I glanced at Fats and noticed his pink and ruddy complexion. Judging by the way he looked and the way he moved, it seemed impossible for him to be a ghost. "Uncle Three," I asked, "could you have seen someone else instead?"

"No, it was definitely him," my uncle a.s.sured me, "I'm not mistaken. Didn't he urge you to put your hand into the female corpse's mouth just now? He was trying to kill you."

In a panic, I blurted out, "So you're saying Fats is a ghost?"

Uncle Three answered, "Yes. No matter what he says, don't believe him. Now, be quick! Find something nearby to protect yourself against the evil that he plans to do to you."

At this moment, Fats gave me a look that held both anger and resentment, making me believe at least half of what my uncle claimed was true. I felt around nervously and found the belt that I had pulled from the waist of the armored corpse. Guessing that our ancestors carved spells on their belts to protect themselves from evil, I grabbed it.

Although the words on the belt were badly faded, I could still identify the text as that of the State of Lu. Could this corpse really be the Ruler of Dead Soldiers? Was this woman next to him his wife?

As these thoughts ran through my mind, my eyes were working overtime. I had already scanned the text once and although I didn't understand most of it, there were a few words I easily recognized. Traced in gold powder, they said The Ruler of Yinxi-the king of the western underworld-this was indeed a spell to ward off evil spirits. I was delighted.

A disturbing question popped into my head and I asked Uncle Three, "Something's not right. This jade bed isn't transparent. How can you see us?"

"I don't know," my uncle told me, "I can see you clearly from below, as if the bed were made of window gla.s.s. When I came to this spot, you were just about to put your hand into the female corpse's mouth to take the key. So I yelled out to stop you, and luckily you could hear me. Otherwise, it would have been terrible if you had put your hand between her jaws."

I was even more confused, and still felt something was wrong. This jade bed was quite narrow and the two corpses on it were jammed close together, covering the entire bed. What's more, the moon beams weren't particularly bright. To be able to see through two corpses so clearly under such a small amount of moonlight seemed highly improbable, even if the bed was somehow transparent.

I glanced over at Fats again and saw that he was still examining the key. Suddenly I was sure something was askew.

Fats was the kind of guy who would have interrupted my uncle's speech, even if he did not understand the Hangzhou dialect that Uncle Three was using. And it was completely out of character for Fats to sit still for so long staring at a key in silence.

I got off the jade bed and patted his beefy shoulder to see how Fats would respond, but to my shock, his reaction was completely out of control. Staring at me in fury, he bellowed, "You G.o.dd.a.m.n kid-you've been lying to me all this time!" Raising his hand that still held the dagger I had thrown to him, he began to stab in my direction.

Taking several steps backward, I screamed, "What the h.e.l.l are you doing?"

His eyes were bloodred and he didn't seem to be able to hear me. Rushing towards me, he tried to stab me again. His movements were precise and forceful, and I figured if I didn't run, I was going to get hurt. I raced down the steps, with Fats behind me. "It's no good to run from me, you b.a.s.t.a.r.d," he roared, grinding his teeth with rage as if I had just murdered his father.

I ran for my life. Fats had a gross and bloated body, but he could move like an Olympic racer. The tunnel I was following was a short one and in a second I would be at the end of the burial platform. Behind that, the area was filled with vines. If I stepped on one, I would again soon be hanging upside down like a sausage.

Could Fats really be a devil, intending to pull me down into h.e.l.l and make me suffer? But what kind of devil ran about the earth stabbing people with a knife?

As my thoughts wandered, the tunnel before me ended. I halted abruptly and lashed the belt in my hand towards Fats as though I were wielding a whip. He dodged away and I charged over to bite his hand that clutched the dagger, thinking, I'm probably the first person in the world who dared to bite the hand of a ghost. Fats screamed in pain. The dagger dropped to the ground and I kicked it far out of reach.

Fats grabbed me, threw me to the ground and muttered, "I'll f.u.c.king strangle you, you son of a b.i.t.c.h," as he put me in a headlock. I wrapped the belt around his neck, thinking, Play dirty, will you, fat man-I can do that too.

