Chapter 67 The Sleeping Curse (31) Not long ago, there was a young...
Su He's boat was incredibly fast, and it ran quickly after landing, but it didn't leave the town.
He returned to the hotel first, but the group had already left.
The Fallen Hotel could still be considered a hotel back then, but ever since the black goats came here, it has become a place for trapping and temporarily storing sacrificial offerings.
Now that the outsiders have left, the hotel is empty and deserted.
He glanced at 101; the hotel couple lay together, having been dead for some time.
Su He returned to the long dining table, sat alone at one end, and started cracking sunflower seeds on the table.
The sunflower seed shells struck the skull lamp precisely, like pebbles thrown into a river, creating ripples. Suddenly, the excited voice of a freckled girl came from inside the lamp, confessing her sins.
The only audience member sat on the "filming set," listening to the recorded playback with a blank expression, sunflower seed shells lying on the ground.
At first, only the freckled girl's voice could be heard, but soon, all sorts of voices began to emerge.
Because it's a dining table, there are mostly sounds of eating and the usual conversations during meals, which is incredibly boring. There's also the even louder party noise, with people playing instruments and singing, which is really annoying.
In this noisy cacophony, it's hard to pinpoint a single sound. If someone is as emotional as this little girl and speaks loudly, that's fine... but the one he's looking for is the softest and faintest.
It's hidden there, as if it hadn't been recorded at all.
Su He pricked up her ears and concentrated intently on discerning the boy's words.
"...Pandora's Box...you can pretend it doesn't exist."
Su He scoffed, thinking that this kid was just trying to fool the little girl.
If Xie Tan were to sleep peacefully and obediently await the sacrifice, Su He would still have some faith that he was a wise young man who understood the importance of going with the flow and living life in a daze.
He really does look like he's tired of living.
Su He also guessed that Xie Tan was forced to join the cult because of his talent, and was tormented by these gods and ghosts to the point of losing the desire to live. But the cult thought he was useful and wouldn't let him die, so he went to the cult's mortal enemy and eagerly provoked them.
After all, only a goat can fight against a mirror. No wonder he played a useless collateral relative so badly. He didn't even want to act properly.
Or, to put it more simply, if Xie Tan really came to gather intelligence, it would be understandable if he escaped in the chaos.
As a result, he turned around and set himself on fire, blowing up the mountain and taking all the offerings and the vengeful spirits from his dreams with him.
That guy's a hypocrite, a complete idiot.
Su He caught Xie Tan's final words, urging the little girl to take a nap, which further confirmed that the boy had planned this all along. Those sleeping young men were the ones he had persuaded this little girl to release into her dream.
He went to 301 again.
The card reader had fallen off long ago; he removed it on the first night because he didn't intend for the audacious imposter to simply "sleep."
Those suspected of being members of the cult were naturally killed outright; using the hotel owner's insane wife was a perfect solution.
But the girl who liked Xie Tan discovered the card slot on the first night and arrived at his door first.
Even if it rains and can't sing, it still wants to see him.
Is Xie Tan somewhat...attracted by ghosts?
The corpse collector was made by Su Han from the skins of the sacrificial offerings. He had followed the old man for decades, but betrayed him the moment he saw him.
Su He lifted the wallpaper and sat on the bed. In the empty room, he listened to the noise left over from the past few years. This time, apart from their conversation on the first night, he did not catch the boy's voice again.
So quiet... Well, the boy just seems like a quiet person.
I don't talk much when I'm with friends, and even less when I'm alone.
As Su He was going downstairs, she suddenly heard the little devil say that he still had unfinished business, and she paused for a moment.
Ah... these are the sounds of the dream world. Those empty vessels will record the sounds of two towns.
He went to the coffin shop and kicked down the rickety door.
The stench of blood filled the air, and the place was a complete mess.
Su He swept aside the coffin lid blocking her way with her foot, coldly walked through the narrow corridor, and entered the inner room where the smell of blood was even stronger.
He went straight to the chair and took the old man's clothes hanging there to put under his bottom.
The old man's fierce questioning still echoed in the room. He lit a cigarette but didn't say anything.
