Free Web NovelChapter 247: Chapter 51: The Zhu Family’s Young Wife and the Evil in the Lake
Is it not five people as one?
]"Even though you have resorted to such a crude way of explaining, without bringing up her before you met, and though this doesn’t affect you knowing the truth, to the point of fighting over time, I apologize, but is it not because she is the Zhu family’s second youngest sister, that you believe she can’t be one of five people?"[
Zhu Jia was somewhat confused, seeing the white mist as if through fog.
He pushed open the door to Zhu Jia’s boudoir, where an offering was placed to venerate the Divine Lake in the corner.
To Bai Wu, this thirteen-year-old girl was of absolutely no interest; a vestige of ancient times passing through the modern era, Zhu Jia was a thirty-year-old woman acting as a young girl.
Bai Wu very quickly found the small chamber of Zhu Jia’s younger sister after making a note to herself.
The old and the new courtyards were not much different, with two rooms facing north in the very center, an embodiment of the Southern Dynasty era.
The crowd around him dispersed entirely, leaving Bai Wu feeling as if he had exploded the atmosphere in an instant.
People believed in the lake’s curse’s birth because no one dared to joke about this sort of superstition, especially those in the village who were deep into such beliefs.
"You’re trying to stop me because I’ve just been entangled by a lake monster’s curse?"
Bai Wu smiled faintly, as Ma Li approached to stop him while he was walking towards the Zhu family’s main courtyard.
Without saying another word, Bai Wu immediately rushed into the Zhu family’s home, deciding that he needed to sort out this entire affair as quickly as possible.
Some couldn’t even attend their own funerals due to red affairs taking precedence, let alone think about relying on them for a solution.
Although the Zhu family’s courtyard was celebrating a joyous day, having already begun preparations for a wedding with all sorts of red paper cuttings everywhere, it was as if to prevent a blood disaster from occurring again, which made it hardly a surprise when the open ceremonies began.
But to Erleipu, this was just one more annoyance that he saw through, thinking it couldn’t be that simple disguise affair.
Since all five actors were together in the same scene, he had to find the remaining four, given that he had to figure out first and foremost who exactly was the Zhu family’s younger sister.
Because he personally saw someone coming from the lake to fetch water, this second scene was not at all as it used to be, an ever-repeating environment.
Bai Wu firmly decided to take Zhu Jia to look at the lake upfront.
...
...
How could this wedding still proceed?
If the blood disaster is witnessed tomorrow, on the second day of heaven, Elder Zhao’s family, which altogether had six or seven mouths to feed and not that many people, will inevitably face some deaths, as seen by the Zhu family today, and Zhao’s family too had just seen it.
One of the Zhu family’s sons was attacked and killed by a wild beast while fetching water outside; another, an older man, was crushed to death alive by the collapsing beams of the house. Having witnessed that post-curse, it was ordained that the Zhao family would also be enveloped in the calamity on an auspicious day, and the bridal makeup has already been sent over.
The Zhu family members were also stunned.
"How can this be good ah! How could this... that monster... how could it have come to our house too, what on earth is this good for!"
Elder Zhao’s face was ashen.
With the Zhu and Zhao families stunned in their original places, Bai Wu walked away.
He knew where the first scene was; it was that ghostly husband and wife temple right over there, within the Zhu family’s courtyard.
Bai Wu stood gaping with a group of people, having just completed a big speech about filial piety in the main hall.
"You’re fighting over who gets to play the ghost, Elder Zhao, but our Zhu family’s about to suffer a great defeat if you keep this up, arranging a fine meal last minute. Our elders might just tuck in one last time, so you better rush to prepare a nice meal. But I should just hide under the bed because, if I meet that black monster from the lake again, I’ll need to play hide and seek with him, just like how I’ve just encountered him there," Bai Wu said, addressing Elder Zhao’s kindness after pondering his next move.
