Chapter 252 - 251: Did He Know?

Chapter 252: Chapter 251: Did He Know?

Without snacks, watching the show was instantly half as fun.

Fortunately, when one was concentrating intently, their energy depleted quickly.

Just as Gu Qingyin couldn’t help but let out her third yawn, a bead of sweat on the forehead of the man confronting the victims’ souls slid down his brow bone and landed on his eyelashes. He subconsciously raised a hand to wipe it away.

The victims’ souls seized the opportunity. The moment the man closed his eyes, they swarmed him.

Huh? Gu Qingyin was wide awake in an instant.

The man never expected that a small gesture like wiping away sweat could provoke the victims’ souls to swarm him.

Caught off guard, the man’s forced courage instantly deflated. Driven by instinct, he grabbed his hammer and began swinging it wildly, attempting to scare the victims’ souls away again.

But he had forgotten—or perhaps, he never knew—that ghost souls cannot make contact with physical objects.

So the hammer passed right through the victims’ souls without causing any harm. Instead, the two unlucky men behind him were hit one after another.

One of them was struck directly on the head. He collapsed, clutching his head, and lay motionless on the ground for a long time, with only dark red blood seeping from between his fingers.

The remaining man was clearly even more panicked. With nowhere to run, he could only curl up on the ground, covering his head and praying the hammer wouldn’t find him, and that the victims’ souls would spare him for the time being.

The victims’ souls were indeed paying him little mind. They had a score to settle, and he was merely an accomplice. With the main culprit still standing, all the souls stared, eager to rush forward and take a bite.

"Get lost! All of you, get the hell away from me!"

The man swung the hammer wildly with his eyes closed. Between the extreme tension and fear, his stamina gave out after just a few swings, and he had to stop to catch his breath.

In the two seconds he rested, he felt the surroundings grow quiet again. He couldn’t help but rejoice inwardly. ’Could it be? Did I scare them off again?’ He silently adjusted his expression, trying to look even more ferocious.

Then he opened his eyes, looked up, and his face pressed against something cold and greasy.

"It’s so cold down below. Why don’t you come keep me company?"

The man screamed and recoiled, only to trip over the person lying on the ground. As he fell, he crashed into the other man cowering on the floor, and the two of them couldn’t help but let out another round of shouts.

Once things quieted down, the man realized what had happened. He had just been face-to-face with that female ghost!

His face a mask of terror and disgust, he raised his hand and violently scrubbed at his still-chilly cheek.

Perhaps he used too much force, because he felt a sharp pain on his cheek. He instinctively looked down and saw that the back of his hand, all the way to his wrist, was bright red.

The man froze, then cautiously raised his hand to touch his face again. A searing pain shot through him.

"Ah!" The man yelped again. He sat on the ground, breathing raggedly, completely bewildered. ’How did I get hurt? I just rubbed my face! Was it that female ghost? Was it because I touched her?’

"Does it hurt?" the female ghost drifted closer, her voice cold and hollow. "I was in so much pain, too... Was the flesh from my face tasty?"

Before her voice had faded, a chorus of overlapping voices rose from all around.

"My legs were broken and boiled for soup..."

"My arms were chopped off and barbecued..."

"My ribs were severed and braised..."

"It hurts so much, we’re all in so much pain... Do you know how much it hurts? Why don’t you try it for yourself?"

...

The cacophony of voices, like a surround sound system, echoed ceaselessly in the man’s ears. He clutched his head in agony, feeling pain everywhere in his body, a pain that grew more and more intense.

Soon, the pain became so excruciating that his consciousness began to blur. He couldn’t help but wonder, ’Is this retribution? But... I just wanted to survive. Is it wrong to want to live?’

That was the man’s last conscious thought before he passed out.

The other man who was still conscious wasn’t faring much better. He hadn’t heard those words, but among the victims’ souls, he saw his dead wife—Changsheng’s mother.

The man was adaptable. Not caring if he had seen correctly or not, he dropped to his knees and began kowtowing in her direction. "Wife, I was wrong! Wife, I was forced into it! Please, let me go! Let me go... I still have to raise Changsheng! If I’m gone, Changsheng won’t last much longer either."

Seeing this, the other victims’ souls paused, turning to look at the female ghost behind them—the most senior among them, the first woman to be murdered by these three animals.

The first victims weren’t women, but the young girls of the village.

The mountain village was isolated, and the belief that sons were superior to daughters was deeply ingrained. Whenever there wasn’t enough food to go around, the girls were the first to be abandoned.

Once the girls were gone, those people’s needs naturally escalated. They started thinking about getting an adult—it would be a new taste, and one adult could last for many days.

Of course, they didn’t dare target the men. Every man was the pillar of his family; losing any of them would cause a huge uproar. But women were different. If one was gone, they could always find another.

Besides, most of the women who married into the village were from outside. In a famine, if they died, they died. No one would come looking for trouble.

And so, the first victim appeared—a timid woman who was always quiet, did her work without complaint, and had little presence.

His wife. His son’s own mother.

When they first chose her, he had disagreed. But the woman was truly too plain; he had indeed grown tired of her. Besides, he was just so hungry. So, he reluctantly went along with it.

The woman had been lured there. By her own son.

She didn’t know if Changsheng knew what she was about to face. She struggled a little when she entered that room, until she saw Changsheng standing silhouetted against the light at the doorway, quietly watching as she was brutalized.

Suddenly, the woman felt she’d had enough. She had had enough of living.

She stopped struggling and died in that old house without a sound.

Strangely, though she felt no resentment, she still became a ghost, trapped near this house, unable to go anywhere.

Afterward, she could only watch as Changsheng brought back woman after woman. More and more ghost souls were born, until they flooded the old house.

She also watched Changsheng become more and more of a stranger, like a cold-blooded, heartless demon.

She even began to wonder, ’Is Changsheng really my son? How did he become like this?’ Every day, she would ask herself over and over, ’Is it my fault? Did I do something wrong?’

Until today, when she finally had the chance to ask.

The female ghost drifted to the front, looking down at the man who was still kowtowing relentlessly. After a long moment, she spoke. "Back then, did Changsheng know?"

After asking the question, the female ghost realized it was the only thing she truly cared about.

Did Changsheng know what his mother would experience—what she would become—after he lured her over?

The man paused for a second before it registered. He nodded frantically. "He knew!"

The female ghost was silent for several seconds before she continued, "Was he forced?"

"He did get hit, but I didn’t hit him that hard..." the man hesitated.

The female ghost seemed to waver, and suddenly, she no longer wanted to ask any more questions.