Chapter 4: Daring

  Both hands pressed down on the old lady's hands, saying that no matter what, they couldn't let her palms turn over, and their body had to press down hard on the old lady's body. I could feel the old lady trying to exert force to straighten up her body. It turned out that playing dead was real, and there really was such a thing. How did that stiff hand have so much strength? I almost couldn't hold on anymore. My left wrist hurt terribly, and I suspected it might be dislocated. If this continued, I feared I wouldn't be able to hold on for long.

  Fortunately, after a brief panic, Fat Dog and Zhu Zi Ge, who were notorious for their bravery in the village, got up from the ground, gritted their teeth, and rushed over. In an instant, they pounced on Second Master's body, pressing him down so hard that he let out a muffled groan and cursed: "You two little rascals want to crush me to death? Why don't you go press down the old lady instead? You're killing me!"

  The two of them finally scrambled to get out of the way, and Second Master used all his strength to hold down the struggling old lady. It's no wonder that Fat Dog and Zhu Zi Ge were able to eat so much - they had a lot of energy. With their help, I could hardly feel the old lady's upward thrusts. Fat Dog even took over from Second Master in holding down one of her hands, pressing it down tightly, and indeed she didn't move at all, unlike Second Master who was red in the face from exertion.

  Fat dog replaced the second master, and the second master finally had time to catch his breath. He thought about ways to deal with the fake corpse. Fortunately, old people often talked about these things, and the second master still remembered them until now. He quickly turned his head towards Yang Ersheng: "Ersheng, hurry up and find a rope, the longer and thicker the better. What are you standing there for, waiting for your mother to come back and look for you?"

  Yang Ersheng shivered all over, his whole body trembling like an egg, but he was a bit stronger than his younger brother and didn't wet his pants. His face turned as white as an old lady's, his mouth opened several times, but he was speechless, only making "heh heh" sounds in his throat. He stared at Second Master but still didn't move, completely frightened out of his wits. Seeing him made me realize that my own courage was actually quite great.

  The Second Master stomped his foot in anger, and didn't even bother to greet Yang Ersheng again. He turned around and walked into the house, reminding us: "You must hold on tight, our lives will depend on you tonight, I'm going inside to find some rope."

  The second master went to find the rope, leaving us to use all our might and the old lady's strength. The power that bursts out when people are in crisis is unimaginable. The dead have no doubt great strength, which is hard to imagine, but with my small body, I firmly pressed down on the hand that kept trying to turn over. As for the much stronger fat dog, it's even more unimaginable. With a 200-pound body pressing down on the old lady, it was like a small mountain. Brother Zhu didn't want to show weakness either, and firmly pinned down the other hand. I was impressed by Brother Zhu's strength, which was so great that he could use such force in this critical moment. All I saw was Brother Zhu's body swaying, and then he fell to the ground, still holding onto one of the old lady's hands. In the chaos, Brother Zhu had actually managed to pull the old lady's hand off.

  Holding the old lady's bloody and mangled hand, Zhuzi Ge looked a bit stunned. Seeing me staring at him, he couldn't think of anything to say, and muttered: "Haizi, her hand... it came off, what do we do?"

  "What to do, come quickly and hold down the arm, the old lady wants to get up, fatty dog brother, press down hard, I don't want to die yet——" I scolded Zhu Zi Ge, at this time I couldn't care that he was actually much older than me, nor did I have time to be afraid of the dead man's palm in his hand. In order to save my life, I had already forgotten about fear and terror, and at this moment I didn't have the same fear as before.

  Zhu Zi Ge's brain had already been frightened to the point of not being in charge, listening to my scolding, he was startled, and subconsciously got up, pounced over, gritted his teeth and pressed down on the old lady. Sometimes when people are afraid to the extreme, they become fearless. The three of us were all in this situation, we were afraid but also beyond fear, what should happen would still happen, so we just let go and didn't fear anymore.

  Soon, I saw the second master coming out of the house with a dark face, but in his hand there was only a sheet except for a rope. Who knows what kind of evil spirit the second master is playing? However, I know that I am about to collapse, and my hands are almost dislocated from competing with the old lady, and my fingers have no sensation. I couldn't help but call out to the second master: "Second Master, I'm about to collapse, what should we do?"

  The Second Master let out a bitter laugh, shook the quilt in his hand and threw it onto the spiritual bed, only to find that it was still not long enough. The embarrassed Second Master's face turned red with rage, he gritted his teeth, turned around and quickly walked towards Yang Ersheng. At this time, Yang Ersheng and Yang Chuanming were both still in a daze, clearly still unable to shake off the fear. But this was normal, compared to them, we three brave ones were somewhat abnormal.

