Chapter 212: Inhuman (20) (1st update + 2nd update + 0.5 update) [VIP]

A meal that was tasteless.

Aunt Rong and Uncle Rong both went outside to help with the work. Before leaving, they reminded them not to clean up after breakfast and to go to the town quickly, otherwise the weather would become hot when the sun rose.

Xiao Fei sent the two away with a few words, turned around and closed the door, then said to Bai Jinshu in a panic, "Brother Er! Do you feel something is wrong?"

"How did you sleep last night?"

"Don't worry," Bai Jinshu shook his head. "I was just like you. My eyes went dark, and then it was the next morning."

"What's going on? It's... it's still dark?" Xiao Fei's face looked a little better after hearing Bai Jin's words of comfort. He quickly ran to the dining table and said, "Er Ge, did the two of us accidentally trigger some strange rules in the ghost story? I just remember that I went back to my room a few minutes ago and turned on the air conditioner, then lay down on the bed to rest. Before I fell asleep, Aunt Rong suddenly came in and asked me to get up! I came to see Er Ge that you were gone, and I thought I was the only one like this!"

"It shouldn't be," Bai Jinshu finished the millet porridge in his bowl, motioned Xiaofei to eat first, and then he said, "You closed your eyes, so you shouldn't know that it suddenly became dark last night."

"It suddenly turned black?" Xiao Fei paused in surprise. "Now that you mention it, Brother Er... I think I did feel a moment when I was lying there, and everything in front of me went black all of a sudden."

The sun had not yet set when he lay down. Although the sky was much darker than during the day, it was still bright overall.

For a moment, the scene in front of his eyes suddenly turned black, but before Xiao Fei could become alert, this brief blackness disappeared in an instant.

If Bai Jinshu hadn't suddenly mentioned it, Xiao Fei might have thought that he was just too tired and his eyes were blurry.

"It only took a moment, probably..." Bai Jinshu estimated, "two or three seconds, very quickly, after the black curtain faded, it was the next morning."

"According to my observation, this conspiracy should have happened after the sun set and before it rose the next morning," Bai Jinshu thought for a while, "and I suspect that there are more than just the two of us."

"Brother Er, what you mean is that other people are just like us, and it's already the next day in a flash?" Xiao Fei understood quickly.

"Yes," Bai Jinshu nodded, "We'll know after asking."

If there is no night after everyone enters the ghost story, then everyone will only be woken up by the name of "getting up" after the darkness disappears, which is when the sun just rises.

In this way, everyone has about the same time for breakfast, and those who are going shopping will meet each other sooner or later.

Xiaofei also figured this out and started eating faster.

After hurriedly finishing breakfast, the sun outside the window had risen a little. The temperature rose visibly, and both of them could clearly feel that the air at the tip of their noses was beginning to become hot.

The two of them didn't even bother to clean up the dishes and hurriedly walked towards the village entrance.

As soon as they arrived at the entrance of the village, as expected, other triggerers also gathered here. Before Bai Jinshu and the others walked in, they heard Xiao Tang's voice: "What a ghost! I went home last night and wanted to sleep for a while before getting up to eat, but I was still sleeping upstairs and Huangmao was eating downstairs. I opened my eyes and closed them, and it was dawn!"

Huang Mao changed into a set of clothes that was more convenient for walking on the mountain road, and said, "Yeah, I was eating and didn't pay attention to the time. I was holding the bowl in my hand one second, and the next second, my eyes went dark. When I opened my eyes again, I was sitting at the table empty-handed. What I was holding in my hand had turned into breakfast!"

It seems a bit inappropriate to call him Huangmao now. Probably to fit the background of the place where the ghost story takes place, his hair that was dyed yellow has now turned black. At first glance, he looks decent. The aura of the ghost fire boy is diluted a lot by the plain and simple hairstyle and clothes, showing a delicateness that is incompatible with this kid.

"What's going on with you guys?" Huangmao and Xiao Tang were siblings. Huangmao found something was wrong and quickly went upstairs to call Xiao Tang down. After checking their information, they immediately found that the problem was with the three or four seconds long black screen.

