Chapter 210: Inhuman (18) (1st update + 2nd update + 0.5 update) [VIP]

Suddenly there was a knock on the door.

"Who is it?" Xiao Han pushed the door open a little and exclaimed, "Brother Xi!"

Standing at the door was an adult male with a white towel tied on his head. He looked to be about the same age as Bai Jinshu and the other five who had just returned from the fields, but a little more mature than them.

Combining the names of these people before, this "Xi" should be "Xi".

Generally, people name their children to express certain expectations. If a large number of people use the same naming format, it only means that this format carries the expectations of a certain group.

All the male peers in this village have names related to water, most of them even have three water drops in their radicals. It is even believed that "Xiaochuan", the character Bai Jinshu became, has a bad health because he is the only one whose name does not have three water drops. According to this logic, this village should be extremely short of water, or in great need of water resources.

Otherwise, people wouldn’t have such an obsession with “water” when naming.

But just now...

Bai Jinshu looked thoughtfully through the gap at the farmland in the distance. Although it was getting dark, he could still vaguely see some outlines.

Although the weather here is hot, all the crops in this village are rice, which requires a lot of water resources. How can it look like there is a water shortage?

There is no shortage of water, so why name the child like this?

While he was thinking, the closed door was pushed open by the stream at the entrance.

"Didn't you go and invite the master?!" Before the newlyweds in the ancestral hall could observe the expressions of the surrounding aborigines, the village chief standing in the front looked behind him and his face changed drastically, "It will take at least a day to go to Baiyang Temple and back, where is the master?"

"Uncle Qi," the panic on Brother Xi's face was real, "I went to Baiyang Temple as you instructed, and they said that the master had passed away a few days ago!"

"Sir, you are not going to help us anymore and that's why you are making excuses? Tell me the truth, boy Xi, did you go to that temple but were turned away?" someone in the crowd shouted.

"No!" Brother Xi shouted, "That gentleman is really dead, I even saw his corpse!"

After hearing this sentence, many people in the ancestral hall changed their expressions.

Bai Jinshu clearly heard a middle-aged man next to him muttering quietly: "Could it be retribution for helping us last time?"

"Don't talk nonsense!" The woman next to him hit him hard, "Stop it now! Shoot! Shoot! You are so careless with your mouth! Shoot now!"

"Ptah, pah, pah!" The man quickly followed suit and spat a few times.

But even though he pouted, there were probably many people in the ancestral hall who felt the same way.

Bai Jinshu looked around and saw that many people had doubts on their faces, and most of those with such expressions were middle-aged and elderly people.

His peers of the same age looked more curious and confused, as if they had no idea what this meant.

"Gone...died?" The village chief's face was also very bad, and his voice suddenly became heavy. "How did he die?"

"They...they said that the master got up in the morning and went out, but he slipped and fell off the cliff." Brother Xi was startled by the noise in the ancestral hall. He stuttered before continuing, "I heard that when they found the body, the man had been gone for a while. When I went there, the man's coffin was parked in the back mountain... He was indeed gone."

There was chaos in the ancestral hall in an instant.

Bai Jinshu clearly heard the middle-aged man next to him muttering again: "This shouldn't be the case. How could he have slipped and fallen? I also went to the Baiyang Temple more than 20 years ago."

Bai Jinshu wanted to ask more, but he had to maintain his weak image, so he had to wink at Xiao He who was standing next to him. Fortunately, Xiao He was smart enough and immediately came over and asked, "What do you mean?"

"Xiao He?" The middle-aged man looked up at him and said, "Why are you standing here? Why don't you stand with your father and the others?"

"Xiaochuan and I just came out of the fields," Xiao He explained casually, "What's going on? Who is this gentleman? Why didn't he fall?"

"Go away, kid, don't ask so many questions," the middle-aged woman said again, "Don't listen to your fourth uncle's nonsense!"

