When the magic stick summons cute pets

phantom?

Ye Changsheng stood where he was, and the Yin fish in his eyes swam slowly. He frowned, and his face was a little dignified: What is the reason for the phantom here?

He and the old couple just met once. If it is said that the illusion was mirrored from his own memory and mapped to reality, then the first thing he saw was He Jiuzhong, right?

When he thought of this, he suddenly had another meal.

He raised his head and glanced at the thick fog that kept surging around him, then looked at the bright "59:[-]" on the phone, took a breath, and put the phone in his hand and put it in his pocket.

No, although the old couple just now was just an illusion, why does he think he is in reality now?

Ye Changsheng turned around and sat back on the platform around the hot spring again. Looking down at the rounded Yuhua stone paved with an unknown pattern on the ground, he gathered himself and tried to sort out his confused thoughts.

First of all, no matter whether he is in reality or fantasy, this musical fountain may be the center of this place for him now.

He wakes up from here, and when he looks for other paths, he will return here after all.He has tried it a few times, and maybe he can try it a few more times later when he regains a little strength to see if he can get any different results.

And what about everyone else besides him?

Ye Changsheng tilted his head slightly, and took a look in the direction where the old couple left just now: it's not for nothing that he can see their phantom in this kind of place.

Although he didn't meet anyone else during the few trips just now, the accident he experienced before was too weird after all, and the place where he fell now is really unusual.He made reasonable calculations. Maybe the tourists in the same car just fell somewhere nearby, and they were caught in a similar "ghost hit the wall" situation and couldn't get out?

When Ye Changsheng's train of thought came here, he was suddenly interrupted by a mournful cry from his stomach.He was slightly startled at first, then he lowered his head and touched his empty stomach, sighed a long time, and suddenly felt a little miserable.

His backpack full of food reserves had been completely reduced to ashes in the explosion that accompanied the minibus earlier.

Although his time seemed to be completely stopped in this weird thick fog, the consumption of physical strength and fat from his body obviously did not stop accordingly.

Ye Changsheng thought back to the fried rice that he had eaten half in the hot spring hotel this morning and then threw it away, and he suddenly felt regretful.

If he had known that such a thing would happen, he would not have wasted food like this.real.

——It's all because He Jiuzhong's extravagant style led him, who has always been frugal and simple, to ruin.

If it's broken, it's broken, right now, why don't you take responsibility and stay by his side, and even dare to lose contact casually?

Ye Changsheng felt that this was too much. After thinking about it, he couldn't help but jumped off the stage excitedly.

After reaching into his pocket for a long time, he found a flat, round iron box.He lifted the lid of the iron box, looked at the cinnabar inside, and secretly thanked himself for a while that he didn't put this thing in his backpack during the day. I made a mark on the location, looked up at the sky again, and then changed a road and continued to walk forward.

This time the time spent on the road was longer than before.

Through calculation, Ye Changsheng carefully moved his steps and deviated from the original route.He looked down at the lines on the stone slab on the ground, and then changed his direction little by little according to those lines.

Every ten steps, he squatted down and made a small mark on the ground with cinnabar.He didn't know how long it took to stop and go, and then in the thick fog of nothingness, he finally vaguely saw a slightly different building.

Ye Changsheng was startled for a moment, then suppressed the joy rising in his heart and immediately moved towards the building.

It was a wooden hut, about two or three stories high.It was clearly still daytime outside, but there was a warm yellow light leaking from the inside of the room. Standing close to the window sill, I could faintly hear voices coming from inside.

He breathed a sigh of relief, turned to the door of the hut, reached out and knocked on the door.

The conversation inside seemed to have stopped, followed by the sound of chairs being dragged on the ground, and then, a burst of footsteps came, followed by "squeak—" a tooth-piercing sound The door opened.

Ye Changsheng subconsciously raised his head and looked into the room, but before he could see anything clearly, he saw a flash of white light, his eyes suddenly went dark, he fell down, and lost consciousness in an instant.

When he woke up from the coma with difficulty, before he opened his eyes, he knew that he was sent back to the old place just by listening to the bursts of cheerful music passing into his ears.

Struggling to sit up from the ground, he glanced at the time again.It was still eleven fifty-nine.

He sighed, realizing that his work had been wasted again.Subconsciously touched his neck again, and then his eyes sank suddenly: his blood jade is gone!

