Chapter 82 Nightfall
After a simple dinner, it was getting dark.
Everyone returned to their rooms to rest, including Lin Qiushi and Gu Longming. Lin Qiushi quickly washed up in his room and didn't rush to bed. Instead, he stood by the window, observing the room across from him.
The place where the infant's remains had cried yesterday was directly across from them. Those rooms housed two teams of four people, and the room Lin Qiushi had moved out of in the middle of the night was right in the middle of them.
After checking during the day, Lin Qiushi did not find anything unusual in those rooms, except for those small holes on the window paper that were easily overlooked.
The windows here were divided into small pieces with wood, with glass on top and paper on the bottom. Lin Qiushi could see the outside through the glass when he stood by the window, but if he sat down, he would see nothing.
"What are you looking at?" Gu Longming, who was lying on the bed, turned his head to look at Lin Qiushi and asked.
"I want to see what the difference is between that room and ours," Lin Qiushi said. "You go to sleep first."
Gu Longming said: "Then let's go together."
Lin Qiushi said, "I can do it alone. I won't be here for too long. You go to sleep first. You won't be able to help much if you're awake anyway."
Gu Longming blinked at Lin Qiushi and didn't insist: "Okay." He yawned, turned over, and fell asleep in less than two minutes.
Looking at him, Lin Qiushi couldn't help but think of Ruan Nanzhu... Ruan Nanzhu's ability to fall asleep was also first-rate. But then again, it seemed that most people who entered the door to do the mission with him fell asleep quickly, even Cheng Yixie was no exception.
The night was dark and a cool breeze blew through the corridor, making the lanterns hanging there sway.
The firelight flickered, and Lin Qiushi could only vaguely see the scenery of the corridor outside through the darkness. He looked down at his watch. It was already eleven o'clock in the evening, almost midnight.
Lin Qiushi planned to wait until twelve o'clock, and if there was no change in the room opposite, he would go back to bed and sleep.
While thinking this, Lin Qiushi noticed that a blurry red figure appeared at the end of the opposite corridor. The figure moved slowly in the darkness. When it came under a lantern, Lin Qiushi finally saw clearly what the red figure was with the help of the lantern's light.
There were actually seven or eight children in red clothes. They clung to the shoulders of the people in front of them, their heads lowered, and moved slowly forward. Perhaps because of the distance, Lin Qiushi couldn't see their appearance clearly, but judging from their gait, these children were clearly not human.
They lined up and walked slowly forward, but when they came to a window, they suddenly stopped. The first child showed a weird smile on his pale face, slowly turned around to face the window, stood on tiptoe, stretched out a tiny finger, poked a small hole in the paper on the window, and then put his face on the hole.
When Lin Qiushi saw this scene, a layer of white sweat broke out on his back. He finally understood why there were so many small holes on the window of the room he had moved to before... If he had not brought the infant's remains out and had not changed rooms, then those little ghosts would have seen them from the other side of the window paper.
Those things seemed to notice that no one was in the house, so they turned and headed for the next room. Lin Qiushi remembered that room was occupied, so he saw that after the children poked a hole, they turned into a stream of blood, flowing through the hole in the window paper and into the room.
All this happened silently, but in a flash the corridor returned to peace again.
Lin Qiushi thought of the events of the day and whispered the clue several times: "The sky is in turmoil, the earth is in turmoil, there is a crying child in my home. A benefactor who has passed by, please recite this three times and you will sleep until dawn..." He repeated it three times in a row and was about to return to his bed when he saw the back of a woman appear in the middle of the courtyard. The woman was wearing a long red dress and had long black hair. She looked like the hostess who had received them that day.
She stood there quietly, facing the room where the children went in, her cold back like a frozen statue.
Lin Qiushi didn't want to look any further. He carefully turned around and walked towards the bed. However, just as he sat down on the edge of the bed, a bright light suddenly appeared before his eyes. Lin Qiushi was stunned to find that the oil lamp on the table had somehow lit up on its own.
The light of the oil lamp illuminated the entire room, undoubtedly attracting the attention of everything in the dark night - whether good or bad.
In a flash, Lin Qiushi flew to the oil lamp. Without caring about anything else, he reached out and picked up the lampshade and quickly covered the oil lamp.
The oil lamp went out instantly, but Lin Qiushi's body froze. He felt a gaze coming from outside the window. He half-crouched, not daring to stand up, fearing that something outside might see him.
