Flowers of the Departed Souls - Chapter 38

When they withdrew, Guangming hid and didn’t go with them; he wanted to wait for the bureau’s people to arrive.

As soon as Guangming hid, he heard a few chimes of a bell, “Clang—clang—clang—” Guangming even thought he was going crazy, experiencing auditory hallucinations. A bell sound in this ghostly place? Thinking carefully, there seemed to be a large grandfather clock in the village. Could it be coming from that? Guangming vigorously shook his head to clear it. He hadn’t slept well for several nights and couldn’t help but doze off; he was truly too tired. When he pricked up his ears, the bell sound was gone. The surroundings were so quiet that he could even hear the sound of mice walking, except for the occasional rustling of dry fallen leaves as the wind blew past. He smiled bitterly, shaking his head. All of this felt too much like a dream.

This time, the Chief himself led the team. Dozens of cars sped like lightning. Chi Ziming had taken a shortcut through the mountain path, so he missed the cars.

When the bureau’s people arrived, everyone had already dispersed. Chief Liu met up with Guangming. Guangming said, “You’re one step too late. Now I suspect that the series of tattooed people murdered in the city might not be related to them. Of course, that’s just speculation for now, with no concrete evidence. However, they can’t escape responsibility for the case at the inn. Let’s search everywhere. Luo Jialiang’s house is here; he might still be in the village. Let’s search the village first, in groups. One group goes to Luo Jialiang’s house, one group thoroughly searches the inn, and another group thoroughly searches the Vulture’s Lair. There’s also an old woman there who raises carrion vultures for the Divine Bird Cult. Everyone gathers at the inn in the end.”

However, the three groups searched the entire village but couldn’t find a single person. It was as if everyone in the village had secretly disappeared. This looked too eerie, baffling them. Did this village have a secret passage? Had everyone been moved out? Guangming regretted not going with them, but he was also afraid that no one from the bureau would lead the team, and they wouldn’t understand the situation or find their way.

The group that went to Luo Jialiang’s house returned, shaking their heads. “No one. It’s truly too eerie. Along the way, I just kept feeling like this village… like no one had lived here for decades… And some house doors were open, and inside, it was all dust…”

Another person said, “Yes, I also felt the whole area was eerie… like, like it wasn’t from the living world…” Hearing this, Guangming and Chief Liu exchanged glances. Just then, a gust of wind blew, rustling the fallen leaves on the ground. They swept straight towards them, hitting their faces and bodies, as if ghosts with deep grievances were slapping them, again and again. That chilling sensation instantly spread wildly through every pore, expanding and swelling. They all stared wide-eyed in horror. One timid person’s teeth chattered, “Chief, Chief, this place, this place… has ghosts…”

Chief Liu also felt a little spooked, but he still shouted loudly, “Nonsense! What ghosts? Have Kelou and Guangming been here for so long, and all they saw were ghosts? And are those dead tattooed people also ghosts? Can ghosts even die? I really don’t know how I raised you guys to have such thoughts; you’re as timid as anything.”

Guangming was also very terrified at this moment. Hearing them say that, he felt that this village was indeed very strange. The outsiders at the inn had all been killed. He usually saw the villagers idle, and he hadn’t seen many regularly fishing. In his impression, they all seemed like shadows, as if, as if they didn’t have concrete bodies.

At the thought of those last few words, Guangming actually shivered all over. Damn it, how could I have such a thought? I spoke with Luo Xiaofeng and the others. How could there be ghosts? Luo Xiaofeng is also a villager. But where did these people go? And Luo Yifu and Luo Xiaofeng? Oh, right, and that limping Luo Bozi. Why did all these people disappear overnight? Right, wasn’t there also an old woman in the Vulture’s Lair?

“I’ll take you to the Vulture’s Lair.”

When they reached the entrance of the Vulture’s Lair, it was equally desolate. No carrion vultures were seen there either, which made Guangming’s heart pound. It felt as if his earlier experiences were just a dream, completely illusory and non-existent in the real world. Guangming felt a cold sweat break out on his forehead.

However, everything inside the cave seemed unchanged. There were some dead mice on the ground and some feathers stuck to the ground and cave walls. They looked like they had been there for a long time, which made Guangming feel that the situation was becoming stranger and stranger, far beyond anything he had ever estimated.

