Chapter 4: Doors and Sickness

After discussion, the four agreed that they should wait a little longer in the ancestral hall. If there were other living people in He Family Village who knew about the existence of "taboos," then they would definitely come to the ancestral hall to flip through the almanac and check the day's fortune.

It was unknown what happened tonight; every household in He Family Village closed their doors and windows, and not a single family came out to the ancestral hall to check the day's fortune.

This matter was very abnormal, and abnormal meant bizarre.

"Do you have any clues?" Zhang Yangxu asked while waiting.

"No." Ning Zhe shook his head: "The He family people come to the ancestral hall to flip through the almanac at midnight every night, but they didn't come today. Either they no longer care about seeking good fortune and avoiding disaster, or they have other ways to know today's fortune. Or it's... there is some kind of danger in the ancestral hall today that makes them afraid to come."

"Oh?" Zhang Yangxu was a bit curious: "Is that so?"

"I don't know, just a guess." Ning Zhe spread his hands.

"Dan... danger?" Upon hearing that there might be danger in the ancestral hall, Feng Yushu's entire face turned pale. She was already a Buddhist, and after seeing the bizarre nature of the Serpent God in He Family Village with her own eyes, she was even more trembling, doing everything like walking on thin ice.

Feng Yushu looked at the spirit tablets of the deceased and the Serpent God statue on the lotus pedestal with lingering fear, then looked at Ning Zhe with a pleading gaze, suggesting: "Otherwise, let's go out first and wait outside the ancestral hall... Staying in front of the Serpent God without leaving, would it be a bit offensive?"

"I think so too." Ning Zhe agreed, shifting his gaze to Zhang Yangxu and Xie Sining: "What do you think?"

"It makes sense. A place like an ancestral hall is not something outsiders should enter, let alone stay here for a long time." Xie Sining also felt this way: "Mr. Zhang, shall we go out?"

Zhang Yangxu looked at Ning Zhe silently and nodded: "Let's go."

The four left the lotus pedestal where the Serpent God was worshipped from the main entrance and waited under the eaves outside the ancestral hall's main entrance.

There was nothing to talk about among a few strangers. Xie Sining suggested that everyone could exchange the process of being dragged into He Family Village, perhaps they could find some common points, or clues to leave here.

Feng Yushu said first: "Yesterday... it should be the day before yesterday. My husband, daughter, and I stayed in a hotel in Gubei Town. Because he has the habit of working alone at night, we opened three rooms, one for him, one for me, and one for my daughter."

"At about 7:00 PM, I made some coffee and prepared to send it to my husband's room... But after opening his door and stepping over the threshold, what appeared in front of me wasn't a hotel room, but a narrow alley paved with bluestone."

Feng Yushu said with lingering fear: "At that time, the stainless steel door handle I was holding turned into an old brass door latch, and behind me was a low-rise civilian house with stone walls and tile roofs. The house was empty... as if I had just walked out of this door."

Zhang Yangxu nodded slightly: "My situation was about the same. At that time, my car was parked at a gas station outside Gubei Town, and the driver went to the bathroom. I asked Sining to help me buy a pack of cigarettes, but she didn't come back for a long time, and she didn't reply to messages, so I had to open the car door to find her. The moment I opened the car door and got out, I came here."

Xie Sining continued: "I bought the cigarettes Mr. Zhang wanted at the gas station's small shop, but after pushing open the door and leaving the shop, the ground under my feet was no longer the concrete road of the gas station, but the stone slabs paved on the streets of He Family Village."

"I'm more direct." Ning Zhe nodded: "I returned to my hometown, pushed open the door of the old family home, and then I arrived here."

Zhang Yangxu's eyes narrowed slightly, lost in thought.

Was it a coincidence? Or inevitable? Whether it was the door of the old house, the hotel room door, the glass door of the department store... or even the car door, although the process of the four people coming to He Family Village was different, they were all related to "doors." Ning Zhe's expression remained calm, thinking to himself: "It's a pity that Lin Zhiyuan is already dead, otherwise I could ask how he got in here, was it also through a door?" Suddenly, a corner of a black shadow appeared at the edge of Ning Zhe's field of vision, disappearing in a flash.

"There is someone in the alley opposite, he is going to run." Ning Zhe took out his phone without hesitation, turned on the flashlight, and pointed the light source at a small alley across the street.

The illumination distance of the phone's built-in flashlight wasn't far. Ning Zhe did this just to transmit the coordinate information of that black shadow to others in the most direct and fast way. Describing it in words was too inefficient and easy to distort.

But strangely, the black figure that was still trying to run away just now stopped walking after seeing the flashlight Ning Zhe turned on.

That person walked two steps toward this side, and then, a point of white light lit up from his hand; it was also a flashlight.

"Great, it's a living person." Feng Yushu breathed a sigh of relief instantly; her heart had almost jumped out of her chest just now.

After getting closer, it was discovered that there wasn't just one person in the alley across the street, but two. A man and a woman, two young people, looking like they weren't very old, seemingly still university students.

"Hello everyone, my name is Gu Yunqing." The young man introduced himself first, then introduced the young woman beside him: "This is my senior, we are both students at Qinzhou Medical University."

"My name is Ye Miaozhu." Gu Yunqing's senior introduced herself: "Were you also accidentally dragged into this place?"

Ning Zhe nodded.

After some exchange, everyone exchanged information about each other and the identity documents they could prove. Gu Yunqing and Ye Miaozhu both showed their internship certificates.

Gu Yunqing and Ye Miaozhu were both intern doctors. Qinzhou Medical University had always had a tradition of letting students go to the countryside to small clinics in remote places for internships to accumulate experience, similar to teaching support, and their internship location was the designated medical point in Gubei Town.

Like Ning Zhe and the other four, Gu Yunqing and Ye Miaozhu arrived here after pushing open the doors of the clinic and pharmacy, respectively.

"Sure enough, it's related to doors." Ning Zhe's guess in his heart became more certain: "If we all entered He Family Village through 'doors,' does this mean that somewhere in this village, there is also a 'door' hidden that can let us leave this bizarre world and return to reality?"

"Not sure, but it's possible." Zhang Yangxu acknowledged his guess.

Zhang Yangxu asked Ye Miaozhu again: "You should know about the existence of fortune and taboos, but why didn't you enter the ancestral hall to flip through the almanac, but hid in the alley across the street?"

Ye Miaozhu shook her head: "We didn't dare to go in."

Gu Yunqing also said: "The He family people usually come to the ancestral hall on time every day to flip through the almanac and check the fortune, but none of them came today. Do you know why this is?"

"Why?" Feng Yushu asked hurriedly.

Gu Yunqing took a deep breath and said: "I also overheard two very old villagers chatting... saying that the Serpent God is sick, and today is the day of His illness."

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 5 =====