A Prophet - Chapter 11 (Part 6)
Chapter 6 - Lanterns on the Wall
At the third watch of the night, Zuo Yongchan and his party departed. Grandpa Zu lay in bed, turning over and over as he pondered Zuo Yongchan's words, unable to sleep for the entire night.
The next day, the Shanghai News published a startling piece of news: With the Ghost Festival of July Fifteenth fast approaching, Master Xuanzi intended to light ghost lanterns by the banks of the Huangpu River on the night of the full moon to deliver the souls of all departed spirits throughout the Jianghuai region. The report claimed that throughout history, apart from Master Zhang Daoling of the Eastern Jin dynasty, Master Xuanzi was the sole individual possessing such capability!
"Throughout history"—that was an extraordinarily bold claim! From Pangu splitting the heavens and earth down to the twenty-third year of the Republic, how many grudges and grievances, rights and wrongs had accumulated across the Chinese land? Wars, slaughter, assassinations, mistaken killings, suicides, crimes of passion—if all those ghosts were to gather on the banks of the Huangpu River, wouldn't they crowd people right into the river?
Master Xuanzi, oh Master Xuanzi, even if you have someone backing you from behind the scenes, you needn't act so unhinged! Grandpa Zu gnashed his teeth in exasperation.
"He's mad! Mad! Completely mad!" Third Boss Ba cursed furiously.
Grandpa Zu wore a solemn expression, then murmured a few instructions in a low voice to Third Boss Ba, who acknowledged the order and departed.
A few days later, on the evening of July Fifteenth, Grandpa Zu assumed a disguise and brought Second Boss Ba, Third Boss Ba, Zhang Zizhan, and Huang Farong to the banks of the Huangpu River where Master Xuanzi's ritual altar had been erected. The riverbank was a sea of churning heads crowded with common folk, while the Garrison Headquarters and the patrol station had also dispatched men, alongside various government dignitaries. The scale of the setup was massive!
At sunset during the hour of Xu, the pale moon rose in the east, casting its reflection upon the river waters—what a magnificent scene of a moonlit night!
Following several beats of the drum, Master Xuanzi's chief disciple shouted in a booming voice: "The vast heavenly gates open through the ages, how many return and how many come? The Guiyou ruling year's netherworld amnesty dispels karmic debt to cross the bitter sea. Open the altar—"
The crowd instantly fell silent. The bright moon in the sky silently drifted across the cloud cover, and all sounds of nature hushed, leaving only the surging waters of the Huangpu River rippling slowly in the moonlight.
Master Xuanzi emerged slowly from behind the curtains, gripping a horsetail whisk, arrayed in Daoist robes with his hair hanging loose. Muttering incantations under his breath, he ascended the ritual altar, burned incense in prayer, and paid homage to heaven and earth.
Built into the ritual altar was a slab of white-plastered wall, measuring roughly three zhang in length, one chi in width, and two zhang in height. The wall surface was immaculate and stark white, bearing no other adornments. After praying for the span of about an incense stick, Master Xuanzi lifted a red candle from the incense table, cradled it in his hands, and walked toward the white plastered wall. Kneeling beneath the wall, he raised the candle and traced a circle across the wall's surface. With a soft whoosh, more than ten lantern-shaped imprints abruptly materialized on the pristine white wall, glowing a deep, vivid red, flickering on and off as if ablaze! An immediate gasp of astonishment burst from the crowd!
Immediately following this, Master Xuanzi knelt and chanted the deliverance scripture:
Supreme decree issued, delivering your solitary souls;
All ghosts and phantoms, the four forms receive grace.
Those with heads pass over, those headless find birth;
Stabbed by spears or killed by blades, drowned in water or hanged by rope.
Perishing in the light or dying in the dark, suffering unjust and wrongful deaths;
Enemies and creditors, the youngsters demanding their lives.
Kneeling before my altar, the Eight Trigrams emit light;
Step out from the Kan trigram, transcend to other realms born anew.
Whether male or female, bear it by your own accord;
Wealth and poverty, nobility and baseness, are self-summoned by you.
Decreeing all you masses, make haste to transcend and be reborn!
Decreeing all you masses, make haste to transcend and be reborn!
Upon finishing the chant, he rose to his feet, retrieved his horsetail whisk, and lashed it several times toward the lanterns on the wall. The light of the lanterns gradually dimmed. Then, pointing the whisk directly at the Huangpu River, he let out a thunderous shout: "Rise!"
In an instant, countless lanterns surged up from the surface of the river. One by one, resembling departed souls, they flickered with red light and soared into the sky. The crowd boiled over with emotion; the common people could no longer restrain themselves, dropping to their knees en masse. Those nursing grievances, burdened with sorrow, and caught in suffering wept without restraint in that moment, kowtowing ceaselessly and kneeling in veneration. Their wrongfully slain loved ones had finally been delivered!
