Chamber of Secrets
Just when the female ghost's rotten face was about to touch Zhang Dazhui, he burst out with brute force, pushed Ye Qingwu away, and stumbled out.
He screamed and ran all the way, his heart almost jumping out of his throat, until he saw the door of the new house, he breathed a sigh of relief. However, he did not realize that the place that should have been guarded was empty.
"Master Qi! Something's wrong here, run!"
Zhang Dazhui rushed into the new house, and his voice echoed in the empty house.
…
But no one responded.
Cold sweat slid down his back. He swallowed and shouted anxiously a few more times.
…
Until a faint humming sound from inside a closet caught his attention.
Zhang Dazhu instantly picked up the copper candlestick on the table and approached the wardrobe step by step. His palms were full of sweat and the candlestick slipped in his palms.
"Who's there?"
His voice trembled.
Still no response.
He took a deep breath and flung open the cabinet door.
"Bang!"
"ah!"
Without thinking, Zhang Dazhui picked up the candlestick and smashed it down hard, waking the sleepy Qi Xiuming up to a state of complete awakening.
"Master Qi! I'm sorry! I'm so sorry!"
After Zhang Dazhu saw who it was, he hurriedly threw away the candlestick and apologized helplessly, "I thought..."
Qi Mingxiu covered his buzzing head and kicked him: "You have no eyes!"
After venting his anger, he belatedly asked, "Why are you here?"
Zhang Dazhu quickly told the whole story of what had happened, and at the end, he advised with lingering fear: "This place is very weird, let's go quickly!"
Qi Mingxiu then remembered the horrific scene before he fell into a coma and quickly looked around.
The bridal chamber was empty, the red candles had burned out, the wedding scale had broken into two pieces, and there was no trace of the bride.
"Where's the bride?" His voice was tense.
Zhang Dazhu was bewildered. "What bride? I didn't see anyone when I came in!"
Qi Mingxiu's face turned pale in an instant.
It's really weird!
Zhang Dazhu's legs felt weak, his back pressed against the door, his voice trembling and unrecognizable: "Master Qi, Master Qi, we really can't stay in this place anymore! There's a ghost!"
Qi Mingxiu glanced at him sideways, cursing in his heart that this coward was afraid that if he gave in and ran away now, where would he, the young master of the Qi family, put his face?
Seeing that there was no hope of leaving, Zhang Dazhu had no choice but to continue playing the adventure game with the young master of the Qi family.
Just as the two were about to leave the new house, the door suddenly "clicked" - it was locked!
"It's over, it's over!"
Zhang Dazhu was panicking and pounding on the door frantically, "That female ghost is going to trap us to death here!"
Qi Mingxiu kicked him irritably: "Can you be more promising?"
"This is clearly a trap set by the store! Where's the devil? They just want to tell us that there's a secret in this new house!"
So under Qi Mingxiu's coercion, Zhang Dazhui suppressed his fear and accompanied him to search for clues in the new house.
Qi Mingxiu rummaged through the drawers and cabinets impatiently, but found almost nothing in the house except some common daily necessities. His eyes finally fell on the bookcase in the study.
The bookcases were overflowing with ancient books neatly arranged, the gold-embossed titles on the spines gleaming in the candlelight.
"I didn't expect that Mr. Ye actually loves reading."
Qi Mingxiu curled his lips, sat bored at the desk, and flipped through the books on the table.
Suddenly, a yellowed piece of paper slipped from between the pages.
"What the hell?"
Qi Mingxiu frowned and picked it up, only to find a strange pattern drawn on the paper, with crisscrossing lines that made it impossible to make out what it was.
He fiddled with the paper, changing the angle to observe it, but he always felt that he had seen this pattern somewhere before.
Qi Mingxiu suddenly looked up and scanned the bookshelf while comparing it with the pattern.
This pattern... is exactly the same as the arrangement of books on the bookshelf!
Parts of the bookcase are broken, which seems to imply missing books.
He quickly picked out a few books from the desk and put them back in the empty spaces on the bookcase one by one according to the pattern.
There was a slight "click" sound, and a crack slowly appeared in the middle of the bookcase. A cold wind seeped out from the crack and blew out the candle on the table.
I guessed it right!
"Zhang Dazhu! Come here!" Qi Mingxiu shouted in surprise.
The two of them worked together to push open the secret door, and a dark passage appeared before their eyes. The stone steps meandered downwards, and the end was immersed in thick darkness, which seemed to lead to a secret entrance.
"Let's go in and take a look."
Qi Mingxiu took a candle from the desk and fixed it on the copper candlestick with candle wax to make a simple torch. The flickering flame illuminated his tense profile. He took a deep breath and stepped into the secret passage first.
The secret passage was narrow and damp, and the stone steps were covered with a thin layer of moss, making them slippery and cold. Their footsteps were particularly clear in the silence, making a subtle creaking sound.
Soon, they reached the end. Qi Mingxiu pushed open the door of the secret room, and the fire illuminated a corner of the secret room.
He fumbled to light the candlestick on the wall, and the faint fluorescence spread like ripples, gradually revealing the outline of the secret room.
On the ebony bookshelves on the four walls, yellowed books and scrolls were neatly arranged, with a hint of decay mixed in with the dusty scent of ink. Qi Mingxiu casually unfolded a scroll.
In the painting, a pair of lovers lean on each other under an apricot tree. The man, dressed in a green shirt, writes a calligraphy, while the woman, wearing red sleeves, adds fragrance and a smile. In the corner of the painting, a lingering poem is inscribed:
"I wish to be a pair of wings in the sky and a pair of branches on the ground."
Signed: Ye Li, Ye Qingwu.