When they reached the shallow pool, the old woman was also gone. Guangming thought, What the hell is going on? Am I really seeing ghosts? Is this entire village completely devoid of human presence? But he didn’t believe it was all an illusion. No, absolutely impossible.

Just as they stood there, collectively dumbfounded, Chi Ziming also stumbled over, looking utterly disheveled from having rolled in the mud, his clothes tattered and torn. He was no different from a slovenly, unkempt villager. A person from behind grabbed him, shouting excitedly, “My God, there’s finally someone! Bosses, this is a real person!”

Chi Ziming was so confused that he was grabbed like a chicken and then thrown in front of Guangming and Chief Liu. “Ask this villager; he’ll definitely know the whereabouts of the other people.” Then he kicked Chi Ziming’s butt from behind. “Hurry up and tell us what’s going on! Where are the others? Where did they hide?”

If Chi Ziming hadn’t called out, “Guangming, it’s me!” Guangming truly wouldn’t have recognized him. “Stop it! God, weren’t you sent to the city? Why did you come back?”

“I can’t explain it clearly to you now. I had to come back.” With that, Chi Ziming jumped into the shallow pool and ran towards the large face statue.

Guangming roared from behind, “Cai Yilian is dead!”

Chi Ziming’s body froze as if acupointed, motionless. After a long while, he turned around. “What did you say?”

Guangming walked over and handed him the letter from his pocket. “This is the letter she gave you. She, she’s dead. Two hours ago.”

Chi Ziming’s face, which had been blank, suddenly became frantic, hysterical. “Where is she? How did she die? How did she die?! No, impossible, she wouldn’t leave before me!” He grabbed Guangming’s shirt. “Quick, tell me where she is!”

“Right near that Bird Slope.” At this moment, Guangming suddenly had a very strange thought: if it was all fake, if it was all an illusion, then was Cai Yilian still alive? He didn’t know when he started having such an almost childish, unrealistic thought.

Chi Ziming pushed Guangming away and ran out of the cave. But halfway out, Ke’er’s voice rang in his ear: “Brother Ziming, save me quickly! I can’t hold on much longer! The jade rod!”

Chi Ziming hesitated for a moment, but ultimately continued running towards the large face statue. He opened the switch and ran into the secret room, opened the coffin. Ke’er still lay there peacefully. He took out the jade rod, closed the lid, but then, he didn’t know what to do. How could he give this thing to Ke’er? At this moment, Ke’er said in his ear, “Quick, go to Illusion Cliff!”

Chi Ziming murmured, “Yilian, I always failed you.” With that, he ran out of the cave entrance, shouting back to Guangming, “I’ll explain later! Wait for me at Bird Slope!”

Leaving behind a large group of people staring blankly at the considerable and dazzling jade artifacts in the secret room.

When Chi Ziming reached Illusion Cliff with the jade rod, he was already so tired he was almost collapsing. All his energy seemed to have been depleted. The jade rod, as if held by an invisible hand, floated into mid-air. Then, he heard Ke’er’s voice: “Thank you, Brother Ziming.”

He checked the time. It had been 29 minutes since he entered the Realm of Qingxu. That was close.

Now, he thought, his part was over. At this moment, Guangming and a few other police officers, who had been following him, also ran over, panting. “God, come back quickly! That’s Illusion Cliff!”

Chi Ziming walked out. “It’s strange. Except for the first time I almost died in here, I’ve been fine ever since. Have I become immune to Illusion Cliff?”

He suddenly remembered Ke’er’s words: The jade yue will protect you invisibly. Was it because he had once worn that jade? Otherwise, there was no real explanation.

Guangming said anxiously, “Can you help me find some colleagues who are lost in there?”

At this moment, Chi Ziming was desperate to find Cai Yilian. He felt he was about to break down. Why, even after she’s dead, is it so hard for me to see her one last time?

He said weakly, “How long have they been in there?”

“At least twenty-four hours.”

Guangming patted Chi Ziming’s shoulder. “I understand how you feel. Cai Yilian, no, her surname is actually Xiao, she was killed by the Divine Bird Cult members. I saw it with my own eyes. Those people are already gone… I hope you can help us now.”

