Ita Era

Chapter 3 Peach Blossom Village (Part 1)

There was an asphalt road and a pavilion by the roadside. Before Ding Shi could even get a good look at his surroundings, he heard a male voice say, "Someone else is coming."

Ding Shi looked in the direction of the sound and first saw a tall, slender man wearing gold-rimmed glasses, with a refined and cultured appearance. Beside him were two people, a man and a woman. The woman was around thirty years old, pretty, but not exceptionally beautiful. The man was in his early twenties, with a buzz cut.

The crew-cut man said, "Brother, that's the respawn point over there, don't crowd people."

Ding Shi walked into the pavilion: "What are we going to do?"

The woman replied, "I don't know." She arrived only 10 seconds earlier than Ding Shi.

Ita World provided everyone with 20 hours of rest, effectively calming everyone's emotions and preparing them mentally, preventing them from being overly excited upon entering the dungeon. From this perspective, Ita World is quite user-friendly.

At 7:59, another tall, thin man appeared. He calmed himself down and looked at everyone: "Hello everyone, is this a random teammate for a dungeon run?"

Before anyone could answer, the man with glasses said, "There are minibuses."

A minibus appeared from the corner of the road, heading towards the pavilion. A sign was placed on the passenger seat of the minibus, which read: Taoyuan County - Taoyuan Village.

The tall, thin man said, "Peach Blossom Village should be the place we're going to, right?"

The crew-cut man replied, "Probably."

The tall, thin man said, "Guess what? Will the driver and ticket seller be some kind of horrible corpses?"

Everyone was taken aback. The tall, thin man countered, "Haven't you read any horror novels? Players might have to survive being chased by supernatural and disgusting creatures. Based on the script, I suspect Peach Blossom Village has been destroyed and is now a ghost village, but the villagers don't know it. We'll have to stay in the homes of villagers whose bodies are rotting, constantly on guard against being killed by these ghost villagers. Only by surviving for a certain period of time, or by completing the main quest, can we clear the game and leave Peach Blossom Village."

The group looked at each other. The tall, thin man observed them for a while and, seeing their bewildered expressions, said, "Remember a few rules: don't eat meat, don't stay out overnight, and don't readily agree to the villagers' requests."

The minibus stopped at the pavilion. The door opened, and everyone hesitated to move after the tall, thin man's words. The tall, thin man wasn't in a hurry; according to the novel's plot, someone who didn't take him seriously would go and test the waters at this point.

Ding Shi stepped onto the minibus first, boarding the ramp. There was only one driver on board, smoking a cigarette and leisurely looking ahead. He glanced up at Ding Shi as a greeting, and Ding Shi pointed to the passenger seat: "Can I sit here?"

The driver said, "Okay."

Ding Shi took his seat, and everyone else got into the car. The driver glanced at the pavilion and, seeing no one was there, drove off.

Ding Shi noticed that this was a 20% new, manual transmission diesel minibus. If his memory served him right, it was a typical rural minibus from the late 80s or early 90s. Judging from the rough asphalt road and the "All Closed" sign at the mountain pass, it was almost certain that the timeline of this instance was around the 90s.

As the minibus set off, the tall, thin man looked around and said, "It's fate that we've met. Let's all get to know each other. My name is Li Si."

Li Si looked at the man with glasses, who was taken aback: "Then can I be called Zhang San?"

Li Si realized the bespectacled man had misunderstood and was about to explain when Ding Shi said, "Hello everyone, my name is Wang Wu."

Is this some kind of rule? The crew-cut man replied, "Hello everyone, I'm Zhao Liu."

The woman said, "Hello everyone, my name is Sun Qi." Li Si was about to explain when Sun Qi said, "Brother Li Si, what kind of player are you, and what kind of dungeon are you? Can you tell us?"

Seeing the eager eyes of the group, Li Si immediately became interested. Based on his experience of reading hundreds of horror novels, he said, "We are the players. As for the dungeons, they are all kinds of strange and varied, but generally speaking, there will be a BOSS. Since our destination is a village, it is highly likely that Peach Blossom Village is a remote mountain village. One type is a reflection of reality, such as many abducted women and many murdered female infants in the village. Another type is eerie and terrifying, such as what I mentioned earlier, that the villagers are all dead. Another type is a sacrificial activity, where the villagers offer us as sacrifices to some evil god. And another type..."

Ding Shi had overheard a bit earlier, but when Li Si mentioned that Taoyuan Village was a remote mountain village, Ding Shi stopped paying attention to Li Si's nonsense and started chatting with the driver.

Although the asphalt road is poorly constructed, with a layer of asphalt that melts in the summer, it shows that Taoyuan Village is not isolated.

The minibus was spaced far apart, so conversations didn't disturb each other. The driver wasn't very talkative, offering only brief, disjointed answers, which gave Ding Shi a basic understanding of Taoyuan Village.

Taoyuan Village has more than 100 households. Backed by mountains and facing plains, it mainly grows rice and tobacco. Its economic level is no lower than that of other villages. The people you see riding Jialing motorcycles on the road are basically villagers from Taoyuan Village.

However, Li Si was right about one thing: there would be a sacrificial ceremony in Taoyuan Village in seven days. The driver didn't know the specifics, because the villagers of Taoyuan Village never talked about the ceremony with outsiders. He only knew that Taoyuan Village would be closed for a day on the day of the ceremony.

……

Half an hour later, the minibus slowly stopped at the entrance of Taoyuan Village.

The group got off the bus one by one. There was a roughly constructed waiting pavilion where some people were standing or sitting.

An elderly man, around 60 years old and dressed in blue, greeted everyone, leaning on a cane with one hand. Once they stopped in front of him, the old man introduced himself: "I am the village chief of Peach Blossom Village. You must be students from Ita University?"

As soon as the village chief said this, everyone received a system message: You are a folklore student at Ita University. In order to complete your graduation thesis, you are going to Taoyuan Village to participate in the sacrificial ceremony.

Main task: Participate in the sacrificial ceremony.

How to leave the instance: Take a minibus at 8:00 AM on the eighth day.

Risk level: Extremely low.

Main quest: Obtain an identity.

Ding Shi was the first to speak, answering, "Yes."

The village chief nodded, first welcoming everyone to this year's sacrificial ceremony on behalf of the village. Originally, outsiders weren't allowed to participate, but since the professor of folklore was his cousin, and also to let the outside world know about Taoyuan Village, he overruled objections and agreed to let the students participate. However, the rules couldn't be broken, so Ding Shi and the others needed to have a village identity to participate in the ceremony.

The parking pavilion was large, and quite a few people were sitting inside. The village chief gestured for everyone to look to the left. On the left sat a woman in red, who was turning her head to look at the children playing in the bamboo grove outside the pavilion.

The village chief called out, "Haitang."

"Hey!" The woman in red, Haitang, turned around and immediately stunned Ding Shi. At eighteen years old, she had bright eyes and white teeth, and was pure and beautiful.

Having seen so many opulent peonies in modern metropolises, this wild chrysanthemum from the countryside momentarily stunned everyone present. Haitang smiled sweetly at everyone, then shyly turned her head away, avoiding their gazes.

(End of this chapter)