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The Woodpecker Spirit
Old Ge, a carpenter at the east end of Qingtang Town, reads his timber by the woodpecker in the old camphor behind his yard: quick drumming means a hidden crack, a slow tap sound wood. The bird came the spring after his father, a carpenter, died, and never left. When a new road threatened the tree, Ge kept nightly watch with a bamboo pole until the route bent aside. On opening day the bird pecks a melon on his table, then flies off, and the wind in the leaves sounds like someone answering him.
The Camphor Spirit
A poor woodcutter named Musheng steals dead branches from an old camphor tree to warm his sick mother. One snowy night the tree's spirit, a camphor-scented old man, says he has watched the boy's filial theft for years, gives him camphor to warm their home, then foretells his doom: lightning will burn the tree on the Awakening of Insects, his mother's death day. He offers his charred wood for her coffin, keeping her uncorrupted. Musheng obeys, and the fragrant coffin becomes a wonder.
The Snow Maiden
On a snowbound night on the northern frontier, a lost carrier is led by a white-clad woman into a warm cave; at dawn she has melted into a puddle of snow-water. Thereafter, each good deed he does summons her lantern to guide him home through the storm.
Zigu, Goddess of the Latrine
In the village of Shuixi, the widowed Ruan Qiaoniang is pressed by her late husband's clan to surrender the two mu of dowry fields that are her only living. On New Year's Eve she performs the women's rite of welcoming Zigu, the lowly goddess of the latrine, who possesses a sieve and writes the truth in ashes—exposing the stolen deed and shaming the clan into retreat.
The Rotten Bridge
A rotten bridge about to fall is kept whole because each dusk an old man carries lone travelers across; villagers learn he is the bridge-builder's soul, who in life spent all he had to save them from drowning and in death still keeps watch. A stone bridge replaces it and his shadow is seen no more.
The Candle Maid
A poor scholar reads by a single candle that keeps hardening its wax into a girl's shape; when he falls ill a plain-clad girl keeps him company, and he learns she is the soul of a studious girl who died at the lamp. After he sacrifices to her, the candle forms no shape.
The Charred Zither
An ancient zither sounds of itself each night after its poor master Zhou dies; the zither-fanatic Tong buys it and hears Zhou's soul speak of wishes unfulfilled. Tong teaches widely in Zhou's name; one night the zither sounds gentle, a string breaks, and it falls silent.
The Night Watchman
Lao Qin has watched the shut-down factory district for twenty years; each night he hears the farthest row of lathes run, as if men were still on shift. The night before demolition, all the lathes ring out together, as if the old hands finished their last shift.