455 Well
After getting the promise from Wang Pingan, Han Fei told the man to go home early but Pingan took his phone and scrolled up the delivery record. He pointed at the shop. “Here… ordered a lot of rice.”
Han Fei looked at the screen. Wang Pingan’s first white rice order was from the 2nd hand shop.
“I, I made the delivery but the rice was abandoned, the employee said no one had ordered it.” Wang Pingan uttered slowly. He was trying to express something.
“Our shop has ordered white rice?” If only the dead would order white rice, then it meant that the 2nd hand shop had dead people too. “The shop is filled with recycled antiques, it’s normal for them to contain some spirits. It proves that they are authentic. Perhaps the boss likes to collect such things.” A normal worker would have panicked from fear but Han Fei thought this was nothing.
After Wang Pingan left, Han Fei returned to the counter, stood at the camera blind spot and switched off the surveillance. “I love my job and see the shop as my home. There shouldn’t be any problem for me to check the items around my house.”
Han Fei put on the landlord’s ring from his inventory. Once the ring was on his finger, the familiar chill returned. ‘I knew these recycled objects aren’t normal. The boss built this place not out of feelings, but had an ulterior motive.’ Raising his hand, Han Fei used the ring as a compass. The ring led him to the altar. A fake altar was placed deep inside the store, the real altar was underground. Ever since Han Fei found out about the real altar, he forgot all about the fake altar. However, the landlord’s ring was telling Han Fei otherwise. This altar was radiating a cold presence!
Han Fei pulled back the black cloth. The wooden altar looked normal, it was no different from the altars Han Fei had encountered before, it was like an aged art piece. The altar’s doors were nailed shut. Han Fei leaned closer and he realized the wooden planks were written with many curses like whoever opened this altar would be cursed with tragedy and misfortune.
The altar aboveground and belowground had the same size but they couldn’t be more different. You could feel the strange presence of the underground altar when you got near. Once the black cloth was pulled back, the whole underground storeroom would become strange.
However, the altar before Han Fei, even though its doors were sealed, didn't give off any presence of danger. ‘Should I open it? As Big Sin’s owner, Lee Zai’s friend and the carrier of several Unmentionable’s curses, I should be the unluckiest person in the cryptic world, right?’ Han Fei put on the gloves and found the toolbox. Since the surveillance was switched off and there was no customer, Han Fei started to remove the wooden planks. The landlord’s ring kept warning Han Fei but he didn’t care. Like Big Sin, Han Fei didn’t target the front of the altar but started from the sides. When the small door was almost detached from the altar, the lights inside the shop started to flicker, a wounded arm reached out from the altar to grab at Han Fei’s finger!
Han Fei was prepared. He already reacted very fast but he still couldn’t avoid the arm. His body was dragged towards the altar. Han Fei could barely maintain his balance. His bloodshot left eye glanced into the dark altar, there was a wounded man stuffed inside. The man’s limbs and body were twisted together and shoved inside the altar. His pale face was directed towards the front door. His mouth was left hanging half-open and black mist kept rushing into his body.
‘He’s wearing the same uniform as I am?!’ While he struggled, Han Fei’s brain spun quickly. He then shouted at the top of his lungs. “I’m here to deliver red sweaters! Your mother has been looking for you! Because of you, she comes to the shop daily, she wants to be reunited with you!”
His body still leaned towards the altar but the force became smaller. “It’s the boss who did this to you and now he wants to kill me! It was your mother who saved me! I am here to thank her!”
Han Fei was not fully acting, he was not reading lines, he really did mean the words he said. The force dwindled further. Han Fei found the opportunity to roll away. He didn’t aim to escape. Instead he grabbed at the rucksack not far away. After the old lady dragged him out from the illusions, she left the clothes she wanted to donate that night not far away from the altar.
Han Fei reached in to grab the bloody red sweater. He ran back to the altar. “Your mom has been tricked by the boss. She thought doing 1000 good deeds will free you but the boss never intended to let us go! After he has made use of us and exhausted every drop of our worth, he will kill us! I had no other choice but to take the risk to open the altar!” Han Fei placed the red sweater before him like a shield. “Your mom has saved me! So even if I die, I will fulfill her wish! Let me suffer the boss’ anger. You can use this time to reunite with your mother, she has waited for you for a decade already, we mustn’t let her wait any longer!”
Han Fei shouted without any reservation. He had stunned the man inside the altar. For the past decade, this was the first time the man had seen the light of day and the first person he saw was this strange man. The wounded arm stopped dragging Han Fei. The folded man opened up his mouth like he was trying to say something. However, his teeth and tongue had been removed so he couldn’t make any sound. He struggled inside the dark altar but he couldn’t even move his body, his flesh had grown into the altar.
“What is it that you want to say? If you can’t leave the altar, I can bring the altar to her…” Before Han Fei finished, the man inside the altar struggled, he didn’t want his mother to see him like this.
“Then how can I help you?” The man’s only moveable arm slammed at the bottom of the altar until he exhausted himself out.
The lights returned to normal and the man disappeared. The fake altar only had a death portrait left. The man inside the black and white picture was quite handsome. He was mature and melancholic like he hadn’t smiled for a long time already. Looking at the picture and comparing it to the folded man, Han Fei shivered. ‘They are the same person?’
He took out the picture and hid it inside the red sweater. Then Han Fei moved the altar to see if there was anything hidden underneath. The wooden altar was much heavier than Han Fei anticipated. He tried his best to move it. After the altar was moved, strange-looking bugs crawled out, their cries sounded like children crying. Han Fei continued to apply force. After the altar was completely moved out of the way, a dark hole appeared before him. “The altar on the surface is to block off this hole?”
Capillaries-like roots grew near the hole and the bottom of the altar. When Han Fei moved the altar, he snapped off most of the roots. “It looks connected to the basement.”
Han Fei leaned on the hole and looked down. He saw a well and the water surface was floating with trash and photographs. Han Fei found a fishing line in the store. He wanted to hook the stuff up. However, when the fishing line touched the water surface, something emerged from underwater and then a powerful force pulled the fishing line into the well. Seeing the bloody cut on his hand, Han Fei was shocked. Before he could react, the fishing line was already dragged away from him.
“Thankfully I didn’t go down there myself.” Han Fei gauged the distance between the mouth of the well and the water surface. Han Fei turned to close the shop. And then he found an iron shovel and pickaxe at the shop. He carried the tools and went into the underground basement. He stopped at the last row of shelves. The altar was on the other side of the shelves, it seemed to sit facing away from the well. After moving the shelf away, Han Fei tapped on the dusty wall. “If I open a hole here, it should lead me to the well.”
However, it was getting late. ‘The boss might come in the morning. I need to return everything to their places and make my move tomorrow night.’ Han Fei knew that all the pain that befell the altar owner was the doing of the mall boss but he didn’t plan to quit the job, if anything, he loved his job even more. He wanted to work here long term and used his passion to correct the boss.
‘The boss should have received the message from the western city already. After he found out I was not made a cripple by those gangsters, he would take more severe revenge on me.
‘I have offended the boss but I can’t lose this job… in that case, the only way forward is to remove the boss.
‘The mall boss has strayed from the straight and narrow. There’s no point keeping him around.’
