Thinking of Qin Bing'er, I was suddenly jolted into realizing I had been thinking too long and had almost forgotten to look for her. Given the current environment and my own harrowing experience, no matter whether Qin Bing'er had gone willingly or due to unforeseen external forces, the only place she could have gone was this stilted building. Therefore, I decided to investigate this diaojiaolou that held countless women captive first. Looking back, I saw that the stilted building was in the standard "tiger-sitting" style, with side wings and a central main house forming a character configuration, possessing three levels: upper, middle, and lower.

Both the upper and middle floors featured corridors shaped like the perimeter of the character "" (Fierce). I was currently standing on the second level; the level below only had a few sparse pillars rising from the black ground. This stilted building was unlike the first one Qin Bing'er and I had entered; it wasn't carved from a single piece of stone. All its parts were constructed from wood: the wooden floorboards, the wooden outer railings, the wooden inner walls, the wooden lattice windows, the wooden cantilever beams… Moreover, by inhaling the scent, I discovered that all the timber was Masang wood!

I had expected to find a door on the partition wall of the side wing nearest the main room, but as I walked along the corridor, I found only solid plank walls, with nothing that could be called a door. There were a few intricately carved lattice windows, though. Strange—according to the structural layout of a diaojiaolou, a door ought to be here, shouldn't it? Otherwise, how would the residents enter the rooms?

A thought struck me, recalling the Masang trees in front of the building. Could the door that should have been there be on the other side of the wing? Speculating, I turned back and navigated two sharp ninety-degree bends along the corridor, arriving at the opposite side of the side wing, where I indeed found a slightly ajar door set into the plank wall. Damn it, the structural layout of this stilted building was the complete inverse of reality.

I muttered, pushing open the ajar door. I expected to hear a creak, but the door moved silently, as if its hinges had just been oiled. Once opened, I surprisingly found a very ancient, carved bed. It was placed neither in the center of the room nor in a corner, but unexpectedly facing the door directly.

Judging by its style, this end of the bed was where a person would stretch out their feet when lying down. The foot end was empty, lacking any canopy or bedding, merely a wooden frame. In truth, ever since I wiped away Hua'er's tears and gained the ability to clearly perceive the black and white world, I had encountered so many strange things that my heart had slowly grown accustomed to them. But seeing this peculiarly placed bed still shocked me deeply, because a bed positioned in defiance of the main beam, facing the door, was not a bed at all, but a coffin.

This alignment—head inside, feet facing the main door—was only done after a person died, which was the utmost taboo for the Tujia people. However, my attention at that moment was not on the bed, but on searching the room for any trace of Qin Bing'er's presence. Upon closer inspection, I found another peculiar detail. Logically, this building should have been long abandoned and covered in cobwebs, yet the room's plank walls and floor were spotlessly clean.

Even though I could only discern shades of black and white, I could clearly see that the room was nearly free of dust. On the left side of the room was an open doorway leading directly into an annex room of the main house. Entering the annex, I saw it was divided into an outer and an inner room. The outer room had a clean wooden floor, while the inner room was about a foot lower than the outer one, sloping downwards from front to back.

In the center of the inner room was a fire pit, but it lacked the corresponding "tripod." This, too, was the complete opposite of the traditional Tujia dwelling structure, which was lower in the front and higher in the back. Similar to the side wing, both the inner and outer sections of the annex were thoroughly swept clean—neither cobwebs nor any trace of soot could be found. Furthermore, the inner room also had an empty bed placed directly facing the door. When I moved from the annex into the main hall (tangwu), I realized even more clearly that the room arrangements in this stilted building were the exact opposite of the real ones.

The six large doors of the main house were wide open, but they opened outwards. This style is called a "pigsty door" in the Tujia region, and respectable households would never configure the sacred tangwu doors this way. In the exact center of the tangwu stood a lacquer-black, gleaming Baxian table, with the seams of its tabletop facing the main door. Three high stools were placed perfectly around the left, right, and outer perimeter of the table.

There was a shrine on the inner wall, but the shrine was actually higher than the central beam of the tangwu. Beneath the shrine were the positions for "Heaven, Earth, Ruler, Kin, Teacher" (Tiandi Junqinshiwei), but these six characters were written upside down: "" (Position) was at the top, and "" (Heaven) was at the bottom. Furthermore, the protective frames flanking the six characters did not flare outwards in an arc, but were closed inwards, like a shut door… All these details were the absolute opposite of a genuine dwelling layout. While the shrine suggested sacrilege against the spirits, the arrangement of the three stools was also utterly absurd.

