"Fishing"

"Strange, I can't find him anywhere..."

The middle-aged villager scratched his head, then came face-to-face with the Village Chief.

"...Ah, good afternoon." The villager nodded to the Village Chief.

"It's almost dark. What are you doing out here?"

"I'm looking for Zhou Shan. I looked everywhere just now, but I couldn't find him."

"He's not at home?"

"No. I knocked, but no one answered."

The Village Chief frowned and waved him off. "Go home for now."

The villager hurriedly said goodbye. Seemingly worried about how late it was himself, he rushed home.

The Village Chief stood there thinking for a while, then headed toward Riverside.

The sky went completely dark along the way, but he showed no intention of turning back. Instead, he quickened his pace.

The riverbank was empty, but one thing caught the Village Chief's eye with glaring clarity.

The stone covering the Square Well had rolled onto the ground.

The Village Chief clenched his fists, winding blue veins bulging on the backs of his withered hands.

"What happened..."

He turned his head, a faint, breathy sound escaping his throat, and showed panic for the first time.

The door of the abandoned tiled-roof house slammed into the wall with a bang. The Village Chief stepped inside, picked up the bloodstained strips of cloth scattered beside the bed, and clenched them tightly in his hand.

Meanwhile, Li Xian and the others had already begun to act.

Qian Xin stood beside the well, cold sweat pouring uncontrollably from his forehead.

"Are you sure Shen Xiaomei's body is down there?"

"Fifty percent sure," Li Xian answered.

Xu Yao covered her mouth at his words.

Did that mean they might have been drinking corpse water these past few days?

Li Xian looked down into the well. "Even if Shen Xiaomei's body isn't in this well, there must be something else in there."

Qian Xin paced anxiously, sighing every so often.

"I must be out of my mind... coming here to do something like this with you..."

"Sighing won't help now." Song Qingzhang tightened the rope in his hands, binding the Wedding Dress securely.

"Ugh..."

Qian Xin sighed again and grabbed the other end of the rope in resignation.

The five of them lined up in a tug-of-war stance. Standing at the front, Li Xian counted down from three and flung the Wedding Dress into the well.

Splash.

The sound of it hitting the water rose from below.

Qian Xin felt as though his heart had skipped a beat along with it.

After a stretch of deathly silence, a churning sound suddenly came from the bottom of the well.

Then the rope in their hands went taut.

A familiar force traveled through the rope, just as it had when Song Qingzhang had nearly been dragged into the well. This time, however, they were ready and pulled back desperately on the hemp rope.

Song Qingzhang gritted his teeth, his face turning red with exertion. The others were giving it everything they had, too, yet the rope only inched toward them. The slightest slackening would let it drag them back.

Cold sweat had already soaked the hair hanging over Li Xian's forehead.

The wound in his chest made its presence painfully clear. Every pull brought a tearing pain, asserting itself even more forcefully than the creature beneath the river.

[Health points -10]

[Health points -10]

The familiar sound rang in Li Xian's ears again.

The moment his attention slipped, half the rope was yanked back.

"Fuck..."

He couldn't hold back the curse and immediately pulled hard to keep things under control.

Time stretched on as though it had stopped. All that remained was the agony in his chest and the crushing force against his palms.

Ten seconds.

Twenty seconds.

Just as everyone was about to reach their limit, the force on their hands abruptly vanished.

A lump was flung out on the end of the rope and hit the ground with a smack.

The Wedding Dress was soaked through and crumpled into a ball. Then it suddenly began to move.

Still sitting on the ground, Qian Xin hadn't had time to get up. Frightened, he scooted backward on his backside, staring at the writhing bundle of Wedding Dress in alarm and uncertainty.

"That doesn't look big enough to be a bod... ah!"

Xu Yao cried out as the thing wrapped in the Wedding Dress finally struggled free.

First came a hand with clearly defined knuckles, followed by a pale, swollen forearm.

Just as everyone thought there really was a corpse beneath the Wedding Dress, it broke free completely.

It was a hand attached to half an arm.

The arm ended at the elbow, its severed surface exposing bone and flesh. Its slender fingers bent at strange angles to grip the ground, dragging it along as it crawled.

It wasn't fast, as though it hadn't yet adapted to moving on land. Even so, everyone warily took several steps back.

"C-could we have torn the body apart..."

Zhao Fengyi stared at the severed arm, looking distinctly unwell.

At that, Xu Yao immediately covered her mouth, looking as though she wanted to vomit.

"Bro, is that Shen Xiaomei's hand?"

Song Qingzhang asked. When Li Xian didn't answer, he turned to look at him, only to discover that he still hadn't gotten up.

Li Xian held one hand over his chest and waved the other at Song Qingzhang, then braced himself against the ground and stood.

In the darkness, Song Qingzhang thought he saw a darker patch beneath Li Xian's hand.

He moved a couple of steps closer. The barely noticeable dark patch spread a little farther, allowing Song Qingzhang to see it clearly.

Was that... blood?

Song Qingzhang blinked uncertainly and was about to ask when he suddenly noticed an eerie stillness in the air.

"...What have you done?"

A voice audibly suppressing its rage sounded behind them.

The Village Chief looked past Song Qingzhang's shoulder. At the sight of Li Xian, he froze for a moment, then his expression darkened completely, as though he had realized something.

"W-we can expl..." Qian Xin, who was closest to the Village Chief, struggled to offer an explanation, only for Zhao Fengyi to clamp a hand over his mouth.

The Village Chief's attention was focused entirely on Li Xian. No one else even registered in his eyes.

Only when cold sweat soaked his clothes did Qian Xin realize how recklessly he had just courted death.

Reason told him to escape now, but fear had welded his legs to the ground.

The Village Chief stared fixedly at Li Xian and walked straight toward him.

Yet Li Xian stepped past Song Qingzhang and went to meet the approaching Village Chief.

Then he kicked the arm on the ground.

Ever since it had escaped the Wedding Dress, the arm had ignored everyone and crawled slowly in one direction. Caught off guard by Li Xian's sudden kick, it had no time to react before it went flying.

It landed squarely on the Village Chief's face.

The hand instinctively grabbed his face. After a brief pause, it began clawing frantically at him as though it had found its sworn enemy.

"Run! Back to Riverside!"

Li Xian shouted to the others, then seized the opening to slip past the Village Chief and sprint back the way they had come.

Everyone broke into a frantic run, not even daring to glance back. But Li Xian had only put a few steps between them when the pain in his chest made his legs buckle, sending him crashing to the ground.

He looked back and saw the Village Chief wrench the severed arm off his face and slam it viciously onto the ground. His face covered in bloody scratches, he walked toward Li Xian.