"Fourth Auntie..." Xiao He immediately responded when he heard the name, "We are so old, and we are still children. You have to let us know what's going on, right?"

"What could it be? That's it!" The middle-aged woman avoided the topic. "If you really want to know, go back and ask your father."

Xiao He hit a snag and could only look at Bai Jinshu for help.

"Fourth Aunt..." Bai Jinshu coughed and said, "Seventh Uncle has called us here today. I guess he wants to tell us about this. Just tell us. What difference does it make if you know it earlier or later?"

"Xiaochuan?" The middle-aged woman raised her eyebrows in surprise. The shyness on her face suddenly turned into worry. She walked over in a few steps. "Hey, what's wrong? Do you have a fever? Why are you sick again? Let your aunt take a look at you."

The back of her hand naturally rested on Bai Jinshu's head, and she kept mumbling, "Why did you come to the ancestral hall when you were sick? Xiaohe and Dahai didn't even know that you were allowed to go home and rest."

The uncle next to him also looked worried: "Is Xiaochuan sick? Can I take a look?"

"Go away, you know nothing! When he was little, we took turns to take care of him!" Fourth Aunt turned around and slapped Fourth Uncle's hand away with disdain, then patted Bai Jinshu's hand with heartache, "I think the child just got too hot this afternoon. Xiaochuan has been in poor health since he was young, and you let him go to the fields in the afternoon. I told you not to let him go out, don't let him go out!"

"I didn't let him go," the middle-aged man muttered aggrievedly, "his father and mother didn't want to let him go either. It was Xiaochuan who said he wanted to go."

"He said he was going and you let him go?!"

Both of them had their focus shifted. Bai Jinshu silently added a personality attribute to the identity he had obtained: he had been weak since childhood and seemed to be the darling of the village.

"Aunt, don't blame Fourth Uncle." He watched the two people quarreling for a while, then slowly brought the topic back to the topic, "I insisted on going, so let's talk about what happened to that gentleman."

The ancestral hall had already been in chaos due to Xi Ge's words. There was a buzz of conversation from below. The village chief came down from above with the help of a cane, pulled Xi Ge aside and asked him something in a low voice.

The girl Xiao Han who went to open the door had a look of helplessness on her face. Several children who were less than ten years old were excluded from the adults' conversation circle. Although they didn't know what was going on, they could tell from the tension on their faces that the atmosphere had suddenly become wrong.

It seems that only the elders in the village know this information, while the younger generations are kept in the dark.

After hearing what Bai Jin said, the expression on the Fourth Aunt's face relaxed a lot: "This matter...this matter still needs your Fourth Uncle to tell you."

"Back then...it was him and your third uncle who went to Baiyang Temple to invite that gentleman for the first time."

Seeing this, several young men nearby came over and said in unison: "Fourth Uncle, what's going on?"

"Uncle, why haven't I heard you say that?"

"My father never told me that."

Bai Jinshu glanced at the person who said this.

His father should be that "Third Uncle".

"This happened... a long time ago." The fourth uncle was silent for a moment, then spoke in a low voice, "When we went there, the sea had just been born."

"The child is asking you a question, so don't talk nonsense!" Fourth Aunt said disdainfully.

"Uncle, please say more. We love to listen!" Several peers who came over spoke up quickly.

"There's nothing to say..." Fourth Uncle thought for a while, "What happened was just as you know. Those bastards from Touzhou Village harmed us, so we had to harm them back. We asked for help because we wanted to ask them to do something. Three years before Dahai was born, there was a severe drought in the village, and the harvest was poor for three consecutive years. Later, the village chief at that time went to Second Uncle to inquire and found out that it was the grandson of Touzhou Village who caused us to be like this, so he wanted us to take revenge."

"At that time, the third brother and I were the fastest runners in the village. Second uncle heard that there was a master at the Baiyang Temple, which was dozens of miles away. He was very effective, so he asked us to go and ask for help. So the third brother and I went."

"Is Baiyun Temple on the mountain?" Xiao He asked.