I pulled tightly on the belt and he pressed his grip tightly around my neck, each of us desperately trying to strangle the other before we were suffocated ourselves. Fats was fighting to the death, choking me so viciously that I almost bit off my tongue. Repaying him in kind, I used all the strength I had. But the belt which looked so well-preserved was weak with age. As I pulled on it, it popped and broke into two pieces.

The leather that the belt was made of was ornamented with pieces of copper that flew all over the place when the belt broke in two. The piece of copper engraved with the words The Ruler of Yinxi landed straight in my mouth and I felt a bitter liquid roll down my throat. Knowing that the piece had recently been on a dead body, I choked with nausea and a cloud of mist appeared before my eyes as if I had fallen into a thick, black fog.

What's happened to me? I wondered, could Fats have choked me to death so quickly? The taste of bitterness grew stronger and stronger in my mouth. The cloud before my eyes turned clearer by the second and I woke up with a start to find that I was pressed down on the jade bed. Fats had his hands tightly around my neck, his arms were tightly hooked around my shoulders, and his eyes had turned to a shade of brilliant green.

The copper key with the dark green pearl was still inside the female corpse's mouth, and her arms still tightly embraced me. Suddenly I realized that during the past few minutes I had been under the power of an illusion.

Turning my head, I looked at the green-eyed fox-corpse. His mask was still on the ground and the two eyeb.a.l.l.s inside his narrow sockets had rolled in our direction as he stared straight at us.

I thought to myself, s.h.i.t! No wonder Fats had told me earlier not to look at this-the green eyes of that fox-corpse had a dreadful power. Fats was still strangling me with enormous strength and if that copper piece had ever really been in my mouth, it had by now completely dissolved. Suddenly from the corner of my eye I spotted the purple-enameled gold box in the hands of the fox-corpse. Stretching out my arm, I grabbed it and hit Fats on the head with it as hard as I could.

Fats never loosened his grip-if anything he held on to my neck tighter than ever. You plan to choke me to death and rip my neck from my body, I thought, and I knew I had to stop this guy somehow, so I hit him again even harder than before. Then there was a strange sound, Fats's eyes rolled back into his head, and he fell forward onto my body, releasing his stranglehold on my throat. Coughing up blood, I suddenly saw the green eyes of the fox-corpse open wide and staring in Fats's direction, emitting a surge of power that forced me to look into them.

I felt as though I was again losing control of my mind-there was nothing for me to do but push Fats on top of the corpse, since I no longer cared for him very much at all. His huge body completely covered the corpse and since I could no longer see that dreadful green-eyed stare, I began to regain my mental equilibrium.

I rubbed my neck, which was bruised with huge fingerprints and so swollen that its shape was distorted. My whole body hurt. The powerful hypnotic stare of that green-eyed fox-corpse was not to be underestimated.

Picking up the purple-enameled gold box I had just used as a weapon, I found it had a tiny keyhole. "Hmm," I grunted and looked over at the female corpse's mouth, as I muttered to myself, "Could that key open this box?"

And then I saw the corpse's belt, torn in two, with little bits of copper scattered everywhere. Suddenly the memory of the taste of copper filled my mouth like blood.

Chapter Twenty-Two.

DISINTEGRATION OF A BEAUTIFUL CORPSE.

The box felt heavy and looked like the ones that contained Buddhist relics. But at the time this box was made, Buddhism had not yet come to China, so whatever was inside couldn't be a sacred relic. I shook my head as I asked myself, Could the devil's imperial seal that Fats talked about earlier be inside this box?

The key was still in the female corpse's mouth. I pulled myself together, reached under her tongue with two fingers, grabbed the key, and carefully began to remove it. When the key was halfway out, I noticed a very fine string of silk thread tied to it that went all the way down the dead woman's throat. The end of this thread seemed to be tied to something and I realized this could be a very bad sign.

Grandfather had told me that ingenious Chinese craftsmen of the Shang dynasty were able to place crossbows inside a dead body which were usually triggered by pulling a gold thread. Once a grave robber removed the jade or the pearls that had been concealed within a corpse's mouth or a.s.shole, the motion would tug the thread that triggered the trap, and bolts would shoot out of the corpse. Because the distance between the robber and the dead body was usually very close when this happened, it was impossible to avoid the attack. Heaven knew how many grave robbers died from this trap, but I didn't want to be one of them.