Chi Ziming naturally understood what Guangming meant. He sighed. “Alright, I’ll go in and look. I’ll do my best. If I feel unwell, I’ll come out first.”

Guangming nodded and handed him a walkie-talkie. “Take this; it’ll be useful.”

“There’s serious magnetic interference here. Will this walkie-talkie work?” Guangming tested it and found the radio waves inside were chaotic, but he could still faintly hear voices. Chi Ziming silently took it and walked back towards Illusion Cliff.

In truth, Chi Ziming’s mind was a tangled mess. Xiao Yilian’s death was a heavy blow to him, like a sword cutting him in half at the waist. He felt as if he had died with her, yet he was still a man, a man burdened with many inexplicable missions. He didn’t know why he bore these things, these missions that had nothing to do with him. He also didn’t know why they chose him and not someone else. But then, why did Xiao Yilian infiltrate that damned cult that deserved to be cut into a thousand pieces? Everything seemed like a broken thread, tied into another knot, connected. Why did she still die? All of this seemed to have been arranged by her, perhaps she had been waiting for this day all along.

The radiation here was very strong, and Chi Ziming still felt a bit nauseous. For a moment, he truly didn’t know if he could withstand the terrifying power of Illusion Cliff. Going in and out briefly was fine, but now he had to search for people. And Chi Ziming suddenly remembered why Ke’er always wanted him to come to this place to connect with her. He remembered that the first time he entered that ruined city, it was also through Illusion Cliff. Could it be that Illusion Cliff, besides its potentially strong metal radiation causing hallucinations, coma, and even death in severe cases, was also a passage to the ancient city of Qingxu? Right, she seemed to have said that the magnetic field here was connected to her space.

At this moment, he thought of Ke’er. Could Ke’er have defeated those fireballs and Departed Soul Flowers? Had she escaped from that ancient world? If she could come back, she should have already.

He tentatively called out “Ke’er.” After a long time, there was no response. He thought, either Ke’er was imprisoned in that world again, or her soul was taken by those terrifying things, or she had returned to her body. If so, she should have returned completely to the Vulture’s Lair. Thinking of the Vulture’s Lair, he suddenly thought again: when he came out, he hadn’t closed the door to that secret room. Heaven, those people, would they discover Ke’er’s coffin?

Chi Ziming felt extremely distraught. His thoughts were like a tangle of hair that had rolled in mud, intertwined with grass roots and dirt, completely without any order. He was completely lost, only relying on his remaining, almost numb clarity to direct himself on what to do and what not to do.

However, he wondered if he was still affected by the radiation. He always felt a pair of eyes staring directly at him. Those eyes were too conspicuous, too clear, so much so that Chi Ziming felt they were staring at him nakedly, like the moon, without any disguise or reservation. Impossible, who would be watching him in this dangerous place?

He looked around. On the dry, barren, and uneven hills, not a single person was in sight. So he walked to the edge of the cliff, looked at the bottomless sea, and sighed. He saw no survivors; they had probably already fallen and been swept far away by the sea. At this moment, he inadvertently discovered a corner sticking out from beneath the cliff rocks, like the bow of a boat. There was actually a boat beneath this terrifying and fearsome Illusion Cliff? He was very puzzled. Could it be a derelict boat that drifted here? Just unused?

At this moment, he felt a very strange sound behind him, like—human breathing. He turned abruptly, almost bumping face to face with the person, and saw someone standing right behind him, 0.2 meters away. “Who are you?” But the person didn’t answer, their gaze a little dull, seemingly ignoring him and deaf to his words.

Chi Ziming carefully observed him. He saw him wearing a police uniform, but he was dull and unresponsive, acting as if in a trance. Yes, sleepwalking. Chi Ziming felt as if he too was standing there as if sleepwalking, but his state was still clear, while this person seemed like an idiot.

“Hey, you’re a police officer, right? Guangming and the others are waiting for you, and where are the other few?” But he still paid no heed to Chi Ziming’s words. Perhaps he had truly become senile. It seemed that no one who entered Illusion Cliff escaped unscathed. Oh, except for himself. Chi Ziming also wasn’t sure why he had developed immunity to Illusion Cliff.

