Chapter 48: Flesh-Eating (Part 20) - Village History

Mother Su carried her usual wooden bucket filled with meat and left the house, heading in the direction of the ancestral hall.

Ah-Xi skipped along beside her, singing nursery rhymes the entire way.

Upon hearing Yang Yundong utter the words, "Conspirators are destined to hide only in the gutters; I was born to stand in the sunlight," Si Qi knew there was nothing more to discuss.

He returned to the courtyard, stepped into an empty corner, and lowered his gaze to watch his pale gray shadow sway with his posture.

Zhao Feng immediately hurried over and asked, "Brother Chang, what did you and Yang Yundong talk about?"

Si Qi looked him up and down and flashed a toothy grin: "He is of no use anymore. If you get the chance, kill him."

"Huh? Me? Kill Yang Yundong?"

"If you can't even beat a disabled man with a severed arm, there's no need for you to join Sheol." Si Qi's smile carried a chilling edge. "Are you scared? If you're scared, give the blade back to me, and I'll do it."

Zhao Feng knew that once he handed the blade back, all the efforts he had made to join the Sheol guild would go down the drain.

He nodded hurriedly, his expression fierce: "No problem at all! I've disliked him for a long time. The moment I get a chance, I'll slaughter him first!"

After the tattooed woman's death, going to the ancestral hall to atone for one's sins no longer seemed so urgent. Moreover, at this hour, Mother Su was most likely at the ancestral hall, making an encounter probable. Striking a consensus, the players decided to explore the village history museum first.

The six of them walked along the muddy path, following the directions on the map. In just five minutes, they arrived in front of a large house with windows facing the road and excellent natural light.

The windows of the house were not pasted over with paper; although covered in a thick layer of dust, the desks and chairs inside could still be seen through the aging glass.

The low wooden door belonging to the building stood wide open, seemingly inviting people to enter.

Si Qi followed behind Yang Yundong, stepping across the threshold of the main entrance. Instantly, the accumulated dust inside the house showered over him, causing him to cough involuntarily.

The village history museum consisted of only a single room, and its furnishings were visible at a glance. Free of ghosts and death traps, searching for clues here was not difficult.

Having been visited by no one for a long time, spiderwebs had sealed away the past, and dust-covered desks were spread with scattered papers, as though sealed by time.

On the corner of a table lay a yellowed household registration ledger with one corner folded over. Zhu Ling reached out and opened it.

That page contained the names "Mother Su" and "Su Xi," along with their dates of death, which were recorded as the exact same day.

Beyond that page, nothing remained except blank sheets, as if everyone else were still alive, or as though some sudden event had occurred that caused the recorder to stop making new entries.

Si Qi slowly curved the corners of his lips: "The records indeed cut off after that... After all, having eaten the flesh of the god and transformed into the village chief's state, it is difficult to determine whether they are dead or alive."

Zhu Ling smiled with sudden realization: "Because Mother Su and Ah-Xi did not eat the flesh of the god and did not die contaminated by sin, they were able to retain human forms and walk in the sunlight."

"That's not right," Zhang Licai said, scratching his head. "If they didn't eat the flesh of the god, how did they know it tasted good? Besides, when we asked Mother Su about the legend of the god on the first day, she spoke with absolute fluency..."

"Why look for a reason?" Zhao Feng said impatiently. "She's a major NPC, of course she has to know. Even if she didn't experience it firsthand, she must have memorized it through hearsay."

Si Qi's judgment was much the same as Zhao Feng's.

Mother Su certainly had never eaten the flesh of the god, because she had died before the villagers began sharing it.

She participated in this instance merely because her soul belonged to the god, acting as a major NPC after her death, much like Anna and Annie in *Rose Manor*.

Those lines were probably given to her by the god to deceive outsiders—meaning the players...

Zhu Ling picked up the village history booklet scattered amid the dust and carefully opened it.

The first few pages of the village history booklet had been torn out, omitting the events that occurred before the famine, making it impossible to deduce the famine's origin.

This disaster seemed entirely like a natural calamity, plucked from the air by some god-like entity and dropped onto this land—something that could neither be probed deeply nor avoided.

Zhu Ling turned the village history booklet to a page where the text was barely legible and softly read the words aloud.

A corner of the iceberg that was the past of Su Family Village was revealed.

...

The god who descended without warning had no past, no tribe, and no bonds.

Seduced by desire, the starving people cannibalized Him. Watching flesh and skin regrow over His bloodied skeleton, with wounds disappearing at a speed visible to the naked eye, they could not help whispering among themselves.

On one hand, they craved the taste of the god's flesh, hoping to survive the famine through it; on the other hand, they feared unprovoked sin and divine punishment, terrified of the unknown mighty power.

In the end, the old village chief stepped forward, declaring that he had a dream last night. The dream told him that the god's descent was for salvation, and His entire body of flesh and blood was a blessing.

The villagers were encouraged. After eating their fill, they gathered in a circle and vividly recounted their respective dreams, as though everyone had dreamed of the god, and everyone's actions had received divine sanction.

Relying on the endlessly regenerating flesh of the god, the villagers survived the famine.

Though still poor, every household chipped in to repair a new ancestral hall used to worship the god who had helped them through the famine.

They embellished the legend of the god-given flesh and passed it down by word of mouth, gradually spreading it to nearby villages.

The story seemed to be developing in a good direction until one day, a merchant in black clothes and golden eyes arrived at Su Family Village, saying he wanted to taste the rumored flesh of the god.

The villagers instinctively wanted to refuse, but the merchant produced a large sum of money and cajoled them: "Didn't you say that even if flesh is cut off, His wounds will quickly grow back? What harm is there in letting me eat a piece of meat?"