In an instant, his thoughts that had just been sorted out suddenly became confused again: when did he lose his jade?just?Or in a car accident?He has never found out?

But why?

Will he come back here countless times, is it because his time is frozen here?In other words, should he stay near this musical fountain at 59:[-]?

Ye Changsheng thought of the hut that obviously had people there before, and he became a little bit more energetic.Anyway, at least he knew now that he wasn't alone in this damn place.

As far as this one is concerned, for Ye Changsheng, who no longer knows how long he has been groping alone in the dense fog, it is enough news to make him happy.

Then, the most urgent task now is to figure out how to undo this strange time-freezing spell on him.

Ye Changsheng lay down on his back, looked up at the sky covered by layers of dense fog: But, how to relieve it?

Just when he was deep in thought, suddenly there was another rush of footsteps around him. Ye Changsheng sat up and turned his head slightly to look over there, only to see a middle-aged man covered in blood stumbling towards him. ran over in the direction.

"Help...help...I don't want to die!"

The man stumbled and ran towards Ye Changsheng: "I don't want to die, save me, save me!"

Ye Changsheng was taken aback, as if he was a little surprised that this man was taking the initiative to talk to him, but before he could respond, he saw that the man's body exploded all of a sudden close at hand.

His flesh and blood splashed in all directions, quickly dyeing the surrounding mist into a foul-smelling crimson.

Although Ye Changsheng was used to seeing people die in various ways because of his yin and yang eyes, but it was the first time that he exploded in front of him so shockingly.

He stared blankly at the pile of carrion in front of his eyes, but he hadn't fully recovered from his senses. After a while, he heard the low voices of several people talking behind him.

This time there were more people, it sounded like there were four or five people.Ye Changsheng turned around and saw a group of figures coming through the thick fog, and when their eyes collided with him, all the previous voices stopped.

"Oh my God... you're still alive!"

It was the old couple who spoke first. They obviously recognized Ye Changsheng. They walked up to him and looked at him with concern. You can't receive the signal, are you frightened to be here alone?"

Ye Changsheng properly hid his scrutinizing eyes, and glanced at the place where the puddle of flesh was left by the previous man's self-explosion—sure enough, it seemed as if nothing had happened at this moment, bloody The smell is completely gone, and the ground is also clean. It is completely invisible that a person died tragically here about 1 minute ago.

He glanced at the old couple who seemed to be in good spirits before him, then looked at the other three passengers who looked familiar, and nodded with his lips pursed, "I was the only one here when I woke up... ...have you seen my companions?"

The old couple and the other three looked at each other, then shook their heads. The old gentleman explained to him: "No, we just woke up from a coma, and we met you after walking for a long time."

Ye Changsheng nodded, because he already knew the result in his heart, so he was not particularly disappointed.

"Don't worry too much. The fog here is really too thick. When the fog here clears up, maybe we can help you find the man who was with you again."

Probably because she was afraid that Ye Changsheng would feel uncomfortable, another girl who looked like a student looked at him and immediately tried to persuade him.

Ye Changsheng forced a smile, nodded his head, but didn't say much.

"However, it's not a solution to hang around all the time outside. Otherwise, let's find a place to rest for a while? We see that everyone is a little tired."

The other man in a suit looked much calmer. After he finished speaking, he glanced at Ye Changsheng again: "What do you think?"

Naturally, Ye Changsheng had no objection. He nodded, followed behind the five-person team, and then took out his phone to check the time when everyone was not paying attention.

Nine fifty-five.

His pupils narrowed almost imperceptibly: time went back two hours.

Almost subconsciously, he hurriedly turned his head to look at the mark he had made by the fountain platform: the place was as clean as new, the water in the fountain was splashing everywhere, and the cheerful singing was still melodious.

Ye Changsheng looked there deeply for a while, then withdrew his gaze, and followed the crowd to continue walking.

In the dense fog, everyone walked cautiously, and their speed was not fast.As time passed bit by bit, the surrounding fog seemed to gradually dissipate, and they were able to vaguely see things around them as they walked on the street.

Uncharacteristically, Ye Changsheng remained silent all the way. He raised his head slightly, taking in all the barely visible surroundings.

Apart from the five of them, there seemed to be nothing else on the extremely wide street. There were houses and shops around, but when they knocked on the door, they didn't get a response all the way.

