Chapter 43

Parsed with an automated reader. The content accuracy is not guranteed.

Original Title: 挖坟挖出鬼

Genres: Drama, Horror, Mystery, Supernatural, Yaoi

This translation is based on multiple MTLs and my own limited knowledge of Chinese characters. If I have made any egregious mistakes, please let me know.

Chapter Index

Chapter 43

When he reached a fork in the road, the white figure turned around. The familiar profile and the slightly frowning expression made Lin Yan almost shiver all over.

“Xiao Yu!” He called out uncontrollably.

The white figure paused for a moment like he wanted to turn his head, but he controlled himself and took a step forward again.

“Don’t go. I’m begging you, don’t go…” Lin Yan shouted at the shadow in desperation.

Xiao Yu slowly turned around. His face was extraordinarily pale, like a water spirit on a rainy night. His black hair was wet against his cheeks, and water was dripping down from the ends of his hair and clothes. The hem of his garment was soaked in the mud, gaunt and wretched. With his head bowed, he raised his eyes to look at Lin Yan, his figure like fluttering white silk in the wind.

A man and a ghost confronted each other in a dark alley.

“Come home. I’ve been looking for you every day.” His voice was hoarse for a moment. Lin Yan put Xiao Yu’s hand on his chest and covered it with his own. “It’s cold outside.”

Xiao Yu’s eyes were hollow and sad. He quietly raised his eyes and Lin Yan suddenly trembled. He felt that Xiao Yu was not looking at him. His unfocused gaze went straight through his body, as if he was a translucent shadow. Lin Yan looked back. There was only a small patch of light at the end of the alley in the distance behind him, like a window, with cars coming and going.

“Xiao Yu?” He hesitated and tried. “I’m sorry for what happened at the hospital. I should never have suspected it was you. Weiwei woke up. She said that she saw Immortal Gu that day, and she didn’t know why the little pendant was on her. We were too careless, but why won’t you say anything?”

“We can find a way to deal with the yang and yin. Even if A-Yan can’t figure it out, there are always experts. Let’s go to Mount Lao and the southern border.” Lin Yan took a breath and said sullenly, “Come back with me. I miss you.”

Xiao Yu shook his head slowly but still didn’t speak. Lin Yan felt his face getting hot, so he lowered his head and didn’t dare to look at him. He took out the jade pendant from his pocket and wanted to tie it around Xiao Yu. The familiar chill was reassuring, but the ghost took a step back as if he were agitated. The silk sash wasn’t properly tightened, and the weight pulled it to the ground with a clatter. It rolled around a few times in the sewage then stopped moving. Xiao Yu sighed. He picked up the jade pendant and put it in Lin Yan’s hands. There was a shallow crack on the jade, an extraordinarily eye-catching slight flaw in the white background.

“Don’t look for me.” The ghost finally spoke, and a cold hand stroked Lin Yan’s face, “People and ghosts have different paths.”

Lin Yan stared at him stubbornly: “Tell me the truth. You haven’t left at all these past few days, have you? You watched me search for you in the streets and alleys. I was going crazy trying to find you. If it weren’t for the movie theatre incident today, were you never going to show up?”

Xiao Yu didn’t deny it. After a moment of silence, he turned around and walked towards the dark depths of the alley. The cold rain hit his shoulders, and his tall upright figure looked desolate and lonely. Lin Yan stared at his figure. His lips trembled like wax, and he was speechless. He knew this ghost’s temper too well. This was his last chance. How could he keep him? How could he convince a proud ghost?

After a moment of hesitation, Lin Yan rushed several steps forward to keep up with Xiao Yu and hugged his waist fiercely from behind.

Xiao Yu trembled slightly, standing still. Lin Yan heard him sigh faintly, and after a long stalemate, a pair of icy hands clasped the back of his hands. They stroked along his knuckles before finally grabbing his wrists and struggling hard. Lin Yan stubbornly refused to let go. A sudden fire surged in him. He held him tighter, the emotions that had been building up for many days were uncontrollable, and even his voice was filled with sobs.

