In the afternoon, a light rain fell.
Puddles accumulated on the uneven bluestone pavement, filling the town with a damp smell.
All around were buildings with red brick, green tiles, and horse-head walls, exuding a strong ancient charm.
A group of people walked down the street holding umbrellas.
Yue Shan looked at the surrounding buildings and some familiar yet strange figures in the doorways, feeling quite emotional.
"This time, we will definitely find the truth!"
Yue Qin clenched her fists.
Chu He silently carried the express delivery they had brought.
It was a folder, about the thickness of a finger, seemingly containing some documents or a very thick letter.
Beside him, Murong Hong held an umbrella over him.
This strange group of people immediately caught the attention of the villagers.
"What are you... doing?"
A middle-aged man with a black umbrella looked at the newcomers suspiciously.
"Are you... Uncle Gouzi?"
Yue Shan stepped forward, smiling, "I’m Xiao Shan... These are our friends, here for a visit."
"Yue Family’s Xiao Shan?!"
Uncle Gouzi examined Yue Shan carefully, then turned to look at Yue Qin: "Are you Xiao Qin? My, my, a girl changes eighteen times as she grows up. I can hardly recognize you."
"Our company’s people came out for an autumn outing, but the travel agency we booked went bankrupt and closed down..."
Yue Shan made up a story on the spot, "I invited them to stay at my house for one night since we have many rooms... It’s just that we might not have much to eat tonight. Could you send over some local dishes? City folks love farm-styled dining..."
"That can be arranged!"
Uncle Gouzi happily took the five hundred yuan bill and became much more enthusiastic: "We have a farm-styled restaurant in town run by the third of the Han Family. I’ll personally deliver the food for you. Very convenient!"
He left cheerfully, but upon returning home, he saw his elderly father staring blankly at the empty gate with a confused look: "Dad, what’s wrong?"
"I thought I saw Yue Xue come back..."
The old man’s eyes were somewhat cloudy. He had previously been taken to the hospital and diagnosed with senile dementia.
Uncle Gouzi immediately laughed: "That wasn’t Yue Xue, but Yue Xue’s son, Xiao Shan. Xiao Qin came back too. Look at them, a whole group of company colleagues, so well-dressed, all very wealthy. If we get on good terms with them, maybe Xiao Yu can find a good job..."
He hadn’t finished speaking when he saw his father’s face contort in terror, falling to the ground, "Yue Shan... a ghost!"
"There, you recognized someone earlier, and I thought you were getting better, but it turns out you’re more confused than ever..."
Uncle Gouzi shook his head helplessly and rushed forward to help his father up.
"I have a question..."
Han Bingjie walked on the road, the small wooden box in his arms giving off a chill, which comforted him.
As an indispensable proxy purchaser, he and the sage, Chu He, were both entitled to their share of supernatural items.
The last supernatural item was given to Wu Qi.
He was also trying to think through the information Yue Shan had provided earlier, trying to figure out a way to survive: "If the old Yue Family house had paranormal events, how could there have only been one tragedy... And after that, Yue Shan and his sister, along with many others, turned the house upside down and did not find any related clues or evidence..."
"It’s not that anomalies always operate within a fixed range, they might leave..."
Chu He calmly replied, "And according to my speculation, another possibility is the theory of an alternate dimension..."
"Alternate dimension?"
Yue Shan asked, "What do you mean?"
"You’re still inexperienced... If you had more such experiences in your job, you would understand that some types of work involve different worlds, or what could be called Hell or Netherworld... Usually, they are parallel lines to our world, hardly intersecting, but at certain fixed moments or after certain conditions are met, overlaps occur... That’s when anomalies appear!"
"The most famous alternate dimension task is not on our floor, but on the 18th floor. Their several team-building tasks involved an alternate dimension, or perhaps many, all related to the 444 bus..."
"That’s a very peculiar Spirit Car that connects to many different stops. Merely the first few stops already lead to alternate dimensions of varying depths. The danger is unspeakably high, one might encounter anomalies at any time, even an anomaly wave!"
"They even suspect that the final stop of that bus line might be the legendary Hell or... the birthplace of anomalies..."
"So... Chu He, you suspect that the old Yue Family house is also connected to an alternate dimension... and that it last opened during the time of the tragedy?"
Wu Qi pensively said, "Then, after the tragedy, the anomaly returned to another space, and naturally no traces would be found in the real world!"
Yue Qin’s eyes lit up: "If that’s the case, many things would make sense..."
Like why they had lived there all those years without any incidents.
"It’s just a theory for now, we will have to see..."
Chu He pushed his glasses up, remembering Cao Liuyu’s case, and looked at Yue Shan and his sister with a heavy heart.
The old Yue Family house was on the outskirts of Black Water Town, a ten-minute walk from the town center.
The property was very spacious, surrounded by tall walls painted white, black tiles showing traces of moss.
It looked desolate from all sides as if it was rarely visited, sitting alone on the wasteland, appearing very quiet. It had no windows, which gave off an oppressive feeling.
Wu Qi glanced at it and felt a heaviness in his heart.
"Wow! Yue Shan, your house is so big? I was worried we wouldn’t have enough space to stay... Your family must have been wealthy landowners in the past!"
Han Bingjie looked at the large estate and, quite heartlessly, expressed his admiration.
"I don’t think my family were landlords, but our ancestors were quite wealthy. I remember when I was little, whenever the village had some kind of ceremony or another, someone would come to invite Grandfather, and later my father..."
Yue Shan gazed at the tall walls with a look of confusion on his face.
"In ancient towns, besides the rich landlords, there was another possibility for wealth... clerics. In our terms, this would be the Divine Woman, Divine Man, or Priest..."
Chu He sighed and added, "Here’s one piece of evidence: these walls have no windows!"
Prompted by him, Wu Qi finally realized why a sense of unease had arisen within him.
Such an enormous wall, and indeed, it did not have a single window!
From afar, it looked like a massive tomb!
The thought of spending a night in such an ancient house made even Han Bingjie’s scalp tingle...