"But ultimately, based on the information we received before the death occurred, making one choice is imperative, even though I too could have made an entirely different choice earlier. I must find the shortest possible window. If that’s indeed the case here, and one scene leads to another, then this one must also be an entrance."
"Although I don’t know if the present time is unified with that of the ethereal world, or if seeing this ceremony means I have still to go through a lengthy wedding, to endure the violence of the Zhu family, to wait for Elder Zhao. I have dallied too long; these trifling matters are troubling me," I thought as I watched my body outside the Pagoda at the Fourth Hour encounter a negative situation.
In that moment, a myriad of thoughts flickered through my mind like a white fog.
Elder Zhao, my father-in-law, whom I was originally going to greet, furiously scolded Ma Li, who appeared with a face covered in dust and white fog.
"How on earth did you get yourself into such a state? Zhu family has sent the bridal makeup today, and here you are, all dirty and disheveled, tsk tsk!"
It had been only half a day since I left; taking a detour, I would arrive at Chinese Date Lake, where the villagers would fetch water. The entire village resembled a national period village.
This place is deemed a large household in the village, though it is only a relatively tall building, including the Zhu family, the Feng family, the Cui family, and the Zhao family.
This village wasn’t large, with roughly around two hundred citizens, making up just a few more than a dozen households.
Stepping out of the mist, one could have glimpsed the bustling of a seventeenth-century village.
Indeed, this scenery was not lacking compared to the second stratum of the spiritual world, which was quite a scene in itself.
"[If you had tackled the q option, you would naturally unlock the Jiaxie treasure; even though it was an erroneous choice, I’m going to tell you, it still counts as a selection, and you will soon have to make a choice. Even if she is not one of the five people, she was originally a person of importance... But I can only tell you that you are indeed in the same realm of existence.]"
God Granny was a significant figure in the whole affair, but I still couldn’t fully understand her, though I was certain about the rest.
"God Granny! You’ve been cursed!"
With a cough and the sound of a brass bell, an old woman attempted to stop the white mist, which was striding briskly, but an abrupt disruption in the thread of communication had apparently occurred.
He would break the curse!
At the same time, ensuring everyone remained safely in their place during the Fourth Hour, the whole department was solemnly vigilant against all unseen threats.
Chu Qing had decided to settle everything at once, and he would use Erleipu’s eyes to investigate; the white mist walked directly toward Zhao family’s courtyard after leaving the Zhu family’s compound.
The white mist was not entirely confident about himself.
Those who even dared to touch the white mist feared the curse of death and disaster because of the strange black glossy objects that filled the Zhu family’s courtyard after their departure, like the ones found within the lake.
He left the Zhu family’s compound.
"Wait for me; I’ll come for you soon," he reassured with a good piece of news.
As the white mist pondered in an instant, considering himself a refined spirit fit for a challenging riddle, he returned very quickly: "Could this girl’s persistent memory be the key to unlocking the memories of the third layer?"
"All ties to the Zhu family’s girl, but I’m just a spectator, though I am Zhao family’s elder in the second act. They probably don’t care what point of view others might have."
"Choosing to enter deeper into the memory layers means living in the coffin’s material. To leave the scene, the first act is to lift the cover."
"Is this the younger sister of the Zhu family... No, it can’t be that simple. You can only escape the spirit’s predicament by having a fully formed obsession, which seems familiar from my past experiences."
These two cursed individuals were a sight for the villagers, two who seemed to be plagued by evil spirits.
White mist speculated that this lack of guests and history of emotional ties might be because their love was the cause... No one stood by them.
In the spacious compound, there was only one couple, paying their respect to the dark clouded sky at night; no guests were present.
It was a recollection of the first scene. White mist assumed that this was not Elder Zhao’s historical experience.
Zhu Jia looked at Elder Zhao.
"Do you like me, aren’t you afraid of that monster? Will you marry me, wait and see?"
