The old lady asked us to look at our sleeves. I immediately rolled up my sleeves and found a 'yin yang fish' pattern on my forearm.
The pattern was actually swimming on my forearm as if it were a swimming pool.
After looking at it a few times, I felt a chill in my heart and asked the old lady, "What is this?"
The old lady coldly smiled and said it's a hundred-year curse from Mount Feng Men. Those who see the 'yin yang fish' will never be able to leave Mount Feng Men in their lifetime!
"How do we break it?" I asked.
"How? Only I know," the old lady changed to a proud look, as if we were seeking help from her.
As I uncovered the 'yin yang fish' pattern on my sleeve, the rest of the people also rolled up their sleeves, revealing the 'yin yang fish' pattern on their arms.
Everyone was cursed!
"Only you know?" I asked the old lady.
The old lady laughed haughtily, "Haha, a hundred-year curse, only I can break it. If you don't want to stay in the village forever, you have to let me go, otherwise... hehehe!"
"You're just bragging. I ask you, did you kill the male and female corpses we burned this afternoon?"
"Yes!" the old lady said. "You are indeed daring to burn them. Now you are also cursed, right?"
"Let me ask you again. Did you cut off the 'meat' on the hands?"
The old lady admitted.
I sneered, "Old lady, you are really good at deceiving people. This curse first appears on the hands, indicating that the hands are the most severely cursed part. You would rather cut off the most delicious 'meat' on the body rather than eat it, showing that you are afraid of this curse. You have no way to deal with it!"
I heard the old lady say in the afternoon that the most delicious 'meat' on the body is on the hands because it is fresh.
The old lady was exposed by me and hung her head, not saying a word.
I scolded, "You animal, not only did you ambush us into Mount Feng Men, but also caused us to be cursed? Do you think I will spare your life? You're delusional!"
"Brother, little brother, please spare me and my son. We really regret it. From now on, we will definitely... ah!"
Before the old lady finished her sentence, I threw the corpse oil at her.
Then I set her and her son Xia Bao on fire!
Boom!
A huge flame immediately ignited inside the Bagua Array.
Without looking back, I said, "Let's go!"
"Where to?" Da Jinya asked me.
I said, "Down the mountain. Let's go outside first to see if we are really cursed and can't leave Feng Men Village. We can't be scared by the old lady's words alone."
"Yes, let's go, young master Li," Da Jinya nodded.
We packed up the tent and went down the mountain.
On the way down the mountain, everyone's mood was not very high. After all, the 'yin yang fish' pattern was too strange. It's like a tattoo, moving back and forth on our bodies. Just this is scary enough!
Especially Huang Xin and Cheng Yan, they were gloomy.
I understand them. If what the old lady said was true, seeing the 'yin yang fish' meant never leaving Feng Men in their lifetime. What would they do for the rest of their lives in a small mountain village?
We soon arrived outside the entrance of the mountain road.
A few of us walked to the van parked on the side of the road, without finding anything wrong.
I breathed a sigh of relief. Seeing the 'yin yang fish' and never leaving Feng Men? Wasn't I fine?
I walked to the other side of the road to see the position of the entire Feng Men mountain, and then figure out how to go to Feng Men village.
In fact, something is quite strange. Last time, the Heavenly Fox did not give me a monster's phone number.
According to my speculation, before the last call, the woman in Feng Men had not died yet. It's just that the things that happened in the last two days, she was eaten by the wolf monster and the leopard monster, and then the wolf monster and the leopard monster started to plan against me.
Since the woman lived in Feng Men Village, the clues were still not broken.
I walked to the other side of the road, but as soon as I faced the sun, suddenly, a black smoke began to emit from my forearm, and when I looked down, the 'yin yang fish' on my forearm was moving extremely fast, with a big mouth, slowly gnawing at the muscles and skin on my forearm.
"Oh my god." I quickly ran back to where I was and told everyone, "Brothers, the curse is real, this thing is really weird!"
I showed them my arm. As long as I ran back to my original position, the 'yin yang fish' spit out the flesh and skin it devoured from my arm, and the strange phenomenon disappeared.
It seems that death in Feng Men, stay within Feng Men, this curse is indeed real.
This curse is going to trap us in Feng Men for a lifetime.
"How could this happen? How could this happen?" Even Fengying was anxious, saying he had never heard of this kind of curse in Feng Men Mountain before!
With this curse, does that mean there is no way to leave Feng Men Village?
