It is rare for will-o'-the-wisp to injure people.
Chen Ling thought about it carefully and asked, "What happened to the burned people later?"
"The wounds will hurt before the 19th day of the lunar calendar." Jin Yu found it very strange. "In fact, they don't have any wounds on their bodies, but they just hurt. I saw with my own eyes that an elder rolled on the ground in pain."
Wu Weiwei shuddered, he could imagine the pain.
Jin Yu: "The pain seemed to never stop until that elder passed away."
Chen Ling thought of the fire that Jin Yu had mentioned, but the fire happened at the old site of the village. "The things you mentioned happened in the past, right?"
Jin Yu: "Of course."
Chen Ling: "Then do you know whether those so-called evil spirits and will-o'-the-wisp actually left with the villagers?"
"Well..." Jin Yu apologized, "I really don't know. After all, I have been away from the village for twelve years."
Wu Weiwei heard something, "Brother Chen, do you suspect that the will-o'-the-wisp is related to the fire many years ago?"
Chen Ling looked out the window, and saw lush forests everywhere. "Some souls will have a hard time leaving peacefully if they have experienced great suffering before death. Their obsession with the world and their memory of pain will make them repeat their own death at a certain time."
Wu Weiwei: "If this is true, wouldn't this valley be very dangerous?"
"Probably." Chen Ling said, "I'm just guessing."
Everything was just inferred based on book knowledge and previous experience, and there was no solid evidence. But if things really went as he thought, then the evening at the hot spring resort would be very uneasy.
Chen Ling pinched his brows and decided to talk to Jiang Shengxing first, asking him to act as a middleman to talk to the boss and see if the guests could be evacuated first.
After Jiang Shengxing received the call, he directly assured: "Don't worry, Mr. Chen, leave everything to me."
Chen Ling said thank you and immediately called his father.
When he received the call from his son, Mr. Chen was mixing new fertilizer. He took off his thick gloves with great effort and said cheerfully, "Son, what's wrong?"
Chen Ling asked: "Dad, when did you go to Fengling Hot Spring Club?"
"Last month." Father Chen couldn't remember the exact date, but he remembered, "It was the Saturday of the third week of last month."
Chen Ling reported the time to Wu Weiwei and asked him to check the lunar calendar corresponding to the third day of last month.
Father Chen asked on the other end: "What happened? Why are you asking this all of a sudden?"
"It's okay, I'm just asking casually." In addition to running a cemetery in Yuhe Mountain, Chen Ling did not tell his parents that he also had a part-time job catching ghosts and exorcising evil spirits.
But Father Chen was not stupid. He could tell that his son was trying to hide something. After a few seconds of silence on the receiver, he said, "Be careful when you are out there. Come home when you are tired. Mom and Dad are here."
Chen Ling tightened his grip on the phone. He responded in a low voice, softening his voice and saying, "Got it. Thank you, Dad."
After hanging up the phone, Wu Weiwei reported the corresponding time: "Brother Chen, it is exactly ten days after June 19th."
Chen Ling breathed a sigh of relief. It seemed that when his parents didn't encounter ghost fires or evil spirits, they certainly didn't run into any bad things.
He raised his hand to wipe his forehead, which was covered in cold sweat, and wiped it clean with a tissue. "When did the hot spring resort start its trial operation?"
"I'll call and ask." Wu Weiwei dialed the front desk number. Because the date was specially calculated by a master, the receptionist remembered the lunar calendar time very clearly: it was June 23rd.
Also after nineteen.
In fact, the owner of the guild hall was lucky. If the trial operation started before the 19th day of the lunar calendar, if there were ghost lights in the evening, I'm afraid no one would dare to come.
Wu Weiwei put down the phone and looked up at his brother Chen. He found that he was frowning and didn't know what he was thinking.
At this time, the doorbell rang. It was the food delivery staff.
Wu Weiwei welcomed people in and helped put the food on the round table in the dining room.
What puzzled him was that the staff on this working day were clearly not concentrating on the work in their hands. When they were holding the bowls, their thumbs were pressed into the bowls, which was a bit... unhygienic.
After Wu Weiwei reminded him, the staff member came to his senses, said sorry, and then speeded up his actions.
Just as he was about to leave, Chen Ling suddenly stopped him and said, "Wait a moment, I want to ask you a question."
The staff stood up straight and said with a smile, "Please speak, sir."
Chen Ling said, "You must have come here when the business opened. Do you think there is anything strange about this forest?"
"No." The staff member looked into Chen Ling's eyes and said firmly, "Absolutely not."
