Notes from Guixu: The Western Xia Dragon Bone Tomb

Fifty years ago, my grandfather unearthed a bone covered in symbols from a Western Xia tomb in western Sichuan. He sold the bone but kept a rubbing.

Fifty years later, someone brought us an identical rubbing.

That night, the rubbing was stolen.

I began investigating my grandfather's past, only to discover that he was more than just a tomb raider. He was one of the "Gatekeepers."

What he guarded was called Guixu.

Guixu is alive. Things can grow inside it.

Like the person named Liu Qingci.

He looks under thirty, but my grandfather said he had already been around 130 years ago.