"Dead...dead?" The woman couldn't take the shock. "Wasn't that a dream? He really..."
Large tears streamed down her face as she knelt on the ground and kowtowed to the crowd, pleading, "Please! If you've seen him, tell me where he is, please..."
“A family can’t function without a man. I can’t finish all the work in the fields by myself. I also have an elderly mother and children at home. How can I support them all by myself? If he doesn’t come back, our whole family will not survive… Please, for the sake of our lives, tell me where he went? Where did he go?” The woman wept bitterly, looking utterly pitiful.
The villagers, seeing the woman's state, remained silent, unable to utter a word.
Wu Yong is a hateful person, but he is also pitiful.
They were originally no different from the people of Ning'an Village. They worked hard in the fields and would try to go hunting in the mountains in their spare time to supplement their family income.
It must be said that all their toil, pain, and hardship were for the sake of their family's better life.
But the weather was uncooperative; the heavens refused to send rain, the land was parched, and every household was dirt poor. Some jobs were too expensive for them to do, so they had to risk their lives to go hunting in the mountains.
Now he's lost his life, and in such a tragic way.
The people of Ning'an Village had just been hating Wu Yong for being unable to distinguish right from wrong, for bullying the weak and fearing the strong, and for not daring to confront those bandits, only daring to blame them.
Now, when I hear a woman crying and pleading, I can't help but feel a sense of shared sorrow.
If they hadn't been lucky, and if it hadn't rained a few more times, the crops in the fields would finally have yielded some harvest.
Perhaps they too will go up the mountain with Wu Yong and his group, die there, and disappear without a trace...
"Alright, stop crying, it's no use crying anymore. Go back and live your life properly, coming back to look for her won't get you anywhere." Even Granny Zheng, whose neck was aching from being choked, showed pity and stepped forward to help the woman up: "I still have some wild vegetables here, take them back and eat them. Heaven is watching, it won't just watch people die like this, it will rain eventually, and things will get better."
Grandma Zheng walked to the pond and handed the woman the basket of wild vegetables she had washed.
The text does not explicitly state what Wu Yong and his companions experienced on the mountain.
After all, this is simply too brutal.
However, the implication in their words was clear: Wu Yong and the others would not return; they must have died on the mountain.
The woman understood what Granny Zheng meant. Seeing the pity on everyone's faces, she let out a mournful cry and then fainted.
Lin Wanyue stepped forward to observe and found that the woman had fainted because she was already physically weak and was being controlled by Wu Yong, causing her yang energy to dissipate further.
"This...this can't be another ghost encounter, can it?" the village women worried.
"She looks like she fainted from excessive grief. Quickly, fetch some water and wash her face," Liu Junlan said.
The situation in other villages was unknown, but this woman looked pale and sickly, her face covered in grime, and her hair was matted and tangled, as if it hadn't been washed for years.
Lin Wanyue used leaves to form the shape of a small wine cup and secretly gave some spiritual spring water to the woman to drink.
As the cool spring water went down her throat, the woman slowly spun around.
The village head was worried that the woman would die in his village, so he quickly called a few people to take her back. There were men and women among them, so he wasn't afraid of any taboos.
They didn't forget to bring Grandma Zheng's basket of wild vegetables.
After the person was taken away, the crowd of onlookers dispersed.
But even as they left, they didn't forget to discuss it, chattering away.
"That man's death wasn't unjust; he was a fool. It was one thing to be afraid of bandits when he was alive, but even after he died, he didn't dare to confront them? A coward who bullies the weak and fears the strong, he even dared to possess his own wife's body. Wasn't he afraid of killing his whole family?" The little pink butterfly floated to Lin Wanyue's side and clicked its tongue.
Wu Yong was the pillar of the family; without him, all the burdens would fall on his wife's frail shoulders.
Humans and ghosts are on different paths.
Wu Yong's ghost possessed his wife's body. Even disregarding the injuries on his wife's body, the fact that she was possessed by a ghost was enough to damage her yang energy and shorten her lifespan.
If Lin Wanyue hadn't intervened, his wife might have been injured, and his whole family would have starved to death.
"You can't say that," Lin Wanyue said, not finding it strange at all. "Even ghosts are afraid of evil spirits."
As the saying goes, people are three parts afraid of ghosts, but ghosts are seven parts afraid of people.
Those bandits even ate people, which left a deep shadow on Wu Yong.
"Hmph, he's just a piece of trash." Little Pink Butterfly sneered. "But his name is quite fitting, Wu Yong, Wu Yong. He's indeed a useless thing, he doesn't even have the courage to avenge himself."
Little Pink Butterfly was single-mindedly focused on revenge and looked down on Wu Yong, a man who couldn't distinguish right from wrong.
Although the woman was sent away, the village head was still worried.
He had already believed Lin Wanyue's earlier statement that there might be bandits in the mountains, and he urged the whole village not to go up the mountain to hunt casually.
Now, Wu Yong's situation, especially that horribly mutilated corpse, has caused a huge shock to everyone.
It was not uncommon for bandits to commit murder.
However, it is extremely rare to hear of someone being so ferocious as to eat people.
This is enough to show the brutal nature of this band of bandits. If they fell into their hands, they would probably end up like Wu Yong, unable to even be buried after death!
This was especially terrifying for the already elderly village head.
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