Translator-Rhapsodite
Editor-PerpetualMreow, Proofreader-Spring Flower
Afterward, Wei Fuyuan told Bei Quan in great detail about what he saw in Feng Mingguang’s memory.
Bei Quan didn’t show much of a reaction after listening, but Liu Fan, who was listening on the side, had a shocked and fearful expression.
“This, this can’t be possible!”
Most young people of this age were atheists, not believing in anything beyond the material world. It was really hard to imagine how a normal hot pot could turn into live worms that could devour people.
“The next day, when the foreman discovered the four of them, they were indeed in the on-duty board room, but he didn’t mention any bugs in the house!”
Liu Fan tried hard to convince himself using science and common sense.
And, if so many live worms were crawling into people’s eyes, ears, mouths, and noses, would they still be alive? They would have choked and suffocated, right?
He turned his head and glanced at Feng Mingguang, who was sitting and facing the wall. “They may have gone crazy, that’s for sure, but when they were taken to the hospital for examination, the doctors said they had no injuries!”
“You make a good point. There must be something fishy going on that we don’t know about.”
Bei Quan nodded with a smile. “That’s why it’s crucial to go and see the scene for ourselves.”
———————————————-
On November 9th, Tuesday, at 3:20 PM.
The Liu family’s private car driver was driving Young Master Liu and the two guests he had invited to their ancestral village.
After getting off the highway and onto the provincial road, the road conditions started to worsen.
Every time the car passed over a pothole or crack, it would noticeably jolt.
“Thud!”
Bei Quan banged his head against the window glass, making a muffled sound that sounded painful.
But even so, he didn’t open his eyes. He just naturally changed direction and laid his head on Wei Fuyuan’s shoulder, continuing to sleep soundly.
Wei Fuyuan was truly helpless.
Last night, he fully fulfilled his bold declaration of “making Bei Quan meow all day” and pressed him onto the bed, tossing and turning and tormenting him until dawn.
The result of their night of indulgence was that neither of them was able to wake up on time today as they usually do.
Originally, they had agreed to leave at 9 a.m. with Liu Fan, but they ended up dragging it until the afternoon.
And as soon as Bei Quan got in the car, he fell asleep. He ended up sleeping through the entire car ride. He hardly opened his eyes along the way, even when his head hit the window, he continued to sleep soundly as if nothing had happened.
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
Qfl Mesejc bglulcjiis kjcafv ab yf j kfii-yftjnfv jrrlrajca lc ogbca bo batfgr, yea Dfl Hejc, klatbea jcs tfrlajalbc, ifjcfv bc tlw ktfc tf ofii jriffq. Ktf cjaegji jaalaevf jcv lcalwjaf qbraegf yfakffc atfw wjvf la bynlber ab jcsbcf klat cbgwji nlrlbc atja atfs kfgf lc j gbwjcalm gfijalbcrtlq.
Qfl Mesejc vfmlvfv ab pera ub klat atf oibk jcv gfjmtfv bea ab qeii Dfl Hejc mibrfg, jvperalcu atflg qbrlalbcr ab wjxf tlw wbgf mbwobgajyif.
Luckily, Liu Fan had good foresight. Even though he noticed the sticky situation in the backseat, he pretended not to see anything and didn’t ask any questions.
The chauffeur, who was responsible for driving and being a bodyguard, knew well about the professional etiquette required when serving wealthy families. He kept his eyes straight ahead the whole time and didn’t even glance at the rearview mirror.
At 5:40 in the afternoon, the car turned towards Liu Fan’s hometown village.
November had already been touched by winter. The nights were getting longer and the days shorter.
The sun was setting, and the sky gradually grew dim. It was already time to cook dinner.
Wei Fuyuan noticed that the villagers seemed to recognize Liu Fan’s car.
As the car entered the village, all the way through, the villagers paid extra attention to this black Lotus sedan. Their faces showed a multitude of emotions, combining curiosity, wariness, scrutiny, and even a hint of schadenfreude. Some people didn’t even bother to hide it and immediately started whispering to each other.
“It seems like everyone in the village already knows about your family’s situation, huh?”
Bei Quan, who had woken up at some point, was now awake and looking out the window. While observing, he commented,
“You must have had a hard time during this period, right?”
“Ugh, don’t even mention it.”
Liu Fan let out a long sigh.
“Nowadays, it’s not just construction workers that we can’t find–we can’t even find someone willing to help us look at houses! The saying ‘under great rewards, there must be brave men’ doesn’t always run true!”
Wei Fuyuan thought to himself, ‘well of course, if I had to experience the live bug hot pot that scared four people out of their wits, no amount of money would make me want to go through that again either!’
Being brave can lead to misfortune too, it’s not just about having money, it’s about having a life to spend it!
At that moment, Liu Fan suddenly cleared his throat and awkwardly said, “Master Bei Quan, are you planning to stay overnight at my ancestral home tonight?”
He scratched his chin, looking very troubled, “Well… um… if that’s the case, then, uh, I…”
After all, the master came because he was entrusted by himself.
He brought the person here, and now he wanted to leave. It just didn’t feel right no matter how he thought about it. But he had been tormented by the ghosts in the old mansion these past few days, and he couldn’t muster the courage to spend another night there.
Not only Liu Fan, but even the driver didn’t want to stay overnight at the ancestral home. At this point, he also perked up his ears, wanting to hear the young master’s plans for tonight.
“Tonight, it’s enough for me and Xiao Wei to stay behind.”
Bei Quan smiled faintly, “But we won’t be staying at your ancestral home. Instead, we’ll be spending the night at the ancestral hall.”
“What!?”
