Chapter 479 - Ma.s.s Burial Ground Shock
Most of the clues found so far were indirect clues and there was no direct evidence related to the murderer. Xiao Lou deduced that the murderer’s relatives starved to death in the famine 20 years ago and they returned to take revenge. This was based on criminal psychology. As Lu Jiuchuan said, it was really difficult to find the relationship between the people who died 20 years ago and the murderer.
In the time span of 20 years, most of the evidence would have been lost. Not to mention, the insiders from that time were likely to be dead and the relevant people killed by the murderer, such as the Zhao family and Chen family.
Lu Jiuchuan looked over to Yu Hanjiang and asked, “Do you have any good ideas? After all, you are the most professional.”
Yu Hanjiang said, “Our current ident.i.ty is just a pa.s.serby who happens to come to this town. It isn’t convenient to go around and investigate on a large scale. This will alert the enemy.”
Xiao Lou agreed. “This isn’t like 8 of Hearts. At that time, Hanjiang was the newly appointed prefectural magistrate and it was logical to investigate the murder. Now we are living at the inn. People who come and go every day will arouse suspicion. If there are hidden hunters in the town, we have to hide from them…”
He paused and looked at Yu Hanjiang. “What do you think about letting Chief Shao and Xiao Ye investigate?”
Yu Hanjiang nodded. “Yes, Shao Qingge has money. Sometimes when inquiring about information, it is a good choice to give money. Today, he and Ye Qi stopped to buy clothes and they got a lot of useful clues.”
Lu Jiuchuan suggested, “There is also Huaying who is acting alone. Shao Qingge can buy people’s hearts with money when inquiring about information and Huaying can investigate more directly. She can use a dagger to force people to tell the truth.”
The candidates to inquire about information had been determined. The key was: how to ask?
Xiao Lou thought about it before pressing on the earpiece. “Chief Shao, Xiao Ye, Huaying, can I trouble the three of you to go around town? Pretend that you have relatives and friends in Qingfeng Town whose whereabouts became unknown 20 years ago. You are here to find your relatives or friends. Try to find the old people in town to inquire about the famine 20 years ago. There might be some gains.”
Chu Huaying responded positively and quickly sneaked into town.
Shao Qingge asked, “When are you coming back? Do you need me to stay at the inn for teleportation?”
Xiao Lou said, “We still have to investigate the ma.s.s burial site. You give the teleportation card to Teacher Qu. I will contact her before going back.”
Shao Qingge answered, “Yes. I’ll take Ye Qi out for a walk.”
After ending the communication, Xiao Lou and the three others continued to search the ma.s.s burial sites. Most of the bodies were piled up haphazardly but some had gravestones with the names of the owners written on them. During the daytime, the gravestones weren’t as dense as what was seen last night. Even so, there were hundreds of them and the four people had to check them in turn.
During the search of the gravestones, they found the Chen family, including the midwife they saw last night. All of them were dead but they didn’t see the body of the newborn baby.
Yu Hanjiang said, “Last night, we went to the Chen house and heard the baby’s crying. There is no reason why the adults would go to the ma.s.s burial site while the baby is left behind. Where did the child’s body go?”
Xiao Lou replied, “I don’t know. It seems that there isn’t a single infant’s corpse in the entire ma.s.s burial site .”
Lu Jiuchuan couldn’t help cursing. “Does the murderer have a special fetish? For example, eating a baby’s heart to practice kung-fu? It is disgusting!”
Tang Ci, “……”
This possibility couldn’t be ruled out. This murderer was different from the murderers they had encountered in the past.
Xiao Lou said, “If the murderer really killed people for revenge, would they come to the grave of their relatives to worship?”
The moment Yu Hanjiang heard this, his sharp eyes immediately swept over the ma.s.s burial site. He didn’t find any gravestone with food for worship in front of it but there was a gravestone nearby with sc.r.a.ps of paper left by burning paper money as well as black ash.
Yu Hanjiang walked over quickly. He crouched down and touched some black powder with his fingers, having removed a glove, smelling it. After a moment, he pointed to the gravestone and said firmly, “Someone came here this morning and burned some paper money.”
Tang Ci wondered, “Are you sure it is this morning?”