For a moment, he was truly helpless. He could only lead this disoriented police officer, wanting to take him out of Illusion Cliff. At this point, the police officer let out a silly laugh, making Chi Ziming inexplicably confused. He looked in the direction the officer pointed, and saw another police officer squatting under a rock, as if digging for something. It took Chi Ziming a great effort to realize that he was digging out a dead, smelly bug buried in the dirt and was actually about to put the bug into his mouth. Chi Ziming almost threw up. He knocked the thing out of the officer’s hand, pulled him up, and holding one person with each hand, quickly walked out of this damned Illusion Cliff. As he was about to reach the edge of Illusion Cliff, strangely, he still felt a pair of bright, moon-like eyes staring directly at him.

Guangming looked at his two once-sharp colleagues who had become like this and truly couldn’t believe it. A pang of sadness hit him. He said gratefully to Chi Ziming, “Thank you very much, truly.”

Chi Ziming said blankly, “Don’t thank me. I also have something to ask of you. Take me to see Cai Yilian.” Guangming looked at him and felt as if he had instantly aged and withered, transforming from a somewhat dejected young man into an old man who had weathered much hardship.

Guangming handed his two disoriented subordinates over to other colleagues. “Take them back to the city for medical treatment immediately. Conduct detailed examinations and treatment, and try to help them recall what happened in Illusion Cliff. I’ll go to Bird Slope with Chi Ziming first.”

The others helped the two seemingly sleepwalking colleagues, shook their heads, sighed, and then left. Now, only Guangming and Chi Ziming walked towards Bird Slope.

At this moment, the moon had set, and the sky gradually showed the color of a fish belly, everything was already brightening. This gave Guangming a sudden feeling of returning to the human world, as if everything that happened this entire night didn’t belong to the human realm. This real world felt like just a dream, and these dreams carried the chill of the underworld, the dampness from hundreds of miles underground, giving one a sensation of continuous cold and sinister discomfort.

When they arrived at Bird Slope, the place where Cai Yilian was buried, Chi Ziming knelt down, covering his face and crying. His sobs were like the roars of a beast suppressed for too long, too long. Then he frantically clawed at the mud with his fingers, mumbling, “Only by seeing it with my own eyes can I believe this is real. No, this isn’t real, is it? It’s all a dream, a dream, nothing happened… Yilian, it’s my fault, I failed you. If I hadn’t let you leave me, you’d be safely by my side. I’m sorry… Why do I always never ask for your thoughts? Sometimes, I always felt you had too many things buried in your heart, but you didn’t tell me. Whenever you woke from a nightmare, you always held me tight, asking if I loved you, asking if I would miss you if you left one day… Actually, I should have realized it earlier… How could I be so stupid, so stupid? It’s my fault, all my fault, Yilian… But I truly don’t understand why something like this happened…”

Chi Ziming’s tears fell one by one, soaking the mud. Guangming had never seen a man cry like that. Sigh, a man’s tears don’t fall easily, only when he is truly heartbroken.

If everything were an illusion, like the villagers who vanished without a trace in the blink of an eye, Guangming would wish that what happened today was all fake, all illusory. Then, Cai Yilian would not be beneath this mud now. Guangming truly wanted to comfort Chi Ziming, but at that moment, he truly had nothing to say. He didn’t know what words could comfort him. He could only silently pray in his heart that none of this was real, that they were all just inexplicably having a multi-day dream, though this dream was too long and too cruel, making them all lost within it, unable to wake up.

However, Cai Yilian’s pale face emerged from the black mud. Guangming realized that those villagers were probably not ghosts, and the people of the Divine Bird Cult were not the legendary devils. They were human, but they had hearts like devils. Humans, in fact, are always more terrifying than ghosts.

Guangming gently said, “Let’s put her to rest.”

“No, I want to take her back. I can’t just leave her alone here.”

Guangming nodded. “Let’s go back. Let’s go back to the city first.”

As they left, Guangming felt a black shadow flash through the woods. He chased for a few steps but saw no one. Perhaps he was just oversensitive.

I’ll go back to the city later; my physical strength is already giving out.

As they left Luoyang Village, Guangming and Chi Ziming both vaguely heard the “Clang—clang—clang—” of a bell. Guangming looked at the time: 6:12. It wasn’t on the hour. So this irregular bell chime? He suddenly realized, Could someone be controlling that bell? Then, are there still people in the village?