"It's on a very high mountain," Fourth Uncle nodded. "The mountain road is very dangerous. If you take a wrong step, you will fall down. The first time I went there, Third Brother and I climbed up carefully. We were all dumbfounded when we saw the people in their temple walking on the mountain road as if it were flat ground. After we invited the master down, he walked very fast on the mountain road, leaving us far behind."

"So this time they say he fell from the mountain..." Fourth Uncle looked a little embarrassed, "It's unlikely. I don't believe it."

"Maybe he wasn't fully awake when he woke up this morning?" someone interrupted.

"No, you don't know," Fourth Uncle shook his head, "When we sent the master back, everyone was drunk. The third brother and I sobered up when we saw the mountain road, but we still didn't dare to walk. As a result, the master and the people in his temple were drunker than us, but they were able to walk back and forth on that road!"

"Even if more than 20 years have passed, then sir shouldn't be worse than when I was drunk, right?"

This example was quite convincing, and everyone fell silent for a moment.

If that's the case, why did this gentleman fall down this time?

Xiao He and Bai Jinshu looked at each other, both of them had guesses in their eyes.

If the body was really seen by Brother Xi and there was no way to fake it, then maybe this gentleman really was getting his comeuppance.

After all, just listening to the description of this fourth uncle, after this gentleman came once, their village, which had suffered from severe drought for three years, immediately had sufficient water resources. Even if the gentleman was very powerful, he couldn't change the climate with his bare hands, right?

If there is a conflict between two random villages, they can each find a master, one to cause a three-year drought on the other side, and the other to bring various rivers to the land that has been suffering from three years of drought. This is a great ability.

Of course, these few words from the fourth uncle alone could not dispel the curious young man. Several people nearby immediately urged the fourth uncle to say more. The fourth uncle looked at the village chief who was still talking to Brother Xi in the distance, thought for a moment and said, "What else can I say? Tell me about this gentleman?"

"When the gentleman heard our request, he said that water was fine, but the feng shui of our place was broken by Touzhou Village. Even if water was brought to us, we wouldn't be able to keep it. The worse our life is, the better the life of Touzhou Village will be."

As soon as these words came out, Dahai beside him became anxious: "There is such a thing? How come I never heard of it when I was a child? Where is this village?"

"This village has long been gone," Fourth Auntie answered, her hands on her hips. "It's normal that you don't know. By the time you can remember, Touzhou Village had already disappeared."

No more?

Several people looked at each other, and Xiao He asked, "What's next? The worse our place is from Touzhou Village, the better. So what will happen to Mr.?"

"We were all dumbfounded at the time. We had taken so much trouble to invite you to come, but who could have thought that the group of people in Touzhou Village were so vicious? We were all at our wits' end. It was the village chief's second uncle who asked, 'Is there no way to break this situation?'"

"The gentleman thought about it for a long time and said that there was only one way," Fourth Uncle paused, "but this method is a bit too cruel, it will hurt others and not benefit ourselves. He has done something bad. Although we can take revenge on the other party after using it, it will not be easy for us..."

"But... who cared so much at that time," Fourth Uncle smiled bitterly, "We were all so angry that we agreed to the master's proposal without thinking and asked him to help us. The master couldn't save face, so he had to repeatedly remind us not to tell anyone about this matter. After the ritual, no matter what happened, we had to keep it to ourselves."

Having said that, curiosity began to show on everyone's faces.

There were several comments on the live broadcast room:

[Oh, this is it! I remember it now!]

【What do you remember? 】

[That Tou Village, because of this ritual, many people died. ]

Many people died...

Bai Jinshu glanced at the barrage of comments and became even more curious about what this ritual was about.

"What did the gentleman say?" Dahai asked.

"The master said that our Feng Shui was broken by Touzhou Village. They are at the foot of the mountain, and we are in the mountain cave. The energy we leak out can just nourish them. In this case, why don't we pile up one thing to the largest and let it leak out."

