"She wasn't feeling well? Was she sick?"
The old man serving the food shook his head.
"I couldn't say. I didn't ask much. Probably just some minor ailment... The medical care in this village isn't great, and there's something sinister about the place. An occasional headache or two is normal."
Ning Qiushui then asked the old man where the woman lived.
Once he had the information he wanted, he carried his tray to Bai Xiaoxiao and Liu Chengfeng's room.
"How did it go, buddy?"
Liu Chengfeng looked at Ning Qiushui as he shoveled food into his mouth.
"She didn't come. Apparently, she wasn't feeling well, but I don't think it's that simple. Let's go to her house after we eat and see what's going on..."
The two nodded.
After their meal, they followed the old man's directions into the residential part of the village.
To be honest, this was their first time here.
The village's tourist attractions and guesthouse were completely different from its residential area.
The buildings in the first two areas were exquisitely constructed, while the villagers' living conditions were decidedly crude, with more than a hint of backwater poverty.
Judging by the buildings at the tourist attractions, the three had assumed the villagers were reasonably well-off and lived fairly comfortable lives.
Yet the surroundings before them were nothing like what they had imagined!
The roads were made entirely of mud and loose stones. Most of the villagers' houses were mud-walled structures with tiled roofs; they hadn't even built brick walls.
Desolation filled their view.
"Holy shit... how could it be this run-down?"
Liu Chengfeng muttered under his breath. Even someone as thick-skinned as him had noticed that something was wrong with the village.
The three walked along the dirt-and-stone road. Villagers occasionally passing by, as well as those busy working in their yards, cast strange looks at them.
It was an eerie sort of scrutiny.
Their gazes held an indescribable trace of guilt, along with a measure of inexplicable menace.
Without exception, however, these villagers only stole glances at them. None stared openly, and none dared meet their eyes.
"These people really do have something to hide."
Ning Qiushui gave a cold chuckle.
Before long, they arrived at the home of the woman who had served them lunch in the cafeteria the day before.
They pushed open the dilapidated gate and entered the yard, coming face-to-face with a middle-aged man who had just stepped out of the house.
The man carried a basin of water, with a towel draped over its edge.
His expression changed abruptly at the sight of the three. First came a flash of startled panic, but he quickly forced it down.
"Who are you? What are you doing in my house?"
The middle-aged man's voice was flat, and he seemed hostile toward the three.
Ning Qiushui said:
"We're here to see Mi Lan."
Mi Lan was the name of the woman who had served lunch in the cafeteria the day before.
The middle-aged man's expression turned icy.
"You've got the wrong house. There's no one named Mi Lan here."
With that, he tried to usher them out.
Just as Ning Qiushui was considering whether to force his way in, Bai Xiaoxiao suddenly spoke beside him:
"You'd better not stand in our way."
"To tell you the truth, we're not the ones who want to see Mi Lan. It's someone... you can't afford to cross."
The middle-aged man's movements faltered slightly.
Bai Xiaoxiao approached him at an unhurried pace, her steps swaying, and whispered a name to him.
At that name, the middle-aged man's face went white in an instant!
He stumbled back two steps, cold sweat already beading on his forehead.
"You don't believe me?"
Bai Xiaoxiao wore a faint, ambiguous smile.
"Do you want us to bring that thing out?"
"He has it tucked against his chest!"
Her eerie voice swept over the middle-aged man like a gust of winter wind, making him shudder. He hastily shook his head.
"N-no... there's no need."
"Mi Lan is my wife. She isn't feeling well today, so I'd rather she didn't see any visitors."
Bai Xiaoxiao smiled gently:
"Don't worry. We know who's responsible, and we're not here to take revenge on her. We just want to confirm a few things with her. Once we've asked our questions, we'll leave."
The middle-aged man immediately emptied the basin, set it on a stone ledge, and led them into the room.
The room looked even more dilapidated than the outside, as though it hadn't been maintained in a long time. Much of the furniture bore heavy signs of age, giving the impression that the house had been built decades ago and nothing inside had been replaced since.
A short, plump middle-aged woman lay in bed, bundled in a quilt, her lips pale.
Her eyes were tightly shut, as though she were asleep.
Bai Xiaoxiao stepped forward and placed a hand on the middle-aged woman's forehead.
She had a fever.
A high one, too-probably a little over thirty-nine degrees.
The noise the three made seemed to wake Mi Lan.
The moment she opened her eyes, she cried out:
"You... when did you come into my house?!"
Ning Qiushui signaled to Liu Chengfeng to close the door.
As the door creaked shut, the room immediately grew dark.
Click!
He pulled the cord for the ceiling light.
The dim yellow light fell over them, lending their figures an inexplicably eerie air.
"I have some questions for you. Once we're done, we'll leave."
Mi Lan seemed to remember Ning Qiushui's face. Her expression eased a little, losing some of its earlier panic.
Yet at Ning Qiushui's next question, her body suddenly went rigid beneath the quilt!
"Why did you clean up a haunted house for us outsiders to stay in?"
Mi Lan stammered, her face deathly pale:
"W-what haunted house?"
"I don't know what you're talking about..."
Ning Qiushui looked into Mi Lan's eyes and suddenly smiled:
"That building you cleaned up at the last minute-it's on the site of the Misty Rain Temple, isn't it?"
At his words, Mi Lan began trembling violently.
Seeing that something was wrong, the middle-aged man beside them was about to step forward and intervene when Ning Qiushui suddenly took something from inside his clothes and held it in front of him.
The moment the middle-aged man saw what it was, he screamed, clutched his head, and dropped to his knees, shaking uncontrollably!
As though possessed, he kept muttering:
"It has nothing to do with us... we didn't do it... don't come after us..."
What Ning Qiushui held in his hand was none other than Guangchuan's Memorial Tablet!
Before you continue