Watching from amidst the crowd, Grandpa Zu felt a chill creep up the back of his neck, while Zhang Zizhan furrowed his brows even more tightly.
"It's over!" Grandpa Zu cried out internally. Once this setup was executed, there would never be a second master left in the Jianghuai region! The three-hundred-year foundation of "Plum Blossom Lotus" was on the verge of being completely severed! Flying arts, flying arts—the core strength of "Plum Blossom Lotus"—yet now the entire guild had been squeezed out until it had no foothold left! Grandpa Zu had always prided himself on his cleverness, yet he was utterly defeated by a mere member of the younger generation! Realizing the general trend was lost, what use was there in him remaining in Jianghuai? Thinking of this, Grandpa Zu experienced a crushing tightness in his chest, and with a sudden blech, he actually coughed up a mouthful of fresh blood!
"Grandpa Zu!" Jiang Feiyan, standing right behind Grandpa Zu, caught him and held him steady.
"Grandpa Zu!" Second Boss Ba, Third Boss Ba, and Zhang Zizhan also rushed over.
Grandpa Zu looked at his brothers. These men made their living following him, calling him "Grandpa Zu" day in and day out, running about at his beck and call without a shred of resentment or regret, yet as the head of the guild, he had led everyone to such a miserable pass! Overwhelmed by shame, Grandpa Zu felt the world spinning around him as darkness consumed his vision!
During that period filled with frequent setbacks and agonizing pain, Grandpa Zu lost his self-confidence for the very first time.
Zhang Zizhan furrowed his brows even deeper, while only Huang Farong maintained her composure.
When everyone returned to the guild headquarters that night, Grandpa Zu lay weakly in a chair while the guild leaders sat in heavy, unbroken silence. After a long while, Huang Farong said softly, "Grandpa Zu, please take some restorative medicine."
"It's nothing," Grandpa Zu said wearily. "You should all head back and rest early."
The others wanted to offer words of comfort, but Grandpa Zu waved his hand. Exchanging glances, they all withdrew in silence.
Dragging his exhausted body, Grandpa Zu lay down in bed, feeling utterly drained. In a hazy, half-conscious state, he dreamed of his parents, of his younger brothers and sisters, of the familiar walls of his home, and of the gardenias in the courtyard corner.
Suddenly, a rhythmic rapping at the door jolted him awake. Though knocked very lightly, it still woke him. It was the housekeeper; he truly wished not to disturb Grandpa Zu, but the matter was so urgent that he had to knock. Third Boss Ba had an important report to deliver.
Grandpa Zu asked, "How did it go?"
Third Boss Ba looked at Grandpa Zu and said in a low voice, "The two newly arranged operatives have already entered the 'Plum Blossom Society'... Wuzi is dead."
Grandpa Zu was stunned, his heart aching as if pierced by a knife. "Wuzi" was a foot-runner of the guild who had been planted as a mole inside the "Plum Blossom Society" last year. A few days prior, Grandpa Zu had issued a secret order to Third Boss Ba instructing him to notify Wuzi to find out the inside story of Master Xuanzi's ritual on the riverbank ahead of time. Whether Wuzi had grown impatient and slipped up or the enemy had discovered him long beforehand, the fact was that Wuzi had been eliminated by the enemy before their scheme could even unfold, failing to transmit a single scrap of news back.
The two operatives just recently planted into the "Plum Blossom Society" were newcomers to the guild, and Third Boss Ba had disguised their appearances, so the enemy wouldn't uncover them immediately.
The art of disguise was an ancient secret technique with numerous methods and schools, shrouded in supernatural mystique since antiquity, though its basic techniques essentially boiled down to three types.
The first type was human skin masks. This method originated from Zhang Jiao of the Eastern Han dynasty: peeling the skin from a person's face, washing it clean with medicinal solutions, and applying it over one's own face to create an "undying body." However, the duration this method could be employed was relatively brief, as human skin was bound to rot eventually.
The second type was acupuncture. The method of acupuncture traced meridians and pressed acupoints; the facial acupoints each had their respective domains. Beneath a single inch, manipulating qi turned the blood; beneath three inches, meridians could be reversed. By locating the exact acupoint and executing precise technique, a single needle strike could cause the mouth and eyes to skew crookedly. Once the facial features had been shifted, recognition became nearly impossible. Afterwards, locating the corrective counter-acupoint and recuperating for a week allowed complete recovery.
The third type was ruthless and severe, accessible to anyone—disfigurement. Cutting oneself across the face to carve a hideous scar made one unrecognizable to ordinary people. In 1932, when Wang Yaqiao was surrounded by secret agents at Hedley Building, he had no choice but to execute this exact method to barely escape with his life.
The method Third Boss Ba employed on the newcomers this time was acupuncture, learned from the Secret Manual of Flying Arts. After Third Boss Ba entered the profession, recognizing his cleverness, cunning nature, and tactical mind, Grandpa Zu had passed this technique on to him, putting him in charge of assigning and coordinating informants.