Ye Changsheng looked around, and when everyone was a little discouraged, he seemed to see something suddenly, said "wait" to the others, then crossed the street, and suddenly looked towards a wooden building that looked familiar. The three-story hut walked past.

The remaining five people didn't know what he was going to do, they just watched him go straight to the side of the road, looked at each other for a while, and then followed hesitantly.

Ye Changsheng stood in front of the wooden house and looked up for a while, then collected himself, reached out and knocked on the door and asked, "Is anyone there?"

There was no immediate response from inside, but Ye Changsheng didn't give up either, he just stood in front of the door and continued to knock.After a while, there was finally a slight sound of footsteps inside, and someone opened the door from inside. Ye Changsheng lowered his head, facing a small face looking up.

It was a girl about seven or eight years old. Her skin was translucent pink and white, and her slightly brown hair with a little natural curl set off her delicate face, making her look like a cute doll.

Ye Changsheng recognized at a glance that this was the little girl who was accompanied by the young man who got into the car last morning.Something vaguely flashed through his mind, but before he could carefully capture the sudden thought, he heard a warm voice in the room suddenly coming from the stairs on the second floor.

"Ninny, who's here?"

The little girl blinked and looked at Ye Changsheng, without saying a word, turned around and ran up the stairs, reached out and pinched the corner of the man's clothes, looking timid, as if she was a little afraid of people.

The man watched the little girl's movements, smiled slightly, stretched out his hand to touch her head, said softly "Go", then let the other end go upstairs, and he walked along the stairs to the front of the door come over.

His eyes fixed on Ye Changsheng for a moment, a gleam of light flashed just right on his face, then he raised the corners of his lips, stepped forward a few steps, swept the people outside the door, and said, "So everyone is still here!" Good. Great, my daughter and I woke up and found no one else around and panicked, now seeing you all feels more at ease.

Come in quickly, it looks like you are all very tired, there is no one else in this room except us, come in first and rest for a while. "

Everyone outside the house showed a trace of joy on their faces when they heard the words.In addition to the fact that they were physically exhausted after walking for too long, the panic and pressure that had been pressing on their hearts also made them feel double tired.

After thanking the young man in the room, everyone hurried into the room with Ye Changsheng.

The room seemed bigger than Ye Changsheng from the outside, even though a group of them were crowded in the living room on the first floor, the surrounding space didn't seem cramped.

The young man closed the door, then turned around and introduced himself with a slight smile: "Although it may be a bit late to introduce myself, after all, we still need to get along with each other for a while——Shen Wei, a businessman. The one upstairs It's my daughter Shen Nannan."

Ye Changsheng looked at his pale amber eyes filled with a kind smile, and after a while, he bent his lips and smiled, stretched out his hand to shake the eyes: "Ye Changsheng."

Shen Wei looked back at Ye Changsheng, smiled softly and praised: "Your name is very special."

Ye Changsheng nodded without humility, and said in a brisk voice: "Many people say that."

Shen Wei smiled again, and then looked at the others.Everyone then exchanged names, and after a brief self-introduction, the man in the suit first asked Shen Wei: "Mr. Shen, have you been in this room since you woke up?"

Shen Wei walked to the sofa in the living room and sat down, nodded and said: "My daughter and I both woke up in this room. After waking up, I also thought about going out to look for other survivors , but the fog outside is really too big, I don't feel at ease taking my daughter out together, and I am also not at ease leaving her in the house alone, so I just delayed it like this."

The man nodded, agreeing with this statement, then turned his head to look at Ye Changsheng and asked again: "Before we accidentally fell off the cliff, Mr. Ye, you once said that the driver can no longer drive the car when an accident occurs, and asked us to Get out of the car right now... Now that this is the case, can I ask what happened at that time?"

Ye Changsheng thought about it for a while, and felt that the current situation was already weird enough, so there was no need to hide what happened before, so he simply explained to the other side: "When I went to check in the driver's seat, I drove The driver is dead."

Although everyone had already vaguely guessed something about this matter, but now hearing Ye Changsheng say it clearly, they still couldn't help but shudder.

The girl who was the first to comfort Ye Changsheng on the road now heard his words, but she seemed to be unable to bear it and sobbed in a low voice: "What's going on? We're just here for a trip. This happened so well?" He looked up at Ye Changsheng again, and said helplessly, "Are we finished? This place is too strange, can we not get out?"

