Chapter 200: A Mountain Suspended, A River Submerged (14)
Before the program team set off, the official in charge casually asked Taoist Ma, who was beside him, about the destination for the trip.
Taoist Ma was still busy with matters concerning the Yin Path and Binhai University, so when he heard the question, he didn’t think too much. He immediately replied that he had previously calculated the situation and there hadn’t been any issues when the program team went to Longevity Village before. As for this time, he wasn’t sure, because Director Zhang hadn’t contacted him.
But Taoist Ma didn’t dwell on it and simply left a comment, “Director Zhang must have consulted another Taoist. Judging by his recent mood, everything should be fine.” He was then hurriedly called away, caught up in a flurry of activity.
Before leaving, Taoist Ma thought for a moment and added, “It’s still better to check with Director Zhang. Recently, the Taoists at Haiyun Temple have been either injured or recovering, and I’ve been too busy to return to the temple, so I’m not sure about the details.”
The official in charge agreed.
However, he too was overwhelmed with tasks, and often before one phone call ended, another would ring. He had been running nonstop for several days, even sleeping in his chair during meetings.
As a result, the official forgot about the matter.
After all, Longevity Village was an experimental project promoted by the southern region’s government, and in his mind, there was a built-in safety net. He instinctively thought that there wouldn’t be any problems.
By the time he remembered, the program team had already entered the mountains.
While on the phone, the official suddenly recalled the matter and quickly waved to someone nearby, taking the tablet to check on the program team’s status.
On the main screen, there was a leisurely, relaxed travel atmosphere — blue skies, white clouds, clear waters, and lush mountains, all giving off a sense of tranquility.
It was in stark contrast to the tense, crisis-laden atmosphere of previous episodes.
The official nodded in satisfaction, feeling relieved.
If even the collaboration with the southern region’s government had issues, he would genuinely sympathize with Zhang Wubing.
What kind of unlucky director always seemed to run into trouble?
Luckily, this episode had gone smoothly, and it seemed no different from any ordinary travel program. Zhang Wubing’s original intention in creating the show had finally been realized.
The official in charge felt happy for Zhang Wubing.
He casually dialed Zhang Wubing’s number to ask about the results of his fortune-telling before the trip, but the call didn’t go through.
However, as the live broadcast showed, Zhang Wubing was still chatting and working with staff nearby, apparently not hearing the phone, and it didn’t seem like there was any danger.
The official shook his head, smiled, and planned to wait until Zhang Wubing was free to call him again.
But before the official could even think about the matter again, someone from the special department had already called him.
“The person monitoring the live broadcast said that all the screens have gone black, and there seems to be danger. We heard the guests screaming from the broadcast.”
The staff member said with concern, “It looks like the program has run into trouble again.”
After several episodes, the special department had grown accustomed to the program team’s frequent encounters with ghostly occurrences. This time, before the audience even had time to question what was happening, they had already discovered the problem and were reporting it to the official.
The official, clutching his aching stomach, stood up from the meeting, quickly walked out, and grabbed the tablet from someone’s hands.
Sure enough, both the main screen and the individual guest screens had plunged into darkness.
The scene was now eerily different from the peaceful and relaxed atmosphere the official had seen earlier. Now, the footage was strange, filled with a tense, ominous sense of danger.
The guests’ flashlights flickered back and forth, their light casting shadows in the small building, heightening the tension. Even the audience began to sense that something was wrong, feeling uneasy and unsure of what was happening.
Some viewers sent worried comments, wanting to check if everyone was safe.
[Did the power go out? Is there a backup power source? Is everyone safe?]
[It’s so dark in the mountains, be careful, it’s easy to fall or get hurt.]
[Is anyone from the director’s team around? Can you give us an update? I’m really getting scared.]
[Ah, Director Zhang, stop shaking the flashlight! The more I watch, the more frightened I get. It feels like we’re trying to escape.]
[Zhao Zhen’s screen has turned off, does anyone know why?]
[It looks like several of the guests were changing clothes and washing up, so their screens were turned off. But in a situation like this, I really wish they wouldn’t turn them off! Not seeing them is making me nervous.]
However, the staff members who were supposed to monitor the comments and feedback from the audience didn’t respond at all. Even in the chaos of the flickering footage, there was no sign of them.
The audience, who had not received any response, could only remain on edge, praying in front of their screens that nothing bad would happen.
Many people kept refreshing the comments, unable to stop themselves, hoping to see some sort of response from the staff of the show.
But with every refresh, their hope was dashed, and the feeling of panic piled up, layer after layer.
[If you’re safe, just let us know! I’m really scared now, I can’t help but start overthinking, sobbing.]
[I am too… I’m already wondering if they’re in danger again, especially after hearing that cry for help earlier…]
[Ugh, please stop jinxing it. The poor guy has already had such bad luck. If something happens again… emmm, did he destroy the Earth in his past life? What kind of terrible luck is this?]
While the audience anxiously waited for a response from the crew, the official in charge had already quickly received the analysis report from the special department.
In the darkness caused by the power outage, many of the guests had panicked, and their split-screen cameras were shaking along with them. The flashing light of their flashlights created a more terrifying atmosphere.
However, it was precisely because of this that the cameras caught several details that were easy to overlook.
The special department, which had been closely monitoring the program, quickly contacted the live streaming platform and obtained the archived video files. The entire technical team was mobilized, replaying the footage frame by frame, trying to clearly see what was happening inside the cottage when illuminated by the flashlights.
But the final discovery made the technical team shudder.
Even though they knew they were sitting in an office full of people, with familiar colleagues sitting next to and behind them, bright lights overhead, and the air conditioning cranked up, they couldn’t shake the feeling of a cold chill creeping up their spines.