"Ye Qingwu?" Qi Mingxiu frowned, "Why haven't I heard of this name?"
Zhang Dazhu quickly came over and said, "Master Qi, Young Master Ye married this Miss Ye! I even attended their wedding!" He pointed at the woman in the painting and said, "Look at her round face and almond-shaped eyes. I can't mistake her!"
Qi Mingxiu quickly flipped through the other scrolls. There were pictures of the two reading poetry and books together, boating and picking lotus flowers, and even an intimate scene of Ye Li drawing eyebrows for his wife, all of which reflected the love between the two.
"Who is this beautiful lady?"
He was puzzled. He had never heard of Ye Li's second marriage. So what was the wedding scene he just experienced?
Qi Xiuming continued to flip through the remaining scrolls until—
In the painting, only Ye Qingwu was left standing in the blood-red wedding hall, holding a half-broken piece of red silk in his hand. The inscription was severely scratched, and the ink was smudged like tear marks.
"That's not right..." Qi Mingxiu suddenly grabbed the scroll on the table and frantically searched for it. "If Ye Li really loved Ye Qingwu, why did he marry her again later?"
Zhang Dazhu scratched his head, his face full of confusion: "The Ye family's young master and Miss Ye are childhood sweethearts. They grew up together and have a very good relationship. Why did they end up..."
Qi Mingxiu's eyes were sharp as he spread out several scrolls on the table one by one, pointing at the dates signed. "Look, they haven't worked together on a single painting since six years ago."
He spoke in a low voice, "Something must have happened six years ago. Considering what we've experienced here, it's very likely that Ye Li abandoned his first wife and found someone new."
"Six years ago..."
Zhang Dazhu slapped his thigh suddenly. "I remember now! Six years ago, the people in the Ye Mansion suddenly stopped interacting with the neighbors. Later, they simply stayed indoors and even had servants do their shopping secretly..."
Qi Mingxiu sneered, "But that's not right. If Ye Li really changed his mind and married someone new, how could the Ye family not know about it? The neighbors didn't even hear a quarrel. That doesn't make sense."
He tapped his fingers heavily on the last painting. Ye Qingwu stood alone in the wedding hall. At that time, her heart must have been filled with anger and sorrow...
After searching fruitlessly, Qi Mingxiu angrily kicked the bookshelf, knocking over several poetry collections. Zhang Dazhu, however, continued to grope around, finally finding a small wooden box in the gap between the bookshelf and the wall.
"Master Qi! I've found something!"
He excitedly opened the box, but his expression changed instantly—
In the box lay a shriveled insect corpse, its entire body pitch black, shaped like a centipede but with a scorpion tail. Even though it had been dead for a long time, its mouthparts still emitted a strange blue light.
"What bad luck!"
Zhang Dazhui threw the wooden box back with a curse, then followed Qi Xiuming out of the secret room.
The two stumbled back to the new house, but found that the door that was originally locked was wide open. They walked out without hesitation.
Zhang Dazhu slumped against the stone pier, his chest heaving violently, beads of sweat rolling down his forehead, soaking his clothes. "Has the two hours finally arrived?" he wailed weakly.
Qi Mingxiu looked up at the moonlight and estimated that it was almost time. However, there was still a mystery that remained unsolved. He grabbed the limp Zhang Dazhu and said, "Let's go to another place while there's still time."
"Still going?"
Zhang Dazhui's eyes went dark, and he felt as if a ghost had sucked all his energy away, and his life became bleak.
Qi Mingxiu narrowed his eyes and lowered his voice: "Have you never thought about it? Why would Ye Li agree to marry his mother?"
Zhang Dazhu was stunned, and his chaotic mind suddenly became clear for a moment.
That’s right! The Ye family’s mistress and Ye Qingwu were like mother and daughter, and the two families had a close relationship. Even if Ye Li really changed his mind, the Ye family’s mistress would never easily agree to this marriage!
"So..." Qi Mingxiu's eyes flashed, "We have to go ask this mistress in person."
He did it right away. He stopped a passing maid and asked sternly, "Madam Ye, no, where is my mother now?"
The maid was intimidated by his aura and stammered, "In, in the ancestral hall..."
Without saying a word, Qi Mingxiu dragged Zhang Dazhui straight to the ancestral hall. The night wind was howling, and the lanterns on both sides of the corridor flickered, making the shadows of the two people sway like ghosts.
Pushing open the heavy wooden door of the ancestral hall, a stale smell of incense hit them in the face. In the dim candlelight, a woman in gorgeous clothes was kneeling on a cushion with her back to them, slowly turning the Buddhist beads in her hand.
"Mother?" Qi Mingxiu called out tentatively, his voice echoing in the empty ancestral hall.
The figure remained motionless, like a stiff statue.
He raised his voice: "Mother!"
Finally, the figure trembled slightly and slowly turned around.
"Li'er..."
The Ye family mistress's voice was like being squeezed out of an old bellows, hoarse and dry, each word pronounced with emphasis. "Why are you coming to me instead of spending your wedding night with your new bride?"
Under the candlelight, her face was as pale as paper, with a stiff smile on the corner of her mouth, and she looked at Qi Xiuming with a dull look in her eyes, like a puppet controlled by silk strings.
Qi Mingxiu suppressed the chill and took a step forward. "Mother, I have a question for you." He stared into her eyes. "Do you still remember my first wife... Ye Qingwu?"
"Ye...Qing...Wu..."
The mistress's lips opened and closed mechanically, and suddenly, a creepy smile appeared on her face. "Remember... that girl... didn't she die of illness..."
Her voice suddenly stopped, her neck twisted strangely, and her head suddenly tilted to one side, as if the joints were torn apart by invisible threads.
“Hehehe…”
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