Chapter 2 The First Corpse-Carrying

  My heart is stuck in my throat, I feel like I'm having trouble breathing, my heart feels like it's being clenched by an invisible giant hand, constantly compressing, getting tighter and tighter.

  "This is a humble abode, don't come casually unless necessary, even if you sense something, pretend to be unaware." Xiang Rihua spoke up, and I, feeling like I was going to die, suddenly relaxed my entire body, panting heavily as if struggling to survive.

  His words surprised me, and I stared blankly at the sunflower in front of me, which seemed to know what had just happened to me. But what was a small flat house?

  "I asked: 'What is a small flat house?' He didn't answer me, just told me to follow closely. I turned around and looked back, my fear growing as I quickened my pace to catch up."

  As I walked past the small bungalow, my vision suddenly cleared up, and I saw the old man guarding the door again. The old man was also looking at me, his originally dull eyes suddenly became spirited, and his tightly closed mouth suddenly added a strange smile.

  That smile carried a sense of triumph and mockery, as if there was also a hint of cunning and sadistic pleasure...

  I don't know how to describe it either, but his smile makes me very uncomfortable, and I even wonder if I'll have nightmares tonight.

  Then met the cleaning aunt, a woman in her fifties.

  When the aunt saw me, her originally dull eyes became bright like the gatekeeper's, and her posture of sweeping the floor changed to staring at me.

  She stared at me, her mouth opening and closing as if she was saying something. And! She even turned her face to the side and talked to the air, gesturing with her hands and feet as if there was someone next to her, chatting away...

  After walking this section of road, my heart is uneasy and my hands and feet are shaking slightly.

  Everyone here is filled with a strange and eerie aura, weird and bizarre. This also makes me wonder again if it was the wrong choice to come to the crematorium to carry coffins.

  Xiangrikua didn't lead me inside, but outside, which made my nerves tense again. Seeing those people just now, everything here makes me fearful.

  I asked him where he was going to take me, and he said it depends on fate.

  I was busy and curious, so I asked him again, but he didn't respond to me anymore and just walked his own way. I called out to him a few more times, but unfortunately, there was no reaction. This made me even more curious about Hyuga, and suddenly, the image of his pale face and an inexplicable sense of deathly silence on his body flashed through my mind. At that moment, I buried many questions in my heart.

  I want to leave here, turn around and run away immediately, leaving this ghost place. But as soon as I think that I have no money, no place to live, and nothing to eat. I have to tell myself to stay again.

  Just work for a few days, just work for a few days. Once I have money, I won't look back and will immediately leave this godforsaken place.

  He said that fortune-telling is really about reading one's fate, and it was in a wooden house on the mountain opposite the crematorium, which was on the verge of collapse, that he met a young woman.

  Her name is Meng Yao, about 24 years old. Her eyebrows are clear and her eyes are beautiful, with a temperament that stands out from the crowd, making people can't help but take a second look. She's the one who reads my fortune.

  I thought it was an old man or something, but in fact it completely exceeded my expectations. From the corpse-carrying Yang Hua to the present Meng Yao, they are all so young.

  "Newcomer?" Meng Yao asked.

  Xiang Rihua nodded and then turned around and left the house, leaving only me and Meng Yao.

  "She asked: 'Date of birth, time.'"

  I said: "Born on the evening of January 15th in the lunar calendar, year of the tiger, 1986."

  She said: "Life is tough, can carry a corpse."

  Xiang Rihua came in again and said it was okay to just pretend to be tough, letting me follow him back to carry the corpse.

  All along I was full of doubts, the dream jade in front of me said that my fate is strong, but what does having a strong fate have to do with carrying corpses? I asked: "If my fate isn't strong, can't I carry corpses?"

  Xiang Rihua looked at me coldly, Meng Yao also looked at me with a light and airy expression. He said, "You're not afraid of being played to death by ghosts since you don't have a hard life?"

  His words gave me a feeling of being out of body for the first time, my feet were cold, and I jumped to my back, while stuttering: "Ghost? Is there a ghost? Don't scare me."

  Meng Yao smiled slightly.

  She said, "People born in the year of the tiger are not very good at fate. You're also a big tiger in the first month, coinciding with the fifteenth day of burning incense, and it's at night. Don't worry, your fate is even harder than his." Meng Yao pointed at Xiang Ronghua, then stopped talking, staring blankly at the door, lost in thought.

  Hearing this, I felt slightly relieved.

  At least my life is tougher than this damn Hydrangea, he's fine, what can happen to me? Besides, Liu Pangzi also said, just top a few days of class. Mix for a few days and I'll be gone, who cares about what ghosts or not?

  Xiangri Hua took me back to the crematorium. This time on the way back, he actually said a few words to me.

  There are many types of workers in crematoriums, including incineration technicians who burn corpses. They are also known as furnace workers and mainly work in the incineration room where temperatures can reach 1000 degrees Celsius. There are also morticians who make up the deceased and reassemble fragmented bodies.

  Cleaning and being on duty must be included.

  He just told me mainly about the cremator and the mortician, and reminded me not to be too curious while working here, just focus on carrying the corpses, don't talk nonsense.

  After eating, I rested for a while and someone passed on the message to go outside to carry the dead body. It was said that a man had jumped off the building and died, and we were asked to follow the hearse to clean up. So, I followed behind and got on the hearse, and then arrived at the place where the man had jumped off after a bumpy ride.

  There were many people gathered around to watch the commotion, and police had set up a cordon. Before I even walked in, I heard sobbing sounds, followed by murmurs of discussion from the onlookers nearby.

