Chapter Thirty-Six: Unraveling the Cocoon

  Anxiously waiting for more than half an hour, Liu Weimin returned with a calm expression, his hair perfectly combed, his clothes neat and tidy, only with a few specks of mud on his black cloth shoes, as if he had taken a spring stroll in the vineyard rather than going to rescue someone.

  Without waiting for me to ask, Liu Weimin said that he didn't see Xu Qi and the other two, but there were chaotic footprints on the ground. It can be seen that Xu Qi did not die, but escaped. The horse-faced monster chased after him. Whether or not he could catch up depends on Xu Qi's luck.

  I asked Liu Weimin to think of a way to save him.

  Liu Weimin turned around and asked me instead, "What method are you thinking of?" He sneered at me and said, "Why not... try calling the police?"

  I didn't laugh, and he laughed even more, comforting me by saying: "Don't get worked up, Master Xu has his own destiny, besides, you two have only known each other for a short while, is it worth being so worried about him? You're really an idiot."

  I glared at him and he hastily explained: "I wasn't scolding you, I said Xu Qi is an idiot."

  I told him word for word: "No, Xu Qi is my master."

  You're so silly, I laughed so hard that tears almost fell out: "Okay okay okay, he's not a fool, you are, your brain was eaten by zombies!" After laughing twice, You Wu said seriously: "Wang Zhen, we came to Guan Cun Village not to catch zombies, nor is it to find a master and dig up other people's ancestral graves? If you're too lazy to save Wen Jing, let's go home now!"

  I was already anxious and impatient, but upon hearing these words, I jumped up from my seat, and my speech became much clearer.

  "Was I capturing a zombie or was the zombie capturing me? You don't know why I worship Xu Qi as my master?"

  Liu Weimin refused to save people and also didn't let me go find the village chief.

  I turned to him, fiercely questioning: "Tell me, since you came to Guanxi Village, what have you done? Where were you when I was being put into the coffin? Was it your idea for me to agree with Xu Qi to catch zombies? Where were you when I almost got beaten to death? You brought me here to save Wenjing, where is she?"

  Liu Weimin opened his mouth to speak, and I shouted: "Shut up! I don't believe you anymore. From start to finish, you're just a scammer. Although I don't know what secrets you have, but you brought me here for the thing in that camphor wood coffin! You won't save Xu Qi, I'll go save him myself!"

  I'm going out, don't hurry to intercept and make a scene, questioning me how I can speak like this to the old man, while raising an eyebrow and asking me to calm down, but many things have been bottled up in my heart for a long time, since I've opened my mouth, I must say it clearly.

  I pulled Yu Wu, letting him not get muddy here, and stuck my neck out to Liu Weimin: "Is the soul of Wen Jing in your hands? Hurry up and return it to me! You old cheat, damn it!"

  Liu Weimin looked at me with a tilted head, his eyes dull and expressionless, not saying a word as if he hadn't gotten angry, but also didn't plan to make a statement. However, his hands were clenched together on his lower abdomen, the veins bulging out, the tiger's mouth was pressed by his thumb, turning white, obviously trying hard to control himself.

  Yu Wuzhong was jumping up and down between us, but I remained unmoved, staring fixedly at Liu Weimin. It wasn't until much later that Liu Weimin let out a faint laugh, a somewhat bitter smile spreading across his face as he said something utterly ridiculous.

  "Life is like being in a thorny forest, if the heart doesn't move, people won't make mistakes, and if they don't move, they won't get hurt. But if the heart moves, people will make mistakes, and it will harm their body and bones, experiencing all kinds of suffering in the world." He walked to the head of the bed with a relaxed expression, leaned against the quilt, and asked me leisurely: "Wang Zhen, little friend, Xu Qi won't die, don't worry. But I want to ask you, why do you think your sister's soul is in my hands?"

  "I'm guessing!"

  "How did you guess?"

  Organizing my language, I said: "Xu Da Zhang said that people who have lost their souls can be called back, why don't you do so?"

