Jian Ran knew perfectly well that the moment he stepped into this deserted village, he had entered a vengeful ghost's Resentment Domain again.
The scenes formed from obsession and resentment were like yesterday playing out again, while he watched the story's entire ending unfold as a bystander.
Mother Liu cradled her own daughter, who had already stopped breathing, and stared fixedly at the clan chief. The resentment rising around her was even stronger than that of the woman who had died violently in her arms.
"Let's go home, dear?" Father Liu, who stood behind her supporting her, was devastated. "It was all my fault. I shouldn't have just left like that."
"If I'd stayed to watch over our Ying'er, perhaps she wouldn't have..."
"Stop talking!" Mother Liu cut him off sharply. "Home! Take our Ying home!"
Father Liu dared not say any more. He took the mud-covered, brutally abused young body from her arms. That slightly swollen belly held a child who had died before even being born.
Two lives had been lost, yet no one present felt any pity.
Every villager's gaze was filled with contempt. Even after Father and Mother Liu left the ancestral hall, they spat on the ground.
"Pah! What a filthy little slut!"
"They raised that whore, and they still had the nerve to come asking for her back?!"
"They wanted that bitch to live and give birth to her child?! In their dreams!"
"Pah! Even if the clan chief agreed, the ancestors in the ancestral hall never would!"
"What a disgrace to the family, raising a daughter like that!"
The vicious words went on and on. Although Jian Ran could not feel what they felt, he still frowned, deeply disgusted.
He followed the stumbling elderly couple out of the ancestral hall.
Outside, the moon