Holy Bone

Chapter 2010 The Bleeding Knife and the Disheveled Woman

Boom!

The red gourd curled up and sucked in the little girl, causing her to fall heavily to the ground.

Glug!

Glug!

Glug!

The red gourd shook violently at first, but quickly returned to calm.

With a flick of his wrist, the headless Jin An deftly lifted the red gourd from the ground.

"This is the sixth time."

After the headless Jin An finished speaking, the surrounding ruins disappeared and the wooden plank walkway of the cliffside street in the underworld reappeared.

A light mist still lingered.

The headless Jin'an continued on his way, heading deeper into the wooden plank walkway.

Wu Tou Jin An had been trying to find clues about the little girl through battle. He was very curious as to why the little girl could not be eliminated and kept reappearing. He had already killed the sixth one.

He experienced the exact same scene six times.

However, the legend of the Little Calamity Star seems to never die out, and it keeps recurring, which makes his search for the ghosts of Zhang Weishan and the other two very difficult. The ghosts of Zhang Weishan and the other two have not been found yet.

After experiencing numerous battles, Wu Tou Jin An gradually grew impatient and lost his patience.

He wanted to end this pointless battle as soon as possible so he could find Zhang Weishan and the other two and return to the mortal realm to thoroughly investigate the matter.

Since someone was going to make a move against him, he naturally wouldn't let the mastermind behind it get away with it.

"Count to ten."

"No peeking."

"Run! Hahaha!"

……

"Run! It's that little jinx!"

"We must never let this little jinx get close to us. My mother says she's a bad thing, and anyone who touches her will be unlucky for life!"

"Yeah, yeah, who would date a jinx like that? If people found out, they'd be looked down upon for life!"

……

The familiar sounds and familiar scenes reappeared.

The headless Jin An was cold-hearted, no longer interested in or wanting to explore these scenes, and only wanted to end the battle as soon as possible.

The headless Jin An reached out and touched his red gourd magic weapon.

Just like the previous times, after experiencing similar scenes many times, he had lost patience to explore slowly. The fourth, fifth, and sixth times, he directly killed the little girl outside the town.

This time is no exception.

They wanted to kill the little girl.

However, just as the headless Jin An was about to make his move, his hand suddenly stopped. A woman with tattered clothes, dirty clothes that looked like they hadn't been washed for years, especially her chest and thighs, which were disheveled and exposed her white flesh, stood outside the town, watching the little girl who was heading home.

The headless Jin An took a deep look at the woman.

The woman's hair was pulled back and held in place by a hairpin, revealing her long, snow-white neck. Combined with her snow-white breasts and thighs, the phrase "a feast for the eyes" would not be an exaggeration when describing her.

This made her dirty clothes seem less unacceptable.

The headless Jin An coldly observed the newly appeared woman. Without hesitation, he immediately chased after her, wanting to find out her identity.

However, a thick fog suddenly rose in the countryside outside the town, obscuring his vision and rendering even his divine sense ineffective.

When he emerged from the thick fog and arrived near the town, he found that the woman had vanished without a trace.

Meanwhile, the little girl had already arrived near the town. With her head down and struggling to carry the firewood on her back, she did not notice the headless Jin An and continued to carry the firewood into the town.

The women and children in the town still behaved exactly the same way; upon seeing the little girl, they would rush home and close the door, ignoring her completely.

This time, the headless Jin An did not immediately follow the little girl's back, because he noticed that the compass in his hand had changed.

When he was in a hallucination, the Luo Geng Jade Plate would spin erratically, but its direction was very stable and its changes were unpredictable.

However, this time the compass rose did not spin randomly; instead, the pointer remained straight and pointed in one direction.

That direction was actually the direction of the little girl's family.

The headless Jin An was shocked. He wondered if Zhang Weishan and the other two had been captured by the little girl after leaving the underworld and had been trapped in the house, which was why they had not been able to return to the world of the living and wake up.
Thinking of this, the headless Jin An immediately ran to the little girl's house.

Strangely, no matter how hard he searched, he couldn't find Zhang Weishan and the other two at the little girl's house.

But the compass plate in his hand was the one that pinpointed the little girl's home.

The headless Jin'an always trusted the Luo Geng Jade Plate. The Luo Geng Jade Plate had never made a mistake in locating people and things. He used it with ease and with perfect skill.

