Witchcraft

  This hand was slender and icy, and upon closer inspection, the fingers were as white as scallions, but the fingernails were covered in reddish-brown marks. Qin Guiren's heart tightened, and he looked up along the arm to see that one of the villagers who had been lying beside the bronze coffin was staring at him with wide eyes.

  Qin Guiren's heart skipped a beat, and he didn't know if the villager had been pretending to sleep from the beginning or was suddenly awakened by some noise. Anyway, at this moment, the villager's eyes were fixed on his face like an awl, with suspicion, anger, but more surprisingly, murderous intent.

  Qin Guiren had once killed enemies on the battlefield and had also seen his close comrades die, but this kind of murderous gaze seemed even more ferocious, making even a veteran like Qin Guiren feel a hint of fear.

  Fortunately, the villager did not make any drastic moves later on, but just stared at Qin Guiren. Qin Guiren's right hand was held by the villager, while his left hand had secretly gripped the short knife tied to his calf, watching the villager with extreme vigilance.

  However, neither of the two people made a move first, and the scene suddenly became somewhat awkward. Soon, the night watchman rushed over, looking at Qin Guiren and talking about something in his mouth, and the others were also awakened by him one after another. Qin Gui and others saw that Qin Guiren was held by the villager's wrist, seemingly full of gunpowder, and they also hastily picked up their guns and stood behind Qin Guiren.

  "Don't move! If you move, I'll shoot you dead!" Qin Gui and his men shouted.

  He let out a loud roar and several other villagers followed suit, but the other side just kept on babbling away, it was impossible to know what they were saying.

  "Nobody is allowed to shoot!" Qin Guiren shouted loudly, his voice immediately overwhelming the chaotic cries.

  Qin Guiren looked at the villager who was holding his wrist, and tentatively pulled his hand back. The villager also relaxed his grip upon seeing this. Both of them were very cautious, slowly standing up inch by inch, until finally, the villager let go of his hand.

  As soon as the villager let go, Qin Gui and Ma immediately raised their rifles to shoot. Qin Gui Ren quickly stretched out his hand to stop him, saying: "Didn't I tell you not to fire?"

  The soldiers looked at each other in confusion, not knowing what Qin Guiren was thinking. Although the villager had not done anything to harm Qin Guiren, the hostility in his eyes had already made it clear that these villagers did not have a friendly attitude towards them.

  Two groups of people stood facing each other, Qin Guiren took the lead and walked to the front, looked at the villager who had just grasped his arm, bowed respectfully, and said: "I was just curious about this bronze coffin, I didn't mean to be disrespectful to your village chief. If there was any offense earlier, I hope you can forgive me."

  Those six villagers looked at each other after hearing Qin Guiren's words, exchanged a few sentences in a low voice, and then lay down on the ground again, seemingly preparing to continue sleeping.

  The cook soldier on the side said with some discontent: "Captain, what are we afraid of them for? A group of mountain people, even if they're tough, can't withstand bullets?"

  Qin Guiren didn't bother with him, just waved his hand weakly and said: "You all go back to sleep, I'll continue keeping watch."

  Everyone seemed reluctant to let things go like this, hesitantly looking at the few villagers, as if they were somewhat taboo. Qin Guiren suddenly became very impatient and shouted: "I said it, all go back to sleep!"

  Everyone saw Qin Guiren get angry and then went back to sleep by the fire. However, compared with others, Qin Gui obviously knew more about his brother's temperament. He knew that Qin Guiren was not a person who liked to muddle through things, and he must have had a reason for doing so earlier.

  Then, Qin Gui and quietly walked to his brother's side, squatted down, and handed him a cigarette. This walk in was not a big deal, but just look at Qin Guiren's face, which was as pale as earth, with purple lips, and his whole body seemed to be trembling slightly, as if he had received some kind of intense shock.

  Qin Guihe felt puzzled, on the battlefield, bullets whizzing past his face didn't even make Qin Guiren frown, so what was it that made him so fearful now?

  "Brother, what's wrong?" Qin Gui asked with concern.

  Qin Guiren lit a cigarette, took two strong puffs, looked at his younger brother and said, "What kind of people have we actually met?"

  Qin Gui furrowed his brow and asked in a very low voice, "Is there something wrong with those villagers?"

  Qin Guiren shook his head, "The villagers are naturally strange, but that bronze coffin is even more eerie."

  Qin Gui did not interrupt and quietly waited for Qin Guiren to continue speaking himself.

  After a while, Qin Guiren stammered: "Just now, I wanted to take a look at the bronze coffin and see how heavy it was. But before I even touched the coffin, the villager grabbed my wrist. At that moment, I...I seemed to see that the lid of the bronze coffin seemed to lift up a seam, and a pair of green eyes were looking out from inside."

