187 Entering the Village
◎Like a paper figure◎
The bus sped through the night.
After getting on the car, Wang Shan was responsible for driving, and the six players sat together in pairs. Some of the other villagers sat in front of them, and some sat behind them. It seemed to be the result of random selection, but in fact they were intentionally surrounding the few people, like guards.
"How have you been doing outside these years?" As soon as he sat down, Zhang Wei started chatting with several people, asking about their experiences, conditions, and future developments in recent years.
They were all meaningless topics, Qi Qiuxue answered casually, but privately switched her phone to the memo interface and typed a few words in silence.
Li Yiqing, who was sitting next to her, had the same idea as her. She had covered her hands with her backpack in advance and showed Qi Qiuxue the secretly edited content out of sight of the villagers.
They are very hostile towards people who don't belong to Chigu Village, and they don't want us to have any contact with people from the outside world.
Qi Qiuxue: [Yes, their deliberate act of tearing up the business card is the best proof. But it doesn't matter. I've already memorized the number beforehand. I don't know if it'll come in handy later, but it's always good to gather more clues.]
Li Yiqing nodded and continued, "I just checked my phone quietly. Ever since we got in the car, there has been no signal."
Qi Qiuxue: [Mine too. Perhaps they tampered with the car, or perhaps the phone was disturbed by an unknown magnetic field.]
[Having encountered so many things before entering the village, it is clear that there will be more misfortunes in the future.]
She specifically reminded her lover beside her: [Please pay attention to safety and stay alert.]
Li Yiqing quickly replied: [I know, Ah Xue too.]
After chatting about this, the two of them put their phones away one after another.
While they were chatting, several villagers were still chattering with the players. They were very defensive and unwilling to reveal anything about themselves. When talking about some sensitive topics, they quickly changed the subject to other topics.
Everyone tried to get some information but to no avail, so they had to give up for the time being.
The atmosphere gradually quieted down, and the players intentionally interrupted the chat. As the person with the best temper in the team, Wu Shanyue expressed his desire to end the chat in a more tactful way.
The villagers may have realized it, but they obviously didn't take her words seriously.
Finally, Su Wen exploded, slapped his thigh, and shouted, "Stop arguing! We're exhausted after a long day of traveling. Can we please take a break?"
The sound was deafening and resonated throughout the bus, even creating an echo.
“…”
The villagers were startled, and besides shock, there was also a hint of displeasure in their eyes, as if they were dissatisfied with her "disrespectful" behavior.
But they soon returned to their earlier amiable demeanor and responded, "Yes, yes, you should have a good rest."
"Then I won't bother you. It's at least a two-hour drive from here to our village. If you're tired, take a nap. I'll tell you when we get there."
"Yeah." Su Wen nodded unhappily.
At this point, the car finally quieted down.
After a while, Qi Qiuxue let out a light chuckle.
-
The journey continues.
The deeper you go, the fewer and dimmer the roadside lights are. Some remote and steep sections of the road even have no lighting at all, and you can only rely on the light of your car lights to move forward.
This made the already complicated route even more difficult to identify. Qi Qiuxue pretended to rest her chin against the window with her hand, but in fact she was always paying attention to the situation outside the car, trying to remember the entire route ahead.
The dim light and physical fatigue undoubtedly increased her burden. No wonder the ticket taken out of the package was a hard seat, and no wonder the train arrived so late. It seemed that these were also interference and tests imposed on them by the villagers, or the copy.
Time passed by minute by minute, and when they finally arrived at Chigu Village, it was almost three o'clock in the morning.
The village was quiet, with only a few houses having their lights on. Most of the people here were engaged in the funeral industry, and one could often see strange coffins, wreaths, and strings of paper money wherever one looked.
And paper figures.
In the darkness of night, some pale paper figures with strange clothes, red paint on their cheeks and weird smiles stood quietly in every corner, "staring" at every player with their straight eyes.
Although he had already completed several copies, Wu Shanyue still felt a chill down his spine when he saw such creepy things, and subconsciously moved closer to Bai Shien beside him.
"Don't be afraid." Bai Shien raised his hand and patted her shoulder, comforting her in a low voice.
"A lot has happened in the village during the years you were away. Some houses have been renovated and moved, and the entire village has been expanded. Your residences are no longer in their original locations."