"But the master also mentioned that once this tactic is started, it can't be stopped, and the outcome will only be a lose-lose situation," Fourth Aunt shook her head. "At that time, no one cared about so much. All they could think about was that our harvests had been poor for three years, while Touzhou Village had been smooth sailing for three years. They wanted to take revenge, so they agreed to this tactic without even thinking about it."

"Mr. didn't expect that we would agree to this. He was in a dilemma for a while. Finally, he couldn't resist everyone's pleading and had to say that it was too late to take back what had been done. Now that he has made this decision, no matter what happens in the future, don't go to him again."

"So..." Bai Jinshu seemed to be thinking about something.

The weather was the thing they chose to “leak” out in the end?

And this time when the village chief said "we risked our lives to invite him back", did he mean to invite this gentleman back?

"In the first few years, after the rituals were performed, things did get much better here, and the grandsons of Touzhou Village finally tasted the bitter fruit," Fourth Uncle sighed, "but the good times didn't last long. You know the weather is not something a human can stand. Not many years later, a big fire broke out in Touzhou Village."

"It was a big incident at the time. A fire broke out in the middle of the night. The flames were so bright that they lit up half the sky. Our entire village woke up at that time."

The fire was incredibly big, with layers of heat waves rushing up through the mountainside. Standing on the cliff at the edge of the village, you can feel the heat waves coming towards you from below.

The fire was so big that no one dared to get close and put out any rescue efforts. By the next morning when the flames had subsided and someone dared to get close, the entire Touzhou Village had been burned to ashes.

Since the fire broke out in the middle of the night, no one in Touzhou Village could escape, except for a few young people who were not in the village that night and went to the town for work. Such a large village was reduced to ruins overnight, and only three or four people out of hundreds of people were still alive.

"That night..." Fourth Uncle said in a hoarse voice, "Everyone, everyone was dumbfounded."

No one could have imagined that things would turn out like this?

Even if they wanted the other side to suffer retribution, all they could think of was an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. They chose to "leak" the weather just to make the other side suffer from a three-year drought.

No one expected that the "leaked" fire would eventually cause a big fire, directly taking the lives of hundreds of people.

"That summer... no one in the entire village dared to go down the mountain," Fourth Uncle was silent for a moment, took out a pipe of dry tobacco from his pocket and wanted to smoke, but suddenly stopped when he realized that he was now in the ancestral hall. "Touzhou Village is located on the road we must take to go down the mountain. When the relationship between the two villages became strained, they even set up a checkpoint in the middle of the road to block us. Now the whole village has turned to ashes. As long as you go down the mountain, you can see the charred ruins."

Everyone in Touzhou Village died. Outsiders didn’t know why the fire broke out in the middle of the night in summer. They could only guess that maybe a family in Touzhou Village was still using an oil lamp and forgot to turn it off before going to bed, which eventually led to the disaster.

But this reason might have convinced outsiders, but it could not convince the young people who came back from doing business in the town and found the village on fire.

They simply said that no one in the village used oil lamps, and the fire in the middle of the night must have been arson. However, Touzhou Village is located in a remote area, and the only village next to them is Zhoufu Village on the mountain. Zhoufu Village and Touzhou Village have had a long-standing grudge, and at that time Touzhou Village deliberately set up checkpoints on the road to prevent people from Zhoufu Village from going down. So as soon as this suspicion was expressed, they were scolded back by outsiders.

Normally, there is a long-standing grudge between the two villages that involves a wide range of people and everyone knows about it, but no one intervenes. But this time, a fire suddenly broke out in your Touzhou Village, and you want to put the blame on Zhoufu Village. Everyone knows that the checkpoint you set up would take a lot of effort to get over even during the day, and how could it be possible to get through in the dark at night.

This only guess that was close to the truth was defined as the most unlikely one in discussions among outsiders.

