Chapter 25 Mayfly Silk
Xiaohua's eyes widened in surprise. "My father is possessed by evil spirits? Impossible. The palace is protected by a special formation, so no evil spirits or ghosts can get close. Even among the people from the Xuanjing Division, only Xie Shouzheng can enter and leave the palace at will."
Lin Qingyue said, "The guards and maids were all in the imperial study. He and I were at a distance, just chatting for a few words. At first, I didn't even notice anything unusual, until later, when I accidentally noticed that his eyes were a little red. That wasn't a normal condition, but rather an abnormality caused by some evil spirit."
"Father..." Xiaohua was so worried that she wanted to rush to the palace to find out what was going on.
But soon, he calmed down.
After all, he is just a cat now. If he goes back rashly, not only will he be unable to save people, but he will also alert the enemy.
"Go to Xuanjingsi to find Xie Shouzheng!"
Just as he arrived at the gate of Xuanjingsi, he heard a horse neighing behind him, followed by Dongfang Yan's haunting voice: "Lin Qingyue!"
Lin Qingyue turned around and saw Dongfang Yan jumping off the horse, still wearing his previous court robes.
"Why don't you take the palace carriage home?"
He had clearly given her a way out, so why didn't she appreciate it at all?
He had already returned to the palace and was preparing to change clothes and meet the guests.
But then he heard his subordinates come to report: "The princess refused to come back, and she didn't even take the palace carriage."
So Dongfang Yan hurriedly chased after him without even changing his court clothes.
"You haven't resigned from the job at Xuanjingsi?"
"No."
"Lin Qingyue, don't say you're my princess consort; you represent my dignity! Even if you were the wife of an ordinary family, you should consult with your husband before making any decision!"
"Discuss with you? Sorry, I'm not used to that!"
Lin Qingyue was too lazy to talk to him anymore and walked into the gate of Xuanjingsi with the cat.
Although Dongfang Yan was angry, he still cared about his reputation and did not kidnap anyone in broad daylight.
After calming down, he felt something was wrong again.
Lin Qingyue had clearly been gentle and eloquent before.
How come he suddenly became a different person these past two days? Not only did he disobey me, but he even lowered himself to hang out with that rabble.
By the way, everything seems to have started after returning home.
Could it be that because I cared too much about Zhen'er, it made her sad, so she was playing hard to get?
The backyard of Xuanjingsi.
Before Lin Qingyue even walked in, she smelled a strong smell of blood.
Xie Shouzheng and a group of his men were studying a corpse with a blasted brain.
The rat demon Da Mi covered his nose and said, "This is disgusting! Can't we park the body outside?"
"What nonsense are you talking about? What if it spreads outside and scares the people?" Xie Shouzheng said and then snorted twice.
Turning around and seeing Lin Qingyue, he quickly called her over:
"There's a case. Come and take a look."
So everyone quickly dispersed to make room for Lin Qingyue - in fact, they all wanted to run as far away as possible.
Lin Qingyue walked closer and took a look, and couldn't help but frown.
The man's head was broken into pieces and blood was gushing out. There was a worm as thin as a hair and about half an arm long wriggling in the wound.
It makes one's scalp tingle and makes one feel extremely disgusted.
Xie Shouzheng explained, "This man was the owner of the Dongsheng Restaurant. This morning, he accidentally fell from the upper floors and hit his head, dying on the spot. It was supposed to be an accident, but I didn't expect a strange bug to emerge from his head."
"The Supreme Court couldn't handle it, so they brought it here. I was eating noodles at the time... Now I don't think I'll ever eat noodles again."
He then ordered some rice and said, "Report the intelligence you just collected to Deputy Envoy Lin again."
Da Mi looked at the tabby cat cautiously and asked, "Can you let the cat go out first?"
Lin Qingyue said: "No."
Xie Shouzheng scolded, "Coward! Xiaohua hasn't even looked at you straight in the eye. You're obviously a cat that won't eat mice! Let's get down to business!"
"Uh... okay." Da Mi rubbed his hands timidly and began to describe the victim's situation.
"The victim's name was Li Dongsheng, the 60-year-old owner of Dongsheng Restaurant. He enjoyed drinking and eating sashimi. His restaurant also specializes in sashimi dishes."
"Before the accident, I had never heard that he was feeling unwell. He even married an 18-year-old concubine a month ago, so he's still going strong. He was drinking with friends all night last night, and he probably drank too much, which led to his fall."
Xie Shouzheng took over the conversation, "At first, I suspected the worm in his brain was a parasite contracted from eating raw fish. But then I started to think it wasn't the case. This worm carries a sinister aura, like a demon but not a demon, like a worm but not a worm. It's something I've never seen or heard of before."
Lin Qingyue's expression also grew more serious. "This is definitely not an ordinary parasitic infection. This worm should be attributed to an evil demon, called 'Mayfly Silk', a type of worm that splits off after the mayfly becomes a demon. Mayflies live and die every day, and mayfly silk has an even shorter lifespan. The only way to prolong life is through parasitism."
"Once the mayfly silk enters the human body, it reaches the brain and takes control of the body. It can even mimic a person's habits and behaviors, making it difficult for even those close to the victim to detect any abnormalities."
"The infected person's original soul still retains consciousness in the early stages of infection, but is unable to speak or control the body. Once the infection lasts for more than three years, the original owner's consciousness dies completely, and the body becomes a mayfly silk puppet."
"Hence, the mayfly silk is also known as 'nematode'. It turns the host into a puppet, controlled by the palm of their hand."
"Most importantly, once a case of Ephemeral infection is discovered, it means that there are already a large number of undiscovered infections."
After hearing this, everyone was horrified.
"So what should we do? How do we find out who is infected? And, Princess, where do you know this?"
Xie Shouzheng had many problems. Although Lin Qingyue was only his deputy, he had become his backbone without knowing when.
The reason why Lin Qingyue knew all this was because there had been a large-scale infection of mayfly silk in the world of immortal cultivation in her previous life.
At that time, the infection occurred in one county, and nearly half of the people were infected.
What’s even worse is that the local county officials have insufficient knowledge about mayfly silk and are unable to distinguish between infected and uninfected people.
Finally, the Taoist priest in charge of the matter made up his mind and ordered the killing of all the people in the county.
The most ironic thing is that after killing everyone in the county, they discovered that the Taoist priest was also infected. And a new round of infection continued to break out.
Fortunately, someone later developed a way to identify infected people, which averted a terrible disaster.
"I met him by chance in the countryside before." Lin Qingyue just said a perfunctory sentence about her past.
"Mayflies survive by parasitizing others. Once they leave the human body, or if the host dies, they will lose their strength and die within an hour."
As he was speaking, Xie Shouzheng saw the worm in the dead man's head roll over a few times and then stop moving.
Da Mi hurriedly said, "From the time Li Dongsheng fell on his head and died to now, it's been exactly one hour!"
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