Chapter 9: Trap

Gu Xianwang called a serious meeting for the four of them.

She meticulously dissected the situation, clearly outlining the risks they might encounter while searching for the Gu Witch to Ye Chan and the Tour Guide. In the end, they unanimously decided—to go take a look first.

The modified Wrangler drove out from the mountain road, heading northeast as indicated by the Undying Turtle. Gu Xianwang sat in the passenger seat, cradling the Black Jade Disk in her hands. The Undying Turtle functioned like a compass, constantly adjusting its direction based on the road conditions. Following its guidance, they drove from daytime straight through to evening.

Along the way, the Tour Guide borrowed Gu Xianwang’s phone to send a text to the company, explaining that the vehicle had run into some issues and needed repairs, which might delay the rest of the itinerary.

Ye Chan munched through two packs of cookies and polished off the last of the chips from her bag. The atmosphere inside the car hung heavy. She tried a few times to lighten the mood but failed, so she simply tilted her head and dozed off.

She slept all the way to the end of the road.

The car came to a stop on a narrow dirt track, with no paths branching off to either side. Ahead lay a vast expanse of dense forest. The road they had followed appeared to have been carved out by small machinery like a tractor. The Tour Guide mentioned that there used to be a logging camp around here, but it had long since been abandoned.

Gu Xianwang sorted through her luggage, stuffing tools, portable food, and water into her hiking backpack. She slipped on a hard-shell jacket and said, “According to the Jade Turtle Disk’s pointer, whatever is resonating with the Gu Worm inside you is still deeper in the forest. If we want to find it, we’ll have to go the rest of the way on foot. I have no idea how deep these woods go—we might even end up spending the night in the mountains. Otherwise, Ye Chan, you could stay with the car. If anything happens to us, fire off the flare signal. You’ve got Senior Brother’s phone; call the police as soon as you see it.”

Ye Chan glanced around. The primitive forest was eerily silent, devoid of any trace of human life. There was no way she was staying behind alone. “I’ll come with you guys. More people means more support, right?”

Before Gu Xianwang could object, she pulled out her trump card. “Besides, this thing in my eye doesn’t strike me as the friendly type. What if you all leave and it bursts out before you get back? It’ll eat me alive!”

Yao Cuo had a vivid imagination, and the gruesome image immediately sprang to mind. He joined in the persuasion. “I think leaving Xiao Ye, a girl on her own out here, isn’t safe at all. She should stick with us. We’ve got two guys along for extra security.”

Gu Xianwang knew he still hadn’t grasped the full picture, oblivious to just how formidable the Gu Witch and the Corpse Drivers truly were. But she could understand—Yao Cuo was just like she had been before last night: an ordinary modern person at heart, shaped by rumors and hearsay, his lifelong mindset hard to shake.

