Folklore and Strange Tales: At the Start, You Retrieve the Sea-Suppressing Black Iron

Zhou Banxian paused for a moment while twisting the bottle cap, then unscrewed it, poured half a glass of wine, and gulped it down.

He wiped his mouth but said nothing.

I poured a second glass and drank it all.

Cheng Xiaojin didn't urge him, but sat on the stool and waited.

When he finished his third cup of wine, Zhou Banxian slammed the cup down on the table, let out a long breath, and the aroma of wine filled the small room.

"Besides me, has anyone else used this word with you recently?"

"It was Boss Lin who mentioned it to me, saying that he had a diagram of an array, which was the key to the Eight-Armed Nezha City array."

Zhou Banxian touched the old map with his finger, finding the Forbidden City in the very center, and tapped it twice with his fingernail.

"Does Boss Lin have a formation diagram?"

"I saw it with my own eyes. It's a copper sheet, about half the size of my palm, and the pattern is exactly the same as the one drawn on page 87 of the tattered scroll."

Zhou Banxian looked up and stared at him for three seconds.

"You've read the incomplete scroll."

"I've seen it."

"Did Ma Wenchang show it to you?"

"It was left to me by my grandfather; it's under a camphor wood chest."

Zhou Banxian closed his eyes briefly, and when he opened them again, his gaze was different, carrying an indescribable heaviness.

"Your grandfather was better at hiding things than at appraising them."

"Uncle Zhou, I know too little right now. The fragment mentions a formation diagram but doesn't elaborate on it. Boss Lin mentioned the Eight-Armed Nezha City but didn't explain it clearly. Everyone around me is playing riddles with me. I'm about to suffocate from these riddles."

Zhou Banxian poured himself another half glass of wine, but this time he didn't gulp it down; he took a small sip.

Do you know who built Beijing?

"I've heard of Yao Guangxiao, the Black-Robed Prime Minister, from the Yongle era."

"Do you know how he chose the layout when he built the city?"

"You told me before that Yao Guangxiao built Beijing in the shape of Nezha, making it look like a human, with Zhengyangmen being a head or something, but you didn't go on to say anything more."

Zhou Banxian took off his reading glasses and placed them on the table. He then took a brush and started drawing a line on the map, beginning from Zhengyangmen.

"You know that Zhengyang Gate is Nezha's head."

Zhou Banxian's pen tip brushed against the Chongwen Gate.

"Chongwen Gate and Xuanwu Gate are like two ears."

"The ventilation holes left inside the barbican are the ear holes."

The brush moved upwards, drawing two circles in the northeast and northwest of the inner city.

"Dongzhimen, Xizhimen, Andingmen, and Deshengmen are like Nezha's four arms. Each arm corresponds to an official road, which is like a meridian. Qi enters the city from outside through the official road, just like blood."

The pen tip then landed on the east and west sides.

"Chaoyangmen and Fuchengmen are like two legs, stepping on two waterways, one to the east and one to the west. Tonghui River and the moat are like the wind-fire wheels that Nezha rides."

"Nine inner gates, seven outer gates, and four imperial city gates, totaling twenty city gates, corresponding to all the joints and acupoints of Nezha's three heads, six arms, and two feet."

Cheng Xiaojin stared at the red circles on the map, connecting them in his mind to form a line that indeed resembled a human figure with outstretched arms.

"I roughly know these things, but what does the array diagram have to do with this?"

Zhou Banxian took a sip of wine and lowered his voice by half a tone.

"The one you see on the ground is Yangcheng, the one on the surface, for the common people to live in, and for the emperor to sit on the dragon throne."

"But when Yao Guangxiao was building the city, he also dug a mirrored structure underground."

Cheng Xiaojin's already small eyes widened slightly.

"Each city gate on the ground corresponds to a Yin gate directly below it. The walls of the Yang city correspond to the Yin walls underground. The central axis of the Yang city corresponds to a Yin axis underground. From Yongding Gate to the Bell and Drum Tower, there is an axis underground that is exactly the same as the one on the ground."

"You mean the City of Shadows?"

"The City of Shadows".

Zhou Banxian pronounced those two words slowly and deliberately.

"Yao Guangxiao used one town after another, with the living city suppressing the dead city, and the living suppressing the dead, and he did not move for six hundred years."

"What inanimate object are you pressing down on?"

No, it's not an inanimate object.

Zhou Banxian's tone suddenly changed, and something seemed to be moving in his cloudy eyes.

"It's alive."

"What do you mean?"

"Hold back your treasure..."

Cheng Xiaojin clenched her fists on her knees.

Have you ever heard of the term "treasure hunter"?

"I've heard of it. My grandfather mentioned it once. He said that in the old days, there was a craftsman who specialized in finding treasures for high-ranking officials and nobles. The method he used wasn't digging, robbing, or stealing, but rather 'stealing'."

