The Creatures That We Are

Chapter 37: Condolences

With a slight frown, Qing Ling asked, “What are you getting at?”

“Exactly what I just said. This isn’t the Gu Family’s Village we entered earlier.” Gao Yang stretched his body. Bathed in the warm sunlight, pleasant breeze swept over them every once in a while, and the village appeared serene and prosperous, so much so that it seemed surreal.

“You’re saying there are two Gu Family’s Villages?” Qing Ling questioned, unable to accept the explanation.

“Use your imagination.” As someone who had transmigrated into this world, Gao Yang was more open to seemingly insane ideas. “It can be a hidden world of the outerworld we came from, or we may have gone back in time and returned to the Gu Family’s Village thirty years ago.”

Qing Ling shook her head. “You really are insane.”

“Gao Yang!”

The familiar headache-inducing voice came. Gao Yang turned to see Wang Zikai running along the muddy path between the pond and the field toward him, followed by Officer Huang and Fat Jun.

Wang Zikai put an arm around Gao Yang’s shoulder. “I knew you wouldn’t die so easily.”

“Where were you?” asked Gao Yang.

“We woke up in the forest.” Officer Huang looked around and spotted the stone stele at the village entrance immediately, which put a frown on his face. “Things are getting complicated.”

Gao Yang briefly explained his hypothesis to Officer Huang. Officer Huang listened with rapt attention. Then he thought for a moment and made a decision. “Wang Zikai, Fat Jun, you two take Qing Ling to try the same thing in the other direction. Gao Yang, follow me to the forest. I have something to show you.”

“Okay.” Gao Yang didn’t know what Officer Huang was up to, but he followed the man all the same.

Soon, they entered the forest. Sunlight streamed through the canopies of trees and scattered flickering specks of gold on them. When they first entered, their walk was accompanied by a breeze, but halfway to their destination, the wind stopped.

Officer Huang came to a halt. “Here.”

Gao Yang looked ahead. They were twenty meters from leaving the forest and returning to the asphalt road leading to the urban area.

“Your patrol car should have been parked by the road, but now it’s gone,” said Gao Yang. “This really isn’t the same village.”

“There’s more.” Officer Huang pointed at the road outside the forest. “Walk forward.”

Gao Yang did so and was suddenly hit with a strange feeling.

The air around him grew heavy, and somehow, the gravity pulling him downward was shifting in a strange way. Even though he kept walking forward, somehow, the edge of the forest was always about twenty meters away from him when it should’ve taken him only 10 seconds to get out. It was like the horizon. No matter how long you walked, you were always approaching it, but never reaching it.

The sun was high in the sky, yet Gao Yang felt a chill run down his spine, and all the hair on his body stood on end. He took a deep breath and picked up his pace, running forward for a long time without stopping.

Nothing changed.

He was still about twenty meters from the road outside the forest. Gao Yang turned around to find Officer Huang right behind him, as if the man had been following him.

“You...”

“I swear I haven’t taken even a step,” said Officer Huang.

Gao Yang asked, “Did it seem like I was moving to you?”

“You were, but...how should I put it?” Officer Huang smacked his lips and tried to explain things in a more academic way. “You know what perspective means in art, don’t you? It’s something artists and photographers make use of.”

Gao Yang nodded.

“In my eyes, the relationship between you and the scenery before me doesn’t stay consistent. The perspective is all messed up. Although you were walking forward, after a moment, it seemed like you hadn’t moved at all...”

Gao Yang took a few steps back, and this time, he easily returned to Officer Huang’s side. He asked in confusion, “How is this happening?”

“I don’t know,” said Officer Huang. “We would’ve never noticed this supernatural barrier if Fat Jun hadn’t begged to leave.”

It took a few minutes for Officer Huang and Gao Yang to go back to the village entrance, and soon, Wang Zikai returned from the west side of the village with Fat Jun and Qing Ling.

“So?” asked Officer Huang.