With a nod, she said nothing more. The group packed their personal backpacks, locked the car, pushed through knee-high bushes, and plunged into the deepening shadows of the vast jungle.

~~~

At first, Gu Xianwang managed to keep pace with Yao Cuo at the front, blazing the trail. But after more than an hour, her stamina began to flag.

The Tour Guide grew quiet after entering the woods, deliberately slowing to trail behind the other three. The moment he had spotted the tools in Gu Xianwang’s travel pack, he had realized this woman was no ordinary traveler.

Noticing her slowing down, he stepped up and offered, “Let me take point.”

Gu Xianwang gripped her knife tightly, swatting away the damp grass blades brushing against her side. “You’re in short sleeves and shorts. That won’t make for easy going.”

After the incident with the Driver, she found it hard to trust outsiders. The knife felt secure only in her own grasp.

The Tour Guide let out a couple of chuckles, then strode ahead of Yao Cuo with empty hands. “Us mountain kids have been scrambling through these forests since we could walk. Makes all the difference—take a look at this.”

He crouched down, pointing to clusters of delicate purple-white flowers nestled in the underbrush beneath two fir trees. “This here’s Rod Shengma—also goes by Orchid Grass.” With his nails, he snapped off a few stems, crushing the flowers and leaves together in his palm before smearing the pulp over his hands and feet.

“Give it a sniff—so fragrant. Keeps the bugs away.”

Yao Cuo and Ye Chan took the Orchid Grass he handed them, mimicking his actions to crush it up and inhale. Sure enough, it released a rich, invigorating scent.

“It really works! Little Hei, you’ve got skills. Tour guiding’s gotta be a waste of your talents,” Ye Chan said with a laugh.

A shy grin spread across the Tour Guide’s dark face, stripped of the slick charm he showed with tour groups. “Rainy season and all—mountains are crawling with poisonous bugs. You can pick Mugwort too; works the same way.”

Yao Cuo was an avid hiker himself, always itching to join veteran trekkers on wild paths for camping and photography whenever his schedule allowed. Time constraints kept him to the Beijing suburbs mostly, though his boldest outing had been slipping into Four Maidens Mountain right on the heels of the rainy season—a trip that nearly ended in disaster.

“You oughta think about guiding, man. City slickers are all over rainforest treks these days.”

The tour guide’s smile faded as he gazed at the towering canopy of emerald leaves stretching endlessly before them, his eyes distant and filled with nostalgia. “Every mountain’s got its own personality, y’know. It ain’t like the others. Our family’s lived in these hills for generations, but the only woods we really know are the ones right by the village. The kids are as familiar with ’em as they are with their own ma and pa.”

“…You gotta respect it, be afraid of it,” he added softly. “The old folks say the forest’s like a ghost’s pocket. We live here, and we die here. Those who don’t know fear and wander too far… well, one wrong step, and they never come back.”

Gu Xianwang eyed him in surprise.

They had lived in the city for so long that awe had become a distant memory. Only now, truly immersed in this vast, boundless sea of trees—cut off from signals and tools—did they suddenly grasp their own insignificance. Even on the same mountain ridge, two people unable to communicate might never cross paths in their entire lives.

She glanced down at the Undying Turtle in her hand. It was still stubbornly pointing east.

Could they really find what they sought? She had no idea.

Daylight dwindled swiftly in the deep mountains, night falling earlier than elsewhere. The season’s heavy moisture turned the paths into muddy quagmires, slick and exhausting. Soon, no one spoke at all.

Ye Chan’s eyesight was poor, and she didn’t want to slow the group, so she tumbled twice without complaint. Her shoes and socks were caked in wet mud, squelching noisily with every step. When exhaustion set in, she recited geography lessons silently in her mind: Guidong lay in a zone of humid evergreen broadleaf forest, under a subtropical monsoon climate—mild winters, cool summers, pronounced rainy seasons, abundant precipitation… abundant…

She reached that point when a deafening crack of thunder exploded overhead. Ye Chan froze and looked up. The dense foliage blotted out the sky entirely, lightning flickering through narrow gaps as a heavy, humid pallor pressed down.

The tour guide yelled, “Rain’s comin’!”

Yao Cuo hurriedly fished plastic raincoats from his backpack and passed them around. They had just struggled into them when fat raindrops began hammering down like buckshot. The deluge pounded the treetops in a relentless tattoo, sending up sheets of water like curtains and veils. It felt as if they’d plunged into a misty emerald sea, where shadows of people and trees swayed indistinctly, impossible to distinguish.

