What I just did was recite a Song family mantra. I didn’t know what it meant or how it worked exactly, but it was something that Grandpa taught me. A Traditional Coroner had to deal with death a lot after all, and we often stumbled upon unclean and evil spirits while doing our job. Thus, Grandpa armed me with this mantra.

With the disappearance of the ghost, the crisis was averted for the time being. Dali stopped bouncing the ball and returned to normal. Xiaotao yelled at Dali and asked what had gotten into him and why he scared her like that. Dali explained what he saw to her, causing Xiaotao to freeze in fear.

“D-Did that ghost really hold a knife against my neck?” she asked.

“There’s no reason to be scared,” I assured her. “There’s no way a ghost could do you any harm!”

“But ghosts can attack our souls directly and kill us without spilling our blood!” Dali argued. “It’s like when you’re walking down the street and then suddenly you feel a chill down your spine—it means a ghost just passed through you. It can pull out your soul from your body and possess you!”

“I don’t believe any of that is possible,” I countered. “If ghosts can kill people so easily, then what’s the point of having the police investigate murders at all?”

“That’s right!” nodded Xiaotao.

But even so, it was now evident that the mansion really was haunted, so I suggested that we all should go upstairs and stay close together for the rest of the night. That way our Yang energy would be focused in one place and ward off the spirits that might roam around here from approaching us again.

After staying upstairs for a while, Dali suddenly said, “Um, dude… I need to take a dump.”

“How do you have so much shit in you?!” I snapped.

“I didn’t get to take a shit last time because that freaking ghost hand grabbed my ass, remember?”

“Ugh. Just hold it in for a while, won’t you?”

A few minutes after that, Xiaotao said she needed to go to the toilet. I told her I’d accompany her there.

“You’re clearly being unfair, dude!” cried Dali.

“Xiaotao is a woman. Of course I have to be more concerned about her safety!”

Considering what just happened earlier, I decided the best thing we should do was to relieve ourselves outside the mansion. The overgrown bushes outside were waist-high anyway. So we all went out of the mansion and both Xiaotao and Dali immediately disappeared into the bushes to do their business. I myself found a quiet spot to urinate too.

Once I was done, I suddenly noticed a black SUV parked across the road. There were no other houses around here, nor were there any shops or commercial buildings. Who would park their car at an isolated place like this? Could it be a couple of lovers getting frisky in their car?

However, since we were at a murder scene, I thought it would be best to err on the side of caution. When Xiaotao was done, I told her, “That car looks suspicious. Let’s go check it out.”

“Right!”

But just as we were approaching it, the engine of the car suddenly started. Xiaotao rushed forward and shouted, “Freeze! Police!”

The car quickly drove away. Xiaotao pulled out her gun and fired it at the car, creating a spark as the shot hit it.

“Why did you shoot the car?” I asked in confusion.

“It’s just a blank!” she explained. “The car had no license plate, so it would almost be impossible to track it down. But now it’s easier since I left a mark on it!”

She then pulled out her phone and called the officers at the police station to check every auto repair shop in the city and detain every owner of a black SUV that had a bullet hole in it. The first shot of the police gun was always a blank for safety reasons, but the impact was still strong enough to put a hole through a car. Xiaotao might have just violated a rule by shooting just now, but if she hadn’t done that, we would’ve never found out who the car belonged to. Desperate times called for desperate measures!

I praised Xiaotao’s quick thinking. She smugly blew the smoke off the gun and said, “It’s the wisdom I gained from being on the battlefield.”

We then turned around to return to the mansion. I shouted Dali’s name into the bushes but heard no response. I waded through the overgrown weeds and fallen tree branches to find him, but only saw a pile of fresh poop. At that moment, Dali’s scream was heard inside the house. Xiaotao and I exchanged a look. That bastard! We merely left him alone for a few minutes and he already managed to get into trouble!

We rushed back upstairs. In the dark hallway, I caught a glimpse of a dark figure flitting about from room to room.

“Song Yang, look!” cried Xiaotao, holding onto my shoulder tightly. “Someone is crawling on the floor!”

Sure enough, we saw the figure of a man climbing slowly out of a room. It turned out to be Dali. He was soaked in sweat and was looking around him fearfully. He looked as if he didn’t see us and just crawled all the way to the end of the hallway where the bathroom was.