Pressing the stomach of the dead woman, I felt some hard objects under her skin. Lucky that I'm such a slow and cautious guy, I thought. If Fats or Panzi were doing this, by now they would most likely have been fooled and killed by this trap designed to kill grave robbers like us. I shivered with fear and relief.

The thread tied to the key was made of gold; it could be pulled but not twisted. I pinched it with my fingernails until I broke it, and cautiously removing the key, I inserted it in the keyhole of the box. It fit perfectly.

But was there anything dangerous inside the box? There could well be other traps so I decided it was best to keep it locked for now.

Suddenly I felt a ferocious intensity coming from the female corpse. Her embracing arms fell from my shoulders at last. Her face instantly caved in upon itself, like a rotting orange. An indescribable noise came from her throat that made me clap my hands over my ears. As I shivered in disbelieving horror, the perfect beauty in front of me became a mummified corpse. Her withered, putrefied body fell onto the jade platform, shrinking and becoming smaller by the second.

It was an appalling spectacle. Evidently the pearl on the key had prevented her from rotting over the past centuries. I stuffed the box and its key into my bag, thinking I'd spent too much time already in this place. Then I went to find Fats.

He was pretty battered from our fight and didn't move even when I made several attempts to pull him to his feet. He can't be that bad off, I told myself. I certainly hadn't beaten him to death-not that I would have cared if I had. I grabbed him by the arm, yelled "Up!" and slung him over my back.

Fats was deadweight and of course extremely heavy. His bulk pressed into me as I spat out blood from our fight. I shook my head and cursed his ancestors as I walked with his corpulence burdening my shoulders.

Fortunately the stone corridor was not very long and as soon as I left the area with the twisting vines, I could see the cliff. Neither Uncle Three nor Panzi was there; it looked as if they had gone back to look for a way out. I walked to the end of the stone corridor where the sacrificial platform was. Just as I was about to put Fats down and take a rest, I saw Uncle Three climbing out of an opening in the cliff not too far away.

I was afraid he might not see me so I waved and shouted, "Uncle Three, I'm here!"

He caught sight of me and almost broke into a smile, but then his expression changed and he pointed towards my back. I turned to see Fats sitting up. Behind him and out of his sight, the green-eyed fox-corpse sat watching me with his blank and heartless stare.

Chapter Twenty-Three.

INNER AND OUTER COFFINS.

It was impossible for me to turn away from that green gaze but although I was frozen in what was almost a trance, for some reason my thoughts were still very clear. The taste of copper in my mouth was very strong and I wondered if I had swallowed the piece from the belt after all. Perhaps somehow it was offering its protection.

When I heard the sounds of Uncle Three and the others rushing to my rescue, I knew immediately that this was a mistake. They had not yet felt the black magic that this fox-corpse could wield, and so had no idea of the danger we were in. If they blundered over to help, something terrible was bound to happen. I wanted to yell a warning to them, but it was as if something were stuck in my throat. Even with my mouth wide open, not a sound emerged.

But then I realized I could still move my hands. I made a gesture of two guns with my hands, each of them pointing at the head of the fox-corpse. My heart was screaming, Panzi, you have to be smart just this once. If you can't interpret this simple piece of body language, then you should just give up and eat s.h.i.t for the rest of your life.

A gunshot crackled behind me and the head of the green-eyed fox-corpse exploded before my eyes. My mouth was still wide open from my failed warning attempt, and liquid from the corpse splashed right in my face.

I began to vomit; this stuff tasted worse than s.h.i.t and I threw up everything but my intestines and stomach lining. I turned and saw Panzi clutching his wounds with one hand and making an OK gesture with the other. I cursed silently and wiped the fluid from the corpse off my face with my sleeve.

There was a fair amount of distance between where Uncle Three was and my position on the sacrificial platform. The terrain was covered with vines and could have been the death of him, but Uncle Three was quick and clever. He threw stones to distract the vines and then rushed safely past them.