Yu Hanjiang nodded. “Yes, the paper money isn’t completely burned out. The lower layer of black ash is stained with muddy water but the upper layer is dry. If the paper burner came before yesterday, last night’s torrential rain should’ve soaked all the ashes. The ashes are dry, proving they must’ve come this morning to burn paper for the gravestone.”
No wonder Yu Hanjiang would personally touch this piece of ash with his hands.
Last night’s torrential rain would’ve soaked everything. The surface of the ash was dry. This meant it was left only this morning.
Xiao Lou speculated, “Is the person who came to burn paper money for the deceased the murderer? Looking closely at this gravestone, it doesn’t have the name of a deceased engraved on it.”
Most of the surrounding gravestones bore the names of the deceased, such as ‘Tomb of my father, Li Qingyun.’
However, the gravestone in front of them was only a stone and there was nothing written on it. The location of the gravestone had good feng shui. It was against a large tree. In the summer, the dense branches and leaves would cast a large shadow and shroud the gravestone in shade. It could be seen that the person who erected the gravestone was very attentive. They chose a good place for the deceased.
Tang Ci looked up at the tree. “So the murderer came to the ma.s.s burial site this morning and we just missed them?”
Lu Jiuchuan suddenly remembered something and hit his head hard. “By the way, I climbed up a vine from the bottom of the cliff just now. Thinking back on it, this vine is a bit strange. My guess is that the murderer probably climbed up the vine as well.”
Yu Hanjiang immediately stood up. “Quickly! The vine is likely to be destroyed!”
The four people moved like they were flying. Yu Hanjiang simply used the light footwork card to take Xiao Lou back to the cliff at the top of the mountain.
Xiao Lou leaned over and looked down. There was a thick white fog under the cliff. On the edge of the steep cliff, there was indeed a vine woven with gra.s.s and wood. It was as thick as a man’s arm and fell down the cliff wall. However, due to the thick fog in the mountain, it was impossible to see if the end of the vine reached the bottom of the mountain.
Yu Hanjiang stated, “I’ll go down and take a look.”
He grabbed the vine with one hand, flying down with the light footwork card while using his feet against the cliff as a landing point. After only a few seconds, Yu Hanjiang flew back to the top of the mountain and told them, “The vine was cut in the middle. If we didn’t have cards and rushed down, we would just fall and be smashed.”
Xiao Lou was stunned. “It seems that the murderer has already discovered us?”
Lu Jiuchuan’s expression changed dramatically. “Is it the hunter?”
Tang Ci shook his head. “Probably not. That hunter looks very young and is probably around 25 years old. He said that he has lived here for 10 years. We questioned him before and he honestly told us what he saw and heard on the rainy night three years ago. He thought he saw a ghost bride and was trembling out of fear… he didn’t seem like a murderer with a fierce heart.”
If he really was the murderer then his acting skills were too superb.
Lu Jiuchuan thought about it for a moment. “Your words are reasonable. There should be no secret room that allows us to directly find the murderer at the beginning. So the murderer has actually been lurking under the mountain. Just now when I climbed up the vine, he took the opportunity to cut off the vine and the path. Is it to trap us on the mountain?”
Xiao Lou wondered, “However, the zombies won’t change during the day. Can’t we just go down the mountain along the other path? It is useless for him to cut off the vine, right?”
Xiao Lou heard a strange sound in his ears the moment he finished speaking.
He looked back and saw a large number of zombies that seemed to be awakened by something. They were surrounding the group. The tide-like swarm of zombies made Lu Jiuchuan curse. “The corpses also change during the day? Isn’t this unreasonable?”
Yu Hanjiang spoke with a calm expression, “Our thoughts were too simple. The crisis doesn’t only appear at night.”
Xiao Lou hurriedly pressed on the voice headset and said to Qu Wanyue, “Teacher Qu, quickly open the teleportation!”
He quickly took out the compa.s.s to try and draw an invincible circle to protect everyone. As a result, he had just taken out the compa.s.s when a female zombie in red suddenly threw out the red silk in her hand!
The group of female zombies who attacked the group was more powerful. It was the bride Zhao Zean who attacked. Her eyes were red, her expression sluggish but her movements much more flexible than the other zombies. Xiao Lou only felt a numbness from his wrist before the compa.s.s in his hand was knocked down to the bottom of the cliff.
Seeing that the red silk was about to wrap around Xiao Lou’s waist, Yu Hanjiang moved quickly. He held Xiao Lou and flew in the air. The saber in his hand decisively moved and split the silk in two!
