Chapter 43 The Curse of Sleep (7) "You're not investigating the sleeping...
Xie Tan leaned against the doorframe and asked very naturally, "How long has he been asleep?"
He remembered that he had just read in the story two stories ago that Chang Mingai had been lying in her bedroom for a year.
"Why aren't you saying anything?" Xie Tan said nonchalantly. "You're not really dead, are you?"
He said this not simply because the young master lacked tact and was annoying, but also because of the layout of the room.
The curtains and drapes were all white, and a mirror hung on the cabinet directly opposite the foot of the bed. Underneath the mirror, there was an incense burner with three sticks of incense, as well as fruit and pastries.
It reminded him of the obsidian photo frame on the empty tombstone.
Xie Tan felt that replacing the bed with a coffin would be more appropriate for the occasion.
The old man noticed the knot in the boy's hair at his waist, patted the boy's arm, and told him to move aside.
He entered the room, picked up a towel from the copper basin, and wiped the man's face on the bed.
The man remained motionless, letting the old man take care of him, but Xie Tan could tell that the man's body was still soft, unlike a corpse.
The old man's voice was hoarse and unpleasant, as if he were speaking with sand in his mouth: "He's just asleep. He's been asleep for many years."
Xie Tan wasn't chased away, so he entered the house more naturally and sat down in a chair: "Who is he to you? He's quite filial."
It's unclear whether "filial piety" refers to a man who lies down and is cared for by a frail old man, or to an old man who is as filial as one would to one's parents.
The old man's cloudy eyes, full of wrinkles at the corners, looked over, but Xie Tan didn't take it to heart: "I haven't met many of my clansmen, so I don't know which of you is which. If it weren't for my mission, I would never have crossed paths with you in this lifetime."
He openly expressed his contempt, but the old man only looked at him for a moment before explaining his relationship with the man.
He was not a member of the Black Goat family, but rather a man's attendant, taking care of his daily life and travels. He referred to himself as "Han".
Old Man Han had followed the man for over a decade and naturally knew of the family's existence. He held them in great awe and seemed to know some of the inside story: "I met Mr. Su He this morning. The family sent several capable people there, presumably on important business. Could it be about the strange things happening in the town?"
So the old man met Su He first, and Xie Tan benefited from that and was also considered a member of the main family? After all, how could a wolf act with a peripheral member of the family?
He nodded: "Tell me about it."
“It’s right in front of you.” Old Han picked up a willow comb and began to comb the man’s hair. “There are many people like this sleeping in the town.”
Old Han then briefly told Xie Tan about the situation in the town.
The people of Fushui Town make a living by fishing. Three years ago, during a rain and fog, a fishing boat went missing at sea. Other residents searched for it by boat, but found no trace of it.
When the rain stopped and the fog cleared, they found the boat floating on the shore. When they boarded the boat, they found everyone there, but they were all fast asleep and could not be woken up no matter what they did.
From then on, such things happened one after another, supposedly because they heard the enchanting chants of sirens, which caused them to fall into a deep sleep.
People dared not go out to sea, but they still needed to make a living from it. They asked the local shaman to drive away the sea monster, but the shaman who went out to sea also fell into a deep sleep, so they had no choice but to ask for help from outside.
Like the Mirror Cult, the Black Goat Family pays close attention to metaphysical events and ancient folk customs in various places. Mr. Su, who is in bed, is very interested in the cultural fusion phenomenon in Diqiu by the sea. He originally wanted to go to the end of the afterglow, but unexpectedly discovered the town. At the request of the local townspeople, he devoted himself to the investigation.
Because of many past experiences, they did not go out to sea, but instead stayed in the town as much as possible, at most going to the seaside to investigate, and using some of their family's metaphysical methods to detect the energy in the sea.
But even without going out to sea, during one of the investigations where the two teams split up, Old Man Han found a man on the beach who had fallen into a deep sleep.
There were no boats around, and the residents said the man did not ask them for a boat to go out to sea.
But he didn't wake up, nor did he die.
A deep sleep spread through the town like a curse.
Xie Tan finally understood the strange things in the town; they were actually a means of isolating sound to prevent the siren's song from reaching the town.
After Old Man Han finished speaking, he asked, "Did you come here to awaken him?"
