Chapter Twenty Midnight Fright

  The night fell gradually over the entire Yinyang Village, as darkness invaded, the silent Wangmang Ridge mountain surged out waves of thick fog, covering the mountains and forests. The cold and damp air spread out, causing the temperature around to drop suddenly.

  Nan San and the others hid in a dilapidated wooden hut, not daring to light a fire, fearing that the flames would attract some kind of evil spirit. In the darkness, the three of them held their breath, their spirits tense, the silence was so still that they could even feel the sound of their own heartbeats. Nan San ordered Liu Suo Chang and Xi Zai to stay inside the hut, no matter what sounds they heard, not to come out. The two naturally obeyed, in this dark and eerie place, who dared to wander around randomly?

  Nan San, however, was close to the gate, vigilantly staring at the gap outside. When night fell, Nan San, who had been in a light sleep, suddenly heard footsteps and low growls coming from outside, as if someone was dragging something while walking. Under this circumstance, neither Xi Zi nor Liu Suo Long had the mood to sleep anymore, and they fearfully asked Nan San what was going on.

  Nan San hastily made a silencing gesture, then peeked out through the gap in the door. In the pitch-black night, outside was dead silent, with only a solitary altar standing alone, and there wasn't anything strange or unusual at all.

  But just now, what was that sound? Nan San took a closer look again, and at this moment, he suddenly heard a faint female voice on the altar, gasping for breath, as if calling for help. He hastily fixed his eyes to take a look, and with this one glance, Nan San could no longer remain calm, hurriedly bursting out of the door and rushing straight towards the altar.

  Why was Nan San in such a hurry? It turned out that on the altar at this moment, a little girl was lying helplessly struggling on it. Above her was a guillotine, as if being manipulated by an invisible force, slowly falling down. If it continued, the little girl would probably be cut in two. Nan San could see at a glance that the little girl was a normal person and couldn't just sit back and do nothing. Seeing how frail she looked in the moonlight, he hastily went out.

  With a flick of his right hand, the wooden sword stabbed fiercely at the guillotine's edge, and a shrill, eerie cry pierced the night air. The guillotine's downward momentum came to an abrupt halt as Nan San leapt forward, landing beside the little girl and swiftly untying her bonds. Her face was deathly pale, her entire body trembling violently, her eyes tightly shut - it was clear she had been terrified out of her wits.

  Nan San saw that the little girl was fine, and slightly let out a breath of relief. He then stared intently at a certain spot below the altar, his eyes cold and sharp as he said, "No matter what kind of ghost or monster you are, human sacrifice is an evil custom. Why must you continue to slaughter innocent lives?"

  As soon as the words were spoken, a strange and eerie long laugh was heard, and a dark wind rushed towards Nan San. He let out a cold hum, took out the yin-yang pen, drew a few strokes in mid-air, and then shouted loudly, pointing the yin-yang pen in a certain direction. A puff of green smoke rose up. This move by Nan San was a kind of Taoist magic symbol that could be quickly cast, but its only drawback was that it didn't have much destructive power.

  After the green smoke passed, a virtual shadow appeared at the edge of the altar. Before Nan San could see what kind of ghost was haunting, he saw the shadow suddenly leave the ground and run towards the depths of the mountain.

  Seeing this, Nan San hurriedly rushed down from the altar, and Zhao Xizi and Liu Suozhang shouted: "You two quickly protect the girl well, I'll go catch that ghost thing!" After finishing, he hastily chased in the direction where the figure disappeared.

  In the darkness, Liu Suo and Xi Zi were unclear about what had just happened, but they guessed it wasn't a good thing. They heard Nan San say this and were all stunned - where was there a little girl? They hurriedly turned on their flashlights and only then discovered that there was a small girl on the altar, while Nan San had already disappeared without a trace.

  "Where's Third Brother?" Xi Zi looked around, Liu Suo Chang thought for a moment and said: "He must have gone chasing after him, I think we should stay inside first and wait for San to come back before doing anything!"

  But they didn't realize that as soon as San Yi left, the feng shui of Yinyang Village began to change again. By the time San Yi reacted, it was too late. He looked back and thought to himself, "This is not good." Earlier, he had been so focused on chasing after that ghostly thing that he had forgotten about Liu Suozhang and Xi Zhi. These two people didn't know any Daoist techniques, nor could they read the feng shui. Leaving them behind would only lead to disaster.

  Nan San furrowed his brow, and by the time he turned back, it was already too late. Even if he used a compass to calculate, it would take some time. He could only hold up his wooden sword and move forward cautiously. Perhaps it was the darkness that blocked his way, Nan San took out a talisman, pinched his fingers together, and ignited it. Under the faint light of the flame, he saw a shocking scene.

  This is a dense forest of pagoda trees, with lush branches stretching out in all directions. San discovered that the trees seemed to be quite old, with thick trunks that required two people to hug them tightly. But what truly shocked him was the objects hanging from the tree trunks - corpse after corpse, suspended above, some horizontal, some vertical, each with a different expression, but all sharing one thing in common: their tongues were sticking out, and their necks had been stretched by the rope to an unnatural length.

  A drop of fresh blood fell from the fingertips of the corpse, merging into the mud, filling the entire pagoda tree forest with a strong bloody smell. Nan San hastily cast the fire talisman spell, and three talismans were released, briefly illuminating the pagoda tree forest. In the flash of light, his heart skipped a beat as he saw that the corpses were scattered all over, roughly estimated to be two or three hundred bodies, seemingly having died not long ago.