  Liu Weimin's face showed a mixture of laughter and tears as he said, "You lost the key, and standing at the door can call it back? I understand what you mean, the soul will follow the sound to return, but Huang Jinbai is not an ordinary person, he will take action to block!"

  I said those theories of Xu Qi again, if you can't even call them back, it means your skills are inferior to others, what's the point of taking them back?

  Liu Weimin sighed, "Let me give you an example. If you ask You Wu for something and he doesn't give it to you because he's not afraid of you, you can sneak into his house and steal it or kidnap him and force him to hand it over. That's what we're doing now, except Huang Jinbai is hiding too deeply and we can't find him for the time being. As for me using you to open that coffin... this is even more absurd. I think there isn't a single person in the world who would dare to want the things inside that coffin."

  Does he know what's inside?

  Since he said Xu Qi would be in no danger, I'll go all out and talk to him today without asking questions, waiting for Liu Weimin to make a voluntary surrender!

  "All these years, in order to find Huang Jibei, I have changed my appearance and come to Guan Cun Village many times to investigate. Even before the old patriarch passed away, I had dealings with him and knew about the existence of that nanmu coffin."

  Talking about the past, Liu Weimin sighed a little. He smiled and said: "It's not just this one, but also the other eight coffins buried elsewhere, I know them all, but I'm not interested in these treasures..."

  I and You Mou Yi have the same voice in unison, what is called another eight coffins.

  Liu Weimin explained with a smile that the coffin with the heavenly master sitting in the coffin actually had nine mouths, called Jiulong Coffin or Longzi Coffin, taking the meaning of a dragon giving birth to nine sons. Because Zhang Yuangui indeed had a huge secret hidden in his coffin, but he made a trick, hiding the true location of his coffin, and buried nine fake coffins everywhere, each named after one of the nine sons of the dragon.

  The village of Guanxi has a famous coffin called the "Three-layered Coffin of Jiaozi". Among the nine sons of the Dragon King, Jiaozi is the most cunning and easiest to kill. In the past, Emperor Ming Xianzong sent someone to this place to kill Zhang Yuangui, and he buried this coffin here. There are three coffins in total, so it's called the Three-layered Coffin. One coffin is nested inside another, or one is connected to another. Liu Weimin doesn't know the specific arrangement, but once the coffin is opened, it's certain that no one will be left alive in Guanxi Village.

  What they called killing Zhang Yuanji was just that, whether it was a fake death or a resurrection, Liu Weimin didn't know, nor did he know what was inside the coffin, and even less interested in opening it to take a look.

  He said that if I didn't believe him, and if I dared to gamble with Wenjing's life, he could help dig up the coffin, but only after he had escaped to a place ten million eight thousand miles away could it be opened.

  Silently speechless, anyway whatever he says is right, I have no way to refute.

  "There are two reasons why I've been hiding these past few days. Firstly, I think Huang Jinbai has already noticed us, so I'm hiding and waiting for him to stir up the waters before catching him off guard..."

  "He's stupid, he knows you're coming and still doesn't run?"

  Liu Weimin chuckled and said, "He's really that foolish, he didn't run away, just hid and waited for us to return empty-handed. But we can't take action against his family members because he also has hostages in hand, right? From the timing, if the old man who always draws himself as a paper person at the paper mache shop is indeed him, after discovering me, he would have escaped back to Guanxi Village that night and deliberately created a ruckus with the zombies to muddy the waters. Do you think this is possible?"

  I said it was impossible, that day on the bridge, a middle-aged man even helped us two pass messages.

  Liu Wei Min said, perhaps it was a message between me and the phone!

  I didn't say a word, but Yu Mou asked him, "Old Zu Gong and the old lady upstairs in my house died on the same day, but Huang Jinbai found Liu Weimin several days later. How could he predict that Old Zu Gong would become a zombie?"

  Liu Weimin burst out laughing and said, "He naturally couldn't predict this, but when he came back here, he managed to turn the old clan elder into a zombie. A person from the Qing dynasty era, wearing Qing dynasty official attire, was buried in the ground - it's absolutely impossible for him to rise again. The old clan elder lived over 100 years and definitely understood this principle. If he really had deep grievances with the entire village and wanted to come back to seek revenge after death, he would never have been buried like that."