  He walked up to Yang Ersheng and shouted in a low, urgent tone: "Ersheng, Ersheng, wake up, you bastard! Tell me where the rope is at home. This is a matter of life and death. If your mother wakes up, she'll disown us all, and the whole village will be unlucky with you. Hurry up and say something!"

  Yang Ersheng was completely deaf to the warning, which made Second Master furious. A sharp glint flashed in his eyes, and he gritted his teeth, no longer caring about anything else. With a swift motion, he slapped Yang Ersheng's face with a loud crack. One slap wasn't enough to wake him up, so Second Master continued to rain down slap after slap, determined to rouse Yang Ersheng. If he couldn't find the rope tonight, things might not end well.

  At this moment, Yang Chuanming's miserable cry had already startled the two madams and a group of children in the front yard. Of course, they were not really children, almost none of them were younger than me, except for Yang Xiufeng and Yang Qiming from the second branch, who were only two years younger than me. Naturally, when they heard their father's miserable cry, they all came to the back yard together to see what was happening. As soon as they entered the door, they saw Second Master Liu fiercely punching and kicking Yang Ersheng, almost beating him to death. Seeing this, Yang Ersheng's wife and children definitely wouldn't stand for it, especially Yang Ersheng's fierce wife, who was the first to shout: "Liu Xianzhou, you're crazy! How dare you hit my husband? I'll fight you to the end!"

  As soon as the voice fell, the 150-160 catty heavy man rushed towards Second Master Yang with a loud shout. The ground shook and the high-decibel voice echoed through the quiet night village, causing many villagers to turn on their lights, guessing that they wanted to come out and see the excitement. After all, in the dull mountain village, there was usually nothing worth paying attention to, let alone a fight between two families, and people would still gather to watch the commotion. How could it be that tonight, when the Yang family was holding a funeral, Second Master Yang had a fight with Yang Ersheng? This must be a spectacular show to watch.

  It just so happened that Yang's wife shouted loudly, and Second Master stopped his hand. At the same time, Yang Ersheng also woke up. He was frightened and didn't feel anything about Second Master hitting him. Instead, he remembered the rope that Second Master had asked for earlier. He let out a strange cry, jumped up from the ground, and ran outside quickly, which scared Second Master.

  Yang Ersheng suddenly let out a strange cry, jumped up and turned around to run. He was so quick that he rushed past his wife's side like a whirlwind. Before the Yang family could react, he had already disappeared from sight, leaving no one knowing what he was going to do. The woman wanted to stretch out her hand to grab Yang Ersheng, but ended up grasping at nothing, and cried out in confusion: "Husband, what's wrong with you?"

  Yang Ersheng ignored them and disappeared, leaving the Yang family staring at each other in confusion. Yang Chuanming's wife and two sons didn't have time to deal with their family matters because Yang Chuanming was still clutching his leg and wailing in pain, unsure of what had happened. His wife rushed over with their two sons and hugged Yang Chuanming, who was so distressed that he was almost crying. No matter how much they shouted at him, Yang Chuanming just kept wailing and didn't say a word.

  Of course, there's something even more surprising. Let alone the second master, originally invited to keep vigil, fat dog Zhuzi and temporary substitute me, three people were like crazy, pressed on the old lady's body, one by one gritting their teeth, suffocating with a red face.

  Actually, these things are quite complicated, but it's just a matter of time. The second master took a deep breath and walked forward, grabbing the fat woman's hand, which scared her to death. She thought the second master was going to flirt with her, didn't you see three shameless perverts lying on the spiritual bed? As a result, before the second master could speak, the fat woman reacted and slapped him in the face, causing the words that were about to come out of his mouth to be slapped back. The old and weak second master couldn't withstand the fat woman's slap, and he fell to the ground dazed. The fat woman stood with her hands on her hips, looking like a typical evil wife, pointing at the second master and scolding: "You old shameless thing, thinking of taking advantage of me, believe it or not, I'll beat you to death!"

  Second Master, this is a grievance! This fat woman doesn't even consider her own dignity. To say something unpleasant, it's just that Yang Ersheng was blind to have chosen her; otherwise, all the women in the world would have died out, and men would rather become bachelors. To say something even more vulgar, they wouldn't even dare to take a piss and look at their own reflection. Unfortunately, I really can't care about Second Master right now, because I'm really about to collapse.

  The old lady's struggling grew stronger and stronger, to the point where my hands had no feeling left. My eyes stared at her as I was about to hold on no longer. I gritted my teeth and pressed down with all my might, but unfortunately, there was a fat dog brother blocking me, so I couldn't reach her chest. I could only press down towards her upper body. However, after pressing down, I realized that I had made the wrong choice. My face and the old lady's face were almost touching, and that distorted face was right in front of my eyes. To make matters worse, I forgot to close my eyes and just stared blankly at the old lady, seeing my own reflection in her eyes, as well as flames burning fiercely within them.