  Nan San thought of the villagers who had disappeared from the village, and his heart was filled with horror. He stared at the corpses with a difficult expression, thinking that these bodies might be those of the villagers. The purpose of their trip was to see if they could stop the disaster, but unfortunately, everything was too late. The villagers were hanged alive in this locust tree forest, and no one survived. Perhaps the little girl was lucky. Nan San quickly counted with his fingers and found that the corpses had been dead for six days, and he finally felt a slight relief in his heart.

  After all, there is a saying that people die on the seventh day. If these corpses are not buried and rituals are not performed after seven days, they will probably become lonely ghosts. Even so, Nan San can still feel the heavy yin energy in this place, coupled with the fact that the pagoda tree belongs to yin, making people's bodies cold all over.

  Nan San gazed at the scene before him with a sorrowful expression, it was the first time he had seen such a tragic scene since he started practicing Taoism. He fell silent for a moment, even forgetting about the ghostly shadow. After a long while, he finally spoke up: "Although you died unjustly, in order to prevent your corpses from becoming zombies, Nan San has committed a sin here, I hope you can rest in peace in the underworld."

  After finishing speaking, Nan San planned to burn down the pagoda tree forest with fire, but suddenly saw a figure standing on the pagoda tree, revealing a pair of blood-red eyes. The firelight shone directly on his face, and Nan San's expression was stunned. What stood above was a black cat, to be precise, a one-legged black cat. If not for those blood-red eyes that revealed an evil aura, it would have been no different from ordinary domestic cats.

  The sudden appearance of the black cat made Nan San dare not move, who knew what strange place this cat had, and hurriedly put on a defensive posture. Just as he did so, the black cat suddenly let out a "meow" and quickly jumped onto another tree trunk.

  Nan San hastily made a gesture of warding off evil, thinking the black cat was going to attack him, but he was wrong. The black cat's eyes were fixed tightly on something behind him, its fur standing on end as if it had encountered some arch-nemesis.

  As soon as he saw the black cat's expression, Nan San hastily turned his head to look back, behind him was a dense forest as black as ink, and the village of Yinyang had long since disappeared from view. But his eyes were fixed tightly on the forest, his expression serious: "What kind of ghost or monster are you? Why don't you come out?"

  As soon as the voice fell, a rustling sound came from the dense forest, and a figure jumped out of the forest. When he saw clearly, Nan San exclaimed in surprise: "Xi Zi, how did you get in!"

  It turned out to be Xi Zǐ, but Nan San wasn't clear how he got there. He just saw him smiling foolishly and saying: "This isn't Liu Suǒzhǎng worrying about you, so he called me over to take a look. He's outside taking care of that little girl!"

  Nan San nodded, looked deeply at Xi Zi, then turned around to look for the black cat, but was surprised to find that it had disappeared from the tree trunk. He hastily searched around and Xi Zi asked: "What's wrong, Third Brother, what are you looking for?"

  Nan San shook his head and said: "Nothing, let's burn this place down and get out of here quickly!"

  Just as Nan San was about to burn the pagoda forest with incense, the numerous corpses hanging above suddenly trembled and then wildly swayed back and forth like they had come back to life. They let out mournful wails, like a hundred ghosts marching at night. The people who heard it felt their hearts turn cold, Xi Zi was immediately frightened and cried out in alarm, his face turning pale in an instant.

  "Third brother, let's hurry up and get out of here, this place is too eerie!" Xi Zi was trembling as he looked at the corpses, his legs were a bit numb.

  Nan San nodded three times, burned the talisman in his hand and threw it forward, then shouted: "Run quickly!"

  The flames spread like a fuse, instantly engulfing a large number of locust trees. For a time, the sound of shattering wood and the screams of the dead intertwined, making one's hair stand on end. As for why the flames were so fast, there was another reason - the locust tree is yin, a thing of the element of fire, which Daoists call a "ghost tree" and consider an unlucky tree. Therefore, this fire was one of its greatest enemies.

  Seeing that the place was about to become a sea of flames, Nan San dragged Xi Zi and ran, but before they could take two steps, the corpse hanging above suddenly had its rope burned through, and with a "thud" it fell down. However, it didn't die completely, and still charged at them with its body stiff. Nan San hastily told Xi Zi to use her big knife to deal with it, as his talismanic techniques were no longer effective, and he was afraid that if they didn't get close, they would already be burned.

  Xi Zi didn't hesitate, although she was scared, but at the critical moment, she didn't falter, holding a big knife and chopping these mutated corpses in two. Nan San didn't understand, this corpse obviously hadn't reached the point of mutation yet, how could it be like this? He suddenly thought of the black cat from earlier and suddenly realized. It was clear that the black cat was playing tricks, if not for its meow, things wouldn't have turned out so badly.

  "Third brother, this is too much! My hand is numb from chopping!" Xi Zi was drenched in sweat, and after resolving one with a knife, he couldn't withstand the batch of mutated corpses and hastily retreated.

  Nan San was getting anxious, retreating, but the road had already been blocked. The left and right sides were densely packed with corpses and a sea of flames. The only way out was forward. Although he didn't know what dangers lay ahead, for now, he couldn't worry about it. He hastily shouted to Xi Zhi: "Quickly run towards the front!"

  Two men rushed out of the pagoda tree forest with a big fire on their heads.