My first reaction at that moment was that it must be haunted, because everything I saw and heard was beyond my understanding, and only the tales of ghosts and spirits that adults often spoke of could explain it.

Hearing that mournful crying, I was truly terrified. I hurriedly threw away the incense, candles, and yellow paper in my hands and turned to run home...

After returning home, I fell ill in the second half of the night, running a high fever that wouldn’t go down. I lay in bed for three whole days before I recovered. After this incident, I began to doubt the so-called “Smash the Four Olds” campaign, and even started to feel some resistance to it. In my heart, Principal was a kind and caring Principal, yet died such a tragic death. On top of that, having seen with my own eyes the ghostly figure and heard the weeping of Principal that night, I began to wonder if ghosts and spirits really did exist in this world.

In the years that followed, it turned out that the old pagoda really was haunted, and it was the very Principal who had committed suicide that was causing the disturbances. In the following year or two, people often saw the ghost of Principal at the old pagoda at night. Because the pagoda was near the school, whenever there was a night of thunder and rain, we could hear the mournful cries coming from the direction of the pagoda, echoing for miles around, sending chills down the spines of all us students! Of course, that’s a story for another time.

After I recovered, although I was still a Red Guard, I was no longer as fanatical as before. And precisely because of this, not long after, when we went to destroy a temple, I narrowly escaped a bloody disaster!

This happened five or six days after I recovered. By then, the streets of the capital had been pretty much swept clean, so the Red Guard Captain at our school set his sights on a temple in the suburbs.

During those days, in the campaign to Smash the Four Olds, thousands of ancient temples and monasteries across China were destroyed almost overnight, and this time, we also picked such an ancient temple!

Chapter 8: The Bodhisattva of Human Bones

This happened five or six days after I recovered. By then, the streets of the capital had been pretty much swept clean, so the Red Guard Captain at our school set his sights on a temple in the suburbs.

During those days, in the campaign to Smash the Four Olds, thousands of ancient temples and monasteries across China were destroyed almost overnight, and this time, we also picked such an ancient temple!

The temple was on a mountain in the suburbs. A large group of us Red Guards shouted and climbed to the top of the mountain and entered the temple. As soon as we entered, Captain waved his hand, and dozens of Red Guards rushed in and tied up several old monks in the temple, binding them tightly, and then locked them in the abbot’s quarters. Then Captain shouted that this was the birthplace of “monsters and demons,” that everything here was a malignant tumor left by the evil old society, and that we must sweep away all the poisonous tumors of feudal superstition!

As soon as Captain finished speaking, all the Red Guards were fired up, each one eager to act as if injected with chicken blood. Then, at Captain’s command, all the Red Guards began a massive cleanup. In no time, the temple’s steles, scriptures, Buddha statues, and offering tables were all smashed or burned. A centuries-old temple was thus destroyed just like that.

Of course, because I had already begun to feel resistance deep inside, although I was there, I was not as fanatical as the others. Instead, I volunteered to guard the old monks in the abbot’s quarters.

The old monks locked in the abbot’s quarters ranged in age from over eighty to just over fifty. The younger monks had already fled when the Cultural Revolution broke out, but these old monks stayed behind, prepared to die.

From the moment they were captured and locked up, these old monks never resisted or cursed us. When they saw me volunteer to guard the abbot’s quarters, one of the old monks spoke: “Since we are willing to stay here, we will not run away. Why do we need to be guarded? Why don’t you go with the others?”

I looked around and saw that everyone else had left, so I knew the old monk was talking to me. I shook my head and replied that I didn’t want to go with them.

The old monks looked at me in confusion, as if I were some kind of monster, making me feel very uncomfortable. Then, the old monk who had spoken before asked, “Oh? That’s quite strange. Didn’t you come here for the so-called ‘Smash the Four Olds’? Why don’t you want to join them?”

Because of what happened with Principal in the past few days, my mind was in turmoil, not knowing what was right or wrong. Seeing the old monk ask me why, I told them about Principal, and then asked him if there really were ghosts in this world, and why I had heard Principal crying at the old pagoda that night.

At the time, I was still young, and in my mind, these old monks surely knew a lot, which is why I told them about Principal.

After hearing my story, the old monks all sorrowfully chanted “Amitabha,” and then said to me: “Little Benefactor, I see that you still know the difference between good and evil in your heart. Then let this humble monk tell Little Benefactor: though the world is in chaos, the heavenly way is not. Though right and wrong are confused in this world, cause and effect, karma and retribution, good and evil will each receive their due! I hope Little Benefactor will remember what I say today, or else you will not escape disaster today!”

Hearing this, I was stunned. I thought, I only asked if there are ghosts in the world, so why is this old guy saying all this irrelevant stuff? And he even said I would face disaster today—damn, is he just trying to scare me?