When I got up, I saw that the sky outside was gray and hazy. I put on more clothes and walked to the window. Instantly, I felt chilled-to-the-bone.
Another autumn had come. It became colder and colder day after day. I thought there would be a sharp drop in temperature soon. I rubbed my palm and reluctantly opened my shop.
These days, Yin Xinyue was busy, so she didn’t spend the night in the shop. My breakfast was always bought during the dinner of the previous night. I just needed to heat it in the morning.
After breakfast, I held a teapot in my hands and leisurely sat on my chair. I watched the people move back and forth outside. I thought I was indulging myself a lot and wished to enjoy my life like this every day.
While I was having a nice dream, Li Mazi’s voice came from outside. He startled me, and I almost fell off my chair.
“Little Brother Zhang, bad things have happened!” Li Mazi looked panic-stricken. As he talked, he didn’t stop looking outside the shop.
My good mood was shattered. I felt annoyed and scoffed at him. “Why are you so worried? What happened so early in the morning that made you like this?”
“There’s a bloody man outside. Right at your door! He said he had something very urgent to tell you and that he needed your help…” Li Mazi panted and gasped for his breath.
After listening to him, I guessed this could be my next business case. I walked out of the antique shop. Not far from me was a man who was sitting on the sidewalk. He looked pale, and half of his face was covered in blood. His clothes were torn and tattered. It looked like he had just escaped a brutal fight.
After looking at him, an uncomfortable feeling rose in my heart. “Hey, brother! Brother, wake up!”
He didn’t react to my call. I suddenly had a bad feeling about this. I hastily reached under his nose to check his breathing. Luckily, he was still breathing. I exhaled a deep breath and turned to talk to Li Mazi, who looked dumbstruck. “Call the ambulance! If you linger here, he could die!”
Li Mazi gave me a nod and took out his phone to call the ambulance. After the ambulance crew took the man into the vehicle, they asked, “Who’s his guardian?”
Li Mazi was afraid of taking responsibility. He hurried to explain the situation to the crew. “We don’t know him. We found him unconscious in front of our shop this morning.”
The ambulance crew staff had to call the police as they were afraid that this man would die inside their ambulance.
Soon, two policemen came. They were patrolling the street and were in charge of maintaining order and security in my neighborhood. The people living in this area knew them well.
“Mr. Zhang, what happened?”
I told him about the situation. They nodded and took a few photos of the bloodstains on the ground. Then, they followed the ambulance to the hospital.
I thought that this incident would end here. However, three days later, as Li Mazi and I were about to close the shop, the two policemen came again.
“That man has been unconscious for three days. He woke up today. As soon as he woke up, he hurriedly asked to see you, Mr. Zhang. He said he needed your help. He has something very important to say to you.” After talking to me, the policemen took me to the hospital to see that man.
The man had strips of fabric bandage on his head, which made him look like an Egyptian mummy.
When we entered his patient ward, he was screaming. “I want to see Zhang Jiulin! Hurry! I need to see him as soon as possible! Otherwise, more people will die!” From his tone and words, I guessed he had encountered something foul.
I frowned and walked to his bed. I cleared my throat to get his attention. “I am Zhang Jiulin. Did you get into some trouble?”
When he saw me, his eyes turned bright. He cheered up as if he had just grabbed a straw that could save his life. He grabbed my arm and screamed, “Master Zhang, hurry! Come save us!”
“Friend, don’t be stirred up. Calm down, and tell me everything slowly. If I can help you, I’m sure I will,” I said politely as I patted his arm.
The man finally calmed down and took a few breaths to stabilize himself. Then, he carefully arranged his words. “The story I’m going to tell you, I hope to share with you only. We can’t let other people know about it.”
I felt a little awkward and looked at the two policemen. They gave me a forced smile then left the ward.
Li Mazi followed them and politely closed the door of the room. “I’m his assistant. Please tell us the story.”
