Chapter 23
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“Scared?” Lou Yan joked.
Li Sanxin chuckled, snuffing out the cigarette. “Let’s go!”
The two brothers chatted for almost half an hour before leisurely driving home.
At home, since Lou Yan stormed out without a word, Duan Zege and Lu Haoxiu had been waiting for them. After explaining and expressing concern upon their return, they busied themselves until it was already late at night, 8 o’clock, after packing Li Sanxin’s belongings.
The four hurriedly had dinner and went to rest in their respective rooms to recharge.
Lou Yan found it hard to fall asleep.
Ever since the Anomaly Resurgence from his past life, his sleep quality hadn’t been good. He would often wake up in the middle of the night, suspicious of any sudden strangeness around him. Tonight, the scene of seeing Li Sanxin skinned kept flashing in Lou Yan’s mind, making it even more difficult for him to fall asleep.
Lou Yan decided to have a glass of wine to help him sleep, sipping the slightly sweet liquid slowly.
Wen Yian, Cai Mo…
He had some doubts. Did the cultists from his past life establish themselves so early?
Leaving aside Wen Yian, who was an influential star domestically and internationally, just the name Cai Mo made Lou Yan feel familiar, like the name of some CEO of a building materials company.
Lou Yan knew quite a bit about the cultists. When they were just starting out, they were short on manpower and were urgently in need of influential figures with resources and power to join them. But how did they manage to make Wen Yian and Cai Mo their believers in less than half a month after the Anomaly Resurgence?
Lou Yan didn’t know the reasons behind it, but that didn’t matter; Wen Yian did.
Lou Yan casually twirled his wine glass, finishing the last sip of red wine.
The next morning at eight o’clock, the four of them prepared to leave with their belongings.
Lou Yan hesitated for a long time at the bedside table, finally opening the drawer and taking out the Seize Life Phone inside. He didn’t know what he would encounter in Liushu Village, but perhaps the Seize Life Phone could be a way out… Lou Yan put the Seize Life Phone in his pocket.
Liushu Village was located in Dayan Town, a journey of more than two hours by car. They arrived at their destination around ten thirty in the morning, only to find Liushu Village sealed off by relevant authorities. They hadn’t even reached Liushu Village yet, but the road was already blocked.
Lu Haoxiu found a solution given by “Furniture Boss” and directed Duan Zege along the road. “Brother Duan, take the side road.”
The side road was in the wilderness, a dirt road formed by human feet. It was only a little over two meters wide, just enough for a car to pass through with difficulty. The branches along the road scraped against the car windows and doors, but fortunately Duan Zege’s driving skills were good, and he steadily drove all the way to the end of the side road.
Lu Haoxiu carefully compared the photos and nodded affirmatively, “Furniture Boss said that there’s no way to drive here, we can only walk. This mountain is actually just a small slope, once we climb over it, we’ll reach Liushu Village.”
Li Sanxin chuckled, “Walk? He really doesn’t mince his words. If someone really comes to buy furniture, how can they carry it out by walking?”
Lu Haoxiu burst into laughter, then sighed with concern, “I don’t know how many people will fall for it. I reported that post, but it still hasn’t been deleted…”
After walking for about twenty minutes up the small hill, they finally walked out of the mountain road and saw Liushu Village.
Gradually, a light drizzle began to fall from the sky, and the clear weather was gradually obscured by layers of rain clouds. This rain had the characteristics of spring rain in March, not heavy, but sticky, enveloping the village in a misty rain.
Liushu Village was named after the abundance of willow trees. Every road was lined with willow trees, and it happened to be the season when the willow trees were sprouting branches. At first glance, Liushu Village seemed to be submerged in a sea of greenery.
At the first sight of Liushu Village, Lou Yan’s crisis perception kicked in, reminding him that there was a high danger within a radius of two hundred meters!
[Psychic Power: 45/50]
Lou Yan stopped in his tracks, squinting at Liushu Village, and said to the people around him, “Liushu Village is very dangerous. From now on, be vigilant.”