“You bastard, you fucking bastard. You forced me to do this. You scared me so much. You have to acknowledge me. I would cut out my heart for you. I have to say this. I, a big old gentleman, can only think of a man every single day. I can’t stay away from him. I miss him every day I don’t see him. I can’t even without getting fucked by him for one day.”

"What else do you want me to admit? I give up, I’m shameless! I’ll say it all!”

“Come back with me.” Lin Yan’s face rested on Xiao Yu’s back. He didn’t know that his eyes had turned red. He whispered in the man’s ear, “You don’t know how I’ve been living these past few days. I miss you so much…”

Xiao Yu turned around abruptly and stared straight at Lin Yan, as if he was holding back and suppressing something. Without a moment’s hesitation, Lin Yan wrapped his arms around his neck and kissed Xiao Yu heavily on the lips, actively and passionately sticking his tongue into his mouth and exploring it. Xiao Yu took a step back. Lin Yan took the opportunity to push against him harder. He pressed him against the wall of the alley, biting a small piece of skin on the side of his neck and sucking it repeatedly, licking it like a cat before finally prying his teeth away. The rainy night was cold, and Xiao Yu’s body was also freezing. The two of them were completely soaked, rubbing against the mud on each of the moss-covered walls, kissing like there was no tomorrow.

After the kiss ended, Lin Yan touched his lips and stared at Xiao Yu indignantly: “Do you know what I want to do now?”

“I want to fucking hold you here and beat the shit out of you, and then fuck you!”

“You’re not doing too bad so far.” Xiao Yu puffed out a laugh.

After being separated for more than half a month, the empty passenger seat finally had its owner back. The two kissed and embraced in the car, eager to swallow each other whole. Lin Yan’s hazy vision swept across the car window. Facing them were two pairs of eyes in the green tree line. One pair was old and cloudy, the other pair had a cold smile, staying low in the dense undergrowth and watching them silently.

Things were far from over.

In the quiet hallway of a quiet home, Lin Yan and Xiao Yu walked out of the elevator. When he opened the door, the little yellow cat that he had adopted suddenly came out from behind the door, rubbing against Lin Yan’s shoes with its furry head and acting like a spoiled child. Then he noticed the anomaly and let out a mournful cat cry, arching his back in a defensive posture, a cold light in his eyes, staring warily behind Lin Yan.

“Introductions, this is Xiao Yu.” Lin Yan smiled and held the little yellow cat in front of Xiao Yu. I met an old man in the hospital during the time you were gone, and he left his cat unattended, so I brought it back.“

"I saw.” Xiao Yu’s eyes were a little strange as if he was deliberately avoiding the little yellow cat.

“Are you afraid of cats?”

“Cats ward off evil spirits.”

Lin Yan awkwardly put the cat back on the ground. The little guy immediately took a stance toward Xiao Yu, the hair on his body stood on end, and a warning growl sounded from his throat.

“Then you go in first. I’ll send it to Yin Zhou to foster for a few days.” Lin Yan took out the car keys in his pant pocket, but Xiao Yu held his hand: “It’s okay, keep it if you like.”

Lin Yan cocked his head and looked at Xiao Yu, speaking softly, “Carry me in. From now on, this will really be our home.” Xiao Yu didn’t say a word. One hand held Lin Yan’s knee, the other held his shoulders to carry him through the door and carefully place him on the sofa. After that, he stood alone in front of the window. The living room was dark and dreary, neither bothering to turn on the lights. Lin Yan lit a cigarette and stared at Xiao Yu’s back in a daze. Sparks were flying, his eyes filled with thoughts.

