The antique shop was located at the far end of the pedestrian street outside the mall. Even the decoration around its entrance had a distinctly old-fashioned feel.
The four of them walked inside and discovered that it actually had two floors.
The first floor displayed some larger antique pieces: carved wardrobes, dressing tables, official-style armchairs, and so on. The central area had been arranged into a life scene modeled after an ancient setting.
There were even several dummy mannequins. Some wore Qing Dynasty clothing straight out of a zombie movie, while others were dressed in red bridal gowns.
Whether they were authentic or not, they were certainly interesting to look at.
Wei Yao crouched in front of the Qing Dynasty official robe and stared at it.
“Is this clothing real?”
Wen Dajiang noticed that there were even dark-red stains on the hem of the Qing Dynasty official robe, making it look rather unclean, so he casually said, “It should be real, right? Look, there are still marks on the hem.”
Wei Yao rolled his eyes. “Maybe they deliberately made it look old.”
Xu Muchan listened to the two of them discussing it and curiously looked toward the few mannequins as well. The mannequins had no heads; instead, the head positions had been made into stands for displaying the matching hats.
The Qing Dynasty official robe was paired with an official hat decorated with peacock feathers, while the red wedding dress was paired with a red bridal veil covered in elaborate embroidery and adorned with translucent beads.
Xu Muchan couldn’t tell whether they were genuine or fake. He only felt that both sets of clothing looked exquisitely made, so he couldn’t help taking a few more glances.
The exhibition hall on the first floor wasn’t very large, and there were no staff around. The four of them finished looking around in no time. Wei Yao couldn’t find anything suitable, so he headed upstairs. “Come on, let’s go upstairs and have a look.”
Xu Muchan followed him toward the stairs, but as he passed the mannequin wearing the red wedding dress, it suddenly tipped toward him. Xu Muchan quickly reached out and caught it, preventing it from falling to the floor. Unfortunately, the red bridal veil covered in beads happened to fall onto his head before sliding down onto his arm.
Wei Xilou reached out and steadied the mannequin, then picked up the red bridal veil hanging from Xu Muchan’s arm and put it back where it belonged. “Are you all right?”
Xu Muchan shook his head and looked at the mannequin now standing upright. “Luckily it didn’t fall.”
Otherwise, they probably would’ve tried to make him pay for it.
After this little incident, the four of them went up to the second floor. The lighting upstairs was slightly dimmer, and the décor was more tasteful. It was obvious that it wasn’t nearly as gaudy as the first floor.
Someone who was either an employee or the owner was sitting behind the counter. He casually greeted them and told them to look around on their own.
Xu Muchan had nothing he wanted to buy and was only there to look around. Wei Xilou, meanwhile, didn’t care for any of it at all, his eyes practically always on Xu Muchan. In the end, only Wei Yao and Wen Dajiang spent a long time whispering together before picking out a jade ornament.
Wei Yao called the owner over to ask the price. The owner held up one hand and waved it.
“Five thousand?” Wei Yao said happily. “That’s not bad. I’ll take it.”
The owner said, “Fifty thousand.”
Wei Yao was stunned. “That expensive?”
The owner rolled his eyes, looking as though he couldn’t care less whether Wei Yao bought it or not. “This is top-quality mutton-fat white jade. Look at how smooth and lustrous it is. And feel the texture…”
Wei Yao examined it carefully. It did indeed seem pretty good, and he hesitated again. “Can you make it a little cheaper?”
The owner said, “We’re having a grand opening promotion, so I can give you twelve percent off.”
Even with twelve percent off, it would still cost forty-four thousand. Wei Yao looked at his little savings account with a pained expression. He could afford it, but his savings were only going out and not coming in these days, so spending such a large amount all at once was still rather painful.
However, when he thought that making his grandfather happy might mean his grandfather would give him even more money, he endured the pain and said, “Fine. Wrap it up for me.”
The owner promptly wrapped it up. Wei Yao paid and happily held the package in his hands. “I’m heading home now. I need to hurry and give it to my grandpa while it’s still fresh.”
Wen Dajiang waved him away like he was shooing a fly. “Get lost!”
After Wei Yao left, Wen Dajiang looked at the old man and young man standing side by side beside him. For some reason, he suddenly felt like he didn’t belong.