Therefore, the Luo Geng Jade Plate could not possibly be wrong.

Then there's only one possibility left.

This house itself has a lot of problems, and we need to use some methods to find Zhang Weishan and the other two who are trapped.

Thinking of this, the headless Jin'an raised his neck, seemingly passing through the gate of the house and looking at the little girl on the town street who was going home.

In the town, at the house, I put down the firewood in the kitchen, went back to the front door to lock it, and then went to my room to call my mother for dinner...

The exact same scene appeared again.

"Mother, are you still refining pills?"

Haven't you eaten?

The little girl is talking to her mother in the room, but based on the previous six scenes, there is no mother in the room, and no one will answer the little girl's question.

Just as the headless Jin An in the room was thinking this, unexpectedly, after a moment of silence, a third person responded.

"Yes, I just refined a little bit." A grown woman's voice came from the darkness.

The voice was neither warm nor cold, just like an ordinary conversation between strangers.

The headless Jin An suddenly turned his neck and looked in the direction of the huge, round, three-legged alchemy furnace. The woman's voice was coming from there.

The little girl came to the table alone, sat down, and reached for a bowl and chopsticks to eat.

It turned out that the rice grains in the bowl were moldy.

The little girl changed several bowls and found that they were all moldy.

"Mother, is my cooking not good?"

No one spoke in the room. "A few days ago, Xiao Yin heard the storyteller mention that ancient immortals could refine a kind of pill called something like... something like that..."

"It is said that after eating it, a person can go for ten days or half a month without feeling hungry... Mother, ever since you became obsessed with alchemy, you have neglected all household affairs. Have you managed to refine such a magic elixir?"

The little girl, holding her rice bowl, asked.

"Yes, I'm learning how to refine Bigu pills." The woman's calm voice came again from the three-legged alchemy furnace in the darkness.

The little girl glanced into the darkness, but apart from a very blurry, huge, round shadow, she couldn't even make out the three-legged alchemy furnace, let alone a person.

"Xiaoyin, go heat up the food and bring it back for Mommy," the little girl whispered.

"No need, you eat. I'm not hungry yet," the woman said calmly in the darkness.

"Oh," the little girl replied softly.

Then, with difficulty, he picked up the bowls and chopsticks on the table, stumbled out of the room, and walked away unsteadily.

After a while, the little girl returned with her rice bowl.

"Mother, I've reheated the food. You should eat first and then refine the elixir."

The little girl put down her chopsticks and started hissing, putting her hands on her earlobes to cool down.

After a while, a voice came from the darkness of the room, saying, "I'm not hungry now, you eat."

"If Mommy isn't hungry, then Xiaoyin will eat first..."

The little girl picked up the bowl and chopsticks and ate her food with gusto. She finished the bowl of rice quickly and then licked every finger clean, making sure not to miss a single grain of rice or any oil.

It's easy to imagine how hungry she was.

After she finished eating, the little girl timidly and weakly said to her mother, who was not visible in the room, "Mother, no one plays with me. They all say I'm a little jinx who brings bad luck to everyone. Nobody wants to play with me... Mother, can you play hide-and-seek with me?"

From the darkness, the woman calmly replied, "I want to refine elixirs."

The little girl looked pitiful and whispered, "Can't you stay with me for one day?"

The unseen woman repeated, "I want to refine elixirs."

The little girl lowered her head in disappointment, fidgeting nervously with her hands, like a lost and helpless person.

The little girl was completely unaware that a woman's figure silently emerged from the darkness of a corner of the room and slowly stood behind her.

The woman's clothes were tattered and dirty, as if they hadn't been washed for years. Her clothes were slightly disheveled, and her face was particularly pale, unlike the skin tone of a normal person.

The woman looked down at the little girl expressionlessly, then slowly extended her hand, revealing a small knife covered in blood—it was unclear whether it was human or animal blood…

Just as the woman's hand holding the knife was about to touch the little girl, there was a knock on the door.

The little girl stood up abruptly.

"Who?"

"Who's knocking?"

The little girl ran out of the room.

Is anyone there?

