Zhong Nan

"Phew~~~"

The boy let out a long breath. "Thank goodness Brother Zhang brought me here in time. Otherwise, the consequences would've been unthinkable."

"Heh heh heh..."

The piglet snorted beside them, but unfortunately, no one understood what the little guy was saying.

"Who are you?"

Xu Tong stepped forward and reached out toward the boy, but the boy immediately backed away and pointed at the Cinnabar Bracelet on his wrist. "Don't touch me. That thing will burn my soul."

"This?!"

At the boy's words, he glanced at the Cinnabar Bracelet on his wrist. It was the bracelet he'd received when he got the script.

He hadn't paid much attention to the trinket before, but now it seemed to have a use he hadn't known about.

"My name is Zhong Nan. I warned them earlier not to trust my uncle and told them to leave as soon as they could, but they wouldn't listen. Now they've ended up like this."

The boy walked over to the table and looked at the Paper Dolls that resembled Zhou Yu and Wang Shaohui. He sighed deeply. "If only you'd listened to me back then."

Whether Zhou Yu and Wang Shaohui could hear him or not, a cold draft suddenly swept through the room. It stirred Zhou Yu's veil, revealing the ashen face beneath it.

"Brrr~~!!"

Li Bo felt the air around him turn icy in an instant. Looking at the two Paper Dolls sitting on the chairs, he couldn't have felt more uneasy.

He hurriedly asked, "Who's your uncle? From what you're saying, was all of this your uncle's doing?"

The boy nodded and pointed to the box on the left, signaling for Li Bo to take it down. "You'll understand when you see what's inside."

Li Bo looked at Xu Tong, full of suspicion. Only after Xu Tong nodded did he step forward and lift down the box.

While he was occupied, Xu Tong picked up the jade plaque from the floor and held it in his hand.

"How did you end up inside this?"

"I was a wandering soul trapped in the village. This is a piece of black jade, the perfect place to nourish a soul, so I hid inside it. I also warned them to watch out for my uncle and tried to guide them, but they wouldn't listen."

Zhong Nan looked regretful. As he spoke, he pointed at Zhang Hao beside him. "That guy ran straight outside. Luckily, he ran into me. Otherwise..."

Zhong Nan trailed off, but the meaning was clear enough.

Xu Tong glanced at Zhang Hao, but there was no way he could read anything from a pig's head.

"Are they alive or dead?"

Li Bo brought the box over, then helplessly waved his arm, his wound gaping open, signaling Xu Tong to bandage it more securely.

Zhong Nan noticed Li Bo's severed hand. "They're alive, but just like the villagers outside, my uncle tricked their souls out of their bodies. The only way to restore them is with the Soul-Calling Bell at my uncle's waist."

Zhong Nan opened the box. It was full of paper ingots. After rummaging through them, he pulled out a small booklet and found a black-and-white family photo inside.

There were three people in the photo: a man and a woman, with a baby in their arms.

The man looked young, and his honest smile showed just how happy he was.

"My uncle used to be the town's paper craftsman. He wasn't exactly a member of the occult sects, but he knew a few things that had been passed down.

"Later, he married and had a big, healthy boy. They were happy enough, but within two years, his son died young. His wife couldn't bear the shock and hanged herself. After that, my uncle went mad."

As he spoke, Zhong Nan slowly crouched down, wrapped his arms around his shoulders, and curled into a ball. He gazed at the vast village outside the door.

"My uncle built this village himself. At first, he made people out of straw and dressed them in clothes. Everyone in town said he was crazy.

"Then one day, a caravan stopped here to rest. None of them ever left.

"When the townspeople came to investigate, they discovered that the straw figures were alive. My uncle had done it... He lured living people here, pulled their souls out, and put them into the straw. Then he made them human skin out of paper...

"It's terrifying~~ So terrifying~ I want to go home. I... I want to go home..."

As Zhong Nan spoke, his body began to tremble uncontrollably. His face was full of terror, as though he'd remembered something horrifying.

Even Li Bo, a rough man who was usually arrogant and domineering, couldn't help letting out a sigh at the sight of the boy. He silently shook his head.

Xu Tong rummaged through the box and found a sandalwood case. When he opened it, he saw a book inside.

It looked ancient enough to fall apart in his hands. The brittle pages were like dead leaves in autumn; it seemed that even the slightest breath could scatter them.

The cover was also old, but nowhere near as deteriorated as the pages. It seemed to have been rebound at some point. Three crooked characters were written across it: Book of Ghost Craftsman.

He tried opening it to see what was inside, but the writing wasn't in the simplified characters he knew, nor was it traditional Chinese. The flowing script looked a bit like clerical script, but not quite. After struggling through two lines, he couldn't make out any more.

Still, it had to be valuable. Otherwise, it wouldn't have been carefully stored in a sandalwood case.

Zhong Nan watched him tuck the book into his clothes. The corner of her mouth twitched, but she didn't say anything.

"So the villagers here were all originally living people? Then those people we saw burned to death at the foot of the mountain..."

He looked toward Zhou Yu and Wang Shaohui, who were lying on the bed. Li Bo stood to one side. Just thinking about those charred corpses made his stomach churn again. They had clearly left him with deep psychological scars.

"Please, I'm begging you, help me, help us! We've been trapped here for far too long. If you can get the bell from my uncle's waist, we'll be free."

Zhong Nan threw herself against Li Bo's thigh, weeping and pleading.

Just then, a notification suddenly sounded in their ears. [Main Mission: Find the Culprit] completed.

[Main Mission 2: Liberation]

[Mission Objective: Free the innocent souls trapped here.]

[Mission Hint: You have to believe that there are some things the dead need even more than the living...]

The cold notification echoed in the ears of the two men and the pig, confirming that Zhong Nan hadn't been lying. The truth had been uncovered, and the one responsible for everything was the uncle Zhong Nan had spoken of.

But was this really the truth? Xu Tong looked at Zhong Nan, still crouched on the floor crying. His impassive face finally revealed a trace of disdain.