Placid Chang'an

Su Cen was taken aback when he heard the word "Lujiazhuang", and slowly stopped walking while watching the place where the cooking smoke was rising in the distance.

In the summer of Yonglong's 22nd year, Lu Xiaoliu, who was originally scheduled to be executed after autumn, was repatriated to his original Lujiazhuang because of the new emperor's accession to the throne, but was beaten to death on the day he returned for molesting the daughter of a butcher's family while drunk.Mr. Chen Guanglu, who was Dali Shaoqing at the time, accepted the case, and brought Zhang Jun, who was still the official of the temple, down to Lujiazhuang to investigate in person, but the body was gone.Later, because the butcher pleaded guilty, the case was hastily closed.Afterwards, Mr. Chen was relegated to leave Beijing for unknown reasons, and Zhang Jun was even more silent about it. Lujiazhuang disappeared from people's sight from then on, and there is no record of a single word.

Su Cen never expected to hear the name of Lujiazhuang here.

"Brother Su, what's wrong?" Qu Ling'er stopped and asked.

Su Cen shook his head, took another look into the distance, and then followed the crowd down the mountain together.

When I returned to Jinghe Village, every household was basically surrounded by smoke.Su Cen and the others lived in a family whose surname was Zhang. There was only a couple in the family with a seven or eight-year-old child. They have been farmers who have been doing their jobs for generations.Su Cen was generous with the money, and the couple prepared a table of dishes, enough for seven or eight people.

Su Cen borrowed flowers to present Buddha, and asked Zhang's sister-in-law to call a few people from the neighborhood to join in the fun.

They are all simple and honest villagers, and you come and go with each other over a glass of wine. When the wine is hot, the conversation box opens.

Naturally, what they were talking about was the murder that happened on Mount Gabdir.

The Orion in the village said that he has been on the mountain for many years, but he has never found such a cave on this mountain. It must have been covered by stones before. The flash flood washed away the stones and exposed the cave entrance. .

"Doctor Li, you are quite courageous at such a young age!" Orion followed him up the mountain, knowing that Su Cen had entered the cave, and said to Su Cen, "The officials and gentlemen from the county government dare not go in. Seeing that you are not at all afraid to lead this little brother."

"Dr. Li has traveled all over the world and has seen a lot. Do you think he's like you bastards?" Mrs. Zhang joked, "Dr. Li, tell us quickly, what's in that cave?"

Su Cen stopped the chopsticks with a smile, "I was tricked into this too. If I had known there were bones inside, I wouldn't have gone."

"That's right, that's right," Qu Ling'er echoed, "My scalp still feels numb when I think about it now, you don't know, there is a dense patch of dead bones in there, you can't see the head at a glance, who is so mad, More than 200 lives were killed if they were said to be killed."

There was a moment of silence at the dinner table, and everyone stopped what they were doing. Qu Ling'er noticed something was wrong, and looked up at the crowd, and after a while, Orion who was sitting across from her sighed, "Is it true that someone did it? Not good."

Su Cen raised his glass after being taken aback for a moment, "I would like to hear more about it."

Orion clinked glasses with Su Cen, smacked his lips in one gulp, looked at the candle lamp on the table and seemed to hesitate for a while, then lowered his voice and said, "You guys still remember the legend on the mountain, saying that there is a The Goddess of the Mountain, after eating people, she turns people into ghosts, and then seduces people to eat them for her. That cave must be the Goddess of the Mountain's cave, and she must have killed those people, otherwise, whoever still has the ability to kill them in one go What kind of people."

"It's no wonder that so many people haven't found the source of the corpses," the blacksmith in the village suddenly realized, "They must be strangers caught by ghosts!"

The table fell silent for a moment, and the people sitting around the table looked at each other, their confusion and fear fully exposed by the candlelight.

"No," Su Cen suddenly smiled, "Since you call her a mountain god, it's fine if she doesn't want to be a part of the mountain, how can there be a reason for cannibalism?"