The man hesitated for a while. Eventually, he started to talk. “I am Tang Xianzu. I live in Tangjia Village in Zijin Mountain. During recent years, many tourists have come to our village. Then, contractors came to exploit our land. When the construction teams came, they used excavators to turn up the soil in our fields. At first, the people in my village felt happy and thought that these contractors were very hard-working. However, after a while, we found that except for digging up our fields and leaving holes here and there, they didn’t do anything else. After a short course of fifteen days, they had dug a few hundred holes in our Tangjia Village…”
Because Tang Xianzu was hurt, when he became stirred up, he couldn’t stop coughing. I had to bring him a glass of water. I asked him to drink and talk more slowly.
Tang Xianzu calmed down and continued the story. Although the villagers all felt the construction teams were acting strange, their lands were requisitioned. They didn’t have any right to voice up.
Around a week ago, some good friends of Tang Xianzu came to him and told him that they wanted to go to the field and dig some treasures.
It turned out that their village had a special piece of land where no blade of grass could grow no matter what season it was. Even during the drought season, when all the other fields were dried and cracked, that piece of land stayed the same.
Tang Xianzu had heard from the elders in his village that that piece of land was very strange. In olden times, the central government had uniformly allocated the fields to the farmers in this village. However, anybody who got this piece of land couldn’t grow anything. When they grew corn, no sprouts came out of the soil. When they grew rice, the plants all died. The farmers couldn’t do anything. Gradually, no one wanted this land anymore. It had turned into a piece of wasteland. Since there was no ownership of this land and was located in a remote corner, the construction teams had missed this spot. The kids in this village had always listened to the elders, so they never went to that place.
However, those real estate investors had dug more and more holes in the villages, so they seemed to be searching for something. Tang Xianzu’s friends were smart. They guessed that their village might have some hidden treasures. Moreover, it could be buried in that unwanted piece of land.
The friends got together and planned to go there at night time to see what it was. Tang Xianzu didn’t want to go with them. However, he was afraid that his friends would tease him for being a coward. As such, he gathered his courage and followed them.
At the first step onto that piece of land, Tang Xianzu felt a chill. He couldn’t help but shudder. He was startled by it and insisted that he go home.
However, his friends told him that it was normal that the place was cold at night time. They threw him a hoe and asked him to start digging.
None of them had expected that that piece of land would have strangely tough soil, which was as hard as reinforced concrete. When their hoes hit the ground, the coiling force tingled their purlicue. However, it also encouraged them into thinking there was something underneath.
Tang Xianzu had exerted a lot of effort to dig a hole around half a meter deep. He panted and decided to sit down and smoke a cigarette to rest.
But then, right at this moment, he suddenly heard his friends scream. “Found it! We found it!”
Tang Xianzu hurried to that area. He saw that one of his friends had done a good job at digging with his hoe and dug a big hole in the ground. Something was sparkling inside.
When he came to this part of the story, I could confirm that something odd was in that land. If it was a real otherworldly item, would I be able to earn a huge sum this time?
I guessed Li Mazi shared the same thought. He rolled his eyes and urged Tang Xianzu to tell us more details.
Tang Xianzu nodded and continued, “We continued to dig. After a while, we found a sparkling stick. My friends resolutely used their hands to dig the soil around. They wanted to know what that stick was. However, no matter how hard we pulled, we couldn’t take it out. That stick seemed to be growing inside the earth. As such, we decided to take a buffalo there to pull it. When it was completely drawn out, we recognized it was more than two meters long, with a shining, pointy end. It was a spear used by a general in ancient times. Everybody knew that it was a valuable antique. My friends hurried to wipe the dust and mud off the spear. They even washed it clean. After cleaning it, we were all surprised and recognized that this spear was made of pure silver. The entire spear reflected cold light!”