The new ebony coffin in the middle was pushed open with a creak, and the coffin lid fell to the ground.
His bloodied hands gripped the edge of the coffin tightly as he struggled to his feet; the old man now only had half a head left.
The two eyeballs rolled twice in their open eye sockets, seemingly searching for the other half of the head that had been cut off.
His left eye saw Su He first, and he was startled, immediately freezing in place.
The right eye was still moving when it found half a head, grabbed it with both hands, and put it on.
“Mr. Su He! Please excuse my disheveled appearance. Let me wait a moment… Oh, here I am.”
He randomly pulled a hair from the coffin, trying to sew the two halves of his head back together, but it was too difficult, and he failed; half of his head fell off again.
Perhaps due to excessive blood loss, the emaciated old man became nothing more than skin and bones, his entire body covered in burn marks, his flesh and hair fused together, making him nothing more than a monstrous creature clinging to life.
He couldn't sit still any longer and slammed back into the coffin, crushing the other half of his head. He could only place one eyeball on the side of the coffin so he could look at Su He and speak while lying down, gritting his teeth.
"It's all because of that brat. You heard it too. He's actually a member of the clan, but unfortunately, he was spoiled and wasted outside. I almost fell into his hands. Luckily, my master loved me dearly back then. When he left, he connected me to the shards of the mirror in the sea, leaving me a way out. As long as the small mountain doesn't collapse and the power doesn't dissipate, I will..."
Su Han finally noticed Su He's strange silence and realized that he was in a very bad mood, which made her heart skip a beat.
Su He came here for the family's prophecy, which is the most important thing. Could something have gone wrong?
This is much more important than any illegitimate child!
Su Han immediately put the damned brat out of her mind: "You came back after checking 'Observation Two'? How are these eyes? The family later focused on refining other observations. Observation Two... or rather 'Bi' has been dormant for many years, but it also belongs to the family. I know this is my mission, and I dare not slack off. I have been guarding it. In my eyes, it is more important than my life."
"Although the number of sacrifices to the sun god has decreased as the mirror fragments are gradually absorbed by the hill, it has never stopped. The gods are clearly working. Could it be... that true 'observation' has truly appeared from within me?"
His incompletely pieced-together face was able to conjure up a fanatical expression.
Like an apple among thousands of others, only one apple from his own orchard was favored by the gods and transformed into gold. The sheer glory he felt was beyond words.
Su He was still smoking with her head down: "Not a single one reacted."
A bucket of cold water was poured over him, and Su Han choked, as if she knew why he was in a bad mood, but she was still a little unwilling to give up. That was the Black Goat's lifelong pursuit: "The whole mountain... there isn't a single one..."
"The mountain is gone."
Su Han didn't react to his words for a moment; her mind was split in two, and she was slow to process what he said.
When he finally understood, he shouted, "What? The mountain... 'Bi' was... impossible! You have the goat's mark, the observation is indestructible..."
"Even the sun's fire can't destroy it?"
Su Han was speechless once again.
He finally understood why he couldn't recover for so long; even with the power of the sun, his life was still slipping away: "Help... Who did this? Was Observation Two burned?... Was it that brat? How did he do that... Damn it!"
"He set the mountain on fire with his coffin."
“Those are eyes that have been refined, not coffins, how could that be… Could it be the ‘Eye of Observation’ that manifested, but he found it first…!”
"Show my ass, it's an empty coffin, there aren't even any eyes."
Losing hope once again, Su Han couldn't care less. His life was slipping away more and more clearly, and he panicked, pleading, "Mr. Su He, please...please save me! I've lost too much blood, I have no strength left...please use a talisman to cover my head, just add some other people's flesh. I have plenty here, there's some in the pool, just use whatever you like! It's no trouble! As long as the fragments aren't completely digested, I'll be able to...!"
Bloodstains and corpses were everywhere, with only a few skull lamps lit, their thick, dim light more eerie than complete darkness.
The old man was humbly pleading for help, and from within those vessels, he was shouting at the boy to bring glory to his family. The voices were mixed together, both terrifying and humorous.
The eyeballs rolled around the edge of the coffin, and Su Han inside the coffin bounced like a dead fish.