Voices blurred into a roar; everyone had to shout to be heard. Ye Chan caught someone up ahead bellowing, “Can’t go on! Find shelter, quick!”

“No good—can’t see the path, too dangerous! Xianwang, Xianwang? Wrap this around your waist!”

The clamor rose and fell in the din. Ye Chan was all but blind, arms outstretched groping forward, when the end of a rope was thrust into her hand. Strong hands seized her arm next, fumbling to loop the rope twice around her waist and knot it securely.

“Hold tight to the rope, Ye Chan—follow our lead!” the voice shouted.

“Got it!” Ye Chan yelled back at the top of her lungs.

The voices around her faded quickly. Heart in her throat, she let the tension on the rope guide her, head bowed against the onslaught. It was like trudging under a waterfall; water cascaded down her raincoat collar, drenching her to the bone, but there was no time to worry about it.

Time dragged on interminably, her body a numb blur of cold and ache. Mouth agape, spitting water and gasping for air, she suddenly heard a bloodcurdling scream from ahead—”Ah!”—followed by a frantic shout: “Stop! Stop! Don’t move—there’s something there!”

Gu Xianwang clutched the rope trailing behind her while straining to peer forward. The tour guide lay sprawled beside a massive boulder, gripping his ankle; Yao Cuo was crouched over him, probing carefully.

In that instant, a frantic whir of flapping wings erupted overhead—like a flock of birds. Gu Xianwang ignored it, slipping the Undying Turtle back on before wading through the torrent to join Yao Cuo.

“What is it?” she shouted.

Yao Cuo swiped the water from his face and pointed at the tour guide’s leg. “Rope snare! It’s a trap—watch your step!”

Fortunately, it was just a crude loop of rope, nothing serious. Yao Cuo drew his knife and severed the grass cord anchored to a heavy stone, then helped the tour guide to his feet. “You alright?”

“Just a little twist, no big deal,” the tour guide said, shaking his head. He shouted, “These snares don’t come alone—there’s more around here! Backtrack and find another way!”

Bereft of the Undying Turtle’s guidance, they stumbled about like blind men. With the rope’s end tied to him, the tour guide hauled them forward like a millstone grinding grain, progress agonizingly slow. Thunder rolled without cease overhead, the ground slick as oil beneath their feet. They crawled on hands and knees for what felt like hours before finally spotting a jutting rock overhang. The four crammed into the narrow cleft, at last able to catch their breath.

They pulled off their raincoat hoods, revealing faces etched with exhaustion and dishevelment. Yao Cuo gave Gu Xianwang a thorough once-over, confirming she was unhurt, before squatting down to rummage in his pack and produce several Snickers bars.

“Here, everyone eat somethin’. Gotta replenish our strength—can’t let hypothermia set in.”

Yao Cuo passed the Snickers bar over. The tour guide was bent over inspecting the bloody scrape on his ankle. Yao Cuo froze for a moment, then exclaimed in shock, “Bro, your back is covered in blood!”

“Huh?”

The tour guide craned his neck but couldn’t see behind him. He had a pink raincoat draped over his gray shirt; soaked through, the colors had blended into a murky haze. Now sheltered from the rain, he noticed the water trickling down was a pale red.

Yao Cuo carefully lifted the tour guide’s clothes. Rows of blisters across his back had burst open, the raw red-and-yellow sores crawling with over a dozen grayish-white bugs. They clung tightly to his flesh, still wriggling.

A shiver ran down Gu Xianwang’s spine. Her voice trembled as she said, “Don’t—hold still for now.”

She took the windproof lighter from Yao Cuo and held up a small knife. “Heat it over the flame to sterilize it.” The lighter’s flame danced shakily as she heated the blade tip until it glowed. She glanced at the tour guide. “I’ll pick off these gu worms for you.”

The tour guide had Yao Cuo steady his shoulders. He nodded and gritted his teeth. “It’s fine. Go ahead.”

The scalding knife tip probed into the pale, blistered flesh, hooking under the gu worm’s legs and flicking it free in one swift motion. One by one, the inch-long grubs dropped to the ground, where Yao Cuo stomped them into yellow paste, one foot at a time.

Gu Xianwang worked with total focus, clearing the bugs from his back, but she didn’t relax. “There are still some… they’ve burrowed into the meat. Can’t hook them out.”

Digging deeper would mean carving open the flesh, and in these conditions, Gu Xianwang didn’t dare risk enlarging the wound. Infection could kill him.

The tour guide straightened up, water streaming down his face—rain or sweat, it was impossible to tell. He tugged at the corner of his mouth, trying to play it cool. “No big deal. Feels way better already. Thanks, Miss Gu.”

Gu Xianwang pressed her lips together, unable to muster a smile. She wasn’t a doctor, and the heavy weight of another’s life in her hands felt terrible. It dragged her thoughts back to her own family.

