At that moment, I took the compass out of the yellow cloth bag. As soon as I looked at it in my hand, I saw the compass needle spinning and jumping as if it were dancing. I was instantly startled, thinking to myself, this place is damn sinister!

Seeing this situation, I didn’t dare linger any longer. I turned and told the villagers, “These stone statues are a bit strange. This is the first time I’ve seen the compass spin so wildly. Clearly, there’s evil yin energy involved here, and resentment is lingering nonstop. Everyone, let’s leave quickly. We can’t dig here anymore!”

Chapter Five: Human Head Marker Plaques

The compass, also known as luogeng or luojing, can be said to be the lifeblood of a feng shui master. Every master will only pass on their most important teachings and secrets to their favorite and most capable disciples before they die, and the compass is one of the inherited ritual objects. A feng shui master can judge whether the earth’s energy is pure and whether there is interference from evil magnetic fields based on the movement of the compass needle.

Just now, the compass needle in my hand was spinning, which is called “spinning needle,” also known as “deceiving needle.” It means that evil spirits have invaded, resentment is lingering all around, and it can harm people—this is a needle pattern that foretells great disaster. When I was very young, I saw this needle pattern while out dragon-seeking with Grandpa. At that time, we were traveling through deep mountains and forests, and happened to pass by an ownerless yang house at dusk. Grandpa and I planned to rest in that abandoned house. We sat in the living room, placed the compass flat on the ground, and suddenly the compass needle started spinning like a fan. As soon as Grandpa saw this, he immediately told me not to speak, to pack up, and leave. As we were leaving, I suddenly felt dizzy and my chest was tight. After we left that old house, Grandpa told me that this was the “deceiving needle” among the Eight Strange Needles, meaning there was an evil spirit nearby, and if we didn’t leave, disaster would strike. The next day, out of curiosity, we returned to that place and asked the nearby villagers, only to learn that the old house was a haunted house. Before liberation, a family of eight had all died at the hands of the Japanese devils— the men were killed, and the women were raped and then hanged in that house.

Grandpa said that the people in that house all died with deep resentment, so after death, their resentment lingered and refused to leave, turning the house into a haunted place. However, Grandpa also said we were lucky to have noticed the change in the compass in time; otherwise, if we hadn’t, the two of us might have lost our lives to evil spirits that night.

Every time I think back on that night, I still feel scared. In any case, whenever the spinning needle appears, disaster is imminent, and you must leave immediately. I think that’s why Edward suddenly fainted.

Back to the present—because I had just cured the fainted Edward, everyone no longer treated me like a child as before. Now, hearing my words, no one doubted me. The village secretary immediately gave the order to stop work, and everyone went home for now. The matter of road construction would be discussed another day.

Just like that, the villagers all listened to me and returned to the village. I also left the place with them. Although I didn’t know why the compass showed the presence of evil spirits—after all, the road being built was just an expansion of the old road, which generations had walked without incident—now something had happened, and it was clearly because of those strange stone statues that had just been unearthed.

I didn’t know exactly what those strange stone statues were, but the compass doesn’t lie. The presence of evil spirits was a fact. For now, besides stopping construction, all I could do was wait for Grandpa to return and decide what to do next.

For the rest of the day, the whole village was talking about the strange stone statues. The story spread from one to ten, ten to a hundred, and by the next day, the entire Chen Family Town knew about it. There were all kinds of rumors: some villages said we had dug up several Guanyin statues and many people had died; others said we had unearthed a huge coffin, and inside was a zombie covered in white hair. In short, the rumors became more and more outrageous, making people both shocked and amused!

Just as the rumors about the strange stone statues were spreading everywhere and everyone was on edge, Grandpa finally returned home after finishing feng shui work in the neighboring county. I told him everything that had happened in the village over the past two days. Without another word, Grandpa immediately asked me to take him to see the stone statues.

Soon, the villagers heard that my Grandpa had returned, so they came with me and Grandpa to the place outside the village where the stone statues had been unearthed. Grandpa looked the statues up and down for a while, then his expression grew grave. Seeing this, I knew Grandpa must have figured something out. So I asked him what exactly these stone statues were for—could they be something like burial figurines? And why did the compass always spin here? It was really strange.

Grandpa stared intently at the stone statues and shook his head, saying, “These aren’t burial figurines at all—they’re human head marker plaques!”

Human head marker plaques? Hearing this, not only were the villagers present startled, but I was both shocked and puzzled. Shocked because the name was terrifying, and puzzled as to what exactly these human head marker plaques were for.

Seeing everyone’s expressions, Grandpa naturally knew what we were thinking, so he began to tell us about the human head marker plaques. What I heard made my scalp tingle.