Chapter Ten: The Mysterious House

  The wild grass in this thicket is not too tall, and it's not too tiring to walk through, but we're all extremely vigilant in our hearts. Walking like this, there's also a kind of indescribable fatigue.

  Following the map, we arrived at the foot of a mountain, turned around a bend and came across a stone house.

  It's unbelievable that a residential area can appear in such a desolate place, and judging from the map, Hei Zi is nearby, almost within sight. There's no sign of him anywhere else, so he's probably hiding in this stone house.

  Lu Yufeng put away the wireless communicator and said to us, "It's unclear what dangers are inside, let's gear up with our weapons first and listen for my orders."

  The two of us nodded, and Panzi and I took out our batons. The contact person pulled out an electric baton from his pant leg.

  Lu Yifeng didn't need to prepare anything, his watch was his weapon. The two of us followed him to the stone house, I thought we had to knock on the door, but Lu Yifeng gently pushed it and found that it wasn't locked, it opened automatically.

  We didn't rush inside, and Lu Yifeng shouted towards the interior, "Is anyone there?"

  No one answered. After a while, Lu Yifeng shouted again, "Heizi?"

  The house was still quiet and empty, Lu Yifeng gestured for us to enter.

  Before, I was blocked by Lu Yifeng and couldn't see what the room looked like. Now that the view has widened, I took a good look around.

  This is a room inside and outside, the inner house doesn't know what it looks like, just talking about this outer room, it's paved with inferior floorboards, some places are cracked, there are no windows, more than ten oil lamps are hung on the roof, all of which are still lit, although each lamp's light is not strong, but together, they also illuminate the house with a yellowish glow.

  In a corner, two plaster statues are lined up. If I didn't know in advance that there was a problem here, just looking at the plaster statues, I would have thought this was an artist's residence.

  These two plaster statues are particularly vivid, one of which is thin and slender, with a very round face, making a gesture of playing with a mobile phone. The other statue has a strong physique, with a beard on his face, and scars can be seen on his neck, cheeks and arms.

  I didn't think there was anything, but Lu Yifeng and the contact person were both quite nervous, especially the contact person, who couldn't help but open the electric baton and gave a few loud zaps.

  I looked at the person in charge with a puzzled expression, and Lu Yifeng pointed to the plaster statue and said, "It's almost identical to a real person, not only in height, but also in body proportions."

  Pan Zi didn't react and asked again, "Who do they look like?"

  But I suddenly turned around, and my heart was still jumping wildly, I thought of the thin ghost and the knife guest, and even a more absurd idea, this plaster statue is a real person!

  Lu Yu Feng made a gesture to remain vigilant, and then walked forward. However, after just a few steps, he stepped on a rotten floorboard and his entire body sank down slightly.

  Under its weight, the rotten floor also overflows with some thick yellow **.

  We don't know what this is, so we're all carefully watching. Lu Yu Feng wants to take my slingshot and dips it in a bit before picking it up again for closer inspection.

  He knew what he was talking about and said with certainty, "It's gasoline, just a low concentration."

  As soon as I heard it was oil, I looked up at the oil lamps on my head and thought to myself, "This thing can't fall down, or else this house will catch fire." However, looking at the lock chain hanging from the oil lamp, I think unless there's a massive earthquake, such a pessimistic phenomenon won't occur.

  We didn't care much and walked a few more steps together, gathering beside the plaster statue.

  Lu Yifeng took out a spring knife and scratched the thin plaster statue a few times. He was scratching at the hand that made the phone call, although the blade was very sharp, he used a light force.

  I thought it would just scrape off a layer of plaster, but who could have imagined that the plaster hand suddenly loosened and broke off at the wrist, falling down with a thud.

  This is nothing, the plaster hand fell off, I clearly saw that the fracture was a person's broken wrist, especially the blood vessels and muscle tissue inside, fully presented in front of me.

  My prophecy has come true, this is a corpse, only its exterior was coated with a thin layer of plaster.

  Pan Zi let out a startled hum, but Lu Yu Feng immediately made a silencing motion to calm him down. A Feng appeared very calm and even squatted down to pick up the severed hand.

  He punched a few punches at it, and the plaster on top was completely shattered. After cleaning up, the entire hand was exposed without any cover in front of us.

  I mainly looked at the wrist cut, and the wound was very neat, without even a hair edge, this must have been cut off with a particularly sharp weapon.

  Lu Yifeng didn't hesitate, touching the severed hand, he looked up at the plaster statue and said, "Xigu Brothers, take care!"

  It's no longer necessary for either of us to remind each other of anything else. Besides, that plaster statue must be a killer.

  The go-between was very active, he used an electric baton to tap the plaster statue of the knife guest's head, wanting to reveal the true face before his death. Coincidentally, with this tap, the plaster statue's head fell off and shattered on the ground, shattering all the external plaster.

