Qingshui Ghost Town
"Bowl? What kind of bowl do you want?" Yuanli asked in confusion.
She was just about to put her ear close to his mouth to listen carefully, but Qi Heng suddenly woke up and sat up straight, looking a little panicked. When he woke up, his eyes were full of fear and hatred. After taking a clear look around him, he calmed down and gasped.
Following Qi Heng's movements and the reflection of the firelight, Yuanli realized that Qi Heng was sweating on his forehead.
"Having a nightmare?"
"Yeah." Qi Heng's eyes dodged, he lowered his head and passed by her body to pick up the porcelain bowl that had spilled beside him and dusted it off.
Facing Yuanli's question, Qi Heng stopped what he was doing, looked at her and said, "It's a unique piece fired in the Nanhua official kiln, how much does it cost?"
The porcelain produced by Nanhua Official Kiln is the best and hard to come by. Although it is called an official kiln, it is not only used as tribute to the palace. It is also loved by the third generation emperor of Western Xinjiang. He was specially named an official kiln but was not subject to any restrictions.
Even if he had money and power, the owner of the Nanhua official kiln might not necessarily sell it. No wonder Qi Heng kept talking about this bowl in his dreams.
It is said that it was founded by a young and beautiful woman.
My father has a porcelain vase fired in the Nanhua official kiln, which he keeps in the family ancestral hall and cherishes very much.
"Sir, you and Xiang Yao will easily catch a cold if you sleep outside. It's getting late, and the carriage is quite large. Why don't we squeeze in and sit until dawn?"
Qi Heng said in a tone of displeasure, "No, how can a girl like me share a carriage with two grown men at night?"
"Why didn't you say anything when we were alone in a room last night..." Yuanli said in a low voice.
"What did you say?"
"Nothing, nothing. I think what you said is very reasonable."
Qi Heng handed the thick cloak he was wearing back to Yuan Li, then adjusted his own black cloak and said, "It's cold at night. Go back to the carriage first."
Seeing Qi Heng's resolute attitude, Yuanli had no choice but to return to the carriage to rest. It was much warmer outside Qingshui Town. Judging from the weather, it shouldn't snow tonight, so I wouldn't freeze to death.
In the early morning of the next day, Yuanli was awakened by the shaking of the carriage. She wanted to sit up, but her legs, which had been crossed last night, were so numb that she dared not move.
As she moved slowly, the numbness in her legs almost disappeared, and the carriage just stopped. Yuanli pushed open the window of the carriage, and with the weak candlelight coming through the carriage, the boundary marker of Qingshui Town came into view.
Yuanli supported the window with her left hand, picked up the candlestick on the table with her right hand and stretched it out the window. With the faint candlelight, Yuanli could see clearly that the boundary marker was covered with moss.
Boundary markers are local landmarks that mark the boundaries of various places. They are extremely important, and local government offices and county yamen will send people to clean them regularly.
The boundary marker of Qingshui Town is covered with moss. Judging from how dirty it is, no one has been here for a long time.
"The mastermind behind this is now weak, and what I see is almost the truth. I'm not sure what's happening in Qingshui Town. Do you want to come with me, or wait here? I'll leave Xiang Yao to you."
Yuanli put away the candle, closed the carriage window tightly, sat down and said, "Let's go together."
"Okay, follow me closely and don't run around."
After saying that, the carriage continued to move forward. The closer it got to Qingshui Town, the more severe the cold became. The surroundings were extremely quiet, with only the sound of the wheels turning and the whistling of the wind in the ears.
For a town of any size, this is completely impossible.
A woman's miserable cries were heard in the distance. The carriage suddenly stopped, and the door was pushed open with a creak. The cold wind rushed in and extinguished the candle.
It was pitch black outside the carriage, and a white lantern was thrust in. The woman's crying continued, and Yuanli unconsciously shrank inside.
"There is a tinder in the first drawer under the couch. Light this lantern."
Hearing Qi Heng's voice, Yuanli felt much more at ease. She took the white lantern and fumbled for the tinder to light it.
As soon as she leaned out, Qi Heng reached out and carefully helped her down from the carriage, put the lighter on his waist, and then took the white lantern from her hand to light the way ahead and walked towards the town entrance.
When I got closer, I saw a disheveled woman sitting under the wooden stake of the town gate, holding a baby in her arms.
The crying sound seemed to come from the cradle, but the crying did not sound like a baby, but more like a teenage girl.
The woman patiently rocked the swaddling clothes to soothe the child. The baby's crying became louder and louder. The woman suddenly began to hum a nursery rhyme to soothe the child to sleep, but only the melody could be heard, without the words.
Perhaps it was because the woman's voice was too sharp, the nursery rhyme seemed particularly terrifying, making the surrounding environment seem full of gloom.
Qi Heng protected Yuanli behind him and continued to move forward, looking calm and not showing any fear at all.
When she approached him, the woman stopped what she was doing and the nursery rhyme she was humming came to an abrupt end. She slowly turned her head, her movements somewhat stiff, and tilted her head to look at them.
A scarlet face was under the messy long hair. Qi Heng extended the lantern forward, and as the candlelight shone, he could see the woman's face clearly.
