Chapter 6: Why Wasn’t It You Who Died!
Aunt Zheng’s reaction made the three adults on the scene feel a sinking feeling in their hearts.
This didn’t look like there was no grievance at all.
“Aunt, don’t hide it from me anymore.” Zheng Feiyu said with a bitter face: “She’s already come to the door!”
Upon hearing the words “come to the door,” Aunt Zheng’s face turned deathly pale. She gripped Zheng Feiyu’s hand tightly and suddenly exerted force, her voice sharp: “What did you say? Zhou Ying came to the door? Didn’t she already…” die?
How could a dead person still come to the door?
It was only at this moment that Aunt Zheng saw the exceptionally messy mourning hall, as well as Old Master Zheng’s corpse lying at the staircase doorway.
Jiang Lixuan observed the expression on her face, frowned, and said coldly: “Zhou Ying turned into a ghost and came to the Zheng family for her life, saying it’s all because you owe her.”
“If you want to keep hiding and wait to die, then keep hiding. I’m not staying to die with you.”
Aunt Zheng’s face looked even worse. She took a deep breath, tried hard to suppress the fear in her heart, but still denied it when she spoke: “What dead or alive? I already said, our Zheng family doesn’t owe Zhou Ying anything!”
“We have no grievance with her either!”
Nan Yuanman blinked her eyes and stared at Aunt Zheng, saying: “You’re lying.”
“No!” Aunt Zheng raised her voice, her gaze on Nan Yuanman carrying some anger: “Yuanman! You’re talking nonsense again!”
“Ah, I get it!” She suddenly stood up, some color returning to her pale face. She put her hands on her hips and pointed at her: “Is it you causing trouble again? You did the same before! Where’s Old Man Nan? I’m going to ask him how he teaches his child!”
Nan Yuanman widened her eyes: “I didn’t! Don’t wrongly accuse people!”
Zheng Feiyu helplessly: “Aunt, this has nothing to do with Yuanman, you…”
Before Zheng Feiyu could finish, Aunt Zheng interrupted him: “Alright, alright, don’t scare me. There are no ghosts in this world at all. Even if there are, if Zhou Ying comes to the door, I’m not afraid of her!”
“Feiyu, I’m telling you, you’ve at least been to university, how can you still be superstitious?”
“It’s getting late now, all of you go back and sleep!”
Aunt Zheng finished speaking rapidly, not giving Zheng Feiyu and the others any chance to interject, and waved her hand to shoo them back to sleep.
Nan Yuanman huffed angrily, hugged the small straw doll, and turned to leave: “Good advice is hard to persuade for a damned ghost! Next time I come to save you, I’ll be a pig!”
“Hey! Yuanman!” Zheng Feiyu called her once, then turned his head with some reproach: “Aunt, Yuanman is just a child, how can you say that to her?”
Seeing Aunt Zheng like this, Zheng Feiyu knew he couldn’t get anything out of her mouth, so he sighed helplessly and said: “Forget it, I’ll walk her back. Aunt, think it over carefully.”
He took the small coffin Nan Yuanman had lent him and chased after her. Jiang Lixuan stepped forward to follow: “Wait for me.”
Zhang Shimian gave Aunt Zheng a meaningful look, then turned and followed.
After they left, Aunt Zheng heavily exhaled, her legs going weak as she knelt on the ground. Her eyes filled with alarm as she glanced around, clasped her hands together, and murmured softly: “It really can’t be blamed on us. If you must blame someone, blame the Liu family for pretending so well. They are the ones who truly killed you. You should go find them, don’t come for me, don’t come for me…”
–
Zheng Feiyu didn’t expect that Nan Yuanman, though small, walked very quickly.
By the time he chased out from the Zheng house, she had already run ten meters away.
“Yuanman! Yuanman! Wait! I’ll walk you!” Zheng Feiyu called her several times before Nan Yuanman reluctantly stopped.
Jiang Lixuan couldn’t help but jab at her: “You’re not tall, but you run pretty fast.”
Nan Yuanman unceremoniously retorted: “Who’s like you, with legs grown so long for nothing. In my grandpa’s words, someone like you couldn’t catch up to hot shit even if you tried eating it.”
Jiang Lixuan laughed in anger, grinding his teeth: “Nan Yuanman, can’t you talk to me nicely? After all, I’m your uncle!”
Nan Yuanman’s small face was tense: “You were the one who didn’t talk to me nicely first!”
Looking at the little girl in front of him, her small face tense like a hedgehog, in a daze, he seemed to see Bai Wenyin’s stubborn face again before she left the Jiang family.
His emotions were complicated, and he murmured softly: “Your temper is exactly like your mom’s.”
Both equally stubborn, equally unwilling to suffer a loss.
Zhang Shimian looked at Jiang Lixuan, then at Nan Yuanman, scratched his head with his hand—he seemed to have… forgotten something.
Under the escort of the three adults, Nan Yuanman returned home.
As soon as Zhang Shimian entered the yard, he saw many coffins placed in every corner of the yard, and some small coffins being carved on the ground. His eyes showed surprise: “Yuanman, your family sells coffins?”
