As they approached the village gates, a white mist rose behind them, isolating the entire village.

If someone were to pass by here, they wouldn't even see this village.

Jing Le noticed the commotion behind her, but only raised an eyebrow and didn't say anything.

The commotion at the village entrance also attracted the attention of the villagers.

A middle-aged man in his forties walked over slowly.

His gait looked normal, but the slight sluggishness seemed rather strange.

"You're from out of town, aren't you? Are you looking for a place to stay?"

"Uncle, yes, may we stay here tonight? Don't worry, we'll pay you."

Shadow Six is ​​now the diplomat of this group, and he handles all the negotiations.

The same applies now.

"I'm the village chief here, my surname is Hu. There are so many of you, no other family can accommodate you. Come with me."

My place is spacious enough to make do for one night.

Village Chief Hu suddenly smiled and invited them to his home, his eyes fixed on Jing Le's direction.

[This old man is clearly being controlled. The person behind him even knows how to control corpses. Hmph, evil and wicked.]

[This village must have met with misfortune before we arrived; these villagers clearly haven't even started developing lividity yet, meaning they died no more than an hour ago.]

Jing Le acted like a normal three-year-old in Emperor Jing's arms, but his eyes were observing the movements of the surrounding villagers.

Emperor Jing observed Village Chief Hu, following the questions raised by Jing Le.

Apart from being a little stiff when walking, he is no different from a normal person.

Oh, and when he speaks, his tone is slightly slower than a normal person's.

"Alright, then I'll leave it to Village Chief Hu."

Seeing Emperor Jing nod, Ying Liu smiled and followed behind him, leading the way.

A short while later, Jing Le and his group received four rooms: one decent room and three thatched huts.

The better rooms were probably recently built at Village Chief Hu's house, making it quite unique in the entire village.

The thatched house must be an old house from the past.

"You distinguished guests may rest for a while. I will have my wife prepare dinner for you."

Village Chief Hu tried his best to be friendly, but as time went on, his facial expression began to stiffen.

As for his family, Jing Le had already observed them and came to the same conclusion: there were no living people left in the village long ago.

As for why they are still able to move, it seems that the person behind them clearly designed this to target their group.

This is interesting. I wonder if the person behind this is targeting me, or my father?

However, there's definitely a demonic element involved here.

My previous senses were correct; the other party must have some kind of magical artifact that shields them from demonic energy.

Jing Le withdrew her divine sense and sat on the stool to wait for dinner.

I'm kind of looking forward to it, wondering what kind of dinner they'll prepare for us.

Emperor Jing remained unmoved, showing no concern whatsoever about being in danger.

Without even glancing at the tea on the table, he took out his own water and drank it, then poured a cup for Jing Le as well.

Duan Feibai, who was standing to the side, was holding the white tiger and was also drinking water from his own water bag.

Shadow Three and the others had also been warned, so naturally they wouldn't touch anything here, but Shadow One and the others didn't know that.

He didn't take such a small matter to heart and simply picked up the tea on the table and started drinking.

Jing Le watched without offering any advice, and even looked on with interest.

[Heh, it seems like Yingyi and the others are enjoying their drink quite a bit. If they knew there were drops of corpse fluid in it, would they immediately vomit?]

[Forget it, I'll just not tell them. It won't kill anyone to drink it; consider it a lesson learned.]

Emperor Jing: We really need to learn a lesson. We need to train harder when we get back.

Duan Feibai: Luckily I brought water, so I don't have to drink the spiked water like them.

Just then, Village Chief Hu and his wife brought the food to the table.

The dishes looked like ordinary home-cooked meals, but Jing Le frowned, her disdain obvious, as if her eyes had been polluted.

She immediately rushed into Emperor Jing's arms to catch her breath.

[Ugh, my eyes are tainted! The person behind this is trying to disgust me, right? What kind of materials are they using?]

[It could practically be called a full-body feast.]

That's disgusting.

Emperor Jing was holding his daughter, who had thrown herself into his arms, and was about to ask what was wrong when he heard Jing Le internally ranting.

A feast of a whole corpse?! And what's on the table?!

Emperor Jing looked at the home-style dishes, which looked quite appetizing, and suddenly felt a little nauseous.

"Please make do with this, esteemed guests. These are all my old woman's best dishes."

Village Chief Hu greeted them warmly and then introduced them one by one:

"This is tofu pudding that Aunt Wang next door just made. She asked me to bring it over for you to try."

Wow, it really does look like tofu pudding, because the main ingredient is human brain.

Jing Le felt disgusted and kept complaining.

Emperor Jing looked at the white tofu pudding, and when he thought of the human brain, his face froze for a moment.

He doesn't have such heavy tastes. Besides, there are no living people here, so where did this human brain come from?

Jing Le lived up to expectations and explained the origins of the human brain.

[This brain looks like it was just taken out recently; it's still warm. It might even belong to Aunt Wang next door.]

This is quite intriguing. Logically, a corpse's brain shouldn't be this fresh, unless their body is dead but their brain is still alive.

Jing Le immediately thought of a kind of evil technique, a forbidden technique in the cultivation world, a spell created by a puppeteer.

He can turn living people into corpses, but keep their heads alive, and then control them. It is said that the corpses controlled in this way are no different from real people.

Because it was too cruel, it was resisted, and eventually the puppetry technique was stolen by the demons.

Jing Le recalled the demonic energy she had sensed twice, and then thought of the corpses in front of her, and understood.

[So that's how it is. It seems the person behind this isn't skilled enough; their skills are quite crude.]

Jing Le was referring to Village Chief Hu and the others. They could tell at a glance that they had only recently learned puppetry.

Village Chief Hu continued, "These are wood ear mushrooms picked from the mountain; they're very fresh and tender."

Of course, those were ears just cut off from the heads of people in your village, how could they not be fresh and tender?!

"And this wild boar meat dish is something we only make to entertain distinguished guests. It was hunted by a hunter from the village not long ago."

Village Chief Hu pointed to one of the meat dishes, which looked perfectly marbled with fat and lean meat, and smelled so delicious that it made one's mouth water.

How lucky it is to be able to eat a meat meal in a village in the middle of nowhere.

However, this is under normal circumstances, but it is not normal at this time.

Jing Le glanced at Ying Yi and the others, and several of them swallowed hard.

This village chief is quite good at dealing with people; there was meat on three or four tables, what a pity.

[What a pity, these aren't wild boars, they're clearly human flesh, perhaps even cut from a corpse in the village.]