My Healing Games

Chapter 701 Mind, Lake God

The old woman sat alone in front of the freezer, skillfully wielding a knife. The sound of fish scales being scraped off combined with the short song she hummed, sending chills down the spines of anyone who heard it.

Han Fei, who was standing at the door, coughed softly, and the old man immediately stopped what he was doing, and the room instantly became quiet.

The old man slowly stretched out his hand, which was covered in fish scales and bloodstains. He pulled down his headscarf to cover half of his face before timidly turning around to look at the back door.

Their bright eyes were like black gemstones, full of luster, as if they had been constantly polished by flowing water.

"Are you here for a meal? I'm sorry, the chef isn't here. If you're really hungry, I can make you something simple to eat." The old lady's voice sounded much younger than her age, without any of the hoarseness often associated with the elderly: "Don't worry, it's free."

The stench filling the room made Yan Le and the other player lose their appetite, but Han Fei smiled and said, "Thank you for your help."

He spoke very politely, his refined and courteous demeanor a complete contrast to his previous one.

"It's no trouble at all. Our town has developed thanks to tourists. Helping you is helping ourselves." The old woman seemed to have a hidden meaning in her words. By the time Han Fei could see her expression clearly, the old woman had already turned around.

She took off her apron, which was covered in fish scales, and threw it into the pool next to her. Then, holding the knife she used to scrape fish scales, she went into another room in the kitchen.

"Han Fei, are you sure you want to eat here?" The player, who was a lifeguard in real life, was a little scared. He knew some survival skills and was a good swimmer, but that was only compared to ordinary people. If he were to actually snatch someone from a water ghost, he would be hesitant.

"It's rare to run into a living person, so it's better to have a good chat." After the old man left, Han Fei walked towards the freezer and sink. He looked at the fish scales on the ground and picked up a black scale with flesh and blood still attached: "Do you know what kind of fish this scale is from?"

"I've never seen such large and hard scales before. Could it be a giant bone snakefish?" The lifeguard frowned as he followed behind Han Fei. He covered his mouth and nose, feeling acid reflux rising in his stomach. This room really stank.

"Take a look at what kind of fish are in this freezer? Are there any special species?" Han Fei asked the lifeguard to check the freezer, while he stood next to the sink.

When the old lady left, she made a seemingly casual but actually deliberate move: after taking off her apron, she didn't hang it on the hook, but threw it directly into the sink, letting it float in the sink and cover the water surface.

"What are you looking at?"

"When we came in, the old lady was scaling a fish, but after we came in, the fish she was scaling disappeared. I suspect that when she took off her apron, she wrapped the fish inside and threw it directly into the sink." Han Fei mentioned some details that no one else had noticed. He ignored Yan Le and picked up the iron hook next to him to fish out the apron.

The water tank, two meters long and one meter wide, was of unknown purpose. It was filled with a pool of murky, filthy sewage that emitted a pungent stench.

"Whether you use this water to raise fish or clean fish, eating it will kill people, right?" The lifeguard had already checked the freezer: "There are only some very common fish in there, nothing special."

Han Fei did not respond to the lifeguard. His eyes were fixed on the sink, and he was simulating the old lady's action of throwing the apron in his mind.

"If there really was a fish hidden in the apron, it would probably have fallen into this spot." Rolling up his sleeves, Han Fei reached his hand into the tank under the lifeguard's astonished gaze.

To his surprise, the seemingly small water tank was actually very deep; even with his arm fully submerged, he still couldn't touch the bottom.

"So deep?"

Unable to find what he had thrown into the sink, Han Fei had no choice but to give up. But just as he was about to take his hand out of the sink, his fingertips touched something slippery, like fish meat with its scales scraped off.

He spread his five fingers and reached out to grab it, but to his slight change of expression, what he grabbed was not a fish, but his five fingers.

"That's a human hand!"

The old lady was scraping scales off a severed hand, not a fish.
In the instant his mind was focused, Han Fei suddenly felt a tremendous force. It was as if his arm had been bitten by the mouth of a large fish, and he was falling headlong towards the water tank!

