Psych Hunter (Haunted House Notebook) : Book 1

Chapter 24 - Lame Liu

However, as Qin Yi Heng had told me to go there, that person must be reliable, and I really wanted to see him at least once, because I am very curious about the person who had seen the king of the underworld. I had heard that Qin Yi Heng told me that Lame Liu was once not lame, and had a decent job. He belongs in those who work from nine-to-five. This happened more than ten years ago. One summer, Lame Liu had just left the night shift, and he was too depressed to sleep, so he simply spread a mat and laid it on the roof of their bungalow at that time. But, he never woke up from this sleep. Everyone in his family thought he was dead and were ready to cremate him, but he miraculously returned to life.

When he woke up, he told his family that he has been taken away by a demon, who told him that he is an evil person, later on he was taken to the great hall of the underworld to be questioned. As a result, the king of the underworld after seeing realized that he had summoned the wrong soul, so he lets the demon to return his soul. He was also afraid to the point that he peed on his pants. He had followed the demon and had returned to the house. However, he was afraid the demon would change his mind so he rushed into the house before the demon can release the cuff on his feet. As a result, when he woke up, his feet had become crippled. When he went to the hospital, the doctors could not figure out the reason. Even if they treated his varicose veins, he still didn't get better. Since then, the nickname Lame Liu was adopted by the people around him.

This is of course only the rumors spread by Lame Liu's family and no one can confirm its veracity, but it is obvious to everybody that he is lame. Resurrection from the dead has also been recognized by science as a state of suspended animation so it was nothing new, but the absurd thing was what happened to Lame Liu after this incident. According to him after being lame, he was very depressed. One night, he dreamed that the demon who took his soul came to him again and blamed him for being too impatient. Now, the cuffs of his feet have been latched into him and cannot be opened, but the demon taught him some remedies in his dream as a way for compensating his mistake of having caught the wrong person.

As soon as Lame Liu woke up, he actually remembered these remedies and when he tried to use them, the remedies actually worked. He simply began to live on these remedies and he gradually gained fame. I had wondered whether this Lame Liu had concocted such a story to boost his fame, but regardless of whether it's true or not, when I meet him later on, I will tell him that I refuse to eat weird things.

I took the address of Lame Liu and went to his house. His location was not as remote as I imagined, instead he is in a very prosperous area but the house is a bit old. It is said that many developers had wanted this piece of land, but the compensation for the demolition was too high, so no plans have been made. It didn't take a long time for me to find his house by his house number. When I walked to the door, I saw that his name had been written on a red paper stuck at the door of his house. Most likely, his name has been used as some sort of a signboard.

I knocked the door and saw lame Liu. His appearance surprised me as he doesn't look like a profiteer in the slightest. On the contrary, he looked very honest. I opened the door and told him what I was coming from and he nodded, saying that it was not difficult to heal and asked me to wait in the living room for a while and went in to prepare.

When he said that, I felt quite nervous and wondered whether he would take some weird things for me to eat, and while pondering about it, I looked at his home furniture. It has become a professional habit after being in this business for so long.

The living room is very clean and there is a small shrine in the inner corner for a god whose identity I cannot identify. I thought it was very strange, so I stood up and looked at it, only to find out that it was a Buddha statue, but the Buddha statue was placed in a strange way as it was faced against the wall. I just murmured quietly inside my heart. This is an act of disrespect to the gods. Is he not afraid of being condemned by the Buddha if he so blatantly positioned it in this manner? Although I don't know much about precautions involving these kinds of things, I have heard Qin Yi Heng said that these things cannot be bought, but can only be requested to come with prayer, but the date of doing this is also important and this ritual must be done in a correct manner. There is actually a saying that when you walk to a shop that sells statues, and you feel that one of them is smiling at you, then you have to buy for it. It will only properly yield results if you do it like this. This may seem ridiculous, but a lot of people have claimed to see the statues laugh. In actuality, the statues are made by tools so there is no such thing as a laugh. But, of course, it might be possible but it is more likely affected by your psychological state.