FEG | Chapter 12

Chapter 12, True and False Past Events

“An abducted woman? How did you know?” Bald Guy asked in confusion.

Anisocoria put on an air of deliberate calm. “A village in the mountains, a city woman, and she still wanted to run away. Put them together, and it’s obvious.”

Ning Xiaomeng said with deep sympathy, “So pitiful. In the end, she was strangled to death too. Tianshi, did you hit her?”

Tianshi Li was a little embarrassed by her question. “When I saw what she looked like, I knew the village chief hadn’t told me the truth. I wanted to let her off, but she had already noticed me and was walking toward my position...”

“I spoke to her, but she ignored me. Maybe she had already lost her mind. I had no choice, so I had to use rooster’s blood and glutinous rice to deal with her... I killed a rooster, twisted its neck, used the hot chicken blood to draw half a circle to block her steps, then scattered glutinous rice at her. While she was struggling, I used the blood of another rooster to finish drawing the other half of the circle, trapping her inside. She kept turning around inside the circle and couldn’t get out.”

“After I subdued her, I went back to sleep. Not until daylight came the next day, when the sun rose, did she immediately turn into flying ash...”

“Tianshi Li was so bold!” Ning Xiaomeng’s lips parted slightly as she sighed in admiration.

“Not at all, you get used to it after seeing enough of it.” Tianshi Li said modestly. “This is just one small thing from my many years of traveling. It’s not worth mentioning, I’m just bringing it out today as a story to listen to.”

Anisocoria praised him, “Tianshi Li helps people without seeking repayment, truly lofty in character.”

“Oh, you flatter me.” Tianshi Li waved his hand, then said to Spirit Young Master, “Little girl, do you understand now?”

Spirit Young Master nodded. “I understand. Using chicken blood and glutinous rice to deal with a female ghost was something you made up.”

Tianshi Li narrowed his eyes. “Little girl, there’s a limit to how much nonsense you can talk.”

Spirit Young Master was not the least bit intimidated by his threat, and said calmly, “If it’s fake, then it’s fake.”

Afraid the two of them would clash, Anisocoria hurriedly advised, “Both of you, stop arguing. We’re still livestreaming.”

Ning Xiaomeng said gloomily, “I think Spirit Young Master, just like me, hopes it’s only a story. Otherwise, that female ghost is too pitiful...”

Bald Guy said, “In my opinion, she got what she deserved. The murderer who killed her is already dead, and she still wouldn’t let it go. There’s nothing more to say about her being dealt with.”

Sun Fangchi had a different opinion. He tilted the candle in his hand, and wax dripped to the floor. He said, “I think her revenge hasn’t ended. The murderer was only Lao Zuo? That’s not right. The village chief knew she was a bought wife, so how could the other villagers not know? The ones who caused her death were not only Lao Zuo, but also all the villagers who stood by and watched.”

“Why did she use knocking on doors to kill people? Maybe before she died, she escaped from Lao Zuo’s hands, knocked on the villagers’ doors for help, and no one opened them.” Sun Fangchi smiled at the others, revealing a mouthful of white teeth. “Am I right?”

Everyone: “...”

It wasn’t a matter of whether he was right or not. This was clearly a supernatural game, but after his interpretation, it sounded like you were listening to Moral and Law.

Tianshi Li blew out the candle in his hand. With no light source beside the three who had finished telling their stories, the darkness behind them surged forward and almost swallowed the three of them.

Anisocoria steadied himself and said, “What I’m going to tell is a story my grandma told me when I was little. In the old home of her childhood, there was a woman of very high seniority, a concubine from a landlord’s family.”

“The landlord and his lawful wife both died early, and the concubine had no children. The landlord’s son had two rooms built for her outside, letting her live alone out there, and every day he had a farmhand bring her meals, so he could avoid seeing her. That concubine had a fiery temper. As a woman, she liked smoking dry tobacco and drinking strong old liquor. The children in the village were all afraid of her, and my grandma was afraid of her too. Everyone in the village called her Old Hua Grandma.”

“My grandma said Old Hua Grandma liked to visit people’s homes when she had nothing to do. She carried her pipe wherever she went, and she especially hated children. Whenever she saw children, she would get very bad-tempered. When she came to my grandma’s house to visit, my grandma would hide and not dare let her see her.”

“At that time, she wasn’t very old, only in her forties. People called her Old Hua Grandma because her seniority was high. She was very beautiful. My grandma said her eyes were like a fox’s, but no man in the village ever dared offend her, because of a rumor about her.”

Anisocoria swallowed. “I thought it sounded unrealistic, but my grandma firmly said it was true. The two rooms Old Hua Grandma lived in were built by the landlord’s son, but when they were built, he cut corners. He only put up a few walls and added a roof on top, and didn’t care about anything else. The floor in the house was all packed earth, and Old Hua Grandma didn’t have many furnishings either. He only gave her a bed by the entrance, an eight-immortal table, and two chairs. The room was empty...”

“There was no electricity then. People in the village all used kerosene lamps, and Old Hua Grandma didn’t have much lamp oil, so she usually stayed in the dark. One night, while Old Hua Grandma was asleep, the bed suddenly sank down. She herself was thrown to the floor. The room was very dark, and she couldn’t see what was going on, so she felt around with her hands. As she kept feeling around, she touched something cold, a bone...”