After thinking about it for a while, he decided it must be because he was wearing a fluorescent-green T-shirt today, which was completely out of sync with the other two. So he rubbed his hands together and said he was going to the Internet café to play some games for a while, then quickly slipped away.
The annoying little mouse was finally gone. The furrow between Wei Xilou’s brows relaxed, and he smiled as he asked Xu Muchan, “Want to go to the mall?”
Xu Muchan couldn’t find another excuse and could only resign himself to it.
On the way to the mall, he remembered the jade ornament Wei Yao had bought. Xu Muchan didn’t know anything about jade, but he knew how to read people. When Wei Yao had paid, the owner’s eyebrows had practically looked ready to fly off his face.
“Was that jade Wei Yao bought genuine?”
Wei Xilou said, “It was genuine, but it wasn’t particularly good material. At the current market price… at most five thousand.”
The owner had made nearly forty thousand yuan off Wei Yao with tears of joy.
“…” Xu Muchan was silent for a moment before looking at Wei Xilou with quiet accusation. “You could tell. Why didn’t you say anything?”
Wei Xilou looked even more puzzled than Xu Muchan. “Why would I?”
That little mouse was so annoying. The fact that he could tolerate him without laying a hand on him was already an act of great mercy.
Xu Muchan realized he’d asked a stupid question. He silently turned his head away and said, “Let’s go look at clothes.”
Xu Muchan often found himself puzzled by Wei Xilou. Wei Xilou was clearly an old relic from the Republican era, yet when it came to modern society, he seemed completely unbothered by it. For example, Xu Muchan himself had never once entered these luxury stores with their terrifying prices.
Before, it had been because he was poor.
Now, it was because he was used to being poor.
Even after having money, he only wanted to save it and spend it where it actually mattered. He wouldn’t even spare these terrifyingly expensive luxury stores a second glance when passing by.
But Wei Xilou walked into one as though he were returning to his own home. He circled the racks of clothes, picked out several pieces, and just as Xu Muchan was about to take them and try them on, he heard Wei Xilou tell the sales associate, “Don’t take these few. I’ll take everything else.”
He then gave Xu Muchan’s measurements. The moment the sales associate heard them, her eyes practically lit up. She happily called over her colleagues to start sorting and packaging the clothes.
Xu Muchan endured it again and again, but finally couldn’t hold back. “I haven’t even tried on a single thing yet. What if they don’t fit? And there are so many of them. I can’t possibly wear all this.”
Wei Xilou said, “Ah-Chan looks good in everything. There’s no need to try them on.”
Xu Muchan said, “That’s such a waste.”
Wei Xilou disagreed. “How is this a waste? It’s not like we don’t have room at home. I’ve already contacted someone to expand the walk-in closet, and I’m going to enlarge your study too. We have so many empty rooms at home—that’s what I call a waste.”
“…” Xu Muchan was exhausted.
Thinking that it wasn’t his money being spent, he silently endured it.
Wei Xilou, however, reached out and rubbed his hair. “Is Ah-Chan worried that we don’t have enough money?”
As he said this, he smiled happily, apparently finding Xu Muchan’s unnecessary worrying adorable.
Xu Muchan couldn’t help secretly rolling his eyes.
When Wei Xilou saw it, his smile became even more delighted.
He took Xu Muchan around every men’s clothing store in the mall that was well-known enough to have a name. Besides clothes, he also bought watches and all kinds of accessories.
At first, Xu Muchan still felt distressed about the money. Later, he became somewhat numb to it. Then he grew a little worried, even wondering whether Wei Xilou was secretly involved in some kind of illegal business. Otherwise, where did he get so much money?
He seemed to have more than he could ever spend.
By the time they returned home that evening, Xu Muchan felt that this was something that really needed to be discussed seriously. He put on a stern expression and looked at Wei Xilou.
“I have a question.”
Wei Xilou hummed and looked at him leisurely. “What question does Ah-Chan have?”
Xu Muchan hesitated, but finally asked, “You haven’t done anything illegal, have you?”
Wei Xilou actually thought about it seriously before saying, “I’m still not familiar enough with the law, but Old Man Wei introduced me to a pretty good lawyer. I don’t think so.”
Xu Muchan’s eyelid twitched at his answer. “Then where did you get all this money?”
Wei Xilou smiled and reached out to pinch Xu Muchan’s cheek, but Xu Muchan seriously pushed his hand away. Wei Xilou could only regretfully rub his fingertips together.