After seeing the strange phenomenon on my hand, Cheng Yan burst into tears all of a sudden.
Huang Xin hastily comforted Cheng Yan, saying, "Yan Yan, don't cry. Even if we have to stay in Fengmen Village for a long time, I will figure out a way to rescue everyone in the end."
I also helped comfort Cheng Yan, saying it's okay. Even if we stay in Fengmen Village, it doesn't mean we have to stay in this ghostly place forever. I have plenty of ways; there won't be any problem.
I sounded quite optimistic, but in reality, I had no assurance at all. I've never encountered a curse before.
Cheng Yan started crying again, saying, "I'm not worried about not being able to leave. Even if I can't leave, it's fine. I just feel guilty. If it wasn't for me, you wouldn't have encountered this situation."
The whole thing was caused by the fox spirit inside Cheng Yan's body.
Without the fox spirit, we wouldn't have made this trip to Fengmen Village, and we wouldn't have encountered the curse.
Cheng Yan feels guilty that she caused us to end up like this.
I held Cheng Yan's shoulders and said earnestly, "Yan Yan, I hope you can calm down. Don't be silly. You are our friend, and saving you is only right and proper!"
"Okay," Cheng Yan nodded heavily at me.
Everyone looked at me and asked, "What's the next step?"
I said, "What else can we do? We can't leave Fengmen right now. We might as well investigate directly in the village. Turn the place upside down; maybe we can find a clue to the curse."
We've ended up stirring up trouble after failing to find clues about the fox spirit and ghost coffin; we've incurred this curse.
But since we've incurred it, we can't be afraid!
"No troubles, no fears. Since we're already under the curse, our visit to Fengmen is imminent," I told my companions. Then I got in the car, and we drove toward Fengmen Village.
To return to Fengmen Village, we need to drive to the other side of the road. But because we're under the curse, we can't go to the opposite side; otherwise, the Yin-Yang fish on our hands will devour our flesh and skin.
So, going back to the village, we were basically traveling against the flow or taking small paths, always staying close to the periphery of Fengmen Village.
Finally, I followed a road and arrived at the entrance of Fengmen Village.
Just as we arrived at the entrance, we ran into a funeral procession. Thirty-four people were carrying coffins in two neatly arranged lines, moving in our direction.
Cheng Yan pointed to the funeral procession and said, "Look, isn't that Grandma A?"
We quickly looked at the funeral procession, and indeed, the woman at the front was holding a large photo frame, and inside the frame was the photo of the old lady who had tricked us into going up the Fengmen Mountain.
She had actually died seven days ago, but it was only now that the funeral was taking place!
I quickly got out of the car and stood in front of the funeral procession, asking, "Hey! I need to ask you something about this old lady..."
Before I could finish my question, a villager in the front suddenly cursed loudly, "What's it to you? Get out of the village!"
"Why are you like this? Have we offended you?" I retorted.
"Our village doesn't welcome outsiders," someone from the funeral procession suddenly cursed at me.
I got angry and rolled up my sleeve, revealing the Yin-Yang fish on my arm and said to them, "Take a good look at this. I'm not the least bit interested in living in your Fengmen Village, but... but I'm under a curse and can't leave Fengmen now, so I have to stay in your village for a while."
Before I revealed the Yin-Yang fish, the villagers were very noisy, with some murmuring, some cursing, and some children causing a commotion. But when they saw our Yin-Yang fish, the whole scene fell completely silent.
"Do you know about this curse?" I felt the villagers' expressions were not right. I grabbed a villager in front of me and demanded, "Tell me, what does this curse mean? And who is the old lady?"
The villager quickly freed himself from my grip and ran back to the village, shouting as he ran, "Village chief, village chief, something's happened, something big."
I wanted to ask other villagers, but as soon as their eyes met mine, they immediately looked away, as if they had seen a ghost.
At the same time, many children and women in the village were crying, as if meeting us was a disaster for them.
Frankly speaking, I'd seen the same behavior in orphaned or widowed families. The children and women's reactions were exactly the same as those of the people in the village. The book "Zui Kuai" is to be updated. [Semi-floating, living]
"What's going on?" I thought to myself, feeling that the situation had become particularly strange. I rushed forward to find someone to ask, but whoever I asked ran away.
This was also quite strange.
I decided not to ask anymore and got in the car, planning to drive into Fengmen Village and ask the village officials about who the old lady was and what our curse was all about. Judging by their expressions, I figured out that the people in this village seemed to know something about the Yin-Yang fish.