Zhao Zean had her weapon cut off and immediately went berserk. Her mouth emitted a piercing roar and she jumped at Yu Hanjiang, who jumped with his left leg and kicked her with his right foot. Her entire body was kicked to the ground.
Nearby, Lu Jiuchuan and Tang Ci were surrounded. Tang Ci was forced to retreat step by step and could only release his own mechanical drones to bomb the zombie swarm. Lu Jiuchuan took out a sword and waved it in front of him, blocking the zombies’ approach. He shouted, “Xiao Tang, quickly summon the wolf king to buy time!”
White Wolf King was a card that Lu Jiuchuan had given to Tang Ci not long ago. Tang Ci remembered this card and summoned the white wolf king.
The wolf king’s second skill could summon dozens of small wolves to a.s.sist in combat. The moment Tang Ci used the skill, dozens of fierce little wolves suddenly appeared around him. They tangled with the zombies according to their master’s will.
Wolves were extremely fierce animals. Their number might be inferior to that of the zombie swarm but they could bite the legs of zombies and drag the zombies forward.
The scene was extremely chaotic for a while.
Yu Hanjiang and Lu Jiuchuan quickly moved through the zombie swarm, cutting at the approaching zombies. Xiao Lou could only see blood and flesh flying in front of him. The entire ma.s.s burial site was like purgatory on earth!
He asked in horror, “Does the murderer know an evil art?”
Tang Ci was staring at Lu Jiuchuan within the zombie group with a pale face. The moment he heard this, his eyes trembled slightly. “This instance is a supernatural theme so it isn’t surprising that the murderer can manipulate the actions of the living and the dead.”
Tang Ci recalled the hunter’s words about what he saw three years ago and was certain of this.
On that rainy night three years ago, the hunter who lived in the forest saw a bridal procession. None of them made a sound and walked in a neat and stiff pace toward the ma.s.s burial site.
If it wasn’t for the murderer who controlled the actions of these people, how could so many people be like ‘marionettes’ and run to the ma.s.s burial site in the middle of the night?
Xiao Lou frowned. “The murderer uses some type of magic technique that can manipulate humans to act according to his instructions or they can manipulate the corpses of the deceased? It seems that the zombies of the ma.s.s grave are being deliberately manipulated by the murderer to besiege us?”
Yu Hanjiang, who wasn’t far away, heard this and said “I can’t delay things with Brother Jiu too long. Let Qu Wanyue quickly open the teleportation!”
Lu Jiuchuan added, “Li Qingzhao’s mark will take five minutes to go into effect. If not, let’s go to the Peach Blossom Spring first?”
Xiao Lou answered, “Yes, evacuate quickly!”
Lu Jiuchuan immediately opened the Peach Blossom Spring. The scenery in front of the four people changed and they appeared under the peach blossom trees.
Xiao Lou remembered the last scene of them leaving the ma.s.s burial site was the zombie bride’s dumbfounded expression.
The expressions of the four people were very ugly. Tang Ci said softly. “The murderer has discovered our movements. This is troublesome.”
Lu Jiuchuan said, “No wonder this secret room is called battle royale. This murderer has made us targets to be killed? Moreover, the enemy is in the darkness and we are in the light. We must be doubly careful at every step in the future.”
Xiao Lou took another deep breath and asked. “Teacher Qu, is the mark ready? Pull us back to the inn.”
Qu Wanyue answered, “There is still half a minute left. Are you okay?”
Xiao Lou looked at his teammates around him. “We’re fine. We ran quickly and weren’t injured.”
Half a minute pa.s.sed quickly. Xiao Lou and Yu Hanjiang were pulled back to the inn’s Heaven room by Li Qingzhao’s mark. The owner of the inn didn’t notice that they had left and come back.
They were just a bit scared looking back on the experience just now.
The murderer encountered in this supernatural room was too evil. They could manipulate the actions of the living, letting people follow his will and run to the ma.s.s burial site late at night like marionettes.
Now the murderer had found out they were investigating this matter. What if the other team members were manipulated?
Xiao Lou thought of this and immediately pressed on the earpiece. “Chief Shao, Xiao Ye, Huaying, you come back as soon as possible! The murderer this time is extremely dangerous. We have to discuss countermeasures.”