Daomu Biji: Wu Xie’s Private Notes

Old Dog Wu was my grandfather. He was the first generation of the Wu family in Changsha. He was an orthodox grave robber who came from a village full of grave robbers. He hurt his nose in the early days of liberation. Everyone was too familiar with this story, so there’s no need to elaborate on it.

My grandfather, like Chen Pi Ah Si, had also been through a major case, but it was on an even higher level because it involved the Warring States silk book. It was a scandal of cosmic proportions at the time, and there were so many people involved that I can’t say too much about it.

In short, that case almost led to the entire reshuffle of Changsha’s grave robbers. After my grandfather was deceived by Qiu Dekao, he came to Hangzhou and that was how my family ended up here. The Mystic Nine had fallen because of this, and they never managed to get back up again. That was why Old Dog Wu was so famous, but it wasn’t a good reputation. After all, so many people went to jail or died during that turmoil, and only my grandfather survived. There were bound to be some rumors.

In my opinion, this incident was the first time that people from the top had paid attention to the Mystic Nine in Changsha, and they started to look into it and arrest people. As a result, Grandpa kept a low profile afterwards. That was why I was so surprised when someone suddenly asked about him.

Old Dog Wu was the king of dogs. Of course, the most interesting things were about the dogs he kept. My grandfather loved dogs and kept many of them. He understood them very well, but at the same time, he also enjoyed eating dog meat, which was very strange.

My grandfather had a favorite dog called “Three Inch Nail” that was a very small Tibetan spaniel. This kind of dog wouldn’t grow too big, and only weighed a few hundred grams. My grandfather kept it in his sleeve wherever he went.

He said that it was the most vigilant kind of dog, and really distrusted strangers. It was difficult to gain its trust, and if someone meant harm, the dog hidden in the sleeve would definitely warn its owner.

My grandfather didn’t trust people very much after the accident. The cruel world made him feel very discouraged, so he always took this dog with him. But Hangzhou was alright because it was home, and there weren’t as many complicated things as those in the old Changsha.

However, my grandfather told me one thing that made me look at this dog with admiration.

My grandfather might have been afraid of people’s hearts, but he wasn’t afraid of gods and ghosts, although there were some exceptions.

He once went to Nanning in Guangxi and stayed in a guest house. That night, when he went to the bathroom (all the guest houses at the time only had public bathrooms), he found that part of it was strange. It was as if the bathroom had been remodeled, for there were wooden boards nailed around it.

He was suffering from diarrhea and was very bored, so he looked into the gap between the wooden boards and found that there was an iron gate behind them.

He thought about it for a while and finally understood what had happened. It turned out that the boss had cordoned off a one- or two-meter section of the corridor to make a bathroom. This door had originally been at the end of the corridor.

My grandfather found it strange. Didn’t that mean there was a room missing? Why would the boss do this?

The planks were warped, and the nails were rotten, so he broke the planks and looked inside. He found that the iron gate behind the planks was rusty. Strangely enough, there were some traces of ingot candles on it, and the gate had been welded shut.

The iron gate was a kind of fenced gate with a wooden door inside. Everyone should be familiar with this kind of setup since it was the earliest anti-theft gate. When Grandpa stretched his hand over and pushed it, he found that the wooden door inside was unlocked and could be pushed open.

He thought it was a little strange, but he was so courageous that it was impossible to be scared in such a place. He pushed hard, trying to force the wooden door wide open.

But when the door had been pushed to a certain extent, it hit something and couldn't be opened any more. My grandpa pushed hard a few times, but found that it didn’t feel right. It didn’t feel like something was stuck, but like someone was blocking the door.

He took a breath, immediately closed the wooden door, and turned his head and left. Behind him, he heard the sound of the wooden door being opened by something.

Back in his room, he felt that things were strange, but after waiting for a while, there was no other movement. He had encountered too many weird things and didn't want to think about it anymore. Maybe the boss here was a voyeur.

In the middle of the night, he suddenly felt uncomfortable and smelled a very strange odor. He opened his eyes in a daze, and saw a strangely tall person standing at the foot of his bed. The person had an unusually long head, and that, coupled with his height, made him taller than two meters. But he was as thin as a piece of firewood. He wasn’t wearing any clothes, and the skin on his body seemed to be transparent under the moonlight coming in through the window.

The most peculiar thing was that Three Inch Nail was lying on his body, and staring at the two-meter-high monster very calmly. Not only did it not bark, but it also wasn’t afraid at all.

After that, Grandpa fell asleep again. Everything was fine when he woke up the next morning, but when he remembered what had happened last night, he broke out in a cold sweat.

After he left Nanning, he thought about this matter constantly. What exactly was that thing? And Three Inch Nail had also behaved very strangely that night.

Grandpa told me that when he asked someone about it, that person told him that what he had seen was a bit like a deformity sufferer. In Tibet, the Tibetan dogs would pay respect to the Bodhisattva. They were usually kept in a temple and would sit below the seat of the Bodhisattva statues. Maybe the reason Three Inch Nail was lying on his body was to save his life.

After that, my grandfather was impressed with Three Inch Nail, and it became his favorite dog.

That dog was indeed a bit fascinating. Three days after my grandfather passed away, the dog disappeared and never showed up again. I didn’t know if it had been stolen and eaten among the chaos, or what.