Paintings of Terror

"What will happen, I don't know," Mu Yiran gave him a cold look, "The last person who did something similar suffered a terrible backlash."

"Okay, then it won't be burned." Ke Xun spread his hands, "Then what if I draw a tortoise king and a goatee or something on their faces?"

Mu Yiran looked at him with the eyes of a mentally retarded person: "In the Chinese culture of gods and ghosts, no matter whether they are gods or ghosts, they should not be humiliated."

"Then the gods and ghosts can humiliate people?" Ke Xun was helpless.

After everyone checked, they found nothing exciting. They looked at the sky, and although it was gray and gloomy, they knew that it was already dawn, so they closed the main room door and walked out of the courtyard.

Ke Xun remembered that the old man had confessed last night that he had to meet at his place at eight o'clock this morning, so he called Weidong who had been staying in the yard.

As soon as I got out of the hospital, I saw the owner of the pancake stall sitting on the ground collapsed, with water stains on his face, and he didn't know whether it was sweat or tears.

Weidong finally remembered what Liu Yufei said to him last night, and went over to grab the pancake stall owner: "Stop doing useless things, this place can't get out, wherever you go, you will eventually return to the same place Come on, let's go with everyone, maybe we can find a way to go back today."

The owner of the pancake stand got up in a daze, and followed everyone like a puppet.

Ke Xun asked Wei Dong: "What's the matter with returning to the same place no matter how you run?"

Wei Dong pointed to the depths of the gray fog in the distance: "Liu Yufei said that no matter which direction you run, you will eventually return to the starting point where you started. This is like a painting in front of you, and the people on the painting go Running on the left side of the frame, when running out of the frame, people will appear on the right side of the frame, and then run back to the same place, you understand? Anyway, no matter how you run, you can’t get out of the frame.”

"... so desperate." Ke Xun sighed.

"What did you see in that room?" Wei Dong asked.

Ke Xun briefly explained to him, raised his eyes and saw Mu Yiran walking in front, quickened his pace to catch up, and asked him side by side: "Brother Xiao Mu, tell me, you found it in the mourning hall at that time. what?"

Mu Yiran closed his eyes, Ke Xun could see some helplessness on his ice-cold face, and softened his eyebrows before he knew it, instead of urging him, he just tilted his head and looked at him, waiting quietly. .

Mu Yiran lowered his eyes to look at the face in front of him. The messy short hair made this person look a little lazy and uninhibited, but the pair of eyes under the two beautiful eyebrows were particularly pure and kind. Seriously, black and white are clearly distinguished, and there is a clear light flashing in the blink of an eye.

Just looking at this face, I really can't tell that this person has the attributes of a thick-skinned bastard.

Pursing his lips, Mu Yi suddenly looked away, and said in a low voice: "There is something wrong with the wood of that coffin. The wood used to make coffins is usually made of nanmu, paulownia, pine or mixed cedar and cypress wood. The coffin used here is made of pure cypress wood, unadulterated cypress wood."

"So?" Ke Xun looked at him.

"In the funeral culture in some parts of China, pure willow or pure cypress is not allowed to be used as wood for coffins." Mu Yiran said in a low voice, "According to the old tradition, willows do not produce seeds, so if you use it as a coffin wood, it will lead to extinction .And if you use a pure cypress wooden coffin, you will be beaten by heaven."

"Heaven strike?" Ke Xun raised his eyebrows, "Heaven strikes with lightning?"

Mu Yiran nodded slightly: "It can be said so. Therefore, using pure willow and pure cypress wooden coffins is a kind of funeral taboo. Where there are related customs, it is usually impossible to make such a mistake."

Ke Xun turned his head and glanced at the Li family's house, which was far behind: "But this family committed a taboo, which means..."

"It means it was done on purpose." Mu Yiran also looked back with deep meaning in his eyes, "There is probably only one possibility for this kind of practice, which is to turn a taboo into a curse."

Ke Xun: "...Curse? It's amazing. Why is that?"

Mu Yiran lowered his eyes and seemed to be thinking: "Even if it is a painting, the content must be logical, and if it is a realistic painting, it must be combined with reality. After we enter the painting, we become the characters in the painting." Among them are spirit guards, woodcutters, granary guards, warehouse guards, and grave diggers..."

"There seems to be something missing." Ke Xun looked at the few people walking in front.

Mu Yiran's eyes flickered slightly: "The second protagonist in the funeral ceremony is missing."

"Who?" Ke Xun looked at him.

Mu Yiran shifted his gaze to his face: "The family of the deceased."

Ke Xun came to his senses: "That's right, there were no other characters in the yard last night except us. Wait, are the three dead people the family members of the deceased?"

"No." Mu Yiran pointed at the few people walking in front with his chin, "All of us have the same attire, if they are the family members of the deceased, they should wear filial piety, or even if not, the attire will not be the same. Same. According to the situation of being 'arranged' at the old man's house last night, we should be 'villagers'."

