Chapter 392: The Qilin Bearing Everything (3)

The atmosphere turned very eerie all of a sudden. As I looked at Huo Xiuxiu, I felt as if I was facing a little fox.

Indeed, the moment she said it, I immediately knew exactly what kind of scene she was describing, and I understood she wasn't just bluffing. In fact, I believed she might actually have some information I didn't know. But under her gaze, I had an illusion that the real topic wasn't these things.

Huo Ling and the others crawling on the ground should be the same as what I saw in that tape. It seemed Old Mrs. Huo also had videotapes from Golmud. How did this happen?

After a tense standoff, I suddenly felt a bit embarrassed. Here were three grown men—me, Fatty, and Poker-face—and a young girl had come to exchange information with us, yet we were still hesitating. Look at her guts and spirit! Compared to her, we three seemed petty and uptight. At this point, either we refuse and act cool, or we agree quickly. Hesitating was just embarrassing.

So I sighed and nodded. "Alright, I trust you. But actually, I've already told most of the stuff to your grandmother. All that's left are details. You might be disappointed."

Huo Xiuxiu gave a little cheer. "No worries, honestly, we're lucky to have any intel to exchange in this whole mess, right?"

I nodded, and she said, "When I came, I already thought about what you just said. The whole thing is very complicated. We could start from the beginning and compare notes, but our info overlaps in a weird way, so maybe we should start from something specific." She glanced at Poker-face. "Why not start with him? I'll tell you what I know about him, and you tell me about that ancient tomb on the snow mountain you mentioned."

Fatty and I exchanged a look. Fatty cleared his throat. "I'm down with that. So, you go first?"

She looked at me. "Are you guys men or not? Always trying to get one over on me."

Fatty was about to argue, but I stopped him. I figured it didn't matter anyway, so I said I'd go first. Then, from beginning to end, I told her everything about the Cloud Summit Palace in detail.

I was extremely thorough because I'd already given a rough version to the old lady earlier, so being brief would've been a waste of time. It took me about half an hour to finish. She didn't interrupt at all, listening intently. Maybe because I had a beautiful audience, I got really into it. Even Fatty gave me a thumbs-up, saying I had a talent for storytelling.

After I finished, she sat motionless for a long time, as if lost in thought. Fatty called her name twice before she snapped out of it. She let out a breath and looked at Poker-face. "This big bro is so impressive, no wonder my grandmother had to kneel to him. I thought we lost face kneeling today, but now I feel it was deserved."

"So, any insights?" Fatty asked her. She shook her head. "My head's a bit messy. I'm connecting some dots, but it'll take a while. Maybe I'll have a conclusion later."

Fatty looked at me and laughed. "You sound just like her—female version of Innocent."

"Your turn," I reminded her.

She steadied herself and took a breath. "Okay, let me think how to say this." She paused, lost in thought. "It has to start with a nightmare."

"A nightmare?" Fatty smirked. She said, "Actually, it should be called my grandmother's dream."

Then Huo Xiuxiu began to tell her story.

At first, I was smug because she'd been so focused on my story. But after she started hers, I had almost the same reaction—I was shocked. Her experiences were just as complex as mine, if not more. And with her female perspective, I felt she might even be closer to the truth than I was.

Indeed, it all started with a dream, but the content of the dream itself wasn't that important, because even now she didn't know what that dream was about. What interested her was that whenever her grandmother had this nightmare, she would always mutter one thing in her sleep.

About six or seven years ago, Huo Xiuxiu was still a young girl. In her own words, even wearing a miniskirt, nobody would turn to look at her. She was Old Mrs. Huo's favorite grandchild. Every summer, she would escape the furnace of Changsha to cool off in Beijing. Back then, Old Mrs. Huo would take her shopping, visit Houhai and the Summer Palace, or drive to Wanping Ancient City for street food.

But no matter how close they were, Old Mrs. Huo had one habit—she had to sleep alone at night. No matter where they stayed, the little girl couldn't share a bed with her grandmother.

At that time, the old lady lived in a siheyuan, with a bedroom so big twenty people could sleep. As the little girl grew older and more curious, she found this odd—why was her grandmother so close yet so distant? But she never dared to ask. At night, she slept in the same room as the nanny.

One night, she woke up to find the nanny wasn't there. In that ancient house, with darkness outside and moonlight casting eerie shadows, the room seemed vast. With a child's vivid imagination, she was terrified and turned pale.

She called out a few times, but the nanny didn't answer. She started trembling. Thinking of her grandmother, she jumped out of bed and ran to her grandmother's room, wanting to hide in her arms.

But when she lifted the curtain of the old-style bed, she found it empty. She froze, then broke out in a cold sweat. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw something hanging from the frame above the bed.

Looking up, she saw the most terrifying scene of her life. Her grandmother was hanging upside down from the bed frame in a bizarre pose, eyes rolled back, hair disheveled, apparently fast asleep.

She was so scared she wet herself, sitting on the floor almost fainting. She didn't know how long passed before she heard her grandmother speak.

At first, she thought her grandmother was calling her, but upon listening more closely, she realized it was just sleep talk.

What her grandmother said was: "There's no time left."