Chapter 039
Cheng Hui hid his body and approached quietly. He saw a graceful woman in a stone chamber on one side of the passage praying sincerely to a tall stone statue.
Cheng Hui couldn't hear clearly, and could only hear intermittent things like being willing and offering sacrifices sincerely, and asking for the gods' mercy.
He looked at the woman's back and guessed her identity in his mind.
In this entire manor, Painter Xie and Mrs. Xie have already shown up. The only one who hasn't shown up is Miss Xie. But Miss Xie is a dwarf, while the woman in front of him is of normal height.
Could it be... that this person is the maid in the manor?
Another question is...is this woman a human or a ghost?
"What do you think?" Cheng Hui asked Aqiu. This woman didn't look dangerous, but who knows if she would suddenly explode and start a murder spree or something.
Ah Qiu chuckled: "Since we're here, why not try it out and you'll know."
Cheng Hui's mouth twitched, but he couldn't think of any other way, so he simply listened to his advice and deliberately made some noise.
"Who?" The woman turned her head suddenly, revealing a beautiful face.
It's just... this face looks a little familiar.
"Miss Xie?"
"Who are you? How did you get in?" Miss Xie looked at Cheng Hui nervously, with a hint of shyness on her face that a young woman would show when seeing a man from another world.
Cheng Hui paused, wondering, "It really is Miss Xie? But why has she grown taller?"
He thought for a moment and said, "My name is Cheng Hui, and I'm a demon hunter. I wonder why you are here, Miss Xie?"
"Demon Hunter?" Miss Xie's eyes widened suddenly, and she said excitedly, "Are you here to rescue me?"
Cheng Hui raised his eyebrows: "You are trapped here? How did you get trapped here? Do you know what happened in the manor?"
"I... I don't know." Miss Xie looked a little bewildered. "I... I only remember marrying my cousin, and then... my father, he became so scary. I don't remember anything after that. I just know that I've been trapped here since I woke up."
Miss Xie bit her lower lip with her pearly teeth: "Young Master Cheng, can you save me out? It's so dark here, I'm so scared..." She took light steps, as if trying to find support in Cheng Hui.
But Cheng Hui shouted without mercy: "Stop, don't come over!"
Miss Xie: “…”
"Ms. Xie, how long have you been here?" Cheng Hui continued to ask.
Miss Xie shook her head. "I don't know either... I woke up here. I looked everywhere, but couldn't find an exit. I could only stay here and pray to the gods."
Cheng Hui glanced around the stone chamber. It was empty. Apart from the stone statue and the cushion for kneeling, there was not even a glass of water in the room.
Very good, confirmed. Even if this person in front of me is really Miss Xie, she would have turned into a ghost long ago. A human can't live this long.
"Ms. Xie, you have lived here for so long. Have you ever felt hungry?" Cheng Hui asked sharply.
Miss Xie froze for a moment, and after a long while, she fell to the ground as if she couldn't bear the blow.
"I... really died a long time ago? That's right... my father at that time... well, he's dead, why mention him again?" Miss Xie said with tears in her eyes.
Cheng Hui thought to himself, no, bring it up quickly, I'm just waiting for you to provide me with clues.
Miss Xie's crying did not destroy her beauty at all, but instead made people feel very distressed.
Cheng Hui wasn't a devil, so he waited for a while. But seeing that she was still crying, he had to remind her, "Miss Xie, can I ask what happened to your father?"
Ms. Xie: ...What kind of devilish man is this! Doesn't he have any sympathy?
She tilted her head slightly, revealing her most beautiful profile. Two lines of tears seemed to be about to fall, adding a touch of fragility to her beauty.
But... Cheng Hui, the man she faced, was a straight man. He didn't appreciate her beauty at all. Instead, he anxiously asked, "Ms. Xie, can we not waste time? Look, you want to leave, and I want to leave too. If you don't tell me what you know, how can I find clues to leave?"
Xie Wan was dizzy from his constant comings and goings. Seeing that her tears couldn't move this man, she could only resent his change. She took out a handkerchief and wiped away her tears: "Mother always said that Father had changed. I didn't believe it at first, but later... Father really changed, becoming more and more strange."
"How strange is it?"
"He..." Xie Wan shuddered, as if recalling some horrific scene: "Father, he... he eats people."
"Hmm?" Cheng Hui perked up instantly. He only knew that Painter Xie seemed to have used those words to take away other people's lives, but he had never heard of him eating people. Could this be the clue they had been missing? "Tell me more about it."
Xie Wan then gently told her about the changes in painter Xie.
According to her, Painter Xie did not eat people from the beginning. To be more precise, she did not see Painter Xie eat people. She only knew that the number of servants and maids in the manor was decreasing day by day. Later, even her own maid would disappear for no reason.