When he came to this part, I couldn’t help but feel excited. With my experience, I knew this silver spear had to be a great treasure! In ancient times, blacksmithing skills and techniques weren’t good at all. Metal objects were very expensive. Normally, the soldiers used spears with wooden handles and metal pointy heads. They would never use pure silver to cast a spear. The person that could use a silver spear like this must have been an intimidatingly famous general in ancient times.
Moreover, as far as we knew, because this spear was buried in the ground, that piece of land couldn’t even grow a single blade of grass. It was enough to prove how formidable its murderous aura was! It was able to kill all the living things in that land.
After thinking that I was going to gain this silver spear, the corners of my mouth inadvertently rose.
However, when Tang Xianzu saw me smile, he was scared. “Is something the matter?”
I then recognized that I was acting awkward. After pulling myself together, I told him to continue his story.
Then, Tang Xianzu told me every detail of the event. After listening to the complete story, I had to snort to vent my irritation.
It turned out when these people saw the benefits and forgot about their friendship. As soon as they saw the silver spear, they all wanted to make it their possession. No one cared about their long-term friendship anymore. However, there was only one silver spear. They discussed it and eventually agreed to weigh it and divide it equally.
They were really wasting the heavenly treasure!
I didn’t wait for Tang Xianzu to finish talking. I snarled and said. “Did you melt that silver spear?”
“Oh, we didn’t…” Tang Xianzu shook his head repeatedly. “Even though my friends were so excited and happy, I couldn’t feel happy at all. I always had a feeling that the silver spear was evil. I had that feeling because whenever I touched it, a chill was sent to my heart! It was so cold that I thought my blood had frozen for a moment!”
Tang Xianzu was afraid that they would end up in a horrible mess. He suggested burying the silver spear back in its place and to consider that nothing had happened that night. However, no matter how hard he tried to persuade them, his friends still insisted on dividing the silver spear. Tang Xianzu couldn’t talk them out of it. Feeling dispirited, he left.
When he got home, Tang Xianzu wasn’t able to pull himself together. He had a feeling that something bad would happen. He was flustered and restlessly anxious. When his wife recognized his abnormal behavior, she asked him why. He didn’t dare to tell her the truth, so he casually found an excuse to comfort her.
He couldn’t sleep that night. Every time he closed his eyes, he smelled the scent of blood that emitted from the silver spear. Eventually, he decided not to sleep. He sat up and leaned against the bedrest, playing games on his phone.
He didn’t know how long he had been playing when his phone screen blacked out. He thought it had run out of battery, so he went to charge it. But when he turned around, he saw a man kneeling by his bed!
Since everything in front of him was pitch-black, he didn’t see that person clearly. He thought it was a thief. Instinctively, he blurted, “Who the heck are you? Why have you come to my house?!”
However, after the scolding, the shadow started to cry. At first, that shadow’s sobbing was low and indistinctive, but his voice grew louder and clearer as time passed. Eventually, Tang Xianzu was touched. He forgot about his fears and asked the shadow, “Why are you crying in my house?”
The shadow didn’t react or answer his question. Tang Xianzu went to turn the light on. He then saw a shadow kneeling by his bed. It had no physical body! It scared the heck out of him.
However, he didn’t want to scare his wife and kids, so he tried to suppress his fears and hold in his scream. The shadow then got up. Tang Xianzu got a glimpse of a headless man wearing a set of armor. Blood was still dripping from his cut neck.
As the blood started to form a puddle on the ground, Tang Xianzu smelled a familiar scent. Suddenly, he recognized it was the same as the smell he had sniffed when they dug up the silver spear!
Tang Xianzu was scared out of his wits. He couldn’t help it anymore and let out a scream. Right after that, his wife opened the door and entered the room. She asked him if he was all right.
Tang Xianzu got himself together. He turned and looked again, but nothing was there. There was no shadow or puddle of blood. He exhaled in relief. Although it could have been a nightmare, he strongly believed that the silver spear wasn’t normal. As soon as it became brighter the next morning, he went to find his friends...
