Chapter 125: Shuangxi Town (19) – Journey to the Yellow Springs

It was exactly one o’clock in the afternoon.

Qi Si stepped out of the residence with his phone in hand, and in a second, he was soaked through by the damp chill.

Endless mist once again curled up from the shadows, gracefully and coyly shrouding the entire street, casting a white veil-like filter over the distant white walls and black tiles, as if in a dream.

Qi Si lowered his head to adjust the size and orientation of the map on his phone with two fingers, mapped out a route, then put the phone away and proceeded according to his memory.

Du Xiaoyu and Shang Qingbei followed behind him, silent the whole way.

The mist grew thicker, and the houses on both sides became further and further apart, as if they were flowing from a narrow waterway into a lake.

After the road opened up to the extreme, Qi Si saw a well in the center of the flat ground before him.

The well was built with black stones, its rim worn in many places and in a state of disrepair.

There was no bucket nearby, but a circle of half-rotted rope was wrapped around a wooden frame, with a movable noose tied to the end.

The hint was clear: put the noose around your waist and lower yourself down.

Looking at the hemp rope, which appeared uneven in thickness due to decay, Qi Si vaguely suspected that once someone went down, the rope would break at some point, leaving them trapped below forever.

“Drip, drip…”

A faint sound of water echoed in his ears, sounding like a water clock.

A stammering voice trembled from beneath the well: “Save me… save me…”

The surrounding light dimmed significantly, instantly shifting from day to night.

Qi Si saw a woman in a red wedding dress sitting by the well, looking haggard.

The woman’s hair, long like a waterfall, covered most of her face, making her features unclear. He could only see the hollow eyes peeking through her hair and her cold, gloomy gaze.

“Can no one save me? I can’t save anyone… no one can save me…”

She muttered, as if she had finally made a decision, then instantly turned around and jumped down.

The lingering red image reflected in the mist like blood, refusing to dissipate for a long time.

The scene continued. Townspeople who clearly did not belong to this era rushed over with torches, whispering and discussing among themselves.

“The young lady is dead, what are we going to do?”

“This is trouble. Committing suicide by jumping into a well while wearing a red wedding dress—I’m afraid she’s going to become a malevolent spirit!”

The whispering gradually died down as a short, stout woman in floral clothing pushed through the crowd and walked to the front.

She was clearly very prestigious; with just a wave of her hand, she calmed the panicked townspeople.

“What are you afraid of? This girl was bewitched; I, as her grandmother, will just pretend I never had this granddaughter! I’ll build a temple for her another day, set up a feng shui formation, and seal her inside.”

“It just so happens that someone is watching us and wants to send people to investigate. When that time comes, we’ll just say it’s a custom for worshipping the gods, stuff some silver into their hands, and what’s there to worry about?”

The townspeople clamored in agreement, and the scene faded away amidst the noise like a vegetable market, dissipating into mist like a wisp of smoke in the wind.

The sky brightened again.

Qi Si checked the time; it was exactly 1:30 PM.

“Save me…” the voice beneath the well rang out tirelessly.

Qi Si turned back to look at Du Xiaoyu and Shang Qingbei, saying jokingly, “Although I don’t know if these scenes are credible, at least there’s an explanation for the truth about the Goddess of Joy. Is this considered a treat before asking us for a favor?”

Shang Qingbei adjusted his glasses: “It seems the Goddess of Joy did indeed commit suicide, but the reason is different from what Sister Xu said. She was forced by the people in the town, and having no one to turn to for help, she had no choice but to choose death.”

Du Xiaoyu asked, not understanding: “Judging by how those people addressed her, wasn’t she a ‘young lady’? Who else could force her to her death?”

The answer is desire.

Ever since humans learned to think and became accustomed to seeking greater benefits beyond survival, alienation began to occur.

Power, profit, conflict, and checks and balances—every one of these contributed to the stripping away of humanity, causing humanoid creatures to step further and further away from the category of “human.”

There was no longer any closeness or distance, only sycophancy and sordid dealings.

Qi Si walked step by step toward the well, looking down at the wellhead, which was as deep and dark as an eye: “We are still missing key clues; I’m afraid we’ll have to go down the well to find them.”

…

In the past timeline of Shuangxi Town, Liu Bingding and Li Yao sat leaning against a Coffin with its lid pried open, speechless.

Their meeting was so simple it was almost sloppy.

Liu Bingding followed the funeral procession and found the place where the Coffin was kept, just in time to hear Xu Yao’s cry for help, so he pried open the four Coffin nails and helped her out.

Li Yao’s identity at this time was “Miss Xu,” and since she was outside the Xu residence, the side quest 【Escape the Xu residence with “Miss Xu”】 was naturally judged as 【Completed】.

