Chapter 116: Shuangxi Town (X) Ghosts Talking About Ghosts

Li Yao claimed to be a horror novelist, and her role in this instance was clear: to provide paranormal knowledge to the players.

But what if she was lying?

She naturally possessed an information advantage, which was unfair to the other players; that was why the mobile phone existed as another source of knowledge.

But in that case, it made her existence seem redundant…

Qi Si remained impassive: “By the way, Li Yao, when was your last instance? I’ve noticed many people are forced to continue matching into instances only after waiting for the seven-day countdown to end.”

Li Yao blinked in confusion and was about to answer, but was interrupted by an enthusiastic greeting.

“Oh my! Why are you all up so early? After traveling for so long, you didn’t even rest a bit on your first day!” Sister Xu’s shrill voice came from the right side of the gate.

She took quick, short steps out of the cluster of morning mist, her smile exaggeratedly wide. Her wrinkled skin looked like a piece of white paper that had been crumpled up and then smoothed out, with white powder falling off its uneven surface.

Qi Si looked at her waist and didn’t see the bell.

She seemed to only wear the Soul-Summoning Bell, which could connect the living and the dead, after dusk; it was unclear what she was avoiding.

Qi Si asked: “Sister Xu, where is the bell at your waist? Did you leave it somewhere, or is there a reason you don’t want to wear it?”

Sister Xu slapped her thigh and let out an “Oh my”: “My memory isn’t what it used to be. It’s a good thing you reminded me, otherwise I wouldn’t have known I’d lost it.”

That sounded fake.

Qi Si feigned concern: “That is your family heirloom and has great significance. You don’t need to worry about us; it’s not too late to find the bell first.”

Sister Xu’s smile remained unchanged: “The family heirloom is important, but not as important as you distinguished guests. I came here to take you all to the banquet!”

Qi Si raised an eyebrow: “Whose banquet? Did someone die last night?”

“Oh, it’s not good to keep talking about life and death; it’s unlucky.” Sister Xu’s smile faded slightly. “We are holding a wedding for Xier. Chicken, duck, beef, mutton, green, yellow, red, and white wine—the tables will be set from one end of the street to the other, and the whole town will come to the banquet!”

“I’ll take you all first. Later, I’ll bring people to dress Xier up. When the ceremonial procession arrives, we’ll send her off in the bridal sedan chair with music and fanfare, letting her marry in splendor.”

Although her words were polite, she intentionally wanted to separate the players from Xier.

Qi Si lowered his eyes and gently requested: “I haven’t seen a traditional Chinese wedding before. Can I stay behind to see the process?”

Although Li Yao didn’t understand his intention, she chimed in: “Yes, we Investigators of folklore grew up in the city and haven’t seen many things. It’s rare to have a chance to take a look, so we’re all curious…”

“No.” Sister Xu’s tone became stiff. “According to our customs, Xier is going to be a wife to someone else. Even though you are our distinguished guests, you are outsiders after all. If Miss Xier makes a scene and offends you all, it wouldn’t be good.”

As she said “offends,” her eyes were cold, as if she were looking at dead people.

If the content of her words were replaced with “causing you all to die accidentally,” it wouldn’t seem out of place.

Qi Si knew he couldn’t keep asking. He pursed his lips and stepped to the side, indicating it was none of his business.

Li Yao naturally said no more.

Seeing that the two had stopped talking, Sister Xu’s expression gradually returned to peace, as if the previous gloom and ferocity were just the players’ illusion.

She swung her two inverted cone-shaped legs, nimbly stepped over the threshold, and headed deep into the residence, presumably to call the other players.

Listening to her footsteps fade away, Qi Si smiled coldly: “After we leave, the people in the town will probably do something to Xier, and those things are unspeakable and need to be hidden from us.”

It is known that the town’s source of fortune comes from the resentment of the girl dying on her wedding day. To obtain more fortune, the resentment must naturally be heavier. In other words, it is best for the girl to die a tragic death, suffering inhumane torture before death.

“However, Sister Xu said that after taking us to the banquet, she would bring people back. We will have plenty of opportunities to slip away from the banquet and come back to take a look.”

Qi Si didn’t say it definitively, but Li Yao agreed without hesitation: “I’ll try to see if I can sneak back. I have a stealth skill…”

Footsteps sounded behind them again, cutting off her subsequent words.

Sister Xu walked out with three players and greeted them with a smile: “Everyone follow closely. I’m taking you all to the banquet.”

Just like the first day, she walked in front, wobbling and shuffling her feet, weaving through the water town with its white walls and black tiles.

The players followed closely behind.

It was unclear how Shuangxi Town was laid out. When they arrived, they had come to the residence from the left road, but when going to the banquet, they took the right road. Clearly, they hadn’t retraced their steps, but after wandering around for a long time, they surprisingly passed by the God of Joy Temple they had passed on the first day.

Behind the vermilion temple door, the Idol wearing a red dress seemed to have taken a small step forward, closer to the door than yesterday, as if it were about to walk down from the shrine. The full face was still not visible, but one could see the pale, soft jaw and the bright red lips.

The man and woman kneeling below the Idol also slightly turned their bodies toward the door, their heads twisted in a bizarre posture, watching the passing players.

The smoke from burning paper dispersed faintly. Through the half-closed door, one could see the thin smoke inside, casting a layer of decay over the already gloomy interior.

“Someone is burning paper inside? Does this God of Joy also handle funerals?” Du Xiaoyu muttered in a low voice.

Sister Xu said with a smile: “After the banquet, you all should come to the God of Joy Temple to pay your respects. The Goddess of Joy not only blesses happy events and newlyweds; those who seek fortune and want to avoid disasters can worship Her to seek good fortune, avoid evil, and obtain joy.”

