Chapter Sixty: Lost (Part One)

  My body has already started to sweat, and if I hadn't seen the video on Niang's phone, I wouldn't have immediately connected the sentence I heard in my dream with the chicken soup in front of me. But now that Niang has watched that video called "Old Mansion", she knows even more than I do, so what she'll do next is uncertain. I don't know what the content after Chapter 55 says either. Thinking about her strange behavior on the way here makes me increasingly tense and fearful, to the point where for a moment I suspected Niang of being that author called "Sha Zi Mao", but I quickly dismissed my own idea - after all, there are some things that Niang absolutely can't know.

  But then I thought of a possibility, if there was someone who had been watching everything I did, and then told the story to my mother just like they provided me with material, and finally my mother wrote an ending, which would be carried out by that damned ancestor of mine, then everything would fall into place. If it were really so, what kind of ending would my mother have written? What's the deal with the voice in my dream?

  I felt as if I had fallen into an ice cave, and my mother seemed even more terrifying than those so-called ghosts in front of me. I raised my head and stared at her blankly. My mother noticed that something was wrong with me and asked: "Are you uncomfortable? Drinking chicken soup will make you feel better."

  A girl's words reminded me, and I immediately found an excuse for myself: "Yes, I feel a bit uncomfortable, maybe I caught a cold yesterday, seeing greasy things makes me lose my appetite, you just drink it yourself."

  I spoke while observing the expression of the mother, and the mother's complexion indeed changed slightly. I became more vigilant in my heart, but the mother did not force me afterwards, only telling me to rest well and seize the time to go to that place. After saying these words, she opened the thermos flask and poured out chicken soup for herself to drink.

  I couldn't help but pause, originally I thought that the old woman would put some kind of medicine in this chicken soup, and my mind was still hesitant about whether or not to follow her to the place she mentioned. Now seeing her drink it herself in front of me, it's clear that there's nothing wrong with this chicken soup. It's not like we're in a martial arts novel where you can just eat some antidote first. Could it be that the old woman really is just concerned about me? But I feel like this concern is too inexplicable, and I still can't forget the thermos next to her when I first saw her at the old mansion, not to mention that strange "don't drink" in my dream.

  Since I've already started pretending to be ill, I couldn't very well say that I'd set off immediately, so I continued with the act. Conveniently, the boss had someone come to repair the door, and I used the excuse of being a bit tired to return to my room and rest. I spent the whole night tossing and turning, unable to sleep, lying in bed thinking about what Mother's intentions were.

  After a night of contemplation, I have made up my mind to follow the woman to that place. Firstly, it's because I'm worried about the two old people. Secondly, if what I suspect is true - that she used someone else's material and wrote "The Old Mansion" under Miao's pen name - then the story she writes will be just like the one I originally wrote, and in the end, it will unfold according to her predetermined plot, and no one can escape. Since that's the case, I have no choice but to grit my teeth and follow her to that place to take a look.

  Auntie took me to leave the town by bus, and we transferred buses several times along the way. Each time I wrote down the place names because I didn't sleep well the night before, and this bus ride was a bit bumpy, so I unknowingly fell asleep. I don't know how long I slept, but I felt someone pushing me, opened my eyes, it was Auntie, she said: "We're here, get off the bus."

  I hastily stood up and the outside sky had gradually darkened. The station outside was very small, looking like a rural town. Anyway, I didn't recognize it, only remembering the place name.

  The more the old woman urged me, the more uneasy I felt in my heart. I touched my backpack, where I had bought an iron hammer and a fruit knife from a roadside stall while the old woman was buying tickets. Now, all luggage must be checked when entering or leaving the station, so I didn't dare to carry controlled knives. Besides, there's no way to buy them now. Having these things made me feel a little more at ease.

  A girl led the way in front, according to her words, a little further ahead and you have to climb mountains, cars can't get there either, I don't know where she got the strength from, she walked faster than me all the way, sometimes I even had to jog to keep up with her pace.

  A girl walked with me and talked to me. I had an impression that she was never so talkative before. She said, "Are you saying this place is good or not?"

  I panted and replied: "What's good about this broken mountain? Except for the fresh air, there's nothing good about it."

  One of the girls seemed a bit angry at my response and said: "What's wrong with this place? I think it's fine, or you can just stay here."

