Deeply
"Huangcun? What kind of place is that?"
Liang An didn't answer, broke free from Ling Xiao's hand, and opened the door. Ling Xiao quickly grabbed his coat and phone and chased after him.
Liang An walked quickly, his steps mechanical but firm. Ling Xiao followed behind him, trying to guide him away from the road. Strangely, Liang An seemed to have a clear sense of direction; he stopped at the bus stop, just as a bus heading to the suburbs pulled in.
"To Huangcun," Liang An said to the driver, his voice flat and emotionless.
The driver gave him a strange look, then glanced at Ling Xiao who had followed. Ling Xiao quickly took out his bus card, swiped it twice, and pulled Liang An to sit in the back.
"Do you know where Huangcun is?" Ling Xiao asked in a low voice.
Liang An didn't answer, but just stared straight out the window. The bus drove away from the city, the buildings gradually thinned out, and farmland and scattered houses came into view.
About forty minutes later, the bus stopped in front of a simple bus stop sign. "Huangcun has arrived," the driver called out.
Liang An immediately stood up and got out of the car. Ling Xiao followed closely behind, looking around. This was clearly a remote village, with several dirt roads leading in different directions, and some old houses visible in the distance. At the village entrance stood a huge locust tree, with a faded sign hanging on it, but the words "Huang Village" were still legible.
The air was filled with the smell of damp earth and a faint humus. It was afternoon, but the village was unusually quiet, with hardly any pedestrians in sight.
Liang An began walking along a dirt road deeper into the village. His steps remained mechanical, but his goal was clear. Ling Xiao followed closely beside him, vigilantly observing their surroundings.
They walked through the village and came to a reed bed. The reeds were taller than a person, swaying gently in the breeze and rustling softly. A narrow path wound its way into the reeds.
Without hesitation, Liang An stepped onto the path. Ling Xiao quickly followed, the density and silence of the reeds making him uneasy, but he couldn't leave Liang An alone.
They walked through the reeds for about ten minutes when Liang An suddenly stopped. He squatted down and began digging in the soil with his hands.
"Liang An, what are you doing?" Ling Xiao also squatted down.
Liang An didn't answer, he just dug mechanically. His fingers were quickly covered in mud, and his fingernails were filled with black, damp soil. Ling Xiao wanted to stop him, but suddenly, Liang An stopped.
A pale object protruded from the soil.
Ling Xiao's breath hitched. It was the stump of a foot, also unnaturally pale, with clean cut marks at the ankle. Like the arm found in the tea garden, it was clearly part of a human body.
Just as the severed limbs were fully exposed, Liang An's body suddenly trembled violently. He opened his mouth, letting out a silent scream, and then fell backward. Ling Xiao quickly caught him and found that Liang An's eyes were closed, as if he had fallen into a deep coma.
But at the same time, Ling Xiao sensed that something had left Liang An. The icy aura that had been surrounding Liang An suddenly vanished, as if it had never existed. Liang An's body temperature was still low, but it was no longer the unsettling, deathly cold.
“He Yuzhi…” Ling Xiao suddenly understood. It was that woman's spirit that guided Liang An to find her remaining limbs. Now, it had fulfilled its obsession and dissipated.
Ling Xiao grasped Liang An's left hand, raised his wrist to look at the black bracelet, where the golden plot cursor inside the groove was shaking violently, as if it couldn't wait to jump out of the bracelet.
Ling Xiao cupped Liang An's cheeks, trying to revive him with kisses. But Liang An remained unresponsive. They were in a secluded reed bed, next to a human dismemberment. Ling Xiao forced himself to calm down and pulled out his phone to call the police.
Just as he pressed 110 and the call connected, a rustling sound suddenly came from the reeds. Several people who looked like villagers emerged from the reeds, carrying hoes and shovels.
"What are you doing!" a middle-aged man shouted sternly.
Ling Xiao instinctively shielded Liang An behind him: "We've found... part of the body, and we're calling the police."
"Call the police?" Another younger villager looked at them sharply. "Give me your phone."
"What?" Ling Xiao gripped his phone tightly. The operator's voice came through the line: "Hello, this is the 110 emergency center..."
The young villager rushed forward, snatched Ling Xiao's phone, and hung up. He was so strong that Ling Xiao didn't have time to react.
"You can't do this! Corpse remains have been found here, we must call the police!" Ling Xiao tried to take back the phone, but was restrained by the other two villagers.
The middle-aged man walked to the severed limbs, looked down at them, and his face turned extremely grim. He exchanged a complicated glance with the other villagers.
"Take them back," the middle-aged man said in a deep voice.
"Where are you taking us? Let me go!" Ling Xiao struggled, but he was no match for the two adult villagers.
“Young man, quiet down.” The middle-aged man’s voice carried an undeniable authority. “This matter isn’t that simple. You can’t leave until we figure it out.”
