After listening to Wu Liang, Jiang Min’s small face turned pale.
"Then... should we turn back?"
After making the suggestion, she found that Wu Liang was still showing that indifferent expression. He weighed the vegetables he bought in his hand and said, "Since we’re here, we can’t leave without visiting the grave, right?"
With that said, he continued to lead the way. Tʜe sourcᴇ of thɪs content ɪs novel✦fire.net
Ms. Yang followed him with an expression of nonchalance, cheerful as ever. She had never been to such a rural village and looked curious no matter where she went.
Seeing Ms. Yang decisively follow, Jiang Min gritted her teeth and walked forward behind Wu Liang.
After all, no dangerous signs had appeared since she entered the village, and no visions of a Fierce Ghost harming people appeared in her mind. Maybe it was just overthinking.
A few minutes later, the three arrived in front of a courtyard with tightly closed gates.
Even through the gaps in the door, they could see that the courtyard was already overgrown with weeds. The heavy wooden door was covered with spider webs, and even the stone steps outside the door were filled with moss, showing desolation and decay.
"Wait for me to open the door."
After saying this, Wu Liang handed the black bag to Jiang Min and rushed out like an arrow off the string.
He kicked the wall of the courtyard hard, grabbed the edge of the outer wall in a leap, and then flipped inside with a smooth motion that was dazzling.
"How come you have to climb the wall to return to your own home? Don’t you have a key?!" Jiang Min couldn’t help but complain.
Accompanied by the heavy wooden door being pushed open from the inside, Wu Liang smiled sheepishly and said, "Indeed, I don’t have one. Each year I climb in; I only come once a year, so I don’t bother changing the lock."
He took the black bag and proficiently headed to the kitchen to prepare for cooking dinner.
Jiang Min took the initiative to tidy up the living room and bedroom, given it’s been unoccupied for years and she didn’t know how much dust and spider webs might be inside...
"Hmm? Why is your house so clean?"
Jiang Min, upon entering the bedroom, found that not only was the bed already made, but there was hardly any dust on the floor, as if someone was cleaning regularly.
The only slightly messy spot was the dried yellow mud on the bed.
But if someone was living in the Wu family house, why was the outside so overgrown?
This contradictory sight left Jiang Min perplexed.
"Wu Liang! I’m going out for a while! Call me when dinner is ready!" Ms. Yang suddenly shouted aloud, regardless of whether Wu Liang agreed, she turned and ran into the village.
She vanished in a flash.
Jiang Min sighed and turned to check the kitchen since the bedroom was so clean, surely the kitchen too...
"Cough cough! Why is there so much dust here!"
Just upon entering, she was choked by the dust cloud, seeing Wu Liang swinging the broom with such energy that one might think the kitchen collapsed to stir up such a dust storm.
Upon hearing her cough, Wu Liang stopped.
"Weren’t you going to clean the living room and bedroom?"
"The bedroom is so clean, not a bit of dust anywhere, seems like someone snuck into your house,"
Jiang Min thought, perhaps someone from the village eyes Wu Xiaoyao’s house and moved in while he wasn’t around.
But she soon realized something wasn’t right.
If someone indeed moved in, why were there no signs of kitchen use?
Could someone live without eating?
If not eating...is that still human?
But Wu Liang didn’t say much; he just handed her a broom, and the two of them cleaned up the kitchen.
"I’ll deal with the bedroom; let’s clean up and then I’ll burn some paper," Wu Liang said.
Within about twenty minutes, the kitchen could be used normally. Even finding the firewood Wu Liang cut last year remained unchanged since he left.
"I’ll go burn the paper; will you come?"
After cleaning, Wu Liang found a bag of leftover yellow paper and incense candles from the bedroom.
Jiang Min shivered and quickly said, "Of course, I’ll go! Staying alone here feels uneasy."
Since entering the village, she felt everything was somewhat off.
She dared not stay alone in the house, unlike carefree Ms. Yang, who had already dashed away.
The two walked shoulder to shoulder from the side of the old house and deep into the mountain behind.
The Wu family’s ancestral graves, along with his parents’ cenotaph, were on the mountain behind.
Unexpectedly, just as they left, Ms. Yang rushed back to the old house, looking panicked.
She burst through the door, yelling inside, "Wu Liang! Wu Liang! The villagers aren’t right! I suspect they are all no longer human!"
"Oh? How are they not right? Tell me more,"
A "Wu Liang" holding a sickle covered in dried yellow mud, with slightly stiff facial expressions, walked out from the bedroom in response to Ms. Yang’s call.
Meanwhile, the two who had already climbed the mountain reached a vast area of graves within minutes.
This was the Wu family ancestral grave.
After clearing some weeds around the ancestral grave, Wu Liang solemnly walked up to one of the tombstones.
[Beloved Parents: Wu Xiaoyao/Yao Qingxue’s Tomb]
[Filial Son Wu Liang Kowtows Here]
[Disaster Calendar Year One Spring]
This is his parents’ cenotaph.
He took a deep breath, formally lit the candles in front of the tombstone, and lights the incense, spiraling lighter smoke rising upwards.
After solemnly bowing three times with incense, he prepared to step forward to place it before the tombstone, then burning the paper...
At this moment, a sudden noise erupted from the grave before Wu Liang, causing Jiang Min who was standing farther away to cover her mouth in disbelief.
She saw a hand, thin as a deadwood, emerge from the grave!
Not only that, the hand awkwardly twisted, slowly pressing against the mound as if trying to pull its body out from below.
Yet as this terrifying scene unfolded.
Wu Liang, ready to offer incense, steps fiercely forward, forcefully piercing the hand with three incense sticks like nails, pinning it to the grave.
He grasped the incense with clenched fists, veins bulging.
"Damn it, enough! I didn’t want to fight today! I planned to pay respect to my parents before investigating the village! Whether you’re a human or a ghost, insist on seeking death, right!"
The cenotaph doesn’t contain bodies.
But now, it seems something unclean has sneaked in...
This not only felt provocative but an enormous insult!
As words fell, an unseen pressure arose from Wu Liang, in his mind seven Fierce Ghosts lurked in the Shadow, ready to emerge anytime and tear potential threats apart.
Jiang Min, despite the distance, couldn’t help but shake slightly.
She felt at that moment Wu Liang seemed like a demon crawling up from Hell, never expecting such violent, ruthless expressions to appear in this young man’s eyes.
Anger, brutality with a scent of death began to spread on him...