The man ignored him and sat there in this terrifying scene, his elbows on his thighs, his upper body leaning forward, his head slightly lowered, quietly smoking.
He held the cigarette butt in his hand, twisted it between his fingers, and was brought back to his senses by the burn.
The shadows enveloped him as he asked, "You said it was that brat who did it, and that he's a member of the family bloodline, that's why you're in such a sorry state. He seems more useful than you. Such a promising talent, what do you think we should do with him?"
He spoke plainly, revealing no emotion, just like when he casually praised Su Han for her thoroughness before leaving the house that day.
But Su Han, on the verge of death, failed to read the room and shouted, "He must not be allowed to live! Even if he has great abilities, if it's not for the family, he will only be a huge obstacle. We should inform the main family as soon as possible and ask them to send someone to kill him, to get rid of him as quickly as possible..."
The man stood up.
As soon as he looked into the coffin, the old man inside instinctively shut his mouth.
But then she saw the man walk toward the coffin, and Su Han finally breathed a sigh of relief. With her last breath, she exhaled a string of thanks, saying that her life now belonged to him and that she was at his beck and call.
Su He stopped beside the coffin, looking down at the old man who had rotted into a mess, the red cloth hanging down from his braid swaying twice.
He rubbed his fingers together and suddenly asked, "Did you make that coffin that's used to observe the second peak?"
“Yes, all the coffins you see in town were made by me…” Su Han felt something was off, but to please Su He, she answered every question, trying hard to recall the relevant information. “I remember that one was empty… Oh, I see. Could it be that coffin that went wrong? It’s been sitting there for too long. It was one of the first batches, but it wasn’t used. There’s nothing special about it. Oh dear, my memory… I think that was…”
He suddenly fell silent, realizing what was strange.
Not long ago, someone asked him a similar question.
So, the boy was actually asking about the coffin?
The coffin… Su Han suddenly noticed that a hair was wrapped around the base of Su He's fingers that she had been rubbing.
A thought flashed through his mind, and he remembered the talisman in Xie Tan's long hair. It looked familiar, like... like the incantation on the inner circle of the red cloth on Su He's braid! It was another "observation"...!
His pupils dilated to their maximum size and trembled violently; he finally sensed danger.
“…Ah.” He heard the man utter a meaningless syllable.
Then, the cigarette butt fell into the crack in the old man's head and instantly ignited. Before the flames could escape, Su He ruthlessly slammed the coffin lid shut.
As the man walked down the corridor, for a moment, he seemed to overlap with Xie Tan's figure, sharing a similar gloomy expression.
As soon as he stepped out of the coffin shop, the inner room exploded with a deafening roar, and flames, just like those on the other side of the sea, engulfed the coffin shop and swept towards the entire town.
He also brought a shard of mirror, a gift from his family, originally intended to stimulate the observation of "Bi".
The fragment of the mirror underwater has been mostly digested, and the overall situation is stabilizing.
He needs a little "vitality" to help him find the Eye of Observation that he has just acquired.
But strangely enough, before he even used it, the sea became active the day after he arrived, even though it didn't rain.
At that time, he did not test the extra fragment power; the cult's fragments were only used when breaking through the small mountain.
It's also possible that another fragment might have escaped his notice. Even the gossipy cult leader has come, but losing two fragments would be a loss for the cult.
Xie Tan could guess that he had fragments to activate Xiaoshan, and wouldn't do it himself... So what activated the solar energy?
But those things are not important for now.
The important thing is that he saved that piece of debris.
He could... kill him to silence him.
The two towns burned together, and even though the "mirror" between them shattered, it was still a reflection of the original.
Death and sleep are twins, Su He thought.
He drove off, and as he passed the art gallery, he caught a glimpse of the three blood-red characters that had been flipped up, now completely burned away by the fire and finally disappeared.
His car sped out of the town before the flames engulfed Floating Town.
With the concealment spell gone, the town was exposed, and the burning black mist, no longer obstructed, was blown by the wind and rolled away into the distance.
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Author's Note: I'm here! I've been too busy lately, but I'll still randomly send out some red envelopes in the comments section.
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