When I got up, I saw that the sky outside was gray and hazy. I put on more clothes and walked to the window. Instantly, I felt chilled-to-the-bone.
Another autumn had come. It became colder and colder day after day. I thought there would be a sharp drop in temperature soon. I rubbed my palm and reluctantly opened my shop.
These days, Yin Xinyue was busy, so she didn’t spend the night in the shop. My breakfast was always bought during the dinner of the previous night. I just needed to heat it in the morning.
After breakfast, I held a teapot in my hands and leisurely sat on my chair. I watched the people move back and forth outside. I thought I was indulging myself a lot and wished to enjoy my life like this every day.
While I was having a nice dream, Li Mazi’s voice came from outside. He startled me, and I almost fell off my chair.
“Little Brother Zhang, bad things have happened!” Li Mazi looked panic-stricken. As he talked, he didn’t stop looking outside the shop.
My good mood was shattered. I felt annoyed and scoffed at him. “Why are you so worried? What happened so early in the morning that made you like this?”
“There’s a bloody man outside. Right at your door! He said he had something very urgent to tell you and that he needed your help…” Li Mazi panted and gasped for his breath.
After listening to him, I guessed this could be my next business case. I walked out of the antique shop. Not far from me was a man who was sitting on the sidewalk. He looked pale, and half of his face was covered in blood. His clothes were torn and tattered. It looked like he had just escaped a brutal fight.
After looking at him, an uncomfortable feeling rose in my heart. “Hey, brother! Brother, wake up!”
He didn’t react to my call. I suddenly had a bad feeling about this. I hastily reached under his nose to check his breathing. Luckily, he was still breathing. I exhaled a deep breath and turned to talk to Li Mazi, who looked dumbstruck. “Call the ambulance! If you linger here, he could die!”
Li Mazi gave me a nod and took out his phone to call the ambulance. After the ambulance crew took the man into the vehicle, they asked, “Who’s his guardian?”
Li Mazi was afraid of taking responsibility. He hurried to explain the situation to the crew. “We don’t know him. We found him unconscious in front of our shop this morning.”
The ambulance crew staff had to call the police as they were afraid that this man would die inside their ambulance.
Soon, two policemen came. They were patrolling the street and were in charge of maintaining order and security in my neighborhood. The people living in this area knew them well.
“Mr. Zhang, what happened?”
I told him about the situation. They nodded and took a few photos of the bloodstains on the ground. Then, they followed the ambulance to the hospital.
I thought that this incident would end here. However, three days later, as Li Mazi and I were about to close the shop, the two policemen came again.
“That man has been unconscious for three days. He woke up today. As soon as he woke up, he hurriedly asked to see you, Mr. Zhang. He said he needed your help. He has something very important to say to you.” After talking to me, the policemen took me to the hospital to see that man.
The man had strips of fabric bandage on his head, which made him look like an Egyptian mummy.
When we entered his patient ward, he was screaming. “I want to see Zhang Jiulin! Hurry! I need to see him as soon as possible! Otherwise, more people will die!” From his tone and words, I guessed he had encountered something foul.
I frowned and walked to his bed. I cleared my throat to get his attention. “I am Zhang Jiulin. Did you get into some trouble?”
When he saw me, his eyes turned bright. He cheered up as if he had just grabbed a straw that could save his life. He grabbed my arm and screamed, “Master Zhang, hurry! Come save us!”
“Friend, don’t be stirred up. Calm down, and tell me everything slowly. If I can help you, I’m sure I will,” I said politely as I patted his arm.
The man finally calmed down and took a few breaths to stabilize himself. Then, he carefully arranged his words. “The story I’m going to tell you, I hope to share with you only. We can’t let other people know about it.”
I felt a little awkward and looked at the two policemen. They gave me a forced smile then left the ward.
Li Mazi followed them and politely closed the door of the room. “I’m his assistant. Please tell us the story.”
