Free Web NovelChapter 378: Chapter 354: The Mountain God Is Angry, Everyone Prepare the Sacrificial Ceremony
As the villager recounted the miraculous story of the Deadman’s Grass,
his whole body seemed to be injected with boundless vitality. He gesticulated wildly,
his face flushed with excitement and his eyes gleaming with a fanatical light.
He continued to ramble on, "After that, every single household in the village started planting this Deadman’s Grass.
And hey, you know, some of the quicker-witted folks in our village immediately spotted the hidden business opportunity.
Just think about it. If we could grow a huge amount of this Deadman’s Grass
and sell it to the outside world, that would be incredible!
This stuff would definitely be worth more than any Thousand-year-old Ginseng or Ten-thousand-year-old Reishi Mushroom!
If we really pulled it off, our village could become the richest one on all of Blue Star!
Then we wouldn’t have to live such hard lives anymore."
At this, the villager’s eyes filled with longing.
"But, it’s a strange thing."
The villager frowned, a trace of confusion on his face. "I don’t know if it’s because our village’s soil is too poor,
but everyone here tried all sorts of methods,
and we just couldn’t manage to cultivate this Deadman’s Grass on a large scale.
Every time we planted it, the number that sprouted was pitifully small,
almost as if heaven itself was deliberately stopping us from getting rich."
Every young person present felt their blood run cold upon hearing this.
A chill shot up from the soles of their feet to the tops of their heads.
After all, they were students who had received specialized education;
in today’s world, most of their curriculum revolved around bizarre Evil Spirits.
They knew full well that in this world, the more peculiar an item’s effect,
the greater the danger it usually concealed.
It was like a beautiful poppy—seemingly exquisite, but in reality, deadly.
Listening to the villager’s story, they looked toward the plants, which were faintly visible in the darkness.
They saw pale white skulls, each one growing on a slender stalk,
swaying gently in the sinister wind like a troupe of phantoms from Hell dancing in silence.
These skulls emanated a ghastly aura,
as if every sway told a tale of death.
And yet, something this terrifying
had actually been able to save a person on the brink of death—someone even the village’s barefoot doctor had given up on—
snatching them back from the grave by some heaven-defying means.
There had to be a serious problem with it, a problem far greater than they could imagine.
In this world, many supernatural artifacts actually possessed all sorts of seemingly alluring effects.
In the beginning,
they were like Pandora’s boxes radiating a mysterious glow,
drawing people from all over the globe to flock to them.
People frantically sought out all kinds of supernatural artifacts, like moths drawn to a flame.
At first, everything seemed calm and peaceful;
nothing bad appeared to be happening.
As time went on, when the hidden drawbacks began to emerge one by one,
many people awoke as if from a dream and felt a profound sense of terror.
Even in this situation,
there were still plenty of people, blinded by greed,
who risked their lives to buy and sell these supernatural artifacts.
For most people, however, they were absolutely unwilling,
and even more so, afraid, to bear such terrible side effects.
The disasters caused by these supernatural artifacts were like nightmares,
lingering in people’s minds and becoming shadows they could not shake.
"Who brought this Deadman’s Grass here? How did you discover it?"
Lai Yu Yao’s brow furrowed slightly, her gaze as sharp as a falcon’s.
She had keenly perceived the crux of the matter,
her eyes looking as if they could pierce the villager’s very soul to find the truth.
"Just who are you people? Are you here to investigate us?"
The excited smile that had just been on the villager’s face vanished without a trace,
like a candle flame snuffed out by a cold gust of wind.
On one hand, Lai Yu Yao’s interrogative tone had been too blunt and aggressive,
each word like a stone striking his heart.
On the other hand,
a piece of wisdom passed down from his elders suddenly struck him like a bolt of lightning,
jolting him to his senses.
That is, a treasure this miraculous was like a piece of glittering gold;
in a dark world like this, it could all too easily attract the greedy eyes of others and bring ruin upon them.
After all, the effects of the Deadman’s Grass were simply too powerful—
powerful enough to drive anyone mad for it.
Originally, the villagers had harbored dreams of getting rich,
thinking they could use the Deadman’s Grass to bring prosperity to their village.
But after repeated discussions and countless attempts,
they discovered that not only was the Deadman’s Grass impossible to cultivate on a large scale, but its survival rate was also pitifully low,
like a delicate flower struggling to survive in a gale.
So, the villagers decided to keep this a secret,
reserving it for their own use and letting it become the village’s unique life-saving talisman.
A moment ago, when the villager had seen those crisp, red bills with their enticing sheen,
it was as if his mind had been bewitched. In a moment of weakness, he had said so many things he shouldn’t have.
Now, seeing the serious expressions on the young people’s faces
and the seemingly hidden purpose in their eyes,
the villager’s heart was a mix of complicated feelings, and he was filled with regret.
He cursed himself inwardly: ’I shouldn’t have been so greedy and taken those red bills!’
