Chapter 242
Chapter 242
Late at night, in the rear courtyard of the Hu Family Manor.
The ancestors of the Hu Family had been itinerant barbers, carrying their tools on shoulder poles as they wandered the streets shaving people’s heads and beards.
Then, a century ago, they had somehow obtained a Tooth Regrowth Formula. After spending a generation amassing wealth, they purchased a plot of land in the old city.
As if determined to vent the resentment of several generations of poverty all at once, they spared no expense on materials and built this manor in the utmost luxury.
No one knew which feng shui master or team of builders they had hired, but the farther one went into the rear courtyards, the more labyrinthine the layout became.
After everyone in the Hu Family vanished overnight, leaving behind only a manor full of servants, the estate became hot property, changing hands repeatedly between local gentry and warlords.
The manor seemed to be cursed. Few of its successive owners met a good end.
It was eventually abandoned, and only in modern times was it restored and preserved as a historic structure.
The rear courtyard of the Hu Family had originally been closed to the public and sealed off behind iron gates.
But the Earth Womb moved through the grounds as though it were in its own home, shattering stone paving and ripping iron gates from their hinges along the way.
Upon reaching the rear courtyard, it plunged headfirst into the Bagua Well.
The stone-lined Bagua Well was enormous and had been built in accordance with the feng shui layout of the Hu Family. Bracing its thick arms beneath its ribs against the walls, the Earth Womb began climbing down.
By the time Qin Ying and the other two arrived, they only caught a glimpse of one yellowed heel disappearing into the darkness.
The wind howled past the well.
Xie Shao had already swollen to an enormous size, and black bristles covered his body. His pair of oversized, protruding ears gave him exceptionally sharp hearing.
He stopped abruptly. “Wait. Something’s wrong.”
“There’s something else here!”
“It sounds like… someone’s humming?”
He gave a dry laugh. The Monstrous Beast Transformation had overtaken most of his face, making his expression impossible to read. After tilting his head to listen, he turned toward the seemingly empty stone platform around the well.
“It’s a woman.”
A humming voice was clearly coming from that empty patch of ground.
It was the dead of night in a century-old manor. Xie Shao couldn’t help thinking of the supernatural.
Even Qin Ying, standing beside him, heard him gulp.
She looked in the direction he indicated but saw nothing at first.
However, after hearing what Xie Shao had said, she listened carefully to the sound carried on the wind. The moment she truly heard a woman humming, Qin Ying saw the air beside the well distort.
It was as if something transparent, something invisible to the human eye, was crouched at the edge of the well.
As she “looked” at it, the thing abruptly raised its head.
For some inexplicable reason, Qin Ying felt as though their gazes met in that instant.
The humming stopped. Under Qin Ying’s stare, the thing beside the well gradually took solid form.
A figure nearly two meters tall and terrifyingly gaunt, dressed in sackcloth, slowly straightened up.
A chill swept over Qin Ying, and she ducked behind Han Lie as he raised an arm protectively in front of her.
“What’s that thing?” she asked him.
Han Lie stared at her in astonishment. “What?”
Xie Shao, his face covered in black fur, also turned toward Qin Ying. “What do you see?”
From their expressions, Qin Ying immediately knew that neither of them could see the “person” beside the well.
After more than twenty years of life, had she finally seen a ghost?
The thought flashed wildly through her mind.
She could clearly see the tall, gaunt woman dressed in ragged sackcloth mottled black and gray. In her arms, she cradled an empty swaddling bundle.
Tangled, matted hair concealed her face.
“You can’t see her?” Qin Ying couldn’t help asking.
There was someone that huge standing right there.
Xie Shao and Han Lie shook their heads at the same time.
Qin Ying was just about to say something else when she suddenly saw the figure beside the well take a step forward.
More precisely, it took a step toward her.
It was coming this way!
No matter how unflappable Qin Ying usually was, a wave of dread washed over her at that moment.
Qin Ying pointed the short blade Di Shang had transformed into at the spot. “Attack there.”
Whether it was an illusion or her eyes were playing tricks on her, it was always better to strike first. Whatever it was, they could beat it up before worrying about the details.
At her command, Han Lie flicked his wrist and hurled the iron spike he had pried from a cast-iron railing with all his strength.
With a heavy thud, it plunged a palm’s depth into the ground. The tiles around it shattered into large chunks.
At the same time, several finger-thick bolts of lightning crackled through the air and struck the exact spot Qin Ying had indicated.
Xie Shao was a beat slower. Only after the lightning struck did he hunch his back and charge.
After undergoing Monstrous Beast Transformation, he already bore a strong resemblance to a wild boar. This charge made him look even more like one, head lowered and elbow thrust forward as he powered ahead with brute force.
With the muscles he had now, even a rhinoceros might lose in a head-on collision with him.
And yet, Xie Shao hit nothing.
Unable to stop his momentum, he nearly tumbled into the Bagua Well before finally skidding to a halt.
“There… there’s nothing there?”
He turned, about to ask if Qin Ying’s eyes were playing tricks on her.
Instead, he saw her staring fixedly at a certain spot.
Every hair on Qin Ying’s body stood on end, and sweat beaded at her hairline.
All three attacks had missed just now, but not because the tall, gaunt figure had vanished.
They had passed right through it!
Xie Shao’s headlong charge had carried him straight through the lanky apparition cradling a swaddled bundle.
For an instant, their bodies had even overlapped.
Qin Ying forced herself to stay calm and murmured, “A phantom?”
Before she could reach a conclusion, the figure beside the well took another step toward her.
This time, it began sobbing as it cradled the empty swaddling bundle.
Qin Ying felt as though someone had stuffed a handful of ice shards down the back of her collar.
She couldn’t help asking Han Lie, “In the legends, does the Earth Womb have a mother?”
Given the figure holding a swaddled bundle and the Earth Womb, the connection was only natural.
Sensing Qin Ying’s unease, Han Lie moved his entire body in front of her and replied, “According to the stories, the Earth Womb is born from the ley lines. It shouldn’t have a mother.”
If it had no mother, then what was that thing in front of them?
In the time it took them to exchange those few words, the gaunt figure took yet another step toward Qin Ying.
Its sobs sounded remarkably similar to the Earth Womb’s, only much older.
“There’s really nothing there,” Xie Shao said, his voice several shades rougher than usual.
As he spoke, he walked back toward them, once again overlapping with the strange figure.
Completely unaware, he swung his arm, which was as thick as Qin Ying’s thigh, through the air twice as if swatting at a mosquito.
From Qin Ying’s perspective, when his misshapen bulk overlapped with its lanky form, the two seemed to fuse into some entirely new creature.
She said softly to Xie Shao, “You. Come here.”
Her words had barely left her mouth. Before Xie Shao could return, the strange figure reacted first. Still cradling the swaddled bundle, it moved toward Qin Ying.
Just then, a whimper rose from the Earth Womb’s throat inside the well.
The shadow that no one else could see shuddered. Still sobbing, it turned back toward the well and plunged headfirst inside.
Only then did Qin Ying breathe a sigh of relief.
Xie Shao slowly walked back and asked, “What exactly did you see?”
“How about we leave first?”
He looked at Qin Ying, waiting for her decision.
After struggling to calm herself from the fright, Qin Ying looked at Xie Shao and said, “No. Let’s go down and take a look.”
She couldn’t shake the feeling that Xie Shao and Han Lie’s inability to see it wasn’t because something was wrong with them.
The problem lay with her, the one who could see it.