Greed Is to Blame for Everything
Once no one was around, the disgusting monster crawled out of the pit again. Because it had eaten too many people, its body had swelled up once more, transforming into a gigantic beast. It struggled to climb out of the pit, turned around, and spat out a pile of bones.
As the bones were expelled, the monster's body smirked slightly. It then quickly climbed down into the pit and retrieved the large box, its means of survival through hunting. However, by the time it emerged, its mother, the old woman, had vanished.
This enraged the monster. After searching the surrounding area without success, it realized something was wrong and quickly ran away with the box. Lu Li and the others, who were in the distance, did not immediately give chase, but instead looked at the old woman in front of them.
"Save my son, please save my son!" The old woman wasn't speaking to Lu Li and the others, but to a swarm of ants swarming on the ground. Due to prolonged mental and physical torment, coupled with the constant inhalation of pollen, the old woman had long since lost her reason.
"We can't get any information out of her like this," Jasmine said with some distress. Unlike before, when she carried out missions, she mostly used force, and she didn't have any special skills when interrogating madmen.
"Let me do it." Lu Li pulled the old woman over and made her look into his eyes. The next moment, the world around them changed, and Lu Li entered a fragmented dream.
Most of the surroundings were gray and black, except for a farmhouse in the distance that shone with a little light. As Lu Li drifted over, he saw a woman handing an old cow to Jack.
"Jack, move the cows to the market to sell. Don't sell them cheaply; you know the market price," the woman said sternly. At this time, she looked to be in her thirties or forties, not nearly as old as the fifty or sixty-year-olds outside.
"Yes, Mother, I'll be right back." Jack led the cow away happily, and then the next moment seemed to be fast-forwarded. Nothing about what Jack encountered during that time was shown, and the surrounding area became even darker.
Jack had barely left when he returned, the cow in his hand gone. He came back beaming, jumped in front of his mother, and said, "Mom, look what I got!"
Jack held out his palm, revealing three peas. Lu Li, watching from a distance, narrowed his eyes. This was a dream recreated based on the memories of the dream's owner; things within it wouldn't increase or decrease for no reason.
"These are peas that can grow straight to the sky! I traded three for them. Aren't I amazing?" Jack said proudly. But all he got in return was a beating from his mother. That was a cow, and even though it was an old cow, it was definitely not something that could be traded for a few peas.
Jack was sullen after being beaten. That night, he ran out and planted a pea in the yard. The next morning, a real pea sprout shot into the sky in the yard. Jack climbed the pea sprout despite his mother's objections.
The scene fast-forwards again, showing Jack sliding down from the pea shoot with a bag of gold coins in his hand. The woman stops scolding him and instead praises him for getting a treasure. However, it's clear from Jack's trade for a cow that he has absolutely no concept of managing a household.
In the dream, Jack's gold coins would be significantly less each time he returned from going out, and he would buy unnecessary things, quickly running out of gold coins.
Having no other choice, Jack climbed the pea shoot again. A short while later, when he slid down, he was holding a hen that laid golden eggs. This hen laid two to three golden eggs every day, so Jack spent money even more extravagantly.
His mother tried to persuade him, but he rudely pushed her away and said, "I traded for the peas, I brought this hen back, and I got all the money in the house. Now I'm the one who calls the shots."
Soon Jack felt that one or two golden eggs a day were not enough, so he figured that since the hen could lay golden eggs every day, there must be countless golden eggs inside her. So he simply killed the hen, cut open her belly, and took out a few bloody golden eggs.
Disappointed, Jack cursed the hen for being incompetent. Thinking that the pea shoot was still in the yard, he carelessly took the bloodstained golden egg and went out to enjoy himself. When he had spent all the golden egg and was penniless again, he climbed the pea shoot for the third time.
From the woman's perspective, she couldn't see what was happening in the clouds; she only saw Jack sliding down from the pea shoots again, his eyes bulging, and a harp slung over his back.
On the pea shoot, there was a strange giant climbing down. The giant was covered in black fur, had huge claws on its feet, and its hands were split into two at the front. Most terrifyingly, its mouth was not horizontal, but vertical, as if its face had been split open, and it had huge yellow teeth.
The giant's eyes shone pink on either side of his face. He was carrying a large box on his back and roaring madly from a tree, as if he was vowing to catch Jack, the little thief. However, Jack rushed into the house, grabbed an axe, and chopped the pea shoots in half.
The pea shoots withered and turned to dust within seconds after being cut, while the giant climbing on them fell to the ground, his body smashing into a pile of minced meat. However, the large box on his back remained intact.
Then things started to get increasingly strange. Jack retrieved the large trunk and stayed home all day, fiddling with it and the harp. His behavior became increasingly bizarre, his violent tendencies worsened, and he became more and more horrifying towards women.
Most surprisingly, his eyes grew wider and wider, and he was constantly itchy all over. Until one day, his eyes popped out of his head, and some pink bumps appeared on his face.
The old woman, sensing something was wrong, tried to call a doctor, but Jack tied her up at home and fed her raw meat sauce every day. After Jack peeled off the dried skin from his body, he had become a complete monster.
The meat sauce was quickly finished, and Jack, along with the old woman and the large box, began setting traps to swindle people everywhere. By the time they encountered Lu Li and his group, they had already swindled people seven or eight times in other places.
As these shattered memories flooded in, the old woman's expression worsened, and the entire dream almost turned into a gloomy gray. Having obtained the general information, Lu Li withdrew from the old woman's dream; he had no intention of absorbing its energy.
Because she consumed the dream monster, her dreams have been corrupted, and they may even undergo further mutations later. The more powerful the monster, the stronger its infectivity; this is true for those monsters, and it is also true for Lu Li.
Those familiar with Cthulhu should know what that giant is.