Since there are people like me, it means that it is most likely not that I have triggered some wrong rules of the ghost story, but that the shady deal itself is the rule of this ghost story.

Similarly, the newcomers who were assigned to a family and obtained the status of relatives, as soon as the dark curtain faded, determined that this was due to the rules. The sisters Shi Xiuzhu and Shi Xiulan, the brother and sister Huangmao and Xiaotang, the three brothers who shared the same dormitory as Shi Pang, and Bai Jinshu who accidentally moved into Xiaofei's house because his house burned down, these nine people were the fastest to determine that this dark curtain was related to the mechanism.

The remaining three people living alone were a little confused at first, but after they arrived at the village entrance and found out that everyone was feeling the same, they slowly began to feel relieved.

"What is going on with this shady deal? Has anyone noticed it?" someone asked hurriedly.

"Yes." Bai Jinshu gestured to Xiaofei to speak.

After a tiring day yesterday, most people chose to go to sleep or eat after returning home, and few paid attention to the weather outside.

"When the black curtain appeared, Erge was right at the window. The thing appeared at the moment the sun set, and then disappeared at the moment the sun rose the next day," Xiaofei said quickly, "so we suspect that this strange story can only take place when the sun appears."

"Not allowed to sleep?" Xiao Tang's train of thought immediately matched Bai Jinshu's, "No wonder this ghost story has a high mortality rate."

Originally, there were two tasks during the day: investigation and disguising as this person. In addition, the weather in Zhoufu Village was too abnormal, and it was almost hot to the limit of the human body. It was hot, tiring, and scary. As time went on, people's physical strength and thinking ability would decrease, and their reaction speed would also become slower.

At this time, if any fatal danger arises, the chances of all triggerers making mistakes and dying will only increase sharply.

[Revenge] This strange story takes a long time. Shi Pang said it takes five days. Even if the sun is up for only half of the time, that is twelve hours a day, it will take sixty hours in five days. If there is no rest in the middle, it is equivalent to staying awake for two and a half days in a high temperature environment.

Of course, it is impossible not to rest.

The newcomers briefly exchanged views on the shady situation and immediately began to discuss how to take time out during the day to rest.

"We tried to get some information when we got back yesterday," Shi Xiuzhu said as he walked, "but the villagers all said the same thing. What they told us was the same as what the fourth uncle told Ersi and Xiao He. Before that gentleman came, we probably couldn't find out anything in the village."

"I asked too," the yellow-haired man nodded, "and he said the same thing."

It seems that either what happened that year was indeed true, there had always been friction between Zhoufu Village and Touzhou Village, and later Touzhou Village asked someone to help Zhoufu Village because of the three-year drought, and Zhoufu Village retaliated, which led to a fire in Touzhou Village overnight.

Or maybe all the villagers in Zhoufu Village have spoken with one voice and will not tell the truth even to their own children.

As for the former, who did Touzhou Village find to cause the three-year drought in Zhoufu Village, and why did the gentleman invited by Zhoufu Village die before leaving? Even if the villagers wanted to find out this information, they did not know. The former village chief who was in charge at that time has died, and many things cannot be explained clearly.

As for the latter, everyone intends to conceal it and will not even tell their relatives. Then no matter how much they ask, they will not get the correct answer.

In this situation, until there is a new turn of events, no matter which possibility it is, the village will not be able to obtain any new information.

"That means that from now on, let's assume that there are twelve... no, eleven and a half hours until the next black curtain appears," Shi Xiulan calculated. "Based on everyone's experience yesterday, we will be where we were before the black curtain appeared, and we will be where we are after the black curtain appears. However, during the time that the black curtain skips, everything we did will be automatically completed by the natives here. All we have to do is bring our things back to the village before these eleven and a half hours."

Everyone nodded as they hurried along the mountain road.

"The town doesn't seem to be far from here. There are scheduled buses after we get down the mountain," Huang Mao said quickly. "I heard from the natives that the buses run every hour and arrive at the station on the hour."

That means they need to catch the bus back before 11 o'clock.