"Then why are the villagers kept on guard?" Ke Xun asked.

"In some villages with a small population, if a family organizes weddings and funerals, the whole village has to help." Mu Yi replied calmly.

Ke Xun asked, "Could it be that brother Xiaomu, you are from a simple peasant brother?"

Mu Yiran looked at him coldly: "Read more."

"I'm from the Department of Physical Education." Ke Xun had no shame on his face, "By the way, can the book teach you how to identify the wood of a coffin?"

Mu Yiran didn't look like he wanted to answer, but he seemed afraid of being pestered by Ke Xun, so he reluctantly said, "I have a friend who is obsessed with woodwork."

This "obsession" is very particular, and usually accompanied by obsession is the crazy Amway - it is estimated that there is no less knowledge about wood by Amway.

"Then why didn't the family of the deceased show up?" Ke Xun returned to the topic, "The deceased was cursed in a cypress coffin, and the family didn't say anything? Who made the coffin for the deceased?"

Mu Yiran said quietly: "If you find the answers to these questions, you will probably be able to leave here."

During the conversation, I arrived at the old man's house last night. After entering the door, I saw steamed buns, rice porridge and bowls and chopsticks on the table. The old man's lifeless eyes swept over everyone: "Everyone worked hard last night, let's have breakfast first. During the day There is no work to do, everyone can rest and come to me when it gets dark, and I will arrange work for you tonight."

After speaking, the old man turned around and entered the back room.

Ke Xun was thinking about whether the food on the table might be poisonous, but he saw two or three people had already walked over and sat down to eat. Ke Xun looked at Mu Yiran and saw that his face was a little gloomy, but he also walked towards the table , I served myself a bowl of porridge.

"Are you all right?" Ke Xun sat next to him, watching him scoop up a spoonful of porridge and put it into his mouth with graceful movements.

Liu Yufei next to him said sarcastically: "Eat it with confidence, if the food is poisonous, there is no need to make so many mysterious things to toss us, just throw it in the house and starve for a month, no one will survive."

Ke Xun still looked at Mu Yiran: "Then what's the matter with your face? Is there shit in the porridge?"

Mu Yiran gave him a cold look: "If you want to die in a second, I will fulfill you."

Ke Xun immediately remembered the situation when he was pinned to the ground by this man last night and had no power to resist, so he said to him: "Don't make trouble, eat quickly."

He stretched out his hand to grab two buns, and handed one to Big Brother Mu, but Big Brother Mu ignored him, and Wei Dong stretched out his hand to snatch it.

Next to him, Liu Yufei was stirring the watery rice porridge in the bowl with a spoon in disgust, while continuing to talk to Ke Xun: "His face is ugly, I guess it's because the two grave diggers are dead."

Ke Xun paused, counted the heads in the room, and found that the two who went to dig the grave yesterday were indeed missing: "How do you know those two are dead?"

"Because the old man let us have dinner without waiting for those two to come back," Liu Yufei pointed to the back room. "If those two were still alive, the old man would have waited for everyone to come back before saying what he just said."

"Crap." Wei Dong cursed in a low voice, "We folded five of them in one night. With this efficiency, how many can we have left after today?"

No one answered his words, they just ate in silence. Some people looked numb, some seemed to be thinking, and some were lost.

The taste of this meal is really indescribable, the porridge is cold, the buns are hard, white hairs are hanging on a few pickle sticks, the stuffing of the buns is unknown, it tastes like grass, and it smells like horse manure Son.

But no matter how unpalatable it is, I still have to eat it, otherwise I don't know how long my physical strength can last.

The unpalatable meal was over soon, Mu Yiran stood up and walked out.

Ke Xun pulled Wei Dong to follow: "Where are you going?"

"Go outside and look for clues." Mu Yiran replied in a deep voice.

"Can you walk around? Are you not afraid of meeting anything?" Wei Dong asked.

"According to the content reflected in the painting, it should be fine during the day," Mu Yiran said, "Besides, the old man didn't mention not being allowed to go outside in his speech just now, so it should be fine."

"We'll go with you." Ke Xun decided to hold the big brother's thigh tightly and not relax.

Mu Yiran ignored him, stepped out of the yard with his long legs, and headed straight to the north of the village.

The north of the village is a wasteland, and the place farther away is still boundless and chaotic.

In the sky above the wasteland, some jackdaws screamed shrilly. After circling a few times, they landed beside a mound.

Ke Xun Weidong strode over with Mu Yiran, but saw two corpses beside the mound.

Wei Dong yelled, sat down on the ground with his buttocks, and then backed up seven or eight meters in a row with his hips and hands on the ground before stopping, pointing at the corpse and trembling.

"Close your eyes and step aside." Ke Xun stood in front of him. He didn't want to see the death of the two corpses at first, but Mu Yiran walked up to him, lowered his head and looked at the corpses carefully. After checking, I endured the discomfort and glanced at the corpse.

This look almost spit out on the spot.