Chapter 131: "Resurrection" from the Dead

Page (1/3)

Old Ma put away his gourd and stopped spraying. He said, “This thing is an evil entity that forms on its own. It inhabits flesh, manipulates corpses, and controls their movements. Livestock and children have weaker resistance, so they are easily possessed.”

Manipulating corpses and controlling their movements—could it be...

The gaunt middle-aged man looked at the motionless fat pig, then at the sinister, horrifying two-headed snake. Furious, grief-stricken, and terrified, he said, “How could something like this be in the mountains? It killed my pig! What are we supposed to do now?”

“How could something like this be in the mountains? Don’t all of you already know?” I said coldly.

Everyone turned to look at me, their faces filled with confusion.

I stared coldly at them and raised my voice. “You forbade us from entering the mountains, then planted fast-growing eucalyptus trees all over them. Wasn’t it to keep people from discovering those walking corpses?”

Everyone’s expression changed abruptly. Old Ma’s face hardened as he looked at me. “What do you mean?”

I was just about to explain when a terrified cry rang out: “Somebody come quickly! Something’s happened to my son! Hurry and help!”

We ran toward the voice as fast as we could. The piercing cries of a child came rolling toward us.

When we reached the scene, we saw Three Monkey clamped tightly onto the shoulder of another child his age. The child was screaming loudly, while three or four adults pulled at him from the side, yet could not pry him loose.

I suddenly remembered that Three Monkey had also disappeared in the mountains before, only to be found the following morning. Could it be...

Old Ma hurried forward, muttering something under his breath. He slapped Three Monkey on the back of the head, and Three Monkey immediately released his bite.

Two adults quickly carried the wailing child away.

Old Ma ordered me, “Go see whether the child is hurt.”

I hurried over to examine him. The bite had been vicious; it had torn straight through his thick coat, and blood was streaming down. I undid the child’s clothes. There were two rows of teeth marks, but apart from that, nothing seemed wrong.

Tuge came over and ran a finger between the two rows of teeth marks.

“Is there a problem?” I asked.

Page (1/3)

Page (2/3)

“No. He was only moments away from being bitten by a snake,” he said casually.

I looked toward Old Ma. Three Monkey lay sprawled on the ground, utterly motionless. Something writhed inside his throat. Before long, a pitch-black two-headed snake crawled out.

Old Ma held water from his gourd in his mouth and sprayed it at the snake. The creature twisted and thrashed. Old Ma sprayed it again, and its movements weakened. He sprayed it a third time, and the creature grew even stiller.

The water in Old Ma’s gourd seemed capable only of suppressing them, not truly killing them. I picked up an iron shovel from the side and smashed the snake dead.

“Three Monkey! Three Monkey! Wake up!” His parents cried out in anguish, shaking the motionless body on the ground.

“Grandfather, what happened to my son? Please, please save him!” Three Monkey’s mother begged.

Old Ma sighed and shook his head. “He died long ago. That snake merely attached itself to his body and controlled it.”

Three Monkey’s mother was devastated, tears streaming down her face. “That’s impossible! How could my son be dead? Impossible! He was clearly alive and well—how could he be dead? I don’t believe it! I don’t believe it! Waaaah—”

Looking at Three Monkey, who would never move again, I thought of how mischievous he had always been and could not help but sigh.

Old Ma walked over to the sobbing child and examined his wound. “Luckily, we arrived in time. He was only moments from being bitten by the two-headed snake inhabiting that corpse. If it had bitten him, he would not have survived either.”

I jolted and looked at Tuge. No wonder he had made it sound so casual earlier!

Now that a person had died, the villagers finally relented and stopped hiding the truth.

Everyone of any importance in the village gathered in the main room. The place was packed. The three of us sat among them.

The gaunt middle-aged man sighed. “We didn’t mean to conceal anything. But who doesn’t have their own selfish considerations? Feelings aren’t something you can simply sever at will.”

They had already planted an entire forest, yet still claimed they had not meant to hide anything. Everyone had their own interests, certainly, but circumstances mattered. Just what had these people been concealing?

Three Monkey’s mother said sadly, “Now they’re harming living people! What is there left to hide?”

The gaunt middle-aged man had also lost a large, fat pig. Full of regret, he told us what had happened.

Page (2/3)

Page (3/3)

It all began five years ago. That year, the village produced its first university student—and not just any university student, but one admitted to a prestigious institution. For this remote and impoverished village, it was an occasion of immense joy. Yet all the changes that followed were connected to that student.

His name was Yang Guangyu. His father had died when he was young, and his mother never remarried, raising him alone. The village was poor to begin with, and their family was poorer still. Even so, his mother had exhausted herself supporting his education, rising before dawn and working late into the night, laboring herself to the bone.

Yang Guangyu did not disappoint her. He was admitted to a prestigious university. He thought he had finally made it through and would at last be able to repay his mother’s devotion. But when he brought home his admission letter, his mother, worn down by years of toil and illness, died that very day. She never even got the chance to see the letter.

It was an unbearable tragedy. The villagers helped arrange the funeral, and according to tradition, her body was buried deep in the mountains.

That should have been the end of it. Yet one day, people saw his mother in the mountains. Though she had died long ago, she was walking there as if she were alive.

The villagers could not believe their eyes. They kept watch in the mountains for several days, and sure enough, they saw her again. But she was not quite like a living person. She could not speak, did not respond, refused to return home, and stayed only in the depths of the mountains.

The villagers were terrified. They wanted to burn the body to ashes, but Yang Guangyu refused no matter what. He even threatened them with the matter of his university education. After all, his studies were not merely his own concern—they represented the hope of the entire village. A rare talent had finally emerged, and the villagers could not simply give up on him.

In the end, they had no choice but to compromise, and the body was not burned.

Later, other villagers died as well, but after some time had passed, those who had died would “come back to life.” At first, everyone was frightened. But as time went on, they discovered that the “resurrected” people posed no danger. Coupled with their longing for their departed loved ones, the villagers gradually came to accept the phenomenon.

Later still, to prevent outsiders from discovering it, they planted the vegetation in the forest more densely and brought in fast-growing eucalyptus trees.

...

How reckless could they be—and how short a life were they willing to risk? They had actually come to accept the resurrection of corpses as normal!

After recounting everything, the villagers themselves began to tremble. Before, they had not known what was happening and had merely thought it strange. Now that children and livestock had fallen victim, they finally understood what fear meant.

The gaunt middle-aged man asked in a trembling voice, “Th-Those corpses... were they all possessed by those monstrous snakes?”

Page (3/3)