"If you calculate it this way, minus the time spent on the round trip and the half hour needed to arrive in advance, we still have nine hours left for shopping." Bai Jinshu calculated.

"Let's divide the shopping list," he offered. "There are twelve of us here. Let's roughly divide the items on the list. The sooner we finish shopping, the sooner we can rest."

Everyone had been working continuously for more than ten hours despite their tired bodies, so naturally they had no objection to his proposal.

The shopping list was in Xiao He's hand. Everyone divided into groups of two and quickly divided the things that needed to be bought into six portions.

"The weather seems to be getting hotter..." Xiao Tang wiped the sweat from his forehead and looked up at the sky.

While they were walking on the mountain road, the sun rose a lot higher and was now hanging entirely in the sky.

The air around them gradually became hot and humid. Looking back, they were already quite far away from the boat village where they started. Now they were close to the foot of the mountain. The tallest building in the boat village had become a dot as long as a finger knuckle.

"The sun is about to rise, we need to walk faster," Shi Xiulan also looked behind her, her tone a little anxious, "There should be air conditioning in the bus and in the town. We won't be able to walk when the sun rises."

When everyone heard this, they quickly started to move.

The weather was getting hotter and hotter. The triggerers, who were originally in the mood to discuss while walking, gradually became silent. The further they walked, the quieter it became. In the end, the only sounds in the entire team were footsteps and breathing, and a few faint inhalation sounds.

Some people's bodies can no longer hold on.

Bai Jinshu walked at the end of the team, barely keeping up with everyone else.

He did the least work yesterday, but he was the weakest. The muscle soreness that others could just endure went away, but for him it felt like his body was falling apart.

Isn’t this “Ogawa” a bit too weak?

The twelve hours swallowed up by the dark screen did not seem to have any impact on the newcomers' bodies. At the beginning, everyone was still enduring the cries of pain, but later on, the gradually hot weather coupled with the heat caused by physical discomfort, someone cursed in a low voice, "My legs are so sore, damn it", which immediately started the whole team talking.

"I'm really convinced!" Xiao Tang kicked away the branch next to him, very angry. "How long is this mountain road? Why do we need to perform rituals in such abnormal weather? Just call the National Meteorological Bureau to set up a weather station observation point here, and you can take the resettlement money and live at the foot of the mountain, okay?"

"If we discover the magical effect of Feng Shui on global warming, maybe Mr. So-and-so could be awarded a Nobel Prize posthumously!"

As soon as these words were spoken, everyone started complaining.

"Can you please be a little scientific? One village performed a ritual that caused a three-year drought, and the other village performed a ritual that caused a fire in the middle of the night. Your two villages are still fighting back and forth. Who did you offend with the normal weather?"

"To be able to live for more than 20 years in such hot weather is really amazing."

"You treat me like an ox during the day and don't let me sleep at night. Are you trying to keep me awake?"

"You are sick. You didn't move decades ago. Now you are in a hurry and you know to hire someone to solve the problem. You don't know to deal with it until the moment comes, right?"

Everyone started cursing angrily at once, and the team suddenly became much more lively.

Bai Jinshu did not join in this meaningless venting. He opened the live broadcast room and took a look at the barrage.

I don’t know if it’s because few people triggered this weird story before, but there were suddenly a lot more people in his live broadcast room. Most of the viewers noticed that he was looking at the screen and immediately asked:

【Why didn’t the anchor curse together? 】

[The anchor looked very tired. ]

[Isn’t the anchor angry? ]

【The anchor may not be popular. 】

【The anchor is so awesome. 】

【Then maybe the anchor is not tired. 】

[The host is so calm and collected. Pay attention! ]

Bai Jinshu: ...No, he was hot and tired, and the weather was hot. He was very angry and not calm at all. He wanted to kick even the ants passing by.

How can you tell that I’m not hot, tired or angry?

But the problem was that this body was too weak and could no longer support him in any action other than walking.

It is already difficult for him to keep himself from falling behind.

A group of people were cursing and encouraging each other on the mountain road. Xiao Fei even took out his live broadcast room and started broadcasting live to the crowd.

