Chapter 127
Chapter 127
Based on the clues they had gathered so far, everyone had more or less reconstructed what had happened in the village twenty years ago.
Chen Lin summarized, “Putting all the clues together, we can prove that the letter on the fourth floor was written by Meiya back then! Meiya fell in love with a married man, and at the village chief’s urging, she pushed Li Shuhan off the cliff.
“Gao Lei went down below the cliff and found the badly injured Li Shuhan. He returned to the village to ask for help, but the villagers refused him. Li Shuhan’s injuries were too severe, and because she didn’t receive timely treatment, she died.
“After that, Gao Lei went to confront the village chief, but the village chief caught him and locked him in the basement of Meiya’s house. Later, Meiya discovered him and helped him escape. In the end, perhaps because his body was too weak, or perhaps because he was overcome with grief, he died in the cave. His body was thrown off the cliff by the villagers.
“Finally, Li Shuhan and Gao Lei turned into vengeful ghosts and came back. Li Shuhan thought Gao Lei was the one who had killed her, so she used the same method to push Gao Lei off the cliff. Then she killed the real Lili, took her identity, and became the innkeeper.
“From then on, the Faceless Woman and the Skeleton Monster appeared in the village. The villagers lived in constant fear. They raised black dogs to ward off the Skeleton Monster, and they sprinkled salt and Wolf Bone Powder to ward off the Faceless Woman!”
After listening, Lin Xiaoxue asked in confusion, “Hadn’t Gao Lei already died once? How can one ghost kill another ghost again?
“And if both of them became ghosts, couldn’t they just talk to each other about what really happened? As long as they compared their timelines, they would realize the real culprit was someone else.
“Also, in this whole incident, the ones who caused Li Shuhan’s and Gao Lei’s deaths were Meiya and everyone in the village. Since Li Shuhan turned into a vengeful ghost, she could have killed everyone and taken revenge. But instead, she chose to replace the innkeeper Lili and stay at the inn, waiting all this time for tourists to arrive so she could kill them?”
Lin Xiaoxue had voiced the question everyone found baffling about the entire incident.
Wei Sen fell silent in thought. They did not know the differences between an Eerie Shadow, an Eerie Human, and a Chaos Body, so they could not understand why Li Shuhan, after turning into a vengeful ghost, could kill Gao Lei a second time.
Wei Sen speculated that the key reason was that after Li Shuhan died, she became an Eerie Human, while Gao Lei became an Eerie Shadow.
Gao Lei had probably already lost his human consciousness and retained only a few things etched so deeply into his bones that he could never forget them, such as his love for Li Shuhan.
But Li Shuhan misunderstood and believed Gao Lei had killed her, so she “killed” Gao Lei once using the same method.
As an Eerie Shadow, Gao Lei experienced “death” once more beneath the cliff, then over the long years, he became the skeleton he was today.
Even though he had become an Eerie Shadow, and even though his body was rotting away day by day, his love for Li Shuhan had never changed.
Although Li Shuhan changed face after face, he always knew she was his Shuhan. He even thought she liked fresh faces.
That was why he did not hesitate to hunt Order Keepers in secret, tear off their faces, and give them to her as gifts along with roses carved from ice.
Wei Sen could understand this part, but what she could not figure out was why the original residents of the Eerie World would turn into two different things after death: Eerie Humans and Eerie Shadows.
What conditions had triggered the change in their identities?
Ordinary residents were all collectively called Chaos Bodies. Lin Ze had said that if a Chaos Body learned the truth of the Eerie World, it might also directly become an Eerie Human.
It seemed that for ordinary residents to become Eerie Humans or Eerie Shadows, death was not necessarily required.
For the residents of the Eerie World, their “death” was merely a formality. They were not like humans, who could use the boundary of death to distinguish people from ghosts.
Instead, whether they were ultimately a Chaos Body, an Eerie Human, or an Eerie Shadow was determined by two conditions: “whether they knew the truth of the world” and “whether they obeyed the rules.”
