The strange story of Huai'an Inn

In that strange and strong fragrance, the miasma is entangled and twisted.They are wrapped around everyone's body, like a spider's web, which has no weight or touch, but it is so thin and dense that it penetrates every hole.Chong Liu raised his arm, and saw those sticky things coiled and hung on his arm, dancing back and forth with his movements like a broken spider web.But none of the sticky threads touched their faces, as if they couldn't help avoiding their heads.

As for Master Liao, it is even more amazing, he is like an isolated island in the thousands of threads, without any sticky threads entangled on him.

Chongliu vaguely realized that the so-called worm miasma seemed to be afraid of the tea.

Xu Hanke's body suddenly began to tremble violently, and there was a strange, insect-like creaking sound deep in his throat.Liu Sheng hurriedly wanted to go up to check, but the shopkeeper waved his hand at him, motioning him not to move.But the shopkeeper walked lightly behind Xu Hanke, and gently held his chin with his hand, making Xiansi raise his head.Chongliu saw that Xianji's eyelids were moving, but it was not the movement of the eyeballs, but... something was moving the eyelids.

Seeing this, the shopkeeper stretched out his hand to Master Liao.Master Liao handed over the cup of tea that the shopkeeper had just used.The shopkeeper dipped his finger in the tea and drew a symbol on Xu Hanke's forehead.As soon as the painting was finished, Xu Hanke's body convulsed violently again, and the skin on his face began to bulge and lower, making one almost imagine countless worms crawling under the skin.

At this point, can people really be saved?

The next moment, Xu Hanke, who was raising his head, suddenly opened his eyes.

It's just that those eyes seem to be no longer human eyes, but two glass beads, and there is another pair of eyes behind them looking at this world that does not belong to them.

Those eyes locked with those of the shopkeeper, looking at each other fixedly.

No one spoke, only Xu Hanke's body twitched occasionally, making a creaking sound, similar to the strange sound made by insects using their abdominal cavity or flapping their wings.After a while, the shopkeeper raised his head, scanned everyone around, then pointed in the direction of the vegetable cellar door, and then took the lead in striding towards the wooden stairs leading to the cellar door.Chong Liu followed closely, almost impatiently wanting to leave the cold and gloomy vegetable cellar full of miasma.He only hoped that after this incident, the vegetable cellar could safely store vegetables...

When he crawled out of the cellar door, Chong Liu saw those cobweb-like things peeling off his body as if "reluctantly", and finally let go of the diaphragm hanging in his chest.As soon as his feet touched the ground, he immediately ran to a nearby bucket of rotten vegetables, spit out the disgusting liquid in his mouth, followed by retching, and couldn't stop, tears flowed down with the acid water in his stomach Chung, but it can't take away the disgusting taste left in the mouth.

A hand patted his back.Chong Liu finally regained his strength, but found that it was the shopkeeper who was helping him.

"Master Liao drinks this every day?" Chong Liu said hoarsely, "It's not easy for him..."

The shopkeeper couldn't help laughing, "At this moment, you still have time to feel sorry for Master Liao? Don't worry, Master Liao has long been used to drinking."

"Yeah, this stuff is like soybean juice. The first time you drink it, it feels like drinking swill. After drinking it a few times, it will taste delicious in the world." Master Liao said sarcastic words in a self-deprecating tone.

On the other side, Liu Sheng also leaned against the wall and vomited again and again.He wiped his mouth with his sleeve in embarrassment, stared at shopkeeper Zhu and asked, "What's the matter? What's the box you opened just now?"

"It's a scent gland picked from the corpse of a male musk deer that was infected by filth. Anyone who smells this scent will die within three days."

"What did you say!" Liu Sheng became anxious immediately, and directly drew his knife at the shopkeeper.

The shopkeeper shook his head earnestly, "Young man, don't be so impatient. I haven't finished my sentence yet. Although this fragrance can kill people, we all took a sip of Master Liao's tea. This tea has the effect of avoiding filth, So we will be fine. As for Mr. Xiansi... the miasma worm has no form, is everywhere, and is very difficult to deal with. And the fragrance has the effect of restraining and destroying any form of life. Two and two are mutually restraining, we just Master Xu needs to stay in that fragrance for about twelve hours, and the parasites will retract into his body and enter a dormant state. He will be temporarily out of danger."

"Retract? Can't it be cleared?"

"Once the miasma enters the body, it has already fused with the blood and spread all over the body. It is impossible to completely eliminate it. But because his attack time is still short, the miasma has not become too strong, so we have a chance to make it fall asleep '."

Liu Sheng was still holding the knife in his hand tightly, his doubts still in his eyes, "How come there are these strange things in your hand? How come you are so familiar with the parasite?"

The shopkeeper rolled up his sleeves and looked patiently at the sword-ridden opponent, "Aren't you checking me out after you have stayed in my inn for the past few days? Have you asked so many people, but you haven't found out yet?"

Liu Sheng narrowed his eyes, and said in a blunt and stern tone, "Prince Zhong also has miasma."

