Su Bai nodded with a bitter smile. "The guy whose head was smashed by my hoe… He seems to be following me around."

Seven’s look was strange as if he was hurt inside. He didn’t know what to say. He and Gyatso, two masters, were quite sure about the calculation, but it went wrong because of this single ghost; and apparently, it was a lowest-level ghost, nothing but a wronged soul.

"Monk, is there anything we can do to take him out?" Su Bai asked. They couldn’t take the risk of keeping him with them. This time, it was just a maze that trapped them, nothing serious, but if there was some great danger and they lost too much time because of him, it would be disastrous.

"Two ways. One: release him from hatred. He was just ill-fated; he thought he could escape by hiding under the bed, but when he came out with hope, you killed him with a hoe. The ecstasy of hope turned into great sorrow, so he must be extremely angry; with the addition of the special influence of this story world, he became a ghost and followed you around. He must be planning to get revenge, but he was a newly turned and was neither capable nor brave enough to do so.

And two, we can break his soul so he will never have another life[1]."

"So which one do you prefer?" Su Bai asked, although he himself preferred the latter. The former obviously would bring them too much trouble; Gyatso was still missing out there, they didn’t have much time to waste.

"Amitabh, he’s such a poor man. His village was ma.s.sacred; he managed to escape that but was killed, after all. Alas, we should have mercy. So let’s break his soul, it’s freedom for him."

"I like that logic. Really, I love it." Su Bai smiled. "How?"

"Actually, you can do it by yourself. He can only stay with you when you’re human. If you turn into a zombie, he’ll have to leave because zombies don’t belong to the natural elements and are rejected by all ghosts. Once he leaves, he’ll have to show himself, and I’ll take it from there."

Su Bai closed his eyes and his body wizened, spreading a filthy evil scent. Immediately, that vague shadow was bounced off and became a little more legible.

"Dharma Infinite[2]!"

Looking solemn, the monk caught the ghost with one hand and started chanting the Diamond Sutras. The powerless ghost twisted and struggled, but finally disappeared like a balloon that burst into pieces.

"Alright, I’m gonna start over."

Seven seemed to be at ease. He sat down and started calculating again. Apparently, he was mad because he had done the calculation twice, put in so much time and efforts, but ended up wrong both times. After they found out why, he could not vent his anger upon Su Bai, so he totally released his fury on the poor ghost.

Su Bai returned to human form, twisted his wrists for a little bit, leaned against a pillar and started to take a break with his eyes closed. He couldn’t help the monk anyway, since he was better at fighting. Therefore, before he was needed, he’d better take the precious chance to get some rest.

About an hour later, Seven got up again, looking a little tired. He walked to Su Bai and gently patted him on the shoulder. Su Bai opened his eyes and smiled with a little embarra.s.sment. Seven also smiled. He knew that Su Bai was a light sleeper and couldn’t still be sleeping after he stood up. But neither of them said anything.

Seven walked out. Su Bai yawned and then followed him. They took some turns and detours and walked through several cabins with ponds; then two minutes later, when they opened another door, they saw Gyatso standing inside.

And he smiled at them: "I did the calculation but couldn’t get the right answer."

"There has been a little incident." Seven explained. "But no

w we can get out. We’ve wasted quite some time."

With Seven leading the way, they walked through one cabin after another. Finally, after opening another door, they saw the desolate mountains instead of the same cabins with hot spring ponds that they had been really tired of.

And after they got out, they looked back and found only one single wooden cabin, as if they had been back from another world.

It was already daybreak. The cabin maze really cost them a lot of time.

However, before the three of them could let out a breath of relief, they heard hoofbeats from beneath.

"No less than hundreds." Gyatso listened to the thumping hoofbeats, "Hundreds of cavalrymen, must be the main force of Qing army."

It was Qing Dynasty. As a n.o.ble’s carriage was ambushed here, of course the main force would come.

"We can’t go that way, let’s take a detour." Seven walked to the other side of the hill. "We can go down from here. There’s no path, but it won’t be a big problem."

If there were only dozens of cavalrymen, or even scores, they wouldn’t be concerned because they could kill them all as long as they stuck to each other. But there were hundreds; even though they were just calvary with cold weapons, they were overwhelming in numbers. Therefore, the story world must allow them to choose a safer route and avoid danger; anyway, a story wouldn’t be catching if it only sent its characters directly to the enemies.

Seven turned over the edge first. His strong fingers clutched the rocks, then he started to climb down with his feet in the air. Gyatso, on the other hand, was moving across the cliff on all fours like a swift monkey.

Su Bai turned himself into a vampire; with improved senses and reaction, he was not any slower than the other two.

The three of them climbed down quickly and avoided those Qing soldiers.

"Where to then?" Su Bai asked.

"It’ll let us know." Seven looked up into the sky.

Su Bai knew what he was referring to. Indeed, the Dreadful Radio would set everything up. To the Dreadful Radio, those audiences were merely toys; and to the audiences, the Dreadful Radio was just a game, and they knew its routines well.

And they were right. When they had gone about one hundred meters down the hill, they saw a raised terrace. It was large and solid, but blocked by the two mountains, it couldn’t be seen from either above or below. Gyatso was the first one to jump onto it, followed by Su Bai and Seven.

Gyatso pointed at a cave on the end of the terrace, breathing heavily with his arms on his hips. "Let’s take a break and then go in there."

Su Bai looked into the cave on the other side of the hill. It would have been nothing, but there were too many dried corpses by the entrance on both sides of the cave.

Seven walked to one of them, brushed down the heavy dust on it and found a worn monk gown. Around its wrist was a string of Buddhist beads, but the beads were broken; now it was barely a piece of ornament, let alone a spiritual instrument.

Su Bai walked to the other, brushed down the dust and tutted. Then he waved to Gyatso who had been sitting aside having some rest: "Gyatso, your relative’s calling you."

Gyatso walked up and then stared. The dead man was wearing a Lama outfit with a cakra[3] by his had, but it was broken.

Seven and Gyatso looked at each other. A monk from Central Plains and a monk from the Tibetan area, what a coincidence.

Su Bai was standing outside the cave, looking around. "Check them and see if they are you. It will be boring if it’s reincarnation again. And, judging by the age, it’s a reincarnation every ten years."

Seven and Gyatso shook their heads at the same time. Clearly, they were certain that those bodies had nothing to do with them.

Then it was not a reincarnation.

"Must be a coincidence. The monks' bodies indicate that there’s something horrible and mysterious in the cave. They just happened to be same as you two," Su Bai said.

Seven nodded, then shook his head and looked at Su Bai.

Gyatso was also looking at Su Bai.

"Why are you looking at me?" Su Bai asked.

"It won’t be a coincidence if there’s a vampire body." Seven replied.

"Ha. But there are only two bodies, where’s mine?"

Su Bai shrugged with a smile. But the next moment, his smile froze. A rock about two meters high above the cave got loose and fell of. It didn’t hit anyone, but it broke into pieces and revealed a mummified corpse of a huge bat.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Another life: In Buddhism it is believed that after people died their souls will be reincarnated in new bodies, usually without any memory about their lives before. But if someone break their souls, they will never be reborn again.

[2] Dharma Infinite: Dharma is a Buddhist term, meaning the principles, laws, all phenomena and everything involving the Buddha. Dharma Infinite basically means that the power of Buddhism is limitless.

[3] cakra: also known as golden wheel, a kind of weapon used in ancient India.