Soon he climbed on top of the sacrificial platform. He was extremely worried about me and came quickly to be sure I was all right but as soon as he got within smelling range, he frowned and gagged. Annoyed by his fastidiousness, I ran to him and gave him a bear hug, which made him so nauseated that he almost pa.s.sed out.

Since he and Big Kui were both safe, I needed to make them account for their abandonment of me and asked, "Uncle Three, how could you guys have run away to leave me alone in that tomb? You scared the h.e.l.l out of me! Why did you leave me by myself in such a dreadful place?"

In response, my uncle reached over and slapped Big Kui on the head. "I told this f.u.c.king guy not to touch anything but he wouldn't listen." Then he told me everything that had happened from the time that they disappeared.

They had found another opening in the wall of the ear chamber in that main tomb. In most cases where there is a wall opening in an ancient tomb, there's usually a secret room behind it. Naturally they didn't know that all the trapdoors hidden in this tomb opened downward, but Uncle Three was a sharp guy and discovered the ruse with a glance. Big Kui moved too quickly with too little thought, and before Uncle Three could stop him, he pressed the b.u.t.ton of the trap. They fell down one flight into the Western Zhou dynasty tomb, just as we had earlier.

The plot got more and more involved from that point. Uncle Three made it sound so outrageous and confusing as he went on that I could make no sense of his story and soon begged him to stop telling me anything at all.

"You better believe me," Uncle Three said. "Take a look at what I found." He pulled a black box out of his bag-with a "kacha" noise, the box magically turned into a machine gun.

I had done some research on guns, and knew this gun was famous-it was a 9 mm Ayers folding machine gun with bullets the size of a cigarette, very light and easy to use.

Uncle Three said that while they were in the tunnel, they had found several bodies which had been carrying explosives, as well as this gun. The whole place was covered with bullet holes-it looked as though one h.e.l.l of a battle had raged there.

I double-checked the gun and was puzzled. It looked as if that group of grave robbers had been equipped with sophisticated weapons, or at least much more so than we were. Who they could have been, these people who went in but did not come back out? Could they have all died in here? If not, where were they now?

As my thoughts ran on, I leaned back against the sacrificial platform. Who knew that this stone stage that appeared so solid couldn't bear my weight? Before my entire body had pressed against it, the platform suddenly sank halfway into the ground.

Thinking we had triggered a trap, all of us quickly ducked down. The next thing we knew a series of noises came from below our feet, ending with a loud crash near the end of the platform.

We went to take a look and found a huge hole in the gargantuan tree that stood behind the stone platform. From the hole there appeared a mammoth bronze coffin, fixed in place with chains which had been attached to the largest tree branch and then wrapped several times around the coffin.

Uncle Three was speechless and then with a sigh of relief said, "So here is the real coffin."

"Holy s.h.i.t!" Big Kui cried. "A coffin this big must be really valuable. Our trip hasn't been completely in vain!"

Uncle Three slapped him on his head and said, "Valuable?! Stop thinking about G.o.dd.a.m.n money all the time. Even if this thing was worth something, you still wouldn't be able to move it out of here. There's one inner coffin and one outer coffin involved here-not a simple casket. d.a.m.n you, don't always make me lose face with your greed and stupidity."

Big Kui scratched his head and dared not speak again. I looked closely, feeling something was wrong, and remarked to Uncle Three, "This is strange. Coffins of common people usually are nailed shut because n.o.body expects them to be opened again-but look. The traps placed in the platform seemed to have been put there to help us locate this. Could it be that the occupier of this grave wanted someone to open his coffin? Plus, you see here, these tightly wrapped chains don't seem intended to keep the coffin in place but to keep whatever was inside it from getting out."

Uncle Three nodded and we looked at each other questioningly. Could another monster be inside this coffin? Should we open it or leave it alone?

Uncle Three spat and decided, "My guess is everything that's valuable must be here in this coffin. If we leave now, then wouldn't our trip be pointless? So what if there's a monster in there? We have guns and explosives. If there's something in there, we'll fight the f.u.c.king thing!"