“What the hell are you doing now, idiot?” I shouted while I was catching up to him. He was crawling really fast on the floor, and this scared me considerably. Finally, when he reached the bathroom, he took off his shirt and soaked it in the toilet bowl water. Then he squeezed out the excess water and wrapped the wet shirt around his head.

I kicked him in his ass which made his head slam into the toilet bowl. He turned his head around and was surprised to see me there.

“Dude! Get down! This house is on fire!”

“What are you talking about? What fire?”

“This whole house is on fire, dude!” replied Dali in panic. “Don’t just stand there! Get down to the ground or the smoke will choke the life out of you!”

I slapped him hard on his face to make him snap out of it. He cried out in pain but then grabbed me and said, “Dude, we’re gonna burn to death in this house!”

As I looked into his eyes, I realized that they were glazed over.

“You’re hallucinating!” I exclaimed.

“No, I’m not!” he shouted back at me. “Look at my hands! They’re burned!”

He then showed me his arms. There really were burnt marks on his skin.

I had read that our psyche could affect changes on our bodies. A hypnotist could press a normal coin into someone’s skin and then convince the person that it was red-hot. There would be blisters and a burnt mark on that person’s skin.

But that made no sense in Dali’s case since there were no outsiders here. No one could’ve hypnotized Dali! Could it really be the effect of a supernatural power?

Just then, Xiaotao suddenly screamed. Her voice came from the room we were staying in earlier. I rushed over and asked her what happened. She pointed at the wall and cried, “The wall! The wall is bleeding!”

I looked at the wall. It was bright red. Blood was oozing out from it and flowed down to the floor in such a huge amount that it would soon engulf and drown us.

“This fire is too big! Dude, where are you?” screamed Dali as he crawled in through the door.

“No, no, no!” I shouted. “This is just an illusion! It’s all an illusion!”

I closed my eyes and bit my tongue, but it didn’t help at all, because when I opened my eyes again, all I saw was a sea of blood!

I quickly reached for a pack of salt from my bag which I had asked Dali to buy earlier. Salt was known to be able to exorcise evil spirits. I tore open the packaging and grabbed a fistful of salt and hurled it to the ground. As I did so, I could feel my palm turning sticky. I looked down and got so angry I could hardly refrain myself from kicking Dali’s ass again. That moron had mistakenly bought a pack of white sugar!

The pool of blood on the floor suddenly formed into a ball and gradually transformed into a woman’s head.

“You’re so kind to pay us a visit in our humble abode,” the head murmured. “Why don’t you stay with me and my son forever?”

“No, no, no! This is just an illusion! This isn’t real!”

In my panic, I grabbed another handful of white sugar and hurled it at the woman’s head. To my horror, the head lifted up slowly to reveal the woman’s entire neck. My eyes widened to the size of saucers. If salt could exorcise evil spirits, could it be that white sugar could embolden them?

“Ahhh!!!”

Xiaotao let out a loud scream while rubbing her fingers. I grabbed her hand and saw that her delicate fingers were burnt! Immediately after that, I could feel a sharp pain in the palm of my hand. I looked down at it and saw that it was burned too. I was stunned. This might be an illusion, but it could cause actual physical pain!

Then, the sea of blood slowly engulfed us. It rose from our feet then up to our legs. It would soon reach our waists!

I suddenly remembered that I had brought the Mind Clearing Pills with me. I quickly grabbed the chewing gum container in my bag in which I stored the pills and took two pills out. I popped one immediately into my mouth.

This Mind Clearing Pill was made of more than a dozen different Chinese medicinal herbs that were meant to refresh the mind. The second the pill touched my tongue, it was as if scales fell from my eyes. The illusion disintegrated instantaneously, and I finally saw the truth of what was happening.

I burst out in laughter.

So this was the answer to the mystery of human spontaneous combustion!

“Why are you laughing, Song Yang?” asked Xiaotao worriedly. “We’re about to be drowned in blood!”

“You can see for yourself!”

I put the Mind Clearing Pill into her mouth and asked her not to swallow it. The pill had a sharp taste like wasabi or mustard. Xiaotao held her forehead with her hand for a few seconds. When she opened her eyes again, she was shocked.

“Ants?”

“Yes,” I answered. “These are South American bullet ants[1]. The two victims weren’t burned to death by fire. They were killed by the acid secreted by these ants!”

1. Paraponera clavata. The pain from their stings have been compared to being shot, hence the name bullet ants.