Maybe Lin Qiushi was too nervous or what, but he could even hear the subtle sound of the breeze blowing through the hem of her skirt.
Then, something rubbed slowly on the window paper, and after a moment, a finger painted with red nail polish pierced through the thin layer of window paper.
Lin Qiushi was squatting next to the window, right in the blind spot of the cave. The people inside the cave couldn't see him, but he could see the people inside the cave—a black eye appeared behind the window, peering into the house with ill intentions, searching for its target.
Gu Longming on the bed was still breathing evenly and was not woken up by all this.
Lin Qiushi held his breath and tried his best to make his presence less noticeable.
Those eyes looked outside for a long time, but ultimately did not notice Lin Qiushi squatting in the corner. She sighed with some regret and slowly looked away.
But Lin Qiushi didn't dare move. He had a feeling that the thing was still near the house...
Sure enough, a few seconds later, the black eyes appeared again. If Lin Qiushi had believed that she had left at the beginning, he would probably have been seen by this thing. As for what would happen, it was unknown.
Lin Qiushi was still not found, and anger and displeasure were revealed in his black eyes. The sound of night watchmen was heard again outside Lin Qiushi's yard. After hearing the sound, the owner of the black eyes disappeared behind the window paper.
Lin Qiushi squatted there for a long time, making sure the outsiders had left before he slowly stood up. His legs were numb from squatting, and he stumbled back to the bed.
Gu Longming was still sleeping, completely unaware of what had just happened.
Lin Qiushi exhaled and lay down beside Gu Longming, but his mind was filled with thoughts of those children and the mistress of the yard. He always felt that there were crucial clues hidden in this yard.
An ordinary person would definitely not be able to sleep after experiencing what just happened, but Lin Qiushi's rich experience in previous marriages made him calm down quickly. He closed his eyes and began to try to recall the peaceful feeling of lying next to Ruan Nanzhu. Surprisingly, he fell asleep very quickly.
It seems that Ruan Nanzhu's sleeping pills are really effective. Basically, you can fall asleep just by thinking about them.
On the third day, the noise of Gu Longming getting up woke Lin Qiushi. He opened his eyes and saw Gu Longming greeting him nonchalantly, "Good morning. Did you have any problems last night?"
Lin Qiushi said, "I did, and it almost killed me."
Gu Longming: "...Are you serious?"
Lin Qiushi said, "Of course I'm serious." He sat up from the bed and briefly described what happened last night.
Gu Longming didn't take it seriously at first, but when he heard that the thing had been standing by the window staring at him for a long time, he showed a horrified expression: "Fuck, she just stared at me like that all night?"
Lin Qiushi: "About the same."
Gu Longming said, "Fortunately, I was wearing pajamas." He said shyly, "If I slept naked like I do at home..."
Lin Qiushi: “…” You might die.
Gu Longming joked, then turned serious again and said, "Do we need to change rooms tonight?"
Lin Qiushi thought for a moment and said, "Let's go have breakfast first."
When they arrived at the breakfast place, Lin Qiushi discovered that two people were missing from the team. They were the two who lived in the room where the child stayed yesterday.
"Did they come back last night?" Everyone was discussing the two missing people in a low voice.
Lin Qiushi quickly finished his breakfast and winked at Gu Longming.
Gu Longming was still not full, so he stuffed another steamed bun into his mouth and mumbled, "Let's go for a walk."
Lin Qiushi stood up and walked out of the house.
"Where are you going?" someone asked them.
"Let's go check their room," Lin Qiushi replied, "to see if they're still there."
"I'll go with you." Yan Shihe, who entered the ancestral hall after Lin Qiushi and the others yesterday, also stood up. His partner Xiao Qian seemed reluctant to go, but in the end he didn't say anything and followed them over.
The four of them were walking in the corridor, and Yan Shihe asked them if they heard any noise last night.
"No," Gu Longming said frankly, "I usually sleep until dawn and didn't hear anything."
Lin Qiushi also shook his head.
"Oh." Yan Shihe nodded. "I did hear a child crying last night... It probably came from near where you live. You should be careful at night."
Lin Qiushi remained silent upon hearing this. He hadn't heard any unusual sounds last night. With his hearing ability, even Yan Shihe could have heard it, so there was no reason for him to have missed it.