"We are travelers from out of town who have gotten lost and are just passing through this area. We have been looking for a way out, but we can't find it. It's getting cold at night, and we finally found this small town, but all the inns are closed. We have nowhere to go for the time being, so we were thinking of asking if we could stay here for the night?"

Outside the house, a man's voice, clearly enunciated, could be heard.

"Master, please let us stay for the night. There are no inns in this town, and we have nowhere to go for the time being. Thank you very much." Another man's voice rang out from outside the gate.

"Thank you." This was the third male voice.

Seeing that they weren't from the town, the little girl hesitated behind the door, too afraid to open it. There were only two women in the house, her mother and herself; what if they encountered some bad people…

"Young lady, are your parents home? We can pay you in advance. You only need to stay for one night. We'll leave first thing tomorrow morning," the first man said.

“We’re not bad people, this is our lodging fee,” the third man said, and then there was a clatter as several pieces of silver were thrown in through the wall.

The little girl ran over, picked up the pieces of silver, and saw that each piece weighed about one qian (a unit of weight). These pieces of silver added up to about seven or eight qian, so it seemed that she was not short of money.

The little girl hesitated for a moment, then, remembering that her mother was still at home, she lifted the latch and struggled to open the door.

creak.

The door was wide open, revealing three people standing outside. All three were dressed in the uniforms of the Criminal Investigation Department and were members of the department.

These three people are none other than...

These were Zhang Weishan, Jiao Liang, and Jiang Jun, who had been missing since their journey to the underworld and whose whereabouts were unknown.

The officers of the Criminal Investigation Department all carried waist knives with rings at their waists. The little girl noticed the knives on the three men's waists at a glance, and her heart immediately began to pound.

"Little sister, why are you the one opening the door? Are you all alone at home? I am Zhang Weishan, this is my second junior brother Jiao Liang, and this is my junior brother Jiang Jun."

"We happened to pass by this place by chance and ended up getting lost. We walked around for a while before we came across this small town. The town has stone walls to keep out wild animals, and since the inns were closed, we decided to stay here for the night."

Zhang Weishan cupped his hands in greeting to the little girl and spoke politely, showing no disrespect or contempt just because she was a little girl.

"My mother is here too, but she's refining pills. If there's nothing else, please speak softly and don't disturb her. Refining pills requires a quiet environment."

The little girl said solemnly, "Also, you can stay here, but please don't light any lamps. My mother doesn't like lamps; she says they will affect the alchemy process."

Jiao Liang muttered, "How can we get by without lighting the lamps? It's so dark."

The little girl glanced again at the ring-shaped swords at the three men's waists. She bit her lip, sensing that none of them were easy to deal with. She felt a little scared and shrank back.

"It's okay to light lamps, but don't light them around my mother's house, and don't take them out. Just light them in your own living space. Otherwise, if my mother sees them, she'll get angry. My mother has a bad temper, and she's very scary when she gets angry..." the little girl said timidly.

Zhang Weishan and his two companions looked into the house, their eyes narrowing slightly. They saw that the house was indeed pitch black, and even the lanterns were old and broken, with not a single light in sight.

The three whispered for a while, and after a brief discussion, Zhang Weishan bowed to the little girl again and said with a gentle smile, "Alright, we'll light the lamps on the way to the room and in our own room, is that alright?"

"Well... come in." The little girl made way for the three of them before preparing to close the door.

Jiang Jun, being kind-hearted, took the initiative to close the door and latch it for the little girl.

Then, the little girl led the three of them toward the guest room.

The ground was covered with fallen leaves, the flowerbeds were withered, and the ditch was dark, black, and smelly. The little girl led the way, and the man lowered his head and remained silent, somewhat embarrassed. His family was so poor that anyone who saw their dilapidated state could tell that they had fallen on hard times.

The little girl lowered her head and remained silent, leading Zhang Weishan and the other two into the guest room.

"Do you need to wash up before bed? I'll go boil some hot water for you. It's easier to fall asleep after washing up," the little girl said, heading off to boil water.

Zhang Weishan and the other two were touched and said it wasn't necessary, there was no need to be so particular.

Just as they were talking, there was a knock.

Someone knocked on the door again.

The little girl looked towards the gate with some surprise, wondering to herself, "Why is the house so lively today? People keep knocking on the door..."

"I'll go take a look." The little girl ran towards the gate.