The correct placement was to leave the side facing the main door empty of stools, which was related to the Tujia custom of celebrating the "Leap Year" (Gan Nian). The purpose of not seating people near the entrance was supposedly to allow for better observation, enabling a swift escape in case of invasion by external enemies, venomous insects, or fierce beasts. The only feature consistent with a real diaojiaolou was the mysterious symbolic emblem precisely in the center of the main beam. This symbol was very familiar to me; there was one on the main beam of my own old home.

The symbol was circular, with inner and outer layers. The outer ring was painted in vermilion or ink, and the center was red, shaped like an "egg" (luan), giving the whole symbol a very ancient and rustic appearance. Typically, a "Master of the Seal" (Zhangmo Shi) with some knowledge of sorcery, or a Tujia shaman, would use a chisel to bore a circle into the yellow center. The owner of the new house would then kneel down and catch all the wood shavings with their clothing.

Finally, the characters "Qian" (Heaven) and "Kun" (Earth) would be written on either end of the beam. This mysterious, ancient symbol is the icon representing the origin of the universe, embodying the Tujia people's ancient recollection of the creation of heaven and earth and the origin of humanity. The Tujia diaojiaolou is not just situated within the embrace of the cosmic nature; simultaneously, the cosmos is embraced by the diaojiaolou. This spatial concept of containment of the universe is very evident in Tujia ritual songs: "Step one, gaze at the precious beam, a sun in the center, the beginning of unity brings auspiciousness.

Step two brings great joy, Qian and Kun on either side, sun and moon become a pair, enjoyed for eternity…" Of course, the "egg-shaped" symbol on the main beam of this stilted building appeared only in black and white to my eyes, and I could only barely distinguish the distance between the inner and outer circles. I had searched through almost two-thirds of the middle floor of the stilted building. Apart from noting that all the arrangements were the reverse of reality and that everything was impeccably clean, I found no trace of Qin Bing'er. I called out a few times softly, but heard no response.

Thus, I left the main door, only briefly glancing into the right-side annex and side wing through the window before ascending the stairs to the third floor. This stilted building had a typical "scoop-shaped mouth" profile, with a wide, two-meter-plus "mouth"—the tunkou—extending from the outer front of the main house on both the second and third floors. After reaching the third floor, I abandoned searching the side wings and annexes and rushed directly toward the tunkou. I assumed the main doors on the third floor would also open outwards, but unexpectedly, these six doors had returned to normal, all opening inwards, and all were wide open, allowing me to clearly see the interior of the main room.

The room was bare, with almost no furniture. The only captivating sight was the shrine on the main back wall. The shrine held no plaques or writing, only twelve statues, each about two feet tall, possessing countenances as vivid as living beings. The statues sat upon two tiers of wooden boards, eight on the upper tier and four on the lower.

Their facial expressions varied: some lowered their gaze, others had wide, angry eyes… Eleven of the statues were black—perhaps not purely black, but anything with a darker hue appeared black to me—except for the third statue from the left on the lower tier, which was entirely snow-white. It was slightly taller than the other three statues on its row, and its face looked strangely familiar. I was completely captivated by the snow-white statue, standing there motionless, staring at it without blinking. Soon, a flash of lightning pierced my heart—my great uncle!

Wasn't that snow-white statue the man who looked remarkably like me that I had seen in the stone cave of Anle Cave? If my previous assumptions were correct, this statue must be the legendary Tujia ancestor, Lord Lin Jun Ba Wuxiang. I was so excited I almost jumped up. Since the statue of Lord Lin Jun Ba Wuxiang was here, were the Tusi King Qin Cheng and others among these twelve statues?

I scanned the statues one by one, starting with the top row, and noticed that the clothing of the statues on the upper and lower rows was vastly different. The eight statues on the upper row wore what could hardly be called clothes; they were simply wrapped around the waist with something resembling bundles of straw. I was not unfamiliar with this attire; it's what the Tujia people wear when performing the Maogusi dance. Simultaneously, another detail gave me pause: the first statue from the left in the lower row was actually a woman.

This woman wore a short-sleeved long robe, entirely black, and without a close look, one could hardly distinguish her gender. Could this woman be Madame Mo? I walked slowly into the room, filled with questions—who was the female statue, was there any writing on the forehead of the snow-white statue, and if so, what characters were they… Suddenly, a blinding white light erupted in the room, and a dark shadow shot up from the ground…