Looking at the windblown door curtain, I glanced at Fatty and gave him a look, meaning let's go in and see.
Fatty was a bit cowardly, dawdling for a long time and not daring to go forward.
I gritted my teeth, told him to get out of the way, and then lifted the cloth curtain. As my flashlight shone inside, I saw a shriveled corpse on a tatami mat.
The corpse was wearing a kimono and lying on the tatami in a sleeping pose.
This room was different from the others. Besides the tatami mats, there was also a wardrobe, and beside the wardrobe, a vanity table.
This looked like a woman's room.
"Xiang Ye, why are there women's rooms in this underground fortress?" Fatty asked, pointing at the skeleton on the bed, "Could that be Yoshiko Kawashima?"
I rolled my eyes at him and said, "If it were really Yoshiko Kawashima, would she be here?"
"Then who would it be?"
I looked at the daily necessities around and suddenly thought of the term "comfort woman."
Then we looked at other rooms with cloth curtains. They were all laid out the same way, but except for the room with the skeleton we had seen earlier, the other rooms were empty.
It seemed that when the little Japanese devils fled after their defeat, they had forgotten this woman here.
Thinking of this, I felt a bit sorry for the woman.
Fatty asked me what to do next. I thought about it, returned to that room, and bowed to the skeleton: "We are strangers, please don't haunt us. You go your way, and we'll go ours. If you feel we've disturbed you, we'll leave now."
Fatty also followed my example and bowed to the skeleton on the tatami, saying a lot of things.
After doing all this, as we were about to leave, a gust of cold wind blew again, and a mirror that had been on the vanity table suddenly fell to the ground.
Fatty grabbed me and said without looking back, "Xiang Ye... she doesn't want us to leave..."
Hearing Fatty say that, I also felt a bit creeped out, but at the same time, I got a little angry. I turned around and looked at the skeleton on the tatami, saying, "I know you are all alone here, but you don't have to make us stay here with you, do you? I've said my piece. If you insist on not appreciating a toast and instead prefer a forfeit, don't blame us for being impolite later!"
This was the first time I had threatened a "ghost."
When I was a child in my hometown, I heard the elders say that if you encounter something unclean, you should speak harshly and even curse a few times.
The fiercer you are, the less those unclean things dare to provoke you.
This was my first time encountering such a situation, so I could only follow this approach.
I just didn't know if this Japanese female ghost would fall for it, or if she could understand what we were saying.
After a moment, seeing no reaction in the room, I exchanged a look with Fatty, signaling him to slip away quickly.
Who knew that Fatty suddenly said he saw a figure in the mirror!
The mirror had fallen on the ground, and it was clear when illuminated by the flashlight. I hadn't noticed, but Fatty had seen it clearly.
I asked him what kind of figure it was, and he said it was a woman's face, pale white, with rouge on her cheeks.
"What exactly do you want?!" I pointed at the skeleton on the tatami, "If you don't want us to leave, we're leaving! See if you can stop us!"
As soon as I finished speaking, a faint woman's laughter echoed. Upon closer listening, it carried a hint of crying.
My scalp immediately tingled, and Fatty almost peed himself out of fear.
I heard the elders say that if a ghost latches onto someone, it's very likely because of some unfulfilled wish.
But why was this female ghost scaring us? Did she want us to do something for her?
Thinking about it, I noticed a photograph next to the skeleton. I bravely picked it up to take a look. It was a photo of a man and a woman together.
They looked about the same age. The man was wearing a black suit, and the woman was wearing a kimono, the same kimono as the skeleton on the tatami.
I thought, did this female ghost want to be reunited with the person in the photo?
If that were the case, I would be helpless. I couldn't possibly take the skeleton to Japan.
Of course, I couldn't possibly find the man in the photo either.
Thinking of this, I suddenly remembered a rule passed down by our ancestors: "Rest in peace after burial."
It is said that if a corpse is not buried, it cannot reincarnate and will become a lonely wandering soul.
Could it be that this female ghost wanted us to bury her?
With this thought, I asked Fatty to take out the entrenching tool and dig a hole in the floor of the room.
Although the ground was made of stones, it was mixed with a lot of soil. It was a bit difficult to dig, but at this moment, we had no choice but to dig.
Fatty and I dug for over half an hour, finally managing to excavate a hole of moderate size.
Then we placed the skeleton from the tatami into the hole, I also put the photograph in, and covered it with soil.
"Fatty, take out three cigarettes," I said.
Fatty quickly took out three cigarettes and handed them to me. I lit them and stuck them into the ground: "This is all we can do. Please don't bother us anymore. I know it's not easy for you. May you be born into a good family in your next life... Dust to dust, earth to earth, and may your soul return to the earth. We bid you farewell."
As I spoke, I bowed three times. Fatty also followed my example and bowed.
I don't know if it was psychological or what, but after all this commotion, I felt that the atmosphere around us was no longer so cold, and I also felt much more at ease.
When we came out of the room, Fatty was startled again and asked me, "Xiang Ye... did you hear someone speaking?"
"Speaking what?"
"Something like... Arigato?" Fatty asked, looking around with a look of terror.
I froze for a moment, then grinned and said, "I think your ears need to be checked! You're always hearing all sorts of nonsense."
Fatty pursed his lips and tugged at me, saying, "Let's get out of here quickly..."
After we left the barracks, we originally planned to rendezvous with the others. Fatty insisted on checking the "granary" to see if there was anything to eat to fill our stomachs first.
I said angrily, "Why didn't you eat those expired canned goods earlier?"
"Let's just take a look, what if there's something edible?" Fatty said.
I couldn't do anything about him, so I followed him to the "granary."
I have to say, the granary of those little Japanese devils was built quite well. It was much drier inside than outside, and there were many preserved products hanging.
Those preserved products were all sealed in vacuum bags. They looked edible, but I wasn't interested in trying them.
Fatty was like a hungry ghost reincarnated. I don't know where he got some firewood from, but he started a fire in front of a stove. After lighting the firewood, he added some coal cinders, and soon the stove was burning.
The smoke that emerged entered through the ventilation hole at the corner of the wall.
I said, "Aren't you afraid of being poisoned?"
"Xiang Ye, do these things look poisonous?" Fatty grinned, tore open a vacuum bag, and took out the meat inside.
"Eat, eat, eat, you won't die from eating!" I said unhappily.