“We can’t get out! Shit, it’s insane!” Wang Zikai’s face was filled with excitement with no sign of nervousness or fear.

“There’s a river at the edge of the village. No matter what we tried, we couldn’t cross it,” Fat Jun said weakly, face ashen. “We must be trapped by spirits, Officer Huang.”

As someone who didn’t hold such superstitions, Officer Huang didn’t comment on that.

“I’m leaving,” Qing Ling declared. She didn’t like things that she could neither comprehend nor control.

“How? This isn’t something you just get out of. We’re doomed...” Fat Jun grew increasingly pessimistic. “I told all of you that it was better to turn around, but none of you listened...”

“Coward.” Wang Zikai scoffed. “Who cares what we’re gonna face? If it’s a god, we’ll kill the god; if it’s a buddha, we’ll kill the buddha!”

“It’s okay,” Gao Yang said in reassurance. “Every space has an exit. A door, if you will. We just have to find the key to unlock it.”

“That’s right,” Officer Huang said in agreement and added encouragingly, “Don’t lose your calm, folks. This can be another test from the organization.”

Gao Yang didn’t think the Twelve Zodiac Signs would go to such length to test them, but he kept that to himself.

“Then...what do we do?” Fat Jun asked anxiously.

“When in Rome,” Gao Yang said and looked up at the ancestral hall on the hill, “We’ll pay our condolences.”

“Let’s go!” Wang Zikai was the first to agree.

Qing Ling and Officer Huang didn’t oppose the decision either, and Fat Jun nodded in the end despite his reluctance.

They prepared themselves and walked up the hill along the road, soon reaching the tent for the funeral in front of the ancestral hall.

Outside the tent was a table with two men sitting behind it. One was a slim young man dressed like a scholar, while the other was a silver-haired old man wearing old-fashioned glasses with black frame and a 80s-style white shirt, a white flower decorating his chest. The younger man was writing names on a record book with an ink brush.

“Gu Guiluen, five yuan. Gu Xianfang, ten yuan. Gu Mingxue, six yuan.” Half of the old man’s face was covered in discolored patches because of vitiligo. He read out names as he opened each of the white envelopes[1].

The old man looked up to glance at them, his eyes narrowed. “You’re...Huazi’s friends?”

Officer Huang was going to pretend to be a family friend, but the dollar bills on the table were all from thirty years ago. It wouldn’t be appropriate for him to use the new hundred-dollar bills in his wallet.

So he showed the men his police badge. “I’m from the Shanqing Police Station. Here to investigate the homicide.”

“Didn’t you come multiple times already? Can’t you leave the dead in peace during the funeral?” The old man with vitiligo was disgruntled, but he suppressed his anger because he was dealing with a police officer.

“Patriarch Wu, another day the case remains unsolved is another day we live in anxiety and fear. It’s a good thing that the police are so devoted.” The scholarly young man stood up and put aside the ink pen before offering Officer Huang a hand. “Well met, Officer. I’m Gu Xianzhi. Just call me Ah-Zhi. If there’s anything I can help you with, please let me know.”

“Thank you.” Officer Huang nodded. “Would you mind if I go inside to offer incense?”

“Of course we wouldn’t mind.” Ah-Zhi gave him a friendly smile before turning to Gao Yang and the others. “And they are?”

Officer Huang said without missing a beat, “Ah, they’re trainees who just graduated from the academy. I was entrusted with their training. I brought them here because they may be of help with their younger mind and more flexible way of thinking.”

“I understand.” Ah-Zhi stood up and gave Officer Huang a cigarette before leading the five of them into the tent. “Sister Fan, please fetch us five cups of tea.”

1. It is customary to give the family of the dead white envelope of money at traditional funerals, similar to how one gives money in a red envelope when attending a wedding. Usually, people keep a record of who has given how much so that they’ll know how much they should give the person when there’s a wedding/funeral on their side. ?