Chapter 8 – The Feast of Blood (III)
Just as Song Tian’s organs are at the brink of exploding from fear, a round of knocking suddenly sounded from outside the door. The knocking is followed by Ge Ling’s voice, “Why are you screaming as if someone has died?!”
This voice reaches Song Tian’s ear like a wave of heavenly music. He immediately turns back and shouts, “Ah Ling… Hurry, open the door. There is…”
Then he turns his gaze back towards the toilet bowl… But that place is already empty…
“I want to know more about the story behind all these ghostly rumours.”
Li Yin decides to just play along, taking the role of a reporter. Qin Shoutian also pulls out his journalist pa.s.s, thus further convincing Ah Xiu.
After taking out a pen, Li Yin spreads a piece of paper onto the square table in the living room of Ah Xiu’s house. He asks, “Miss Ah Xiu… the following questions we have are very important. I hope you can answer honestly.”
Li Yin is very certain that everything is not as simple as it superficially seems.
That apartment will not a.s.sign them a mission that does not threaten their lives at all, especially when this is his fourth b.l.o.o.d.y word mission. Last time, the phantom in the school killed indiscriminately. But this time, this supernatural incident has a clear motif of revenge.
Then…she has no reason to do anything to us. For the difficulty of this mission to conversely be lower than the third b.l.o.o.d.y word mission, this is impossible.
So Li Yin is convinced that they must have missed something. And what they missed is definitely fatal!
It is impossible that the apartment will give them an obvious safe spot where they can stay alive. After living in that apartment for a year, Li Yin knows this point well!
Ah Xiu who is sitting across Li Yin smiles faintly and says, “Mr. Reporter, then you have to write down my words and publish them.”
“Yes, of course.”
“Okay then… I will tell you.” Ah Xiu starts to recite everything that has happened since Bing Er’s death.
The death of Li Bing indeed aroused a commotion in the village. Although everyone despised Li Bing before, this was a matter of life and death, so the disturbance lasted for a long time after her death. And for Ah Xiu who was deeply attached to Li Bing, the sorrow was too painful for her to endure.
After that incident, Ah Xiu began living like a walking corpse. She never had any mood to cultivate her farm and did not eat well for a few months, eventually becoming a bag of skin and bones.
Those days were truly painful. But there were two people who would always visit her and bring her some food, Liang
Renbin and Zhang Suyue.
In the past, besides Bing Er, Ah Xiu was closest with Suyue. Although she is the granddaughter of the elder’s family, Suyue is usually very easy-going and hardworking due to her status as a farm girl. But her personality is too soft and malleable which is why when the Bing Er incident occurred, she felt pressured by the people around her. Even though she sympathized with Bing Er, she was not brave enough to speak up for her.
This past friendship has already been completely shattered. Now, when Ah Xiu looks towards Suyue, her eyes contain only hatred.
About half a year later, on the night of the 6th of June, Suyue was visiting Ah Xiu again. Although their conversation became awkward after lasting no more than a couple sentences, she still repeatedly reminded Ah Xiu to
take care of herself.
After she left, Ah Xiu could still not fall asleep. Although the night got deeper and deeper, she did not feel sleepy at all. The next day was Bing Er’s commemoration day.
After her parents had pa.s.sed away, Bing Er was Ah Xiu’s only irreplaceable loved one. From childhood till now, no matter what time it was, Bing Er was always there to guard Ah Xiu, caring for and protecting her like an older sister.
She will never be able to recover from Bing Er’s death.
And it was precisely during that night….
She suddenly heard the strange sound of water from the water tank inside of the kitchen.
Initially, Ah Xiu was so scared that she had jumped in fright, but she still slowly walked into the kitchen and crept towards the water tank.
As Ah Xiu speaks about this, Ye Kexin, who is listening on the side, shivers. She cannot help but look towards the kitchen.
“Don’t be scared, Miss Ye.” Ah Xiu says with a smile, “Sister Bing Er will never hurt you guys.”
Following that, she continues her story.
At that time, even she did not know where her courage originated as she flipped open the lid of the water tank.
What appeared in the water tank was… it was actually Suyue’s father, the son in law of elder’s family!
At first, Ah Xiu panicked mindlessly, but then she…noticed something!
There were two thin and pale arms wrapped around the waist of the elder’s son in law’s corpse. And when Ah Xiu noticed that pair of arms, they quickly retracted behind the back of the corpse!
