Strange Tales from the Deep Mountains (Part 21)
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"Cough cough..." The towel in her hand was completely dry, and Li Su was forced to inhale a large mouthful of smoke, which made her cough violently twice.
"Huh? What did the streamer choose?"
"I didn't even dare look at the screen just now. What did I choose? What did I choose?"
"I saw it, the anchor chose B."
"Was it just a guess? Oh well... a guess is better than nothing. At least a guess has a 25% chance of being right..."
"A 1/4 probability, huh? Hmm, hard to say, it doesn't feel good..."
[Player Li Su's final answer is B. Before the fire, the red-clad ghost Rou Rou had not yet realized the player was not her husband, while the little snake had already recognized that the player was not his father.]
[Congratulations to player Li Su, your answer is correct.]
"Huh?! Is the streamer that lucky??"
"Waaaaah, my wife, my wife! This is so great, waaaaah..."
"What? You just attributed someone's correct answer to luck? That's not fair! You're just wiping out their effort so easily (eye roll)."
"That's fantastic! I knew I hadn't misjudged you!"
[All of the player's answers have been confirmed to be correct. The hidden side quest is 50% complete. Please continue your efforts.]
[Please prepare yourself, as we are about to take you into the forgotten consciousness space of the female ghost Rou Rou. Player Li Su, please maintain your self-awareness. If you die in this consciousness space, you will also die in reality. Good luck!]
Having inhaled too much smoke, Li Su felt as if all her strength had been drained away, and she slumped weakly to the ground. In the last second before her consciousness completely disappeared, Li Su vaguely felt herself fall into a cold embrace...
It was cold, but it inexplicably made him feel at ease...
When Li Su opened her eyes again, the small wooden house in front of her, which had been burned by the fire, had been restored to its original state. Everything here was the same as when Rou Rou had first brought her here.
Has he been transported to the consciousness space that Rou Rou has forgotten?
Is this wooden house the consciousness space that Rou Rou forgot?
Before Li Su could figure out why, he saw a small bulge appear on the wooden bed. The bulge moved, and then a fluffy, curly-haired little head poked out from under the covers. The little person on the bed rubbed his sleepy eyes and looked in his direction, still confused.
The moment the little dumpling saw Rou Rou, her eyes lit up, and she waved her little hands toward her, calling out, "Mommy!"
"Ouch—" The little dumpling on the bed lost its balance and fell to the ground with a thud.
Li Su saw his little mouth pout and thought he was about to cry, but to her surprise, the little dumpling just rubbed his sore chin, sat obediently in place, and called out to the woman at the door, "Mommy! You're back! Baby missed you so much!"
Li Su found it hard to connect the innocent and carefree little dumpling in front of him with the naughty brat who set fire to him and tried to burn him alive.
Although Li Su's consciousness was within Rou Rou's consciousness space, he was more like a camera, watching Rou Rou's every move.
Li Su saw the woman at the door turn around and walk quickly to the bed. He heard Rou Rou say, "Mommy misses Xiao Bao too. Is Xiao Bao being good at home all by himself?"
Li Su frowned. Was this woman Rou Rou? But why did she look different from the red-clothed female ghost he had just seen?
Rou Rou placed the fruit basket she was carrying on her arm on the bedside table, then bent down and picked up the little bundle of joy from the bed. "Is Xiao Bao sleeping well?"
"Mmm!" The little dumpling nodded, its round eyes with vertical pupils that looked rather incongruous, and its tail obediently curled up.
The little dumpling hugged Rou Rou's neck, rubbed its fluffy little head against her neck, and asked softly, "Mommy, is Daddy coming back to see us today?"
"Yes, Daddy will be coming to the village to see Mommy and Xiaobao soon." Rou Rou gently pinched the little dumpling's pert nose.
"Knock knock—" The wooden door was suddenly knocked on, and the eyes of the two people, one big and one small, widened.
The little bundle in Rou Rou's arms widened its narrow, vertical pupils and whispered in Rou Rou's ear, "Mommy, is Daddy here?"
Rou Rou gently placed the little bundle of joy into the blanket, carefully covering his green tail with it, and said, "Baby, sit still and don't let anyone see your tail. Mommy will go open the door."
"Okay~" The little dumpling sat obediently on the bed, looking up at Rou Rou, but her gaze kept drifting towards the wooden door.
The little dumpling blinked its round eyes again and asked, "Mommy, can't Daddy watch either?"
Rou Rou bent down and gently rubbed the little dumpling's fluffy head, lowering her voice to say, "No, remember what Mommy told you, baby? This is baby's special magic tail, and it will disappear tonight. So you can't tell this secret to anyone other than Mommy and baby, okay?"
"Mmm!" The little dumpling nodded seriously, hugged her soft neck, and whispered in her ear, "Baby knows! Only Mommy and baby know!"
Li Su's consciousness resided within Rou Rou's body, and he could sense Rou Rou's conflicting emotions of tension and excitement.
He also learned that Rou Rou was only 28 years old and had just married her husband two years ago. However, the two had not been able to conceive since their marriage. Rou Rou's mother-in-law was even more eager for them to have a child as soon as possible, so she found all kinds of Chinese medicine and even folk remedies from who-knows-where for Rou Rou. No matter how unpalatable those things were, Rou Rou would hold her nose and drink them.
There was no other reason than that she loved her husband. The two had been together since college, and Rou Rou cherished this relationship. She didn't want to have a falling out with her mother-in-law, so she always cooperated.
She was sent to Wuzhai this time because her mother-in-law somehow learned that the village had a special method for women who couldn't have children, and that if a woman stayed in the village for a year, she could give birth to a son.