Xie Tan used it and then left. He sensed that Old Man Han was hiding something, but he was not Su He after all. He could only use the old man's power to his advantage. He could hardly get any more clues by interrogating him, and he might even ruin his persona—not the persona of a young master, but the persona of a mysterious person.
So before he left, he coldly retorted, "Shouldn't you be the one to ask that?"
Old Man Han did not answer, but continued to tidy the sleeping man's clothes. Finally, he spoke softly, "There is one more thing you must remember... nothing escapes the eyes of the family."
Xie Tan paused for only a moment before resuming his normal pace, going downstairs as if he hadn't taken those words to heart.
On the way, he thought about the old man's words. Had he fallen into a deep sleep for no reason? Was there really no one else on the third floor of the hotel where he was staying?
After all, when Xue Hong suggested that he wanted to stay on the third floor with him, the boss completely ignored him.
The boss has a bad temper, and on the other hand, there may indeed be no vacant rooms on the third floor.
Moreover, is the new episodic story titled "The Sleeping Curse"?
He opened the comic, and at the end of the latest chapter, the club successfully uncovered the truth about the theater. The so-called haunted singing was not the voice of a dead person, but rather the result of a construction team discovering a treasure underground that resembled burial goods. In order to keep it for themselves, they used a phonograph to pretend it was haunted and mislead people.
In the end, they were all buried alive in the cave where the treasure was hidden due to an underground collapse.
As ghosts, their obsession with hiding treasures remains unchanged. Just like in life, they play the phonograph to scare away anyone who tries to enter the theater.
Xi Rui secretly reclaims the ghost's power and, together with his friends, bravely escapes. The travel agency calls the police, and the treasure is handed over.
As for the police raid and raid on the music theater, that had nothing to do with them.
They were trying to find out why Chang Mingai was in a coma, focusing on the phonograph and records.
The singing is not by any celebrity or musical actor, and the corresponding song cannot be found on the market; it seems to be a private recording.
All that was known was that the construction team leader found it at a local market while on a business trip. But he had always had a habit of collecting things, so an old record was not surprising. He didn't mention it to anyone, so no one knew where the record came from.
Chang Mingai was somewhat discouraged when she found no answer at the music theater.
But soon, the long holiday arrived, and she cheered herself up and went on a beach vacation with everyone, putting the matter aside for the time being. She also needed a change of scenery.
Xue Hong, who was already on the coastal highway at the time, received their message and said that he would go back and apply for the Good Citizen Award for them.
This concludes this episode.
But the story didn't end there.
A beach vacation... still under the "sleeping spell".
Because the unfinished musical theater project was just a misunderstanding.
So, is the source of the song actually in this strange little town, the siren?
Judging by the time, the remaining members of the main characters should be arriving soon.
Xie Tan strolled around until the afternoon, exploring most of the town and learning from the townspeople about the location of the abandoned art museum.
He calculated the route, but the distance was not short, and walking there would be too tiring. He heard that there were bicycles available for the Water Splashing Festival at the beach, so he paid to borrow one.
Cycling along the coast, the sea breeze ruffled his clothes, and Xie Tan felt a rare moment of comfort.
In the distance, he saw fishing boats buried in the sand, and several people surrounding the boats, including Xue Hong.
But the other people he didn't see were the rock-and-roll youths on the second floor; instead, they were members of the travel agency. They had already arrived and were resting, building sandcastles, and playing in the water.
Xie Tan had no intention of stopping and continued cycling along the coastal road, but someone spotted him immediately.
Lu Jinzhao's eyes lit up, and he dropped the shovel he was using to build the castle and his teammates, and ran towards him.
The azure sky stretches to the horizon, white clouds drift lazily, and the sea slowly surges toward the shore. White waves appear and disappear in the sunlight, like a gemstone whose beautiful glint can only be seen when its angle is adjusted in the light.
The young man ran toward him amidst all this bright sunshine.
At this moment, Xie Tan was oblivious to everything else. It was as if the world before him was him: the clear sky was him, the sea was him, the wind was him, and the salty smell of the sea was him.
The sea breeze carried Lu Jinzhao's cheerful call: "A-Tan!"