"This matter was too serious. Hundreds of people died, but no one dared to tell that gentleman. Later, we opened a new mountain road that avoided the location of Touzhou Village, which is the road you are taking now," Fourth Aunt said in a low voice. "At that time, Touzhou Village was gone, which was a heavy blow to us. Those who participated in this matter regarded the gentleman's words as the golden rule. Even you, we never mentioned it. We thought that this matter was over, but..."

However, the nightmare had just begun.

In the first year after Touzhou Village disappeared, people in Zhoufu Village suddenly found that the weather had become warmer.

At that time, everyone just thought it was because the summer was getting hotter and didn't take it seriously, but when winter came, strange things happened.

"It usually snows in winter, but that winter, when it snowed in other places, it suddenly rained in us."

The difference between snow and rain is nothing more than the temperature. If snow turns into rain, it can only be because the temperature in the area has risen.

"Since then, it has become hotter every year here..." Fourth Uncle twisted the tobacco from his pipe with his fingers and put it to his nose to refresh himself. "Everyone knows what's going on, but no one talks about it."

They chose to let the "fire" overflow. Now that there is no Touzhou Village to receive the extra "fire", the "fire" naturally falls on their own heads.

Day after day, year after year, Zhoufu Village became hotter and hotter, and the climate became more and more strange. The newly born children had no idea about this past event and only thought that the place where they lived was born like this.

The names of the "rivers, lakes and seas" that were originally given during the three-year drought to pray for water have also changed.

Now that I think about it, the "Xiao Han" who opened the door was probably not "Han" but "Han".

They hope this will help the weather return to normal.

Looking back now, this certainly failed.

More than 20 years later, the people in Fuzhou Village who were involved in the incident finally decided to go and ask that gentleman to come back.

The "Second Uncle" who was the village chief had passed away a long time ago. The current village chief and several elders had to persuade the gentleman again and asked the young man with the best foot speed in the village to come back to deal with the matter. However, they did not expect that the gentleman died a few days after he agreed to ask for their help.

The way of death was very strange, he accidentally fell off a cliff.

It’s no wonder that the villagers who were involved in this incident were in a panic.

After all, the master said that doing such things would also damage his virtue. Now that the master is dead, won’t they be dead soon too?

That's hundreds of lives. If you spread it out among everyone, it would be roughly one life per person.

After hearing this, several young men who had no idea about the inside story were all speechless.

"No... Fourth Uncle and Fourth Aunt," Da Jiang was dumbfounded for a long time, "You...you are not making up a story to deceive us, right?"

"We have never heard of this Touzhou Village. We didn't hear anyone mention it when we went to the town!"

"Why bring that up?" Fourth Aunt frowned. "Hundreds of people in a village were burned to charcoal overnight. Who would bring that up for no reason? Don't you think it's unlucky?"

That's true.

This kind of tragedy is rarely mentioned except when encountering similar incidents or cases.

"Then..." Dajiang wanted to say something, but Dahai beside him quickly pulled him back and interrupted him, "Now that the gentleman is gone, what should we do?"

"I don't know..." In just a dozen minutes, the ground under the fourth uncle's feet was covered with tobacco that he had dug out from his dry pipe. "Let's see what the village chief will do."

Everyone has lost their backbone and no one knows what to do.

It was that gentleman who set up this trap in the first place, and the person who tied the bell must be the one to untie it. Even if we can find someone else now, can this new gentleman solve the trap that the previous gentleman said "spilt water cannot be reversed"?

Not far away, after having a private conversation with Brother Xi, the village chief finally nodded and tapped the ground with his cane.

There were two loud "knock knocks", but the entire chaotic ancestral hall suddenly became quiet.

"Everyone," the village chief's voice became hoarse, "the gentleman from that year has passed away, but when Xi Xiaozi came back, he met a new gentleman."

"Come on," he patted Brother Xi's shoulder gently, "you speak."