Several people nodded, and Li Sanxin wiped the raindrops off his face, asking, “Where are we going?”
“To find ‘Furniture Boss’,” Lou Yan looked around the scenery of Liushu Village and said directly, “His problem is the biggest, let’s find him first.”
Lu Haoxiu brought out the pictures sent by “Furniture Boss” and pointed to one of them, saying, “When ‘Furniture Boss’ was filming wooden furniture, he captured the gate of this household. There’s a sign hanging on the wall next to the gate that says ‘Old Tree Furniture’. Brother Li, you’ve been to Liushu Village, do you know where this Old Tree Furniture is?”
Although many households in Liushu Village were selling furniture, saplings, and floral arrangements, everyone operated their businesses in their own yards. Once the door was closed, except for the nameplates hanging at the entrances, everything else was more or less the same.
Li Sanxin carefully looked at the environment in the pictures and nodded, “I think I roughly know where this is. Let’s go, I’ll lead the way.”
He led Lou Yan and the other two into Liushu Village. As soon as they entered the village, they saw that every household’s door was tightly closed, and they didn’t see any people along the way.
After walking out of a radius of two hundred meters, Lou Yan’s psychic power was deducted by 5 points again, and the crisis perception continued to remind him of the danger within two hundred meters.
Lou Yan furrowed his brows slightly.
Could it be that there’s danger everywhere in Liushu Village?
Soon, they arrived at Old Tree Furniture, but they saw two other people knocking on the door. It was a man and a woman, seemingly a young couple. The man, wearing white sneakers, was already covered in mud and looked impatient. He knocked on the door impatiently. The woman, wearing black trousers and long sleeves, stood behind him with a yellow umbrella, also impatiently playing with her phone.
They could tell at a glance that they were not locals of Liushu Village. The man in white shoes knocked on the door while shouting, “Furniture sellers! Hurry up and open the door, we’ve come to buy furniture!”
Li Sanxin and Lou Yan exchanged a glance, then approached first. “Brother, are you also here to buy furniture?”
The man turned to look at them, then simply nodded. “Yeah, if it weren’t for buying furniture, we wouldn’t have come here… Did you sneak over too?”
Li Sanxin smiled, “Yeah, we saw the big discounts on furniture and hurried over.”
“What big discounts? It might just be a scam…” The woman playing with her phone grumbled, “We’ve been calling for ages and they still won’t open the door. Even the dead would have been woken up by now.”
As soon as she finished speaking, the tightly closed black wooden door creaked open, revealing a skinny, black-haired girl who looked eight or nine years old. The girl had braided hair and was wearing a red floral dress, her lips pursed as if she could hold soy sauce, “Who are you, and why are you knocking on our door?”
The man in white sneakers looked inside and said impatiently, “Kid, where are the adults in the house? Tell the adults that someone’s here to buy furniture. It’s miserable weather, we need to buy the furniture quickly and leave.”
The girl glanced at them and shouted back, “Dad, Grandpa, someone’s here to buy furniture!”
A middle-aged man with a shrewd look in his thirties soon walked out of the house. This man had a large mole on his nose and jogged to the door with a smile, saying enthusiastically, “Come, come, let’s talk inside.”
The young couple and Lou Yan’s group were invited in. As soon as they entered, Lou Yan saw a large courtyard. Various furniture items such as chairs, tables, and antique shelves were stacked in the corners of the courtyard, piled up almost as high as the courtyard walls, and everything looked good.
This household had two floors, and the middle-aged man led the little girl to lead them into the hall on the first floor, poured them a glass of water, and asked them what kind of furniture they wanted.
The four of them didn’t rush to speak, but the man in white sneakers asked directly, “Do you know ‘Furniture Boss’?”
The middle-aged man chuckled and rubbed his hands, saying, “That’s me, you can call me Old Wang.”
This person was “Furniture Boss”?