At the crucial moment, Han Fei stepped on the edge of the sink, and the ugly cat in his backpack meowed, which finally made the "big fish" let go.

Water splashed everywhere, and Han Fei's face was only a foot away from the murky, dirty water. He quickly pulled his arm away.

Fish entrails and blood slid down his arm, but Han Fei didn't care at all. He stared at his hand carefully, noticing a ring of teeth marks on his wrist. They weren't sharp teeth marks, but the teeth marks of a living person.

"A zombie-like corpse is in the pool?" Han Fei wanted to check further, but the old man came out from another room in the kitchen. The lifeguard also stood in front of Han Fei and used his body to block the arm for him.

The old lady didn't notice anything amiss. Her head and face were covered by the headscarf, so her expression was unreadable. "This place is rather chaotic. You should wait inside the restaurant."

Her clothes smelled fishy and seemed to have been worn for a long time. Apart from her eyes, only her hands were exposed. Her left wrist was wrapped in bandages, whether from an injury or to hide something on her skin, it was unclear.

"Thank you for your help." Han Fei and the lifeguard left the kitchen side by side, with Yan Le following closely behind.

There is a long corridor between the kitchen and the dining hall, so diners can't see the kitchen or smell its odors.

Han Fei found a seat in the lobby, wiped the blood off his arm, and looked around.

This fish restaurant doesn't look like an abandoned building. There's no dust on the tables, chairs, and bar, only some water stains, as if the diners here are all soaked in water.

Overall, the place is fairly clean, with unique decor and various photos hanging on the walls, mostly of tourists catching big fish by the lake and taking photos with them.

"Han Fei, look at this." The lifeguard pointed to a picture frame on the wall: "Why does this fish's face look so much like a person's?"

The closer the photos are to the bar, the stranger the fish look. And the closest photos to the bar are just frames with the photos inside removed.

After waiting for almost twenty minutes, a faint fragrance wafted from the dark corridor, and the old lady came out carrying an iron basin.

"Sorry to keep you waiting. I'm the only one in the restaurant right now, so it's taking a while to prepare." The old lady placed the iron basin on the table. The milky white fish was stained red by the chili peppers, and it looked fresh, fragrant, spicy, and appetizing.

Tourists who have never seen a kitchen before will definitely enjoy the food, but Han Fei and his companions have little appetite.

"There's no rice or noodles in the restaurant right now. If that's not enough, I can make you an extra fish."

"A fish?" Han Fei's lips moved slightly. He had only ever heard of a person before, and this was the first time he had heard the phrase "a fish." He felt that the fish was no ordinary person either.

The lifeguards and Yan Le didn't dare touch it, and even the ugly cat shook its head and kept meowing.

"Eat it while it's hot, it'll get fishy when it cools down." The old lady put down the iron basin and was about to walk to the kitchen when she seemed to remember something and stopped to give a word of advice: "It's getting dark, you'd better not wander around the lake. Just find a place to stay in the town."

"Is the lake dangerous? We were planning to go night fishing." Han Fei's expression was very innocent; at first glance, he seemed like an ordinary fishing enthusiast.

“Don’t go.” The old woman’s voice was very serious. “I don’t want to lie to you, but the reason why the town was forced to stop construction halfway through is because there seems to be a monster in the lake. Several people have already gone missing there.”

"A lake monster?" The lifeguard wiped the sweat from his brow. He knew Han Fei wanted him to go into the water; if there really was a lake monster, going in would be suicide.

The thought of that unknown, terrifying monster made him uncontrollably panic.

"This town used to be very lively. Even before it was built, many fishing enthusiasts came to play. They had a good relationship with the night shift workers. They would take the fish they caught directly to the restaurant to be cooked, and we would only charge a processing fee. Everyone was friendly, and the boss and investors were very optimistic about this place. But starting from one night, everything changed." The old lady didn't seem to be a bad person. She was seriously reminding Han Fei.

"What happened?" Han Fei and the other two were all drawn to the old man's words.

"First, people went missing while night fishing. The eyewitnesses had different accounts. Some said that the missing person had caught a very big fish and was accidentally dragged into the lake, and never came back up. Others said that the missing person walked into the lake while fishing and disappeared silently."

