Everyone was silent. Su Wan wanted to raise his hand for a moment, but lowered his head when he saw the atmosphere in the room. Zhang Qianjun Wanma obviously didn’t understand that my question was meant to be a kind of joke, but instinctively felt that the atmosphere was off.
“He’s joking,” Fatty explained. “What he really means is: I don’t believe there’s such a thing in this world as the Five Ghosts Transportation ritual, so you might as well elaborate. When did your Zhang family start to make a living like this?”
“I can’t explain it clearly to people like you.” Zhang Qianjun Wanma said disdainfully. “You know that concrete block? I’ve already shown my hand. You might not believe it, but some people do.”
“Wait,” Little Brother Zhang said. “You’ve spent so much time with the patriarch. Didn’t he suddenly disappear in front of you? He knows this trick. Hasn’t he ever shown you?”
Fatty and I gave each other an uncomfortable look. It was true that Poker-Face would suddenly disappear from right in front of us, but I didn’t know how he did it.
It didn’t really matter, though. He disappeared when he wanted to and reappeared whenever he felt like it.
I had heard that the giant Buddha statue at Zhang Qishan’s home (the head of the Nine Gates) had also suddenly appeared one day. I even remembered that Poker-Face had suddenly disappeared right before my eyes when we were crawling along the stone road at the Heavenly Palace so long ago. At that time, I thought my mind was playing tricks on me.
“Oh, it seems like you’re not that familiar with each other,” Little Brother Zhang said happily. “Now do you see? You’re not surnamed Zhang, so no matter how close you guys are, he won’t tell you a lot of things.”
Was Poker-Face actually a Taoist priest?
Could it be that every time he disappeared, he wasn’t walking away by himself, but was being carried away by magic? I touched my chin, imagining Poker-Face wearing a Taoist outfit. It was an amusing thought, and I couldn’t help but think that Little Brother Zhang was messing with me.
I could even detect a teasing look in his eyes that was kind of condescending. It seemed that all Zhangs—no matter what their status—saw themselves as different from ordinary people. Although I had done so many things for them, they still thought of me as a mere “mortal”.
This habitual “mortal” label made me very unhappy.
I wanted to keep talking, but Black Glasses had finished putting everything away and motioned to me from behind Brother Zhang, telling me not to ask.
We went back and forth for a while, before finally calling it quits. In the end, Fatty and I didn’t agree to help them rob the tomb. When Black Glasses showed us out, Fatty was still reluctant to give up, “Come on, Black Glasses, what’s wrong with you? Why are you letting these two stay in your home? They’re obviously liars. Su Wan, your master is old and senile. You’re a young man. You have to tell your master to watch out for these kinds of frauds. No, I should call the police.”
Black Glasses ignored him and looked at me, knowing that I had something to ask. “What do they mean? Do you really believe them or do you have other plans?” I asked him.
Black Glasses hooked his arm around my shoulder and chuckled softly, “I’m with them. I stole the concrete block and I put the glasses in that cup. I’m their support. I can’t expose them. I have to make them feel that I’m with them, so that if we really end up going, they won’t guard against me and will only guard against you.”
I frowned at him. “Is this really necessary? Why do you have to play this fake game? Why not just honestly rob the tomb instead of pretending to be a Big Bad Wolf?”
“We want to deceive someone,” Black Glasses said. “If you want to join, you have to help. We can’t make this trip without him.”
“Who?” We asked in unison.
“His nickname is Xiao Canglang,” Black Glasses said. “He’s an unlicensed traditional Chinese medicine practitioner.”
MereBear's Translation 