"Look, this is Xiaoqi's residence now." Wang Shan raised his finger to show Qi Qiuxue, "The one over there is Xiaoli's. A Liu's is on the street behind. I'll take you there later. As for Shanyue, Xiaosu, and Shi En, yours are on the east side of the village..."
"It's getting late now. Let's go back and rest. It's been a tiring journey. We can discuss anything after we wake up tomorrow."
"Yeah." Qi Qiuxue nodded, "Thank you for the trouble."
"No trouble." Wang Shan smiled and shook his head, took out the key from his shirt pocket and handed it to Qi Qiuxue, then raised his hand and made a gesture of invitation, indicating that she should go back.
Then he waved his hand, calling Li Yiqing and others to follow, making it clear that he would personally send them home.
Qi Qiuxue paused, took the key and winked at Li Yiqing.
Li Yiqing understood what she meant, and they parted ways.
Qi Qiuxue glanced sideways at the direction the bus was heading in. In the pitch-black night, the road they came from was completely hidden. Even though there were some street lights installed in various parts of the village, the light was not bright. The dim light poured down from above her head, and everything around her looked weird.
The night wind blew, rustling the artificial flowers and ribbons on the wreath.
Qi Qiuxue inserted the key into the keyhole. The lock on the door was very new and looked like it had been replaced recently. The key turned twice easily and the door lock opened.
But when pushing the door, Qi Qiuxue felt a little bit difficult. She turned on the flashlight and carefully checked the door with the light from her mobile phone. Perhaps because it had not been maintained for many years, the door was rusted everywhere, including the hinges on both sides of the door, which were even more rusty.
It seems that the renovation of the house was not completed in recent years. Judging from the degree of rust on the door and various parts, it has taken at least several years, or even more than ten years.
The door was opened, and the yard was overgrown with weeds. Both the main house and the side rooms were covered with dust. Fortunately, the lighting, water and electricity were still functioning normally. Qi Qiuxue simply cleaned up the house and made a place where she could barely rest and sleep.
Then she sat down on the bed, turned on her camera, and reviewed the photos she had taken earlier.
The train was too noisy at the time, and everything was done in a hurry, whether searching or taking pictures. Even though Qi Qiuxue roughly browsed the information, she was unable to study and think about it properly. Now it was late at night and the world was quiet. After she had overcome the drowsiness just now, her mind was at its active stage.
In fact, there is very little detailed information about Chigu Village on the Internet, including simple Baidu Encyclopedia, location, notifications, questions and answers from foreign tourists, and plans for some nearby areas.
In addition, there are two special contents. One is a missing person notice from more than 20 years ago. Due to its age, the webpage has long been invalid and cannot be clicked on. You can only see some simple information from the entries outside.
One was a discussion thread posted on a forum, exactly ten years ago. The title was even in the format that marketing accounts used to use: "Shocking! Such a horrific thing happened in this remote mountain village!"
Perhaps it violated the forum's posting rules, or there was something wrong with the content, the main post and several comments below it had already been blocked.
Qi Qiuxue turned her attention back to the missing person notice. Through just a few lines of text, she roughly summarized the following information.
The missing person is a five-year-old girl, a villager of Chigu Village. She was accidentally lost when she went to the town to buy things with her family. When she disappeared, she was wearing a red skirt and had two pigtails. Her appearance and body shape did not have obvious and easily identifiable features.
The entry said that a photo was included, but because the webpage had long been invalid, Qi Qiuxue was ultimately unable to find out what the little girl looked like. However, she was at least 27 years old now. It was just that she was too young when she went missing. In addition, so many years had passed, even if she were still alive, she would probably have long forgotten her hometown and her identity.
There were footsteps outside.
Qi Qiuxue realized in an instant that the other person was not anyone in their team, because when she listened carefully, both the depth of the footsteps and the speed of walking were very different from any player she was familiar with.
Qi Qiuxue put away the camera, put her hands behind her back, and quietly summoned the bone knife.
At the same time, a completely unfamiliar face slowly poked its head in.
It was a woman, probably in her fifties or sixties, with long, jet-black hair that flowed carelessly around her body. Even though it was late at night, her face was still covered in foundation and thick blush, and the light hitting her face made her look even more eerie.
Like a paper figure.
【Author’s words】
Here we come!
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