The Exorcist

Chapter 37: Boys and Girls

"It's okay now!"

"But what does 'it's okay' mean?" Bao Datong asked.

"It means that Xitou store has not been 'obviously' harassed since then." Ruan Zhan considered the words, not knowing how to describe the situation in Xitou store.

In fact, everything seemed to be fine on the surface. No children knocked on the door and called for mother in the middle of the night. But since then, the whole village has been like a seriously ill person who has had his yang energy drained away. He has not been able to regain his former health. It used to be just poverty, but now the whole village is shrouded in a dark and fragile atmosphere, without any vitality. The slightest disturbance can silence everyone. The bodies of the people in the village are also very fragile, even the domestic animals and dogs they raise. They all fell ill every now and then. I don't know whether it was because they were too frightened at the time or because the three plague gods brought some disaster.

Ruan Zhan saw all this and understood exactly what was going on. You must know that there are a total of three yang lanterns on the top of a person's head and shoulders, so there are always old people saying that if you walk in the middle of the night, don't look back, because as soon as you look back, the yang lantern will go out. When all three lanterns go out, people will have no innate ability. The breath comes to ward off evil spirits. But even if you encounter evil spirits while walking at night and the sun lamp goes out, as long as you can survive the dangerous moment, the rising yang energy from the earth will naturally give humans enough supplements during the next day, just like filling up the lamp oil. , the sun light will turn on again!

But this was not the case for the people in Xitou shop. They only had one lantern on each shoulder, and the lantern above their heads disappeared without a trace. It was not extinguished temporarily, but completely disappeared!

This gave him a deeper understanding of the strength of those two little monsters. Their yin power was so strong that they actually ate the villagers' yang lanterns and used them for themselves the moment they were born. They have been buried underground for hundreds of years and have stored endless power. As spiritual bodies, they can use the technique of neutralizing yin and yang, which not only improves their power, but also enables them to wander around without being buried in their bones. The limits of earth and day and night.

This is really, really, really hard to deal with.

For the villagers of Xitoudian, if they want to completely eradicate this situation where the Yang fire is weak and external evils may invade at any time, they must destroy these two monsters. He couldn't handle this, and it would take Bao Datong, the authentic Taoist successor. At that time, all it takes is to separate the human yang energy swallowed by these two monsters, and then cast a spell to put it back into the villagers.

"It seems that they are not interested in remote areas like Xitoudian." Bao Datong said, "In fact, from the time they were born to today, there has been a five-year incubation period. So what have they been doing in these five years? Why don't they come out to cause trouble? Is it because they are cultivating themselves? Or do they want a quiet 'life'? And what inducements made them run out and commit crimes later?"

"Zhang Zixin is the inducement, right?" Wan Li said, "At least he came to Xitou shop and let the pair of monsters feel the outside world. I think they have been buried for so many years and were not very young when they were buried, so they may have a certain influence on the world. They are very curious. Maybe this is the reason why they have not harmed mankind in five years. But from another perspective, maybe they have done bad things, but they have not been exposed because they are secretive or the harm is not great. Recently, these have caused people to The panic of missing children may be due to reasons we don’t understand that prompted them to act like this.”

"Maybe there is no reason at all, just do whatever you want." Xiaoxia thought of the child's eyes and shuddered, "You also said that they were only five or six-year-old children when they were buried, so even though hundreds of years have passed, they Their intelligence may grow to be more cunning and cruel than ordinary adults, but their minds may still be children. You know, it is difficult to guess the thoughts of children, and what they do depends on their own temporary likes and dislikes, which may not necessarily be true. There is no reason and no rules to follow.”

"I agree with Xiao Xia's statement. Maybe when Zhang Zixin came here, his own situation or the place he came from aroused the interest of these monsters, so they ran out, maybe wandered around for a while, maybe they lurked directly in the In our city." Bao Datong said, "Think about how terrible this is. For most people, there may be unusual things peeping around us every day. Danger is all around us, but we But I don’t know.”

His words silenced everyone for a while, and then he continued, "What I don't understand is why this matter didn't become known to everyone, and even if Zhang Zixin's friends didn't reveal anything to the police, didn't the police find anything suspicious? ?" he continued.