"Later, the workers who built the town also had accidents one after another. Some died mysteriously in their sleep, their bodies lying in bed, but the cause of death was drowning."

"Then even stranger things happened. People who often ate the big fish from the lake started to grow fish-scale-like things on their bodies. Strange noises would come from their bodies at night. When people went to check during the day, they found only fallen fish scales and some flesh and blood on their beds. The people were gone. Everyone suspected that they had run into the lake and become water ghosts."

Only one small light was on in the fish restaurant, its flickering light illuminating the old man's face, which was covered by a headscarf, making it somewhat eerie.

"In short, don't go near the lake at night. Get a good night's sleep and leave when it's light."

"Thank you for reminding me." Han Fei wasn't going to let the old man leave so easily. He noticed a detail: "You just said that everything changed starting from a certain night. Do you remember what happened on that particular night?"

The dream held a resurrection ceremony by the lake; that night must have been when the dream was preparing for the ceremony.

“That night was the day to worship the lake god. The lake was closed and fishing was prohibited. People who made a living by the lake would come over. Everyone was lively and prayed for good weather and a good harvest in the coming year. In the middle of the night, the village elders would bring out the lake god statue enshrined in the ancestral hall, and then find an orphan to bring three kinds of sacrificial offerings to the island to worship.”

"Landing on the island?" Han Fei blinked.

“There’s a deserted island in the middle of the lake. When worshipping the lake god, they would specifically choose an orphan who had no parents, no ties, and grew up eating food from many families to go there. The biggest problem that night was with the orphan.” The old woman’s tone became urgent: “In recent years, life has improved, and there are no more orphans and shamans in the nearby villages and towns. So the resort owner went to the welfare home and brought a child over. As a result, the child fell into the lake along with the lake god statue while taking a boat to the island, and his body has not been found to this day.”

"It's definitely not a good omen." Han Fei felt that the old lady was unaware of the existence of dreams, so she attributed everything to the sacrificial ceremony. The orphan that night was most likely related to the dream, and even the owner of the resort built here might be someone who had been bewitched by the dream: "Then is there any way we can make amends?"

"I don't know. We haven't even figured out whether the lake god or the lake ghost lives in the lake yet." The old lady shook her head. "If you're interested in these things, you can go to the boat rental center after dawn and ask. The person in charge there grew up by the lake and was specially hired by the resort owner."

"Okay, I know."

Just as Han Fei finished speaking, a sound of a door being pounded came from the kitchen. With a creak, it seemed that one of the kitchen doors had been opened.

The old lady's eyes suddenly became a little panicked: "Remember, absolutely do not go near that lake. Stay in your rooms at night and don't overthink things. Oh, and the most important thing is, whatever you do, don't fall asleep."

After saying that, the old woman hurriedly ran towards the kitchen. Perhaps because she was in such a hurry, her left hand accidentally bumped into the bar, and the bandage wrapped around her wrist came undone a little, revealing the bright red flesh with blood streaks underneath.

"The meat is so tender, it's like a fish whose scales have been scraped off."

Han Fei's gaze was completely different from before. He turned to stare at Yan Le: "The dream ritual was held by the lake, which is called the sea of ​​the mind. The old lady told us not to fall asleep at night. These three things seem to be interconnected."

“The longer we delay, the greater the chance of Meng’s resurrection. Should we take action tonight?” Yan Le’s mother was a little uneasy. She didn’t like Meng, nor did she like Han Fei very much.

"Of course." Han Fei took a banknote out of his pocket and placed it on the table. He then picked up his bag and walked towards the boat rental center.

Of all the buildings in the resort, the boat rental center is the closest to the lake. Han Fei and his team carefully inspected all the rooms, and finally they gathered in the manager's private bedroom.

The room reeked of fish, and a few stinking water plants lay scattered at the base of the wall. The bedroom bed was covered with large water stains, bloodstains, and some thin fish scales.

"It seems to have just left."

Han Fei searched the room for anything useful. When he lifted the bed board, he found a strange statue of a deity under the bed.

(End of this chapter)