The villagers hesitated, but in the end, the old village chief stepped in and made the final decision to grant the merchant's request.

Su Family Village used the merchant's money to pave the village roads, and more and more people heard the news and came from afar.

The legends about the god whitewashed the initial bloodshed, spread through euphemistic storytelling, and came to resemble popular folklore and gimmicks.

Some said the god's flesh could cure diseases, some said eating it granted eternal youth, and others simply out of morbid curiosity, seeing everyone else flocking to it, followed the crowd.

The ignorant people had never seen the corpse of the god with their own eyes and lacked moral consciousness or guilt. Sustaining the hereditary superstition and pursuit of the god passed down through generations, they gathered at the entrance of Su Family Village, demanding to purchase the god's flesh with money just like the pioneering merchant.

Su Family Village was merely an obscure little village, yet too many prominent people came from far and wide. The temptation of money rolled in ceaselessly, and the poverty within the village grew increasingly glaring.

One night, the old village chief summoned the influential clan elders of the village to his home for a secret discussion.

The village chief said: "Last night, I had a dream. The venerable god knows the situation of our village, pities our poverty, and allows us to exchange His flesh for money so that our children can live better lives."

The clan elders chimed in one after another, adding details in a flurry of voices, claiming they had also had the same dream—that it was the god personally bestowing grace to help Su Family Village improve its living conditions...

A new legend was thus fabricated. Early the next morning, Su Family Village announced its opening to the outside world: for a certain amount of money, anyone could taste the flesh of the god.

Depending on the money traded for the god's flesh, the people of Su Family Village ate their fill, built new houses, and had surplus funds for various amusements.

However, they gradually discovered that the recovery speed of the god's corpse wounds was becoming slower and slower. At the same time, mutations began to occur in a small portion of the villagers, and their corpses after death began to exhibit the characteristics of the god's flesh...

...

"Oh, for crying out loud, when all is said and done, these villagers brought this on themselves!" Zhang Licai slapped his palm. "If they had just properly worshipped that god after surviving the famine, or quit while they were ahead after making a fortune from the merchant, none of the subsequent trouble would have happened."

"But that is human nature," Si Qi laughed. "If someone were to pull out a single hair of yours and give you five million, would you be willing?"

Zhang Licai answered without hesitation: "Of course I would, what else?"

Si Qi asked again: "What if cutting off one of your fingers could get you fifty million?"

Zhang Licai fell silent. He more or less anticipated how the questioning would proceed, knowing that answering "yes" would mean falling right into Si Qi's trap.

Yet, asking himself honestly, if he truly encountered such a situation, he knew his choice would certainly not be a refusal.

The smile on Si Qi's lips grew deeper, and he leisurely asked the final question: "Then what if one day you learned that your head could be traded for five hundred million?"

This question left no suspense, and Zhang Licai hurriedly shook his head: "Then I definitely wouldn't do it! Once you lose your life, having money is useless!"

"Yet everyone who learns of this transaction will find a way to chop off your head in exchange for money," Zhu Ling interjected softly, her gaze shifting away from the paper to look out the window.

"Desire has no limits, and once many things are started, they spiral out of control. Even knowing that the end of the road is death, most people will harbor wishful thinking, believing that being just a little bit greedier won't necessarily invite misfortune, or rather—that the disaster won't necessarily befall them."

Yang Yundong let out a breath and said, "Therefore, there are always things that must not be done, and the precedent must never be set."

The sun had climbed to the height of the rooftop, casting down a beam of pure white light. It was getting late.

Zhu Ling lowered her head once more and read the final passage in the village history booklet: "There are too many travelers coming in admiration, and a single divine corpse cannot provide a sufficient supply of the god's flesh. The villagers can only pass off the corpses of the mutated individuals as the real thing."

"Later, everyone mutated."

Zhao Feng pressed on: "And then? Does this thing say how to completely kill the ghosts of this damn place?"

"No." Zhu Ling placed the village history booklet onto the dust-covered desk and recounted calmly, "The villagers discovered that as long as they made contact with sunlight, they would mutate into the god's flesh. So they changed the direction of their doors, pasted black paper over the windows, and huddled inside their houses during the day, dragging out an ignoble existence."

Zhang Licai blinked twice: "Not that I'm complaining, but even like this, they still take in travelers? Are they choosing money over their lives? Even after turning into ghosts, they still have their minds set on money?"

Si Qi looked at him with the gaze one might give a naive child: "Are you certain they want money? Keep in mind, we were all thrown in here by the eerie game, and none of us paid money to Mother Su."

Zhu Ling continued: "They don't want money; they want our flesh. That's why, when Brother Yang went out to explore the night before last and encountered those villagers, he was stopped and demanded for flesh."

"Why do they want our flesh? To throw into that well and perform that 'wax sacrifice' thing?" Zhang Licai pat his chubby face in confusion. "I still haven't figured out what a 'wax sacrifice' is even supposed to do..."

The clues had reached a fracture point. Part of the riddle was solved, yet it gave rise to new questions, resembling an ever-expanding jigsaw puzzle that constantly lacked its most critical pieces.

Si Qi fished a pocket watch from his coat and glanced at it. The hands pointed directly to twelve noon, leaving six hours before the sky went completely dark.

Calculating the time, Mother Su should have already returned to the residence from the ancestral hall and wouldn't cross paths with the players on the road.

With the instance progressing into its middle phase, the players would have to visit the ancestral hall sooner or later—not only to fill in the missing clues, but also to guard against the potential "divine punishment."

Si Qi put away the pocket watch, glanced at the dust-laden village history booklet, and ultimately did not tuck it into his coat.

He lifted his eyelids to look at Yang Yundong and said calmly, "Brother Yang, let us go together to the ancestral hall and pay our respects."