"Oh, you're a foreigner, so you don't know something," Orion Chief sighed, "What kind of mountain god empress, it's just an honorific name, that's a white tiger spirit!"

Qu Linger: "White Tiger Spirit?!"

Everyone was in an uproar, only Su Cen didn't take it seriously, he never believed in ghosts and gods, if any unsolvable cases were attributed to ghosts and gods, what's the use of Dali Temple?

Seeing that Su Cen was not scared, Orion was quite frustrated, and continued to say to Su Cen unyieldingly: "Don't believe me, I've seen that ghost!"

Su Cen was taken aback for a moment, and finally became interested, raised his eyebrows, "How do you say?"

Orion squinted his eyes and thought for a moment before he said: "That was more than ten years ago. At that time, I was still a young man, young and vigorous, and I didn't believe in those nonsense. Once I went hunting in the mountains and met a man covered in blood. People, although there is a lot of blood, but people still have a breath, and told me that there is a tiger on the mountain, and he was injured like that because he fought with that tiger, and told me to go quickly, the tiger was also seriously injured, I am now I will definitely be able to pick up a tiger skin when I go up."

Orion sighed, "Fortunately, I was careful at the time and didn't rush to go. Thinking about it now, if I went, I must have fed the tiger. The man covered in blood must have been killed by a tiger." The people who turned into ghosts!"

"How do you know that person belongs to a ghost?" Zhang's sister-in-law asked hastily.

"The man was anxious to let me go up the mountain, but it was already late at that time, and I hesitated, but the man kept urging me, saying that the tiger ran away because I was late, so I lit a torch and followed him up the mountain. You It was said that a man covered in blood could still walk so fast, I kept an eye on him and followed him, and guess what—” Orion dragged his tone, “I saw a tiger in his tattered clothes Hairs! They just grew out of his wounds scratched by tigers!"

"Then what happened later? Why did you run away?" Qu Ling'er was already addicted to listening to Su Cen, and while hiding behind Su Cen trembling, she poked her head out to listen, "What happened to that ghost?"

"Later——" the butcher took a sip of his wine, "Later I said I was in a hurry to urinate, and I ran back with the help of Gong Gong."

"Hey!" Everyone praised him together.

"It's not enough this time, is it possible that I have to fight with that ghost?" The butcher resented, "This is not a story, it's a true story! If I really leave with him, you can watch it now." Don't see me!"

"That means you didn't see any white tiger spirit, and you're not sure if that person is a ghost," Su Cen said, "It's all just your speculation, and there is no evidence to support your words?"

"Evidence? What kind of evidence?" The butcher frowned, obviously upset, "It's not the elder who opened the trial, what kind of evidence do you want?"

Su Cen realized that it was his old problem again, so he punished himself with a drink, and said with a smile: "I made a slip of the tongue, I hope you don't take offense."

The butcher waved his hand generously, "It's because I didn't see the end, and it's not because you don't believe me. Let's not talk about this matter for now, I'm not talking about Lujiazhuang, that place is really evil."

As soon as Su Cen heard about "Lujiazhuang", Su Cen suddenly became interested. He raised his head and waited to continue talking, but he saw embarrassment on everyone's face, and no one wanted to speak again.

That is to say, Lujiazhuang is a more terrifying place than the white tiger spirit and ghosts.

Su Cen asked first, "Lu Family Village is also haunted?"

"Lujiazhuang..." The blacksmith clicked his tongue, "That place is really evil."

"What's so evil?" Qu Ling'er asked.

"Lujiazhuang, they make coffins," Zhang's sister-in-law lowered her voice, and said, "every household makes coffins, and there is a coffin in front of every household in their village, but their coffins are never sold outside. I don’t even know where it all went.”

