hearse drift

Before dark, everyone arrived at the manor.

Originally thought that the scenery on both sides of the road was beautiful enough, after the car drove into the manor, they were completely amazed by the scenery they saw.

Everywhere you look are red roses.These flowers are close to each other, competing for beauty and extending to the distant horizon, and they are connected with the sunset glow, making people's eyes full of red light.

"The flowers bloom so beautifully." Zhao Xiaotong praised.

"Mister planted these by himself." The housekeeper said, "My wife loves roses the most. After buying this manor, Mr. planted this sea of ​​roses for her."

Xie Baiyuan said: "Your husband, it sounds like he loves his wife very much."

The housekeeper said with a smile: "Mr. and his wife met at an art exhibition. They fell in love at first sight, and their relationship has always been very good."

After entering the manor, everyone had to get out of the car and followed the butler on foot on the bluestone path surrounded by roses.

The winding path is long and secluded, especially with all the fiery red roses all around, it is easy to lose one's eyes accidentally.

The butler led them away for about ten minutes before Fang Li saw an extremely beautiful foreign villa.

The villa is three stories high, with brick-red walls and purple agate inlaid on the glass windows, and the exquisite patterns on the windows can be vaguely seen.From the outside, it looks like a magnificent castle.

A middle-aged man in a white suit with an elegant temperament stood at the door of the villa, holding a girl in a red skirt by his hand, who looked about the same age as Xinxin.

However, the little girl was expressionless, holding a doll in her arms, and her eyes didn't fluctuate when she saw them, it was like a pool of stagnant water.It's obviously a warm scene of a father holding his daughter in the sunset, but there is a kind of uncomfortable disobedience.

"Welcome to the appointment, my guests." The man smiled warmly, giving people a very comfortable feeling, "There are still seven days before the art exhibition. During these seven days, I will personally show you the style of this villa. But before that, Considering that everyone is exhausted, I have arranged a sumptuous dinner for you to enjoy."

He touched the head of the little girl beside him: "This is my daughter, Xiaoyuan."

Madoka just looked at them quietly with her big black eyes, as if she was completely uninterested in their sudden visits.

Zhao Xiaotong saw that the child was cute and cute, so he took out a few lollipops from his bag and handed them to her: "Come on, Xiaoyuan, my sister treats you to some candies."

The snacks in her bag are all new to this world, and the packaging is novel and bright, even this strange little girl showed a hint of curiosity.

She took the sugar and lowered her head slightly: "Thank you, Auntie."

Zhao Xiaotong: "...hehe." Who is the little kid calling auntie!

Seeing her hideous expression for a moment, Fang Li knew without guessing that she must be roaring in her heart.

The decoration inside the villa is more exquisite and complicated. After entering the door, you can see the tall atrium and the vaulted zenith, and the stairs on both sides are decorated with exquisitely crafted carved iron railings.The thick red velvet carpet spreads from the entrance to the stairs, exuding a luxurious atmosphere everywhere.

In the center of the hall on the first floor is a huge group photo, a man and a woman are sitting on chairs, and a little girl with an innocent smile is sitting on the woman's lap.

The woman in the photo is quite beautiful, with gentle eyebrows and a ladylike temperament.And the man is the host who receives them, and the innocent little girl in the photo is Madoka.

The host brought them to the dining room, and everyone sat down at the long marble table.

"May I ask you a question," Chen Zhou asked, "Why haven't you seen your wife?"

"Oh, it's like this," said the host, "my wife has recently caught a cold and has been resting in the bedroom, and doesn't like to go downstairs."

Chen Zhou said: "I wish your wife a speedy recovery. Among us are doctors who can provide services for your wife if necessary."

At this time, Madoka who had been sitting on the side with her arms around the doll suddenly put down the bowl and chopsticks with a "clang".

Her movement was very loud and sudden, and Fang Li's body shook accordingly.

The male host reprimanded in a low voice: "Xiao Yuan, don't play your temper when you have guests."

Xiaoyuan glanced at him, remained silent, then jumped off the chair with the doll in her arms, and ran upstairs.

The male host paused, then smiled at Chen Zhou: "Thank you for your kindness, the child is naughty, let's eat first."

During the whole meal, no one said a word.After eating, the host put down his chopsticks, wiped his mouth, and beckoned a maid to come over. "Make a millet porridge for my wife and send it up."

The maid responded, and the master said to everyone: "It's getting late today, I'll ask the butler to take you to the room to settle down first, everyone can rest for a night, and tomorrow I will show you around the manor."

The butler led them to the second floor. There are a total of six rooms on the second floor for them, and they can allocate them by themselves. Two people share one room.

At this time, no one gave way to each other. In order to facilitate escape, someone with a bag on his back immediately grabbed the room near the stairs.

Xie Baiyuan didn't argue with them, and he took Fang Li slowly to the guest room closest to the end of the corridor after everyone had finished grabbing it.

Zhao Xiaotong and a girl named Le Fei in the team lived diagonally across from them in Fangli.

Fang Li and the others were Gu Feng's father and daughter. Xinxin was only six years old, and she was already too sleepy at this point. She lay on Gu Feng's shoulder, her little face flushed from sleep.

"Why don't you come in?" After washing.Xie Baiyuan leaned out from the room and pulled Fangli's sleeve.

Fang Li stood at the door in a daze, looking at a portrait on the wall: "I'm looking at this painting..."

"Oh?" Xie Baiyuan came out of the room and watched it with him.

