical, and casually dismembered two straw spirits along the way.
As one ominous aura after another swept over him, the last breath of death that he could not swallow was silent yet seemed to scream desperately, and Bai Yuan could not help but turn a blind eye to it.
There is a Yinsui Town in this place, and the souls of the dead buried in the mass graves are incorporated into the Taoist temple, including those women who died young.
They died young and were buried on a barren hillside. Due to the local custom of ghost marriage, they were arranged by their parents and married through a matchmaker. Although their remains were taken away and buried in their husbands' homes, their souls were trapped there.
Unexpectedly, a crack appeared in the seemingly impenetrable temple, becoming the only breakthrough. Thus, the women who had been forced into marriages began to "follow the rules," causing trouble and fulfilling this custom that had been passed down for hundreds of years.
With the betrothal gifts of the deceased woman tucked into her bosom, Zhou Yaren stepped through the gate and once again heard the singing voice from the underworld: "...The wedding procession is lively, the newlyweds laugh, our love is deep, we have never betrayed each other... I am fortunate to have met my beloved, my beloved, my beloved... I am alone in the dark spring, so lonely..."
It's never going to end.
The adorned red and colorful spirits appeared in the darkness and arrived in a few flashes.
Before Zhou Yaren could get close, the wind blade mercilessly cleaved the straw figure in two. A short while later, a row of eight or nine "brides" wearing veils blocked his path.
At first glance, it seems to be a place where one can choose any concubine, but since all the concubines have come to claim their lives, it's impossible for Zhou Yaren to marry a woman named Mao Niang.
He didn't immediately throw away the unlucky "bride price" or strip off the ostentatious wedding clothes, also in order to use himself as bait.
The wind blades swept out suddenly, and a row of eight or nine "brides" were suddenly lifted several feet into the air. The wind blades missed their target, and the "brides" surrounded and besieged them from all directions.
The beast was nothing more than a lingering remnant of its malevolent energy, which dissipated easily and posed no real threat.
Zhou Yaren was about to react when the "brides" suddenly leaped over him and headed behind him.
Liang Youyi carried a tinderbox with him. In the dim light, he bumped into a group of brides in wedding dresses and veils. The scene was terrifying. Liang Youyi's eyes widened in horror, and he stumbled backward, only to be knocked to the ground by the fierce brides. Then, a suffocating feeling suddenly overwhelmed him, as if his throat had been gripped and his breath taken away.
Several wind blades came one after another, decapitating people with a snap. One of the heads, a straw man wrapped in a veil, rolled to Liang Youyi's feet, scaring him out of his wits and causing him to break out in a cold sweat.
Amidst his fear, another thought immediately flashed through Liang Youyi's mind: "Peach... Peach blossom?"
Zhou Yaren caught the tremor in his voice and, fearing he might be getting carried away, said, "It's just a straw spirit, a straw mat made by the villagers using grass stems, not a peach blossom."
Liang Youyi looked up and was so shocked by what he saw that he almost cried out.
Zhou Yaren, dressed in red, had a handsome face, but she stood opposite another villager dressed in wedding attire, whose face was deathly pale, covered with black veins, and looked like a zombie.
Of course, Liang Youyi had seen this villager before. He remembered every face in Fengkou Village, even the number of moles on someone's face.
Whether it was excitement or fear, or perhaps both, Liang Youyi stammered, "Is he... is he dead?"
Zhou Yaren had actually anticipated this; the villagers carried away by the grieving woman were likely in grave danger: "They're dead."
"Good riddance, good riddance, he deserved to die, he deserved to die."
Zhou Yaren then turned to him and said, "This is not a place for you."
“I want to come in and see, I want to see if these evil people have received their retribution.” Liang Youyi stood up and walked in with heavy steps.
At this moment, the corpses of the despised did not horrify him at all; on the contrary, they brought him great satisfaction.
Zhou Yaren, of course, understood a father's deep-seated hatred: "This place is dangerous. From now on, you must stay with me every step of the way."
Zhou Yaren lit a talisman lamp to guide Liang Youyi.