"Brothers, have you ever seen this strange story? I heard that the props that trigger this strange story are all the same, and there are only a few people who can trigger it. Today I will show you!"

"Yes, it's hot! Look, we're all sweating!"

"Last night, as soon as the sun went down, the sky was dark for several seconds, and when it came back bright it was already the next morning. We didn't sleep at all."

"Yeah, I spent the whole day moving stuff yesterday..."

After Xiao Fei did this live broadcast, several people in Shi Pang's team seemed to have received a prompt and opened their live broadcast rooms and started broadcasting live.

In this atmosphere, even Xiao Tang, who usually was too lazy to leave the live broadcast room, managed to say a few words, standing out among the anchors who were cheering up the audience in the live broadcast room:

"Of course it's hot, are you blind?"

"I'm so tired that I'm almost dying. If you don't feel tired then stop nagging me and come on!"

"Er Si? What does it have to do with me if Er Si isn't tired? Why are you so troubled?"

"If you think it's not nice for me to curse at others, then curse back. I didn't say you can't curse at me."

"Although it doesn't look good, it should still be some distance away from death."

As expected of Xiao Tang, after he said a few words, everyone around him had their eyelids twitching.

Just as everyone was broadcasting live, Shi Xiulan, who was walking in the front, suddenly said "Huh?"

She took a few steps back, then walked a few steps forward, turned around and waved with a look of shock: "Come and see!"

Everyone was confused for a moment, but still walked over.

Xiao Tang, who ran over first, soon made a puzzled sound: "Huh?"

She performed the same action as Shi Xiulan, and after repeating it several times, Xiao Tang turned around and said, "Damn it, come and try it, this place won't be hot as soon as you step out!"

This sentence was more useful than what Shi Xiulan said before. The triggerers who could no longer bear this weather rushed forward, and then breathed a sigh of relief after crossing a certain node.

"I...go." The yellow-haired man looked like he was about to cry. "I've never felt the air so cool before."

Several people in the nearby Shi Pang team fell directly to the ground, with their hands and feet spread out, and their whole bodies lying flat on the grass.

Bai Jinshu was walking at the back and he clearly felt that as soon as he crossed a certain area, the air around him suddenly became colder.

The body surface temperature suddenly dropped by at least ten degrees. A gust of wind blew over, and Bai Jinshu even felt goose bumps on his arms from the cold.

The heat above my head that was about to burn me to death suddenly disappeared, the temperature of the sun returned to normal, and everything I just experienced seemed like an illusion.

Bai Jinshu subconsciously took a step back.

The whole body began to be surrounded by a wave of heat again.

He took a step forward and the temperature dropped sharply.

"Is this the dividing line?" Xiao Tang washed his face with water from the stream nearby, exclaiming how refreshing it was. He came over with a pair of wet hands, stretched his arms forward tentatively, and then picked up a stone and drew a line on the ground.

"Cross over here, inside is the steamer, outside is the normal world," she clapped her hands, "Done."

The high temperature in Zhoufu Village is so strange.

It was as if there was an invisible cover covering the entire mountain. The temperature inside the cover was abnormally high, but as long as you stepped out of the range of the cover, the climate returned to normal.

The bus would arrive at the station at a certain time, so everyone didn't dare to waste any more time here. After a short rest, they all got up from the ground and continued walking towards the bus stop.

The latter part of the road is obviously much more lively than the previous one.

After the air cooled down, everyone's inner heat subsided a lot, and their tempers improved a lot. I won't talk about these things anymore. What is obvious is that there are more small animals on both sides of the road.

There were more birds flying in the woods and more cicadas chirping. It was early morning now and one could hear some birds singing from time to time. Everyone then realized that the cover was too quiet just now.

"The animals aren't stupid," Xiao Tang muttered, "they know it's hot inside so they move out. Are the people in this boat village stupid?"

The words may be rough, but the truth is there.

"So there must be other reasons that allow them to endure this heat all year round and still live in the mountains." Bai Jinshu coughed lightly and spoke.

"Indeed," Xiao Tang frowned and looked back, "The people in this village are no good. They don't even tell the truth to their own children. Really."