The small red light on his phone indicated that there was a missed call. A-Yan had called. He hadn’t heard from the little Daoist since they split ways at the hospital, but Yin Zhou met him a few times at school, saying that he was looking for the missing temple master in addition to his part-time job. Lin Yan called back and A-Yan was hesitant for a few moments before he finally revealed that he had received a message from the temple master.

Lin Yan’s nerves suddenly tensed up.

“I-I thought about it, but I think I should tell you. M-Master said today that he was going to Shanxi to do something important. He told me to go to my classes and not contact him. I remember you said that the tomb is also there. I wonder if it’s related…”

His body felt slightly numb. Lin Yan glanced at Xiao Yu, secretly thinking that since his first trick hadn’t worked, he must have another one up his sleeve. The little Daoist heard his silence and he hesitatingly said: “Lin Yan, I know this request is a bit much, if… if this really has something to do with my master, can you show mercy?”

“Master is the only family I have left.” A-Yan pleaded.

Lin Yan was silent for a moment, then said something to put him at ease.

“If he’s willing to let us go, we won’t make things difficult for him.” He heard the little Daoist sigh in relief, and then ask back: “W-We? He’s back?”

Lin Yan didn’t deny it. The little Daoist priest’s voice sank. After briefly hesitating, he asked him, “What are you going to do? It’ll kill you to stay mixed up with him.”

Lin Yan felt a chill in his heart.

The little Daoist priest continued: “It’s b-better if he leaves. It’ll be better for you both. Now that he’s back, e-even if he likes you, he’s become this thing. Do you still expect to live with him for the rest of your life?”

“It’s never too late to make things right. Ghosts are like cats and wolves. They’re carnivores. If you keep them by your side, maybe one day they will gnaw you to the bone.” A-Yan said, “I-I’m doing it for your own good. If he dares try and hurt you, even if I have to fight for my life, I have to…”

Lin Yan gently hung up the phone.

He didn’t know when he had picked up the habit of not turning on the lights. Xiao Yu didn’t like the light. The two had been living a particularly efficient life when they were idle at home. The lights of the residential building across the street provided a ray of light to the house. The ghost was sitting on a piano bench by the window, broad-shouldered, with a straight back and a jade-like face reflecting the deep blue of the night. The cat was cowering in a corner peering at him nervously, its almond-shaped green ghost eyes looking bright like two light bulbs at a certain angle.

The Tongzi wood guqin that he and Xiao Yu ordered in Shenjiayuan had been delivered. It was placed in front of the window together with the violin stand and wooden chair. Ancient colours mixed with ancient scents. The damp night wind blew the curtain like a sail. Xiao Yu’s fingers hooked the strings of the guqin. A long vibrating string sound echoed through time and space, empty and quiet. The man lifted his sleeves, sat beside the piano and thought silently. With his fingertips, ”A Solitary Orchid“ was like the singing of birds in an empty mountain. His undried white clothes stuck to his body, revealing a nice profile of his back. Lin Yan snuffed out the cigarette in his hand and walked up to hug him from behind: "Be good, come take a shower and change your clothes first.”

When he lowered his head on Xiao Yu’s wet long hair, the instrument’s sound stopped, broken off on a high note that had been partially stroked, a story with no context. Xiao Yu turned around and kissed Lin Yan, lingering for a long time before letting him go. He placed his blue and white hands on the surface of the guqin and he whispered, “Are you afraid of me?”

“You heard everything?”

Xiao Yu didn’t deny it. Lin Yan sighed. He touched the ghost’s leg, silently asking him to lean back to make room. Lin Yan sat on Xiao Yu’s lap and put his arms around his neck. He said wearily, “I’m afraid you don’t want me.”

Xiao Yu wrapped one hand around his waist and plucked the strings of the guqin with the other. He didn’t know what tune it was, only that, in the silent night, it felt extraordinarily sad. He didn’t know when the rain stopped. A bright moon moved out from behind the dark clouds. The moon from five hundred years ago, slowly being revealed like a teardrop on rice paper.