They weren’t all truly gone without a trace overnight. Guangming got into the car, but his doubts grew. He felt he couldn’t leave like this; he wouldn’t be at peace.

“Wait for me a few minutes; I’ll be right back.” He jumped out of the car and almost ran in one breath to that pavilion. The grandfather clock was still hanging there, ticking normally and lightly. It was empty inside. He ran around to look, but there was no one. Why was this bell chime so strange? If it wasn’t pre-set, how could it have rung at this time? Was it broken? Did it just ring whenever?

With this question, Guangming still had to go back. When he returned to the village entrance, the police force was about to completely withdraw. He got in the car, and it started. Chi Ziming, who had been silent beside him, suddenly said, “I think that bell chime is a bit strange. A few seconds before the first bizarre death case at the inn, I think I also heard a bell chime. And when Zhong Dan died, the bell chime also seemed to ring.”

“I also found it very strange. I heard it when the Divine Bird Cult members dispersed their meeting too. After that, these villagers and the Divine Bird Cult members were nowhere to be found. The entire village was silent and cold. Not even a live mouse was seen. It was as if this village didn’t belong to this world, with no life, no signs to prove the existence of life. It felt like a place abandoned by God. Sigh.”

Chi Ziming thought now, that when he ran back from the car, he truly didn’t encounter a single person.

He sighed deeply. He no longer had the strength to think about anything. All he needed was sleep, deep sleep, sleep as deep as eternal slumber. Preferably, never to wake up again.

39. The Glass Coffin
When Luo Xiaofeng woke up, she briefly thought she had died and gone to hell. Otherwise, why was everything so dark and quiet around her? But the soreness all over her body reminded her that she wasn’t dead.

Is there truly no pain after death? She moved, and only then realized her hands and feet were bound. She tried to sit up, but her head hit the top several times. Then she realized she was in a glass cabinet.

At this, she was truly shocked. God, how did I end up in a cabinet? A feeling of panic surged over her like a tidal wave. No, no, this is all fake. Luo Xiaofeng banged her head against the side of the glass. It hurt. God, what on earth is going on?

After she, Kelou, and Chi Ziming were attacked and injured by the villagers, she somehow passed out and couldn’t remember anything afterward. How did they put me in this glass cabinet? She felt very sad. Why are those people who watched her grow up now so vicious? Why are they treating her like this? Thinking of those people, she felt they were completely different from their usual selves, but she couldn’t articulate the specific difference. She just felt they seemed to have lost their minds, becoming very terrifying, because they were never like this before. Right, their gaze, their gaze, it was like a group of people who had lost their souls. Lost their souls?

Luo Xiaofeng shivered. She then forcefully pushed the top lid with her head, but it didn’t budge. At this moment, this feeling of claustrophobic panic made her extremely frantic, unable to control herself. She struggled and slammed against the glass like mad, but when she was too tired to move, she suddenly saw light appear inside. Although the light was dim and yellowish, it suddenly gave Luo Xiaofeng a glimmer of hope. At least, this wasn’t real hell.

She saw a masked person sitting on a chair, their eyes revealing an enigmatic smile.

“Hey, let me out quickly!” Luo Xiaofeng still vigorously kicked the cabinet. “Why are you keeping me locked in here? Who are you?”

The masked person slowly said, “I see you’ve been lying down for a while. Alright, I’ll let you out.”

They opened the cabinet and then carried Luo Xiaofeng to a dark chair. The masked person then sat back in their original seat. Only then did Luo Xiaofeng notice that this room contained all sorts of chaotic things: a globe, maps, off-white jade bi discs, computers, and many books, mostly history books. What surprised Luo Xiaofeng was that she had seen many of these items in the Vulture’s Lair secret room. Besides that, there were all sorts of bottles and jars, and various messy instruments, and even—deformed infant fetuses, human hearts, and severed fingers soaked in formalin. The sight sent chills down Luo Xiaofeng’s spine. This place was like a mad scientist’s laboratory.