"My friend has fainted and needs to go to the hospital!"
The middle-aged man glanced at the unconscious Liang An and said to the young villager, "Take him with you. Be careful."
Ling Xiao's hands were tied behind his back, while Liang An was carried on a villager's back. They were led away from the reeds and along another path through the village. Ling Xiao noticed that the village was unusually quiet; they didn't encounter any other villagers along the way, as if the entire village was deserted.
Finally, they were led to an ancient ancestral hall. The lintel of the hall was inscribed with faded characters, appearing to be over a hundred years old. The middle-aged man pushed open the heavy wooden door, revealing a dimly lit hall containing memorial tablets with faces obscured.
"Go in." The young villager gave Ling Xiao a push.
Ling Xiao staggered into the ancestral hall, and Liang An was gently placed on a pile of dry grass on the ground. The door of the ancestral hall closed behind them, and the sound of it being locked could be heard.
"Let us out! This is illegal detention!" Ling Xiao pounded on the wooden door.
There was no response from outside the door.
He turned back to Liang An's side to check on him. Liang An's breathing was steady, as if he had fallen into a natural sleep. Ling Xiao took off his coat and covered him with it, then began to observe the ancestral hall.
The interior of the ancestral hall appeared larger than the exterior, with cobwebs hanging from the high beams and the air filled with a mixture of dust and the smell of incense. Besides the shrine and memorial tablets at the front, there appeared to be some murals on the side walls, but they were blurred and indistinct due to their age.
Ling Xiao's heart sank. They were trapped in the ancestral hall of this remote village, their cell phones confiscated, Liang An unconscious, and villagers with unclear intentions guarding the outside. And all of this was related to the dismembered limbs of the woman named He Yuzhi.
He Yuzhi. This name echoed in Ling Xiao's mind. Why were her severed limbs found in Huang Village? And why were the villagers so tense, even going so far as to illegally detain them?
Ling Xiao sat down beside Liang An, holding his slightly cold hand. Outside the window, the sky began to darken, and the light inside the ancestral hall grew dimmer. He knew he had to find a way to escape.
Ling Xiao leaned against the cold wall, took a deep breath, and forced himself to calm down. He looked at Liang An, whose breathing was shallow and regular, and whose body temperature was still low, but at least it was no longer as frighteningly cold as before.
He gently released Liang An's hand, carefully looked around, and then began to untie the laces on his left shoe.
These are ordinary-looking white sneakers, but there's a tiny, barely noticeable bulge on the inside of the tongue. Since the "altar incident," Ling Xiao's father, Ling Li, has been extremely attentive to his son's safety. These shoes are the latest outdoor protective products developed by his company; their built-in location-based distress signal transmitter can directly transmit encrypted signals via satellite in areas without signal coverage, connecting directly to Ling Li's personal terminal and the company's security center.
Ling Xiao pressed the protrusion and felt a slight vibration from inside the shoe tongue—the signal had been sent. He retied his shoelaces, feeling slightly relieved. His father would definitely act as quickly as possible.
He sat down next to Liang An, gently pulling him into his arms to warm his cold body. The ancestral hall had no windows; only faint sunlight filtered through the cracks in the door and a few broken tiles high up. May was approaching, and although the nights in this small southern village weren't bitterly cold, a chill still seeped into the bones within the damp, old building.
Time passed slowly in silence.
Ling Xiao could hear faint sounds coming from outside—not human voices, but a rhythmic "tap, tap" sound, like the striking of a wooden fish, occasionally interspersed with indistinct chanting, the tone strange, unlike any local opera or ritual. The sound drifted in and out of the quiet village with an unsettling rhythm.
The villagers of Huangcun seemed to have completely forgotten about them. No water was delivered, no food was provided, and not even a single inquiry was made.
Footsteps occasionally passed by outside the ancestral hall, but never stopped. This feeling of being completely ignored was more unsettling than a direct threat. Ling Xiao hugged Liang An tightly, his chin gently resting on the top of his head, silently calculating the time in his mind.
About two hours after the signal was sent, he heard what sounded like a few barks in the distance, but they quickly subsided. In their place, the eerie chanting seemed to become more frequent, and the knocking sounds became clearer.
He didn't know what was going on outside, but his intuition told him that it was no ordinary rural activity.
A faint, cloying, and pungent odor, a mixture of burning paper money and some kind of spice, wafted in the air. This smell reminded Ling Xiao once again of the half-severed, pale arm in the tea garden—it seemed to be emerging from the soil again, its fingers slightly curled, dirt clogging its nails. Then, there were the mangled limbs in the reeds...neat cuts...
This secluded and strange village... this ancient and dark ancestral hall...
He dared not think too deeply, but simply gripped Liang An's hand even tighter, [It will be alright, we will all get out safely...]
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