"Since you're all going to Baijiuze, you're pretty close to guessing. Indeed, ever since I heard the news about King Zhong's illness, I guessed that he was suffering from miasma."

A trace of killing intent flashed across Liu Sheng's face, "Based on your words, I should immediately put you in prison for interrogation."

"But you won't." The shopkeeper smiled, but the smile didn't spread to the corner of his eyes, "After all, the person who can interrogate me is still in the vegetable cellar. If there is a slight mistake, he won't be able to see the sun in the day after tomorrow."

Chong Liu glanced from the shopkeeper to Liu Sheng, and then from Liu Sheng back to the shopkeeper. He was so nervous that his palms that had been frozen just now began to sweat.what's the matter with this?Why did Liu Sheng start asking questions all of a sudden?

So he cautiously stood between the two of them, smiled at Liu Sheng with a shy face, "Master Liu, let's find a way to wake up Xiansi first. Our boss is also kind enough to save people. Now that we are fighting among ourselves, we are not looking for it for ourselves." Is it troublesome? If there is any misunderstanding, wait until Lord Kenji wakes up, shall we?"

Liu Sheng looked at him with a frown, as if he had listened to his words a little bit.He put down the knife in his hand, and said sternly, "I will go to see the national teacher early tomorrow morning, and ask him to come and treat Xiansi."

Chong Liu heard a wave of threats from his tone, as if he was bringing out the Buddha to scare the shopkeeper.

I don't know what color his face will be if he knows that even the national teacher has to be courteous in front of the shopkeeper...

Liu Sheng refused to leave Xu Hanke alone in the vegetable cellar, so he took another sip of tea and went down after a while.Mr. Xu had already found an empty guest room and fell asleep. All the officers and soldiers took turns to be on duty at night, and the entire atrium will be brightly lit all night.Master Liao left a few bowls of tea and went back to sleep in the backyard. Only Chongliu stayed behind and sat with the shopkeeper on the stone pier under the locust tree to observe the situation.

The shopkeeper draped his coat over his shoulders, and took a playbook from behind the counter to read it.

Chong Liu yawned loudly, his eyes were sore and his mouth still had a strange taste.I was complaining secretly that I don't know if I can sleep tonight, so I heard the shopkeeper say, "If you are sleepy, go back to sleep first. There is nothing wrong here."

Chong Liu rubbed his eyes and said, "You asked me to follow you in the cellar before, I thought it was your order..."

"Leaving you here is to let you see what kind of things Xu Hanke is contaminated with, and what kind of fate people who are contaminated with filth and don't know may end up. You must be extremely careful when handling filthy things. Don’t be ambiguous at all.” The shopkeeper looked up at a place among the leaves of the locust tree, and said softly, “If I want you to help me in the future, it won’t cause any catastrophe.”

Chong Liu was stunned for a moment, then asked stupidly, "Master, are you promoting me? The salary..."

The shopkeeper glanced at him lazily, "...try it out first, and I'll give you a raise when you're proficient in your business."

"Okay~" Chong Liuyi immediately smiled when he heard that he was rich, and he didn't care if he couldn't get such a small detail for the time being.He stood up and stretched himself, "Then I'll go back to sleep first, my boss."

"Well, get up early tomorrow, and I'm afraid we will have to go to Zilu Mountain with Liu Sheng to find the national teacher Mengku."

"Oh, good." Just as Chong Liu took a step, he stopped again, hesitated for a moment, turned his head and said, "Boss, can I ask one more question?"

"Say."

"Why did you choose me to help you?" Chong Liu scratched his head and asked.

The shopkeeper bent down, picked up the fat cat that had been rubbing against his calf madly since just now, and scratched its chin, "Because you are curious."

"……Oh?"

"Curiosity killed the cat. Instead of letting you learn nothing and accidentally poke a big basket, it's better to bring you by my side to help." The shopkeeper said softly, with a smile on his face Looking at the raccoon cat in his arms, he closed his eyes and made a purring sound.

Chongliu originally thought that the shopkeeper was interested in his talent or that he was hardworking and reliable, but he didn't expect it to be the reason...

He remembered that the shopkeeper said to him before: "Don't you always want to know what's in his pot?"

It turns out that the shopkeeper has quietly observed all his little moves?

Chong Liu inexplicably felt a chill down his spine, touched his nose, hurriedly said good night to the shopkeeper and went back to the room.Zhu Yi is already asleep.Chongliu washed up and returned to the bed, hesitated for a moment, took out the box under the bed, dipped a pen into the ink, and quickly wrote down the insect miasma he saw today, the various abnormalities on Xu Hanke's body, and the ideas in the shopkeeper's box. There is Master Liao's tea... He wrote eloquently, writing down every detail he could remember.By the time he finished writing, the third watch had passed.

Chong Liu breathed a sigh of relief, as if he finally exhaled the breath he had held.He hesitated for a moment with the pen in his mouth, and then added a sentence under the description of the day in small characters: It was night, the shopkeeper was wearing a cloud brocade with a concubine-colored white crane pattern, and the civet cat was sitting in the courtyard under the moonlight, very beautiful.