“Ah-Chan forgot. There are quite a lot of valuable things buried in the Wei family’s ancestral tomb.”
“There are at least…” Wei Xilou thought about it and realized he hadn’t paid much attention to the exact number, so he estimated, “At least ten boxes of gold ingots alone.”
“These were all excavated from the Wei family’s ancestral graves. The family genealogy was also found in the tombs, and Old Man Wei has already gone through the proper procedures to have everything officially documented. We divided the things between us. I got the larger share, and he got the smaller share. I gave him some of the antiques that were difficult to sell, while all the gold, silver, and other things that were easy to sell went to me.”
Xu Muchan had already known that quite a few valuable things had been excavated from the Wei family’s ancestral tombs, but he had never really had any idea how much those things were worth.
But now, hearing Wei Xilou say that there were at least ten boxes of gold alone…
He remembered the heavy wooden crates he’d seen in the storeroom at the time. He silently took out his phone, opened Alipay, and checked the recent price of gold.
Then he fell silent.
Wei Xilou poured himself a cup of tea. Holding the teacup, he watched Xu Muchan’s ears slowly turn red and said in a very good mood, “You haven’t looked at the card I gave you either, have you?”
Xu Muchan shook his head. He usually ate at the school cafeteria, and Xu Zhifei had already put quite a bit of money on his meal card. There was basically nowhere he needed to spend money.
Wei Xilou put down his teacup. “Ah-Chan can take a look now.”
Without a word, Xu Muchan found the bank card Wei Xilou had given him for pocket money, downloaded the mobile banking app, and logged in. After counting the zeros in the balance carefully, Xu Muchan finally realized that he really had been worrying unnecessarily.
But he couldn’t exactly be blamed. Who told Wei Xilou to always look like he was walking along the edge of the law?
Xu Muchan stood up with red ears and said, “I’m going to take a shower and go to bed!”
After taking a shower, Xu Muchan saw the two pillows on the bed. He thought about it, then ran next door and knocked on the door.
Wei Xilou had just finished showering as well. He casually answered the door wearing only a bath towel, water droplets still glistening on his body.
The droplets rolled down along the smooth, well-defined lines of his muscles…
Xu Muchan lowered his eyes and said, “Brother, I want to sleep by myself tonight.”
Wei Xilou pretended to be confused. “Doesn’t Ah-Chan always sleep by himself?”
Xu Muchan: “…”
He quickly raised his head and said, “I’m already seventeen. I need some private space. Anyway, don’t come over tonight!”
After saying that, Xu Muchan turned around and left.
Wei Xilou watched his retreating figure, slowly furrowing his brows.
Could Ah-Chan have been possessed by some kind of ghost?
Otherwise, why would he suddenly not want to sleep with him?
Xu Muchan returned to his room, stuffed the extra pillow on the bed into the wardrobe, then wrapped himself up completely in the only thin blanket he had before finally settling down to sleep.
In the middle of the night, he dreamed of the Black River again.
Xu Muchan slowly woke from his dazed state and realized that this time, he seemed to be at the upper reaches of the Black River.
Calling it the upper reaches wasn’t entirely accurate, because when he looked up and ahead, he still couldn’t see the source of the Black River. He could only vaguely make out what seemed to be a range of mountains at the far end. Beneath the mountains, there appeared to be a gigantic tree that blotted out the sky, while the enormous moon overhead was slowly rising from the tree. From a distance, it looked as though it were hanging from the treetops.
Xu Muchan stared at the moon overhead. Somehow, he felt that the sphere hanging so unnaturally close to the ground gave off an eerie feeling.
He turned his head toward the opposite bank of the river, only to see something faintly stirring across what had previously been nothing but darkness and emptiness.
Because it was shrouded in darkness, Xu Muchan couldn’t see clearly, but the distinct feeling of being watched told him that something on the other side of the Black River seemed to have responded to his gaze.
The feeling made Xu Muchan uncomfortable, and he also felt unsafe.
He instinctively turned around and walked away, wanting to get farther from the Black River, while constantly reminding himself that he was dreaming and needed to wake up as quickly as possible.
But he hadn’t gone far before his hurried footsteps slowed.
In the darkness not far ahead of him, a red figure had appeared at some point.
It looked like a person wearing a red wedding dress, with a red bridal veil covering her head. Her snow-white hands had bright-red nail polish on them, and she held them folded over her lower abdomen, standing silently and facing Xu Muchan.