So Rou Rou and her husband went to Wuzhai together. They thought it would be some kind of crooked or evil place, but after arriving there, Rou Rou realized that Wuzhai was no different from other places. The main difference was that the environment was quiet and the villagers grew their own food. There were no random drugs or additives. The only difference was that they had to drink a special medicine made in the village every day.
On the first day, the village chief told her the price of getting pregnant: there were only men in the witch village, so there was no way to continue the lineage, and she would be pregnant with two children, one of whom would have to stay in the witch village.
Rou Rou found this absurd, but her husband agreed without hesitation. The two had a big argument about it, but in the end, Rou Rou was persuaded by her husband's gentle words and agreed to the village chief's conditions in order to protect their little family.
In the witch village, childbirth hardly requires the man's involvement. All that's needed is to collect some fluid from that area once everything is ready. So, after everything is prepared, Rou Rou's husband quickly leaves the village to return to his normal work and life. However, for the woman, the harm is much greater.
Rou Rou could feel her body undergoing subtle changes every day—her skin, weight, facial features... and some more embarrassing things, more indescribable aches and pains, but she had no one to confide in and could only silently grit her teeth and swallow them.
Until a year ago, she finally gave birth to her child. When Rou Rou woke up, she only saw one baby on the bed. The other baby had been taken away by the village chief right after it was born.
Until he saw these memories in Rou Rou's consciousness, Li Su still thought they were relatively normal. But the next moment, he saw something new in Rou Rou's deepest consciousness.
When Rou Rou lifted the swaddling cloth around Xiao Bao, she discovered that the child she had carried for ten months had no legs; instead, he had a bright green snake tail.
Terrified, Rou Rou rushed to question the village chief, but the chief calmly took a sip of tea and looked at Rou Rou, whose eyes were red, and said, "You and he were never meant to have a child. He has a problem with his body; his fluids are not viable. So you and he were destined not to have a child. Women who come here can all give birth to normal children, but you can't. So, in order to make you able to have a child, I used some village witchcraft."
“I admit that the village desperately needs new life, so I kept this from you, but isn’t this fulfilling your long-held wish?” The village chief put down his teacup and said calmly, “However, don’t worry too much. The child’s tail will disappear on the night he turns one year old, and he will not be any different from other children.”
“If you want something, you have to pay a price, and because of your husband, you have to pay a higher price than ordinary people.” The village chief paused, looking directly into Rou Rou’s red-rimmed eyes. “For your husband, you’re still willing, aren’t you?”
Rou Rou couldn't refute the village chief's words.
Rou Rou was extremely vulnerable after giving birth. She had no one to confide in about the immense pressure and secrets she was under. She looked at her crying baby and silently shed tears.
At first, Rou Rou couldn't accept that she had given birth to a baby with a tail, but as they spent more time together, her maternal instincts gradually led her to accept the little bundle of joy.
Just like the village chief said, apart from having an extra tail, her baby was just like any other baby, even cuter and more sensible than any child she had ever seen.
So Rou Rou decided to bury this secret in her heart forever.
Viewers in the live stream could see in real time what Li Su's consciousness was going through, and there were more comments than ever before.
"Her name is Rou Rou, but she's anything but weak!"
"Wow, this kid was actually so cute! What happened to him to turn out like that...?"
"I cried... Wasn't I watching a horror game stream? How did it start making me cry?"
"Waaaaah..."
Today is the day her husband is coming to pick her and their child up. Once it's past midnight tonight, her baby will look like a normal child again, and no one will know.
After tucking the little one in, Rou Rou straightened up and glanced at the clock on the wall. It was already 11:30, and her husband's flight was half an hour earlier than expected.
Rou Rou suppressed her nervousness and unease, composed herself, and reached out to open the wooden door.
"Honey, you're here? Why are you here so early?" Rou Rou reached out to take her husband's hand, but he subtly avoided it.
A soft hand hovered in the air.
Her husband, however, remained expressionless and said, "We just got off the plane, and it's very cold outside. I was worried you'd get cold."
As he spoke, he rubbed his hands together.
It's early autumn now, and the temperature at night is lower than during the day. Gently nodding, a sweet feeling welled up in her heart.
Her husband really loves her.
"It's alright, let me warm your hands." Rou Rou didn't mind, closed the wooden door, and quickly stepped forward to take her husband's hand.
The temperature of her husband's palms was warm, not as cold as he had said. Rou Rou was a little surprised, but didn't think much of it. Maybe he had just warmed his hands by rubbing them together.
"Honey, come and see the baby! Today is our baby's first birthday!" Rou Rou happily pulled the man to the bedside, not noticing that the man looked down at their clasped hands and frowned imperceptibly.
"Baby, say 'Daddy'," Rou Rou reminded her.
She was a little puzzled. The little boy would usually greet everyone in the village with a sweet "uncle", "grandpa", or "brother", but now he hadn't said a word for a long time when he saw his father.
Children are very sensitive to emotions.
The little boy keenly sensed that his father didn't seem to like him. But after his mother reminded him, he obediently greeted him.
"Dad, Dad..." the little dumpling called out timidly, then quickly lowered its head.
The air seemed somewhat stuffy.
Her husband didn't say anything either.
Rou Rou smiled and tried to lighten the mood, saying, "Baby is a little shy since it's the first time she's met you."
"This child usually greets everyone politely when he sees them in the village, so why is he being shy today?"
Rourou smiled and gently rubbed the little dumpling's head, then lightly tapped his nose.
"Is that so?" the man scoffed. "He calls others, but not me, is that it?"
During that year, he went to the hospital for a checkup because he was feeling unwell, and also had a checkup at the reproductive department. However, the results showed that the substance he expelled had no activity at all.
Where did this child come from? Who did his wife have it with?
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