Chapter 425 Tales of the Carefree 2
The abandoned construction site's unfinished buildings are dangerous structures. Although they appear fine now, they could collapse during earthquakes and typhoons, so the local government has plans to demolish them safely. However, whether due to recent social unrest or some other reason, this plan has been delayed and has not yet entered the implementation stage.
Junior Sister Qiao never expected that the mysterious location mentioned in the Tales of Worry-Free Ghosts would refer to this place. It's also possible that the mysterious location isn't fixed, and this time it just happened to be an abandoned construction site. Either way, she felt a sense of destiny or fate emanating from it.
She wasn't the only one brought here.
She discovered that a dozen or so men and women had been led one after another to the open space outside the unfinished building, led by monstrous humanoid figures made of shadows. Some had walked there normally, like her, while others had suddenly emerged from black shadowy pools of water on the ground. Perhaps the latter had been transported there by some strange force from a distant place where walking was difficult.
Junior Sister Qiao dared not move, anxiously awaiting her fate while simultaneously observing whether there was a chance to escape. The others seemed to be in the same boat, yet none dared to communicate in front of the shadowy monsters. The atmosphere at the scene resembled that of a terrorist hostage situation.
After everyone seemed to have arrived, Xiao Qiao noticed a man emerging from the unfinished building. The surrounding shadow monsters quickly dissolved into flat shadows, converging into the shadow beneath the man's feet. Everyone clearly realized that the man was the one in charge.
With a wave of his hand, the shadows at everyone's feet turned into pools of water, and a book with a white cover appeared on the surface.
The mysterious man then commanded everyone present to pick up a white book and read. Some people did not immediately obey, while others picked up the book but did not open it.
Seeing this, the mysterious man repeated his command. An incredible thing happened: upon hearing his words, everyone's bodies went out of control. They picked up the white book on the ground, opened it, focused their eyes on the pages, and even involuntarily read aloud the contents of the book.
Xiao Qiao, a junior student, was one of them.
As I listened to her story, I couldn't help but become curious and asked, "What's written in the book?"
"I don't know," Xiao Qiao replied honestly.
"You don't know?" I said. "Didn't you see the contents of the book and even read it aloud?"
Xiao Qiao, a junior student, was also confused: "That's right, but I don't know what I saw or what I recited."
Zhu Shi, standing to the side, seemed lost in thought.
"In other words, the book's content possesses this mysterious quality... making it incomprehensible to others. And considering that you can recite it aloud, perhaps it wasn't written in an unfamiliar language..." I tried to speculate.
Junior Sister Xiao Qiao shook her head: "No, that's not it. I think it's just that I'm a bit special."
"Special?" I wondered.
Xiao Qiao, the junior student, nodded and then continued.
She came to this conclusion because everyone else's reaction was completely different from hers.
Apart from her, everyone else seemed to have been captivated by the book's content after finishing their recitations, standing there in a daze for a few seconds before displaying a variety of emotions.
Some people suddenly burst into tears and cried, some shouted excitedly, and some collapsed to the ground in a daze... They had all clearly seen something very important to them in the book.
The junior student, Xiao Qiao, appeared both panicked and bewildered by this drastic change, while the mysterious man nodded slightly and glanced at her. It was unclear whether her panic and bewilderment were seen as "normal reactions after reading the white book" by the mysterious man, as he didn't seem to pay her much attention.
"You all now know that making your past regrets, present troubles, and future anxieties vanish is not just empty talk here, but a real promise," the mysterious man said. "However, what you just experienced was merely a one-time entry experience. To truly join us, most of you are not yet qualified."
"At this stage, only two of you are qualified to join us."
As he spoke, the mysterious man pointed to two people present.
One of them was so excited after reading the white book that she burst into tears, and the other one was Xiao Qiao, a junior student.
Everyone else looked at them with envy and jealousy, while Xiao Qiao, the junior student, felt as if she had accidentally entered a fanatical religious gathering and was about to become the star of the bloody program that followed. She almost collapsed to the ground again.
