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Join the ServerSeeing this, Mu An could not help but warn the village chief, “Finding the children is only the first step. If we don’t find the root cause of their disappearance, it is only a matter of time before they go missing again.”
The village chief’s face turned deathly pale, and he was about to fall to his knees right then and there, but Mu An stopped him.
“I beg the Great Immortal to save our Chen Village!”
“For the time being, keep the children outside the village. Only let them return once the root cause has been resolved,” Mu An suggested.
The village chief nodded repeatedly, “The Great Immortal is absolutely right.”
“Secondly, we need to inspect the place where your village used to sacrifice baby girls.”
The village chief’s expression froze for a moment upon hearing this.
After all, sacrificing baby girls was hardly something respectable to speak of openly.
However, seeing the look on Mu An’s face, he realized the boys’ disappearances were very likely connected to those sacrifices.
He nodded repeatedly, “We will follow the Great Immortal’s instructions in everything.”
Hearing himself addressed as “Great Immortal” over and over felt rather odd to Mu An, though he was glad his surname wasn’t Huang.
As night had already fallen, Chuanyu was taken home by his biological parents, while Mu An and the others stayed at the village chief’s house.
The next morning, when Mu An stepped outside, he found that there were far fewer people in the village.
They had likely set off in a hurry to pick up their children.
They followed the village chief to the sacrifice site, which was a hillside overlooking the river.
At this moment, the place was completely empty except for a single offering table.
Since it was not the time for rituals, no incense burner had been set out.
Mu An walked up the hillside and looked down at the river water below, “Shizun, is this the upper reaches of the river that runs behind the brothel?”
Shen Shengqing nodded slightly.
“Did you throw the children into this river during the sacrifices?” Mu An asked, looking coldly at the village chief.
The village chief nodded with a sheepish, apologetic smile.
A surge of anger rose in Mu An’s chest at the sight, and he could not help but intimidate him, “It seems the sins you committed have returned to claim your lives.”
The village chief gasped in shock.
Remembering what the Great Immortal had told him yesterday—that those children had all been found in the river—he wondered if it really was the work of vengeful spirits.
He fell to his knees in terror to beg for help, “Great Immortal, you must exorcise that vengeful ghost! Our village has over a hundred people, we cannot let our family lines be cut off like this!”
Standing to the side, Yunnan You frowned deeply as he listened, “If you hadn’t committed those murderous acts, there wouldn’t be any vengeful ghosts. And now you still want to destroy them?”
Mu An’s face was even colder, “Even if there were ghosts, they cannot be exorcised. They have not committed any murder, so they cannot be harmed.”
After all, the information they had gathered so far showed that the children had only lost their memories and were not dead, suggesting that the force behind this had not come to take lives.
Hearing this, the village chief panicked.
It was rare to encounter capable cultivators who could actually retrieve their children, so he could only beg them again and again to investigate further and find some way to uncover the root of the calamity.
Mu An surveyed the area and even waded into the river to investigate, but he could not find even a trace of ghostly, demonic, or evil energy.
It was exactly as the previous cultivators had said: all the demons, ghosts, and monsters in the vicinity had been wiped out, yet the root cause remained undiscovered.
He could not help but turn to Shen Shengqing for help.
Receiving his gaze, Shen Shengqing merely lowered his eyes slightly, “Let us return first.”
Left with no choice, the group headed back.
“Shizun, did you notice anything today?”
Mu An’s eyes were filled with anticipation and admiration, and Yunnan You also looked at Shen Shengqing with a very serious expression.
Shen Shengqing handed the cup of tea in front of him to Mu An, “Aside from gods, immortals, humans, demons, devils, ghosts, and monsters who can act of their own accord, there are other, more ethereal entities in this world that possess the power to cause trouble.”
Mu An thought for a moment, “Do you mean the spiritual energy of heaven and earth, Shizun? But those exist naturally and possess no self-awareness whatsoever.”
He really could not think of anything else besides that which could cause such disturbances.
Shen Shengqing simply watched him think with a gentle gaze, and after a short while, he said, “There is no rush. Since that entity targeted Yunnan You, it means it sensed a threat. We might as well wait patiently and see if it comes to our door.”
Hearing this, Mu An nodded.
Since they were in the light and the opponent was in the dark, it was indeed better to wait for the other party to make the first move.
This wait lasted for nearly a week.
The villagers waiting outside could no longer restrain themselves and eventually brought their newly found sons back to the village.