Lin Yan stared blankly at Xiao Yu. In the night, his face is like a sculpture of jade, cold and hard. No matter how gentle he was, it was still a plastic porcelain body, a deep chill in his heart. He was not an ordinary soul. He was a ghost that demanded a life. The first time he returned to the world of the living, he was full of anger, and he needed to see blood on his hands to calm his old grievances slightly. There was a soft cat meowing from the corner. Xiao Yu’s fingertips trembled. Lin Yan looked up at him, he suddenly realized that Xiao Yu was actually terrifying. He was like a cat, agile, cold, untameable, hiding in the shadows, spying on his prey. Cats are never willing to lie in the arms of people because they’re submissive. Who knows if they are thinking that when you die I can eat your corpse one bite at a time?

He wasn’t capable of taming a ghost. People are always weak in the face of darkness, but he did not listen to advice and took the wrong step.

Lin Yan tentatively asked him, “Xiao Yu… how did you die?”

The ghost’s eyes were filled with strange resentment for a moment. He frowned, his fingers trembling slightly. He let out a breath after a while, shook his head and said, “Slayn with a gun, killed with a knife, hung with a rope, there’s always some way to die. I don’t remember very clearly. It seems that I have only woken up recently, and I have been walking in a drowsy state before that. The events of my life have passed too long ago.”

A ghost who has been dead for a hundred years, returning to the world for the first time, in a daze, following instinct the whole time, not knowing where he came from, not knowing where to go, carrying the unwillingness and sadness of the previous life, carrying the burden of fleeing the world, meeting a person out of thin air, transferring his love and hate from his previous life to him - who knows what relationship he had with this person in his previous life? Even if there was a relationship, after the reincarnation into this world, was the person still the same person?

Meng Po’s bowl of soup* is the gods’ most sincere sympathy for the weak world. A knock on the wooden bowl will save you from loneliness in the next life, maybe like Xiao Yu?

*(T/N: Meng Po (孟婆) is the goddess of forgetfulness in Chinese mythology, who serves Meng Po Soup on the Bridge of Forgetfulness or Naihe Bridge. This soup wipes the memory of the person so they can reincarnate into the next life without the burdens of the previous life.)

Lin Yan curled up in Xiao Yu’s arms. He narrowed his eyes and nestled under his neck. He said softly, “There’s a Japanese monster called the Ameonna*, who stands alone in the rain. When a man smiles at her, signalling to share an umbrella, she’ll follow him. From then on, the man will live in constant rain and will die soon after.”

*(T/N: Ameonna (雨女, “rain woman”) is a Japanese yōkai thought to call forth rain)

“It’s a very lonely demon.” Lin Yan sighed.

“Japanese slaves*.” Xiao Yu was not interested and hummed from his nose.

*(T/N: So the term 倭奴 was a derogatory way of referring to the Japanese people in the country of Wakoku (which is what they called Japan) by the ancient Chinese. The first character means ‘dwarf’ and the second means 'slave’)

Lin Yan kissed Xiao Yu’s face and suddenly got serious: “If we stay like this, how long do I have?”

Xiao Yu stopped talking. Lin Yan was startled and guessed, “One year?”

“Half a year?”

There was only a racing heartbeat in the darkness. Lin Yan grabbed Xiao Yu’s hand, squeezing tighter and tighter. The ghost hugged him, rubbing his cold fingers across his neck. He shook his head and said, “Lin Yan, I shouldn’t have come back with you. You still have a family.”

Lin Yan dazedly said that he wanted to take a shower. He slipped off Xiao Yu’s lap, staggering to the bathroom, and twisted the shower valve without even taking off his clothes. The water was freezing, dripping down his cold body. A curtain of water fell in front of his eyes. What he wanted to see and what he didn’t want to see became blurred. Lin Yan sat on the ground leaning against the wall, cold water pouring down his head. He began to laugh bitterly to himself. He laughed and laughed before he covered his face and cried.