  All around, except for the sound of mountain wind and a few insect calls, there was no other sound. Sometimes silence is the most terrifying horror. In order not to be awkward, I casually responded with an "okay", and my mother seemed very happy, her footsteps also quickened a lot, but I became even more tired.

  The sky was getting darker and the terrain steeper, it seemed to be heading towards the mountain top. The ground started to become uneven and difficult to walk on, I was one foot deep and one foot shallow, unable to keep up with Yiniang's speed. I called out: "Yiniang, wait for me."

  But it seemed like my mother hadn't heard my voice, and instead walked even faster. From the moment the sky completely darkened, she gradually became silent, no longer speaking to me, and seemed very familiar with this place, as if she could walk with her eyes closed. The darkness had no effect on her. After returning from the old house, we both bought new clothes, but my mother still chose a red long dress. As the sky grew darker, I turned on my flashlight, and the dry grass on the mountain was over half a person high. I could only vaguely catch glimpses of my mother's red figure, with more darkness and dry grass swaying in the mountain wind.

  I stared intently at the figure of Yiniang, afraid that I would lose sight of her if I blinked. But after just a few steps, I had to lower my head to check the road underfoot. When I raised my head again, I suddenly found that I could no longer see Yiniang's figure in front of me. I hastily shouted out her name several times, but the only responses were the mountain wind and the cries of some unknown wild beast.

  I started to panic, took out my phone, and found that there was no signal again. I could only walk in the direction of where I remembered my mother going, while loudly calling out her name, but it seemed as if she had vanished from this mountain, without leaving any news or sound.

  Just then, the phone suddenly rang, and I was startled by this sudden sound, but immediately overjoyed. It was my mother's mobile phone ringing. I looked down at my own phone and saw that it had a signal now. At this point, I didn't care about anything else and hurriedly walked in the direction of the ringtone.

  Perhaps it was because the mountain was too quiet, so the ringing had to travel a bit further. Although I clearly heard the sound and started walking towards it, there was still quite some distance. Fortunately, the ringing continued, indicating that the person must have been looking for Yini with an urgent matter. I didn't think much about why Yini wasn't answering her phone. As the ringing grew louder, I saw the flashing light of the mobile phone and faintly caught a glimpse of Yini's red long dress. My heart finally settled down, and I hurriedly ran towards that direction.

  At this time the mobile phone ring finally stopped, but I was also close to that place, I panted and said: "Yi Niang, why are you walking so fast? Who made this call? You didn't even answer it."

  The girl didn't respond, and I suddenly felt that something was off. The bright light from the phone seemed to be coming from the ground rather than a normal person's hand height, and the girl's long skirt seemed shorter than usual, as if she wasn't standing but rather crouching down. My heart turned cold, fearing that something unexpected had happened to her. I quickened my pace and walked up to her. The moment my flashlight shone on the red dress, I felt like I'd fallen into an ice cave, my whole body turning icy cold.

  That was indeed a red long dress that Mother wore, but now it's not on Mother's body, it's draped over a mound of earth.

  My hands started shaking uncontrollably, had something unexpected happened to my mother? I took out the knife and hammer from my backpack, then carefully reached out to take down the red long dress. I had to find my mother. Just as I was about to bend down to pick up the phone, my flashlight shone on the tombstone of this mound, and in an instant, I saw clearly the photo of the person on the tombstone.

  That's a photo of my mother, she is smiling at me.

  A desolate mountain, a mound of earth, everything is just like in my dream. The only difference is that the woman in the photo doesn't have a mouthful of blood-red teeth. On the tombstone are written many words, the person inside is called Ye Shufen, I know this is the formal name of my mother-in-law, and above it is written her date of death, which was three months ago.

  Every hair on my body stood up, if the person lying here was a woman, then who was the person with me for the past two days? Was it a ghost of a woman? Why else would she be so familiar with this place? I already believed that ghosts existed in this world, but I didn't know why the woman brought me here or why she used this method to bring me here. Moreover, three months ago, Er Liang had not yet been born, was it possible that the woman at that time was no longer a woman?

  I stood there blankly, recalling the words a woman said to me along the way. The chill in my heart grew stronger. She had always wanted me to stay in this place, and I had agreed to her. Would my life end like this?

  Just then, a thought flashed through my mind and I suddenly remembered something very important. I hastily bent down to pick up the phone of one of the mothers, hurriedly opened it, found "The Old Mansion" book, clicked in and quickly flipped through the pages. Then, I finally saw the words written after Chapter 55.