The four of them secretly assessed him.
“So you’re ‘Furniture Boss’,” the woman looked at him in surprise, pursing her lips, her face not looking good, “Then the post you made was just self-praise, aren’t you deceiving people?”
Old Wang hurriedly explained, “Everything in my post is true. The furniture we have in the yard is the furniture I took pictures of. Each piece doesn’t exceed three hundred, you can take whichever one you like.”
The young couple’s faces lit up, and they went out in the rain to take a look, but soon they came back disappointed, saying, “Is this all your furniture? What about the wardrobe, bed, and dressing table in the photos?”
“We have them, our whole village sells furniture. As long as you want to buy, I can take you to each household to have a look,” Old Wang said, “The prices are all about the same, not too expensive… But you’ve come at the wrong time.”
Lou Yan interjected, “Why?”
Old Wang sighed helplessly, “It has been raining too much these days, and the fields have been flooded. Everyone has been busy rescuing the fields these past two days, and I just came back from the fields. If you want better and more furniture, the soonest you can get them is tomorrow. Tomorrow, the people in our village will have time to take you to see the furniture.”
“Ah?”
The woman and the man in white sneakers glanced at each other, unwilling to leave so easily, nor did they want to bother coming back tomorrow.
Old Wang enthusiastically suggested, “How about staying at my place for the night? I have plenty of rooms here, enough for all of you. Tomorrow morning, I’ll take you to see the furniture.”
The young couple thought about it and agreed, “Then we’ll stay for the night!”
Old Wang then turned to Lou Yan’s group with a smile, “How about you four young gentlemen? Why don’t you stay here for the night too? There are three rooms on the second floor, and it’s just right for two people per room.”
“That’s fine,” Lou Yan made the decision and took out a few hundred yuan from his wallet, handing it to Old Wang, “We don’t need two rooms, one room is enough. Could you please give us a bigger and cleaner room, and take care of our meals as well?”
Old Wang immediately took the money from Lou Yan’s hand, “Don’t worry, big brother, I’ll make you a chicken tonight!”
The young couple saw this scene but pretended not to notice. After all, they wouldn’t be paying Old Wang.
Li Sanxin was good at chatting, and soon he managed to lighten the mood. Through conversation, they learned that the young couple were not married yet. The man’s name was Liu Cheng, and the woman’s name was Huang Xin, but they had already bought a house and were preparing to get married.
The reason they came to Liushu Village was because their new house lacked furniture. When they saw the post made by “Furniture Boss,” it was like a godsend for them. They hurriedly came to Liushu Village, even willing to stay overnight here just to buy all the furniture they needed.
“Cough…”
Just as the conversation was going well, an old man with a cane walked from the east wing to the main hall, coughing as he moved. In a hoarse, old voice, he asked, “Long, who’s here?”
Old Wang quickly stood up and went over to support the old man, “Dad, it’s customers who came to buy furniture. I thought it was raining heavily today, so I invited them to stay for the night.”
Everyone turned to look at the old man, and upon seeing his appearance, Huang Xin couldn’t help but scream, “Ah!”
The old man looked terrifying, his thin body covered only by a layer of sagging, yellowed skin, as if he was just skin and bones. His eye sockets were large and cloudy, and his face, hands, and neck were covered in patches of dark age spots, scattered haphazardly as if black bugs were crawling all over him, making people feel disgusted. The most terrifying part was the old man’s mouth, which had no lips. His teeth were missing, leaving only three or four yellowed teeth crookedly exposed, with saliva occasionally flowing down his mouth.
Lu Haoxiu almost blurted out “D*mn,” but managed to stop himself.
The old man’s cloudy eyes swept over the people, and he raised his trembling cane to point at Huang Xin, “What’s this girl’s name?”
Huang Xin trembled with fear, and Liu Cheng hurriedly hugged her to comfort her.
Old Wang awkwardly smiled a few times and quickly changed the subject, “Dad, are you hungry? Shall I make you something to eat?”
