Chapter 51 Sleepwalking
Before falling asleep, Shen Qiumeng vaguely felt like she had forgotten something.
But after a busy day, she couldn’t remember what she had forgotten.
She only knew that it seemed like her body…
Was moving?
Why was her body moving inexplicably?
She felt something was wrong, but she couldn’t control her body at all.
She couldn’t even open her eyes.
Her vision was pitch black, but her body kept moving forward towards something.
Where was she going?
Shen Qiumeng’s consciousness struggled in the chaos, and she felt her feet stepping on the cold bluestone slabs.
The night wind blew dust onto her face.
Faint opera sounds drifted from a distance, and with every step closer, she felt a bloody taste in her throat.
What was going on?
Suddenly, Shen Qiumeng finally remembered something.
Did she… forget to drink the talismanic water given by Liu Haoyu?
Upon realizing this, Shen Qiumeng’s chaotic brain buzzed.
She finally sensed the danger.
“Wake up, wake up…”
She screamed in her heart, but her body still moved forward uncontrollably.
Unable to open her eyes, unable to know where she was going.
The cold sensation from her soles made her heart grow colder and colder.
“Stop!”
At this moment, a voice came from behind her.
Hearing the voice, Shen Qiumeng was overjoyed.
This was none other than her father calling her.
Her father was a hermit Daoist, so he must have had a way.
“Xiao Meng, where are you going?!”
Her father’s anxious voice continued to echo from behind her, but Shen Qiumeng couldn’t stop her steps and continued to walk forward on her own.
“Evil Banishing Talisman!”
Her father’s stern roar sounded, and Shen Qiumeng felt a strong impact on her back.
It was this impact that made her fall heavily to the ground.
Besides that, she vaguely heard another sound of something landing.
However, the pain in her body instantly cleared her consciousness and she regained control of her body.
She struggled to stand up from the ground.
“Dad! I’m here!”
But when she turned her head, her hopeful eyes gradually turned to despair.
There was no one behind her…
Where was her father?
Wasn’t he just behind her?
Fear stems from the unknown. Although Old Shen was a ghost exorcist, Shen Qiumeng had no interest in ghost exorcism at all.
After the “smashing the four olds” campaign, many old things were rapidly declining, and for a young person like her, ghost exorcism was of no interest.
But at this moment, how she wished she could learn ghost exorcism, even a little bit…
But it was too late to say anything now, she staggered up from the ground.
Because she was wearing thin clothes and not even shoes, she trembled all over.
Jiangliu City in this season is hot during the day and very cold at night.
“Where is this…”
Shen Qiumeng forced herself to calm her panicked heart and looked around.
She found that she had come to the old opera stage on the west side of the town.
There were hardly any residents on the west side of the town, most of them had moved to the east side.
So this opera stage had long been abandoned, and unless there were any cultural performances, no one would come here.
The night wind stirred the tattered opera banners, and the red-painted opera stage flickered with a dark red light under the moonlight.
Although the opera stage was empty, for some reason Shen Qiumeng felt that it was… a bit lively?
Why did she feel like she was in a bustling city?
Logically speaking, even during the day, this abandoned opera stage would not feel lively, right?
Cold sweat kept seeping from Shen Qiumeng’s forehead.
She felt like something was watching her from all around.
But when she looked back in the direction of the gaze, she couldn’t see anything.
What was going on here?
The noisy sounds of the militia that had been there before had now disappeared.
The entire Shigu Town seemed to have become a dead town, completely lifeless.
Looking around at the empty houses, Shen Qiumeng’s heart sank bit by bit.
Although she was not a ghost exorcist, she also knew that she had encountered an evil spirit.
This was likely related to Liu Haoyu.
But Shen Qiumeng didn’t blame him, she just regretted why she had forgotten to drink the talismanic water.
She took a deep breath and then almost ran towards home, leaving the place.
“Shen… Qiu… Meng…”
However, before she could turn the corner, her father’s voice came from behind her again.
She hadn’t had time to be happy when she suddenly felt something was wrong.
Why had her father’s voice become so hoarse?
And this voice seemed to come from a very far place, or like whispering next to her ear.
Something’s wrong…
“Don’t look back.”
At that moment, Liu Haoyu’s warning echoed in her ear.
She bit her lip tightly, forcing herself to keep walking forward, but the voice became clearer and clearer.
“Shen Qiumeng…”
This time, the voice was almost close to her neck, and the cold breath landed on her skin.
Shen Qiumeng quickened her pace again, clenched her fists, and her fingernails dug deep into her flesh.
The pain dispelled much of her fear.
But it was useless.
The voice was getting closer and clearer.
When Shen Qiumeng returned to the street, she found that the street was also empty, and the militiamen and public security special commissioners who were searching everywhere had vanished into thin air.
And just with this turn, Shen Qiumeng saw out of the corner of her eye…
On the ground, behind her shadow, there was another blurry dark shadow.
The shoulder of the shadow seemed to have a large gap torn by something.
Even more crucially, this shadow was slowly raising its hand as if to grab her.
Seeing this shadow, Shen Qiumeng’s heart rate suddenly accelerated, she wanted to run, but her feet couldn’t move.
When the shadow’s hand landed on her shoulder, Shen Qiumeng’s blood almost solidified.
The moment she was grabbed, Shen Qiumeng’s head involuntarily turned, like a rusty gear, little by little.
What met her eyes was a man in a butler’s uniform.
His eyes still retained the despair of his life, and the gap in his shoulder was constantly oozing a viscous substance like asphalt.
And besides him, more incomplete shadows appeared behind him.
These shadows, some with half of their heads missing, some with large holes in their chests, but without exception, like puppets craving flesh and blood, they surrounded Shen Qiumeng.