"The body found in the mountain before..." He didn't finish his words, but the staff understood what he meant.
The news of the body parts on the mountain had spread everywhere, and many guests curiously asked them for information. The staff thought that the young man was the same as these people, so they said honestly: "I dare not say anything else, but I can be sure that he is not our guest."
This place is not close to the city. Vehicles leaving the place will automatically take photos, and check-in requires on-site registration with valid ID. If someone is missing, the front desk will find out quickly.
Chen Ling: "Does anyone usually come here to climb the mountain?"
"Yes, the sunrise and sunset of Fengling Mountain are quite famous. Some people even climb to the top of the mountain, see the scenery and then drive back alone."
Chen Ling sighed: "That's really unlucky."
Li Hongyu should have already found out this information, but he didn't tell anyone due to the company's rules.
Chen Ling glanced at the other person's face thoughtfully, put his elbows on the table, and leaned forward: "When the police came, I remember that some staff came to watch the excitement. Are you here too?"
"No." The staff member rubbed his hands nervously, but his eyes were fixed on the young man's face. "I was helping in the kitchen at that time."
"Really? Are you scared?" Chen Ling asked curiously.
"There's nothing to be afraid of. If you don't do anything wrong, you don't have to worry about ghosts knocking on your door." The staff member smiled gently, retracted his gaze, and lowered his eyes to Chen Ling's ankles. "Sir, do you have any other questions?"
"Yes, I have."
Chen Ling raised one hand to support his cheek and sighed quietly, "I thought you had been to the scene, so I could talk to you. But since you didn't go, forget it. I don't have anything else to ask."
The staff member smiled and said, “Then I’ll leave first.”
As he turned to leave, he suddenly pointed at the porridge on the table and said, "These were made by the hotel chef early in the morning. You can try them while they are still hot."
Chen Ling licked his tongue, as if his appetite was aroused.
His eyes vaguely slid across the staff member's neck, and he suddenly stood up and reached out to grab the person who was about to leave: "Hey, your tie is not tied properly."
The bow tie was an ordinary Windsor knot, but it was not neat at this time, and the part that should have been hidden inside was actually outside.
The staff member looked down and scratched the back of his head in embarrassment, "I was too anxious when I got to work this morning and made a mistake."
Chen Ling: "Tie it again, don't let the supervisor see it."
"Yes, yes, our supervisor is very strict. If you are not dressed properly, you will be fined two hundred yuan." The staff member probably felt embarrassed and spoke deliberately to hide his emotions.
Chen Ling stood up and walked to the coffee table. He lowered his head and took something out of his bag, and he didn't forget to comfort her: "This is what happens when you meet a strict boss. Just pay more attention afterward."
The staff member raised his head and glanced at the young man's back. His pupils constricted. The next second, the pupils, which had almost shrunk into a point, returned to normal.
He dropped his re-knotted hands and strode toward the door.
Without saying a word, Chen Ling turned around and threw out a talisman to immobilize the body, and then a talisman to ward off evil spirits.
The talisman paper seemed to be pulled by an invisible rope and rushed straight towards the young staff member, but the other party seemed to have eyes on the back of his head and dodged by turning his head.
Wu Weiwei didn't understand why the two of them suddenly started fighting, but his natural keen intuition made him pull Jin Yu back a few steps and hide behind Chen Ling.
Chen Ling's expression was serious, his brows furrowed, "He is not a human."
As soon as he finished speaking, the staff member's mouth opened exaggeratedly, his eyeballs gradually bulged out, and his nose bridge sunken. What was even more terrifying was that his body was shrinking at a speed visible to the naked eye.
"Fuck!" Wu Weiwei cursed. He would recognize that weird look even if it turned into ashes!
It’s Huang Fu ghost!
Wu Weiwei looked at his brother Chen in shock, and thinking back to how he had been chatting with this monster, he suddenly understood: "You knew this a long time ago?"
"Not really, I just feel like he's always staring at me." Chen Ling really didn't like that feeling, as if he was just a decoration, an object.
"Later, I noticed his bow tie," he explained. "The service industry has very high dress code requirements, especially in such a large-scale high-end club. Every employee will check their clothes carefully before leaving the dormitory early in the morning. Even if there is any negligence, colleagues will see it and remind them. How could they go out and walk around with an obviously wrong Windsor knot?"
The body of Huang's father's ghost emerged from the pile of employee uniforms, naked, like a shriveled, bleached mummy.
He deliberately opened his mouth wide and stared at Chen Ling's face, obviously very satisfied with the young man's handsome face.