Ye Changsheng also had various conjectures flashing through his heart, but everyone is already panicking enough at this moment, there is really no need to let the fear continue to pile up, he can only comfort her with a smile: "The sky is endless. We fell off the cliff unscathed, and now we have found a temporary place to stay, so we don’t have to sleep on the streets tonight. Isn’t this a very lucky thing?”

The girl was still frowning after hearing what Ye Changsheng said.But in the current situation, she also understood that it wasn't when she was crying, so she responded to the other side and managed to control her emotions.

A short, fat, bald man who has been the most silent among the few people has been sitting in a corner since he entered the room, listening to them talking to each other. After a while, he raised his eyes and looked in Shen Wei's direction, whispering He opened his mouth and asked, "Is there food in this room?"

Shen Wei looked at him, smiled and nodded, "Although there is no electricity in the room and there is nothing in the refrigerator, there seems to be some dry bread in the cabinet. Do you want to eat it?"

The girl's eyes lit up when she heard the words, but then she thought of the weirdness of this place, and couldn't help but hesitated: "The food here...is it edible?"

Shen Wei turned around and walked to a cabinet, opened the cabinet door, showed them a cabinet of well-packed bread inside, and said, "I can't guarantee whether I can eat it, I just found it from the cabinet. That's all."

Everyone was a little hesitant when they heard this, and while hesitating, Ye Changsheng, who was the closest, sauntered forward.He took out a stale French baguette from the cabinet, tore off the packaging bag, opened his mouth and took a bite of it.

"Hey—" Seeing his unabashed appearance, the girl couldn't help shouting subconsciously, but the other end seemed to have never heard of it. She took a few bites of the bread, chewed it, swallowed it, and then Then he raised his head, glanced at the crowd, shook the bread in his hand, and said, "The taste is not bad, but the bread is hard after a long time, which affects the taste too much."

The old couple on the other side looked at Ye Changsheng with a little worry on his face: "Are you okay? Are you feeling sick?"

Ye Changsheng quickly ate the remaining bread in his hand, touched his half-filled stomach, and sighed: "The only thing I am worried about is that the bread is not fresh. It might give me diarrhea."

He looked at the others and said, "Are you really not eating?"

The girl and the man in the suit still seemed to be hesitating, but the bald man who was asking the question before and the old couple walked over to get a bit of bread each.

"I'm already here, and I don't know how long I will stay here. The potential danger is as terrible as the current hunger. Since one can be solved, why do we have to choose two at the same time?" The bald man whispered, and then wolfed down the bread. go down.

Although this sounds reasonable, but out of the subconscious fear of this inexplicable place, the girl and the man in the suit resolutely rejected the bread in the end, and just took some water in the kettle and boiled it to drink a little bit.

Ye Changsheng quietly took out his phone to check the time again.25:[-].

Time has indeed started to move forward, but the question now is, why did the overall time go back two hours?If it's 59:[-] again, what will happen to them?

——Or, will he reset all his experiences as he has done countless times before, and then start again from that musical fountain?

Ye Changsheng felt a little uneasy in his heart. He raised his head and looked at the survivors of the car accident who were sitting or standing in the living room. They may still be taking a breath for the temporary rescue in front of them, but they always have something in their hearts. The crease between Ye Changsheng's brows couldn't be eased.

Shen Wei walked to Ye Changsheng's side, he seemed to sized him up, then smiled at him, and asked, "You seem a little nervous?"

Ye Changsheng raised his eyelids and glanced at him, with a curved smile on his face: "Shouldn't it be natural to be nervous and afraid when encountering such a strange thing?" Slowed down a bit, "It's just that Mr. Shen seems to be able to do a job with ease?"

Shen Wei sat on the sofa, he didn't care about the temptation in Ye Changsheng's words at all, he just smiled calmly: "People are always afraid of the unknown, but I am a little different."

He casually took a clean cup, poured a cup of hot water for Ye Changsheng and handed it over: "Everything is unknown, if even the senses are deprived, what will happen in such an environment, isn't it? Does it make you look forward to it?"

Ye Changsheng took the cup. Although it was made of laminated glass, even if it was filled with freshly boiled hot water, it would not feel hot to the touch. However, the heat of nearly [-] degrees inside spread up, making the cup almost instantly. The mouth of the cup is covered with fine and dense drops of water.

