Chapter 0290 – Living Coffin Village
The blood-red spider silk left a line of words on the door panel, and strangely enough, by the time the oldest man turned around to look at it, those words turned into blood and slowly slid down.
”You’ve been searching for Sister Jiangling’s corpse, have you done something to shame her?” Chen Ge heard a hint of guilt and self-reproach in the oldest master’s words.
”Go inside first.” The oldest master hung the lamp in his hand at the door, the discovery of the secret that had been hidden in his heart for many years had left him a bit at a loss for words.
After seeing Chen Ge come in, he stood in the middle of the second wooden house and let out a long sigh, “Actually, I know who the person who poisoned that couple was.”
”You know?” Chen Ge grabbed the skull crushing hammer and stopped at the doorway, not continuing inside.
”I can probably guess some.” The old man lifted the boards of the wooden bed, and there was a coffin hidden under the bed.
It was a bit smaller than a normal coffin, and was pure black.
”Putting a coffin under the bed?” Chen Ge felt even more curious.
”The coffin is for the Zhu family’s daughter.” The old master pushed open the lid of the coffin and took out a still unfinished tablet from inside, with three words written on it – Zhu Xinrou.
”Why did you prepare a coffin for her? Could it be that her disappearance has something to do with you?”
”This matter really counts from a long time ago.” The old man stared blankly at the tablet in his hand, “When I was young, I heard from the village adults that there was a coffin village deep in the mountains of Jiujiang, that village never interacted with outsiders, and the people in the village looked oddly shaped, and there were many odd customs, for example, there was a living coffin in every house, and I don’t know what it was used for.”
The first half of what the old man said Chen Ge could still understand, the village was deep in the mountains not interacting with outsiders, inbreeding and intermarriage, the probability of deformities would be high.
But what the old man said afterward, Chen Ge couldn’t understand, what does it mean for every family to have a live coffin? The coffin was placed in the house, which was too unlucky.
”Grandpa, is that village still there now?” Chen Ge closed the door to the room and softly inquired.
”At first, I thought that village was a legend, after all, no one had ever seen it, but who knew that strange things really happened.” The oldest put down Jiangling’s sister’s tablet and reached out to rummage for something in the coffin, “The coffin village in the big mountains was plagued by a disaster more than ten years ago, and a few families escaped.”
”Everyone who escaped had an appearance similar to that of a normal person, and didn’t have those strange habits from the legends, so the Bai Family Village at the foot of the mountain took them in at that time.”
”But no one expected that in the very same year, the White Family Village was also plagued by the plague.” There was some regret in the old man’s voice, as if someone had objected to taking in those people at that time, but they didn’t care.
”It was those people who brought the disease out from inside the big mountain?”
”Who can say now? The village’s capable ones have all moved away, and nine out of ten rooms are empty; instead, those few families who escaped from Coffin Village put down roots here, and later they changed the name of the village as well, which is the Lin Guan Village you see now.” Master Bai finally found what he was looking for in the coffin, and he took out a black cloth coat from it.
”I made this coat for the Zhu family’s eldest daughter, people who die outside should wear black clothes when they enter the coffin, so that the blood won’t be too conspicuous.” The clothes in the boss’s hand had another feature, there were four sleeves that were only a quarter of the length of a normal sleeve on both ribs and the back.
”Doesn’t it seem like this shirt is strange? The Zhu family boss looks like this.” The Boss’s voice was getting lower and lower, and Chen Ge could hear the hard feelings in his heart, “That child’s parents escaped from the Coffin Village, and her mother was already pregnant with her at that time, so it can be said that this child is the last ‘seed’ of that Coffin Village.”
”This level of deformity can no longer be explained by inbreeding, that coffin village has a big problem!”
Chen Ge did not expect the answer to be like this, he looked at the black clothes made by the old man and could visualize Zhu Xinrou.
”I don’t know if there are any problems in the coffin village, I’m only clear that this child is living a very painful life, her parents are very afraid of the village people seeing her. When she was young, they wrapped her up tightly no matter how hot it was, and when she grew up, she couldn’t hide anymore. They then locked the child into the house and wouldn’t let her go out.” The oldest man folded the dress and placed it on the lid of the coffin, soon the dress would be ready for use.
”What happened after that?”
”Paper can’t wrap fire, the village people still found out about the Zhu family’s eldest daughter, the most surprising thing to me was that those people who fled from the coffin village together, not only didn’t speak up for the couple at this time, but they were also ready to get the eldest daughter killed directly.”
”They spoke vehemently, and in the end, it was the people from the original Bai Family Village who stepped in to stabilize the situation, and everyone decided to drive the couple out of the village.”
”The father of the Zhu family’s eldest daughter was a coffin maker, and was well versed in carpentry, and after leaving the village, they stayed near the Peach Forest, living on very little.”
”As the days went by and everything went quiet, I heard that the couple gave birth to a second daughter.”
”Just when everyone thought it was all going to be over, it turned out that the couple ran back to the village again, saying that they had lost their eldest daughter, and telling all the families to be careful.”
”You heard right, they weren’t asking for help to find their daughter, they were just telling all the villagers to be careful.”
”A few days later, the Zhu family’s eldest daughter was found in the back of the mountain, and her parents hung her up and beat her severely.”
”After a few months of abatement, the Zhu family’s eldest daughter escaped once again, and every time she was retrieved, her parents would beat her severely.”
”Built in the depths of the peach forest that wooden house, you should not have been there yet, that house is used to lock up the Zhu family’s eldest daughter, her father also made a set of special utensils.”
”The Zhu family’s eldest daughter was treated as a monster by the people in the village, her own parents also disliked and hated her, and out of all the people around her, only her younger sister was kind to her and looked at her as if she were a relative.”
”The Zhu family’s youngest daughter also has a rather strange looking place in her body, but it’s not as obvious as the oldest daughter’s, and she has a well-behaved face that is especially pleasing to the eye and knows her way around.”
The oldest sighed, “My land is right next to the peach forest, I usually have a lot of contact with that little girl, she’s not too afraid of strangers, and she got acquainted after a while.”
”Once I was working in the field, that girl cried and ran over to me to save her sister, I know her family’s situation, so I did not go over.”
Speaking of this, the oldest couldn’t go on, his cloudy eyes staring at the black clothes on the coffin, his hands slowly gripping his knees, “I should have stood up and said something for her then, even if she was a monster.”
”The girl cried and left, I was so relieved that I later ran around the peach forest myself.”
”I saw Zhu’s eldest daughter in the fourth room, and that was the last time I saw her. Her body was stuck to a wooden board, a few of her hands were left hanging by twine, and she was dying with many wounds on her body.”
”I really couldn’t imagine what she had been through, and she begged me to save her, but I was too scared to think about leaving in a hurry.”
”After a few days, when I finally mustered up the courage to go over there again, the couple told me that his eldest daughter was missing.”