Brother Xi was pushed to the front by him, staring at the burning gazes of hundreds of people, a little nervous: "I came down from the mountain and met... met an old man who looked old. He was carrying a lot of things, which looked very heavy."

"There was only one path on the mountain road, and I thought since I was young and strong, it was my duty to help the old man, so I went up and offered to help him carry his things," Brother Xi said, his eyes fixed on the ground in front of him awkwardly, "We walked a long way, and when we were almost at the foot of the mountain, the old man said thank you to me, and he turned here."

"There were no other forks on that road at the time, so I thought he had misremembered it and said there was only one road. But he said no, there was a fork in the road, but I couldn't see that road. That road led to a village that used to exist but is gone now."

When these words were spoken, the other juniors didn't know what they meant, but everyone who had just heard the story instantly understood what they were talking about.

The village that the old man was talking about was probably Touzhou Village.

But that's strange.

If this old man was one of the young people who survived in Touzhou Village back then, then the time didn't match. But if this old man was someone who didn't know what happened in Touzhou Village and came here to look for his relatives or for some other purpose, then he knew that Touzhou Village had long been gone.

Obviously, Brother Xi, who was facing the old man at that time, didn't know what to do.

"I was very confused at the time, so I asked him where the village was. Going up this road, there is only one village, Zhoufu Village," Brother Xi continued, "but the old man was very sure. He said there was one, and I have a deep connection with this village, so I should know it."

There was a lot of whispering around.

"Quiet!" The village chief stamped his cane, "Listen to what Xi boy has to say!"

The crowd quieted down.

"I was very confused at the time," Brother Xi scratched his head, "but I didn't think too much about it. I just said you go ahead, I'll go back to the village now."

"Unexpectedly, the old man who had been silent all the way suddenly opened up and said that he didn't want to help me, but I was a kind-hearted person, so he made an exception and asked me if I was looking for someone, but the person I was looking for died."

"I was stunned at the time. The old man continued to say that the man I was looking for knew that he was going to die. When he agreed to go with us, he knew that he was not far from death. He just didn't expect that he would die so soon. He was found before he even set off. If you don't find a solution, the next to die will be everyone in the village."

The confusion and cluelessness on Brother Xi's face could not be faked. The old man was silent for a moment, then said earnestly, "I see that you also don't know. I can't explain it clearly to you. Let's put it this way. I will come to your village in a few days to solve this matter, but there are some things that you need to prepare in advance."

"The old man recited a lot of things, which were confusing and chaotic. After listening to it once, I felt that I couldn't remember it. I also felt that he was incomprehensible. Just when I wanted to ask again, he disappeared." Brother Xi paused, "Then I thought about it and found that I remembered everything he said clearly, as if it was engraved in my mind."

Brother Xi read out a very strange list of items.

"Yellow cloth eleven feet, red cloth eleven feet, red wax two hundred and twenty sticks, red satin eleven feet, brown cotton two feet, and ten pounds of corn hazel."

"One hundred pieces of five-colored paper, one hundred Buddha statues, and five steamed buns."

"6 liang each of agarwood, costusroot, patchouli, and sandalwood, and half a jin of new red."

As he read out the list, the expressions of the people around him gradually changed, some looked confused, some looked suddenly enlightened, and some even changed their expressions all of a sudden.

"Three dragon whiskers, one double-branched flower, five ghost-seeing sorrows..."

"There is not a rooster that has ever crowed, not a cow that has ever pulled a millstone, not a sheep that has ever had its horns sheared."

"A bunch of black dog hair."

"This list..." Fourth Uncle's face was filled with shock, and his voice unconsciously became louder, "I remember this list!"

Fourth Aunt's eyes were also filled with disbelief: "Isn't this the list that the gentleman gave me back then?"

As soon as these words came out, Bai Jinshu saw that the elders in the entire ancestral hall exploded with a "boom" as if they had received some kind of signal.

The author has something to say:

The setting of this dungeon is not because of the sugar content. It was completely broken by the high temperature this summer (vomiting soul)

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