Qi Si caught the keyword “fortune” and raised an eyebrow.

The Eerie Game would not place the key to solving the worldview on a single clue. Otherwise, hiding one clue could wipe out all other players; such a design would be too reliant on luck and too crude.

Apparently, a part of the clues was in the God of Joy Temple. Even if players didn’t see the relevant pictures and text on the phone, as long as they dared to enter the God of Joy Temple to explore, they could reconstruct the instance’s worldview.

Qi Si spoke at the right moment: “Sister Xu, I’ve been wanting to ask since I entered your town.’Shuangxi’ (Double Joy) is a collective term for happy and sad events. Besides the God of Joy, is there a god in your town who handles funerals?”

The players pricked up their ears, waiting for Sister Xu’s answer.

After all, if there was a God of Joy, there should be a God of Funerals; this deduction fully conformed to the common sense in their cognition.

Sister Xu chuckled: “In our town, there is only one god, the Goddess of Joy. We only worship the Goddess of Joy. She was a person of our town in life, and a god of our town in death. If we don’t worship her, who would we worship?”

Qi Si feigned hesitation: “Then does the Goddess of Joy handle everything? Like life, death, and wealth—does she handle those too?”

“Of course, our Goddess of Joy handles everything, even hauntings,” Sister Xu said.

A ghost talking about hauntings was truly somewhat humorous.

Du Xiaoyu chuckled: “Your town still has hauntings? What kind of hauntings?”

Sister Xu answered patiently: “There have been a few times when hauntings occurred in our town, and everyone would have nightmares. We would go to the Goddess’s temple together to burn paper and pray for her blessing, and those hauntings would all be suppressed into the well.”

The well.

In the strange tale, Zhang Sheng 【accidentally fell into a well one day and saw skeletons lying there, feeling despondent and melancholy】.

In the 【Person in the Well】 clue, the bottom of the well was piled with skeletons that had condensed resentment and accumulated fortune.

Sister Xu had said that the Goddess of Joy had died by jumping into a well.

Li Yao asked: “What exactly are the hauntings? And why suppress them into the well? Is it the well where the Goddess of Joy’s body is located?”

Sister Xu was slightly displeased: “A haunting is a haunting. We don’t have Yin-Yang eyes, so how would we know what kind of haunting it is? Suppressed into the well means suppressed into the well; why are there so many whys?”

Seeing that Sister Xu was angry, the players, who had prepared a basketful of questions, could only shut their mouths and follow quietly behind.

After walking for another distance, Sister Xu pointed far ahead: “We’re here, that’s it.”

The mist on both sides of the road had dispersed for the most part without them noticing. Looking up, one could see a dense crowd of people in the distance wearing various colored clothes, moving back and forth, crowding together; some were carrying plates, others holding bowls and chopsticks.

The venue was decorated quite festively, with red debris scattered all over the ground. Huge red wooden round tables were arranged one after another, extending to invisible corners; just what was in sight numbered as many as twenty.

Sight triggered sound; the clamorous human voices rang out in unison, truly lively and vivid.

Mixed in were a few barks. Qi Si caught a glimpse of a tall black dog with a bone in its mouth, strolling leisurely on the red carpet.

Qi Si had heard some paranormal common knowledge from Jin Yusheng and knew that black dogs were inherently Yang objects. Logically speaking, it was impossible for one to appear in a town filled with ghosts.

Was the town really “full of ghosts” as Xu Wen had said?

Seeing guests arrive, two men came forward one after another to greet Sister Xu: “Granny Xu, our town owes its current state to your arrangements. You just rest when the time comes; let us do the miscellaneous work.”

Both had the faces of dark-skinned farmers, with wrinkles rippling at the corners of their eyes. They were unremarkable in appearance, but their smiles were quite cheerful.

They were quite respectful to Sister Xu. It wasn’t until the woman waved her hand and left that they looked at the players, their expressions becoming reserved: “Everyone, please sit, eat, and look around as you please. If you need anything, just call us!”

The players looked at each other, seeing calculations in each other’s eyes.

Sitting down just to eat was impossible; the main point of this trip was to look around, ideally to find some important clues.

Liu Bingding smiled at the two men: “You two don’t need to be so nervous. We don’t really understand the customs and requirements, so we’ll have to ask you to explain them to us.”

Shang Qingbei hadn’t said a word the whole way. Seeing that Liu Bingding was about to start spouting nonsense with that adult social script, he quickly interrupted: “Do you know where the groom is?”

Ever since he received the side quest “Disrupt Xier’s Wedding,” he had been thinking about how to complete it.

Taking Xier to run away was definitely unrealistic; she was a fool who couldn’t communicate. Could he really just knock her out and hide her?

Although this wedding was said to be a sacrifice, it still went by the name of a “wedding,” so there should be a groom.

Shang Qingbei believed that any task in the Eerie Game had a solution.

If he couldn’t find a breakthrough with Xier, he would try the groom.

“Little brother, what do you need the groom for?” the man asked suspiciously.

“I…” Shang Qingbei choked on his words.

Just as he was about to make up an excuse, before he could stutter out a few words, the cold electronic sound of 【side quest completed】 rang out.

Looking at the text on the system interface, Shang Qingbei blinked in confusion.

What was going on?

He hadn’t done anything yet; how was the side quest completed?

【Due to your low participation, the performance points provided by this task have been automatically transferred to the player with the highest participation.】

New prompt text refreshed. After understanding its meaning, Shang Qingbei’s eyes widened, and he was left in a daze.