"It's very simple." Wan Li spread his hands, "Either the villagers are too timid to speak out, or the local government suppressed it as a matter of feudal superstition, or the pair of monsters did something. But since Zhang Zixin If you know, it proves that this matter is still circulated in the local area. Besides, didn't Azhan say that the local tabloids recorded it? It probably wasn't widely noticed, and was later suppressed. The question now is, how did Zhang Zixin get burned? Yes, and what happened on the other side of the river?" He said, looking at Ruan Zhan again.

"According to the villagers, not long after this incident, a reporter named Zhang from a big city came to their village to inquire about the incident. Maybe the country people are more in awe of the reporter's identity, so although they are afraid After provoking the 'three great immortals' again, he still told Zhang Zixin what happened. Of course Zhang Zixin didn't believe it, and he wanted to find the flaw, so he went to the land where the reservoir was dug to investigate, and then to the ancestral temple. Searching for physical evidence, he finally made a trip to the place where the three skeletons were reburied.”

"Did nothing happen in the village on the other side of the river?" Xiaoxia asked.

"Fortunately." Ruan Zhan said, "The villagers of Xitoudian were afraid that they would not agree to bury them next to other people's villages. Secondly, they also had a conscience and did not want to bring disaster to other villages, so they chose the one The place is a wasteland upstream of the river, with no villages or towns nearby, and it is backed by a barren mountain."

"Wow, the villagers in Xitoudian are really kind. If I were a demon spirit, I wouldn't harm them." Bao Datong sighed exaggeratedly, "They dug me out again, let me see the light of day again, and gave me a piece of mountain." The feng shui treasure land with water allows me to absorb spiritual energy. Even if I am a moody child, I will not retaliate for kindness."

"I said it happened back then." Ruan Zhan reminded him, "With the rapid economic development, that cemetery was leveled as an ownerless cemetery three years ago. Now that place is a flat road, and there are thousands of people there every day. There is no way they can practice in that kind of environment if there are unclear vehicles passing by."

"It can't be a death highway or something, right? It's the kind of car that gets into an accident as soon as it reaches that place." Bao Datong said.

Ruan Zhan shook his head, "There were no major accidents there. Don't forget, Zhang Zixin disappeared five years ago. If those two monsters left Xitou shop because of him, and they were strong enough not to be buried, Due to the limitations of the land and the sun, moon, yin and yang, that so-called tomb was empty five years ago and is just a pile of dead bones, so how can it cause trouble for passers-by?"

Everyone thought so and nodded.

"The question now is about Zhang Zixin. What happened to him after he came to Xitou Store? How did he disappear?" Wan Li brought the topic back.

"According to the village chief, Zhang Zixin was ready to go to the other side of the river to investigate after spending a few days in the village. He was living at the village chief's house at the time, and the village chief tried his best to dissuade him from going, but he was very stubborn. The next day He set off alone early in the morning. He had no transportation, and he didn't know how he walked the five hundred miles of dirt road. When the villagers buried the three dead bones, it took a full week to get there. If he made a round trip, It should have been at least two weeks, but he came back at midnight on the seventh day. The night he came back, some villagers came back late because they went to town. As soon as they entered the village, they saw a man running in the village in a panic. , as if he wanted to hide somewhere. One villager recognized him as reporter Zhang from the city, so he called him. Unexpectedly, he turned his head and almost scared the villagers to death, because he had no body or neck. The whole head turned 180 degrees, and the face was pale and the facial features were blurred to the point of being unclear. Just when everyone was so frightened that they couldn't move, two children, a boy and a girl, suddenly appeared, holding hands. He held his hand and dragged him away! And since then, he has never appeared again. Therefore, although he is legally missing, it can be concluded from the villagers' oral accounts that he must be dead. Otherwise, it would be impossible to go back and forth within seven days, and it wouldn’t be in that state.”

"Then his soul -" Wan Li said with some worry, "did he leave, or was he trapped somewhere, or was he eaten? These two monsters sucked the blood of many dogs as soon as they were born, so why did they capture so many dogs now? Are there many children used as food?"

"The mystery will be revealed only when this matter is completely solved." Ruan Zhan said, "However, the village chief gave me a notebook that Zhang Zixin left back then. Maybe he left in a hurry and forgot to leave the village. I’ve grown up.”

"Ah? Are there notes? Where are they?" The impatient Bao Datong jumped up, "What does it say?"

"I put it away. It will be useful in the future." Ruan Zhan said calmly, "As for what is mentioned above, it is the situation of his investigation in those few days."

"What did he say?" Wan Li was more curious about how an atheist reporter could explain this strange thing.