  Qin Gui and the others subconsciously glanced at the villager with high cheekbones beside them, only to see that he was staring at them with a curious and vigilant gaze. He suddenly felt as if a gust of cold wind had swept over from behind, giving him goosebumps all over his body. Thinking about their experiences over the past few days, they were indeed very mysterious. They had inadvertently discovered an unknown small village, where everyone except the village chief could not speak Chinese. Three days later, the old village chief suddenly died, and then the villagers held a bizarre ritual for him. The next morning, they followed these six coffin-carrying villagers into the deep mountains and ancient forests.

  What kind of people are these villagers? What does that eerie ritual represent? Where are the six villagers carrying the bronze coffin with the old village chief's body going to go?

  Qin Guihe felt that there were too many things that couldn't be explained, but now he could only pretend to be calm because his older brother had obviously received a severe shock. At this time, if he didn't comfort him in time, it was very likely that he would face a mental breakdown. So Qin Guihe patted his older brother's back and said: "Don't think nonsense, probably you just saw things wrongly, how could a dead person look out from the coffin? You also said it was like you saw it, but the fact may not be so. I think you're too tired these days, it's getting late, you go to bed early, I'll take the second watch."

  Qin Guiren nodded heavily and said: "Be careful with everything, be careful with everything."

  The next morning, the two groups continued on their journey. Although neither side mentioned what had happened the night before, the already fragile and delicate relationship between them became even more tense. Let's not dwell on this for now; they walked like this for another two days when suddenly they heard the sound of running water. The six villagers pointed in a direction and said to Qin Guiren and his group, "Ambokong".

  "What's 'Mò gòng'? What does it mean?" The cook soldier looked puzzled.

  Everyone thought for a while, Qin Guiren suddenly realized and said: "He should be referring to the Mekong! The Mekong River! That is, the Lancang River! The sound of water flowing in front should be the Lancang River or one of its tributaries. We can find our way back by following the river!"

  As soon as they heard that they could go home, everyone cheered, but the six villagers didn't pay attention to them and instead walked in a completely opposite direction.

  After that, Qin Guiren's troops had a discussion, some people were eager to return home as soon as possible, while the two Qin brothers and the cook were very interested in the whereabouts of the six villagers. I won't repeat the specific details, in short, finally the Qin brothers and the cook chose to secretly follow the footsteps of the six villagers to see where they would go, while the rest of the people chose to find their way home along the Lancang River.

  And so, the three of them embarked on a journey to follow the six villagers. Because they had previously had a discussion, and during the discussion, those villagers had already gone very far, so they had to work hard to find the villagers who were carrying the coffin again. The difficulties and twists and turns in this process, I can only gloss over, they almost got discovered, almost got lost because of losing track, but all of this is not as unbelievable as what happened next.

  Those six villagers, after getting rid of the soldiers, moved even faster, as if they were in a hurry. Qin Guiren and others also persisted tirelessly, tracking them for a whole day and night. The cook soldier couldn't help but wonder: "After walking for so many days, do these guys have any purpose at all? Our dry rations aren't much."

  Destination? Thinking of this, Qin Guiren's heart tightened. Although some things don't need to be reasoned out and can be judged by intuition, such judgments may play a misleading role. They had subconsciously assumed that the group was going somewhere with a purpose from the very beginning, but in fact, the old village chief only told Qin Guiren that villagers would go north, without mentioning where they were headed. Was this a journey without a destination?

  No! It's impossible, if that's the case, it would be too unreasonable. After the old village chief died, six young villagers carried his bronze coffin aimlessly wandering around the entire Vietnam and southwestern China border, this behavior can't be explained no matter how you explain it.

  They must have a destination, and that destination should not be far away. Qin Guiren's guess was not without basis, because he knew that the dry food carried by those villagers would also be almost gone.

  Sure, here is the translation:

  As expected, on the second evening of tracking, six villagers finally arrived at a small Miao village nestled between two mountains. Qin Guiren and others were astonished to find that the people here seemed to be waiting for those six coffin-carrying villagers. As soon as the bronze coffin arrived at the village, the whole village became lively.

  What Qin Guiren and the other three people did not expect was that on that night, in the Miao village, some mysterious rituals were also performed. They placed a large bronze coffin in the central area of the village, similar to a large altar, where some villagers danced around the bronze coffin with ugly postures, and also burned some tobacco-like incense, which emitted a familiar fragrance that made Qin Guiren and others feel extremely terrified.

  The ceremony had been going on for almost two hours when the villagers asked the six young men who carried the coffin to walk up to the altar. The six villagers joined forces to reopen the bronze coffin, and surprisingly, a beautiful young woman in her early twenties walked out of the bronze coffin.