I nodded, and Uncle Three continued, "Besides, it's not likely now that we'll be able to get out the same way we came in. Nearly all of the cave openings on these cliffs will lead us to the tunnel maze again. To leave from one of them will take us forever. Our best hope is to climb from here."

We raised our heads and saw the crevice on the cavern's ceiling where moonbeams streamed through; what they revealed looked bleak and dreary. Uncle Three pointed to the giant tree. "You see, the top of this tree is very close to the ceiling. It has many branches, which should make it easy for us to climb it. Look at all of these vines that have grown as high as the top of this cave-they make a natural ladder."

"Master Three, what nonsense is this? This is a man-eating tree," Panzi argued. "Isn't climbing it the same thing as committing suicide?"

Uncle Three laughed. "This is a hydra-cypress. I've already thought this through earlier. Don't you see how the vines won't grow on the stones here? That's because this is Tianxin rock, which repels the hydra-cypress and its vines. If we coat ourselves with the dust from these stones, I guarantee we will climb unharmed and everything will proceed smoothly without a hitch."

"Will it really work?" Big Kui whimpered.

Uncle Three stared at him and I was sure he was going to slap Big Kui on the head one more time but instead he muttered, "Okay, s.h.i.t-let's put some on and find out!"

Without another word, we scurried into action. With Fats on Big Kui's back and Uncle Three supporting Panzi, I shouldered our equipment and took a look back at the cave, thinking, We're all safe, but what about Poker-face? Uncle Three knew what was on my mind and a.s.sured me, "Menyouping can take care of himself-don't you worry."

I nodded, realizing I was the last man on earth to worry about Poker-face. He was much savvier than I was, and he seemed to possess supernatural powers. If there was any need for concern on anyone's behalf, he should be worrying about me.

Holding a gun, I led the way as we slowly reached the stone platform. A moment ago as we ran down the steps, we didn't notice that the entire platform was supported by huge boulders of Tianxin rock, so enormous that I couldn't figure out how they were brought in from outside.

Finally we reached the hole in the tree, and the giant bronze coffin stood before us. It was at least two and a half meters long, with ancient inscriptions engraved all over it.

We were all dead silent as if we were reluctant to disturb the occupant of this coffin. Uncle Three took out a crowbar and knocked on the surface, producing a flat, dull thud from inside, which made us realize it was absolutely crammed with objects. Uncle Three knew I had some knowledge of ancient inscriptions and asked me, "Can you read what's written on here?"

I shook my head and replied, "I don't understand the specifics, but I am sure the owner of the tomb is the one we have been looking for. The script on this coffin probably provides an outline of his life. It looks like he died before turning fifty without having fathered any children. The scenario in which he pa.s.sed away is the same as I had read earlier. He died sitting like a Buddhist monk before the Emperor of the State of Lu. All the other texts are probably about his general life."

Uninterested in the personages and culture of the State of Lu, I scanned the inscriptions quickly.

"What do those words mean?" Big Kui asked. I took a look and saw the word Open in the middle of the coffin. Then there were other words that were bigger and more eye-catching than the others, which I knew indicated a date. "This should mark the date that the coffin was placed here, but I can't read the words so don't know what date it is," I explained.

While I examined the inscriptions, Uncle Three looked for the best way to open the coffin. He shook the chains and found they were all as thick as his thumb. After so many years of wear and tear, most of them were no longer in good shape and basically served only a decorative purpose.

Motioning to me to step back, my uncle scolded, "Stop wasting time with those inscriptions. Check them out after we open the coffin."

He had barely finished his sentence when the coffin began to shake, with a m.u.f.fled noise coming from inside. At first I thought I was imagining things, and was about to ask the others if they heard something as well. Then suddenly there was still more quaking; I heard the noise again and knew it was real this time. My heart stopped for a second and I thought, s.h.i.t! Something terrible is trying to get out of there.

Chapter Twenty-Four.

RELEASING THE ZOMBIE.

Panic-stricken, we all took a few steps backward. The quaking of the coffin meant that its occupant could move-and any sort of motion inside a coffin was not a good sign.