  They say this man was a police officer, don't know why he jumped off the building and killed himself. Some people also said that this police officer was very handsome and charming, just in his twenties and had just gotten married, hadn't even had children yet and then killed himself, what a pity. Others also said there must be some conspiracy behind it, otherwise how could he possibly kill himself, etc.

  As I walked with Xiangrikua, the crowd of onlookers automatically parted to make way for us. The police officers who were originally standing outside the cordon also stepped aside and even helped lift up the cordon so we could pass through smoothly.

  At this moment, I actually felt a sense of pride...

  As I entered the crowd, I first saw two women kneeling on the ground and crying. One was an elderly woman, probably the mother of the deceased, and the other was a young woman, likely the wife of the deceased.

  They cried very sadly, not that kind of loud wailing. It was just a sobbing cry, as if they were all holding back their painful crying. Covering their mouths, they wept inaudibly.

  "Old willow, come here..."

  At this moment, a police officer waved at Liu Pangzi and then whispered something to him. His expression was serious, as if he was saying something very important. Not only the police officer, but also Liu Pangzi had a serious face, nodding from time to time.

  Liu Pangzi followed me, I really didn't know, muttering in my heart was just carrying a corpse, did he need to come too?

  On the way here, I actually thought about jumping off a building to kill myself. If it's just a one or two-story building, it's fine, at most I'll just get a head injury and bleed a bit. At worst, I might also break an arm or leg.

  If it's a building of over ten floors, the scene would be even more terrifying. It's like your head is smashed to the ground like a watermelon, bursting into pieces, with blood and flesh everywhere, and you can't even find your five senses.

  I imagined myself to be so strong and had made mental preparations. But when my gaze shifted from Liu Pangzi to the corpse, I was stunned, my scalp felt numb, my legs were weak, and a force that I couldn't describe made my body filled with all sorts of discomfort.

  A puddle of blood on the ground, the corpse's face was facing downwards so it couldn't be seen clearly, but along with the black hair flowed out a mixture of white and red brain matter that made me feel dizzy.

  Look at the corpse again, it's still a corpse! It's just a lump of flesh!

  Maybe it's from a very high place and fell down, and the whole person was smashed into a pile.

  My body is getting more and more uncomfortable, I'm feeling dizzy and starting to feel like vomiting. But I have to hold it in, afraid of losing face in front of so many onlookers.

  I gritted my teeth, lowering my head to conceal the pale and unsightly complexion I must have had at that moment, but then I saw a patch of crimson on the ground, along with a small piece of thin flesh.

  Is this the flesh splashed here when that person jumped off the building and fell to the ground?

  I held my breath, suppressing an even stronger urge to vomit, and shifted my gaze.

  At this time I saw again on the other side of the ground still splashing dark red blood and minced meat...

  I had been holding my breath to avoid feeling unwell, but I finally couldn't bear it anymore. I took a deep breath, but all around me was filled with the smell of blood. With this one breath, the strong smell of blood rushed into my nostrils, and the feeling of evil that I had been trying to suppress could no longer be endured.

  "Wow!"

  I vomited, my stomach was churning violently and rushing out, my mouth and nose were full of it, and tears came out.

  "Wow!"

  Incessant vomiting, bringing up bile, vomiting so painfully that I'm bent over and squatting down, continuing to vomit.

  It wasn't until I was panting and out of breath that I looked up to see everyone staring at me. At this point, I would have liked to find a crack in the ground to crawl into to avoid losing face.

  "Nothing wrong?" Xiang Rihua said coldly.

  I shook my head, wiped my mouth with my hand and hung my head in shame, not daring to look people straight in the eye. I was afraid of meeting their disdainful gaze again, that kind of indifferent gaze.

  "Just clean up the corpse then."

  Huà said, after finishing speaking, walked towards the "mutilated" corpse on the ground. I watched as he squatted down and used both hands to twist the bloodied head of the corpse into a proper position before starting to arrange its limbs.

  He did these movements with ease, the entire body of the corpse was soft and fluffy, when Yang Huai turned his hand back, he just held it like this and casually brought it back.

  No cracking of bones, silent and soundless, as if handling soft-bodied animals or snakes with ease.

  At this time I also went forward, squatted down and started learning from his appearance to pick up the scattered meatballs.

  But things aren't as simple as I thought, my abdomen is cramping and trembling at this moment. My whole body can't help but tremble, and my stomach is churning again, like a hand rummaging through my intestines.

  I feel like vomiting, but I have no choice but to hold it in...

  I just lost face once, so many people are watching me, thinking of the eyes they looked at me when I vomited just now, I can only hold back, half-closing my eyes and picking up things around me like a blind man touching an elephant.

  There's soft, fluffy flesh, hard and prickly bones. In the process, I've even been poked by bones, and when blood flows out, it directly merges with the corpse, feeling an unspeakable eeriness.

  I didn't think much of it and didn't dare to speak out, fearing they would look down on me, fearing that Yang Ronghua would despise me. So I gritted my teeth and endured the pain, enduring the wound still bleeding until after we had cleaned up the body before secretly bandaging the wound.

  The body had just been collected, and Liu Pangzi came over, saying that the body must be treated with respect and absolutely cannot have any disrespect. At the time, I heard this and snorted in derision - collecting a body is just collecting a body, why can't there be any disrespect? The person is already dead, how can there still be anything wrong with what's in your heart?

  Is it because he's a policeman? That's why he gets special treatment? If that's the case, then I might as well become a policeman too. What's so great about being a policeman anyway?

  Just as I thought of this, I felt a sudden chill, as if something had entered my body. When I turned around to look, there was nothing.

  I looked puzzled and furrowed my brow.