Along the way, he inevitably encountered those dead villagers. Liang Youyi counted them one by one, recognizing each one. However, he encountered an unfamiliar face along the way. This person was not a villager from Fengkou Village.
Bai Yuan, carrying a lantern, passed by and briefly paused before this familiar face—both had encountered a tragic woman seeking a husband, but the coachman was clearly not as lucky as Doctor Ding.
Even though he was used to seeing life and death, Bai Yuan still felt that he shouldn't have died here.
Passing through the darkness of the corpses, we arrived at the mass grave in the wilderness.
Bai Yuan hesitated for a moment, almost doubting that she had already left the tomb. Then, when she turned her head, she saw Zhou Yaren and Liang Youyi walking together.
These two were just guarding outside the gate, weren't they? Bai Yuan raised an eyebrow: "I'm coming out?"
If Zhou Yaren weren't blind, she would probably be just as confused as she was, since passing through that half-open door only led her to a mass grave.
It was as if he had been caught up in the Taiyin Dao Body in Beiqu, where a ghost government office was still buried. At that time, Lu Bing and the others mistakenly thought they had returned to the ghost government office in Beiqu.
The Dao body is a replica of real-world terrain and architecture.
Bai Yuan quickly realized that the so-called tomb was just this mass grave.
Zhou Yaren was certain that he had entered the Yin Sui Dao Body because the blind master opened his Yin Eyes by passing through the half-open door and saw everything before him.
Amidst the pervasive stench of decay and blood, Zhou Yaren stood before a high earthen mound.
If Bai Yuan remembers correctly, these ubiquitous mounds and high platforms are just ordinary hills and mounds in the Qin and Jin regions, on which countless skeletons and graves of all sizes are buried.
But in the mound in front of us, rows and rows of human skulls are densely embedded.
A chill seeped into Zhou Yaren's skin and bones, forcing him to feel a strong sense of fear: "A mound of bones..."
In ancient times, when people killed bandits and displayed their corpses in victory, they would build a mound of corpses to bury them.
They never imagined that the mass grave would actually be a mound of corpses.
They already knew that this place was an ancient battlefield, and that the soldiers who died in battle had their bodies piled up in layers of soil and corpses to form mounds, covered with soil and sealed with mud, becoming unremarkable earthen mounds that blended into the terrain of the mountains and hills, making them difficult to spot.
If the rammed earth doesn't collapse or if it's not dug deeper, the Jingguan (a mound of stones) will never see the light of day, unless one passes through the half-open gate and enters the tomb site.
Just like the Ghost Office in Beiqu City, it looks like an abandoned and sealed place. Everyone is afraid of it because of the rumors that it is haunted, but when people go in, they can't see a single ghost.
Upon entering the ghostly government office of the Northern Qu Taiyin Dao Body, a replica of the Dao Body in reality, one will see countless wronged souls imprisoned in jails after dying unjustly in court cases.
The Dao will reveal its core.
Similarly, what people see as a mass grave is a hill full of random graves and overgrown weeds. It is only when they step into the burial ground that the hill's disguise is torn away and its true nature is revealed.
No wonder the villagers dug up filthy soil nourished by blood and flesh as soon as they dug – this was a real mountain of corpses.
Bai Yuan turned around in front of the mountain of corpses and looked at Zhou Yaren, whose face was deathly pale, as if the mountain of corpses had crushed him and was about to pulverize him and send him to hell.
"Zhou Yaren." This was the first time Bai Yuan had called out his name so solemnly.
Zhou Yaren had just recovered from that chilling fear when she heard Bai Yuan say, "You once died right here."
What?
Upon hearing this, he was stunned for a long time, seemingly unable to understand the meaning behind Bai Yuan's words, yet also seemingly understanding but not quite, and an overwhelming sadness welled up within him.
A strong and invisible grief suddenly gripped Zhou Yaren fiercely, gradually reddening his eyes and making him want to cry.
But why? Is it because the stench of death is irritating to the eyes?
As if unable to control himself, he strode towards the mountain of corpses, and the moment his foot landed...
“The wind is picking up,” Bai Yuan reminded him with a sigh, “You can tell by listening to the wind.”
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Author's note: Happy New Year, my darlings!
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