Yan Shihe said this, either he was lying to them, or he was the only one who could hear the crying.
As they were talking, they walked to the door of the residence of the two missing people.
Lin Qiushi raised his hand and knocked on the door. After waiting for a moment, he was not surprised to find that there was no movement inside.
"Go straight in?" Lin Qiushi asked.
"Okay." Yan Shihe didn't mind, "But it seems to be locked inside."
Lin Qiushi said, "Let me try." Outside the door, he had already begun learning the art of opening doors with Ruan Nanzhu, but his progress was slow, and he couldn't handle the more complex locks. This old lock was no problem. If he couldn't open it, he could break in. After all, if he really wanted to, getting in wasn't that difficult.
A minute later, the lock opened.
Gu Longming cast a look of admiration at Lin Qiushi: "Brother, you're amazing. Now I believe you're unemployed."
Lin Qiushi: “…” He always felt that there was something wrong with this sentence.
Yan Shihe reached out and pushed open the door, revealing the scene inside. The small bedroom was covered in blood, but it didn't look like it had been splashed, more like it had been left behind by someone being dragged.
There is no doubt that the owner of the room is in great danger at this point.
Lin Qiushi walked into the room, pretending to casually check around before slowly approaching the window. He saw those small holes again, but compared to yesterday, his feelings were more complicated.
Yan Shihe was also quite meticulous and quickly discovered the small hole in the window. He stared at it, unable to find any clues. Gu Longming, however, pretended to be unconcerned and said, "Why do I think of the incense in martial arts dramas? Could it be a human who killed them?"
Upon hearing this, Yan Shihe glanced at Gu Longming.
Inside the house, there was another concerning point: Lin Qiushi noticed that the oil lamp on the stand was out of oil. It had been filled to the brim when they first moved in, and it had only been used for two nights, so it couldn't possibly be empty. However, the lamp in front of him had burned dry. He didn't know if someone had poured out the oil, or if there was some other reason.
"Where are the bodies? Where are their bodies?" After searching the room, Yan Shihe didn't see the bodies of the two people. He was a little confused. "Even if they are dead, we should at least see the bodies."
But the body was gone, and there was no place to hide it in the small bedroom.
"I don't know." Xiao Qian replied, "Could it have been eaten by those things?"
Yan Shihe frowned and said nothing. In fact, this possibility existed. After all, anything could happen inside the door.
Lin Qiushi was also thinking about the corpse, but what he wanted to know more was where the hostess was now.
It seemed that there were no more clues in the house. However, Gu Longming found a child's bloody handprint in a very remote corner. He did not tell this to Yan Shihe, but quietly told Lin Qiushi after the four of them separated.
"Okay, I see." Lin Qiushi nodded. "Where do you think their bodies were taken?"
Gu Longming: "I don't know... Isn't it normal to be killed by something like this and have no body?"
Lin Qiushi said, "It's hard to say." Gu Longming's words actually made sense, but he just felt something was wrong. His intuition seemed to tell him that the whereabouts of the body were very important, but it was just a hunch, without any evidence to prove it. It was like Ruan Nanzhu's experience, which was difficult to describe in concrete words.
"Since you're so concerned, why don't we look around?" Gu Longming noticed Lin Qiushi's frown and said, "There are still some areas of this yard we haven't explored thoroughly."
"Then let's look for it." Lin Qiushi nodded.
The two of them began to wander around the yard again.
It must be said that this courtyard was very large, and the paths were arranged in a chaotic manner, making it easy to get lost. Fortunately, Lin Qiushi had a very good memory, so it was not difficult for him to guide Gu Longming through it.
Gu Longming, on the other hand, was completely confused and said, "Didn't we just walk past here?" He remembered that the surrounding scenery seemed to be exactly the same.
"I haven't been there," Lin Qiushi said. "The stone on the path I just took was smaller."
Gu Longming: “…” He stared at the stone until his eyes were almost pierced, but he still couldn’t find any difference from the previous one. So he cast an admiring look at Lin Qiushi and said, “You’re really amazing… You can even notice this.”
Lin Qiushi smiled but said nothing.
In fact, he didn't have such a memory before, but since he entered the door, his memory has begun to improve. It is not difficult for him to remember this fixed scene.
This yard seemed to be designed to make people get lost. Many places were built exactly the same, even the potted plants and rockery had the same layout.
