At 7:15 AM, just as Ye Miaozhu exposed the impostor posing as Zhang Yangxu, she witnessed the same eerie scene he had described.
"I tested and questioned it thoroughly until I was absolutely certain this 'ghost' was not Xie Sining—and then it vanished. Like a wisp of smoke, it disappeared completely. That's how I shook it off."
That was how Zhang Yangxu had rid himself of the ghost disguised as Xie Sining.
Now Ye Miaozhu saw it happen again. The figure of "Zhang Yangxu" before her blurred into unreality, collapsing like a sandcastle washed away by water, then dissipating like smoke.
It was gone.
"Is it over…" Ye Miaozhu exhaled in relief.
After calming herself, she turned on her flashlight to inspect the storeroom. As Ning Zhe had said, the rules may remain silent but never lie: every enticing word from the ghost had been true, however dangerous.
Ye Miaozhu swept her light over the dowry shelves, then hurried to the dressing table and examined the copper mirror—nothing amiss. But when her beam glanced the gap between the table and the wall, a man's corpse in a suit lay before her.
"Zhang Yangxu?" Her expression froze as she realized what had happened: the ghost had killed the real Zhang Yangxu, assumed his identity, and lured her here to serve its own purpose…
But what was the ghost's aim?
Puzzled, Ye Miaozhu knelt to perform a simple examination of his body—only to have her pupils suddenly go slack and her limbs give out. She collapsed.
She was dead.
At 6:48 AM, Hejia Village was already alive in the sunshine.
Vendors sold vegetables and groceries at roadside stalls, farmers returned from the fields shoulder-slung with hoes, and tendrils of cooking smoke curled from rooftops as villagers prepared breakfast. Every household worshipped the Serpent God: before each meal, they placed a small portion of food in a bowl before the Serpent God's image, then dared to eat.
"Ingenuity, what are you doing?" In an alley by the street, Feng Yushu stood nervously against the wall, glancing toward the entrance. "Weren't you supposed to solve two mysteries? What are you—"
"Solving a mystery." Ning Zhe leaned on the wall, nonchalant.
But he was clearly just standing there…
Feng Yushu was more confused but dared not question further; having chosen to trust him, she would follow him through to the end.
She glanced at a nearby window wafting candle smoke. A village woman hurried from the kitchen carrying a white porcelain bowl of neatly arranged rice, green beans, sliced meat, a golden-fried dumpling, and a pickled plum. She entered the small room scented by candle smoke and emerged without the bowl.
After she slipped and fell on the way back, Ning Zhe straightened and strolled into that candle-scented room.
"What are you doing?" Feng Yushu called after him.
"Solving a mystery," he replied lightly. "Wait for me here."
Feng Yushu stayed behind as Ning Zhe quietly entered the room. As soon as he stepped in, a pair of hollow, lifeless eyes met his gaze.
On the wall opposite the door hung a roughly one-meter-square painting: a jade-green serpent God with curved horns, scales layered in order, and a celestial pose—yet beneath the gloss was rot and decay.
Approaching, Ning Zhe saw black mold clustered at each scale's base, milky fungal threads creeping through the gaps, and empty eyes: the left socket full of mold, the right rim ringed with spores.
"Just like the wood carving in the temple," he recalled the rotting Serpent God statue.
Both the temple's wooden serpent and the villagers' painted image shared the same corruption—what did this signify?
Unable to discern the connection, Ning Zhe moved beneath the painting, where a small round table held a porcelain bowl of offerings the woman had brought. He stared into the serpent's empty gaze, plucked the pickled plum from the rice, and popped it in his mouth.
"Sour…" He swallowed, loosened the rice with chopsticks, then turned and left.
As he stepped outside, Feng Yushu ran to him, anxious.
"What is it?" Ning Zhe asked.
"Nothing…" she stammered.
Realizing she was simply frightened, Ning Zhe checked his phone: it was 7:17 AM—far from lunchtime.
Just as he reached for the fruit plate before the Serpent God inside the temple, an inexplicable sense of danger flashed through his mind. He turned and saw a disheveled, listless woman standing before him.
"Ye Miaozhu…?" Ning Zhe's eyes narrowed, then he realized: "No, a ghost."
The "Ye Miaozhu" had appeared without warning, her pretty face breaking into a seductive smile. Without a word, she approached the lotus pedestal, flipped open the almanac…
The next moment, Ye Miaozhu died.
"So it is…" Ning Zhe closed his eyes and murmured.
Reference Glossary:
Fourth month of the lunar calendar – Traditional Chinese lunisolar calendar month corresponding to late spring/early summer, associated with seasonal festivals and agricultural markers.