He lowered his eyes slightly to look at the water in the glass, stroked the rim of the glass lightly with his fingers, but didn't drink it: "Only those who are strong enough will not be afraid of all unknown things and find pleasure in them. He put the cup back and shrugged, "Obviously, I'm not up to this level."

Shen Wei looked at Ye Changsheng's appearance, and suddenly asked: "Then what about the man walking with you in the car? Is he up to this level?"

Ye Changsheng suddenly raised his eyes and locked his eyes on Shen Wei again.

Seeing the defense in his eyes, Shen Wei slightly hooked his lips and smiled: "Relax, relax. I'm just asking casually. You should know that I'm your companion now, not your enemy."

Ye Changsheng looked at him deeply for a while, and then said abruptly, "Mr. Shen, have we met somewhere before?"

Shen Wei was slightly taken aback, and then the smile on his face widened a bit, he looked at Ye Changsheng and said, "Is this the legendary 'talking up'?"

"No, no, no." Ye Changsheng waved his hand and said with a smile, "I already have a partner, so letting him hear him will make me unable to get out of bed."

Shen Wei let out an "oh", without any expression fluctuations in his eyes, he spread his hands and said with a gentle smile: "That's really a pity."

"So, if it's just a literal explanation, where have we met before?" Ye Changsheng didn't let the other end make jokes, but repeated it to Shen Wei.

His tone was not aggressive, but his posture was tough.

When he looked at Shen Wei, there was no smile on his face, there seemed to be something slowly swimming past under a pair of pure black eyes, it was obviously hard to see clearly, but there seemed to be faint ripples spreading layer by layer Come on, for some reason, those eyes look a little strange.

Shen Wei looked at Ye Changsheng's eyes, his pupils flickered undetectably, then raised his eyebrows lightly and said: "I don't think so. I have been living abroad for a long time, and it is also the last few days I only returned to China in [-]. Judging from your accent, you should be from X province, if it wasn’t for my memory error, then we should have never seen each other.”

He smiled again and said, "Why, do I look a lot like someone you know?"

Ye Changsheng shook his head: "No, you don't look alike—it's just that Mr. Shen's eyes look too much like him." He looked at Shen Wei in front of him, sincerely and earnestly looking for a suitable adjective, "Indifferent , ego, and aloof.”

After finishing speaking, he smiled again: "It's just that he is not as gentle as you look. Except for his occasional ridicule at me, in my memory, he almost never smiles."

The smile on Shen Wei's lips remained undiminished, he nodded to Ye Changsheng and said, "That sounds like a regrettable person. If there is a chance in the future, I really want to meet him in person."

Ye Changsheng didn't speak anymore, just glanced at him again, then leaned back on the sofa, and for a while, looked at the chandelier in the room and sighed softly.

After the old couple and the bald man had eaten and drank enough, everyone got together and began to discuss the current situation.

"Now that so many of us have been found, I think there may be more people who survived the car accident and fell into this hellish place." The girl said first, "Anyway, one more person is A little more strength, or we will go to the vicinity to look for it while the sky is still bright, even if we can't find anyone else, maybe there will be some new discoveries?"

As soon as her words came out, the bald man retorted first: "Don't you know how long a group of us walked in this damn fog before we found here? When the fog thickened outside, we stood in a row, the first One can’t even see the face of the last one! Under such circumstances, if we go out again, the situation will only be worse than it is now, and I don’t agree to go out now.”

The girl was a little annoyed by the bald man's rebuttal, but she didn't force him to agree with her opinion, she just turned to look at the other people in the room: "Now that the opinions have diverged, what do you mean?"

The man in the suit frowned slightly and thought for a while, avoiding the girl's sight and said in a low voice: "We must be looking for someone, but it's really not very suitable now. You see, we were worried and frightened for so long before we found him." A house that can barely rest for a while, and the fog outside is indeed too heavy. Traveling in such a foggy day, we can't even guarantee our own lives, so talking about saving others is not too idealistic?"

The girl was a little discouraged, she looked at Ye Changsheng and Shen Wei again: "Do you think so too?"

Ye Changsheng smiled: "No, I still want to go out and look for it. After all, my companion doesn't know where it is. If he is awake now, he must be looking for me everywhere."

He stood up from the sofa, "And to be honest, the fog here is different from what we usually see. We can't expect it to melt away when the sun rises tomorrow. To put it in a more pessimistic way, maybe the fog here Not only will it not disappear, but it will become more and more concentrated with time?"