On the system interface, new text refreshed in a timely manner.

【Congratulations on obtaining the clue “Local Gazetteer”】

A yellowed paperback book opened in the minds of the two players, and the dense text outlined the past of Shuangxi Town:

Three hundred years ago, Shuangxi Town was just a small settlement tucked away in a mountain gully, with inconvenient transportation, making travel and purchasing supplies extremely difficult, and thus it had always been accompanied by poverty.

Until a woman surnamed Xu came here, and a proper town rose from the ground.

The woman called herself “Mother Xu.” She was originally a shaman who told fortunes, played tricks, and possessed powerful gu sorcery that could bewitch people’s minds and cause them to become mentally deficient.

She was quite famous in this line of work. Gradually, she became dissatisfied with just swindling money and began using the convenience of traveling from street to street to abduct women and children to sell elsewhere.

At that time, the government was conducting strict investigations. Mother Xu searched everywhere and set her sights on the hidden location of Shuangxi Town, establishing herself there with the wealth and connections she had accumulated over many years.

She returned to her old trade, taking people from the mountains to roam various places. After drugging women and putting them into Coffins, she would avoid the government’s eyes and ears to send them into the mountains, where she would use gu sorcery to make them mentally deficient before transporting them elsewhere.

At first, the government did not notice the actions of the townspeople. After all, no one would have thought that a bride would be mixed into a funeral procession, holding a “happy event” in such an inauspicious way.

By the time the government learned everything, it was too late; the industries of Shuangxi Town had already grown large. The townspeople protected each other, and they had also paid many tributes, greasing all the right palms.

Mother Xu knew how to handle things and was adept at socializing. Furthermore, she never provoked those she shouldn’t have, so those who knew about it mostly turned a blind eye.

Thus, decades passed. Mother Xu had practically become the master of Shuangxi Town, building a large residence and even maintaining connections with numerous officials.

In the following hundred years, her trade and gu sorcery were passed down from generation to generation—passed to daughters, not sons. Every person who took over in each generation was respectfully called “Mother Xu” by the townspeople.

Until Xu Yao’s generation.

The record stopped abruptly. Li Yao continued: “Zhang Sheng’s sister went missing in the Shuangxi Town area. Zhang Sheng almost lost his own life in the process, narrowly escaping Shuangxi Town to report the matter to the county magistrate.

“An assistant magistrate, whether assigned by his superiors or out of a sense of justice, snuck into Shuangxi Town to investigate the disappearance of Zhang Sheng’s sister. As the granddaughter of that generation’s Mother Xu, Xu Yao met and became acquainted with this assistant magistrate by chance.

“Under the influence of the assistant magistrate, Xu Yao gradually became dissatisfied with Mother Xu’s illicit activities and wanted to join forces with the assistant magistrate to collect evidence and rescue the girls who had been abducted, but unfortunately, they were discovered halfway through…”

Liu Bingding asked: “So Mother Xu’sacrificed her own kin for righteousness’?”

“No…” Xu Yao shook her head slightly, but suddenly stopped speaking.

She saw several blurry silhouettes appear in the white mist in the distance, drifting about as if they would be blown away by a gust of wind.

The shadows drew closer, and she could already see the blood-red rouge through the veil-like mist. The faint, eerie smile was ethereal and unclear, making it even more soul-chilling.

“Hee hee hee… hee hee…”

There were seven Paper Effigies in total, all waving their arms as they drifted over.

The shrill, creepy laughter mixed with the rustling of paper clothes, striking the nerves of the listeners with every beat.

“Quick, lie in the Coffin and close the lid!” Xu Yao turned and climbed into the Coffin, pulling Liu Bingding in with her.

With a “bang,” the Coffin lid was closed, shutting out sound, light, and color.

In the last second before the world returned to darkness, Li Yao only saw a pale face flash by in the crack…

…

“Save me… who will save me…”

The voice at the bottom of the well repeated itself over and over.

Qi Si asked: “How do you need us to save you?”

The voice stopped for two seconds, seemingly in thought, and when it sounded again, it had changed its lines: “You come down… take me away…”

Shang Qingbei took a small step back and stroked his chin: “There are three of us, which is just right: one person goes down, one person is responsible for pulling the rope, and one person keeps watch.”

Qi Si lowered his head and asked calmly: “Who is going down?”

“Let me state this beforehand: I will not go down. Even if you force me to go down, I won’t tell you if I find any clues.”

Shang Qingbei adjusted his glasses, his gaze fixed on Qi Si, calm and sharp: “Since things have reached this point, I’ll speak plainly. I suspect you are one of the Slaughter-path players, and I believe you have a way to make Du Xiaoyu follow your orders unconditionally. Leaving the two of you on the surface, I am not at ease, and I don’t trust that you can guarantee my safety.”