The old man nodded slowly and mumbled, “Hungry… Hungry…”
Old Wang gave the customers a apologetic look, then helped his father walk into the kitchen.
Once the two of them left, the atmosphere in the hall immediately relaxed. Huang Xin burst into tears in her boyfriend’s arms, “It’s too scary, wuwuwu, I was so scared.”
Liu Cheng patted her back, his face twisted in concern, “Should we just go home and not buy anything?”
After hesitating for a dozen seconds, Huang Xin shook her head, gritting her teeth, “It’s just for one night anyway. Let’s stay here first. We’ll buy the furniture early tomorrow morning and leave as soon as possible. Besides, his dad lives on the first floor, and he won’t be staying with us on the second floor.”
Liu Cheng agreed and comforted her, “Don’t be afraid, it’s just an old man who looks a bit ugly, nothing more.”
While they were calming down, Lou Yan’s group didn’t say a word to each other, just exchanging glances.
Before entering Liushu Village, they had agreed not to casually discuss anything related to “anomalies.” Even if there was something they wanted to say, they would wait until they were safe with just the four of them. Because they didn’t know who or what was an anomaly, and if they let the anomalies hear their conversation, it might provoke them into attacking.
In addition to the six customers buying furniture in the hall, Old Wang’s daughter, Little Ling, was lying on the table doing her homework, swinging her feet. No matter how much they talked, this little girl didn’t even look up at them once.
Lou Yan thought for a moment, then walked over to Little Ling, “Little girl, are you doing the homework assigned by the school?”
Little Ling looked up from her notebook, holding a pencil, “Yes, this is the homework assigned by our teacher.”
“Liushu Village has been flooded, and you still have to go to school and do homework?” Lou Yan asked.
Little Ling nodded unhappily, “The fields have been flooded these past two days, so we’ve had two days off. But tomorrow, we have to go to school again.”
Lou Yan smiled and coaxed her, “Is your dad very busy these past two days because of the flooded fields?”
Little Ling nodded honestly.
Lou Yan asked again, “During these two days of flooded fields, was your dad angry or upset? Did he behave unusually?”
Little Ling blinked but didn’t answer Lou Yan’s question. Instead, she flipped two pages forward in her notebook, picked it up, and placed it in front of Lou Yan, “Brother, help me answer this question. If you get it right, I’ll tell you~”
Lou Yan raised an eyebrow, lowered his head to look at the notebook.
The question Little Ling asked was the last question on the page, which told a short story.
【Juanjuan is five years old this year. When she got up in the morning, her mother helped her get dressed and took her out for breakfast. Her mother said, “Juanjuan, after you finish this egg, go to your room and put on your backpack. Mommy will take you to school.” Juanjuan obediently nodded and went to the room to get her backpack. But as soon as she entered the room, she was grabbed by a hand covering her mouth. Looking up, Juanjuan found that the person holding her was her mother! Mom’s expression turned serious as she said to Juanjuan, ” Juanjuan, the person outside is a fake mom. You must not make a sound and must not go out with her.”
What, it’s actually a fake mom?
Juanjuan nodded fearfully, and when her mother let go of her mouth, she whispered, “Mom, I won’t go with her.”
But the voice outside kept getting closer step by step, and the fake mom outside said, “Juanjuan, are you still not ready? You’ll be late for school.”
Juanjuan shivered and huddled in her mother’s arms, not saying a word. The fake mom said again, “Juanjuan, come out quickly, Mommy will take you to school!”
Juanjuan’s whole body felt cold, silently wishing for the fake mom to leave. But instead of leaving, the fake mom pushed open her door, then screamed in panic and fear, reaching out to Juanjuan, “Juanjuan, come to Mommy’s arms quickly. The one holding you is a fake mommy! Don’t be fooled by her!”
As Lou Yan finished reading, he suddenly felt a hand on his shoulder, “Guess, which one is the real mom?”
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