"He's dead."
"You're talking nonsense, how would you know if he's dead or not?"
Old Tian was a bit unsure, and said hesitantly: "It seems he's really dead."
"If he were dead, he would surely have invited me to perform a funeral ritual; I haven't done a ritual for him, so he's not dead!"
"Makes sense."
"Come on, I'll take you to find him."
"Alright, let's go!"
Li Sanjiang bent down, lifted Old Tian onto his back, and instead of returning to the room, he went downstairs.
Upon reaching the open space, Li Sanjiang tossed Old Tian into a three-wheeler, then hopped on himself and pedaled away.
By now, Li Zhiyuan had realized there was something unusual about Grandmaster's drunkenness tonight.
Drunk, indeed, but from here on, there seemed to be some external force at play.
"Hey, this road was just repaired recently, why is it so bumpy and twisting..."
Li Sanjiang shook the handlebars as he rode, the three-wheeler zig-zagging down the road.
The pace was slow, allowing Li Zhiyuan to easily keep up.
As soon as they emerged from the path onto the village road, Li Zhiyuan noticed a figure emerging from the direction of his home with a flashlight - it was Uncle Qin.
Li Zhiyuan waved towards him, indicating he could take care of things.
The flashlight turned off, and Uncle Qin returned inside.
After cycling a distance, Li Sanjiang got tired and said to the paralyzed Old Tian behind him: "I'm tired, catch my breath, you ride!"
"I'll ride, sure, get up!"
Li Sanjiang lifted his butt off the seat and stood up, while Old Tian leaned forward, his chest resting on the seat, hands pressing on the pedals, and began pumping up and down.
The bike's speed increased instantly.
Li Zhiyuan behind them began to jog.
"Whew... hahaha!"
Li Sanjiang perched on the front bar, hands on the handlebars steering, while his right hand kept twisting the throttle as if revving the engine.
"Give it some gas, faster, give it more gas, go faster!"
Under the night sky, the two old men were racing the three-wheeler down the road.
Li Zhiyuan had to start sprinting too.
Young and full of stamina, he didn't feel tired.
Finally, the tricycle turned onto a village road, rougher to ride, yet despite Old Tian's paralysis, having once been adept with knives, he retained strength in his hands, maintaining the speed.
Even when sober, asking Li Sanjiang to speed a motorcycle down village paths would be hard to control, not to mention in his current drunken state.
Soon, the three-wheeler veered off the road into fallow land.
The two old men weren't thrown out, but they did experience violent jolts. Once the tricycle stopped, they both sighed with relief, sliding down from it.
The densely populated area, even the roadside foundations, were zealously dug up for extra farming space; no way a piece of barren land could exist here.
Upon closer inspection, it revealed mounds of raised ground.
Old-fashioned grave piles with earthen caps, upright tombstones, and even more extravagant two-story or three-story handicraft houses.
Li Sanjiang reached out, propping himself up on a new tombstone, his foot slipped nearly causing a faceplant, forcing him to instinctively hug the tombstone.
By moonlight, he noticed the photo on the tombstone, black and white, somewhat familiar. Following it down, he read aloud the inscription.
"Hey, found it, we're at his house!"
This was the tomb of that Jianghu doctor.
Old Tian: "Call him to open the door!"
Li Sanjiang: "Hey, we're here, open the door, quickly open the door!"
After shouting for ages with no response, Li Sanjiang's hand hurt from knocking on the tombstone.
Li Sanjiang: "Oh no, seems like he's not home."
Old Tian: "How is that possible, where could he go this late at night?"
Li Sanjiang: "Hard to say, maybe went on a call?"
Old Tian: "No, I hear noises inside, someone's home!"
Li Sanjiang: "Someone? Are you sure?"
Old Tian pressed his ear against the mound behind the tombstone, nodding: "I'm sure, someone's there!"
Li Sanjiang began tapping again: "Open up, if you're home, open up for a visit, otherwise we'll jump over ourselves!"
Saying this, Li Sanjiang began digging at the mound.
Old Tian followed suit, his hands far more efficient digging through the soil than Li Sanjiang's, quickly carving out a small pit.
Then, a hardwood cover appeared below. Old Tian knocked on it, joyously shouting:
"Got him, he's hiding here!"
Li Zhiyuan stood at a distance in the darkness, witnessing everything.
If Grandmaster were just an ordinary old man, he'd definitely have intervened early on. After all, drunkenly digging up graves wouldn't sound nice if word got out.
But with this happening to Grandmaster, Li Zhiyuan dared not interfere rashly, afraid of interrupting some progress.
Also, something bizarre indeed had happened.
Old Tian said he heard noises earlier, and there indeed were noises, even Li Zhiyuan heard them.
Normally, coffins are buried deep, and digging a small pit shouldn't uncover anything, but previously, the noise was actually the coffin moving itself upwards.
This seemed as if the resident was opening the door to welcome visitors.
With the host being so welcoming, talking about the immorality of grave digging felt out of place.
However, a Jianghu doctor having such stirrings before death suggested pre-existing issues.
Li Sanjiang: "Hey, open the door!"
Old Tian: "Yeah, come on, open the door!"
The two old men yelled while prying at the coffin with no tools, leaving Li Sanjiang to futilely dig with his fingers for gesture's sake.