Liu Fan was startled and couldn’t help but raise his voice, “Master Bei Quan, you’re not joking, are you? You really want to spend the night in the ancestral hall!?”
The ancestral hall of the Liu family was very close to the ancestral home.
If you looked at them from a bird’s-eye view, from west to east, they form a standard “8” shape. The ancestral home was in the front, and the ancestral hall was in the back, separated only by a wall, with a connecting door between the courtyard walls.
But even though they are so close, the ancestral hall was where the four young adults were scared crazy, while the ancestral home – although it had some strange things happen– at least nothing major had occurred. It had to be relatively safer.
Although Bei Quan was highly recommended by his old classmate Dai Bo Qian, Liu Fan had not truly experienced the other party’s abilities. What if the other party was a mediocre person who couldn’t solve the strange things in the ancestral hall and had even brought one free extra, which could result in the loss of not one but two lives?
Thinking about this, Liu Fan furrowed his brows into a shape resembling the Chinese character “川”.
“Well… the ancestral hall is almost completely demolished. All that’s left are some broken bricks and tiles. It’s simply uninhabitable.”
He tried to persuade Bei Quan to change his mind, “Or, why don’t you and Xiao Wei stay in the main house?”
“It’s alright.”
Bei Quan smiled faintly, answering calmly and casually, “The temporary building where those four construction workers had an accident should still be there, right? We can stay there tonight.”
——————
During the conversation, the car stopped in front of Liu’s ancestral home.
The land in the village wasn’t worth much, but the Liu family was a wealthy family with assets worth billions. After becoming successful, they had expanded their ancestral home several times.
Now it was a four-story Western-style building with a minimum estimated floor area of 600 square meters.
However, this seemingly grand building was currently dark and abandoned, as if it hadn’t been taken care of for a long time. It looked quite desolate.
“Cough!”
Liu Fan took out the keys and opened the courtyard gate, explaining with some embarrassment, “Because things got chaotic, nobody could live here peacefully. It’s not just my dad, but the workers, housekeepers, and bodyguards all moved out… It’s been almost half a month since anyone has lived here.”
During the few minutes that Liu Fan opened the gate, the neighbors on both sides noticed that someone from the Liu family had arrived, and they all came running to watch.
“Oh, isn’t this Liu Fan!”
The neighboring aunt, who has a very auspicious appearance, leaned against her courtyard gate and shouted at Liu Fan from a distance, mocking him in the local dialect:
“What’s this? Even with all the ghostly happenings, you dare to come back? Aren’t you afraid of going crazy tomorrow?”
“Phew!”
Liu Fan was poked in a sore spot, and he became so angry that smoke seemed to rise from his head. He defiantly retorted in the local dialect, and waved his hand to shoo away the villagers who were just there to watch the commotion.
“At this hour, there are no ghosts yet! What are you all looking at? Disperse!”
“Wait.”
Bei Quan suddenly spoke up to stop him:
“Since everyone wants to see, then let them see.”
After saying that, he took a step forward, clasped his hands, and bowed to the three sides, “I have been invited by Young Master Liu to perform rituals in the courtyard at night, to drive away ghosts and bring peace to the Liu family. If any of you are interested, you can come and have a look.”
Liu Fan: “???”
——What do you mean by “performing rituals”?
——How come I didn’t hear about it until just now??
Meanwhile, Wei Fuyuan glanced at his lover without showing any change in expression.
As soon as he saw Bei Quan putting on this mysterious and profound demeanor, with a smile that seemed to hide some trickery, he knew that this person was thinking of some deceptive idea.
Somehow, he was a little bit excited!
After one sidedly deciding to perform rituals in the courtyard of Liu’s ancestral home later, Bei Quan pulled Wei Fuyuan into the house and randomly found an empty room, pushing him inside.
Wei Fuyuan: “What are you trying to do?”
Bei Quan: “Didn’t I just say it? I’m going to perform rituals!”
As he said that, he opened his black suitcase and started rummaging through it.
Wei Fuyuan: “Are you serious?”
Bei Quan: “Of course!”
He answered while throwing out a few things. Wei Fuyuan picked them up and was even more surprised. Bei Quan had taken out two dark gray Daoist robes, two pairs of soft-soled cloth shoes, and… two wig sets in the style of ox-nose buns.
Wei Fuyuan immediately understood the purpose of these things:
“Don’t tell me we have to put on these outfits!”
“Yeah.”
Bei Quan nodded with a smile, his hands mischievously reaching towards Wei Fuyuan’s chest, unzipping his jacket.
“This is the so-called ‘acting requires a full set’. If we don’t go a little overboard, how can we make ‘others’ believe?” he said.
“Acting?” Wei Fuyuan grabbed Bei Quan’s hand and raised an eyebrow, asking, “Who are these ‘others’?”
Bei Quan smirked mysteriously, leaning close to Wei Fuyuan’s ear, and whispered his plan softly…
—————————————
On November 9th, Tuesday, at 8:42 PM.
Bei Quan instructed Liu Fan to make the courtyard as bright as possible.
So Liu Fan and his driver turned on all the lights inside and outside the ancestral home, and even borrowed two construction lights from the village committee and placed them in the yard.
At this moment, the entire mansion was brightly lit, and the courtyard was as bright as day. The lights could be seen from the beginning to the end of the village.
This commotion naturally startled the entire village.
Everyone had heard the gossip about the Liu family, so they were naturally very curious about these two “Taoist priests” and the exorcism ritual. After dinner, the villagers all rushed over like they were watching a big show in the old days, eager to see what was going on.
The mansion’s courtyard couldn’t accommodate so many people, so some people leaned against the railings to watch. It was packed, with at least a thousand people squeezed in, both inside and outside.