However, they became much more cautious, forbidding their sons from going outside and always keeping at least one person at home to watch over them.
On the very first day they returned with their sons, Mu An took his master to settle down by the riverbank.
Both of them deliberately concealed their cultivation levels, displaying only the peak of the Foundation Establishment stage, gambling that the entity would be bold enough to target the villagers again.
Yet, everything remained completely peaceful.
Mu An grew tired of sleeping in a tent, and just as he was thinking of changing their strategy, he fell into a dream.
Mu An found himself in the midst of a thick mist.
A vast, white fog enveloped him, and from within it came bursts of silver, bell-like laughter, a very tender voice that sounded like a young child.
Mu An sensed that something was deeply wrong, but he could not leave the place, and he could not even muster a shred of spiritual energy.
“Big brother… Big brother.”
Suddenly, a young girl with her hair tied in small braids appeared before him.
However, she was not wearing ancient clothing, but rather dressed like a modern person.
In his anxiety, he called out to the system in his mind, and the system quickly replied, [This is an illusion formed based on your memories. Do not panic.]
The little girl tilted her head to look at him, “Big brother, I’m so bored. Can you play with me?”
The little girl was exceptionally adorable, so much so that even Mu An, who usually disliked children, felt a strange urge to play with her.
He snapped back to his senses, realizing this might be the work of the illusion, but the little children walking out of the mist were only growing in number. “Big brother, play with us! I’m so bored.”
“Play with us~”
“Big brother, what does it feel like to grow up? Can you tell me?” a little girl suddenly asked.
Instantly, a crowd of children began repeating it like broken records, “What does growing up feel like? What does growing up feel like?”
Mu An tried to push them away, but found himself completely unable to do so. Instead, his mind suddenly began flashing back to the life he had lived after turning eighteen.
He had zero control over his own memories, as if something had forcefully pressed the rewind button on his life’s tape.
His eighteenth-century coming-of-age ceremony, his freshman club life, his post-graduation career in the workplace, his various experiences as an extra.
[Host! Host!] The system called out to Mu An anxiously. When calling yielded no results, it prepared to deliver a forced electric shock to jolt the host awake from his slumber.
Yet just then, a flash of cyan light swept past, and all the children’s souls instantly dissolved into nothingness as Mu An jolted violently awake from his dream.
“An’an!” Holding Mu An’s body, Shen Shengqing wore an expression of intense anxiety.
Mu An couldn’t help panting heavily.
Looking up, he discovered that he wasn’t even inside the tent anymore, but walking right in the river, the water already submerging half his body.
The moonlight was cold and detached, the river water radiated a bone-chilling cold, and as a cold wind blew past, Mu An gave an involuntary shiver.
Looking at the cold, handsome man before him, his memories lagged for a fraction of a second before he asked tentatively, “Shizun?”
Shen Shengqing’s expression was grim. He had originally been sitting cross-legged in meditation when he suddenly saw Mu An get up and walk toward the riverbank with a dazed expression.
Realizing something was guiding Mu An, and thinking of how Mu An had spent all these days trying to catch that entity, he hadn’t stepped in immediately.
It wasn’t until Mu An walked into the river and Shen Shengqing caught spiritual energy fluctuations originating from the riverbed that he instantly severed the connection with his spiritual energy, jolting Mu An awake from the dream.
He looked toward the riverbed and unleashed a violent strike precisely where the spiritual energy had just radiated from.
The earth’s crust trembled instantly, and panicked, chaotic cries rang out from the village.
“Shizun?” Mu An asked in surprise.
“There is something underneath.”
“Could it really be an evil dragon?” Mu An asked, finding it unbelievable.
“No, it is lingering obsession.” Shen Shengqing’s fingers suddenly produced a yellow talisman paper, spiritual energy tracing along the talisman’s veins from his fingertips as a red glow manifested.
His lips brushed together, murmuring something as he swept the talisman toward the center of the riverbed, sending red light scattering in all directions.
Mu An couldn’t help closing his eyes, and when he opened them again, he was startled out of his wits.
Before him stood a dense, tightly packed mass of young girls’ souls, stacked together so thickly they formed a solid barrier.
Drawn by the noise, the villagers who rushed over were also frightened out of their wits, screaming about ghosts as they scrambled backward in retreat.
You think this chapter was thrilling? Wait until you read Goddess Angel, Can You Be a Good Girl and Listen To Me?! Click here to discover the next big twist!
Read : Goddess Angel, Can You Be a Good Girl and Listen To Me?
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