It was as if, in the unseen corners of their vision, something was quietly hiding there, silently watching them with bloodshot eyes filled with death…
The first members of the technical team who discovered the truth couldn’t help but look around nervously every few seconds, fearing that there was a corpse standing behind them without their knowledge.
Even when someone entered or exited the office, and the door opened or closed, the technicians would shiver from the cold breeze that passed over their backs and necks, looking fearfully behind them.
The official in charge, while listening to the briefing from the head of the technical team over the phone, was still confused about what could have happened to scare everyone so much. From the live stream, it seemed that the guests were still fine and hadn’t appeared frightened.
This question was only answered when the official in charge opened the file.
—Decomposing, swollen, pale corpses stood silently in the darkness, their red eyes staring fixedly at the guests.
But the guests were completely unaware. Even as they walked past these corpses, they seemed to be unable to see them, with their faces showing no sign of change.
Although the flashlight that Zhang Wubing kept shaking created a tense atmosphere, making the audience feel anxious, causing many to complain about him, it had, in fact, allowed the technical team to see most of the corners of the darkness.
In every frame of the still images, the corpses illuminated by the flashlight were visible.
The corpses had swollen up, as if inflated like balloons, their entire bodies puffed up, looking like giant, several-hundred-pound people.
They stood silently in corners of the room that no one passed, behind floor lamps, behind sofas… in every unnoticed corner, their terrifying figures were lurking.
And the pairs of red eyes, reflecting the flashlight’s beam, glowed eerily in the dark, making anyone who saw them shudder in horror.
Even the official in charge couldn’t help but tremble when he first laid eyes on the scene. The conversation he was having with the person next to him abruptly stopped mid-sentence.
It took him several seconds to snap back to his senses.
“Call Haiyun Temple! Where’s Taoist Ma? What about Taoist Song?”
In his panic, the official’s voice broke with urgency, revealing how anxious he was. “Who else at Haiyun Temple can still move? Hurry!”
He immediately ordered his team to prepare for departure and head to Longevity Village.
The entire special department sprang into action. The rescue teams quickly assembled, and every available hand was immediately mobilized.
The official strode out in long strides, flipping through the analysis reports in his hands as he walked. But the more he read, the more alarmed he became.
In several screenshots, An Nanyuan and the others clearly walked past the rotting corpses—some of them even glanced directly at the corpses. And yet, they had clearly not seen them at all.
It was as if, in their eyes… those corpses that could trigger negative emotions simply didn’t exist.
What truly terrified the official, though, was a particular screenshot of Lu Xingxing.
Lu Xingxing seemed to have just come out of the shower. Water was dripping from the ends of his hair, and he was only wrapped in Zhao Zhen’s coat, barefoot, standing on the floor, looking completely disheveled.
But he appeared to be looking at something. His eyes were alert, fixed on a corner ahead.
Yet in his eyes—there was nothing there.
Lu Xingxing looked like a husky hunting a mouse: fierce and difficult to deal with on the surface, but with eyes full of confusion and emptiness, as if he had no idea where the mouse even was.
But from the screenshot the official held, it clearly wasn’t the case at all.
—In that very corner Lu Xingxing was staring at, there was unmistakably a rotting corpse standing there!
Lu Xingxing had the right direction—but he couldn’t see what he was trying to find.
The official felt his heart go cold.
He realized that the production crew… had no idea that the rotting corpses were right next to them.
But whether by phone or by on-screen messages, there was no way to contact the crew in the mountains. It was as if they had forgotten about their phones entirely.
This made it impossible for the official to even warn them.
The rising panic made his stomach ache even more. Clutching his stomach with one hand, he climbed into the car in large strides and rushed to Longevity Village as fast as possible. At the same time, he urgently contacted officials in the southern region, asking about the situation in Longevity Village with a solemn tone.
How could a village filled with so many corpses become the site for a cooperative promotional filming project?
But the officials from the southern region were completely baffled when they received the call.
“That doesn’t make sense. We’ve been there many times. The people in charge of tourism and publicity also went for on-site inspections. When they came back, they all said the same thing—that Longevity Village is a great place.”
The person on the other end of the call sounded puzzled. “Everyone who’s been there said good things. They even said they wanted to retire early and move to Longevity Village themselves.”
The official felt the whole situation had become absurd.
Whether it was the people who had visited Longevity Village before or the social media posts and blog photos they had shared, all pointed to one thing—Longevity Village was a paradise, like a haven isolated from the world.
But now, under the livestream’s lens, danger lurked in the shadows.
This stark contrast left the official unable to tell what was real and what was false.
Or perhaps…
It was the long-buried truth that had finally been exposed by the livestream.
As the official rushed toward Longevity Village, Taoist Ma received the call as well.
He was so busy he hadn’t even had a sip of water, and when he answered the call, his voice cracked from shock: “Longevity Village? That’s impossible!”
Taoist Ma remembered that Zhang Wubing had once asked him for a fortune reading. At that time, the signs had shown that everything was fine. How could this be?
“Who was the Taoist who helped Director Zhang with the reading afterward? What was the result?”
He quickly grabbed a passing Taoist and asked.
But the Taoist shook his head in confusion. “Never heard about it.”
“The matter at Binhai University and the residual issues from the Yin path haven’t been fully resolved yet. Most of our fellow Taoists were injured, and we’re seriously understaffed. So, nearly everyone from Haiyun Temple who can still move is already out in the field.”
The Taoist explained sincerely, “Even if Director Zhang went to Haiyun Temple, there wouldn’t have been anyone there.”
“Besides, no one mentioned that Director Zhang came to the temple.”
Which meant… he hadn’t had a reading done.
Taoist Ma stood there in a daze, lifting his head as a wave of dizziness swept over him.
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