"Farewell, take care,"
"Going out so early... So early because of my elder brother, because he went out early,"
"How can you remember Chu Qing like this?"
"Four hours... Four."
"You saw something strange in the lake after your grandfather and your brother died a long time ago, didn’t you?"
"What kind of straight talk is this where you do not shy away from mentioning your own father’s death?"
But Zhu Jinxin felt that this reasoning was indeed correct, although it seemed strange. It was Bai Wu who blurted out these explosive words like thunder.
"If I could just understand the root of the curse, everything, every riddle, would be solved. It’s not just about stopping his death. I am talking about... my father said that we won’t truly die until daybreak, saying that the curse simply doesn’t exist, that the dark and murky creature in there is not really, and being clear about it is..." Elder Zhao said.
"How do you prove that?"
"I need to test something first; you see, I can’t just take your word for it. But considering all the deaths that have occurred in the village, I understand," Bai Wu replied.
Somehow, being particularly sensitive to those cold, vengeful breezes and having seen those unique characteristics on the creature, he tended to drift towards certain unsavory thoughts.
To his ears, the sound it emitted seemed to be an evil curse of some kind, unsettling and piercing to hear.
Despite what it did, however ugly... Bai Wu had a flashback, seemingly connecting his own face to the hideous creature’s appearance, but no matter what, it still appeared very ferocious.
"I don’t think it wants to harm me. It was just looking at me with its eyes, but although I listened, I couldn’t understand those words. It kept calling to me for a very long time," Bai Wu said.
"What did the creature do when you encountered it that time?"
Bai Wu looked at Zhu Jinxin and said:
This wolf was clearly undergoing a mutation.
Bai Wu had seen this half-brain-pocket wolf grow to an excessive size. He had previously encountered a three-brained pocket wolf while traveling to see a mine tunnel before.
"It is indeed true that others met with disaster because they encountered this mutant beast," Zhu Jinxin said.
"Could it really be that this is also somehow related to the Zhu family elders’ deaths?" freewebnovёl.ƈom
Bai Wu quickly understood that once Zhu Jinxin finished describing the event:
This creature bearing a half-brain pocket on its neck, believed to be cursed, was the cause behind Divine Lake’s evil hauntings; a notion that many villagers firmly believed. But even though the Zhu family’s eldest son was mauled to death, the wolf was already dead by the time the crowd arrived.
It was at this spot that Zhu Family’s eldest son encountered the wolf with the half-brain pocket, as he was going out to fetch water. The wild beasts outside the village became much more aggressive, and not just the livestock.
Their bodies started to mutate subtly... The chickens, ducks, and fish started to become agitated, and even the pigs, cows, and sheep were growing increasingly restless, but they hadn’t yet turned malevolent or fallen into wickedness.
Nevertheless, as the Day of Doom approached with more mutations occurring, the village could not escape the constant assaults.
Zhu Jinxin really cared for his little sister and blamed himself for his elder brother’s death. In fact, it might have also been avoidable.
The old grandfather of the Zhu family was crushed to death directly after the roof beam collapsed on the second day, once Zhu Jinxin had seen the strange evil in Divine Lake. This alone seemed to be a complete misfortune with no other hidden troubles.
The house was pretty dilapidated and needed repair, but the father had already mentioned wanting to fix it, though grandfather had always been stubborn and refused. The ancestral majesty became unrecognizable after the repairs.
Zhu Jinxin started to describe meticulously about his elder brother’s and grandfather’s deaths. Bai Wu doubted nothing and seemed like just a worker getting to the bottom of something.
"Alright."
"Tell me in detail, how did the people in your family die?"
Bai Wu felt that there was something more apart from what little sister Zhu Jinxin’s sentence revealed...
Could it be that on the Day of Doom, the creature in Divine Lake was inherently evil, needing to murder someone to transform?
Why do these people all seem to die with an external intention?
Bai Wu always felt it was very strange, why were all these people dying day after day?