“Sister Sen, what do you think?” Chen Lin asked. Everyone’s eyes turned to Wei Sen.
Wei Sen came back to herself. Her fingers tapped lightly against the tabletop, and she seemed a little hesitant.
If she did not tell them about the distinctions between the identities of the native inhabitants of the Eerie World, they might never be able to figure out what was going on between Li Shuhan and Gao Lei.
There was no harm in telling them. She might even earn another wave of Merit Points from it.
There was just one thing she wasn’t sure about…
If Order Keepers glimpsed the truth of the Eerie World, what would happen then?
“Sister Sen?” Lin Xiaoxue called again.
Wei Sen drew in a soft breath and made up her mind.
Whatever happened in the future could be dealt with in the future!
And so, Wei Sen carefully explained Eerie Shadows, Eerie Humans, and Chaos Bodies to them.
///Ding~ Congratulations, Host, for completing a Good Deed: sharing clues. Merit Points +100! Accumulated Merit Points: 6600. Current remaining Merit Points: 1400!///
After everyone finished listening, they were all deeply shaken.
Lao Wang confirmed again, “Legend Lin told you this himself?”
“Mm.”
Even Guo Lan, who had been through many Instances, could not hide the shock on her face. “I thought I already understood the Eerie World well enough. I didn’t expect… heh.”
Order Keepers had always assumed from the start that every Eerie Entity in this world was a “ghost,” so it was difficult for them to discover what this world was truly like.
Only Eerie Humans knew that their world was different from the world of the Order Keepers. But Eerie Humans obeyed the Sovereign, and their only mission was to hunt Order Keepers. That meant Order Keepers had almost no chance of learning the truth about the Eerie World from an Eerie Human’s mouth.
Besides, Lin Ze had said before that not every Eerie Human understood the operating rules of the Eerie World.
Eerie Humans were divided by rank as well. Some low-level Eerie Humans only followed orders and hunted Order Keepers every day. They believed that was their normal life and never thought any further.
As for Chaos Bodies and Eerie Shadows, they did not know that the world they lived in was called the Eerie World, nor did they know that Order Keepers were outsiders to this world.
Chaos Bodies lived “normal” lives each day, while Eerie Shadows, under the influence of a Contamination Source, had their own behavior patterns that were completely different from everyone else’s.
Lin Xiaoxue frantically scratched at her head with both hands and looked around at the others. “Do your brains still have enough processing power for this?”
“Let me sort this out…” Xu You stood up with a hand to her forehead. “The native inhabitants of the Eerie World are divided into three identities, and we can’t determine which one someone is based on whether they’re dead or not. We have to analyze their behavior to figure out whether they’re an Eerie Human, an Eerie Shadow, or a Chaos Body!”
Huang Xinze nodded. “So… Li Shuhan is an Eerie Human, Gao Lei is an Eerie Shadow, and Meiya is a Chaos Body!”
Realization dawned on everyone.
Why ghosts could kill ghosts, and why a ghost could die a second time-now there was an answer to everything.
Guo Lan looked at Wei Sen. “So after Li Shuhan became an Eerie Human, her purpose for staying in this village was never revenge! It was… specifically to wait for Order Keepers to arrive, and then hunt us down!”
Wei Sen nodded. “Yes. From Li Shuhan’s perspective, she never knew the truth of what happened back then. She always misunderstood and believed Gao Lei had killed her. So after she killed Gao Lei for revenge, she devoted herself wholeheartedly to serving the Sovereign.”
“Then I have a question.” Chen Lin looked at everyone and asked, “Was the Shu Yue we saw just now an Eerie Shadow? She was an Order Keeper. If an Order Keeper dies in this world, can they also become an Eerie Shadow, an Eerie Human, or a Chaos Body?”
Everyone fell silent for a long while. Then Xu You spoke slowly, her tone heavy. “Maybe… she was a real ghost.”
Xu You’s answer sent a chill crawling up everyone’s spine.