Chapter 37: The Soul (4)

In the lonely house in the wilderness, her heart-wrenching sob sound penetrated the dark night, causing the phantom who was lost in the wasteland to stop. Even the long-term ghost in the house seemed to be disturbed by her sorrow. After a long silence, she made a hoarse and terrifying voice again: "Ah... Jun, you are Ah Jun... It's a good thing, haha... Haha! Tell me quickly, where is my property now? Ah!"

The ghost asked repeatedly, and then Chen Jun turned around from the infinite sadness. She raised her face with tears in a daze and murmured: "Dad, what are you asking? What are the wealth, what are the wealth?" "Where are the things collected from the gambler?!" Chen Jun became more and more confused: "Dad, have you sent it to the capital long ago? It's collected by Brother Lan..."

The ghost's voice became very sharp: "What?! You mean there is no property here?!" "No, oh... it seems there is another one, that blanket..." Chen Jun said in a daze. The physical and mental tortures these days have almost collapsed. She felt that her headache was split, and her whole body seemed to be on fire. "Ajun, raise your head and look at me, look at me... haha!" Suddenly, she looked dark in front of her eyes, and raised her head, with a obscene smile, and her face was slutty and ugly.

Chen Jun fell backwards: "You are not dad, who are you?" The face was full of shameless expression: "Who am I? I am your dad, have you called me for a long time?" "Ah, no!" Chen Jun jumped up from the ground, and the only remaining awake told her that she was in danger. She stumbled backwards: "You, who are you? Why do you pretend to be my dad?!"

The man put away his smile, and his eyes were filled with evil flames of resentment and lewdness: "I'm not interested in pretending to be that dead ghost! Those kind of unforgivable people, I'm here to dig the grave and whip the corpse! You and the little lady kept calling me dad, I'll just joke with you, the little lady... The wilderness is vast and dark, it's a fate for you and me to reunite here. Little lady, in fact, I don't want to be your father, but I want to be your bad brother, haha! Come on, since he doesn't want you, I want you, we'll have a wedding banquet tonight!"

He gritted his teeth and rushed over, Chen Jun turned his head and rushed out. Although she was weak, she was very familiar with the house. She moved faster than the person behind her. She ran out of the yard first and ran wildly in the wilderness in a panic. Behind her, a vicious cry followed closely: "Little lady, little lady! What are you running? Oh, you can't run out of my palm!"

Chen Jun ran regardless of the situation. Her mind was completely confused. There was no direction or road. There was only the whistling north wind in his ears, and there was endless darkness in front of him. The footsteps of chasing were getting closer and closer. She couldn't breathe, and the soles of her feet softened and then went forward. Just before her coma, she felt herself pouring into her arms with only strength. She widened her dim eyes, and in the darkness that almost reached out to see her five fingers, she clearly saw a pair of clear eyes. It was the light of love that appeared in the dream many times. The flames of her life were ignited by it... "Brother Lan." She murmured softly and lost consciousness.

... After struggling in the dark for too long, Chen Jun dared not open his heavy eyelids. She was afraid that she would face the nightmarish reality when she woke up. There was no hope or care. If this were the case, it would be better to hide in the eternal night and never wake up again.

"Ajun, how are you?" Who asked softly beside her? Ah, it's Brother Lan! Chen Jun suddenly opened his eyes. Is it really him? Such familiar eyes have been imprinted into her memories from birth, and they often appear in dreams. These are the few beautiful dreams in her humble life. You must know that the sweetness in bitterness makes people fascinated and irresistible...

Chen Jun rubbed his eyes desperately, his eyes turned from blur to clarity. She saw the dark red candlelight swaying gently, embellishing the originally simple and cold hut with a little warmth and tranquility. The owner of the eyes, a strange man, was leaning down at her, his face full of concern and joy: "Ajun, you are awake!"

"I..." Chen Jun suddenly jumped up in horror: "Who are you?!" The man was stunned for a moment, and then smiled: "A Jun, you don't know me anymore?" Chen Jun looked at him in confusion: his thin face, his tired smile, and his gaze that made her feel very friendly made this originally very serious face gentle-"You are...Mr. Li?!"

Li Yuanfang nodded. Chen Jun asked foolishly: "Mr. Li, why is it you? So, it turns out that the haunted one is you?" "Haunted?" Li Yuanfang asked in surprise: "Ajun, do I look like a ghost?" Chen Jun still stared at him straight: "No... it was my brother who said, my brother said you were dead." "Oh." Li Yuanfang suddenly realized and joked: "Then look, do you think I am dead or alive?" Chen Jun looked him up and down several times before stuttering in a low voice: "Ah, you really, really not dead?"

