Morning mist clung to the ancestral compound as Feng returned. The temporal paradox in his photo gallery gnawed at him—the scarlet cloth's pixel structure clearly originated from CMOS sensors, impossible for 1918. Kneeling by the well, he adjusted camera settings. The viewfinder flickered with a woman's half-face.

A shutter snap ruptured the silence.

The preview showed only blurred images, except the well's reflection: locust branches laden with paper coins, contradicting reality's barren limbs. Feng mounted the camera in burst mode and rushed to last night's shack.

The chest's incense ash remained disturbed. With a respirator secured, he brushed away residue, revealing an oilskin-wrapped diary. Pages crumbled like fish scales. Using a portable humidifier, he unfolded the first leaf.

"March 27, Xuantong 2nd Year (1910). Elders decreed Qizong's posthumous marriage. The Lin girl's pure yin birth chart destined her for our lineage..."

The meticulous calligraphy turned frenzied: "Well's weeping intensifies at night, unquelled by sacrifices. Qizong suspects his spirit bride, orders iron talismans to seal..."

Feng's finger froze on an ink blot. UV light revealed hidden text: "Lin was not dead, but live-buried."

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Camera bursts echoed outside.

He sprinted to the well. The burst sequence mutated: Frame 1 showed normal stones; Frame 5 bore claw marks; Frame 7 revealed a pallid hand gripping the rim. The shutter's triple-beat became a death knell.

Feng yanked the battery. His flashlight beam caught seven bloody handprints materializing on the east wall—the seventh's emerging palm lines cracked the plaster.

Annals of Folk Mysteries trembled in his pack.

Pages fluttered to blank leaves bleeding ink. Vertical Republican-era text materialized: "To suppress a spirit bride, drive peach wood stakes three ke (45 minutes) before live burial's last breath. Mistiming breeds lethal sha." A desiccated peach leaf fell out, its veins mirroring the bloody prints.

Chains clanked in the well.

Feng stored the diary in a moisture-proof bag. Sunlight revealed new patterns in the mirror's vines—faint strokes forming "林" (Lin). As he positioned silicone pads, blood fogged his respirator lens.

Warm blood dripped from the mirror's edge, snaking across bricks. Following the trail upward, he found a rotting hemp noose—identical to archival execution records.

The flashlight died.

Silk rustled in darkness. The mirror burned through its bag. Feng cracked a glow stick—green light revealed his reflection: a spectral bride in chiffon wedding garb, the "Zhang Qizong" corpse coin pinned in her hair.

Corpse oil oozed from the coin's hole. At the rooster's crow, Feng crashed through the gate with his evidence.

The mirror seared his chest, its patterns branding his skin. Behind him, black mist coiled from the well as blood prints eroded in dawn light.

His phone shrieked an alert. All anomalous photos self-deleted, except one blurred reflection—the submerged bride smiling, a platinum diamond ring glinting on her fourth finger.