On the Day of Doom, with Divine Lake’s curse manifesting, everyone in the village was trying to think of a way to resist the evil curse; there are those who hid inside coffin materials, those who burned paper figurines to pray for blessings, and those that hadn’t completed their weddings. They were all families ruined by the curse’s evil hauntings.
He always felt that this incident was too superficial. Zhu Jinxin might be able to grasp a true line of inquiry.
The white mist appeared for a moment, then the interest was gone.
"...I don’t know... I don’t know, but that’s how I feel about it, how it seems to me if I should tell you something, it’s not that I’m afraid of it, I..."
Zhu Jin said:
"Every time it comes, it brings death, don’t you say it’s an evil omen?"
The white mist appeared for a moment, then the interest was gone.
"...I don’t know... I don’t know, but that’s how I feel about it, how it seems to me if I should tell you something, it’s not that I’m afraid of it, I..."
Zhu Jin said:
"Every time it comes, it brings death, don’t you say it’s an evil omen?"
A moment of bewilderment in the white mist.
A moment of bewilderment in the white mist.
"...It’s not that it’s an evil omen, in fact, it’s also like us... That’s it, I’m not scared, okay? But I’ve been entangled by it too, it’s not that it’s bad..."
No one dared come to wish these two families well, having eliminated the God Granny.
Both families might very well encounter something unpredictable.
But now both Zhu Jin and Elder Zhao, having been seen by the evil omen in the lake, were different.
Elder Zhao knew that this little girl would eventually become his daughter-in-law, and Zhu Jin might have been secretly pleased about that for quite a while.
If it turned out to not be the evil omen from Divine Lake, the whole village would certainly celebrate this marriage, without a doubt.
The two families had a mutual understanding, and they would play together from time to time, being neighbors.
In a village as ancient as this one, she seemed only to admire Elder Zhao’s older brother for his good looks, having a child’s heart more innocent than anyone else’s.
What could a three-year-old girl possibly understand?
Chu Qing, with her large, blinking eyes, stood up and looked at the white mist, making her presence noticeable.
The white mist, while continuing the provocative conversation, seemed to be taking into account precisely the right direction, audө.
"If I were to say that I’ve seen the evil omen of Divine Lake, you and your family are bound to be struck with a blood calamity soon, you’d definitely not believe me," Chu Qing said as she followed him.
But the white mist seemed to vaguely understand something, even though Zhu Jin’s words just made the drama even more complicated.
Would Zhu Jin and Elder Zhao actually end up together if the Zhu Family really hasn’t encountered the evil omen of Divine Lake?
But then again, isn’t there some sort of private connection between Zhu Jin and Elder Zhao, here on Fifth Level? That commotion with Elder Zhao on Fifth Level, it’s too strange, isn’t it?
It was the Zhao family’s main house at Zhao Rock that answered Zhu Family’s marriage proposal, with Zhu Family providing many dowries.
The white mist frowned.
And so on.
Chu Qing looked at the white mist with pitiful, pleading eyes, suddenly a bit anxious. "But... you did say you would marry me, didn’t you...?"
""This marriage should definitely not be concluded yet. I just saw the evil omen of Divine Lake, and I feel like this is not a good omen. Just think about it, if anyone hears this, they won’t stay quiet," said Zhu Jin with some trepidation.
Zhu Jin asked with some nervousness,"... You, how could you... here?"
But the outcome was very unexpected for Chu Qing, Chu Qing indeed.
The two of them began to explore the lakeside together, if that wasn’t wrong, then it must have been a queue.
It must indeed have been a rehearsal within, given how incredibly strange it was for Jiaxie to match the secret code precisely to thank the procession. If it was indeed supposed to be a hidden place for Ma Li’s sudden outbreak on his own, if it was indeed simulated, then Erleipu eyes could intensify the sequence within the body. The white mist had already thought up a route in a small path that was just perfect, as if it had already hoped for a diversion on the road above.