The red wedding dress looked strangely familiar. It was exactly the same as the one Xu Muchan had seen at the antique shop during the day.
Xu Muchan wasn’t sure whether this was a coincidence or whether there was something wrong with the wedding dress in the antique shop. He warily stood where he was without moving.
But while he didn’t move, the red wedding dress did.
It glided straight toward Xu Muchan.
Xu Muchan turned and ran, but his legs were obviously no match for something that floated. Very soon, he felt an icy hand grab his arm.
He turned his head and saw the red wedding dress right beside him. It spoke in a ghostly voice.
“Can you do me a favor?”
Xu Muchan secretly exerted force, trying to pull his arm free, while coldly saying, “No. Go ask someone else.”
The red wedding dress didn’t let go. Its fingers, painted with bright-red nail polish, looked slender, yet they held him like an iron clamp.
Again, it asked, “Can you do me a favor?”
Xu Muchan still said, “No.”
The red wedding dress completely ignored him. Like a broken recording, it kept repeating:
“Can you do me a favor?”
She asked faster and faster, more and more frequently. Countless identical questions echoed beside Xu Muchan’s ears, fighting to squeeze into them. His ears began to ache from listening to it.
He stopped answering and desperately tore his arm free. Covering his ears, he ran in the opposite direction.
But no matter which direction Xu Muchan ran, the voice of the red wedding dress remained right behind him, never leaving him for even a moment.
Xu Muchan grew increasingly irritated. He gripped the Mountain God Tablet, turned around, and snapped angrily, “Are you ever going to stop?!”
But there was no red wedding dress behind him.
The repeated murmuring had also fallen silent.
Xu Muchan clutched the Mountain God Tablet and cautiously observed his surroundings. Suddenly, a chill rose along his back.
Before he could turn around, everything in front of him turned red.
A pair of hands held an elaborately embroidered red bridal veil and placed it over Xu Muchan’s head.
A voice whispered eerily beside his ear.
“You agreed before. I don’t want to marry that man. The man I love is already waiting for me, so… you go marry him in my place.”
The moment those words were spoken, festive wedding music sounded beside Xu Muchan’s ears. The surroundings seemed to change as well.
He was no longer beside the Black River beneath the moonlight, but somewhere else entirely.
Xu Muchan lifted the bridal veil and discovered that he was sitting inside a sedan chair. The clothes on his body had also changed into an elaborate, heavy red wedding dress.
The sedan chair looked extremely old-fashioned and was also very cramped. It could barely fit one person. Xu Muchan was tall, making it difficult even to turn around.
The place where the sedan-chair door should have been didn’t have a door at all—it had been sealed shut. There was only a small window about the size of a palm on each side.
Xu Muchan removed the phoenix crown from his head and carefully leaned toward one of the windows to look outside.
It was still nighttime outside, but it wasn’t dark. The torches held by the procession accompanying the sedan chair illuminated the surroundings brightly.
It was just that the people in the procession looked vaguely strange and awkward.
But the window was simply too small, limiting Xu Muchan’s view, so he moved to the other window to look outside.
Just as he looked out, one of the people walking ahead happened to turn his head toward the sedan chair.
Xu Muchan finally understood why the people in the procession had looked so strange and awkward.
They weren’t people at all.
They were paper figures.
The paper figures had been made so realistically that from behind, it was impossible to distinguish them from real people. But when they turned around, two obvious red circles had been painted on their paper-white faces. Their eyes were drawn like simple black lines, yet their black pupils could move around freely.
At that moment, the paper figure that had turned around moved its pupils.
Then its black pupils slid from the front toward the back, looking sideways at Xu Muchan.
Its stiff lips curled upward into a strange smile.
Xu Muchan suddenly straightened up and backed away from the window, his heart pounding wildly.
This place was far too strange.
Remembering that the red wedding dress had mentioned something about a “substitute bride,” Xu Muchan felt an ominous premonition. He hurriedly rummaged through the layers of his red wedding dress, searching for the Mountain God Tablet.
Strangely, however, the Mountain God Tablet, which should have been hanging securely around his neck, was gone.
Previously, no matter whether he needed the Mountain God Tablet or not, as long as it was still hanging safely around his neck, Xu Muchan wouldn’t panic too much.
But now the Mountain God Tablet was gone.
An uncontrollable wave of panic rose inside Xu Muchan, but he forced himself to calm down.