Ah Xiu then quickly fished out that corpse from the water tank (at this point, Kexin looks at Ah Xiu’s face with even more fear), but she could not find the owner of those pale arms.
However, Ah Xiu understood what transpired.
It was Bing Er!
Sister Bing Er had killed this man. Suyue had been coerced by him to end her friendship with Bing Er, to definitely not get too close to her. Because of him, even Suyue had become cold towards Sister Bing Er.
“Want to know what I did later?” Ah Xiu’s expression turns into a ghastly smile, “I cut off his tongue! Because it was talking too much! Then I dragged his corpse to the elder’s doorstep.”
When Qin Shoutian hears this, he adjusts his gla.s.ses and says steadily, “Miss Ah Xiu…you would actually tell us this kind of things?”
“Aren’t you guys journalists? Then publish these things.” Ah Xiu’s smile grows even wider, as though she is just chatting casually about her daily life. “Well, I don’t care anyways. After sister Bing Er pa.s.sed away, I’ve already stopped caring whether I am dead or alive.”
“Cutting the tongue of the elder’s son-in-law… doing something like this…”
“The elder’s family did not announce anything. Hehe, they probably thought of something? Indeed, there were people who suspected me, but so what? My relationship with the villagers is antagonistic as water and fire anyways. Only Liang Renbin still bothers me relentlessly, but every second I’m hoping that someday his corpse will show up in my water tank!”
“All the people who went missing in the village will appear in this water tank? What did you do with the corpses later?”
“I only cut off their tongues. After doing this, the corpse that was there will disappear, and then… new corpses will appear again.”
Li Yin diligently records everything. Then, forcing himself to remain calm, he says, “Thank you very much, Miss Ah Xiu. The material you provided is very valuable.”
This woman is clearly insane.
Her overly stubborn feelings towards Bing Er made her to do these kinds of unimaginable things.
Qin Shoutian looks towards Li Yin, his gaze questioning. His meaning is clear: How much we can trust this woman?
Li Yin also uses his eyes to answer him: Quite trustworthy.
If it was before, Li Yin would be convinced that Ah Xiu suffers from intense paranoia. But now…he believes that this is closer to the reality.
Water tank…corpse…detached tongues…Ah Xiu…Bing Er…
Li Yin feels that everything they’ve discovered seems to be hiding a crucial point that they all overlooked. But what exactly is it? Bing Er’s vengeful ghost is still lingering, committing brutal ma.s.sacres a month after her commemoration day every year and sending the corpses to Ah Xiu’s house.
Even just thinking about it is enough to send bone-chilling shivers up anyone’s spine.
Is moving to Ah Xiu’s house really the correct decision?
“What do you think…” Li Yin lowers his voice and asks, “How many more people will she kill?”
“Hmm… Probably Tieqin, Renbin, Ge Ling, Hongwu and Suyue. These five people will definitely die…”
Li Yin asks another question.
A question that he is extremely concerned about.
“Can you communicate with Bing Er’s soul?”
Ah Xiu shakes her head and says, “I can’t. If that is possible, I really wish that I can talk some more with Sister!”
“Are you not scared?”
“Scared? Why would I be scared?” Ah Xiu continues to retain her gently smiling expression, but this only makes her appear even more terrifying.
Ye Kexin cannot hold back anymore as she asks, “Miss Ah Xiu…You shouldn’t have done this… You…”
Li Yin hurriedly hints to Ye Kexin that she should not continue speaking, but it is too late. Ah Xiu glares at her coldly and says, ‘What? Are you telling me these people don’t deserve to die? They pressured sister Bing Er to death! Did they not? They did!”
“You… that logic…”
Ye Kexin does not dare to say anything more.
That night, the case of Tieqin’s disappearance stirs up a huge panic within the village once again. It can be said that everyone worries about their safety right now. Originally, the village was so peaceful that people didn’t even need to close their doors at night, but now they all lock their doors tightly and are only willing to go out when paired with someone else.
What is going to happen in the next month?
Night.
Li Yin and Qin Shoutian sit in the living room. Listening to the light snoring from the inner rooms, they start to
discuss their plans for the next step.
“Something’s not right.” This is also not the first time that Qin Shoutian has executed a b.l.o.o.d.y mission. He does not believe that everything is this simple.