But this was only the tip of the iceberg. When Luo Xiaofeng’s gaze landed on a mud doll, she paused, feeling it looked familiar. Then she shifted her gaze to the walls. There were all kinds of masks, various bird-headed humans, and very religious, very Gothic paintings. One painting looked the largest and most prominent: it was a very handsome young man, draped in a black cloak, with wings growing from his temples, holding a strange sword in his right hand. To his left stood a very ugly and fierce monster, seemingly only a head without a body, and its mouth was incredibly large. When Luo Xiaofeng clearly saw the English letters “Thanatos” next to it, for a moment, her soul almost fled her body. Thanatos? The legendary God of Death? Wasn’t that the bloody signature left at Zhong Dan’s death scene?

All of this made Luo Xiaofeng feel a surging coldness, her hands and feet freezing, her breathing rapid, her face clammy. Was this the God of Death? Or the killer who called himself the God of Death? Had she truly encountered a legendary psychopath? Would they dismember her first, then reassemble her with animal limbs, or soak her severed fingers in formalin like those in the bottle?

Luo Xiaofeng’s mind was filled with these terrifying thoughts. So much so that when the masked person’s finger glided across her cheek, she shivered. “What… what do you want… to do…”

The masked person stared fixedly at her. “I don’t want to do anything for now. I just hope someone can stay here with me for eight, ten, or even twenty years…”

God, eight years, ten years, twenty years? Trapped in this room? Luo Xiaofeng’s eyes widened, her heart pounding. She felt she truly couldn’t breathe anymore. God, am I really so unlucky as to encounter a psychopath? And only now did she realize the masked person’s voice was very fake. Clearly, they were deliberately altering their voice. Was it someone I knew? Did they deliberately alter their voice for fear I would recognize them?

“Either you let me go, or you just let me die.” Extreme fear instead calmed Luo Xiaofeng. At this moment, her indignation was such that she only wished for death.

“Letting you go isn’t impossible, if you don’t reveal what happened in the secret room surveillance.”

Was this person the one in the surveillance room? Luo Xiaofeng thought. What she found strange was that they could have easily killed her, but now, they were negotiating with her. Perhaps they weren’t that cruel, but someone who could cause three people to die tragically in succession must be cruel, yet now, they were negotiating with her.

Or, they didn’t want her to die, or perhaps they had rescued her from those people. But if they truly rescued her, they shouldn’t treat her like this.

Luo Xiaofeng suddenly felt a sense of luck. Perhaps there was room for negotiation. Then, she could also probe the truth about the inn murders. “Are you the God of Death, Thanatos? Are they the ones you killed? Were the deaths of the first guest, Xia Yimin, and then Zhong Dan, all deliberately planned by you—did you trick them into committing suicide, or did they see something they shouldn’t have—and then you cruelly—cruelly—”

Luo Xiaofeng originally wanted to use a firm, forceful tone to interrogate, to make them feel guilty or hit a sore spot, and then they would honestly tell the truth. However, she was annoyed to find her voice trembling because of her intense fear. Her words were incomplete. At that moment, she truly hated her weakness and also wanted to cry.

The masked person looked at her with a strange gaze for a long time, saying nothing. Luo Xiaofeng’s body was covered in cold sweat. She truly didn’t know what the masked person would do next.

After an unknown period, Luo Xiaofeng felt every second was as agonizing as a century. The masked person finally began to speak, still using that emotionless, genderless voice, like wind howling through a drainpipe. Every word was bone-chilling. “Do you enjoy the feeling of lying in a glass coffin? Is that feeling very, very wonderful, especially when it’s completely dark? In this room, you can’t see anything. Infinite darkness, like a sweet-smelling, decaying shroud, wraps you through the cabinet. Your glass coffin reflects a cold, hazy light, attracting all the ghosts. Those ghosts who arrive with the night and darkness flock to you. Among them, there might be werewolves, vampires, and ghouls. Oh, all sorts of strange fellows. They silently gather before you, their ugly faces pressed against the glass cover, their eyes glowing green or blood-red. Or perhaps, their entire eyeballs are green or red. Noses pressed against the glass, and you can even see long, dirty nasal hairs…”

Luo Xiaofeng had heard these terrifying stories when she was a child, told by the village elders. At that time, the adults wanted to scare them so they wouldn’t run around or do bad things. There were also all sorts of ghostly legends. In fact, including the legend of the God of Death, when Luo Xiaofeng first heard it, she would be afraid in the middle of the night. She always felt the God of Death would silently stand by her bed and then silently take her heart. But now, in such an environment, Luo Xiaofeng truly couldn’t bear it anymore.

