Heavenly Official Sends Evil

Chapter 905 Teahouse Night Talk
Teahouses, brothels, and restaurants.

These three buildings all seem to have something fishy about them.

After running away from the market boundary with the newcomers, Wu Xian stood in the middle of the crossroads, pondering their next goal.

While I was pondering, the surroundings were anything but quiet.

First, there was a constant rustling sound, which sounded very similar to the crawling sound of the half-bodied evil spirit they had heard in the area of ​​corpses. This indicated that the thing did not intend to let them go.

Secondly, there's the barking of dogs, but not the barking of real dogs; it's more like a human imitating a dog's bark. It barks occasionally, and then quickly hides when someone looks over, leaving only a blurry silhouette.

Finally, there were heavy footsteps, belonging to a hunchbacked man. The man was disheveled and dressed in rags, but he was a head taller than Yang Lin. He wandered aimlessly on the street to the right, like a stationary NPC, completely ignoring Wu Xian and the others.

Time was of the essence, and the prisoner woman could come to patrol at any time, so Wu Xian quickly chose the 'teahouse'.

The biggest reason to choose a teahouse is the storyteller on the wooden stage.

The storyteller is a character with a high probability of possessing crucial information; even just revealing a few words could be helpful in surviving in the blessed land.

……

From the outside, the teahouse hall was empty, with a dozen tables and dozens of bamboo chairs. All the bamboo chairs faced the storyteller. On the tables were teapots and teacups, as well as some dried fruits such as peanuts, melon seeds, and almonds. Steam was still rising from the spout of the teapot.

Wu Xian found some odds and ends on the road and threw them in. Without causing any unusual noise, he carefully led the newlyweds in.

Once inside, the place felt even more spacious and quiet.

Besides the main hall, there are several private rooms on the first floor, and a staircase leading upstairs, but this staircase is blocked by the ceiling of the exhibition hall.

Wu Xian, accompanied by his new recruits, began searching the teahouse.

First, there was a private room, which was empty and filled with a faint scent of bamboo. There were no evil spirits, not even a corpse, let alone the large cockroaches that were everywhere in the exhibition hall.

They searched the private room thoroughly and found only a brass bell and a bottle of corpse oil, which was a consolation prize, better than nothing.

Next came the main hall, where not even a feather could be found. The storyteller held up his fan, like a statue, offering no clues whatsoever.

Wu Xian stared wide-eyed.

They continued their thorough, door-to-door search.

He peeled back the plaster to look for hidden compartments, crawled under the table to search for hidden pockets, and even stripped the storyteller's puppet of its clothes and overturned the storyteller's small table, but he found no information that Wu Xian wanted hidden in the table or the clothes...

Shi Yan whispered, "Maybe there's nothing here at all?"

"Makes sense!"

Yang Lin nodded, agreeing with Shi Yan's opinion:
"The four great families were all wiped out, which is why there are so many ghosts there. Judging from the fact that those four families are holding funerals, the time we experienced must have been not long after the four great families were wiped out. Therefore, these three buildings may not have encountered any evil spirits, so it is understandable that they are relatively safe."

Hao Ze breathed a sigh of relief. If he could get through this hour safely here, that would be great.

Wang Wei pointed to the door: "That's an absurd conclusion. Look at the brothel across the street. I'd believe it if you said there were ghosts playing cards inside. Do you think they've never experienced anything like that?"

“If I were to design it, there would definitely be something hidden in the teahouse, but we haven’t found the key to trigger it yet.”

Slurp...

While everyone was discussing, Wu Xian was already sitting on a bamboo chair. He opened the teapot lid and saw the tea leaves floating upright in the water.

"Hmm, Taiping Houkui, this tea can't sing, can't dance, can't fight... people, hmm, it's real tea."

Wu Xian poured himself a glass and took a small sip.

"Hmm, the taste is pretty good, with a noticeable orchid fragrance and sweet aftertaste. It's good tea... You should all try it."

In fact, Wu Xian had already noticed that the teapot was hot when he first entered the teahouse.

These are items from the teahouse inviting them to have tea.

However, this straightforward invitation might be a trap, so Wu Xiancai first thoroughly investigated the entire teahouse.

Now that it's been confirmed that the clues aren't in the open, the only possibility is drinking tea.

The newlyweds were somewhat confused, but they still sat around Wu Xian and each poured themselves a cup of tea. After five cups, the teapot was empty, but there was a gurgling sound coming from inside. Wang Wei opened the lid and found that it was filled with boiling water again, and even the tea leaves had been replaced with black tea.

"Drink up, or we might not be able to continue this scene."

At Wu Xian's urging, the newlyweds each took a sip of tea, and the hot water warmed their bodies.

Snapped!
A strange noise came from ahead.

The storyteller struck the gavel, but because Wu Xian had overturned his small table, he could only strike the table leg.

"Xuan Ling, a newly appointed official, has just taken office when four families are mysteriously and tragically wiped out."

"Why does this vengeful ghost return? Let me tell you of my sorrow and hatred!"

"My surname is Tie, and I'm known in the martial arts world as 'Iron-Tongued Scholar.' Last time, we talked about how the four great families of Xuanling County were successively wiped out. The Ye family was reduced to mere skins, and the Xiao family was haunted by fierce ghosts..."

The storyteller's tale was not much different from the one Wu Xian had learned from the puppet last time, which greatly enriched the background knowledge of this blessed land for the four newcomers who were with him.

But the storyteller's clothes had been stripped off, leaving only a naked puppet body. Even his beard had been pulled out by Wu Xian, making his speech somewhat comical and making it difficult for the audience to get into the story.

Soon the storyteller finished telling the familiar stories, and then all the new stories began.

"Now that Su Qishi has been arrested by the government, the whole city is overjoyed. The streets are decorated with lanterns and colorful decorations, and they are just short of setting off firecrackers to celebrate."

"Everyone in the county praised the magistrate as 'Bao Longtu reborn,' saying that the massacre of the entire family was finally over and they could finally sleep peacefully. Magistrate Meng Bi also earned the nickname 'Meng Longtu.'"

The storyteller lowered his voice and spoke in a suspenseful tone:
"But who would have thought that after Su Qi was imprisoned, she dipped her fingertips in blood and wrote the word 'wrong' all over the prison walls that very night!"

"When the jailer came to check the next day, he found Su Qi hanging from the rafters, her body swaying, her eyes almost bulging out, staring straight at the door. The whole cell was gloomy, the prisoners were all complaining of the cold, and even the jailer felt a chill down his spine!"

“Meng Longtu was afraid that if this matter got out, it would shake the people’s morale, so he quickly ordered a silencing.”

"But ever since that day, Xuanling County has been acting strangely!"

"Today a scholar hangs himself in his room, tomorrow a butcher hangs himself from a tree, and some even see a woman in white prison clothes crawling in the street at night!"

"The news spread like wildfire, reaching every corner of the city overnight, making everyone in Xuanling County live in fear. They locked their doors during the day and turned off their lights at night. Even the night watchmen dared not go out on the streets!"

(End of this chapter)