“Who are you calling a Slaughter-path player?” Du Xiaoyu said with an unkind tone, though his confidence was lacking.

In the few team instances he had experienced in the past, it was basically always veteran players who acted as leaders, taking the lead in searching for evidence and analyzing clues.

Following by the leader’s side, he could at least get a sip of hot soup.

But now that he had arrived at this instance, why did things feel so completely different?

Not to mention the constant conflicts within the team, just look at Qi Si; he looked easy to talk to, but had he fulfilled a single ounce of his responsibilities as a leader from start to finish?

Thinking about it—could Qi Si really be a Slaughter-path player?

Thinking of this, Du Xiaoyu shivered. “Do you have any proof? You can eat whatever you want, but you can’t just say whatever you want!”

“I don’t have any evidence, but I don’t dare to gamble,” Shang Qingbei shook his head gently. “If I’m wrong, I will apologize to you later. But I want to survive, and I cannot afford any mistakes in this regard. I hope you understand.”

“Sound logic,” Qi Si praised, then asked, “Then who do you think should go down?”

Shang Qingbei said, “Du Xiaoyu won’t do; his strength is too weak, and he might not be able to find effective clues. And Qi Wen, you are a veteran player with sufficient strength. Although I have always been suspicious of you, with Du Xiaoyu there, you don’t have to worry about no one pulling you back up.”

Qi Si asked with interest, “Then what makes you think that the clues I obtain at the risk of my life will definitely be made public?”

Shang Qingbei was silent for two seconds, then pinched the frame of his glasses and said, “It doesn’t matter if you don’t make them public; in any case, I won’t go down the well. Compared to clues, I think life is more important.”

This was a typical example of the “Boxed Pigs” game theory model.

Shang Qingbei was in a weak position in this game, with a higher risk of action; correspondingly, Qi Si was in a strong position, with a lower risk of action.

In a situation where they needed to achieve the same goal, the weak player’s payoff for choosing a passive response was higher than taking action, while the strong player had no choice but to act personally due to the circumstances.

Qi Si understood this point well and curled his lips into a calm smile.

He suddenly understood a little why the Puppeteer liked to snatch the “leader” role, which was clearly a trap.

Acting against common sense, imparting probability to all decisions, and even more so, directly inducing the group to put pressure on oneself…

The mob is the easiest to incite; they will always be unconsciously lured into making anti-intellectual decisions, all while thinking it is their own democracy.

And once all choices are veiled in the guise of chance and democracy, few people will suspect a carefully calculated layout.

Just like now, no one would think that Qi Si had wanted to go down the well to take a look from the beginning; they would only think all of this was due to Shang Qingbei’s pressure.

Even if he laid out a massive lie with this as the core, who would think it was a pre-designed scam?

Qi Si walked silently to the wooden frame next to the well and picked up the rope loop, weighing it in his hand.

The whole town was damp, cold, and foggy. The hemp rope was soaked through and felt heavy in his hand, but it looked sturdy.

Qi Si directly looped the rope around his waist and tied it tight.

Shang Qingbei had thought he would need to waste more breath, but he hadn’t expected Qi Si to compromise so quickly.

Watching the young man’s nimble movements, as if he had been prepared for a long time, he felt a little ashamed. Could it be that he had really wronged a good person because of his prejudice?

Qi Si sat on the edge of the well and looked back at Du Xiaoyu: “I will go down and check the situation first. Five minutes later, no matter what happens, you must pull me up.”

Du Xiaoyu nodded hurriedly, stood by the wooden frame wrapped with the rope, and seriously and solemnly fiddled with the pulley mechanism.

The reason he had followed Qi Si’s lead before was definitely not because of any fan complex, but simply because he was picking the thickest thigh to hug, just like in any other instance.

Unexpectedly, this thigh was not as reliable as it looked; it had been persuaded into going down the well after just a few words.

Right now, he had already had a falling out with Shang Qingbei, and all he could do was swallow his teeth along with the blood, praying that Qi Si would come back up in one piece.

Qi Si turned around with a calm expression, gripped the hemp rope with both hands, and leaped into the well.

Du Xiaoyu hurriedly held onto the pulley of the wooden frame and slowly lowered the well rope, circle by circle.

The dry well was bottomless, and the stone walls on both sides were too slippery to get a foothold. Qi Si could only let himself be lowered by the rope, like bait hanging on a fishhook.

Time passed second by second. With the rhythmic ticking of the Pocket Watch of Fate, the circle of light above grew further and further away, and the surrounding temperature dropped, filled with an inescapable chill.