Yuanli's stomach was churning and she felt nauseous. She couldn't help but clench Qi Heng's sleeves and hide behind him.
The woman's skin had been peeled off, blood was dripping down her face, and the swaddling clothes were stained with blood of varying shades, making them extremely dirty.
She just glanced at them, then turned around and sat with her back to them, continuing to hum nursery rhymes and gently rocking the swaddling clothes to coax the child.
Qi Heng quickened his pace and entered the town. When he passed the woman, she suddenly turned her head, her eyes wide open, and said in horror: "Don't go, she will peel off your skin..."
With the crisp sound of bones breaking, the woman turned her head back suddenly, but the direction she turned her head was actually a full circle.
In order to avoid being entangled, Qi Heng did not stop. The smell of blood in Qingshui Town was particularly strong. Every few dozen meters, countless crows were frightened and fled into the night.
The slow footsteps were amplified by the silent night, as if they were the only three left in the town.
According to the road I remembered during the day, whether it was the farm shops or the Yihong Building where people reveled every night, there was no light at this moment and no signs of anyone living there.
After only walking forward a hundred meters, the cold wind extinguished the candlelight in the lantern again, and the steps to go out seemed to be blocked by something on the ground.
Qi Heng was forced to stop, took out the fire starter from his waist and lit the lantern. When the light appeared, a rotten corpse came into view under his feet.
The tip of the shoe that touched the rotting corpse was stained with blood, leaving a dark red mark, and Qi Heng looked displeased.
Xiang Yao took the lantern and illuminated his surroundings. He saw that the usually bustling streets were now covered in blood, and rotting corpses with strange deaths could be seen everywhere, hanging casually.
But they all had one thing in common: there was a pool of blood right next to their heads and their faces had been peeled off.
"They've been dead for at least a year."
Qi Heng and Xiang Yao were attracted by her words and turned to look at her with questions in their eyes.
Yuanli pointed to a shop parked nearby. She saw that the lid of the steamer was slightly hanging from the body of the steamer, and the cake shop owner was lying on the steamer. The things in the steamer were moldy and hairy, and it was impossible to tell what they were before.
The flag planted next to the stall had been corroded by the wind and was in tatters. It was blown around by the wind, and the two words "Qing Ye" could still be vaguely seen, with only half of the word "Ye" left.
"That's green leaf cake, something we eat here during the Qingming Festival. The raw material for green leaf cake, mugwort leaves, is only available in spring, and now it's winter."
Leaving a corpse exposed in the wilderness is understandable, but leaving it exposed in the streets of a town for a whole year without being known to the outside world. The mastermind behind everything must be more than just a wild demon.
More importantly, no one in heaven noticed.
Yuanli held Qi Heng's hand tightly, the warmth in her hand still proving that he was still alive. He didn't shake it off, but instead shook it back.
"Rather than calling it Qingshui Town, it's better to say this is a ghost town." Yuanli shook Qi Heng's hand and said anxiously, "Heng, let's go back. The current situation here is beyond our control. Losing our lives is not worth it."
"I'll have Xiang Yao escort you out of town. If I die here, I'll have Xiang Yao take you back to the Qi Mansion in the imperial capital. If you don't mind, just say you're my widow. My family will treat you well. The wealth I leave behind is enough for you to spend the rest of your life."
"What about you? Is investigating the case so important?" Yuanli was worried and confused, her tone was anxious and her expression was worried.
Suddenly, Xiang Yao saw the concerned look on her face, and felt that the girl his young master had picked up was really like a widow with whom he had been in love for a long time.
"This is what I'm looking for, so I have to go."
"Is what you're looking for... a hosta?"
Xiang Yao suddenly unsheathed the sword at his waist. When Yuanli reacted again, the blade was already against her neck, flashing a cold light. Xiang Yao's eyes were full of vigilance.
"Xiang Yao, you are so presumptuous."
"Sir, if we don't silence her now, it will be too late if she turns out to be an undercover agent sent by the higher-ups."
"She's not an undercover agent, and she won't reveal my secrets. Since we're from the same house, we shouldn't be disrespectful in the future."
Xiang Yao was choked and wanted to say something but stopped, but facing the order from his master, he hesitated and put down the sword in his hand.
As the atmosphere froze, the ground shook slightly, dust rose, and blood dried as if absorbed by the ground. The fallen corpse twisted its limbs and climbed up, its broken limbs quickly twisted back into place.
Most of them had dark, empty eye sockets and numb expressions, as if they had forgotten that they were dead. They each put away what they were doing and left in different directions.
"Time has begun to reset, but this time the reset time seems to be even longer."
"I always feel that the person behind this is deliberately letting us see the corpses on the street." Yuanli thought again and wondered, "But, by doing this, doesn't it contradict the warning he gave us yesterday?"
"You said that before you met me, on that boat by the Qingshui River, you encountered a creature covered in human faces. Tell me more about its appearance."
Yuanli thought carefully about what happened at the Qingshui River that day, and the image of that disgusting ghost stood out in her mind, extremely clear.
However, Yuanli opened her mouth several times but could not utter any words related to his appearance. Even if she tried hard to form the mouth shapes, she could not finish them completely or make any sound.
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