"They will be given a trial afterward, and those who are fortunate enough to pass it will gain immense power and become one of us with honor," the mysterious man said. "As for the others, how you will qualify is already recorded in the books, so I don't think I need to explain it further, do I?"
"Yes... I will definitely do it!" someone shouted enthusiastically.
Some people shouted, "Whatever you ask me to do, I will do it, even if it costs me my life... So you must keep your word!"
“Of course, of course,” the mysterious man replied.
The other people who were not chosen also expressed their agreement, and although the emotions in their voices were not quite the same, they all contained a chilling fervor.
It's as if they've been brainwashed while reading the book. They were so wary and distant at first, but now they've let down their guard against the mysterious man, as if they're afraid he'll abandon them, and they're desperately trying to make their presence known.
Is this the truth behind the Tales of Worry-Free? Is this what they mean by "making all worries vanish"?
Xiao Qiao, the junior student, realized that the white book in her hands must possess some kind of maddening magic. Although she didn't know what was written inside, normal text could never cause so many people to fall into such a frenzy in such a short time. This was definitely a strange and unusual power.
A moment later, the mysterious man announced the end of the event and left some words for Xiao Qiao and another chosen person.
He said that they were not yet ready to give them a trial, so he asked them to return to the abandoned construction site on their own a few nights later, where they would join the trial with the "qualified ones" selected elsewhere.
After explaining everything, the shadow behind his heel expanded strangely, as if turning into a pool of water. He then stepped back and fell into the shadow pool, disappearing from everyone's sight.
Once Xiao Qiao realized the situation was over, she immediately turned and ran. She was terrified that the "fanatics" around her, who were casting envious and jealous glances at her, might do something bad to her. Fortunately, they didn't chase after her. After returning to her university dormitory, she locked the door tightly, her clothes soaked with cold sweat.
The faces of those who had been brainwashed and whose personalities had drastically changed flashed through her mind. She simply didn't have the energy to think about "gaining power from strange events," nor did she want to participate in any trials.
Heaven knows what that trial is all about. Even if you can gain power from it, you might end up being brainwashed like those "fanatic believers." Although she was timid and fearful, she was still clear-headed and could distinguish which things were worth trying and which things she should never touch.
The fact that she hadn't been brainwashed might have already been seen through by that mysterious man.
The problem is that this trial is probably not something she can simply choose not to participate in.
Although the mysterious man hadn't asked her name, her appearance had already given him away. Coupled with his extraordinary abilities and the fact that he referred to himself as "we," it was clear he wasn't acting alone, but rather as part of a group. Given his brainwashing skills, he likely had many henchmen in society. For an ordinary person like herself to try and bury her head in the sand like an ostrich would have unimaginable consequences.
She didn't dare call the police because she didn't believe that someone who possessed supernatural brainwashing powers and seemed capable of mysteriously teleporting her to other places could be dealt with by the police. She even suspected that there might be people within the public security department who had been brainwashed by such strange powers, and that calling the police rashly might be like walking into a trap. Although there seemed to be a "department" called "Luoshan" that specialized in handling these kinds of cases, she couldn't find the official contact information for that "department" and didn't know how to report the case to them.
Even assuming the other party truly fears official power, retaliating against a mere female college student like herself would be effortless. In severe cases, even her family members could be targeted. She has a younger brother in elementary school, and the thought of potentially involving him in the retaliation is too daunting for her to bear.
This may also be why many victims threatened by criminal elements dare not report the crime.
After much thought, she remembered someone who was very knowledgeable about ghost stories and supernatural forces. This person, who was said to stop at nothing to investigate ghost stories, had once consulted her about the ghost stories of an abandoned construction site, and shortly afterward, the abandoned construction site was mysteriously destroyed, allowing her to sleep peacefully in the days that followed…
"—You want me to save you?" I asked.
(End of this chapter)
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