“No, please don’t say anymore—I beg you—” Luo Xiaofeng could no longer hold back her tears. She had never thought that in the face of terror, she would be so helpless and weak, without even a shred of courage to resist, even just a little. But that pathetic psychological defense line had already completely collapsed, like straw soaked in a flood, soft and decaying, crumbling at a touch.

At this moment, she had no strength left to resist. If there was any resistance, it was only a natural defiance towards terror and death. She opened her mouth. For a moment, her throat was too dry to speak. She tried to moisten her throat, licking her cracked lips with her tongue. “Okay—I won’t—I won’t say anything. Now, are you willing to let me go?”

“Yes, but how can I trust you?”

Luo Xiaofeng’s mind was truly in chaos. She really couldn’t think of anything to guarantee it, but she knew she had to leave this place, and she couldn’t stand it for another moment.

“I’ll guarantee it with my life.”

The masked person raised a finger and pretended to be in thought. Luo Xiaofeng noticed that this person’s hand was exceptionally long and fair, and very delicate. However, their other hand, resting on the chair, was dry and black, like an old woman’s, reminding Luo Xiaofeng of those dark, silent hands in ghost stories that would choke your neck. Why did the same person have two completely different hands? How could there be such a terrifying difference? Could they truly be the legendary God of Death? Luo Xiaofeng shivered involuntarily.

Just as she thought of this, the masked person said ominously, “Alright, it’s settled. If you break your promise, then—” Their two very strange hands, one black and one white, came together and made a choking gesture. The fair hand clearly showed exposed blue veins from the effort, terrifying Luo Xiaofeng to her core. This masked person seemed to be able to read her thoughts. Moreover, those pale, green eyes behind the mask pierced through her internal organs like an X-ray.

Luo Xiaofeng swallowed the saliva that had risen in her throat, struggling to calm her pounding heart, and then nodded repeatedly. “I won’t tell, I won’t tell—”

The masked person clapped their hands. “Then, I’ll send you back. Close your eyes.”

The masked person picked up a piece of black cloth from the table and approached Luo Xiaofeng. When they stretched out those two terrifying hands, Luo Xiaofeng tried to close her eyes; she truly didn’t want to see those hands. However, she felt that the exposed elbow joint of the black hand was fair-skinned. She couldn’t help but secretly pay attention to that joint. It was indeed yellowish-white, the skin color of a normal young person, completely different from the aged, darkened skin below. And, at the junction of the two colors, there was a rather obvious peeling of skin. She secretly thought, Could it be…? And she noticed a mole on the wrist of the white hand. A mole?

At this point, the masked person had already covered her eyes. Her heart was still anxious. She was truly afraid this masked person would break their word and cut her up with one slice. At this moment, the masked person’s voice sounded slightly softer. “Just place your hand on my shoulder; I’ll lead you out.”

Luo Xiaofeng nodded and placed her hand on their shoulder, following them. The ground was very uneven, and several times, Luo Xiaofeng almost fell. The surroundings were very quiet. After an unknown period, Luo Xiaofeng actually heard the sound of water. Yes, it must be right, the sound of surging water. Was it by the sea? Or by a small stream?

Then, she felt as if she stepped into a boat. Her whole body swayed. The masked person helped her sit down. She mumbled, “Where is this place?” But the masked person didn’t answer her. After an unknown period, she felt as if the masked person had left the boat. She untied the black cloth covering her eyes, and again, her soul was scattered. She found herself alone on the sea, with a very simple small wooden boat beneath her feet. This small wooden boat drifted aimlessly on the sea, drifting, like a fleeting phantom.

She quickly grabbed the oars and vigorously rowed. If she hadn’t grown up by the sea and often gone out on boats when she was little, she truly wouldn’t know where she might drift to, and then simply freeze or starve to death on the boat.

When she finally managed to row ashore, and climbed out of the boat, exhausted, she saw that many Departed Soul Flowers had emerged from the water at some unknown time. They seemed to have come for her, blooming with a ghostly, extravagant, yet sorrowful smile.

Luo Xiaofeng stood on the shore for a few seconds, then ran like mad towards the village.