The Night Watcher of Great Jing - Chapter 103

In ancient times, the night belonged to darkness.

The mountain ridge lay submerged in blackness. Wherever the mountain wind passed, grass and trees rustled.

Zhao Li rose lightly and crouched behind a clump of vegetation, watching Miss Zhang’s grave.

By the hazy moonlight, she saw loose earth whispering down the burial mound.

A fist-sized hole appeared at the top of the grave, and dirt kept spilling outward through it.

After a long while, something rustled inside the mound.

A bluish-white, swollen hand, wrapped in damp soil, thrust abruptly out.

Zhao Li recognized it as Miss Zhang’s hand. She narrowed her eyes and watched.

The hand twitched and shook several times in the air, then suddenly planted itself against the grave soil.

Bracing itself there, it writhed and dragged the rest of the body out.

Earth from the mound showered over its face and body.

The appearance that had been carefully restored before burial was reduced to a complete mess.

Its jaw hung open as though it had slipped from its joints.

A dark purple tongue lolled over its lips.

Disheveled and filthy, the corpse emerged stiffly like a wooden puppet.

As it turned, Zhao Li saw two mung-bean-sized points of light inside its gaping black mouth.

They looked like… eyes!

The corpse writhed upright like a snake, as if it had no bones at all.

By the time it crawled free of the grave, the body had been ruined beyond recognition.

Its mouth stretched wide as it gazed up at the hazy moon through the black cavern of its throat.

The dim moonlight fell across the corpse’s face. The two mung-bean-sized lights inside its mouth flickered once.

The corpse moved again. It swayed to its knees and bowed once to the moon.

Then it stood, took one step backward, knelt, and bowed again.

In this way, the corpse made its way down the slope, taking one backward step and bowing each time.

At first, Zhao Li thought it was worshipping the moon. After it took two steps, realization dawned. This was not moon worship. It was reverse worship.

Zhao Li had read about reverse worship in the archives.

Ordinary people worshipped gods with the proper rites: three kneelings and nine prostrations.

But one method of worship was different.

Most of those worshipped in this manner were no righteous gods, but wild deities following crooked paths, or beasts cultivating toward immortality.

Zhao Li arched a brow. The thing controlling the corpse either wished to become an immortal or already considered itself one.

The corpse knelt and bowed until it had completed all nine prostrations. Only then did it turn and shuffle step by step down the mountain.

Its movements were stiff and slow.

When ordinary people walked, they lifted their feet and swung their arms in near unison.

But it thrust one leg straight forward first, then swung its arms.

Sometimes it even moved the arm and leg on the same side, still unskilled at the motion.

It was plainly imitating the way humans walked.

The corpse beneath the moon resembled a puppet manipulated by unseen hands.

Zhao Li followed at a distance as it descended the mountain step by step.

After a while, the corpse seemed to sense something. It stopped, cocked its head, and assumed a listening posture.

Zhao Li halted at once and ducked low.

Miss Zhang’s corpse stood there for a moment before continuing onward.

Zhao Li was about to follow when she heard a rustle.

Not far behind Miss Zhang, a head poked out.

The movement was a little too abrupt, dislodging two damp strands of straw.

The head, covered by only a layer of cloth, stared fixedly at Miss Zhang’s corpse.

Zhao Li had not expected something else to barge into the affair.

She did not move. She merely watched as the scarecrow-like thing followed the corpse.

As it went, the scarecrow copied the corpse’s peculiar gait.

Moonlight cast two rigid human shadows upon the ground.

One in front, one behind.

Zhao Li crept along behind both things.

After they had covered some distance, the scarecrow seemed to sense something as well, and its movements slowed.

The thing manipulating Miss Zhang’s corpse had plainly discovered the presence behind it. Though it still moved arm and leg on the same side, it walked faster and faster.

As long as one looked only at its figure and not its face, its determination in the face of disability was truly admirable.

The scarecrow in the middle copied it. Unfortunately, its body was made of straw, and it shed straw all along the way.

Halfway there, the scarecrow was visibly a size smaller.

But both Miss Zhang’s corpse and the scarecrow in pursuit obeyed an ancient rule—they did not look back.

Thus Zhao Li followed close behind the two creatures with her saber in hand.

One living person chasing two uncanny things.

For a time, the scene was both comical and eerie.

When the village finally appeared in the distance, even Zhao Li breathed a sigh of relief.

After being tormented for several days, Miss Zhang’s corpse was a sight no one should have had to look at.

Yet the thing controlling it had plainly failed to investigate the situation. It actually arrived at Li Daniu’s empty home.

At his door, Miss Zhang’s corpse—whose legs had been churning furiously moments ago—seemed to deflate and abruptly stopped before the broken wooden panel.

The scarecrow behind it seemed to hesitate, but moved close anyway.

It placed both hands on Miss Zhang’s shoulders and pressed its blank face beside the corpse’s head, blowing hard against it.

Zhao Li, still behind them, nearly laughed. How could this thing not tell the living from the dead?

Miss Zhang’s corpse paused, then whipped its head around.

“You looked back. Hee-hee, you looked back,” the scarecrow laughed. “Face. I want your face.”

Before it finished speaking, it “saw” the face of Miss Zhang’s corpse clearly.

The face was caked in mud, its eyes bulging and its mouth stretched wide.

The stench of rot drifted from its cavernous throat.

The scarecrow froze, uncertain whether it wanted to copy this face after all.

Miss Zhang’s corpse had already lunged at it with hands outstretched like claws.

It clawed and tore at the scarecrow’s body.

The scarecrow hurriedly fought back.

The two uncanny things rolled into a tangled heap on the ground, like street ruffians brawling.

Once an uncanny being like the scarecrow lost the protection of its rule, it amounted to very little. Miss Zhang soon tore it to pieces.

Zhao Li remained crouched nearby and watched.

Only after a victor emerged did she walk forward.

At that moment, Miss Zhang’s corpse suddenly stopped moving.

Its throat worked, producing a wet, viscous sound.

Soon, a white snake’s head, smeared with rotting, blood-streaked mucus, poked out from Miss Zhang’s gaping mouth.

Cold scales squeezed and scraped over the soft walls of her throat as it wriggled outward.

The white snake was as long as an adult’s thigh and two fingers thick. Coated in the corpse’s foul fluids, it crawled all the way out through Miss Zhang’s windpipe.

Once free, the snake reared up. Its head bobbed in the air as though testing the scents around it.

Suddenly, it seemed to discover something. It stiffened and assumed an attacking posture.

But it was already a step too late. A handful of realgar rained down over its head.

The snake hissed and tried to burrow back into Miss Zhang’s mouth.

It had only gotten its head inside when it heard a voice say, “If you dare crawl back in there, I’ll use this corpse to steep a jar of realgar wine.”

Zhao Li’s intimidation skill activated.

The snake went completely rigid. It raised its head in disbelief and stared at Zhao Li.

Zhao Li said, “You desecrated a corpse and impersonated a righteous god. You’ve been caught in the act and are now under arrest. Unless you want your gallbladder carved out, you’re coming with me.”