8: Chapter 8 New Objects in the "Pickled Vegetable Jar"

I was stuffing the jade stone into my tool bag when Zhao Kai stood by, sucking his teeth in annoyance: "Can you hurry up? If we dawdle until dark, we'll be out here in the mountains feeding the mosquitoes."

The swelling on his ankle looked even more prominent, and his pant leg was still dripping water; he looked just like a drowned rat.

"What's the rush?" I patted my backpack, the wrench inside clinking against the jade stone with a "ding-dang" sound. "Uncle Liu said there's a mountain family ahead; we can just ask for lodging there."

No sooner had I finished speaking than the corner of Old Liu's blue cloth jacket flashed out from the bamboo shadows, his pipe waving in his hand like a soul-summoning banner.

"We're here, we're here!" he shouted into the courtyard, setting his bamboo basket down by the wall corner. The sweet scent of wild grapes immediately spread out. "Auntie Wang, these two city kids fell into the creek; can they rest their feet at your place?"

The house door creaked open a crack, and a woman wearing a blue apron poked her head out. She was clutching a dishcloth, and her apron was stained with specks of lye.

"Oh, it's Old Liu," she said. Her eyes were sharp, and she immediately spotted Zhao Kai's wet pant leg. "What happened to this young man? Did he fall in the creek?"

"That's exactly it," Old Liu said, nodding toward me. "He tripped over a stone. I'm afraid his phone got waterlogged too."

Zhao Kai's face turned red, and he stiffened his neck in defense: "Who said that? This is the latest model of waterproof phone—"

Before he could finish, his phone let out a "ding-dong" from his pocket, and then it went silent. He pulled it out to take a look, but the screen was black like a brick, and he angrily stuffed it back into his pocket.

Auntie Wang laughed, wrinkles gathering at the corners of her eyes: "Come in, come in quickly. There's hot water on the stove, wipe yourselves down first. I just steamed some corn buns; they'll be perfect with some pickled vegetables."

She turned and walked toward the kitchen, her blue apron brushing against the door curtain, stirring up the scent of lye mixed with firewood.

As I set my backpack on the wooden stool in the corner of the courtyard, the tool bag suddenly gave a slight vibration. I reached down to feel it, and it was the jade stone moving—it had been wrapped tightly before, but somehow a corner had come loose. The dark green stone surface was stained with a bit of walnut tree sap, which seemed to add a new mark to those horizontal and vertical lines.

"This bag is heavy," Auntie Wang said as she came out with a basin of water, peering into my backpack. "What kind of treasure are you carrying?"

"Just some tools for repairs." I smiled, and just as I was about to tuck the jade stone more securely into the bag, there was a sudden "clatter" at the courtyard gate.

Zhao Kai jumped up in fright: "What was that?" It turned out to be the pickle jar at the courtyard gate; the bluestone slab weighing it down had somehow shifted by half an inch, and the sour smell from the jar, mixed with the scent of mustard greens, came pouring out.

Auntie Wang was stunned too: "That's strange. This stone slab has been pressing it down for three years; even three people couldn't lift it, so how did it move on its own?"

My heart skipped a beat, and I took out the jade stone. The lines on its surface suddenly flared with an orange-red light, like flickering flames in a stove. Following the light, I glanced toward the pickle jar, and the stone slab had actually shifted further outward. Water stains from the rim of the jar trickled down through the crack in the stone, forming a small puddle on the ground.

"Holy crap!" Zhao Kai's voice went up an octave. "This stone of yours... did it do that?"

Auntie Wang leaned in to look, almost dropping the water basin in her hands: "Could this stone have Spiritual Qi? A while back, my old man wanted to replace it with a heavier stone slab, and he found two young men to help, but they were sweating buckets and couldn't even budge it."

She suddenly lowered her voice. "Have you heard about the lore of 'Suiyu Slope'? The old folks say the stones on that slope are imbued with the Spiritual Qi of the Jade God and can move on their own."

My heart skipped a beat, and I remembered the legend of the Jade God that Old Liu had mentioned. "Auntie Wang knows about this legend too?"

"How could I not?" She glanced toward the kitchen. "When my old man was young, he found a green stone on Suiyu Slope that could make the water in the pickle jar automatically turn clear. Later, it was swindled away by an antique collector, and I still feel heartbroken when I think about it now."

Zhao Kai suddenly pointed at the pickle jar and shouted: "It moved again!" Sure enough, the stone slab had shifted another half-inch, and a mustard green leaf floated out of the jar.

I pulled the jade stone back, and the stone slab "clicked" back into place, fitting so perfectly that it looked as if it had never moved. My fingertips suddenly felt a bit hot. When I looked down, the walnut tree sap on the stone surface had disappeared, and those lines seemed to have become clearer, vaguely revealing a shape similar to a wrench.

"Could it be a magnet?" Old Liu touched the jade stone with his pipe and then tapped the stone slab on the pickle jar. "That's not right; this slab is limestone and isn't magnetic."

Auntie Wang suddenly slapped her thigh: "Could it be that the 'Talismanic Incantation' has manifested? The old family genealogy says that the Jade God's Talismanic Incantation can draw water and move stones when it encounters someone fated."

She peered at the jade stone in my hand. "Young man, where did you pick up this stone?"

"Just by the creek..." I said vaguely, though I was muttering to myself—could this jade stone really be related to the legend of the Jade God?

Just as we were talking, a "sizzle" sound came from the kitchen, and Auntie Wang hurriedly ran back: "Oh my, my corn buns!"

Zhao Kai followed to join the excitement, his nose almost touching the rim of the pot. I touched the tool bag; the jade stone was quiet, as if it had fallen asleep. The wind brushed over the treetops of the walnut trees, carrying the scent of firewood from the stove, which, mixed with the sour smell of the pickle jar, seemed to knead the life of these mountains into this small courtyard.