I turned the steering wheel and slowly drove into the village.
But in less than a minute after the car entered the village, those villagers who had acted very strangely before swarmed up, holding hoes and looking at us menacingly.
"Kill them!"
"Kill them!"
"Kill them."
All the villagers, having shaken off their previous odd behaviors, became fierce and seemed to want our lives.
This really confused me. Why did they want our lives now?
Is it true that the people of Fengmen Village are so fierce? Will they kill someone at the drop of a hat?
Is this a village or hell? Why are people so aggressive?
As I was thinking about this, suddenly a villager rushed towards us and viciously threw the brick in his hand.
The brick hit our car window directly and smashed it.
Not only that, these people also cursed: Kill, kill, kill!
Immediately, there was a continuous sound of smashing, and the villagers smashed all the windows of my van.
One of the villagers grabbed my neck and tried to drag me out.
Without a second thought, I kicked him directly, but my shin was hit by a heavy blow.
"Get them!" Da Jinya and Fengying grabbed the folding shovel from the bag and started swinging.
Cheng Yan and Huang Xin hid under the car seats, trembling all over.
But I only glanced at them, and time really didn't allow for much more because the few of us men were fighting with these villagers.
We didn't do anything wrong, but we were beaten like this. Isn't it cowardly not to fight back?
Just as we were fighting fiercely with the villagers, suddenly a gunshot rang out!
Boom!
Everyone present stopped in their tracks.
A man in his fifties, holding a shotgun, stood on a large rock and shouted, "Stop, how dare you? What's wrong with you? Is there no rule of law? In broad daylight, you want to kill people?"
After speaking, he jumped down and walked up to a villager holding a brick, scolding, "Erzi, throw away the brick for me! What's wrong with you? Tired of living? Want to kill? What are you thinking?"
Erzi argued with the village chief, pointing at us and saying, "Village chief, these six people are cursed. If they don't die, we will die! It's better to just beat them to death."
"Get lost! What are you doing? Killing people and setting fires, is that what you should do?" The village chief also scolded the people around him, "You are the same, even if these seven enter, if seven people in our village are going to die, we have to see the arrangement of the heavens. Whoever the heavens want to die, will bear the consequences."
The village chief talked for a long time, confusing us, but we vaguely heard that they feared our curse.
"Sorry, everyone." The village chief touched the blood on my head, smiled, and said, "Brother, come, let's go to the village office. I will explain things to you. As for your car, you'll have to understand. We don't have much money, we can't afford to compensate for your car, but I will give you an explanation for this matter."
I, Da Jinya, Fengying, Duan Guangyi, Cheng Yan, and Huang Xin followed the village chief into the village office.
Fengmen Village is really poor, it’s evident in many places.
Here, almost every household has a livestock cart at the door. It's hard to see anyone using home appliances, and there are very few mobile phones. If anyone has one, it's a Nokia brick from a decade ago.
The village office was even more dilapidated, like a cowshed, without even a complete office.
The village chief led us into the village office... the cowshed, and gave each of us a large bowl of tea, apologizing, "I'm sorry, I apologize for the villagers not behaving sensibly."
"What happened, exactly?" I asked the village chief.
The village chief, in his fifties with a goatee, curly hair, looked stern but spoke with a friendly tone.
"There's not much to it, it's related to a curse in our village. By the way, let me ask you first, what are you doing in our Fengmen Village?" the village chief asked me.
I quickly narrated the incident of finding the place where the fox demon's coffin was unearthed, and also told about how Xia Bao and the old lady deceived us.
The village chief gave a cold smile and said Xia Bao died a few days ago, as for the old lady, she has been missing for over a week. Her body was found two days later, and she didn’t have a face, in short, she died.
This made me figure out everything. Xia Bao and his six coffin-digging brothers did die, and then the wolf and demon took on their appearances, framed us in the mountains, and wanted to eat us ‘yin’ people.
As for the things Xia Bao said to me in the car, it’s all true, because the village chief also told us that thirty-eight years ago, some city relatives of the village residents died on Fengmen Mountain, except for one who went missing.
Three years after their deaths, Fengmen Village started to experience a real curse, and all the villagers suffered from a particularly terrible curse.
"What curse?" I asked.
The village chief smiled and asked me, "Do you know why the people in the village wanted to kill you just now?"
"I don't know!"
"Because, when you come, someone among them has to die," the village chief said decisively.
I asked him what that meant.
