Chapter 32: The Mysterious Disappearance of Villagers
When I came to the village, I saw that many people in the village were staying behind closed doors, and the shops everywhere were not open, which made the whole village look deserted.
"What's going on? There are almost no people in this village." Lin Yuxi asked.
"Many people have disappeared in this village recently, so the villagers are afraid to go out casually." Guang Xiaoyu walked to a missing person notice board, which was filled with photos of all the missing villagers and their basic information.
"Are these missing villagers all between the ages of 5 and 50?" Zhu Chiyun said.
"Yes, the missing villagers are all young people, young adults or children. If this continues, there will only be some sixty-year-olds left in this village." Guang Xiaoyu said.
"That's okay. By the way, the village chief of this village is not missing, right?"
"The village chief is not missing. We will go see the village chief later."
Not long after, Guang Xiaoyu took Zhu Chiyun and others to the village chief's home.
"Village Chief, this is the person I brought here to help." When everyone saw the village chief, they saw that the village chief was a short, thin old man holding a cane. It was really hard to see him looking like he couldn't help but feel angry. Imagine this person could serve as village chief.
"Hello, village chief." Everyone greeted him in unison.
"You are also Xiaoyu's friends, come in and sit down." The village chief's eyes narrowed and he warmly entertained everyone.
When they arrived at the village chief's house, they saw that the village chief's wife was also an old lady with white hair. When they saw her busy entertaining everyone, the four of them also actively stepped forward to help, but were refused.
"Son, don't worry. Mom can still handle this little housework. I can also entertain your friends, so you can just go and play." The old lady said to Zhu Chiyun.
"What is going on?" Zhu Chiyun said with a look of astonishment.
"Old woman, you made a mistake. He is here to help us find our son. Our son has been missing for many days." Seeing that his wife had made a mistake again, the village chief quickly apologized to Zhu Chiyun.
"It's okay, it's okay, what happened to your son?" Zhu Chiyun asked.
"Hey, our son and daughter-in-law, our daughter's family and two lovely grandchildren have been missing for several weeks inexplicably. We have sent a lot of manpower and material resources to search to no avail. Not only us, other villagers also have family members missing. ." As the village chief said, he looked at a photo of a family of eight and couldn't help but shed a few tears.
"It's okay, village chief, we will definitely help you find the missing villagers and your family." Bi Xiaoxin interrupted with a determined look. No clues have been found yet, and Zhu Chiyun doesn't know where Bi Xiaoxin came from. of confidence.
"Okay, I also hope you can help us." The village chief looked at Bi Xiaoxin as if he saw hope and nodded quickly.
"What are the characteristics of the missing villagers?" Zhu Chiyun asked.
"Every night when night falls, there are always some wandering ghosts, and then several villagers will be missing. The missing people are all children, women, or young adults between the ages of 5 and 50. Now we are all beginning to suspect that it is It’s not that when night falls, there will be ghosts hunting people everywhere, causing people in our village to close their doors.”
"Tathagata is like this, does that mean there are ghosts in this village? But why did they arrest villagers who are about 5 to 50 years old?"
"We don't know either, but if this continues, we old people will be the only ones left in this village."
"Then let's start investigating."
Then, Zhu Chiyun and others began to visit every household.
On one occasion, they came to the home of a villager who specialized in selling clay dolls to conduct an investigation.
"Are you entrusted by the village chief to investigate the disappearance of the villagers? Welcome." The manager of the local puppet shop enthusiastically invited four people into the shop and told them about their situation.
I saw that the manager of the local doll shop was also a middle-aged uncle about 50 years old. He looked very classy in his dress, with a confident smile and a standard artist's hairstyle, giving people a very unique sense of fashion.
"Many apprentices disappeared before the incident happened, hey." The store manager said with a disappointed look on his face, and led everyone to the exhibition room.
"Wow, these clay dolls are very cute." Lin Yuxi and Guang Xiaoyu saw that the clay dolls in the exhibition room were very detailed in their movements, and stepped forward to take a look.
But Bi Xiaoxin seemed to have noticed something strange inside the puppet, and kept frowning.
"What's wrong?" Facing Zhu Chiyun's question, Bi Xiaoxin just shook her head and said it was nothing.
"Little sister, you are really beautiful. If you are willing to be my model, you will definitely make a very good work."
"model?"
Bi Xiaoxin originally wanted to refuse, but with the instigation of the three of them, she agreed to the request to be a model.
"Yes, this is also my talent." The store manager asked Bi Xiaoxin to sit on a chair and quickly drew a portrait of Bi Xiaoxin. Then he asked an apprentice to come over to help and make a clay doll that was somewhat similar to Bi Xiaoxin.
"Wow, the work is indeed very beautiful." Everyone looked at it and felt that the master and apprentice had done a very good job in terms of efficiency and details.
"My stupid apprentice! You still haven't made your work better! I can't see that your intention is included in the work at all. You just do what I ask you to do, without any opinions of your own. Take this Let’s redo a few works.” The store manager asked his apprentice sternly while holding a few drawings.
"What a stern store manager." Seeing the apprentice leave silently, Zhu Chiyun felt that maybe the manager of this clay doll shop made such fine clay dolls because he had very high requirements for his works.
"I'm really sorry. My apprentice has no talent and hasn't produced soulful works yet."
"No, your apprentice's work is also very good."
Zhu Chiyun took a look at his apprentice's work and found that his performance was no less than his master's. Perhaps it was because Zhu Chiyun didn't know much about this art.
Then, after Zhu Chiyun and the store manager did some simple investigations, everyone said goodbye to the store manager.
"Bi Xiaoxin, what's wrong with you? There's no expression there at all." Zhu Chiyun found that in the local puppet shop, Bi Xiaoxin always looked worried. Guang Xiaoyu and Lin Yuxi both admired the local puppets in the shop with smiles on their faces, but only Bi Xiaoxin looked cautious.
"Um...I don't know if I should say it." Bi Xiaoxin said hesitantly.
"What happened? Or did you notice something?"
"I didn't notice anything, I just felt that the puppets were asking for help from us."
"Help? Indeed, we have searched the entire village and can't find any clues. If the disappearance is related to the puppets..."
Zhu Chiyun thought for a moment, then returned to the store manager, picked up a few clay dolls, and studied them carefully, but Zhu Chiyun didn't find anything strange and returned them.
"Isn't this just the same clay puppet we usually see? Are you overthinking it?" Lin Yuxi asked.
"I don't know, maybe." Bi Xiaoxin couldn't explain her feeling, but she planned to investigate the matter alone at night.