"Well, I'm not dead." Li Yuanfang responded thoughtfully and asked with a smile: "Isn't this scary?" "No, it's pretty good." Chen Jun's pale face turned slightly red, and a hint of ease and joy were added to his tone: "Mr. Li, you are still alive, this is great, great. Well, you have a beard? No wonder you can't recognize it all at once..." She couldn't help but raise her hand and shrank back embarrassedly.

Li Yuanfang touched her lips and said self-deprecatingly: "It's good that I didn't scare you. I thought it would be better to change my appearance, but it still made people treat it as a ghost..." Chen Jun chuckled without feeling that he pursed his lips and immediately raised his head in panic and grabbed Li Yuanfang's hand: "Mr. Li, where is that ghost? What about the ghosts who pretended to be my father?!" "Don't be afraid, don't be afraid, it's okay." Li Yuanfang patted her arm: "Those ghosts are tied to me in the woodshed." "Those ghosts?" "Well, in addition to the one chasing you, there are three hidden in this yard, and now they are resting together in the woodshed. However, like me, they are also humans and not ghosts."

Chen Jun lowered his head: "I understand. But why did they come to my house to pretend to be a ghost? I..." She looked at Li Yuanfang with tears in her eyes. The initial chaos passed. Now she recalled the terrible experience before she fainted, and the whole story of coming to Jinchen Pass alone. Her heart became empty again, and she felt her whole body was sore and her mind was dizzy. Li Yuanfang looked at her carefully and whispered: "Don't worry, I'll tell you slowly later. A Jun. Are you hungry? Do you want to eat some porridge first?"

He picked up a bowl from the wooden table beside him: "I searched in the kitchen and found the rice. It was left when you left, right? I used it to cook some porridge. But there was nothing else, I could only drink white porridge, okay?" Chen Jun took the bowl of porridge, scooped a spoon and put it into his mouth. The sweet taste slid down from the tip of his tongue... A strange feeling was inadvertently soaked in the lungs, and her eyes were wet with the steaming heat. She raised her head and greeted timidly: "Mr. Li, do you eat too?"

"I've eaten it." Li Yuanfang answered casually, and looked at Chen Jun taking a few more bites before saying, "It's been ten hours since you fainted last night. It's the next evening." "Oh." Chen Jun put down the porridge bowl and then remembered to ask, "Mr. Li, why are you here? Aren't you outside the border?"

"Hmph," Li Yuanfang answered the question, "You have eaten too little, eat some more." Chen Jun obediently raised the spoon again, and Li Yuanfang smiled at her and said, "I set off from Tingzhou at the end of August. I originally wanted to rush to Luoyang directly. When I passed Jinchen Pass, I heard that the house Shen was haunted, and I felt it was a bit strange. I probably couldn't delay much trip, so I came over and took a look. I didn't expect it to be here." After a pause, he looked at Chen Jun and asked, "Where are you? Why are you here alone?"

Chen Jun had a bloody face turned pale, and after a while, he said in an inauspicious voice: "I, I am going to the Western Regions to find Mr. Mei..." "Why are you so anxious?" Li Yuanfang interrupted her: "I tried my best to rush to Luoyang just to arrive before you set off. After all, you have to wait until you have been with Wuzhile before leaving. I never expected that you have already walked here! If I hadn't happened to go to Chen's house to investigate last night, the consequences would be unimaginable... A Jun!" He stared at Chen Jun and asked sternly: "Why are you leaving alone? What about Chen Huai? He didn't even send a bride? How could this be done?"

Chen Jun was embarrassed and finally said, "Mr. Li, do you know everything?" Li Yuanfang said coldly: "Of course, of course I know everything. And I rushed to Luoyang day and night, and a large part of the reason was to stop you!" "Stop me?" Chen Jun was completely lost, but Li Yuanfang was even more aggressive: "Ajun, answer me, what exactly happened in Luoyang? Why are you so in a hurry and going on the road alone? What is Chen Huai's idea?!"

Chen Jun was speechless, tears surging out, dripping into the porridge bowl in a series. Li Yuanfang frowned and looked at her for a long time, sighed and took the porridge bowl from her hand, and comforted softly: "Okay, stop crying. You are still having a fever, let's take a rest first. Let's wait for everything tomorrow."

Li Yuanfang walked out. Chen Jun looked around in a daze. It turned out that Li Yuanfang sent her back to the boudoir of Chen's house. However, the small house she had lived in for several years seemed so cold and strange at this moment. With Li Yuanfang's departure, the only warmth he felt just now disappeared. Chen Jun suddenly lifted the "quilt" and found that it was a man's clothes on his body. It was conceivable that it must be Li Yuanfang's. She looked around and there was no bedding on the bed. She stood underground and suddenly felt dizzy. She leaned on the wall to calm down. After her beating heart stabilized, she put on her coat and opened the door and went out.

