Well of Mystery

Tao Chuan seems to be a person with road rage syndrome, usually taciturn, he will become quite agitated once he holds the steering wheel.Although I still don't talk much, driving a car seems to be at the speed of life and death. I only step on the accelerator and not on the brakes.Jiang Chenglu was already anxious enough, but he couldn't help but break out in a cold sweat for Tao Chuan. At any rate, there were few people on the road and the place was remote, so he arrived safely without any accidents.

The funeral home in this city has been completed for at least 60 or [-] years. There is an inconspicuous metal sign beside the electric gate. Inside the gate are large lawns and flower beds. Chinese decoration can be seen faintly in the distance. It is a huge building with the same style, and people who don't know it will think it is a park, and they can't think of a funeral parlor at all.

Tao Chuan parked his car on the side of the road, got down with Jiang Chenglu and walked through the deserted street, and saw a small flashlight in the reception room of the funeral parlor waving at them.

In the middle of the night, of course, it would not be an ordinary person who could guard the door of the funeral parlor.

Tao Chuan waved his hand at the flashlight, proving that they were all his own.Then the electric iron door was opened with a small gap, signaling for them to walk in through the gap.

Jiang Chenglu couldn't wait to lift his foot and stepped in. The moment he landed, the surrounding scenery changed dramatically.

The night is still the same night, everything is silent, and no sound can be heard.But the electric gate and the funeral home reception room beside him disappeared without a trace.Instead, there is a huge wooden archway with carved beams and painted buildings, and four characters are engraved on the plaque: "Huangquan Fudi".

A little further ahead, the grass flower beds of the funeral parlor and the farewell hall for the remains disappeared. There was only a large piece of desolate grassland, and the boundless old grass swayed slightly with the wind.

There is only one rammed earth road in the middle of the grassland, and there are more and more archways standing on the road.

Those wooden, stone, and even metal archways are connected to each other one by one, like the skeleton of a silent dragon, running through the road connecting life and death on the grassland.

Jiang Chenglu turned sideways.A translucent figure flashed past him.

It was an old man, not Bai Xiuqi.

"Go further." Tao Chuan reminded him: "The gate of hell is still ahead."

So they moved forward along the path guided by the archway.

Due to the adjustment of the "increased death population policy" in the underworld, every city has built its own ghost gate in the past hundred years, and the souls who report to the underworld after death have been effectively diverted.Along the way, they met two or three souls who were going to the underworld, but none of them were Bai Xiuqi.

He didn't know how far he had gone, but the road ahead was finally blocked by a huge vermilion wooden door.

This is the real gate of hell.

On both sides of the vermilion lacquered gate, there was a grand master's chair, and between the chairs was a table with some forms, paper and pens piled up on the table.

All these tables and chairs almost blocked all the way out of the ghost gate, leaving only a gap where only one person can pass through where the two gates closed. It seems that the "business" here is not very prosperous after the diversion.

There are two people sitting on the grand master chairs on both sides of the ghost gate.They are all dressed as office workers in the financial industry with shirts, ties and trousers.But both of them are lazy.One is reading a book, and the other is holding a mobile phone horizontally, obviously playing games.

Hearing the footsteps of someone approaching, the player who played the game pointed to the wooden door beside him without raising his head: "Fill in the form before entering the door. The sample form is posted on the door. If you feel that you look too miserable and want to recover, you can buy it." Furong Dan, one note is [-] yuan. Guiyuan Dan, who wants to rejuvenate himself, has a note of [-] yuan. There is still a long way to go after entering the door, and he has to buy a paper horse for transportation for [-] yuan!"

"We're looking for someone." Jiang Chenglu walked up to him: "Look for someone named Bai Xiuqi."

As soon as he spoke, the two gatekeepers on the left and right raised their heads in unison.

It was the one who was playing with the mobile phone who spoke first: "What are you doing? Our ghost world and your demon world have always been in harmony with each other, and it is not the way of hell when a goblin dies. What do you two want to do here?"

"Show me your life and death book." Jiang Chenglu said more bluntly: "We want to check the whereabouts of a person."

"Just kidding! Where is the book of life and death that you can check if you want? What do you think of our Great Underworld?" The ghost guard did not give in, and stood up suddenly: "Don't think I will be afraid of you, You have entered the underworld. Even if you are the emperor, I have to bow down obediently!"

"..."

The communication was ineffective. If it was any other time, Jiang Chenglu would have already started weaving some rhetoric to get away with it. However, as the so-called concern is chaos, now he just wants to cut the mess quickly.

Fortunately, Tao Chuan on the other side saw that trouble was coming again, so he grabbed Jiang Chenglu's arm and hinted him to keep calm.And the ghost messenger reading a book on the opposite side also patted his colleague on the shoulder.Signal him to be calm.

