Sack after sack filled with rice paddies was piled all around them, stacked so high they nearly reached the rafters.
In a corner sat an old wooden desk with a yellowed ledger spread across it, next to which rested a hand scale.
Shen Liang looked around. He recognized this place; it was the rice shop's granary, where he had worked for ten years before his death.
The granary's doors and windows were tightly shut. The sound of rain outside persisted, though the pattering was slightly softer than the downpour in the alley earlier.
Shen Liang recalled that when the flood struck Southern Tang, the rain had been virtually endless, pouring down day and night without pause.
Standing in the middle of the granary, Shen Liang was still in a daze.
“Impressive, young man!”
Plague Rat's voice drifted from behind him. Shen Liang turned his head and saw Chen Zhou, Plague Rat, Taotie, and Jian Huaishuang standing not far behind him. They had touched the fabric along with him and jumped into this space together.
“To think there's actually another space nested inside!”
Plague Rat sauntered forward, looking left and right, clicking his tongue in amazement.
“How did you find this out, brother? Our Lord was absolutely right—it really had to be you!”
Made somewhat uncomfortable by his gaze, Shen Liang took a half-step back. Just as he was about to explain, the granary's wooden door suddenly creaked open from the outside.
Plague Rat tensed instantly and dropped into a combat stance. He pressed his hands toward the ground as gray-green death qi flickered between his fingers.
He hadn't sensed anything outside the door at all.
Even the airflow hadn't shifted in the slightest.
The sensory suppression in this place was too severe; he had no idea if the entity pushing the door open was merely an illusion or a physical specter.
A round face poked in from outside, soaking wet with hair plastered to the scalp. Water droplets dripped from the ends of his hair, hitting the threshold with faint pattering sounds.
The cheekbones on that face protruded sharply, with a deep, dark bruise-like shadow under his eyes. His lips were dry and peeling, making him look as if he hadn't slept for days.
He first slipped half his body inside, his gaze quickly sweeping the interior of the granary. Only after confirming it was empty did he drag the rest of his body in.
His movements were incredibly strained, his shoulders and midsection tensing with exertion. Whatever he was dragging had to be very heavy.
Shen Liang's gaze traveled down Squire Zhou's arm. He saw that the man's hands were tightly gripping the corner of a tattered straw mat. The mat was rolled into a long bundle, and peeking from its edge was a pale, bloated hand with curled fingers.
The sleeve of the arm's owner was drenched and blackened by moisture, but there was a dark patch on the cuff. Though bloated and deformed by the water, its shape was one he had seen at the bottom of the river just hours ago.
It was Aunt Sun.
After dragging the straw mat into the granary, Squire Zhou immediately turned back to close the wooden door, his movements swift and silent, producing almost no sound.
Once the bolt was slid into place, he even nudged it with his shoulder to ensure it was tightly shut before finally letting out a long, heavy breath.
Leaning against the door, his chest heaved violently as his eyes remained fixed on the rolled straw mat on the floor.
Plague Rat held his combat stance and waited for a good while, only to realize that the man never looked at them once. Treating them as if they were invisible, he walked right through their bodies, dragging the straw mat deeper into the granary.
“...It's an illusion.” Plague Rat relaxed and brushed the dust off his hands. “Scared the hell out of me.”
Shen Liang did not reply.
His eyes closely followed Squire Zhou, watching him laboriously drag the straw mat to the innermost corner of the granary, where several stacks of torn sacks and some scattered straw lay.
He pushed the straw mat behind the sacks, grabbed a few handfuls of dry grass to cover it, hiding the exposed hand from view, and then finally stood up straight. He wiped the mixture of sweat and rain from his face and stood there dazed for a brief moment.
Step by step, Shen Liang walked over and came to a stop a few paces behind him, looking down at the roll of straw matting half-hidden by the dry grass.
Through a gap in the matting, half of a face was exposed.
It was indeed Aunt Sun.
Her face was already bloated white, her features blurred, and her lips a dark purple. Her eyelids were half-open, but there was no light in her pupils.
Water trickled down from her hair, seeping into the rammed-earth floor and forming a small, dark puddle.
However...
Shen Liang knelt down, examining the face closely.
Although her features were swollen and distorted, the degree of decomposition was very minor.
Her skin was still intact without any major peeling, and the dark purple on her lips was a shade that would only appear shortly after drowning.
This corpse looked as if she had drowned not too long ago.
Squire Zhou stood beside the straw mat for a while, lost in thought, before suddenly turning around as if startled by something and rushing frantically toward the other side of the granary.
Running to the corner, he squatted down and exerted himself to shove several stacks of sacks aside, revealing a half-man-high hidden hole behind them.
The hidden hole was pitch-black. From inside, Squire Zhou dragged out a clay jar. The jar's surface was coated in a layer of slippery, deathly white slime that gleamed with a greasy luster in the dim light.
Carrying the jar back to the straw mat, he set it on the ground and lifted the lid.
The white slime inside the clay jar began to writhe slowly, crawling over the rim and dripping onto the floor.
Upon contacting the rammed-earth floor, the slime slowly spread toward the straw mat.
More water seeped from beneath the straw mat, merging with the white slime.
Squatting beside the clay jar, Squire Zhou stared unblinkingly at the slime. His lips trembled, and his entire body was as tense as a fully drawn bow.
The slime crawled over Aunt Sun's exposed hand, moving across her pale, bloated fingers and creeping along her fingertips toward her palm.
Aunt Sun's corpse twitched slightly.
Squire Zhou tightly covered his mouth, letting out muffled, suppressed sobs. His shoulders shook violently as tears welled from his eyes, streaming down to mix with the rain on his face.
Standing nearby, Plague Rat frowned as he watched the scene unfold.
“Is he using corpses to feed that white slime?” Plague Rat muttered in a low voice.
He pointed toward the hidden hole in the corner. “Look inside there. There are several more clay jars.”
Chen Zhou glanced in the direction he pointed. Indeed, deep within the hidden hole were several more clay jars of the same shape, their openings sealed with mud. However, fine cracks had already appeared on the mud seals, and whatever was inside seemed to be pushing outward.
“He looks like just an ordinary human.” Chen Zhou withdrew his gaze and let it rest on Squire Zhou.
The fabric of the man's clothes was of average quality, with visible wear and tear at the cuffs and collar. On his feet was a pair of mud-caked cloth shoes with soles that were nearly worn through.
Although his bearing was somewhat more decent compared to Shen Liang's past life as an impoverished rice shop accountant, he was still just a slightly well-off commoner.
“Shen Liang,” Chen Zhou suddenly spoke, “you had already transformed into a water ghost by then, correct?”
Snapping out of his daze, Shen Liang nodded.
“Yes.”
“For some time after my death, my resentment was immense and my mind was clouded. As long as anyone approached the riverbank, I would drag them into the water.”
“Since your mind was clouded and you would drag any living person near the riverbank down with you, how did he manage to evade a wronged soul's perception and fish this corpse out?”
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