Yin Shou Shu

Chapter 197 Mandrill
A light mist enveloped the Longchang Street Market. At a roadside mutton noodle stall, a burning coal stove was cooking mutton bones in a pot.

A bloody figure suddenly appeared, with a strong smell of blood, and sat down next to Ran Qing.

But it didn't look at Ran Qing, instead it shouted to the owner of the mutton noodle stall.

The hoarse and low sound coming from the hunched body hurt people's eardrums. It was not the sound made by a normal living person at all.

The monster's voice sounded like a parrot in the mountains trying to imitate human speech by pinching its throat. Its voice was strange and unpleasant, with an inexplicably terrifying sense of "hypocrisy".

Anyone who hears this harsh and strange sound can tell that it is not a living person speaking, but something imitating human speech.

Ran Qing's body was a little stiff.

He glanced at it calmly, and out of the corner of his eye he saw a hunched figure covered in black hair, with a bloody human skin draped over his back and head.

The human skin was very complete. The skinned person looked like he had been split apart by a sharp blade from the center of his eyebrows to his hips, with two shriveled, drooping legs hanging under the monster's buttocks.

As the monster turned around, its two shriveled arms actually swayed left and right beside it.

Such a horrifying scene makes one's scalp tingle.

But Mo Li and Long Zongshu beside him were unaware of all this.

Obviously, in their eyes, this was just a new guest and there was nothing strange about it.

After the stall owner with dark skin, a kind and shy smile brought a bowl of hot mutton noodles, the black-haired monster stopped talking, took the mutton noodles and started eating them in big mouthfuls.

Its rough and ferocious eating style makes its sharp fangs protrude from its mouth.

The monster covered in black hair has a hunched body but is extremely strong, but the most eye-catching thing is the monster's face.

This black-haired monster had a blood-red streak between its eyebrows that extended all the way to its protruding and pointed nose. The entire nose, including both nostrils, was a strange blood-red color.

On both sides of the monkey-like protruding nose, bright dark blue lines spread across the wrinkled pale skin.

The pale beard on its upper lip was wet with mutton noodle soup, and the yellow beard on its chin looked like an old man's goatee.

In the deep eye sockets, two yellow eyeballs rolled around, looking around, flashing with a fierce light.

Ran Qing only took a glance and immediately looked away, not daring to look any further.

——Mandrill!
This legendary monster actually appeared on Longchang Street.

In the horror stories told by the old people, this thing is the same evil man-eating monster as the changeling.

But compared to the ghost stories about the changelings who deceive people by disguising themselves, the stories about the mandrills are more bloody and terrifying.

The elders say the mandrills in the mountains are the incarnation of mountain ghosts. They are ferocious, violent, bloodthirsty, and strong, capable of tearing apart adults with their bare hands. Some elderly mandrills have even become spirits, disguising themselves as living people and entering villages to drag people directly into the mountains.

And the old people say that mandrills love to eat children the most, because children's meat is tender...

Those horror stories made the young Ran Qing full of fear of the dark mountains and forests. He did not dare to leave the village, let alone go into the woods alone.

The strange legend of Longchang Street also says that there are mandrills here who wear human skins to go to the market.

But I didn't expect this thing to actually come out, and sit next to Ran Qing...

The terrifying monster in the shadow of childhood suddenly appeared. Ran Qing didn't dare to stay any longer and just wanted to leave.

But he also didn't dare to alarm the monster beside him. He just said to Mo Li and Long Zongshu, "Have you finished eating? If you're done, leave first. Don't delay the boss's business and occupy the stool."

Ran Qing urged the two to leave. Mo Li looked at Ran Qing in surprise, but said nothing.

The three of them stood up and left with Xiao Mianhua.

Long Zongshu was completely unaware of the danger and looked around curiously, saying, "Where are we going next?"

In the light mist, a headless ghost figure floated past the tall and thin Long Zongshu. Seeing this scene, Ran Qing's eyelids twitched and he said, "Let's go back to the car first."

He wanted to take the two away, or at least get back to the motorcycle.

There were four paper figures standing next to the motorcycle. They were made by Ran Qing using old sheepskin. After they were made, they were hung under the eaves to dry for a week. Every night, Ran Qing would brush the paper figures with some goat blood that had been stored in the underground cellar and soaked in incense ash.

After careful crafting, these four straw raincoat paper figures will be better than the previous ones.

But just as Ran Qing took Mo Li and Long Zongshu to pay and leave the mutton noodle stall, footsteps were heard behind them.

A faint smell of blood lingered in his nose, and Ran Qing's steps as he left froze slightly.

He didn't need to look back to know that the mandrill was following him.

Mo Li walked side by side with him, looking around curiously, and asked in a low voice: "What's going on?"

Mo Li couldn't see anything unusual in the street, but she knew Ran Qing too well.

Ran Qing's behavior was a little unusual, and she realized that something was wrong.

Ran Qing's mouth twitched, and he said, "Let's go back to the car first..."

He wasn't sure how well the monster behind him could hear them.

But this monster, covered in human skin and black hair, can pretend to speak like a human and make harsh and strange false sounds.

This parrot-like ability to imitate others made him instinctively shudder.

A monster that eats living people, but has the ability to learn how living people speak...

Ran Qing brought Mo Li and Long Zongshu back to the cherry tree, where two motorcycles were parked.

Four paper figures stood beside the motorcycles, quietly guarding the two vehicles.

Ran Qing has not yet summoned the souls of these four paper figures. They are just ordinary paper shells at this time, without any abnormality.

But after coming to the four paper figures, Ran Qing immediately found that the bloody smell lingering in his nose had dissipated.

He turned around and found that the hunched and fat figure covered in bloody human skin was walking towards the fog and was almost disappearing in the light mist.

Seeing the mandrill leave, Ran Qing felt a little relieved.

Mo Li squinted his eyes and stared at the direction Ran Qing was looking at, a little confused: "What are you looking at..."

Mo Li asked in a low voice: "Is the man who followed us just now an evil spirit?"

Mo Li obviously also noticed that he was being followed.

But in her eyes, the stalker was just a burly rural man.

Ran Qing looked at the slowly rising fog around him and his companions who were unaware of the fog. He did not say anything, but took out a pen from his canvas bag and asked Mo Li for a playing card.

He wrote this on a playing card.

——That’s not a human, it’s a mandrill.

After finishing writing, Ran Qing continued writing, briefly describing the current situation of Longchang Street in his field of vision and told the two of them.

When Long Zongshu and Mo Li saw that Ran Qing didn't speak but chose to write, they also fell silent.

After seeing the lines of small words written by Ran Qing on the playing cards, their expressions changed drastically.

(End of this chapter)