Kneel to the white lotus

"I've seen that altar...well...to be precise, I've seen it in a book." Xiuxiu sat cross-legged on the bed with a serious expression: "This is a witchcraft, which weakens the spirit of the earth through sacrifices. power, and even kill the earth spirit directly."

"Wait a minute..." An Yixing shook his head, a little unbelievable: "I don't quite understand, witchcraft, have you seen it before, and return to the spirit?"

An Yixing wondered for a moment whether he had gone through the wrong plot.

Although the original novel is a hodgepodge of sci-fi and fantasy, it still uses pseudoscience to justify itself.Therefore, the original work is also an article based on the planetary system of the earth.Xiuxiu is also a serious earthling.

But now not only the game world is fantasy, but even the earth world in the original book is also fantasy?Also witchcraft?Return to the spirit?

"I have never seen anyone perform witchcraft, but I have only seen it in books. In fact, witchcraft is not something that modern novelists imagined out of thin air. It can be traced back to ancient times. Totem tribes, Eastern and Western people have their own The witchcraft system. For example, "Golden Branches", this is a book that records the primitive beliefs and witchcraft in the West, and there are many similar books in the East." Xiuxiu patiently explained a few words: "Witchcraft has its own Historic, this setting appears in the game world, if you think about it carefully, there is actually no conflict.”

After listening to Xiuxiu's explanation, An Yixing suddenly realized that he was really ignorant and not a competent screenwriter. If he had the chance to go back, he had to work hard to make up for the lessons.

"About this altar, I also saw it in a thread-bound book. I didn't recognize it at first glance, and I didn't recall it until I saw the scene when it was repaired by itself." Xiuxiu continued Dao: "The material used to construct the altar is not stone, gold, or wood. It is a living body called filth. It is born of flesh and blood and will never perish. filth will not actively attack people, nor will it affect the terrain and environment. Its The only use is to make an altar for blood/sacrifice to earth spirits."

"You mean, that big snake is actually the earth spirit of Hulin." Anyi Xing affirmed.

"That's right." Xiuxiu nodded: "Earth spirits are spiritual creatures that protect a certain land, that is to say, they cannot be evil."

"If the earth spirit can't be evil, then the NPC who told you to kill the earth spirit in the game is evil?" An Yixing looked at Shu Qing: "Wait a minute, let's straighten it out again."

"In the game played by Shu Qing, the snake disaster was caused by Liu Jinde crushing the snake. The game players collected clues through the NPC, that is, the villagers in this village, and learned how to kill the earth spirit to solve the snake disaster. "

When An Yixing said this, he paused, and saw Shu Qing nodded before continuing.

"And in this [Snake Disaster World] we are in, the snake disaster was also caused by Liu Jinde crushing the snake, but we didn't directly follow the plot given by Shu Qing. So we found the hidden dungeon and learned that the earth spirit is the Just. If the earth spirit is just, then the snake disaster cannot be a so-called disaster, right?" An Yixing looked at Xiuxiu: "There is an earth spirit guarding the tiger forest, and the earth spirit acquiesced to the snake. If the snake disaster happens, then this snake disaster should be protecting the tiger forest in a special way. If we think in this direction, what we should do is not to prevent the snake disaster from happening, but to speed up the progress of the snake disaster, so that the earth spirit Complete what you want to do as soon as possible, and let the snake disaster end as soon as possible."

"Then what we need to figure out now is why Earth Spirit caused such a snake disaster." Shu Qing finally said something intelligent.

"The earth spirit is for the good of the tiger forest, so it will not easily hurt the villagers. But I heard from An Yixing's father that someone was obviously injured during the night watch at the ancestral hall last night." Xiuxiu's eyebrows trembled twice, and the corners of his mouth hooked Qi Qi: "Then there is only one possibility, the injured person had evil intentions towards Hulin."

"Go to the ancestral hall!" Anyi Xing made a decisive decision.

The ancestral hall is an important place in the village. It is not yet known whether the snake disaster has been resolved. There must still be people staying there. They can go to the ancestral hall now and ask who was injured last night.

The four of them hurried back to the ancestral hall in less than two hours after returning from the altar.In order to speed up, An Yixing and Xiuxiu simply drove Shu Qing and An Jin on bicycles.

Regardless of whether Shu Qing likes it or not, An Yixing directly puts him in the back seat of Xiuxiu.

The two of them pedaled like hot wheels, Anyixing was sweating all over his forehead, but Xiuxiu was fine, but he was a little short of breath and didn't sweat profusely like Anyixing.

Just pedaling like crazy, the four rode to the ancestral hall in less than 15 minutes. The village chief Zhao Datong was still guarding the ancestral hall and did not leave.

Zhao Datong sat on the horse tie at the entrance of the ancestral hall with a cigarette in his mouth.His shoulders shrunk into the shape of a ridge, his head hung down, his cheeks shrunk and bulged with cigarettes, and his face was blurred by the smoke he exhaled.

"Uncle Datong." An Yixing bent down slightly, and called out softly.