“Back then, people were still very feudal. Old Hua Grandma didn’t call for anyone. Instead, she lit the kerosene lamp in the dark. When she looked, a big pit had suddenly opened under the bed, and all three legs of the bed had sunk into the pit...”

“She carried the kerosene lamp and crawled under the bed to look. Underneath was a decayed, collapsed coffin, and the corpse inside had already turned into white bones, shaken apart by the impact of the bed collapsing... She had actually been sleeping every night on top of someone’s grave without knowing it!”

“Think about it, what must Old Hua Grandma have felt like, living alone in that house at night? My grandma always told me that Old Hua Grandma was truly an amazing woman. Do you know what she did after seeing the white bones?”

Bald Guy changed his posture, infected by Anisocoria’s fear, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down nonstop.

“She picked up the white bones one by one, put them into the bamboo basket the farmhands used to deliver her food, and under the moonlight she dumped a basket of bones in front of the landlord’s house, then went back home to sleep. The next morning, when the landlord’s farmhand opened the gate and saw a pile of human bones, he almost got scared out of his mind. After that, the landlord’s son never again dared to shortchange her, and even had the farmhands rebuild Old Hua Grandma’s house...”

“People of my grandma’s generation all guessed that the landlord’s son had deliberately built Old Hua Grandma’s house on a burial ground, just to scare her to death. He never expected that Old Hua Grandma, as a woman, would be able to forcefully throw it back at him... Everyone said Old Hua Grandma was a fearless woman, so bold she didn’t know what fear was, and no one dared offend her.”

Anisocoria blew out the candle in his hand. “After I heard it that year, I had nightmares for a long time. Every time, I dreamed that the bed I was sleeping on had sunk into a pitch-black grave.”

Tianshi Li let out a long breath and commented, “The more I think about this story, the scarier it gets.”

Sun Fangchi straightened his back and stretched. “Finally, it’s my turn.”

Anisocoria sneered, “Don’t you not believe there are ghosts in the world?”

Sun Fangchi didn’t even bother with him, and shook his head as he said, “There was a handsome little boy. His name was Xiaofang. He lived in an orphanage...”

Anisocoria: “...”

Sun Fangchi glanced at Bu Xiling, who was sitting on a supply box in the corner, and said, “The story happened in the orphanage...”

“Xiaofang, as a quiet handsome boy, spent his days sitting by the stairway entrance and looking outside. After a long time, the others grew curious and asked him, ‘Xiaofang, what are you looking at?’ Xiaofang answered, ‘There’s an older sister hiding in the water over there. I’m waiting to see when she’ll come out.’”

“Everyone thought Xiaofang was a fool, because the place he was pointing at was the fishpond next to the orphanage. How could there be anyone there? The director also criticized Xiaofang, saying he was telling lies to scare people. Xiaofang found it very strange. There was clearly an older sister standing in the water, so why did everyone say they couldn’t see her? Xiaofang was very angry, so he decided to pull the older sister in the water out himself to prove it to everyone.”

“In the orphanage, Xiaofang had a playmate. She was the only one who believed what Xiaofang said, and she was also the prettiest little girl in the orphanage. Xiaofang knew she could swim, so he asked her to help him pull her out. It was just that she was very timid, and kept persuading Xiaofang not to go into the water. Xiaofang didn’t listen. Taking advantage of the noon break, he slipped away from the adults watching over them, and Xiaofang led the little girl to the edge of the fishpond.”

“The fishpond was more than two meters deep, and the water was a blue-green color. The little girl could only see the sun reflecting on the surface of the water, but Xiaofang was different. He could see a mass of wildly dancing black hair beneath the water’s surface, and at the center of the black hair, a white human face. Xiaofang tied a rope around his waist, tied the other end to a tree beside the fishpond, and told the little girl to keep watch for him. Then he went into the water alone.”

“As soon as he entered the water, Xiaofang felt that the water was cold in an unnatural way. In midsummer, the water was almost so cold it could freeze his body stiff. Xiaofang was frightened, but he couldn’t lose face in front of the girl, so he forced himself to swim toward the white human face. As he swam, something wrapped around his limbs. Looking down, it was all hair, strands by strands, clumps by clumps, filling the water around him. Xiaofang was terrified and shouted to the shore, ‘Quick, pull me up blubblubblub...’ The little girl on shore immediately began pulling the rope, but the hair wrapping around Xiaofang began pulling him downward, and Xiaofang was dragged beneath the water’s surface.”

“Xiaofang sank deeper and deeper. Just as the light above his head was about to disappear, a big splash broke the surface. The little girl jumped into the water to save Xiaofang. Strangely enough, as soon as the little girl grabbed Xiaofang’s hand, the hair wrapping around Xiaofang automatically let go. The little girl saved Xiaofang onto the bank. Xiaofang hadn’t even cried yet, but she herself was crying so hard her nose was running and tears were streaming, and she gave Xiaofang a hard beating.”

“Xiaofang felt guilty, so he begged the little girl not to tell anyone about it. After agreeing to a series of humiliating conditions from the little girl, the matter became a secret between the two of them. Later, the little girl grew up into a great beauty and started living together with handsome Xiaofang. A man and a woman living under the same roof, you can imagine how happy that would be...” Sun Fangchi said meaningfully.

Pangye Zuiheng urged with a lecherous look, “Hurry up, hurry up, I love hearing what happens next.”

“What happens next...” Sun Fangchi shook his head in utter regret. “As soon as the alarm went off, I woke up.”

Everyone: “...”