"In the past, a family died, and all the coffin shops in the ten miles and eight townships were sold out, so I went to Lujiazhuang to buy a coffin. Guess what happened—there was no one in the whole village!" Zhang's sister-in-law stroked With a sigh of relief, "Even if there is no one in other villages, maybe all the big guys have gone somewhere, but in that village, there is no barking or barking, and it is so quiet, it's like a deserted village. It was almost dark at that time, and that person wanted to stay overnight before leaving the next day. As a result, the person was half asleep and half awake when he heard something, and when he opened his eyes, he was almost frightened to death! People from Lujiazhuang came from the door. They crawled out of the coffin one by one, lit a fire, cooked, sang and laughed, and it turned out to be the same as usual! The man hid in the haystack all night trembling, and the next day when the sun came out, no one was there. Lah! None of those people were gone last night! That person is also bold, he even dared to open the coffin to take a look, guess what he saw?"

Su Cen didn't respond, Qu Ling'er was already trembling with fear, "What, what? A corpse?"

"If the corpse is okay," Zhang's sister-in-law said, "it's nothing, just an empty coffin with no bones in it! Where do the people in their village go during the day? And at night? Where did it come from?"

"Could it be that the whole village is transformed by ghosts?" Qu Ling'er gritted her teeth, "This is too creepy."

"Who says it's not?" Zhang's sister-in-law said, "No one has dared to go to Lujiazhuang since then, and they have never seen people from their village come out. The only road into their village is covered by weeds. People are gone."

"Where is that road?"

Everyone was startled, they all looked at Su Cen, and the sister-in-law of the Zhang family asked tentatively, "Doctor Li, do you want to enter the Lu Family Manor?"

Su Cen smiled lightly: "I'm just asking casually, and I don't necessarily want to go."

"It's not hard to find the way, just walk along the foot of Mount Fushan, but you must never go to that place. If you go there, you will die!"

Su Cen raised her eyebrows: "Why, that person didn't come back?"

"I did come back," the blacksmith said tremblingly, "but he died not long after. It is said that he died of fright. What is even more bizarre is that a coffin appeared at the door of the man's house the day after his death. Everyone was buried, and when the family members asked, they found that no one bought the coffin, and no one came to deliver the coffin. The coffin just appeared at the door of his house so quietly, and no one knew how it got there. .”

"It's quite human to scare people to death and give coffins as gifts," Su Cen smiled. "So, shouldn't all the coffins in their village be sent out like this?"

The faces of the people in the circle turned pale, they were all frightened by Su Cen's joke.

When he fell asleep that night, Su Cen couldn't sleep because of the bright moon outside the window, so he simply sat up and thought about things, and sobered up by the way.

Unexpectedly, Qu Ling'er didn't fall asleep either. Seeing that Su Cen woke up, she immediately sat up, "Brother Su, are you too scared to sleep?"

"..." Su Cen was helpless, "I'm thinking about something."

"I'm also thinking about something," Qu Ling'er tilted her head, "Do you think that ghost is real? And what happened to the coffin in Lujiazhuang?"

Su Cen rolled his eyes in the dark, and really couldn't figure out how dare Qu Linger dare to assassinate Li Shi at that time?Wouldn't he scare himself to death before he got in front of Li Shi?

Seeing that Su Cen ignored her, Qu Ling'er had nothing to say, "Brother Su, what are you thinking?"

"Thinking of Lujiazhuang."

Qu Ling'er curled her lips, thinking that Brother Su could be much taller than herself, so she was just as scared.

"Do you remember the Lu Xiaoliu case I told you about? That case happened in Lujiazhuang."

Qu Ling'er was slightly taken aback, "Is that Lujiazhuang the same as this Lujiazhuang? The name is so common, there should be many places with the same name."

"Do you still remember the corpse with cracked leg bones that you saw during the day?" Su Cen asked.

Qu Linger nodded.

"Lu Xiaoliu's leg was broken because he pushed the young master of Ding'an Hou Mansion into the water." Su Cen narrowed his eyes slightly, "I suspect that the bone during the day belongs to him."

"Why, how could it be such a coincidence?" Qu Ling'er was dumbfounded, "Then why did he run into the cave?"

Su Cen shook his head, and said after a while, "I've decided to go to Lujiazhuang tomorrow."