"He believes that the place where Xitoudian is going to dig the reservoir was once a monk's tomb. The big vat in the middle is an old Taoist priest, which can be seen from his hair, teeth and some remaining clothing; the lotus vat has many The paintings that have not faded for many years are a long-lost craft, which is of great research value; the silk screen in the cylinder was also mixed in when the cylinder was made, probably to prevent cracking; and he dug out the cylinder that was buried by the villagers. He found the black charms written with strange pigments on the fragments and rubble. He thought it was a kind of funeral custom, similar to the burial scriptures; the two children with lifelike faces when they were dug out were also from ancient times. One of the cruelest burial methods at that time was to bury boys and girls together. Holes were punched in the tops of their heads and the palms of their hands while they were still alive, and mercury was poured into them. In addition to some weird but profound embalming techniques in the past, this pair Boys and girls can go through hundreds of years without their corpses rotting, and when the villagers dug them out and exposed them to the air, the corpses quickly decomposed; as for the most terrifying phenomenon of knocking on doors in the middle of the night and killing small and large dogs in the village, he believed The former is the collective hallucination of villagers in fear, and the latter is the appearance of ferocious beasts."

"Dogs are the most sensitive animals. No matter how ferocious the beast is, it is impossible to kill them all without alarming them." Bao Datong said, "This does not make sense."

"Yes, he also explained this issue in his notes. He thought it must be a rare creature that can secrete special substances that can emit something similar to hallucinogens, so he made the dogs obediently go to the ancestral temple with it. , and then let it kill."

"It's a good explanation, but where can such an animal exist?" Wan Li said, "If it really existed, then the country wouldn't immediately capture it for protection and research!"

"After this question, he drew a huge red question mark. He probably made a hypothesis first and then slowly verified it. Unfortunately, he never had the chance again." Ruan Zhan sighed lightly and looked out the window, "Actually, In my opinion, the first few of his guesses were correct - after the old Taoist priest died, the boys and girls were buried with him because of his relatively high status, and the charms, the fly whisk in his hand and the gold in his mouth were Bells are used to calm spirits, but his judgment about the boy and girl was wrong. It is true that the boy and girl were just ordinary children before they were buried alive, but after they were buried alive, they might have some reasons. It changed for reasons we don't know.

The reason why there are those spells and magic weapons is probably so that the souls of the two children cannot leave even after they die, and they can accompany the old Taoist priest and become his permanent slaves. But this old Taoist priest obviously does not have that much magic power to enable him to practice cultivation after becoming a soul. Or, his soul after death does not even have innate malevolence. But you know, the smaller and weaker the person, the greater the resentment after death. The boy and girl may have developed great abilities after death, thus swallowing up the soul of the old Taoist priest, and even He may have acquired the spells he had practiced before as his own. But they were pinned underground by the whisk, the golden bell, the vat full of talismans, and even the unknown net. They stayed there for hundreds of years, until the people from Xitou shop accidentally dug them up. And by taking away those things that suppressed them, they were completely freed from it.

Their practice may have been carried out unconsciously, after all, they were so young back then, but it was precisely because of this unconsciousness and lack of distractions that the spells they inherited from the old Taoist priests were pure and high-end. Considering the hundreds of years of darkness and loneliness, and considering the growth of their intelligence, if they later practiced diligently in order to break out of the ground, you can imagine how powerful they are now! "

After Ruan Zhan finished speaking, everyone remained silent for a long time. Everyone was imagining the brutal torture that the pair of monsters suffered at that time and their powerful magic power now, allowing them to do whatever they wanted.

Who is to blame? Maybe they are victims, but when they become powerful perpetrators, what about the people who are hurt? !

"That - that is to say -" Xiao Xia guessed, "Although three dead bones were unearthed, in fact, the old Taoist priest has no soul left, and the only ones who harmed people were this pair of boys and girls who did not realize that they were harming people. So. If we go by our guess, it's Xiaotong and Zhang Jialin! But what about Lu Yan? What role is she playing? Has Zhang Zixin left?"

"Take your time, don't be in a hurry, there are still many problems." Ruan Zhan twitched the corners of his lips and smiled at Xiao Xia, "For example, why did they come to us? Is it accidental or intentional? And... , they seem to have a grudge against Master Bao. Have you forgotten? Xiaotong once said - I remember what he became. So, who is our Master Bao? "