Chapter 55: Spitting Out Small Snakes

  The sky was overcast, as if it were going to rain. The lines of the mountain slope stretched out long and dark. Only the mountain slope could be seen, but not the villagers' figures. In the house, two men occasionally let out mournful howls.

  "It's all my fault," said Wang Da Shu. "If it weren't for me, those two wouldn't have gotten into trouble."

  I patted Wang's aunt on the shoulder: "This is not your fault, it's my fault. If I hadn't been so reckless in catching that madwoman, the two of them wouldn't have gotten into trouble."

  The old woman Wang looked at the two men with a worried face and extreme anxiety. My heart was also extremely uneasy, stuck in my throat.

  The atmosphere was too depressing, at this moment I thought of the crazy woman I met by the river, and couldn't help but ask Wang Dajie: "Do you know anything about that crazy woman's background?"

  Old Lady Wang suddenly frowned: "Crazy Old Woman"

  "I said: 'She's just a crazy old woman, ugly and with a terrible voice. If I'm not mistaken, it was her who cast a spell on your son, that's why he's being haunted by the water ghost.'"

  "Old Mrs. Wang suddenly burst out scolding: 'This is infuriating, my son didn't provoke anyone, why did he have to be at odds with my son?'"

  I was stunned again, so to speak, Wang Dabao didn't know that this crazy woman would harm his son without any reason if he hadn't provoked her.

  In my mind, I inadvertently recalled the scene by the river. Upon careful recollection of the strange behavior of the madwoman, I discovered some clues.

  The problem must be in that pool of water. This crazy woman is muttering incantations at the pool, she must be doing something to it. It seems we have to take a look inside the pool to know.

  Wang's aunt was still scolding loudly, I quickly asked her to stop, lest it affect the condition of the two men.

  Time passed for several hours, and the sky was about to brighten up, but the village chief and others still didn't return. I got a bit anxious and couldn't help pacing back and forth in the room.

  Just then, a mournful cry suddenly came from outside the house. I rushed out of the house and saw a villager who had gone up the mountain to collect medicine, lying on the ground and crying loudly.

  I rushed over to help him up. The villager shouted: "Someone is making trouble, we were just picking the Seven Leaf One Branch Flower on the mountain, and an old woman was guarding the medicine beside it, saying that the medicine was planted by her and not allowing us to guess."

  "My wife" I immediately felt something was off.

  The villager continued: "It was an old woman, she not only said that the medicine was grown by her, but also said that the mountain was hers, and if we didn't leave the mountain, she would kill us all."

  "What about the village head?"

  "That old woman is too sinister, she can actually control snakes, the village head and others were all bitten by snakes, now they're all on the mountain."

  As soon as I heard the snake controller, my heart sank. No need to guess, this old woman must be the one we met by the river. I was so angry that I gritted my teeth, this crazy woman must have known that I would ask someone to go up the mountain to guess the medicine for the snake, so she went up the mountain again to make trouble. And this seven-leafed single flower is the main medicine.

  I'm so anxious that my head is about to explode, two people in the house are going to die soon, and now something has happened to the village chief on the mountain. In a state of anxiety, I started pacing back and forth: "What's going on with the village chief now, why haven't they come back yet?"

  The villager took a few deep breaths: "Don't worry, the village chief and the others are fine. We outnumbered her, so that madwoman didn't dare do anything to us. She was just using the snake to scare us. After we left, she didn't follow us, everyone is okay. I'm fast, so the village chief told me to come back and tell you first. They're planning to go to another mountain to find the Seven-Leafed Flower."

  "How long will it take"

  "I don't know, the mountain over there is quite far away, and we're not familiar with that area. It'll take at least a day to get there and back, and if we add finding herbs to that, it'll be at least two days."

  As soon as I heard this, I slapped my forehead hard. This old woman is really good at scheming. He stopped the village chief and others from picking medicine, obviously opposing me.

  I told the villagers: "It's too late."

  I immediately turned around and went back into the house. Inside, Aunt Wang looked at me with a puzzled expression, just as she was about to say something, I said to her: "You go prepare boiling water and towels, remember it must be boiling water. Also prepare some liquor, cotton thread, the liquor must be strong, the stronger the better."

  The liquor drunk in the countryside is mostly homemade, generally not too strong, but if you say it's strong, it's extremely strong. The strongest liquor is estimated to be as high as medicinal alcohol. Moreover, rural men all like to drink and the stronger the better.

  Wang Datie listened to my orders and left without stopping, then the sound of firewood crackling came from the direction of the kitchen. I ordered that villager: "You go find me some incense paper."

  The villager responded with a sound and also ran away in a hurry.

  I then entered the house, took out a small bottle of black powder from my backpack. Then I took out several things separately, Soul-Cutting Knife, Silver Needle, Red Thread. After that, I mixed the bottle of black powder with water and put it aside.

  Soon, Wang's aunt was busy running back and forth in the house, putting things one by one beside me. At this moment, I felt a little nervous.

  Next, I naturally prepared to take action. However, this thing called taking action, no matter how rich your theoretical knowledge is, it's useless if you don't see the actual operation. If you're not careful, you'll cut a blood vessel or nerve, and the person will die instantly.