She once saw with her own eyes her father call a servant into his study, and then the servant never appeared again, so she thought her father was a cannibal.
"So that's how it is." Cheng Hui understood. The book on sorcery clearly stated that pigments made from direct blood relatives were most effective, but ordinary internal organs also had some effect.
I think Painter Xie killed the servant just to make some special pigments.
"After talking about your father, let's talk about your mother."
Xie Wan: "...? What happened to my mother?"
She looked as if she had no idea what had happened to her mother.
Cheng Hui secretly took note of this, and then asked, "If you don't know about your mother, then you should know about your own affairs, right? Do you remember your cousin? Xie Ying."
Xie Wan nodded.
"Then do you know who he is?"
After writing, she was stunned for a moment, then frowned and said, "How could I not even know my own husband?"
"Husband? Think carefully about what happened on your wedding day."
Xie Wan tried hard to recall the past, and as she recalled, her expression gradually became more ferocious.
"Did she remember it?" Cheng Hui asked Aqiu.
Aqiu said: "Guess?"
Cheng Hui: ...Are you happy just being naughty?
"Xie Ying! How could you do this to me!" Xie Wan was so angry she was about to explode as she recalled the events of her wedding night. She had clearly recalled how Xie Ying had murdered her. "If I could ever get out, I'd send you to hell, where you'd never be able to escape!"
Cheng Hui didn't know what to say. It was really fucked up that a girl was killed by her lover on the day that should have been her happiest.
Xie Wan's reaction was understandable.
After letting Xie Wan vent for a while, Cheng Hui finally comforted her, "Miss Xie, calm down. Even if you want to take revenge on your cousin, you should at least get out of here, right?"
Xie Wan suppressed her anger and forced herself to calm down. "Young Master Cheng is right. I need to calm down. I want to go out and get revenge on him. Wait, if he killed me, what about my parents?" She looked at Cheng Hui anxiously.
Cheng Hui paused and shook his head: "Sorry, I'm not sure either."
Xie Wanyou shed two lines of tears: "You don't have to lie to me, that Meng Lang is so cruel, my parents will definitely not have a chance to escape." She cried for a while, "My parents are so good to him, why would he want to hurt me? It's okay to hurt me, but why did he also hurt my parents?"
"Dad, Mom, I'm such an unfilial daughter. If it weren't for me, you wouldn't have ended up like this..." Xie Wan cried bitterly, "Even now, I don't even have anything to remember you by."
She fell to the ground and cried bitterly. Cheng Hui also sympathized with her. If you want to talk about unlucky people, it is this girl who is unlucky. From her point of view, it is simply the ungrateful scumbag who destroyed her family. Who would have thought that the cousin who was kind enough to rescue her actually took the lives of their family.
After crying for a while, Xie Wan realized her own loss of composure and slowly stopped talking: "I'm sorry, Young Master Cheng, I made you laugh."
"No, no, this is human nature. Miss Xie, there's no need to be so deliberate. When you're sad, it's better to vent it out to avoid hurting yourself."
Xie Wan heard this argument for the first time, and she smiled. "Anyway, let's get out first. I've searched the entire passage and can't find an exit. Does Young Master Cheng know?"
Cheng Hui shook his head. The way he came in was probably blocked, so he could only find a way out from the other side.
The two searched the passage again, but apart from this stone chamber, they soon reached the end of the passage. It was blocked by a huge stone wall and there was no mechanism. It was obviously a dead end.
Returning to the stone chamber, Xie Wan sighed, "When I first woke up, I also looked everywhere for an exit, but unfortunately..."
Unfortunately, she didn't say what it was, but Cheng Hui understood that she was implying that there was no exit here at all.
"Ask her what she was worshipping just now." Aqiu said.
"Excuse me, were you praying just now?"
"Ah? Yes..." Miss Xie blushed a little. It seemed that after Cheng Hui saw her crying like a vent, the distance between them was shortened a lot.
"I have nothing to do here, but sometimes when I feel bored, I pray to this statue."
Upon hearing this, Cheng Hui looked at the stone statue. The statue was of a man wearing a Taoist robe, a high hat and a wide belt. He had an ancient face and looked quite divine.
But for some reason, Cheng Hui inexplicably felt that this statue gave people a somewhat eerie feeling. Perhaps... it was because of the reflection of the corpse oil lamp here?
"Since there is no other exit, the problem is most likely inside this stone chamber. Do you mind if I look for some mechanism or something?" Cheng Hui asked politely.
"Ah? It's okay, Young Master Cheng, please feel free to do as you please. I... I want to go out too." Xie Wan replied somewhat embarrassedly.
*
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