"Yes, trap the treasure in one place and let it grow on its own, absorbing the spiritual energy of heaven and earth and the essence of the earth's veins. Ten, twenty, fifty, a hundred years, the longer it is trapped, the more mellow and powerful it becomes. When the time comes, take it out. Then it will no longer be a treasure, but a spiritual object."

"Did Yao Guangxiao have something he was holding back in the City of the Dead?"

"Not just one."

Zhou Banxian slammed his brush down heavily on the Forbidden City in the center of the map, causing a blot of red ink to appear.

"It's a set."

"The nine array diagrams guide and divide the nine earth vein nodes, each of which suppresses a branch of earth energy. The nine branches converge at the array eye, which is located directly below the Forbidden City."

"Once all nine array diagrams are pulled out, the seal on Yin City will loosen, and the things that have been trapped underground for six hundred years will rise to the surface."

"Then... what will happen if it comes out?"

Zhou Banxian poured the last half glass of wine, and the bottle was empty. He threw the bottle aside, and it rolled once on the floor.

After finishing the drink, his voice became clearer.

"Holding back the treasure, six hundred years... Do you know what it means to have the earth's energy locked underground for six hundred years? The essence of the entire North China dragon vein is siphoned into one point, and that point is the array's core."

"If you remove the seal, it's like blowing up the dam gate. Where will the water go? It will go everywhere... The dragon vein will dissipate its energy, and the entire feng shui pattern of North China will have to be completely re-washed."

"To put it mildly, the entire underground watercourse within a hundred miles will have to change, well water will become turbid, foundations will sink, and old houses will crack—these are all minor issues."

"To put it another way..."

Zhou Bansian stopped.

Cheng Xiaojin waited for him to finish speaking.

The old man wiped the wine stains from the corner of his mouth with the back of his hand, his voice hoarse.

"To put it bluntly, if the dragon vein is severed, the fortune is severed, and everything accumulated over six hundred years will be completely lost. That's not just a matter for one city."

The room remained quiet for a long time.

Cheng Xiaojin went over every word Zhou Banxian said in his mind several times.

"Which number out of nine is the piece that Boss Lin is holding?"

"I don't know about that. I've only seen descriptions of the Nine-Piece Array Diagram in ancient books, I've never seen the real thing. The attached diagram you saw on the fragment is a general pattern diagram, the patterns of the nine pieces are different, corresponding to different directions of the earth's veins."

"So how many of these nine pieces are still in their original positions?"

Zhou Banxian put his reading glasses back on, his gaze falling through the lenses onto the old map covered in red circles.

"As I told you, of the nine suppressing objects, no more than three are intact. The other six have either been dug up or disturbed. But I'm not sure if the ones that were dug up necessarily include the array diagram. Suppressing objects and array diagrams are not the same thing. Suppressing objects are the overt means of suppression, while array diagrams are the foundation underground."

"Is it possible that my dad pulled it out?"

Zhou Banxian suddenly looked up at him.

"What did you say?"

"Twenty years ago, my father was tracking a smuggling route from Beijing to Southeast Asia, dealing in feng shui items, ironware, and bronzeware. The array diagram that Boss Lin has might have come from this route. I'm wondering if it's possible that my father was investigating the whereabouts of these things?"

Zhou Banxian put down his wine glass, placed both hands on the table, and his fingers trembled slightly.

Cheng Xiaojin looked at him.

"Uncle Zhou, how much do you actually know?"

Zhou Banxian did not answer this question.

He stared at the map for a full ten seconds before speaking, his voice much lower than before, almost as if he were whispering.

"Your father came to see me."

Cheng Xiaojin's back tensed up instantly.

"When?"

"In the winter of 1996, on the day of heavy snow, your father came knocking on my door wearing a military overcoat, holding a rubbing in his hand, only half of it, just half of it."

"What did he ask?"

"He asked the exact same questions you asked today... What exactly is the Eight-Armed Nezha City? Where exactly is the Yin City? What exactly is it hiding?"

Cheng Xiaojin clenched his fist.

"Did you tell him?"

"Yes, I told him..."

Zhou Banxian's voice began to hoarse, "I told him everything I knew: the approximate location of Yin City, the distribution pattern of the array diagram, and the principle of treasure hunting."

"and then?"

Zhou Banxian slammed the cup on the table, splashing wine everywhere.

"Then the following spring, your father disappeared."

The air was so still you could hear the ticking of the clock on the wall.

Cheng Xiaojin sat motionless on the stool.

Zhou Banxian looked up at him, something churning in his cloudy old eyes, something that was hard to tell whether it was guilt or fear.

"Your father asked me that question too, and I told him... and then he disappeared..."

The old man grabbed Cheng Xiaojin's wrist, his withered fingers digging into her flesh, leaving white marks on her skin with his nails.

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