  After taking out these things, I sat on the chair and kept adjusting my breath.

  It wasn't long before the fragrant paper arrived. I placed the fragrant paper to one side and continued to adjust my breathing. Old Lady Wang was busy for a while, sending over the strong liquor and gauze, everything was ready except for boiling water, but he said it would be ready soon.

  My preparations have also reached the final stage. I suddenly opened my eyes, poured the strong liquor into a bowl, and ignited it. Suddenly, the liquor caught fire. I took some cotton threads, dipped them in the liquor, and repeatedly disinfected the abdomen of the man in front of me.

  Then I will put the soul-cutting knife on the burning strong wine to roast, until the soul-cutting knife is hot. These procedures are all for disinfection.

  After doing all this, I washed my hands with strong liquor, which was also a disinfectant.

  The poison has almost been eliminated, I grasped the Soul-Cutting Knife and with a burst of strength, I slashed an opening about two thumbs in size on that man's belly. In that instant, the man began to struggle violently, and his abdomen started bleeding.

  I said to the villager in the house: "Hurry up and hold it down."

  The villagers rushed to the scene, pinning the man down. I took out a cotton swab soaked in strong liquor and gently wiped his wound, but he struggled even more violently.

  I grabbed a piece of incense paper next to me and lit it. The incense paper burned, smoke swirling around, and I placed one hand on the man's belly, quickly reciting an incantation in my mouth. This incantation is called the Paralysis Curse. When I burn the incense paper and recite the curse, the soul of the man in front of me will temporarily leave his body and float less than a meter away from his body.

  During this time, no matter what I did to their bodies, they couldn't feel any pain. However, the time is limited, and if it's too long, their bodies won't be able to return. When I finished the operation, I had to recite the soul-calling incantation for their souls to return to their bodies again.

  After finishing the paralyzing curse, the man indeed calmed down, except for his body twitching convulsively, he no longer struggled.

  At this moment, I suddenly dipped the red thread into the bowl of water mixed with black powder. This black powder was naturally made from ghost clothes and ghost hair. Normally, this thing is useless, but at critical moments, its use is great.

  For example, now I use a red thread to dip in the water mixed with ghost hair powder, which can be used to calm the soul.

  I can tell that those snakes falling from the Water Ghost Granny's body are not ordinary snakes. Those snakes must be some kind of evil thing created by the Water Ghost Granny.

  So I'll use ghost hair to calm them down and prevent them from messing around in Hanzi's belly when I'm performing the operation.

  After the red thread got wet, I stretched out my hand to hold the red thread over the burning alcohol and dried it roughly. Immediately afterwards, I tied a living knot with the red thread and put it through the opening cut on the man's belly.

  The man beside him looked puzzled: "With a mouth so small, can you really take out the snake?"

  In fact, the opening on Hanzi's belly was really too small, and I could only insert two fingers at most. Hearing Hanzi's voice, I didn't respond to him, but instead focused all my energy on his belly.

  I had tied a living knot with the red thread and put one end into Han's belly, then immediately loosened my grip, while continuously reciting incantations. At that instant, the red thread in my hand automatically started moving on its own, just like a small worm, constantly squirming around the opening of Han's belly.

  The man beside me let out a loud cry of surprise. I, however, was fully focused and grabbed hold of this end of the red thread.

  Suddenly, I felt it, that living knot had tied up the snake's head. I suddenly clenched my fists and shouted: "Lock."

  The living knot was tied around the man's belly and locked in an instant, and I pulled it tight with a fierce tug. Then, from the mouth on the man's belly, a snake head suddenly appeared.

  The moment the snake's head emerged, it was also accompanied by a large amount of fresh blood, and the snake's head was covered in blood. And I saw that the snake's head really looked very much like a human head, but it wasn't a snake at all, it was a monster with a human head and a snake body.

  I let out a loud roar and pulled with all my might, finally pulling the snake out of the villager's belly button. Just as the snake hit the ground, the villager let out a loud cry and stomped on the snake's head with his foot, flattening it.

  The snake's head let out a shrill and terrifying scream, which was surprisingly similar to a woman's shriek. My scalp felt numb, and I hastily shouted at the villagers: "Throw the snake into the fire and burn it, don't leave its corpse behind."

  The villagers responded immediately and threw the snake directly into the fire. With a crackling sound, a strong stench wafted from inside the house.

  And in the flames, I saw that snake's body twisting and turning into a pale-faced woman. The woman was drenched from head to toe, standing right in the middle of the fire.

  But just in a flash, the woman let out a shrill cry, and nothing was left of the fire.

  I turned my head at this time, and recited a spell of returning soul to the man who had just finished the operation on the bed. After a chant, a gust of yin wind blew through the house, and the man's soul returned to his body.

  But things didn't end there. After finishing the incantation, the man didn't wake up that quickly. I directly pulled him up from the bed and then heavily patted his back.

  At this moment, Hanzi let out a loud vomit, and a big lump of blood-red stuff came out of his mouth, looking like hair. But those things were tangled together, constantly twisting.

  My scalp felt a chill run down it as the man spat out a large pile of small red snakes.