"A Niu, don't be in a hurry. I recognize these two, and they are not here to find fault."

After speaking, he nodded towards Tao Chuan and Jiang Chenglu again: "This afternoon, there was thunder and lightning in the city, and heavy rain and hail poured down. Is it related to the two coming here late at night?"

Jiang Chenglu was not the kind of person who would shirk responsibility at will. He nodded immediately: "The hailstorm was caused by me. If someone is injured or even dies because of it, I will definitely take responsibility."

The ghost officer smiled and nodded, then looked down at the book page in his hand: "Then Ma can tell you some good news. It is recorded in the book of life and death that no one died today due to hail or heavy rain."

It turned out that the book in his hand was the Book of Life and Death!Jiang Chenglu was overjoyed in his heart, and hurriedly asked: "Can you help me to take a look..."

"It's not a problem to see." The ghost guard surnamed Ma interrupted him with a smile: "But you must know. The underworld has its rules, and we can turn a blind eye to matters outside the gate of hell, but Once the soul enters the gate of hell, it is the internal affairs of the underworld, even if the person you are looking for has indeed entered the underworld, it will not be so easy to find it back."

"Yes! Don't think that our ghost messengers are easy to bully!" A Niu chimed in.

Whether you want to bully or not, this is not up to you to decide - Jiang Chenglu thought secretly in his heart, but he calmed down on the surface: "I understand what you mean, but no matter what, please help to check. Even if I Someone Jiang owes the two of you a favor, and he will definitely repay it in the future."

Ma Guicha responded with a smile, "It's easy to say", and lowered his head to rummage through the books in his hand.After a while he looked up again, and gave an unexpected answer very confidently.

"Today, 110 and seven people died in this city. There is no one whose surname is Bai and whose name is Xiuqi. Naturally, there is no record of this person reporting to Guimenguan."

"But, how come..."

Now even Jiang Chenglu was stunned.He still remembers the terrifying feeling of Bai Xiuqi's head in his arms until now.There are even bloodstains belonging to Bai Xiuqi on his clothes, why is there no such person in the book of life and death now?

Ma Guichai said that the names in the book of life and death are all arranged in chronological order of human death, with a concise cause of death marked on the side.After the souls leave the body, they will wander in the wild for a short time, and report to the ghost gate within a few minutes to a few days. At this time, the job of the ghost messenger is to match the ghosts with the list in the book of life and death. .

In other words, if a name is not written in the book of life and death at the moment of his death, it proves that he is not really dead.

"Not dead, Xiaobai is not dead..."

Jiang Chenglu muttered to himself, unable to tell what it was like in his heart.

On the plus side, this proves that there is indeed a chance to retrieve Bai Xiuqi's soul and resurrect it.But on the other hand, the life and death book in the hands of the ghost guard is only the past and the list of people who died at this moment, which does not mean whether Bai Xiuqi's soul will be caught by that murderous monster in the future and truly destroyed.

There's still time...but hurry!

Thinking of this, Jiang Chenglu thanked the horse ghost, but then asked again: "Just now you said that you can turn a blind eye to things outside this ghost gate, so is it true that you only need the soul?" Before entering the gate of hell, it's none of your business to be taken away halfway?"

Ma Guicha didn't nod or shake his head, he just put his finger on his lips and made a gesture of "whispering".

On the contrary, the fast-talking Niu Guichai muttered: "Catching wandering ghosts is the job of Ah Hei and Ah Bai in the next door department. The ghosts caught by them will also be thrown to this Huangquan road, but they themselves rarely Appear here."

Just right.

Jiang Chenglu nodded, turned around and lowered his head, and said to Tao Chuan, "Let Boss Shang bring some paper figures over here and guard them on this Huangquan Road. If Xiaobai is found, first detain them and then notify us." come over."

Tao Chuan nodded, and was thinking about the weird problem of whether he would get a signal when he called Shang Douxing in Hutianli on Huangquan Road, when he suddenly heard a burst of mournful cries approaching on Huangquan Road behind him.

"I died so badly...how did it become like this...I'm still young, and I still want to enjoy my life...I died so badly, so badly, so badly..."

Jiangcheng Road was the first to recognize the owner of the voice. He frowned, turned around and ran towards the direction of the cry, grabbed the ghost by the neck with one hand, and threw him four or five meters away with a little force. on the pillars of the archway.

"Ouch, it hurts so much!!" The ghost yelled like a pig butcher: "You, why are you beating someone! It's...it's you, Jiang, Jiangcheng Road!"

At this point, the ghost—the real Li Kun, howled suddenly, knelt down and hugged Jiang Chenglu's thigh tightly.

"Ah Jiang, help me, help me, A Jiang! I was killed for some reason!"