The bathroom door opened. Xiao Yu turned off the shower and pulled the wet Lin Yan up from the ground. The two embraced each other. Lin Yan buried his face in Xiao Yu’s shoulder. He partially raised his head and said hoarsely: “Are you fucking kidding me…”

“When I wanted nothing to do with you, all you did was pester me. Now I like you, and you don’t want me anymore… Why do you have the final say, who are you?”

People have their obsessions, and ghosts have their own obsessions. Who is more determined than who? Lin Yan quickly calmed down. He touched the water on his face and said solemnly: “Forget it. I admit it. I can’t let you go either way. There’s a beginning and an end. I’ll help you fulfill your wish in life, to be a good ghost with no ties, jump off the sunny cliff to return and have a good life so you don’t float anymore for decades and centuries. It’s too cruel.”

“Let’s go back to Shanxi and go to the tomb. There’s no answer in the book. There may be clues in the tomb.” Lin Yan bit his lip. “The old man in the temple has passed, I’m afraid he’ll try to exorcise you again.”

Xiao Yu shook his head and said, “Stay here with me.”

Lin Yan smiled miserably: “I know. You said at the beginning that on the fifteenth day of the seventh month. We have until the Mid-Autumn Festival. There have to be clues. Whether you want to kill, repay a debt or marry a wife, it’s up to you, I don’t care. If you can’t find it, we’ll just part ways and pretend we never knew each other, okay?”

Warm steam was billowing from the bathroom. The two seemed to be very close, but they were too far away to touch each other. They didn’t even dare to look at each other. They washed their clothes clean of mud. The human being is a human being, and the ghost is a ghost. Lin Yan carefully removed Xiao Yu’s soaked clothes, only to feel heartbroken. The self-respecting son of a nobleman can’t even avoid a city rainstorm. He didn’t care about him. He’ll drift on day after day, becoming a lonely soul wandering downstairs, looking at the lights upstairs every day, anxiously waiting for the person who will open the door.

Lin Yan buried his face in Xiao Yu’s chest, his fingers tracing circles on his cold skin: “Xiao Yu, if things work out, will you remember me in your next life when you are a human being?”

“I’ll definitely come back.”

Lin Yan smiled and put his arms around his neck: “That’s going to be almost twenty years. As long as you don’t mind me being old by then, I’ll follow you.”

Sometimes we open our eyes wide and think we see the world clearly, but in reality, we don’t. The world is divided into black and white. No matter how hard we try, there will always be half hidden in the darkness.

Some truths can only be seen in death.

Before going to bed, Lin Yan changed the flight time on the Internet. After that, he called his parents. He only said that he was going to travel after the exam. He was used to living alone. His parents didn’t ask much. They gave him a few instructions and hung up the phone. Lin Yan was sitting beside the bed in a daze when a cat meow suddenly came from behind him, pampered. His fluffy body rubbed against his back. The little yellow cat occupied the other half of the double bed, vigilantly staring at Xiao Yu. The ghost’s eyes were gloomy, one large and one small glaring at each other.

Lin Yan puffed out a laugh. He took the kitten off of the blanket and put it into the cat bed: “Good boy. You can only sleep here from now on.”

Xiao Yu unceremoniously lay down in the vacant position. Lin Yan came over to pester him, his face pressed against Xiao Yu’s back, murmuring, “You’re finally back.”

“Turn around, I’ll hug you to sleep.” Xiao Yu pried open Lin Yan’s hands. Lin Yan shook his head, hugging his waist tightly, and said softly: “I’m afraid that once I fall asleep, you’ll sneak away again.”

The night was like a gentle blanket wrapping around the two of them. Outside the window, the burning moon after the rain was eerily bright. The two people in the room embraced and slept, not knowing that they were stepping into a premeditated trap. The person who was planting the net was hundreds of kilometers away, nervously arranging something under the same moonlight.