Just as he opened his mouth and was about to burst into laughter, Jiang Yu suddenly appeared on the staircase landing.
The aura emanating from the man was too strong. The thick and almost sticky yin energy made Huang Fugui very hungry, but he couldn't suppress his fear and trembling.
Chen Ling grabbed Huang's father's empty body, pulled out his telescopic stick and rushed forward. The stick suddenly hit the opponent's head with a sound of wind.
Huang's father ghost came to his senses at the critical moment, but his reaction was still a little slow, and his ear was almost hit hard by the seemingly harmless telescopic stick, and his skin and flesh were almost torn off his head!
Chen Ling looked at the blood on his telescopic stick and wiped it off with a tissue. He took a breath and launched another attack.
Huang Fugui was enraged by the pain. He showed a row of white teeth and moved at a speed as fast as lightning.
Chen Ling couldn't see his body clearly, nor could he predict his trajectory. He was scratched by the opponent's sharp teeth several times and bled in an instant.
He quickly used a hemostatic spell to stop the bleeding, then clenched his five fingers together, gripped the telescopic stick even tighter, and his body spun in place along with the afterimages in the air.
"Don't be disturbed by him, just watch carefully." Jiang Yu's steady voice rang out, and at that moment, Chen Ling felt his nervous heart suddenly calm down.
He slowed his breathing and closed his eyes. Everything around him was instantly engulfed in darkness, which gradually amplified his other senses.
The smell of his own blood lingered in the air, and in his ears he could hear the rapid breathing of Wu Weiwei and Jin Yu, as well as the sound of the wind caused by the flashing of Huang's father's ghost.
The sound of the wind was whistling, sometimes near and sometimes far away.
Chen Ling frowned and listened attentively, creating a picture in his dark mind through the various sounds.
Those images were extremely clear in his mind, and then they came together in front of him: Huang Fugui was grinning, and his bulging eyeballs were full of malice and hunger. He was like an ugly hyena that had traveled a long way but had never been able to successfully find food. Now that he had finally seen something fresh and delicious, he was extremely excited. His first priority was to make the other party lose his composure first.
So he moved around frantically, trying to confuse the other party's eyes.
Soon, he succeeded!
The prey closed its eyes like a fool and stood still on the ground.
Huang Fugui did not slow down. He was very alert. He continued his movement while thinking about the prey approaching.
Closer and closer!
He excitedly grinned from ear to ear, his face distorted with extreme excitement, and an exaggerated and weird giggling sound came from his mouth.
The laughter was like a devil's sound filling the ears, piercing the eardrums sharply.
Jiang Yu walked behind Chen Ling at some point, covered his ears with his large hands, and whispered a few spells in the young man's ears to remove the new curse.
Wu Weiwei is not so lucky. He is a single guy with no one loving him and he can only rely on himself.
As if fleeing, he held Jin Yu's head and hid behind the sofa, shouting, "Cover your ears!" He was glad that Huang's father ghost was not smiling at them, otherwise he would have vomited again in half an hour.
At the same time, I am very worried.
He covered his ears which were hurt by the laughter, slowly stood up and looked at the young man who was trapped in the center by the Yellow Father Ghost.
Brother Chen was like a lifeless piece of wood, and even Brother Jiang standing behind him didn't give any reaction.
Just when Wu Weiwei was worried that Huang's father's ghost might attack the two people in the middle of the living room by surprise, Chen Ling suddenly opened his eyes, and his fingertips hanging on both sides flicked on the seam of his trousers a few times. Without any warning, he suddenly raised the telescopic stick and swung it hard in one direction!
Huang Fugui was hit on the head and his body paused. Then, a warm hand with a smell of a stranger grabbed his neck and lifted him up.
The paper-pale skin turned purple, and black veins burst out on both sides of his slightly deformed cheeks, almost bursting the thin skin.
Chen Ling raised his hands, his face cold and his eyes sharp and scary: "Where is the real delivery man? Did you kill him?"
Huang's father ghost had difficulty breathing, but he stared at Chen Ling's eyes stubbornly, opening and closing his mouth, and was determined to cast a curse.
Chen Ling let out a click of his tongue, pinched Huang's father's ghost and left Jiang Yu's protection area. He came to the dining table, took a few steamed buns, and stuffed them all into that huge mouth.
"Try to laugh a few more times." The young man's voice was cold, with a hint of anger.
Huang Fugui's laughter was so ugly, he was really asking for a beating, he had wanted to do this for a long time!