Immediately, the village chief rolled up his sleeve, revealing the yin and yang fish on his forearm, showing it to me: Do you have this symbol too?
"Yes!" I admitted honestly.
The village chief nodded and said: Having this yin and yang fish symbolizes that you're a long-term resident of our village, but in our Fengmen Village, there's a curse. All the long-term residents together must be one thousand eight hundred people, not one more or one less.
"Village chief, please elaborate."
"For example, in our village, if someone dies, immediately one outsider from Fengmen Mountain would be affected by the curse, or if a new child is born. Recently, the seven brothers' mother and daughter-in-law died, a total of eleven deaths. However, only five children were born recently in the village, so six outsiders from Fengmen Mountain were affected by the curse. Do you understand?" the village chief explained.
After hearing his explanation, I understood that we appeared in Fengmen Mountain at the "correct" time, so we got affected by the curse of Fengmen Village.
Damn it, originally, a couple, would have been affected by the curse, occupying two spots, but they have already died, so these six spots all fell on the shoulders of us few people.
There are exactly six of us, so each of us has been affected by the curse.
Cheng Yan asked on the side, "Village chief, you said that if one less person dies, immediately another person will be affected by the curse or a child will be born to make up this number. What if there's one more person?"
"That's a good question," the village chief said with a smirk. "This is the conflict between you and the villagers in our village, they hate you because of this."
The village chief paused for a moment and said, "Actually, it's very simple. If there is one more person in the village, then someone will die! Mysterious deaths, in short, with a population of one thousand eight hundred, not one more, not one less."
He said today was especially strange, as six children were born early in the morning, making the village's population exactly one thousand eight hundred. Everyone thought there would be no more deaths in the village, but at the moment of Zhang's funeral, we encountered the six cursed people.
So, the village's population is now one thousand eight hundred and six, and six people among the villagers will randomly die.
Every person in the village has a probability of dying.
So they want to kill us. By killing the six of us, the village's population will still be one thousand eight hundred, no more, no less, and there will be no more deaths in the village.
"So eerie?" Huang Xin whispered.
It's the first time I've heard of such a strange curse, and I'm starting to wonder if our yin-yang fish is really related to the village's curse.
"Why doesn't everyone try to lift the curse?" I asked the village chief.
"Who can undo a curse set by the heavens?" the village chief slapped the table and said.
"I will definitely break this curse before anyone dies in the village," I said firmly to the village chief.
To be honest, the curse on the village of Fengmen reminds me of the ancient practice of erecting spirit tablets in the village and letting the spirits choose who will die.
"You won't break it," the village chief shook his head and said with a smile.
"In that case, why not leave the village if the curse is so strange? Why?" Huang Xin asked the village chief.
I glanced at Huang Xin and said, "We have a yin-yang fish on us, so how can we leave? Once we do, won't the fish immediately devour our skin and flesh and kill us?"
The village chief laughed and said, "Not necessarily, as long as you live in the village for a month and then leave for no more than three days, you'll be fine."
"Really? What if we exceed three days?" Cheng Yan asked.
"If you exceed three days, you'll spontaneously combust and burn to death outside," the village chief stood up and said to us, "Come, drink this tea. I'll show you around Fengmen Village. In the next few days, six people will definitely die, it could be you, or it could be someone else, in short, anyone could be chosen by the mountain god."
The village chief tapped the table, squinted his eyes, and said, "Life and death, it's up to fate!"
"Alright, life and death are up to fate. I don't believe in this curse," I grabbed the tea cup and finished the tea.
The others also drank the tea.
Just after drinking it, I suddenly felt dizzy and collapsed to the ground.
"This water is tainted," I said to myself before losing consciousness.
Before I passed out, I heard five "bang, bang" sounds on the ground.
I assume the others were affected as well.
When we woke up again, the six of us were bound to a large wooden stake, lined up in a row.
"Haha!" The village chief sat in a high-backed chair in front of us, surrounded by villagers with eyes full of resentment and anger.
"Kill them, kill them."
"Kill them, kill them."
The village chief looked smugly at us and said to the men by his side, "You guys are so stupid. You beat them up for half a day, but you didn't kill anyone. Once I step in, what, all six of them are tied up, and they'll be burned to death right away."
I struggled to free myself from the ropes and cursed the village chief, "You scumbag, we thought you were a good person, but it turns out you're even more vicious than the rest. You're a wolf in sheep's clothing!"
Author's message: Brothers, I wish you all the best in the new year, happiness for your family, prosperity, and good luck!