He looked out of the window, before they could vaguely see the street from the house when they came in, but now they could only see the front and back of the yard: "This house is at best a resting place for us, The only bread that looks edible will definitely not be able to support us through tomorrow. If we don’t go out and have a look now when we still have some strength, it is estimated that in two days, the few of us will have to starve to death here.”

Just as Ye Changsheng finished speaking, the man in the suit immediately retorted: "I have a positioning system installed on my body. If the company finds that I cannot be contacted, they will definitely contact the surrounding search and rescue personnel to search and rescue us. As long as we wait In the past period of time, at most one day, there will definitely be search and rescue teams coming, and we don't need to take risks by ourselves in this situation."

Ye Changsheng turned his head and smiled at him, and asked, "Do you really think that the place we are in is a place where search and rescue personnel can come in?"

The man in the suit looked slightly ugly.

As long as he still has some ability to judge, he can naturally understand that the weirdness of this place is a bit too unusual.

Leaving aside the unreasonable car accident before, even if they really rolled off the cliff because of the car accident, where did such a place come from under the cliff?

Although they couldn't see the whole picture of this place clearly because of the dense fog before, they could still vaguely see that it was clearly a small town with complete facilities just after the fog had faded a little bit.

—a small town with no one in it but their hapless group of outsiders.

"I don't care what you say, anyway, if you want to go out, you can go out by yourself, and I will stay in the room." The bald man looked at the man in the suit and seemed to be a little shaken by Ye Changsheng's words, his face darkened suddenly, and he pulled I don't want to get up after sitting down in the chair.

Shen Wei glanced at him, then at Ye Changsheng and said, "Then what do you mean in the end?"

Ye Changsheng didn't know if it was his subjective impression or something else, but through those light-colored eyes, he always seemed to be able to see that point, which was full of interest like that point when he was watching a theater with the audience.

This expression highly overlapped with the person in his memory again, making him frown involuntarily.

After taking a deep breath, Ye Changsheng replied: "Since some people want to stay and some people want to go out, why don't we divide into two groups. After all, if someone else comes over, there must be no one staying in this house." It's not okay either."

The old couple said slowly: "Maybe we can also look for any lighting tools in the house, such as candles or kerosene lamps. If it is late, the surroundings will be dark, but there is light here." It may be easier for others to find their way from the house."

Shen Wei nodded: "Then we can look for it now."

As he said that, he led everyone to turn around in the house.

A group of seven people almost turned the first floor upside down, and finally found a small package of brand new candles and a half box of matches next to the candles in the kitchen cabinet.The old couple lit a candle and placed it in the living room. The candlelight spread faintly, casting a dim yellow shadow on the curtains of the window.

"These candles should still be usable." The old couple nodded, with a relaxed expression on their faces, "First put out this candle and put it away, and let it stay in the house when it gets darker." The people here just light them all up."

Everyone had no objection to this, but Ye Changsheng, who was sitting by the side, looked at the flickering dim candlelight, but seemed to think of something, and couldn't help furrowing his brows slightly.

The old couple who stood closest to Ye Changsheng couldn't help asking with concern: "What's wrong with you? Are you feeling unwell?"

Ye Changsheng smiled and shook his head when he heard the words. Just as he was about to say something, there was a light knock on the door outside the room.The knock on the door was not loud, and it stopped after a while.

He was startled suddenly.

The conversation in the room stopped for an instant, and they looked at each other, as if they were thinking about who was knocking on the door outside.Ye Changsheng moved his chair back a little and stood up. The four corners of the chair rubbed against the ground and made a noise. The others didn't move, but watched Ye Changsheng walk towards the gate with very slow steps. .

Ye Changsheng felt his heart beat a little faster, he stretched out his hand and slowly pressed on the doorknob, then took a deep breath, and slowly pushed open the wooden door.

The old-fashioned wooden door, probably because of disrepair for a long time, made a "squeak--" sound that made people's teeth ache the moment the door was opened.He poked his head out and looked outside, and sure enough, the thick fog outside further diffused into the yard, but there was no one in front of the door.

He lowered his eyes and glanced at the ground, and then, at the moment when he was about to close the door and enter the house, on the steps in front of the door, something shimmering with red luster caught his sight.

He squatted down to pick up the thing, and then his heart skipped a beat for a moment—it was the blood jade that he had lost when he woke up from the previous stupor!