Chapter 289 God’s Punishment Is About to Come
Yin Xiu silently met those hostile gazes one by one, quietly grasped the hilt of the knife, and emitted a stronger murderous intent back.
When those pale and skinny people saw Yin Xiu's knife, they probably realized that the person in front of them was not easy to mess with. Some of them who were about to stand up slowly sat back down and continued to hang their heads.
But there was one person who approached Yin Xiu with a forced smile. He rubbed his withered hands, and the whole body was just skin and bones. His eyes rolled in his sunken eye sockets as he looked Yin Xiu around. He smiled and said, "Look at you, you're from out of town, right? What's going on in our Hai Village?"
Yin Xiu raised his eyes calmly and stared at the people in front of him, "Is this Hai Village? What happened to you?"
"It's... a famine." The man on the other side rubbed his hands awkwardly. "Famines in other places happen because people can't grow crops. But famines are rare here by the sea, because they can't even catch a single fish. Everyone's on the verge of starvation."
Although the person opposite was more active than the others, his voice sounded weak.
Yin Xiu turned around and looked around again. He saw that the fishing tools that every household used were all broken and tattered. It seemed that they had not been used for a long time. He was even more puzzled. "Are you just starving here? Why don't you leave here and go somewhere else?"
"We want to get out, but we have to..." The man in front pointed into the distance, "People outside say our village is haunted by evil spirits. First, the fish we sold brought bad luck to anyone who bought them. Then, even with so many people from the whole village going out to fish, we couldn't catch a single fish."
He sighed and said sadly, "Perhaps our village is really destined to die."
Yin Xiu felt that it was a bit weird and there must be something fishy going on.
"You weren't like this from the beginning, were you? Do you understand the reason for the change?"
The person in front of him pursed his lips and looked away, seemingly not wanting to say anything.
Yin Xiu immediately took out a bag of small bread from his pocket. It was originally the food Ling Feng gave them when they were in the snowy mountains, but he had already started to mutate by then and could not feel hungry, so he had kept the bread in his pocket and had not eaten it. Now it came in handy.
As soon as this thing was taken out, the eyes of all the people lying around lit up, and they hurriedly got up and moved closer.
The people in front of Yin Xiu immediately became anxious. "Give it to me! Give it to me! I'll tell you everything! I know more than them! I used to be a cadre in Hai Village!"
"Tell me first, and I'll give it to you later." Yin Xiu put away the bread without saying a word.
The people around him saw him put it away and went back, leaving only the person in front of him anxiously, "Let's talk aside."
He pulled Yin Xiu to a secluded spot and stopped there. After making sure there was no one around, he slowly began to speak, "In the beginning, our village wasn't very wealthy. When we first arrived, we couldn't even build houses, and we didn't have enough food to eat. We had no experience fishing, and life was completely impossible. Many people starved to death in one winter.
“It was during that winter that a mysterious figure appeared and told us that if we offered a sacrifice to an unknown being, we would receive a great reward.
"Everyone was excited at the time, so we started organizing it right away. Although there were some people who opposed it, they were not many. There were also many people who were worried, but no one wanted to starve to death.
"So they held the first sacrifice."
Yin Xiu listened and almost realized something, so he asked, "What did you sacrifice?"
The other man shook his head. "The village was so poor at the time, we didn't have anything to offer, so we just casually offered some leftover fish as a sacrifice. But it worked, and it was as if the Lord, whom we couldn't see, showed up. Over the next two days, so many fish bounced onto the shore that we couldn't even pick them all up. As a result, Hai Village prospered."
Yin Xiu crossed his arms over his chest, "Isn't this a good thing? Why did it become like this?"
The once prosperous Xiaohai Village survived the disaster because of the sacrifice and even became wealthy. It was obvious that everything was moving in a good direction.
The man's eyes evaded a little. "That's because... at first, we only offered fish as sacrifices. The village gained quite a bit after the sacrifices, but then someone suggested that since the village was getting richer, offering better sacrifices to the gods might give them something better in return. So, the sacrifices changed from fish to pigs."
Yin Xiu narrowed his eyes slightly, "The harvest turned out to be better, right?"
The person in front nodded and said, "After the pig sacrifice, some broken boats floated over from the sea. Inside were some boxes of old antiques. They provided a large amount of financial support to Hai Village. Everyone was very happy. Then, during the next sacrifice, someone suggested that if they gave better sacrifices, they would get better rewards."
He slowly lowered his head, as if he understood the reason as he spoke, and couldn't help sighing, "The third time, we sacrificed sheep and cattle, and prepared many other things. The harvest from that time made the entire Hai Village rich.
"Villagers who were out fishing discovered a shipwreck filled with gold coins near the coast. For a time, almost the entire village gave up fishing and went to collect the gold coins.
"Not long after, people were no longer willing to live by the humid seaside, so they rebuilt a small town outside the sea village. All the villagers moved there, and the sacrifices stopped."
Yin Xiu listened quietly, waiting for his next turn.
“At first… we all chose to do business. With the capital we had, we could buy and sell things. But for some reason, everything we sold would bring bad luck to the other party. Our business was getting worse and worse, and we even encountered resistance from other villages.
"Everyone was losing money and houses, and they kept losing money. They couldn't live outside anymore, so they all came back.
"Many people believed this was God's punishment, so they started offering sacrifices again, trying to regain God's blessing. But this time, no matter what they offered, it was useless. God never came, and everyone is now waiting to die."
The man sighed, his whole body dejected. "The people in the village outside regard us as evil creatures and won't let us leave. The gods have also abandoned us. We can only wait to die."
Yin Xiu listened quietly, staring at him without blinking. "Do you really have no desire to fight anymore? Do you really want to give up?"
"Of course, besides waiting to die, what else can we do? We've sacrificed all our food but still haven't been able to summon the gods. We can't offer sacrifices higher than cattle and sheep, and we're at our wit's end." The man on the other side shook his head and extended his hand to Yin Xiu, "Can you give me the food now? I'm relying on this to survive today."
Yin Xiu threw the small bread over, and the other party quickly took it and started to eat it in big mouthfuls.
While chewing, he did not forget to remind Yin Xiu, "Since you saved my life today, I will kindly remind you one last time, please leave here quickly.
"In a moment, God's punishment will come."
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