  The knife guest died even more miserably, beheaded. I covered my chest with my hand, trying to make my heart feel better, and forced myself to lower my head and take a look.

  I and Pan Zi didn't have deep feelings with these two special line men, but Lu Yu Feng and the contact person were different. A hateful feeling gradually appeared on their faces. Lu Yu Feng even gritted his teeth and said to the contact person, "Make a phone call, ask for backup!"

  The matchmaker took action. Lu Yifeng didn't care about his dirty hands, rubbed his temples hard and led us into the inner room again.

  The space in the inner room is very small, with only a folding bed and a small cabinet, which makes it feel cramped.

  We came looking for Heizi, but so far, we haven't found any trace of him. Lu Yifeng gazed at the cabinet and suddenly burst out laughing coldly. I knew what he was thinking.

  I'm afraid that when he opens the cabinet and sees Heizi's body, it will be even more distressing for a moment, so I'll just do this myself.

  I first pulled Lu Yifeng back a few steps, then I went forward again, pulling on the cabinet handle, and slowly opened it.

  I had already mentally prepared myself, but when the cabinet door opened a crack, I was still startled. Suddenly, a face stuck to it, pressed against the gap, and all I saw was one eye staring blankly at us, wide open and lifeless.

  I took a few deep breaths and pulled the cabinet door open some more. Gradually, Hei Zi's corpse came into view before us. There were no other injuries on his body, only a thick iron wire hanging around his neck, apparently he had been strangled to death.

  Yesterday when I met Heizi, he was still standing in front of us, full of life. Who would have thought that just one day later, he would be separated from us by the boundary between life and death.

  A sense of sadness welled up in my heart, and as I looked back along Hei Zi's body, I saw that there were two more spirit tablets placed there.

  I suddenly thought of the revenge killing, and the murderer was avenging the person on the spirit tablet. This is an important clue, so I opened all the cabinet doors and wanted to reach in and take out those two spirit tablets.

  I found something strange, this spirit tablet seems to be fixed in place, I couldn't move it at all. I felt curious, even growing up so big, I've never seen anyone nail a spirit tablet to the cabinet.

  During my daze, Panzi suddenly gained courage and stretched out his hand to grab the spirit tablet. With a loud "crack", he pulled it out with his great strength.

  I see that both sides of this spirit tablet are blank and there is no name written on it, but at the bottom of the spirit tablet, a broken iron wire is connected.

  I was still thinking about what's so special about it, but Ah Feng suddenly reacted.

  His face changed color and he didn't even bother to look at Hei Zi's corpse anymore. He shouted loudly at us, "Run!"

  My heart skipped a beat as I thought to myself, could it be that Ah Feng's words triggered some kind of mechanism?

  The two of us rushed out, at this time the contact person had just finished the phone call and was about to enter the house. The four of us blocked each other at the door, and Afeng shouted again before the contact person came back to his senses.

  With this delay, we were a step late. By the time we rushed to the stone house door, a iron grille suddenly appeared beside the wall and locked the door completely.

  At first glance at this iron railing, I was taken aback. Suddenly I thought of a prison, and isn't this stone house now our prison for the four of us?

  It's not over yet, the iron chain of more than a dozen oil lamps also broke mysteriously, and after these dozen oil lamps fell down, they made a loud noise, causing the whole room to catch fire instantly.

  The floor was originally covered with oil, and the fire suddenly became much stronger, with flames reaching as high as knee level in some areas.

  The four of us, even if we wanted to put out the fire, it would be like trying to put out a raging inferno with a cup of water. Now we're all anxious, no one needs to lead, and we all rush to the iron railing, pulling and kicking each other to get there.

  The iron fence was very sturdy, each one as thick as a child's arm, and we couldn't shake it at all. Moreover, after the fire started, the house was filled with thick smoke, and the two of us originally had a cold, our throats were not good, this time even more so, we both started coughing violently.

  I pounded my chest and rushed to Ah Feng's side, shouting at him if he had any other good ideas, trying them out while I still hadn't died, maybe there was a way to survive.

  Lu Yifeng gave up on the iron fence, looked at the stone wall, a fierce look appeared on his face, and he suddenly rushed out, jumped up and violently collided with it using his shoulder.

  He used all his strength, and this collision was quite a shock, but the wall didn't budge, while he covered his shoulder, weakly leaning against the wall.

  I reckon he got hurt quite badly in just this one go.

  I didn't give up and called out to Panzi. The two of us joined forces, aiming at the spot where Ah Feng had crashed into earlier, and charged forward again with our shoulders.

  But it was all in vain, and we two were just like Ah Feng, rubbing our numb right shoulders and humming.

  The contact person stood against the wall, I really didn't think this man who looked like a scholar would have any skills, I thought if we two had no way out, he could only follow us to wait for death.

  But at the critical moment, he actually showed his face.