No matter how much people complain, it is a new discovery to have one more thing that needs to be investigated.

When we got here, the bus was not far away. We looked at the time and saw that there were less than ten minutes left before the next bus arrived. Everyone quickened their pace and got on the bus just in time for it to arrive, and successfully went to the county town.

The journey took nearly an hour. Fortunately, the women's bus station in Zhoufu Village was close to the starting station and there were many seats on the bus. After getting on the bus, everyone chose to catch up on their sleep. Within a few minutes, everyone had fallen asleep in their seats.

*

When I woke up, I saw that the driver had arrived at the terminal.

"Hey, hey, young man?" The driver got down from his seat and nudged Bai Jinshu, "Wake up, we've arrived at the final stop, Heqing Town. Wake up, don't sleep any more, I need to hand over the car and have someone else drive the outbound trip."

Bai Jinshu struggled to open his eyelids, rubbed his temples, and looked around.

There were only twelve of them left in the car, and he was sitting in the front seat, so the driver pushed him awake first and then started to call the people in the back.

"Wake up, wake up, we've arrived! Girl, we've arrived!"

Everyone was woken up by the driver one by one. They stretched their limbs after sleeping in the chairs for almost an hour, and then got off the bus one by one.

"By the way, Master," Xiao Tang asked through the window before leaving, "Do you know where to buy sacrificial supplies here?"

"Sacrificial supplies?" The driver's eyes suddenly became strange. "Why are you buying sacrificial supplies?"

"They're not quick supplies," Bai Jinshu replied quickly, "They're yellow paper and candles and stuff like that. It's almost the anniversary of our elders' death, so we came down to buy some for tomb sweeping."

“Oh, that one!” The weird look on the driver’s face suddenly turned into understanding. “Go to that commercial market and walk to the innermost area. That’s where they sell these.”

"Master, Master!" When the people behind them saw them asking for directions, they also responded, "Do you know where there is a Chinese medicine store? Let's go get some medicine."

"Chinese medicine pharmacy..." The driver thought for a moment, "I don't know if there is a pharmacy, but I know there is an old Chinese medicine doctor's shop near the trade market. You can go over and ask."

After asking the driver for directions for a long time and figuring out how to get to where they wanted to go, everyone dispersed to purchase the items on the list.

What was said last night was only a part of it. Brother Xi added a lot more later. The names of many items were weird, but the elders who had experienced that incident were not reluctant to tell the younger generation about these aspects.

"For the double-headed flower, they said any flower will do," Xiao Tang flipped through the list as he walked, "but it has to be two flowers on one branch, and there can only be two branches, and they can't be pruned."

"Agarwood, Aquilaria, Patchouli, and Sandalwood are all medicinal herbs," Huang Mao counted the list in his hand, "We can get them at the Chinese medicine store later."

"Black dog hair is a bit troublesome..." Xiao Fei touched his chin, "When we go to the farmer's market later, why don't we see who has a dog and cut some."

The things on the list are not difficult to find, but they are very miscellaneous and require running to many places. Fortunately, there are many of them, so there is not much to share.

Bai Jinshu and Xiao Fei were busy for a while, and in the blink of an eye it was almost noon.

Although the sun was hanging in the sky, the temperature was much cooler than in Zhoufu Village. The two of them carried the things they were responsible for purchasing and found a restaurant to sit down.

After a while, another ten people came, each carrying large and small bags.

"When I went to sell the funeral supplies, the boss seemed to know us," the two sisters who were in charge of purchasing candles and yellow paper said in a low voice as soon as they sat down. "As soon as the two of us entered the street of funeral supplies, several bosses looked unhappy. When they saw us trying to go in, they just closed the door."

"What's even weirder is that many business owners on that street keep animals. When we went in, several dogs were fighting, with their fur flying everywhere," Shi Xiulan said. "Xiuzhu is afraid of dogs, and I was a little scared too. When we were still hesitating whether to continue walking forward, the dogs saw us and ran away. We were both stunned."

