The ultimate master in the city

"That's quite an interesting story." The old man chuckled and led the three to a room on the left. He took a kerosene lamp from a table and lit it. Then he pushed open the door, revealing a room that wasn't very big. Apart from a bed and an old wooden pearwood cabinet, there was nothing else. Moreover, the bed was a large communal bed, the kind where a bunch of people sleep together on a wooden plank bed.

"This dormitory-style bed is an antique!" Monk Yuanzhi kicked it twice.

The old man placed the kerosene lamp on the ground to one side, took out three dusty quilts from the cabinet, and said without any hesitation: "It's been almost a hundred years. In the past, there were always wars outside, and the Xiang Army went out. There were many corpses and many craftsmen, and the beds were too small to accommodate everyone."

He threw the blanket onto the communal bed and said, "Make do with this. The blankets were washed and dried before the snow, so they're not dirty. I'll go heat up some food and boil some water. I can't let you spend your money for nothing."

……

After the old man left, the three of them lay down on the bed and exclaimed how comfortable it was, much better than sleeping on the snow.

Zhou Fengchen casually asked, "What do you think that bride came from? Why didn't she come here to cause trouble? Why did she turn around? What was she doing there?"

Monk Yuanzhi said, "Maybe they're going to meet the ghost groom and get married!"

Zhang Shisan said, "Maybe they're just going to take a dump in the wild; that's their usual routine."

Monk Yuanzhi said, "Can you not mention pooping? I just couldn't hold it in anymore."

"Hahaha……"

The three of them burst into strange laughter.

Not long after, the old man pushed in a strange tricycle with a bucket of hot water, a towel, a dish of pickles, six steamed buns, and a bowl of porridge on it.

They were all steaming, which was a pleasant sight on a snowy day.

The old man put down his things, glanced at his old pocket watch before leaving, and solemnly instructed, "Gentlemen, it's nine o'clock at night now. After you finish eating, wash up and go to bed early. No matter what happens outside after midnight, don't go out. Please remember that."

Zhou Fengchen and the other two exchanged glances, sensing something was amiss, but didn't take it seriously. "Alright!"

The pickled vegetables didn't taste very good; they smelled like stinky feet. I wonder if the old man pickled them with his feet. But the steamed buns and porridge were quite authentic. Anyway, they all taste the same.

After finishing their meal, they huddled together to soak their feet. None of the three were very old, so they inevitably started shouting and chatting.

The three students next door couldn't take it anymore. The girl ran to the door, knocked twice, and without waiting for a response, pushed the door open with a creak, glared at them, and said angrily, "You said you weren't noisy? The walls are shaking! Can you please keep your voices down? It's very impolite, you know?"

The girl had long hair and was quite pretty. Her cheeks were rosy from the cold, which made her look rather cute. However, no one would feel good in such a righteous and stern reprimand.

Monk Yuanzhi's face hardened. "This little wench thinks she's so great? What business is it of yours what I say? You think you can draw something on someone's nose?"

Zhang Shisan narrowed his small eyes. "Little sister, this bald guy likes to bully little girls, you'd better be careful!"

The girl retorted sharply, "What can you do about it? Hit me?"

As he spoke, he pulled out a stun gun, which looked like it was high voltage; if someone were hit by this, it would definitely be a serious injury.

But who are Monk Yuanzhi and Zhang Shisan? Feigning surprise, he exclaimed, "Oh my goodness! That's amazing! It's terrifying!"

Looking at the girl, Zhou Fengchen suddenly thought of his younger sister, Chen Siya, who had been spoiled since childhood. He figured that if it were that girl, she would probably be even more aggressive than this one. So he shook his head and said, "Forget it! You two stop talking nonsense. We have no right to argue. Beautiful lady, go back. It's so cold outside, let's keep our voices down."

The girl then turned around and went back in a huff, without even closing the door.

After this incident, the three of them lost interest in chatting. They wiped their feet, closed the door, blew out the light, and each wrapped themselves in a blanket, huddling together until they fell asleep.

……

After an unknown amount of time, a faint sound of crying came from outside, which sounded particularly jarring in the deep mountains at midnight.

Zhou Fengchen woke up with a start, while Zhang Shisan and Monk Yuanzhi beside him also woke up, rubbing their eyes.

"What do you mean?" Zhang Shisan asked.

Monk Yuanzhi yawned and mumbled, "What could it mean? It's haunted! Probably the ghost bride is hungry and has come to grab someone to eat."

Zhang Shisan said, "The old man seems nice; he even knew to give a heads-up. He's probably had dealings with ghosts before, but... will it be alright if we don't go out?"

Monk Yuanzhi said: "In the old society, this Corpse Village was used to house the dead. To prevent accidents, a feng shui master must have been consulted when it was built. It was built in a sunny place where the yang energy circulates, so ghosts and monsters cannot enter and yin spirits cannot be born."

"The analysis makes a lot of sense," Zhang Shisan said, scratching his head. "Should we do something about it?"

"Mind your own business!" Monk Yuanzhi lay down. "As long as it doesn't come in and cause trouble, I'm not going to bother!"

Zhou Fengchen felt quite bored and lay down as well. "I'm really sleepy, whatever, I need to sleep!"

Zhang Shisan listened carefully for a moment, then said to himself, "This isn't right! Why does it sound like an old woman crying? It's not the bride!"

Zhou Fengchen and Monk Yuanzhi listened carefully and found that it was indeed true; the voice was old and unpleasant, almost like that of a seventy or eighty-year-old woman.

Just then, the door to the next room creaked open, followed by the crunching sound of footsteps on the snow. A boy's voice asked in surprise, "Who's crying outside?"

Zhou Fengchen and the other two exchanged glances, thinking to themselves, "Damn it, this student's lost his mind. Why is he meddling in this?"

The crying outside paused for a moment, then continued.

"Who is it? I'm asking you a question." The boy seemed to have walked behind the courtyard gate.

The crying outside stopped again, and a muffled, aged voice said something.

The boy asked, "Do you want to come in?"

The aged voice muttered a few more words.

"Wait a minute!" The boy turned and ran back to the room door, saying, "Xiao west, Xiao Xue, there's an old lady outside who says she lives in the house across the street, but she's having trouble finding her way back. Should we take her there?"

A girl's wary voice came from inside the room, "Where would you find a house and an old lady in this remote mountain village? Mind your own business."

The boy said, "When we came here, we thought we saw a house. Maybe it belongs to that family. But now the old lady doesn't want to come in. It's not good to keep letting her cry outside."

"Alright then, let's go!" The two students inside dawdled for a moment before coming out of the house, and the three of them stepped through the snow and opened the courtyard gate to go out.

Zhou Fengchen and the other two listened in stunned silence from beginning to end.

Monk Yuanzhi said, "I'm impressed! Did the old man not warn them, or did they ruin their brains from reading too much?"

Zhang Shisan shook his head. "You can't say that. Their idea is not wrong. If there is an old lady crying outside, it would indeed be inappropriate to ignore her."

Monk Yuanzhi asked, "What should we do?"

Zhang Shisan jumped up, put on his clothes, and said, "I have to go and do something about this; I can't just watch them die in vain!"

"Wait for me! I'm going to see what's going on." Monk Yuanzhi also put on a sweater.

The two ignored Zhou Fengchen, opened the door, and hurriedly ran out.

"Well! I can't even sleep soundly. How will I have the energy to cause trouble tomorrow?" Zhou Fengchen smiled bitterly, got up, put on his clothes, and went out. However, he wasn't going to chase after them, but to chat with the old man in the guest village.

I like the novel "The Strongest Master in the City".