The sky was as bright as dark as the north wind on the wasteland was whistling, beating the decaying grass on the courtyard wall and the eaves. Chen Jun stepped into the courtyard step by step, and Li Yuanfang's back stood still. On the ground in front of him were the four "ghosts" tied into a ball. When Chen Jun walked to his side, he asked in a low voice without looking back: "It's cold outside, what are you doing?"

Before he finished speaking, a strong wind blew, Chen Jun shivered all over and couldn't help but approach Li Yuanfang: "Mr. Li, me, they..." Li Yuanfang turned his head and looked at her: "What's wrong with them? Don't you want to know why they are haunted here? Ask now." He took two steps forward and pulled the cloth from one of them.

The man lay on the ground and gasped for a few breaths, then shouted like a pig: "Sir, please spare me! We are good people in Jinchen Pass! Good people!" "Good people?" Li Yuanfang sneered: "I have never seen good people who run to other people's homes to pretend to be a ghost! Tell me, what do you want to do here? If you tell the truth, maybe I can consider spareing you."

"This..." The man's eyes were circling, and he met with the other guys who were blocked. He made up his mind: "I dare not deceive this gentleman. Ours is indeed ordinary people in Jinchen Pass. They were all harmed by this deceased devil named Chen Tingfang, so they came here to find the deceased property. Who knew that they had made the East so well. We searched for many days but didn't look for it. We were afraid that people would find it and alarm the government, so we had to scare people... "

"So that's it." Li Yuanfang glanced at Chen Jun again and said, "I heard that this house has started to be haunted shortly after the New Year. Could it be that you are the ones?" "That's not, there were several groups of people who came to find things, but they left one after another if they couldn't find them. We were later. Anyway, everyone used the reason for haunting to do this..." Li Yuanfang interrupted him and asked one after another: "So many people are looking for things, what are you looking for? Why are you looking for in Chen House? You just said that all your property was deceived by Chen Tingfang, so what's going on?"

"Uh..." The man was speechless and couldn't understand his thoughts for a moment. Chen Jun was beside Li Yuanfang's side, crying softly: "Mr. Li, don't ask. Let them go!" "Let them go?" Li Yuanfang looked at him without squinting and asked coldly: "Does Miss Ajun know the inside story?" Turning his head, he said word by word: "Does the girl mean: If I let them go, you will tell me the entanglement between Chen Ting and these people?"

Chen Jun was forced to raise his head by his sharp eyes, and almost burst into tears in a hurry. The man knelt on the ground and shouted: "Yes, yes! Isn't this lady the daughter of Old Zhe Shen? Of course she knows the shameful things her father did! Old Zhe Shen set up a private underground gambling game and tricked many people from nearby towns over the years. He was originally a good and kind people, but they lost all their money because they were confused about gambling. They also owed a lot of debts. They were forced to go out to rob the house and rob the house. Many of them died of unlawful deaths. My elder brother lost all his family and borrowed usury but couldn't pay it back. On the Cold Food Festival two years ago, he committed suicide by hanging himself. My sister-in-law and my nephew had no one to take care of them. They starved to death one after another in less than half a year. Woo woo..." Speaking of the sadness, the man burst into tears, and the three people next to him also made whimpering sounds.

"Are they all said true?" Li Yuanfang's voice was even colder than the roaring north wind. Chen Jun was speechless and could only lower his head and cry. Li Yuanfang turned to the man again: "So, are you here trying to find the property that you lost to Chen Ting for gambling?" The man nodded, "Yes, yes. This old thief Shen is very ghostly. In the past, we couldn't find his residence. After he died at the beginning of this year, people discovered this place one after another. We saw the grave of the old thief erected behind the house, and guessed that there would be a lot of property in the coffin of the old man. When he dug it out, he saw that he was a fucking rotten corpse, and there was no money!"

"God! You, you dug my father's grave?!" Chen Jun exclaimed miserably and was about to run out. Li Yuanfang shouted fiercely: "Ajun, stop for me!" Chen Jun stopped dazedly, and Li Yuanfang looked at her: "You have time to see the grave. Please tell me first, is this person telling the truth?" "Yes..." Chen Jun lowered his head and cried. Li Yuanfang took a deep breath and turned to the people on the ground again: "If the matter is as you said, it's understandable. But I can tell you clearly that all the property in this house has been transferred elsewhere, and even if you dig three feet into the ground, you can't find anything. Today I don't want to pursue it, so you will disperse now. I will inform the government that you don't come from now on, otherwise you will be in prison." He raised his hand and pulled the rope open and said in a low voice: "Get out!"

The four of them ran out of the yard, and disappeared without a trace on the wasteland in a blink of an eye. "A Jun." Chen Jun raised his tears in his eyes, and Li Yuanfang asked expressionlessly: "Where is your father's grave?" "It's in the woods behind... the yard." "Okay, come with me."
Chapter completed!