The man hesitated for a while. Eventually, he started to talk. “I am Tang Xianzu. I live in Tangjia Village in Zijin Mountain. During recent years, many tourists have come to our village. Then, contractors came to exploit our land. When the construction teams came, they used excavators to turn up the soil in our fields. At first, the people in my village felt happy and thought that these contractors were very hard-working. However, after a while, we found that except for digging up our fields and leaving holes here and there, they didn’t do anything else. After a short course of fifteen days, they had dug a few hundred holes in our Tangjia Village…”
Because Tang Xianzu was hurt, when he became stirred up, he couldn’t stop coughing. I had to bring him a glass of water. I asked him to drink and talk more slowly.
Tang Xianzu calmed down and continued the story. Although the villagers all felt the construction teams were acting strange, their lands were requisitioned. They didn’t have any right to voice up.
Around a week ago, some good friends of Tang Xianzu came to him and told him that they wanted to go to the field and dig some treasures.
It turned out that their village had a special piece of land where no blade of grass could grow no matter what season it was. Even during the drought season, when all the other fields were dried and cracked, that piece of land stayed the same.
Tang Xianzu had heard from the elders in his village that that piece of land was very strange. In olden times, the central government had uniformly allocated the fields to the farmers in this village. However, anybody who got this piece of land couldn’t grow anything. When they grew corn, no sprouts came out of the soil. When they grew rice, the plants all died. The farmers couldn’t do anything. Gradually, no one wanted this land anymore. It had turned into a piece of wasteland. Since there was no ownership of this land and was located in a remote corner, the construction teams had missed this spot. The kids in this village had always listened to the elders, so they never went to that place.
However, those real estate investors had dug more and more holes in the villages, so they seemed to be searching for something. Tang Xianzu’s friends were smart. They guessed that their village might have some hidden treasures. Moreover, it could be buried in that unwanted piece of land.
The friends got together and planned to go there at night time to see what it was. Tang Xianzu didn’t want to go with them. However, he was afraid that his friends would tease him for being a coward. As such, he gathered his courage and followed them.
At the first step onto that piece of land, Tang Xianzu felt a chill. He couldn’t help but shudder. He was startled by it and insisted that he go home.
However, his friends told him that it was normal that the place was cold at night time. They threw him a hoe and asked him to start digging.
None of them had expected that that piece of land would have strangely tough soil, which was as hard as reinforced concrete. When their hoes hit the ground, the coiling force tingled their purlicue. However, it also encouraged them into thinking there was something underneath.
Tang Xianzu had exerted a lot of effort to dig a hole around half a meter deep. He panted and decided to sit down and smoke a cigarette to rest.
But then, right at this moment, he suddenly heard his friends scream. “Found it! We found it!”
Tang Xianzu hurried to that area. He saw that one of his friends had done a good job at digging with his hoe and dug a big hole in the ground. Something was sparkling inside.
When he came to this part of the story, I could confirm that something odd was in that land. If it was a real otherworldly item, would I be able to earn a huge sum this time?
I guessed Li Mazi shared the same thought. He rolled his eyes and urged Tang Xianzu to tell us more details.
Tang Xianzu nodded and continued, “We continued to dig. After a while, we found a sparkling stick. My friends resolutely used their hands to dig the soil around. They wanted to know what that stick was. However, no matter how hard we pulled, we couldn’t take it out. That stick seemed to be growing inside the earth. As such, we decided to take a buffalo there to pull it. When it was completely drawn out, we recognized it was more than two meters long, with a shining, pointy end. It was a spear used by a general in ancient times. Everybody knew that it was a valuable antique. My friends hurried to wipe the dust and mud off the spear. They even washed it clean. After cleaning it, we were all surprised and recognized that this spear was made of pure silver. The entire spear reflected cold light!”