In the silence, his feet suddenly stepped onto soft soil; he had unknowingly reached the bottom of the well.

Qi Si took out a makeup mirror from his bosom and turned on the LED light.

Under the pale light, he saw cluttered white bones lying everywhere around him; the skeletons left behind after human corpses rotted were piled up in an orderly fashion.

In the center surrounded by the crawling white bones, a young man wearing a white shirt and black trousers sat cross-legged.

The young man hung his head low, his exposed skin showing a sickly pallor. In the silence, not a single sound of breathing came out, strictly adhering to the quietude that belonged to a corpse.

Qi Si walked over with composure, lifted the young man’s chin, and as expected, saw his own face.

A face that was already dead, calm, and expressionless.

The clue was already very clear: in the past, Zhang Sheng “fell into the well by accident and saw the remains,” and players were the same.

—Whoever goes down the well will see their own corpse.

Whether it was an illusion or reality, what did it matter? Zhuangzi dreamed of a butterfly, the butterfly dreamed of Zhuangzi; perhaps the world itself was just Brahma’s dream…

The moment he reached the conclusion, countless non-narrative pieces of information flowed through his mind; the evil spirit in his Identity Card opened countless scarlet eyes, and black-purple tentacles danced wildly like a swarm of snakes.

Gray fog filled his vision, and scenes flashed before Qi Si’s eyes.

Zhang Sheng, who had come to find someone, sat on the boat, sniffing the incense that had been lit, his consciousness gradually fading.

The boatman steering the boat brought the raft to the shore and ordered the old women on the shore to throw the unconscious uninvited guest into the well.

Zhang Sheng’s soul floated into the town, attached itself to a Paper Effigy, and wandered around in a daze…

It’s just, could a Paper Effigy dream too?

At this point, Qi Si understood that this was undoubtedly an instance similar to the Dialectical Game, and its starting point could not be described as anything but malicious.

Players were replaced by Ghosts without realizing it; even if they successfully achieved clearance, after waking up in reality, they would no longer be their original selves.

Unfortunately for Qi Si, there was no difference between being human or a Ghost. As long as he looked like Qi Si, believed he was Qi Si, and had the thoughts and memories of Qi Si, he was the genuine Qi Si.

The black-haired young man lowered his head to think for a moment, and a strange smile suddenly bloomed on his lips.

He unceremoniously patted his own corpse on the shoulder, leaned over to the latter’s ear, and said loudly: “Wake up, you’ve slept for so long, shouldn’t you get up and work?”

…

In last night’s dream, the Ghost wearing Li Yao’s face asked eerily: “Tell me, am I a dead person or a living person?”

At that time, Qi Si looked at her and showed a gentle smile: “What does it matter if you are a dead person? What does it matter if you are a living person? If you are a Ghost, then kill all the players; if you are a player, then seek survival from the hands of the Ghosts. Except for their positions, what is the difference between Ghosts and humans?”

The female ghost grabbed Qi Si’s neck and said coldly: “I will kill you… I will kill you…”

Qi Si had difficulty breathing, but he was still smiling: “I don’t mind death. If I die, I would be very happy to roam the world as a Ghost and kill those humans.”

He paused for a moment, his eyes curving: “Of course, I am a bit vengeful. Do you think my strength as a fellow Ghost compares to yours?”

…

At this moment, Qi Si used a not-so-gentle method to make himself rise from the dead.

The corpse slightly opened its eyes, and the pupils facing the intruder were pitch black and devoid of light, as if they could devour souls.

Having suffered from the “soul weightlessness” condition for so many years, Qi Si had long been accustomed to facing himself.

He admired his own corpse for a few seconds, smiling and greeting it, before casting his gaze onto a piece of yellow scripture paper scattered on the ground.

He bent down to pick up the yellow paper, quickly scanned the text on it, and clicked his tongue lightly: “The efficiency of sending letters is quite high.”

From the moment he saw the old man burning paper in the God of Joy Temple, Qi Si had realized that this instance might have an interesting mechanic, and he had decisively tried it out.

After discovering that the mobile phone clue was fake, he became even more certain of this guess: since certain high-level entities could create fake clues, why couldn’t players try it too?

Qi Si stuffed the yellow paper into the corpse’s pocket, untied the rope loop from his body, and put it on the corpse; then he placed a series of items such as the silver bracelet, the Pocket Watch of Fate, and the Rose Heart onto the corresponding parts of the corpse one by one.

After finishing everything, he looked with some distress at the items in his inventory like the Recorder and the Sea-God Scepter, which were not easy to take out, then looked up at the corpse that had regained its consciousness and smiled:

“It’s still early. Are you interested in signing a Contract?”