It was as if it was all her fault.

“Xianwang?” Yao Cuo took the knife back from her and rinsed it with rainwater. “You okay?”

Gu Xianwang shook her head silently.

Ye Chan suddenly cried out, “Is that a person over there?”

Gu Xianwang jolted, her gaze snapping toward where Ye Chan was pointing, tense as a bowstring. Sure enough, in the distance, a figure cloaked in a straw rain cape was pushing through the underbrush toward them.

Who would be out in the mountain forest during a downpour like this?

“Shh.”

After watching for a moment and seeing no one else following, Gu Xianwang nodded to Yao Cuo. He called out, “Hey, friend!”

“Yeah! Where y’all at?” came a reply in a thick local accent.

As the rain tapered off, the man drew near, and they could see he was mountain folk, middle-aged and weathered.

He looked at them in surprise. “How’d you folks end up all the way out here?”

The tour guide jumped in. “Aw, man, I was guiding some adventure tourists through the woods when this rain hit outta nowhere. Took a wrong turn.”

The mountain folk recognized his accent and frowned at him, clearly thinking he was a lousy guide.

“Oh, it’s the rainy season, y’know. Look at you, soaked to the bone. C’mon, follow me to the wooden house. We’ll get a fire going.”

He introduced himself as Old Stick, a lifelong bachelor who lived alone in these mountains. He stayed in an old wooden cabin left behind by a hunter, scraping by on welfare. Sometimes he’d set traps down the slope for wild chickens or rats to eat.

The rope snare that had caught the tour guide was one of his.

What a case of strangers turned saviors.

Inside the wooden house, they finally had shelter from the rain. Old Stick stoked the fire pit with firewood, and warm steam began to rise, chasing away the chill. The four of them stripped off their tattered raincoats and huddled by the fire to dry out.

A chattering noise came from under the windowsill. Gu Xianwang turned and saw a black-feathered myna bird cocking its head, preening its feathers.

Old Stick filled a large tea mug with water and set it to boil. “That’s Xizi. It flew back to let me know something was in my trap. Didn’t figure it’d be people.”

Yao Cuo gave an awkward laugh. “Yeah, good thing Uncle Old Stick showed up.”

Gu Xianwang pulled alcohol and cotton balls from her waterproof backpack. She had the tour guide take off his shoe so she could disinfect the wound while everything was still dry.

Old Stick glanced at the injury. “Whoa, that’s scraped up good,” he said flatly, without much remorse.

Ye Chan had been squinting through the rain, her eyes irritated. As Old Stick sat nearby rolling a cigarette, she asked, “Uncle Old Stick, any villages around here?”

Old Stick turned to look at her. His face twitched oddly for a second before he dropped his gaze back to his smoke. “Nope.”

“Oh.” Ye Chan turned to Gu Xianwang. “So what do we do tonight?”

Old Stick finished rolling, lit it with a twig from the fire, took a puff, and stood up. “Y’all can bunk here tonight. I’ll go grab somethin’ to cook.”

Yao Cuo looked delighted. “We couldn’t impose like that.”

Old Stick waved him off and stepped outside, heading around to the back of the house to fetch whatever he had.

After he left, Gu Xianwang finally spoke. “Staying here one night isn’t so bad—at least it’s dry. After dinner, you two should take some antibiotics to ward off any infection.”

Ye Chan lowered her voice. “I’m doing all right. It’s just my eyes that are a little itchy.”

Yao Cuo noticed the rain had stopped and pulled a clean set of clothes from his pack. “Get out of those wet things. You girls go first—we’ll wait outside.”

Ye Chan beamed. “Perfect. Where’s Uncle Old Stick? Let him know when he gets back.”

Gu Xianwang suddenly frowned. “Do you smell something?”

Yao Cuo sniffed the air. “Firewood, I guess.”

The tour guide blinked in confusion. “Smells kinda sweet to me.”

“Sweet?” Ye Chan didn’t notice the odd lilt in her own voice—how it pitched up high before crashing down, drifting away like she was three sheets to the wind.

Gu Xianwang lurched to her feet. “Op… open… the door…”

Bang! The wooden door locked shut from the outside. Gu Xianwang’s eyes flew wide as she staggered forward two steps. Her vision blurred, and she crumpled to the floor.

A moment later, the door creaked open again. Old Stick stood there, hand clamped over his mouth and nose, coldly surveying the four sprawled bodies.

He tossed a grayish-white bug to Xizi, flung open the window, and barked, “Go.”

Xizi snatched up the bug and gulped it down with a toss of its head. It chirped twice, beat its wings, and took flight.

Its glossy feathers unfurled on the breeze as it skimmed low over the ink-black mountain woods, heading back the way they had come.

No one saw it: down in a narrow crevice beneath the rocky outcrop, a few rain-sodden leaves had been eaten away to a charred black crisp.