The corridor was dimly lit, and the painting hung at the end of the corridor, hidden in the shadows, and was not noticed for a while.

But Fang Li had just experienced the boss in the portrait in the last dungeon, so he was particularly sensitive to things like portraits and photos.He noticed the painting as soon as he went upstairs.

The painting depicts a little boy with blond hair and blue eyes. The boy looks at the front sadly and angrily. His eyes are filled with tears, and the tears on his cheeks seem to be dripping down at any moment.

I don't know if it's caused by psychological factors, but Fang Li's hair grows from the bottom of his heart when he sees this portrait. The little boy looks at him as if mixed with monstrous anger.

"This is a painting, don't be afraid." Xie Baiyuan said softly, his voice had a soothing effect: "The owner of this villa is a well-known painter, and there must be some portraits hanging in the house. Come in and sleep."

Fang Li was half pushed and half pulled into the room by him, still feeling a little uneasy.

He didn't know where this feeling came from, but judging from his past experience, his sixth sense seemed to be unexpectedly accurate, and there must be something wrong with that portrait.

The decoration in the room is also very gorgeous, but each room has only one big bed, and the crimson headboard of the bed is carved with complicated patterns. If you look closely, it is actually a rose with thorns.

"This family really loves roses." Fang Li sighed.Rose-style furniture can be seen everywhere in this villa, tableware with gold-plated roses, glass windows engraved with rose patterns, and a vast sea of ​​roses outside the windows.

He rejoiced in his heart that it was fortunate that the world was not yet summer, otherwise he would have to hang a mosquito net embroidered with roses.

"The rose symbolizes faithful love," Xie Baiyuan said. "In ancient Greek and Roman mythology, roses are the embodiment of Aphrodite and Venus, the gods of love."

Fang Li is not interested in the flower language of roses, he is more concerned about another matter: "Didn't Zhu Yicheng see a large field of lilies through divination, how did they turn into roses?"

Xie Baiyuan had already unbuttoned his bathrobe at this time, and sat on the bedside with his chest bare, flipping through his book of bedtime fairy tales: "Who knows, maybe something went wrong with his divination, anyway, it's not the first time."

Fang Li's head was covered with black threads. He remembered that Xie Baiyuan said that he met Zhu Yicheng in the No. [-] carriage, which meant that Zhu Yicheng only divination for him three times in total.This accuracy rate... He began to wonder what Zhu Yicheng usually does. If he was a professional fortune teller, Fang Li was afraid that this person would starve to death on the street tomorrow.

Although there is only one bed, there are two men, so don't worry too much about the details—it's just strange.

Fang Li didn't take off his bathrobe, anyway, the bed was big enough, he was lying flat and ready to fall asleep, and the distance between him and Xie Baiyuan could lie down another Xie Baiyuan.

It's not that he dislikes the other person, it's just that he has been sleeping alone since he was a child, and this is the first time he shares a bed with someone, and he has a subtle feeling that his privacy has been invaded.

This subtle feeling made him unable to fall asleep for a long time after closing his eyes for half an hour.

Fang Li turned over several times in a row, and when he was hovering on the verge of insomnia, Xie Baiyuan suddenly asked softly: "Is the light too bright to sleep?"

Fang Li didn't move for a moment, and said with some embarrassment: "No, I'm not used to it."

He didn't say it was because he was not used to sleeping with other people, and he didn't want Xie Baiyuan to think that he was too pretentious for a big man.

Xie Baiyuan smiled, "If you can't fall asleep, can I tell you a bedtime story?"

Fang Li thought that he was really going to tell himself Grimm's fairy tales, but right now his mobile phone has no internet, and he can't chat with people without reading novels, so he had to choose to listen to Xie Baiyuan's story. "Go ahead."

However, the story Xie Baiyuan wants to tell him is not from the Grimm's fairy tale, "Do you want to know the story of the portrait outside?"

Fang Li's brain trembled, although he was a little scared, he still replied truthfully: "I think."

"About the crying boy, there is a saying that this portrait has been carrying a curse for centuries." Xie Baiyuan said, "It is rumored that the creator of this portrait, the biological father of the little boy, in order to draw this painting, Intentionally frightened his son with a lit candle. The boy was very afraid of fire and shed tears at his father in extreme horror. After the painting came out, the buyers who brought it home encountered fires. In an exhibition , the fire burned all the portraits, leaving this one unscathed."

"Of course there are also claims that the painter took precautions against fire when creating this portrait, but over the centuries, none of its buyers has escaped fire or died in some accident."

Fang Li shivered, and tightened the quilt around his body, "The last one?"

"It's gone," Xie Baiyuan said here and suddenly turned off the kerosene lamp beside the bed. "The bedtime story is over, and it's time to go to bed now."

He added: "Good night."

Fang Li was shivering under the quilt waiting for the follow-up: "..." What kind of fucking bedtime story is this? ?I can't sleep anymore, okay?

Xie Baiyuan's smiling voice came from beside his ear: "I heard that people who like to watch horror movies before going to bed will sleep more soundly."

"..." Fang Li said after a long while, "You are listening to someone's nonsense."

But unexpectedly, he did fall asleep after a while, and he slept very deeply.

In the middle of the night, a sharp cry pierced the silent night. Fang Li sat up from the bed in shock, and heard heavy and hurried footsteps in the corridor.

The author has something to say:

Brother Yuan: The daughter-in-law is scared so she can come into my arms