When he came to this part, I couldn’t help but feel excited. With my experience, I knew this silver spear had to be a great treasure! In ancient times, blacksmithing skills and techniques weren’t good at all. Metal objects were very expensive. Normally, the soldiers used spears with wooden handles and metal pointy heads. They would never use pure silver to cast a spear. The person that could use a silver spear like this must have been an intimidatingly famous general in ancient times.
Moreover, as far as we knew, because this spear was buried in the ground, that piece of land couldn’t even grow a single blade of grass. It was enough to prove how formidable its murderous aura was! It was able to kill all the living things in that land.
After thinking that I was going to gain this silver spear, the corners of my mouth inadvertently rose.
However, when Tang Xianzu saw me smile, he was scared. “Is something the matter?”
I then recognized that I was acting awkward. After pulling myself together, I told him to continue his story.
Then, Tang Xianzu told me every detail of the event. After listening to the complete story, I had to snort to vent my irritation.
It turned out when these people saw the benefits and forgot about their friendship. As soon as they saw the silver spear, they all wanted to make it their possession. No one cared about their long-term friendship anymore. However, there was only one silver spear. They discussed it and eventually agreed to weigh it and divide it equally.
They were really wasting the heavenly treasure!
I didn’t wait for Tang Xianzu to finish talking. I snarled and said. “Did you melt that silver spear?”
“Oh, we didn’t…” Tang Xianzu shook his head repeatedly. “Even though my friends were so excited and happy, I couldn’t feel happy at all. I always had a feeling that the silver spear was evil. I had that feeling because whenever I touched it, a chill was sent to my heart! It was so cold that I thought my blood had frozen for a moment!”
Tang Xianzu was afraid that they would end up in a horrible mess. He suggested burying the silver spear back in its place and to consider that nothing had happened that night. However, no matter how hard he tried to persuade them, his friends still insisted on dividing the silver spear. Tang Xianzu couldn’t talk them out of it. Feeling dispirited, he left.
When he got home, Tang Xianzu wasn’t able to pull himself together. He had a feeling that something bad would happen. He was flustered and restlessly anxious. When his wife recognized his abnormal behavior, she asked him why. He didn’t dare to tell her the truth, so he casually found an excuse to comfort her.
He couldn’t sleep that night. Every time he closed his eyes, he smelled the scent of blood that emitted from the silver spear. Eventually, he decided not to sleep. He sat up and leaned against the bedrest, playing games on his phone.
He didn’t know how long he had been playing when his phone screen blacked out. He thought it had run out of battery, so he went to charge it. But when he turned around, he saw a man kneeling by his bed!
Since everything in front of him was pitch-black, he didn’t see that person clearly. He thought it was a thief. Instinctively, he blurted, “Who the heck are you? Why have you come to my house?!”
However, after the scolding, the shadow started to cry. At first, that shadow’s sobbing was low and indistinctive, but his voice grew louder and clearer as time passed. Eventually, Tang Xianzu was touched. He forgot about his fears and asked the shadow, “Why are you crying in my house?”
The shadow didn’t react or answer his question. Tang Xianzu went to turn the light on. He then saw a shadow kneeling by his bed. It had no physical body! It scared the heck out of him.
However, he didn’t want to scare his wife and kids, so he tried to suppress his fears and hold in his scream. The shadow then got up. Tang Xianzu got a glimpse of a headless man wearing a set of armor. Blood was still dripping from his cut neck.
As the blood started to form a puddle on the ground, Tang Xianzu smelled a familiar scent. Suddenly, he recognized it was the same as the smell he had sniffed when they dug up the silver spear!
Tang Xianzu was scared out of his wits. He couldn’t help it anymore and let out a scream. Right after that, his wife opened the door and entered the room. She asked him if he was all right.
Tang Xianzu got himself together. He turned and looked again, but nothing was there. There was no shadow or puddle of blood. He exhaled in relief. Although it could have been a nightmare, he strongly believed that the silver spear wasn’t normal. As soon as it became brighter the next morning, he went to find his friends...
