Nightmare Assault

With the village head’s description, the dark history of Little Ravine Village slowly unravelled. His voice was hoarse as history danced about. Compared to the hearsay provided by An Ping Town’s inn boss, the village head’s story was more detailed. He even included the names of the women and the horrible incidents that befell them.

Even though these happened some time ago, they sounded harsh to the ears. Humans who lived under the sunlight of civility could never imagine the torture these women had been through being trapped in the dark dungeons.

“Therefore…” Lee Li began carefully, “The women who died with hatred came back for revenge.” This was not a question but a statement. The inn boss had confirmed that.

However, the village head shook his head with a scared face. “Not the women.” He shivered, “She is the only one!”

“Who is she?” Chen Xiaomeng leaned forward.

“It… It’s the woman kidnapper who was beaten to death by the parents who had their daughters stolen!”

“Wait…” Jiang Zhongyi frowned deeply. He stared at the village head and asked, “The main culprit the police caught… It was a woman?!”

The village head nodded. His eyes trembled unnaturally, but he continued, “She was the one who tricked all the women into coming to this village. She looked young and could gain those women’s trust very easily.”

“What was her name?”

“Are you telling me the ghost that has been killing everyone is this main culprit from back then, Zhao Xiangmei?” Yu Man widened her eyes.”

The village head sighed, “Yes.”

“But… why her?” Yu Man pressed, “Wouldn’t it make more sense for the ghost to be one of the women who were tricked here?” Every traveller had the same question. Why did the culprit who deserved her ending return as the ghost and not the innocent women who were kidnapped?

The village head naturally saw the question in everyone’s eyes. He explained, “The ghost can’t be one of those women. Even though they had suffered… none of them died.” He sighed, “How can a living person be a ghost?”

Zhou Rong hesitated and then asked, “Are you sure none of them died?”

“I am,” The village head nodded with determination. “When the police came, they did a full report. Twenty-nine women were kidnapped. Twenty-one were trapped in the village, six were sold to other villages, and the last two were detained at home due to their pregnancies. They are all still alive today.” Then, he explained in an indecipherable tone, “After all, for the villagers, they were valuable assets. They were cultivated with a lot of money…”

After a while, Ben Fu asked, “That ghost… when did it first appear?”

The village head knew what he was thinking. “When the villagers realised that people were getting killed one after another, they also suspected one of the women killed themselves after they were rescued and came back as a ghost to haunt us.” The village head looked at them. “However, we did a thorough investigation. All twenty-nine of them are still alive.”

“Then, the ghost can only be the sole woman who died, the main culprit, Zhao Xiangmei,” Zhou Rong concluded.

The village head seemed to remember something and whispered, “That is basically a confirmed fact.” His eyes darted about. The sound of the wind made him jump. “We… We also found Zhao Xiangmei’s corpse near a stone plaque. There’s a sentence behind it written in blood…” At this point, he found it difficult to continue. Jiang Cheng tilted his head. He glanced at the muscular, tanned man. He realised that the man had also curled up in fear.

“Was it a curse?” Jiang Cheng grumbled, “Things like murdering all the chickens in the village, the villagers will give birth to sons with no xxx and so on…”

The village head, who was so caught in the fear, didn’t hear Jiang Cheng’s rumblings until he heard the word, curse. Then, he nodded vehemently, “Yes. It has to be a curse!”

The others were already immune to Jiang Cheng’s attitude. Ben Fu even looked forward to Jiang Cheng’s nonsensical words to ease the tension.

“Where is the stone plaque?”

“It’s beside the back mountain’s deep pond,” The village head added softly, “Zhao Xiangmei’s corpse was also dumped into that pond in the end.”

Chen Xiaomeng stared at the village head and asked sharply, “I remember you saying that Zhao Xiangmei was taken away by the angry parents and then beaten to death. In that case, when did she have the time to leave behind a bloody curse on the plaque?” Everyone looked at the village head, waiting for his explanation. The atmosphere chilled.

“Yes. Zhao Xiangmei was taken away.” The village head said with confusing melancholy. “However, she was not beaten to death on the spot. Instead, she was merely heavily injured and fainted. The parents thought she had died.

“After the parents left, Zhao Xiangmei woke up.

“Around the evening, some of the villagers realised she was still alive. She extended her broken arm to ask for help. She pleaded through bloody lips. However, no one was willing to help her. They just watched even though… some of them had just bought some women from her the day before.

“I heard that she groaned in pain for the whole night. She only died the next morning.” The village head pressed his lips. “She died with her eyes open. One of her eyes was stabbed blind. It looked like a bloody hole. Her face was cut by roof tiles. Her four limbs were bent out of shape.

“No one knew how she managed to write down that bloody curse. Her limbs… should be unusable. But she did it. And…” The village head raised his head, and his pupils shook. “Her curse came true!”

After hearing the whole story, things became clearer. From Zhao Xiangmei’s perspective, these villagers who let her die were indeed hateful. When the villagers needed her, they smiled at her. However, when she needed it the most, they abandoned her easily. They even worried that she would drag them down.

“Her corpse…” Lee Lu bit her lips.

“Her corpse was dumped into the pool by the villagers on the second day.” The village head looked at Lee Lu. “By then, she was already dead.

“Right. The pool has a special name. It has been there for a long time already. It is called the Chill Virtue Pond. In the earlier generations, the pond was used to execute women who didn’t abide by female sensibility.

“Once these women were discovered, they would be trapped inside pig cages and then tied with stones and thrown into the pool as the whole village watched on.”

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