Zhao Datong raised his head, revealing a pair of bloodshot eyes.In the end, he took a big puff of the cigarette, and the bright red sparks rustled to less than 1mm in front of his lips.Bowing his head and spitting out the cigarette holder, Zhao Datong completely stamped out the extinguishing sparks with his feet: "Why are you here, the children come home, just go home and take care of the house. The ancestral hall is guarded by us adults."

"Uncle Datong, I heard that someone was injured last night, so we just came to see. Is there anything we can do to help? Anyway, we can't go to work or go to school during this period of time. What can we do? There are many people and strength, you Do you mean it?" Seeing Zhao Datong's appearance, An Yixing wondered what might have happened last night.

"Your father is fine, go back quickly, ah, don't stay around." Zhao Datong stood up after finishing speaking, and walked into the ancestral hall.

Anyixing and Xiuxiu looked at each other, then opened the door of the ancestral hall and took a look inside, and could vaguely see something covered by a few pieces of white cloth on the ground.

With a trembling heart, Anyi Xing hurriedly retracted his head, and whispered to Xiuxiu behind him: "I'm afraid he died last night..."

'Slap' a big slap to An Yixing's shoulder: "What are you doing, brat."

An Yixing, who was startled again, turned his head and met Shang An's father's eyes.

"Uncle, let's see how your side is doing, the snakes in the house are all gone." Xiuxiu said.

Father An glanced into the ancestral hall, sighed, and waved: "Come with me."

The four of them didn't communicate with each other, and followed Papa An's footsteps very well-behaved and sensible.

Father An took the four of them to the back of the ancestral hall, where there was a simple shed for the ancestors to rest their feet, which could keep out the rain but not the wind.

Father An asked the four of them to sit down first, and went to get a pot of tea by himself.

"Your mother just went back, have you met?" Papa An asked An Yixing.

"No, we've just arrived too, so we might have diverged."

Father An nodded, took a few sips of tea in silence, and suddenly said, "Did you see it in the ancestral hall?"

The four nodded together.

Putting the remaining half cup of tea aside, Papa An lit a cigarette and took a deep puff: "8 people died last night, all of which were bitten to death by snakes."

"Didn't you say you were injured?"

"Maybe there are about a dozen injuries, not serious." Father An smoked half of the cigarette in a few puffs, and the fluffy ash stuck to the cigarette tremblingly, and it was impossible to drop it: "The few injured, all I was bitten when I was chasing a snake in the middle of the night. The snake was neither poisonous nor serious. In the second half of the night, the snake dispersed. Afraid that the snake would come back again, the village head kept vigil and let us rest first. But wait When we woke up, eight of us were out of breath."

"Didn't Uncle Datong notice that a snake came in?"

"How can I find out? Did you find out that Uncle Datong can make them have trouble. The dead ones, if they weren't out of breath, they looked the same as the living people. Otherwise, how could they not find something wrong with them. Lips It wasn't purple, and it didn't bleed. When I found out I was dead, I took off my clothes and saw that they were bitten under the clothes."

"This thing is evil/sexual..." Papa An took the last puff of cigarette and continued: "The 8 people who died were all the ones who had the most fun in killing snakes and catching snakes."

"Who is there?" An Yixing asked.

"Old Chen's family, you, Uncle Chen and Uncle Chen, and the brother of the old Yu family have all confessed, as well as Liu Jinde's brother and his younger brother." Papa An wiped his eyes: "It was fine last night, this one Wake up in the morning and it's all gone."

'One family and one family die?And the whole family is particularly active in catching and killing snakes?And Liu Jinde's family? "An Yixing licked his lower lip." Thinking with his toes, this group of people must have done something in collusion to make Di Ling blacklisted. '

"Have you notified their families?" An Yixing asked.

"Not yet, the village chief doesn't know how to tell others." Father An sighed: "Don't talk nonsense when you go back, just know it in your heart, wait a minute..."

"You guys go back first." Father An said, stood up, and patted the soot that fell on his thighs: "We will go back after we finish dealing with this end."

An Yixing nodded: "Then you should also be careful."

Papa An waved his hand and walked towards the ancestral hall.

"Brother Liu Jinde and younger brother both had accidents, which means that the snakes didn't chase the car because Liu Jinde overwhelmed them at the beginning." Shu Qing said.

"And it's all the deaths of the whole family, which means that at least their family members know each other about this matter that Earth Spirit thinks will be harmful to Hulin." Anyi Xing's eyebrows were tightly frowned. : "What is the relationship between these three families? Or are they different things at all?" After speaking, Anyi felt that the possibility of the latter was small.

"Paper mill." Xiuxiu said flatly, "The main purpose of Liu Jinde's sports car trip was to bring the factory's investors to the village for investigation."

After Xiuxiu said this, Anyi and the others also checked the memories of their respective shells, and they found out that there was such a saying about building a paper factory.

"For the construction of the factory, these families have strongly supported it, and have been persuading the village chief." Xiuxiu continued: "With the technology of this era, the sewage from the paper mill is very difficult to deal with. dealt with. Once a paper mill is built, the village will soon be polluted."

"You mean, the purpose of the land spirit is to make it difficult to build a paper mill?" Anyi asked rhetorically.