Lin Qiushi and Gu Longming spent the entire morning in the yard and finally found the place they were looking for - they found the courtyard where the hostess lived.
Why was he so sure it was where the hostess lived? Because there, Lin Qiushi saw a long red dress hanging from a treetop, swaying in the wind. He remembered that this dress was the one the hostess had worn last night.
"Do you smell anything?" Gu Longming frowned and sniffed as he came over. "It stinks."
Lin Qiushi also smelled it. It was a smell that was difficult to describe in words. It was a bit like blood, and a bit like something rotten. In short, it was very disgusting.
Fortunately, Cheng Yixie is not here, otherwise it would be very uncomfortable.
There was only an iron door separating the hostess's residence from where they were. The door was half-open, and they could vaguely see the scene inside.
Lin Qiushi first observed from outside for a while.
It was a large courtyard, but it was completely empty. Apart from a huge dead tree, there was no other plant life to be seen. The long dress the hostess was wearing was hanging on the top of the dead tree.
After making sure there was no movement inside, Lin Qiushi quietly pushed the door open and the two of them walked into the yard.
After observing around, Lin Qiushi soon discovered traces of blood in the corner of the yard. The traces looked like something was dragged across the ground, and were very similar to the traces in the rooms of the two missing persons.
Gu Longming seemed to dislike this yard very much. He covered his nose with his hands and looked disgusted.
"What's wrong?" Lin Qiushi asked him.
Gu Longming said, "The feng shui of this yard is terrible. It's like a place where the dead live."
Lin Qiushi asked, "Isn't the place we live in the place where the dead live?"
Gu Longming shook his head: "It's more serious here. Normal houses are supposed to be square, but the house here is deliberately missing a corner..."
Lin Qiushi took a closer look and discovered that the house here was indeed missing a corner. The corner was forcibly built into an arc shape, which looked extremely weird.
As the two of them were talking, Lin Qiushi's expression suddenly changed. He said, "Hide, someone is coming." After that, he found a corner and hid in it with Gu Longming.
A moment later, the hostess in red appeared at the door. There was a cold expression on her pretty face. She did not notice the presence of Lin Qiushi and Gu Longming, and walked towards a room.
Gu Longming finally breathed a sigh of relief after she entered the house and whispered, "I was so scared...Should we leave?"
Lin Qiushi said, "No, I want to go over and take a look."
Gu Longming: "Go and take a look? Why would you go and take a look when it's so dangerous?"
Lin Qiushi gestured for silence. In fact, not long after the hostess entered the room, he heard a very subtle sound, like a sharp blade cutting something hard, one cut after another, a bang-bang sound.
Although Gu Longming strongly disapproved of Lin Qiushi's decision to go over and take a look, he still did not object. Instead, he followed behind Lin Qiushi obediently, tiptoeing forward, although it was indeed quite funny for such a big man to do this.
Lin Qiushi walked to the hostess's door, leaning sideways and looking inside cautiously.
The hostess had her back to them, holding a long knife in her hand, and was chopping something with her head down. After Lin Qiushi took a closer look, he found that it was a large piece of meat... and judging by the location of the ribs, it was clearly part of a human body.
Obviously, the bodies of the two people who disappeared last night should be what the hostess is dealing with now.
Inside the hostess's room, something even stranger caught Lin Qiushi's eye. It was rows of shelves filled with densely packed oil lamps. Some were empty, while others were filled with solidified oil.
The hostess hummed a song as she easily separated the pieces of meat. Lin Qiushi saw the parts that belonged to the hands and feet, which further confirmed his guess. After separating the pieces of meat, the hostess started to light a fire and placed an iron pot on the stove.
What is she going to do... Gu Longming asked Lin Qiushi silently with a horrified look in his eyes.
Lin Qiushi spread his hands, indicating that he didn't know.
Gu Longming's eyes were a little panicked, and he lowered his voice: "Fuck, the meat I ate during the day, it can't be..."
Lin Qiushi: “…I don’t think so.”
Lin Qiushi's tone was also hesitant, clearly uncertain. Thinking of the delicious meal he'd eaten that day and the bone soup he'd drunk the previous night, Gu Longming almost wanted to vomit right there and then. He tried hard to hold it back, mentally reminding himself that it would be safer to stick to compressed biscuits and the like while inside the compound.
The hostess had already heated the pot and started putting pieces of meat into the pot.
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