Chapter 1 — Dusk Seals the Village, Enter Not the Wild Night

Shen Mu raised the sickle and carefully cut into the cowhide. Strangely, when the hide was peeled open, not a drop of blood flowed. And inside the hide was emptiness—no flesh, no bones. When the hide was half peeled, a woman of twenty or thirty rolled out from within. Her legs were still wrapped in the cow's legs, flesh and skin fused with the hide, but her upper body had come free. The woman, hair disheveled, snatched the sickle from the stunned Shen Mu's hand and in two or three strokes cut away the hide from her legs. She looked at Shen Mu, malice rising in her heart, and pressed the sickle to his throat. She sneered, "Little villain, it's because of you that I was turned into a cow! For eleven years I could only eat grass, and I had to nurse you! Pity me—I had just given birth before that witch ambushed me and turned me into a cow to feed you! Today I'm finally free. First I'll kill you, then I'll slaughter every villain in this village!"

Shen Mu's mind reeled. He had no idea what this woman who had emerged from the cowhide was talking about. The woman was about to cut him down when suddenly a chill pierced her back. She looked down—a blade protruded from her chest.

"Mu'er, your Grandpa Alchemist says it's time to go back and take your medicine." The woman's corpse fell. Behind her stood Grandpa Lame Sou from the village, kind-eyed and simple-faced, holding a blood-dripping blade. He smiled at Shen Mu.

"Grandpa Lame Sou..." Shen Mu's body went weak. He looked at the cowhide and the woman's corpse on the ground, still unable to collect himself.

"Go back, go back." Lame Sou patted his shoulder and chuckled.

Shen Mu stumbled back toward the village, one foot high and one foot low. He looked back and saw Lame Sou toss the woman's corpse into the river. The shock of it was so great that he did not even know when he had returned to the village.

"Shen Mu! You little brat, what did I tell you? When night falls, don't go out!"

Night fell, and the statues at the four corners of Yincan Village lit up on their own again. Granny Zhu caught Shen Mu just as he was about to slip out of the village to check on the cowhide by the river, and dragged him back.

"Granny, why can't we go out when it's dark?" Shen Mu asked, looking up.

"When it's dark, terrible things move in the Gloom. Step outside and you die." Granny Zhu said solemnly, "The Night-Guarding Idols protect us. The things in the Gloom dare not enter the village."

"Do other villages have statues like these?" Shen Mu asked curiously.

Granny Zhu nodded, but her face showed worry. She kept looking outside the village and said in a low voice, "Lame Sou should be back by now... I really shouldn't have let him go out. That fellow has only one leg..."

"Granny, something strange happened today..."

Shen Mu hesitated, then told her about the woman emerging from the cow's belly. Granny Zhu said offhandedly, "You mean that woman? Lame Sou told me. He handled it well. I said we should sell the cow when you were weaned at four, but you couldn't bear to part with it, so I let you keep it. See? Now something's happened. I told you—nursing until four would make you attached to the cow."

Shen Mu blushed. Being weaned at four was indeed a bit long, but that didn't seem to be the point.

"Granny, that woman was killed by Grandpa Lame..."

"Good riddance." Granny Zhu said, "That was letting her off easy. She should have died eleven years ago. If she hadn't been needed to nurse you, would she have lived this long?"

Shen Mu was baffled.

Granny Zhu glanced at him. "That woman was the wife of the lord of Crimson Dragon City, a thousand li from here. The lord of Crimson Dragon City is lustful, and she is jealous. He likes to philander and seize respectable women by force. Every time he defiled a woman, this lady would have her beaten to death. I infiltrated Crimson Dragon City, originally intending to kill her, but I saw she had just given birth—the child was only three months old—and I thought of how you had no milk to drink, and she had milk. So I turned her into a cow and brought her back to nurse you. I never expected her to break free of the seal and speak. She nearly did you harm."

Shen Mu was dumbstruck. "Granny, how can a person be turned into a cow?"

Granny Zhu chuckled, revealing her half-mouth of scattered teeth. "You want to learn? I'll teach you... Lame Sou is back!"

Shen Mu looked. Lame Sou was limping toward them, one hand on a crutch, the other gripping the game on his back. The Gloom surged toward the village like a tide. Granny Zhu cried out urgently, "Lame fool, hurry, hurry!"

"What's the rush?"

Lame Sou continued toward the village, unhurried. The moment he stepped inside, the thick Gloom swallowed the village whole. The game on his back was a striped tiger, still alive. Its tail had been grazed by the Gloom. Suddenly the tiger let out a mournful roar. Shen Mu looked quickly and saw that the tiger's tail was nothing but segments of bone—hide, flesh, and blood all gone, as if gnawed away by something. He looked curiously at the Gloom outside the village. It was a murky expanse—nothing to be seen.

"What exactly is in the Gloom?" he wondered.