Something didn’t seem right.
If the Mountain God Tablet had truly been removed, he should have already turned into a ghost.
But when he looked at his skin and fingernails and felt his heartbeat, there were no signs whatsoever of becoming a ghost.
Then either this place was special, or…
The Mountain God Tablet was actually still on him. It hadn’t been removed at all. His perception had simply been deceived.
The second possibility calmed Xu Muchan considerably.
He tightly gripped the red bridal veil and comforted himself.
Don’t panic yet. First, see what these things are trying to do.
It seemed that this place only had nighttime. Xu Muchan couldn’t sense any change in time. He could only feel the sedan chair being carried for a very, very long time before it finally stopped.
The wedding music stopped as well.
The surroundings became unusually quiet.
Xu Muchan held his breath and cautiously leaned toward the window to look outside.
He was immediately met by a snow-white face.
That face was pressed tightly against the window too, with one eye peering into the sedan chair.
Xu Muchan was startled.
The black eyes on the face looked toward Xu Muchan and rolled around, seemingly smiling.
Then Xu Muchan heard a strange voice say,
“Open the sedan-chair door!”
Xu Muchan hurriedly sat back down. After thinking about it, he randomly pulled the red bridal veil over his head again.
His vision was blocked, so Xu Muchan could only rely on his ears.
He heard something being opened in front of him.
First came a creaking sound, followed by wind blowing inside.
The sedan-chair door must have been opened.
Someone stood beside the sedan chair and extended a hand toward Xu Muchan.
“Please, the bride, come down from the sedan chair!”
Xu Muchan didn’t dare touch these paper figures. He merely placed his hand lightly on the offered hand before bending down and climbing out of the sedan chair.
As he stepped onto the footboard, he saw that it was exquisitely carved with dragons and phoenixes. Only then did Xu Muchan realize that this was the sedan-chair door that had previously been sealed shut.
He remembered seeing those ten-thousand-work sedan chairs online before. This one seemed quite similar.
The sedan chair was decorated with elaborate, magnificent ornamentation, but the interior was extremely cramped. Once the bride entered, the sedan-chair door would be sealed shut and wouldn’t be opened until they reached their destination.
Amid all the grandeur and splendor, there was also an ominous, ghostly atmosphere.
Xu Muchan observed his surroundings through the tiny area visible beneath the veil.
A paper figure in front of him led him across a high threshold. After passing through two more doors, they finally stopped.
The family the female ghost had originally been supposed to marry must have been a wealthy, prestigious household with many rules.
Along the way, every time they passed through a door, the paper figures would recite a complicated string of auspicious phrases in shrill voices, almost like chanting scriptures.
Only after they finished could Xu Muchan continue forward.
Now the paper figure began chanting again.
After it finished, it said, “Please, the bride, enter the house!”
Xu Muchan heard the door open.
Then two paper figures who were probably maidservants came over to support him. One on each side, they helped Xu Muchan into the room and finally sat him down beside a carved canopy bed decorated entirely in red.
Once he was seated, the two maidservants stood on either side of him.
Then heavy footsteps approached Xu Muchan.
The person seemed to have a very high status. Xu Muchan heard the other paper figures making sounds of greeting and paying their respects.
The footsteps stopped in front of Xu Muchan.
Then the person spoke slowly.
“The groom was delayed on the road. He won’t be back for another three days. The bride will stay at home for the next few days. Once the groom returns, you’ll hold the wedding ceremony and complete the rites.”
Xu Muchan immediately let out a huge sigh of relief.
Just now, he’d almost thought the person standing in front of him was the groom.
He couldn’t tell whether the other person knew that the bride had already been replaced, so he lowered his voice and answered, “Understood.”
“The bride has had a long journey and must be tired. Get a good rest tonight. If you need anything, just tell the servants.”
The person was probably one of the groom’s elders.
After saying that, he turned and left.
Then came the sound of the bedroom door closing.
There were now only Xu Muchan and the two maidservants in the room.
Xu Muchan thought for a moment and tentatively lifted the bridal veil.
When he realized no one was stopping him, he removed the somewhat heavy veil from his head.
The two maidservants on either side turned their heads toward him in unison.
The two red circles on their cheeks made their faces look even paler. Their black pupils stared straight at Xu Muchan.
Together, they said,
“The bride is so beautiful. The groom is truly blessed.”