After careful observation, Xiao Cheng discovered that the coffin lid was not nailed on, but rather locked to the entire coffin body by a mechanism similar to a Kongming lock.
"How do I open it? Will brute force work?" She had already started warming up when she saw Fang He walk around the four corners, press something, and the coffin lid popped open.
“Drive it like this.” He spread his hands, revealing a few splinters in his palm.
Xiao Cheng: "..." You're really teaching by example.
The process of opening the coffin was too fast; before the little boy could react, he bumped right into his own corpse inside the coffin.
It's even worse than he is now.
His body was covered in knife wounds, clearly showing signs of repeated chopping and hacking; there were hardly any good pieces of flesh left.
A dulled cleaver was stuck in his head, and what was even more shocking was that his forehead and chest had been pierced through by a wooden splinter.
The wooden spikes were stained bright red with blood, and the intricate patterns on them were still faintly visible. Similar to the wooden plaque at the entrance of the shrine maiden's house, they were clearly related to the true god.
The little boy was lying on the edge of the coffin, looking listless and seemingly sad.
"How could I have died so tragically?" he muttered to himself. "Seeing a corpse like this, I'm going to have nightmares tonight."
"It's alright," Xiao Cheng said gently. "You're already a ghost; you'll only give others nightmares."
Fang He was more direct, reaching out to remove the cleaver from the corpse's head: "Wouldn't this look better?"
The little boy said, "..." "Thank you," feeling comforted.
The wooden splinter was embedded very deeply, driving into the coffin and firmly securing the body to the floor. Xiao Cheng and Fang He tried to pull it out, but to no avail.
"Go cut down the tree, don't waste your time here." The little boy finally stopped them, climbed into the coffin, and lay down, embracing his own body. "You are good people, I don't want to see you again."
"Little boy, what's your name?" Xiao Cheng looked at the boy who was curled up in a ball. "I can erect a tombstone for you for free, so you won't be considered a wandering ghost anymore."
The boy was silent for a moment, then said something completely irrelevant: "This is my home."
Then, as if to escape, he turned over, and the coffin lid automatically closed again.
The bell outside the door rang out with a long, loud sound, one after another, making one's soul tremble.
Although the cleaver was dulled, it was exceptionally sharp when chopping trees. Xiao Cheng and Fang He carried half a piece of peach wood, its branches trimmed, out of the house. The door slammed shut behind them and then automatically locked.
It seems that, just as the boy said, once you come out, you can never go back in.
The two walked forward with the peach wood, and along the way they grabbed a handcart parked by the roadside.
Xu Chu and his two companions happened to come out of a room and ran into them.
"You found the knife?" Xu Chu looked at the kitchen knife in their hands with some surprise. "That's great. The three of us went to several places, but we didn't find anything."
"It was discovered by accident." Xiao Cheng didn't mention the little boy's story. "Let's go, we'll go to each house one by one, we should have enough time."
With the tools, the process of cutting down the trees became quite smooth. The five of them took turns and quickly gathered all the peach wood; the last thing they needed was the locust wood from the shrine maiden's house.
Even in daylight, the house looked exceptionally eerie. Two wooden signs, one red and one white, swayed in the wind in front of the door, and a faint woody scent lingered in the air.
"I didn't see it clearly last night, but this wooden sign... it looks like it was stained with blood." Xiao Cheng's mind flashed back to the wooden splinter embedded in the boy's body; the two looked almost identical.
"Don't touch it, it's not a good thing," Fang He said calmly, pushing the door open before Xiao Cheng could.
The yard was a complete mess.
The coffin was smashed in half, the lid collapsed, and the half of the skirt that was buried underneath could be vaguely seen.
The big locust tree was uprooted and fell in the yard. No one knew how it was moved there; broken leaves and branches were scattered all over the ground.
The house was relatively intact, but next to their room, a hole had been smashed in the wall, just big enough for one person to get in and out.
"Wow, what kind of hero could do something like that?" Xiao Cheng couldn't help but exclaim in amazement. "He can even uproot a giant locust tree!"
"Guess who the first person the witch will suspect after she returns?" Fang He's question left Xiao Cheng speechless.
Then he continued, "So why not go all the way? You must be curious about what's in the shrine maiden's house, right?"
The group then divided the tasks clearly: Number 4 and Number 7 stayed in the yard to cut locust wood, Xiao Cheng and Fang He checked the coffin, and Xu Chu tried to open the witch's door by himself.
“I wonder who’s in the coffin.” Fang He pointed to the brightly colored hem of the skirt. “This skirt doesn’t look like something an ordinary villager would wear.”
Xiao Cheng, on the other hand, is always very proactive, and he immediately went over to lift the coffin lid.
There was a layer of sawdust inside. After removing the broken coffin lid, they finally saw the body inside.
It was a female corpse that had been skinned.
The body was cleaned very thoroughly, without even a drop of blood. The muscle texture was exceptionally clear, and wooden splinters were driven into the forehead and chest.
The skirt, which should have been meticulously draped over the corpse, is now covered in dirt and wrinkles because the coffin was destroyed.
"What is this? A jade pendant?" Xiao Cheng spotted the small piece of jade that had fallen onto her skirt. She picked it up and examined it closely. It looked like a longevity lock, but now only a corner remained.
Besides that, there were no other clues.
On the other side, Xu Chu also came over after checking the house.
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