Li Yin takes out a torch and shines it at that piece of paper he recorded on previously, a.n.a.lysing it together with Qin Shoutian, “That water tank seems to be the main medium that Bing Er and Ah Xiu contact each other with. Bing Er will send corpses that she killed every time to that tank, but they will all disappear later. The only exception was the elder’s son-in-law’s corpse. Judging from all these different scenarios, Bing Er and Ah Xiu have a strong attachment and connection with each other. So if we are nice to Ah Xiu, Bing Er has no reason to lay her hands on us. It seems like this superficially…”
“Is it…not true?”
“This is too strange. People in the village once suspected Ah Xiu to be the murderer. But it seems they are more willing to accept ghostly hauntings as the cause. From how they antagonize journalists and what they have said initially, this incident seems to caused quite a large uproar. Although they keep saying that they do not acknowledge the ghostly hauntings, I feel that they cannot eliminate this possibility completely.”
“Li Yin, you are saying…”
“There might be some people still alive now who saw the dead Bing Er, hence spreading the rumour about ghostly hauntings. After all, it is fundamentally more logical to believe that Ah Xiu killed them. But the elder is really concerned about us. He exhorted us repeatedly that anything we hear from Ah Xiu is a lie. Why does he care so much whether we believe in Ah Xiu’s words? Does whether we believe that this village is being haunted by ghosts have some meaning to the elder?”
“This…” Qin Shoutian also finds it difficult to answer this question, “The way the elder treats us so nicely is indeed unusual…”
“Xia Yuan told me that after the fourth instruction, everything will become more and more eerie, bizarre and unnatural. But this case seems to be a very simple revenge of a dead spirit. The evidence is too obvious. Although in reality, this is indeed already very strange, in comparison with the previous three b.l.o.o.d.y missions that I have previously accomplished, this is not very bizarre at all.”
“Indeed…” Qin Shoutian also remembers his past experiences. During those times, many things remain unexplainable even till this day.
“Bing Er killed herself and became a ghost before she exacted revenge on the people who alienated and insulted her back when she was alive. Is everything this simple?” Li Yin uses a pen to point to a couple of key points on the paper. He says, “I notice one thing.”
“What, what is it?”
“Water.”
“Water?”
“Bing Er’s every appearance is always somehow connected with water. The first time I entered this village, I saw the face of that ghost in the bucket that Ah Xiu was carrying. And Bing Er died in water. She even places the corpses into the water tank to give them to Ah Xiu. All of these are closely related with water. ”
“That…That’s true.”
“Maybe she can only move between bodies of water? No, it shouldn’t be that simple. But still, water is absolutely a sign that we cannot afford to overlook.”
“Yeah…I get it.”
At the same time, there is another person who cannot fall asleep… that person is Su Yue.
She lies on her bed alone, tossing and turning but unable to fall into slumber.
In the end, she gets up from her bed alone, and decides to talk a walk near the fish pond outside of her room.
There is no moon tonight. This village is naturally enveloped by a vast darkness.
As she strolls around the fish pond, Su Yue cannot stop thinking about the once happy, lively Bing Er who always used to have a smile on her face. Then, she slowly squats down and begins to scoops up some water.
“Bing Er…” Without her noticing, her face is already covered in tears. “I am sorry, so sorry…”
Just then, she suddenly feels a chill wash over her.
Looking down at that inky dark fish pond, she can vaguely feel that within it, there is an unclear silhouette.
What is that?
Then, she hears footsteps behind her back.
She turns around and sees that amidst the darkness, there is someone walking slowly towards her.
“Who…who are you?!” Although Su Yue was feeling very scared at that moment, but she still calls out.
The other does not answer.
As the figure gets closer, she realises that that black silhouette is very distorted, almost as though there are no bones in its body!
Su Yue quickly stands up, trying to run away. But, it is already too late…
Without knowing when, that black silhouette has already appeared in front of her.
But it is too dark for her to see the other’s face.
She hears the sound of running water carrying over from the fish pond in the back, as though something was rushing out.
The silhouette in front of her extends its hands and clasps tightly onto Su Yue’s neck! Su Yue can only feel that the hand is completely soaked in water.
“Bing…Bing Er…” She feels as though her life is about to be extracted from her body.
As expected, she came back.
Before Su Yue dies, a ray of moonlight shines down. As her surroundings are bathed in moonlight, Su Yue sees it, Bing Er’s cold and white face.