However, after the double memories were superimposed, the first memory that came to mind when he saw Lu Jinzhao was their discussion about suspense movies before they entered the restaurant that day.
Isn't that just how reality is?
The black-haired youth smiled and said, his eyes crinkling.
He was taken aback for a moment, and just then Xi Rui and the others arrived. They went upstairs together and didn't continue the topic. But this time, his thoughts were not completely interrupted or diverted.
He simply... chose to stop there.
Xie Tan stopped riding his bicycle, and Lu Jinzhao braked suddenly in front of him. After Xie Tan stepped off the bicycle, Lu Jinzhao placed the flower wreath on Xie Tan's head, as if he thought it looked better on Xie Tan's head. He laughed and pulled him forward.
"I heard from Uncle Xue that you arrived last night? So what you meant by 'it's arranged' was to come with Uncle Xue."
Xie Tan didn't respond to that. He was about to take off the wreath, but when he heard Lu Jinzhao say, as if taking credit, that he had picked every flower along the way and woven it up little by little, and that there was also a four-leaf clover, he was now giving this handmade fortune to his best neighbor.
So Xie Tan changed his actions and simply straightened the flower wreath: "Then let me share in the glory."
The protagonist himself bestowed this good fortune upon him; I hope his story goes smoothly and he perfectly enters the Black Goat's storyline.
Cat number 7 appeared, jumped on his head, and was curled up in the flower wreath, sleeping with its eyes closed.
Xie Tan let it be, since the system cat had no weight anyway.
"We just arrived and couldn't move when we saw the beach. Are there any hotels here?"
Xie Tan turned around, and their luxury RV was right by the roadside. He said, "Yes, it's not far from the sea."
There are chain hotels and local guesthouses in the seaside area, so there is no need to bring a motorhome unless they originally planned to drive into the woods where no roads have been built.
That was Xi Rui's idea. Like him, he believed there were other anomalies between the two scenic areas, and the real location was in the woods outside the scenic area.
"Great! We can play board games together tonight."
"Go to sleep at night."
"Ah Tan doesn't want to play? Don't worry, we'll play in the RV and won't disturb your rest."
Xie Tan thought that it was fine for them to play; there were plenty of people who were noisier than them at night, and he probably wouldn't even be able to hear them.
Whether it's rock music or ghost stories.
The club cheered when they saw the new member.
"So Xie Tan, you arrived first. What a coincidence! You really are from the club!"
Xi Rui waved a plastic shovel, and Sun Enze, standing beside him, nodded shyly to Xie Tan. The small crabs in the plastic bucket crawled out, only to be shoveled back to the bottom by Xi Rui, who was startled.
"Little Sun, guard this place. This is today's extra food. We can't let them escape."
"Yes, yes!"
Xie Tan also formally met the young lady.
Xia Wujin's appearance was that of a refined and gentle person, just like a chrysanthemum. The two refined individuals met, and their conversation was very brief. They introduced themselves, exchanged names, and then exchanged a few more words:
"Thank you for your pen."
"You're welcome, welcome to the team."
They nodded to each other, and the conversation ended smoothly.
Xi Rui watched in amazement.
Xie Tan ignored him and walked towards Xue Hong.
Xue Hong is studying the fishing boats on the beach.
The hull of the boat was chipped and half buried in the sand. Some strangely patterned canvases and chains made of seashells hung on the boat, making it a beach attraction with a pirate feel.
As Xie Tan entered, Xue Hong said, "It seems the townspeople haven't been fishing at sea for a long time. The fishing boats and fishing gear are just sitting there collecting dust. We came to the beach this morning, and there wasn't a single person there."
The "we" here refers to him and the "rock band" on the second floor.
Xie Tan asked, "Did they go back?"
"Where did you go for fun? The town is quite big." Xue Hong looked at him questioningly. "What about you, going back to the hotel?"
Xie Tan was looking at the woods in the distance, as if there was something behind them. He took off the flower wreath from his head and put it on his arm: "Let's go take a look there."
Chang Mingai asked curiously, "Where are we going?"
It is said that the long-abandoned art museum is the most likely origin of bubble art.
Xie Tan had already walked off the beach when he turned back and glanced at them: "Weren't you investigating the reason for the slumber?"
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