  Xu Qi has also said this.

  I said, Old Master knows that there is a certain kind of coffin under his grave, so he can become a zombie.

  Liu Weimin shook his head and told us that the coffin was originally under Huang Jinbai's ancestral home, but it was moved to the grave of Lao Zonggong, which is why he rose from the dead.

  "And," Liu Weimin said to me, "are you sure that's a zombie? Zombies don't have consciousness, let alone practice calligraphy on your glass. So I'm certain it was Huang Jinbai who was behind this. Think about it, if there were zombies in Guanxi Village, they would definitely go to Longhushan for help. Once they found that nanmu coffin, the Taoist priests from Guanxi Village would gather, not to mention the government departments would also get involved. By then, we would have no choice but to return empty-handed. Fortunately, only a small-time Taoist priest came from Longhushan, which actually made things easier for us. Now Wang Zhen's status in the village has risen greatly, and it's convenient for him to do things... except for that Kang Jiuxiang..."

  Some complex glance at me, Liu Weimin was speechless.

  There's still something fishy, according to what he said, Lao Zu Gong is being controlled by Old Man Huang, trying to scare me away with his mysterious words. But even if I'm scared off, what's the use? Liu Wei Min definitely won't leave, and who knows, once outside the village, he'll change his appearance and sneak back in again.

  Liu Weimin said mysteriously, "The old patriarch is not a zombie. He warned you out of kindness. I inquired about the news during the day and found that the old patriarch suddenly went mad just a few minutes after the death of the old lady on your floor, so I concluded..."

  The first time I saw Liu Weimin laugh very lewdly, he said: "He and the old lady absolutely have an affair!"

  I'm dizzy, my head is all muddled up, what secrets could they possibly have?

  I said, "That old lady is fifty or sixty years old, and the old man is over one hundred and thirty or forty years old. They are separated by more than 800 kilometers, and they have a forbidden love that transcends age and region? It's simply ridiculous! How did they get to know each other? Could it be an online romance?"

  Liu Weimin looked at me and said word by word: "Are you sure that old lady is only fifty years old?"

  "You really can't call out: 'Really, both of us have seen the old lady's portrait, even if she is a hundred years old, age is not a problem anymore, but there is still distance...'"

  I tugged at You Ruo's clothes and told him that there was more than one old lady in my building, and the other one, who looked like she was around seventy, wasn't even human!

  Liu Weimin stood up and walked out the door. I shouted at his back, "Don't go, we're not done yet! You said you didn't show your face for two reasons, what's the other one?"

  Stop in his tracks, Liu Weimin turned around and looked at You Wu with a complicated expression, saying helplessly: "Alas, I'd better not say it, lest you can't take it. Get some rest early, I'll deal with the corpses at the village entrance, then I still need to find the village head to explain things about the little Taoist priest. Tomorrow if someone asks, just say that Xu Qi has temporarily returned to Dragon and Tiger Mountain, leaving behind a clever plan for Wang Zhen, ensuring the safety of our village."

  Liu Weimin left, I asked You Wu what was going on, Liu Weimin's second reason must have something to do with him. You Wu swore to the lamp that he didn't know either, and then ran away.

  These two days were really tiring, although I was worried about Xu Qi, but couldn't withstand the fatigue that surged up to my eyes. After they all left, I didn't even take off my clothes and fell asleep as soon as I lay down.

  I slept until the sun was high in the sky. San Shu knocked on the door so loudly that it shook the heavens. I got up dazed and confused, asking her what was going on.

  Shouting from behind the door, Third Sister said: "Huang Cang and Huang Song want to take you to their home to meet their father!"

  I said who these two guys were, I didn't know them.

  Third Sister-in-law replied: "Your family's Ninth Fragrance's elder brother, their father is Ninth Fragrance's father-in-law. I reckon they want to discuss marrying Ninth Fragrance off to you."

  I suddenly woke up, and Gongjiu Xiang's father-in-law was none other than the old man Huang I had been searching for all along.

  He wants to see me?!