“Yeah, my grandpa is a coffin maker.” Nan Yuanman yawned and rubbed her eyes.
Zhang Shimian thought thoughtfully: “No wonder…” As soon as he entered this yard, he felt a faint yin energy.
“Alright, do whatever you want. I’m going to sleep.” Nan Yuanman said goodbye and went back to her small room to sleep.
Having been up for most of the night, she was already extremely sleepy.
Zheng Feiyu and the other three were mentally fatigued but had no sleepiness at all.
At this moment, Zheng Feiyu felt extremely grateful in his heart. Fortunately, his parents had left early due to company matters; otherwise, tonight they would have almost been harmed by the female ghost, and there would be two more people.
Zheng Feiyu also didn’t dare to go back to the Zheng house. He found a small stool in the yard, sat at the doorway leaning against the door panel to rest.
Jiang Lixuan looked at the dilapidated house and yard in front of him, his emotions particularly complex.
The yard looked fine from the outside, but he didn’t expect it to be so rundown inside. Even the kitchen was still built with mud bricks. In a daze, it looked like a house from the 80s.
Had Nan Yuanman… been living in this kind of environment since she was little?
Zhang Shimian didn’t wander around either. He got a small stool, sat down, and closed his eyes to rest.
The rundown small yard quieted down. None of them noticed that in a corner not far from them, a pitch-black shadow was crouching, its eyes staring at them without blinking…
One night passed.
When Nan Yuanman woke up, Zheng Feiyu and the others had already left. The small coffin she had lent him last night was placed beside her pillow.
She didn’t mind. After carefully washing herself clean, she went to the kitchen to eat the leftover dishes from last night to fill her stomach, then went to check on her grandpa’s condition.
She opened the coffin, wetted the cloth, and wiped her grandpa’s face.
After completing the routine, Nan Yuanman was hungry again.
She touched her growling little stomach. While thinking about which house to beg for food from today, a burst of noisy sounds suddenly came from outside the yard, like people arguing.
Nan Yuanman jumped down from the stool and was about to open the yard gate to join in the excitement when she directly bumped into a long leg.
“Yo, awake?” The annoying voice came from above her head. Nan Yuanman looked up, and her small face instantly fell.
“Why haven’t you left yet?”
Jiang Lixuan snorted with a laugh, reached out to pinch her cheek, and said maliciously: “Come back with me, and I’ll leave now. Otherwise, I’ll stick to you forever.”
A child’s skin is naturally tender. Jiang Lixuan didn’t hold back, pinching her painfully. Nan Yuanman hissed and inhaled sharply, forcefully slapping his hand away.
She raised both hands, seal-clapping her face, equally malicious: “Then stick around for life! I’d rather die than go back with you!”
The two stared at each other, big eyes glaring at small eyes.
The commotion not far away grew more intense.
Zhou Ying’s mother Ye Hong lunged excitedly at a tall, thin man in a suit who looked refined: “Liu Hanfei! Explain yourself! Why did my perfectly fine daughter marry you and die less than half a month later! Did you kill her? Where’s her corpse? Why won’t you let me see her! Why!!”
“Is it because you have a guilty conscience! Say it!!”
Nan Yuanman and Jiang Lixuan both turned to look.
Jiang Lixuan could only see the arguing Liu family and Zhou family members, but Nan Yuanman saw Zhou Ying, who had disappeared last night and turned into a fierce ghost, with a ferocious expression, continuously lunging at Liu Hanfei, only to be repelled each time by the golden light on his body.
Each repulsion made her soul dimmer.
Nan Yuanman frowned slightly. Just as she was about to open the small coffin to take Zhou Ying in first, Zheng Feiyu and Zhang Shimian, also attracted by the noise, ran over.
Zhou Ying sensed Zhang Shimian’s aura, glared hatefully at Liu Hanfei, and her figure quickly disappeared.
Liu Hanfei was completely unaware. He supported the frantic Ye Hong, his face full of pain: “Mom, I’m also heartbroken about Ying’er’s departure, but Ying’er’s leaving was really just an accident.”
“Zhou Ying said before her death that if something unexpected happened one day, she wanted me to cremate her and scatter her ashes into the sea, because she liked freedom, so that’s why there’s no corpse.”
Nan Yuanman looked at the man in front of her whose soul emitted a foul stench, disgust appearing on her face. This person was lying.
Zhang Shimian and Zheng Feiyu also arrived.
Zhang Shimian sensed the lingering yin energy in the air, his face slightly darkening. She had run off again.
When Zheng Feiyu heard Liu Hanfei say Zhou Ying’s name, he scrutinizingly looked at him and asked: “What’s your relationship with Zhou Ying?”
Before Liu Hanfei could speak, the emotionally out-of-control Ye Hong rushed up with red eyes and beat Zheng Feiyu while cursing: “You Zheng family members still dare to show up! It’s all your fault! If not for you, my daughter wouldn’t have died! You rotten-hearted bastards! Why don’t you go die! Why wasn’t it you who died!”