"Look, we picked up the black dog hair from the ground," Shi Xiuzhu pointed to the bag on the ground, "the dogs fought and the ground was covered with hair, and we remembered that there was black dog hair on the list, so we simply collected the hair that was bitten off by the black dogs during the fight. It's a lot, so we can make the best use of it."

"That's good. We don't have to look for it anymore!" Xiao He, who was holding an iron cage nearby, said gratefully, "Thank you, Senior Sister!"

At his feet were the chickens and lambs he bought from the farmers' market.

"It was the same when I went to the farmers' market!" Xiao He quickly followed up, "When I entered, all the poultry in the market was silent. The boss was shocked. I said I wanted a rooster that had never crowed before. The boss said he had two similar ones, one that had crowed before and one that hadn't. He needed to find them. Then he searched for a long time and finally told me to go out a bit, otherwise the chickens wouldn't make any noise and he wouldn't be able to tell them apart."

Everyone talked about the strange things they encountered when shopping. Xiao Tang and Huang Mao encountered the most outrageous things.

"When we went to buy medicine, the apprentice said that we both had black spots on our foreheads and wanted to prescribe medicine for us," Huang Mao took a sip of water, moistened his throat and continued, "Then we both thought there was something fishy going on in Zhoufu Village and that the apprentice had some real skills, so we hurriedly asked him to take our pulses and prescribe medicine. After the medicine was prescribed, a regular customer nearby grabbed Sister Tang and asked her to follow her."

"I went over there, and the regular customer said that the apprentice always said that to everyone..." Xiao Tang was speechless. "Everyone who goes to his pharmacy will say that their foreheads are black. The medicine he prescribes costs several thousand yuan. If you go back and ask another store, they will say that it is just an ordinary prescription for health preservation. If you confront him and ask him if you can get medicine from someone else, he will say that only the medicine he gets is useful."

"We checked on our phones and found that it was indeed an ordinary health-preserving prescription," said the yellow-haired man with a reluctant look. "Originally, because the high temperature in Zhoufu Village was really weird, Sister Xiao Tang and I wanted to buy some to try, but we didn't have enough money..."

"I only have enough money to buy herbs and a few meals," Xiao Tang spread his hands. "I can't afford to buy thousands of dollars at a pharmacy. Fortunately, I was smart and asked the audience on the barrage to take a screenshot for me. Later, we will go to other stores and buy the same ones according to the list."

After some discussion, everyone had almost finished shopping. After lunch, the newlyweds bought the remaining items, found a guesthouse near the bus station, booked a room for a few hours, and took the time to get some sleep.

When it was time for the bus to depart, everyone woke up from their sleep, yawned, checked out of the room, and walked towards the bus stop.

After a few hours of sleep, except for Bai Jinshu who was in the worst health, the other eleven people had basically recovered to their best physical condition.

A group of people got on the bus carrying large and small bags, put all their things on the trunk, and while other passengers and the driver were not there, they simply live streamed for more than ten minutes on the bus. Only then did they continue to catch up on their sleep after the bus started.

After all, although it is almost night now, in more than an hour, darkness will fall again and a new day will begin.

I don’t know if I will have so many opportunities to rest tomorrow, so I have to seize the time and sleep a little longer.

Bai Jinshu leaned against the window. He didn't know how long he had slept when he was suddenly pushed awake by someone next to him.

"Er Ge! Er Ge, don't sleep!" Xiao Fei's voice rang out.

"Are we there yet?" Bai Jinshu raised his eyelids slightly and looked out the window.

When he saw this, he paused.

There was a thick fog outside the window.

"No," Xiao Fei's voice sounded, "It doesn't seem right. I was also woken up by Sister Xiao Tang. It seems that everyone except us is asleep."

Bai Jinshu turned around and realized that all the passengers in the car were asleep. There were only twelve of them left, looking at each other with different expressions.

"How long has this car been parked here?" Bai Jinshu stood up from his seat.

"I don't know." A head appeared at the back door of the vehicle. It was Xiao Tang. "Er Si, come down and take a look. I think there's something wrong with this person."

The author has something to say:

Although, in the early days, poultry could really be carried on rural buses (closed my eyes in pain)

20+20 (walking away with hands behind your back)