Chapter 71
I don't know how long I stayed in this position, but when I came to my senses, my legs were numb and I finally stood up. When I looked up, I found that the hanged man had returned. He was standing a few steps away from me, staring at me blankly without making a sound.
I was suddenly a little happy that this guy could find his way back, although I had some grudges against him because of the previous incident with Shadow Girl. But I suddenly felt that at this time, no matter if it was a human or a ghost, there was someone who could stay by my side, and I felt a little comforted, because in this way, I would not be truly alone.
I have lost too many things during this period of time, and after that conversation with Lu Yao, I felt inexplicably scared. It was not the fear of death as before, but the feeling of being helpless when I became a living soul, when neither humans nor ghosts could see me, and they realized that I still existed in this world.
No matter how high or low, rich or poor, people living in this world can never truly isolate themselves from others, otherwise they cannot be called human beings. What is the meaning of living a life without any meaning?
I moved my legs to make the numbness go away as quickly as possible, then looked at the hanged man and smiled at him.
He looked at me, seemed stunned for a moment, and then suddenly grinned. This silly look made me feel warm inexplicably.
I walked over and sat beside the bed. He still looked at me without saying a word. I thought for a while and asked him, even if it is a ghost, there are some that can be trusted, right?
He didn't answer immediately, but thought for a moment, then pointed at himself, smiled and nodded.
I think what he meant was that he was trying to tell me that he was the ghost I could trust. My mood suddenly brightened up a lot, and I laughed out loud, but after laughing, I suddenly fell silent again.
I glanced towards the door, thinking about Lu Yao in the room opposite, and finally made up my mind and walked towards her room.
I stood outside the door, took a deep breath, and then slowly knocked on the door. I soon heard her footsteps, and then with a click, the door opened.
Lu Yao stood behind the door, looking at me quietly. Neither of us spoke immediately, and the atmosphere was somewhat awkward. After about half a minute, I couldn't help but open my mouth, but I didn't expect that when I made a sound, Lu Yao also called out my name.
She said, Tan Xi, have you thought it through?
I nodded slowly, laughed, and said that staying here forever was not a good idea, as we still had to look at houses. It was almost time to leave.
Lu Yao was stunned for a moment, and finally a hint of joy appeared in the corner of her eyes. I heard her voice choked up a little, and I thought to myself, ghosts also have their own feelings.
She nodded heavily and said "hmm". When she looked up again, I found that her eyes were almost filled with tears, but she still had a smile on her face and said, "Wait for me to pack my things."
I nodded and didn't say anything more. I watched her go into the room and start packing her things. I also went back to the room to prepare, and waited for Lu Yao to finish before leaving the hotel with her.
But it seemed that because of Lu Yao, the hanged ghost was unwilling to follow us. I only saw him following us from a distance with an unhappy look on his face.
This may be just like the little ghost, who always has the most primitive fear of things that are inherently terrifying.
It was as if nothing had happened between me and Lu Yao. I just contacted the addresses she had found one by one. I looked at a lot of houses that day. Although I was satisfied with many of them, Lu Yao still thought they were a bit shabby. I finally found a suitable one after walking until my legs were almost broken.
I was really thankful to God. Accompanying Lu Yao to choose a house was just like accompanying a woman shopping. Although she was a female ghost now, it was really a bit overwhelming for me to have to come all the way to find her.
This house is very big, and there are many rooms, and it is fully furnished. The landlords are an elderly couple, and they are very kind in their words and deeds. Lu Yao is also very satisfied. After a brief discussion, we decided to rent it first. What's more convenient is that we can move in right away. It saves a lot of trouble.
After everything was ready, I immediately fell on the sofa and didn't want to get up. Going out with a woman always makes me feel exhausted. I rested for a while and finally recovered. I called Lu Yao. She was taking her belongings out of her bag one by one. When she heard my voice, she looked at me and asked what was wrong?
After I said this, I felt a little awkward and asked her, what name should I call you now? It can't still be Lu Yao, after all, you are not the real Lu Yao.
She laughed and said, "It's okay, you can call me whatever you want. I have forgotten my own name a long time ago."
I thought about it and felt that it was not appropriate to give someone a random name. I couldn't possibly call her "Bone Girl Painted Skin". In the end, I had no choice but to still call her Lu Yao. I thought that I probably wouldn't have much chance to meet the real Lu Yao in the future, so I might as well just treat her as having the same name.
Lu Yao didn't have any objection. He just smiled and said nothing.
I thought about it for a while and asked her again, Lu Yao, you see you are so powerful, with you around, will there be fewer ghosts around me?
She turned to look at me, walked to my side, patted me on the head, smiled and said, "You wish. I've told you before that I won't help you. Just do what you have to do. It's your business whether you can overcome it or not."
I quickly sat up and said, "No, I just want you to help me for a few days. Look at me, my head and body are covered with wounds, not a single good place. If this continues, I will probably die from these injuries before I learn how to deal with it."
Lu Yao looked at me silently for a while, slowly reached out his hand, and gently touched the bloody holes on my shoulders that were made by the corpse doll. Then he sighed and said, "Okay, I'll help you for a while, and when your injuries are healed, I won't care about you anymore."
I grinned and nodded quickly, saying, "Okay, it would be great if you could just help me for a day. Thank you very much!"
She covered her mouth and smiled, patted me on the head again, then turned around and continued to pack her things.
For the next seven or eight days, nothing really happened. I hardly stepped out of the door. I just stayed in the house watching TV and listening to music. Apart from recuperating from my injuries, I ignored everything else.
The only thing that made me feel a little troubled was the matter of the hanged ghost. No matter what I said, he refused to come in and stood alone outside the house, looking pitiful. I thought that after my injury healed, I would go out and find a few ghost tombs and let him stay inside, then I would feel much more at ease.
It's rare for me to have such a quiet day. Although the time is short and boring, there is always an indescribable feeling of comfort.
When I went online these two days, I found that the incident of being attacked in the street by a zombie puppet had become a hot topic, and the Internet was full of news about that day.
I took a quick look and found that many people posted online that they saw with their own eyes that the corpse had crawled up from the ground and chased after someone. This kind of content easily aroused people's curiosity, so much so that for a period of time, it became a hot search topic.
There was even a video of me fighting desperately with the zombie doll at the end, which went viral online. It was probably uploaded by those people who were standing at the entrance of the alley and watching from afar.
But I am fortunate that although this video looks thrilling, it was shot with a mobile phone and the distance was quite far. Apart from seeing two figures fighting, I could hardly see any details, including my face.
However, there were a lot of people paying attention to this, and finally a TV station came out, probably for ratings or something, and made a program similar to an exploration and discovery program. At the beginning, it talked about all kinds of mysterious things, such as two people falling from the seventh floor in succession and the bodies resurrected. The scarier the better, but later it turned into a mystery show.
The TV station specially invited experts, including a fat-faced monk. They came to the alley where I had rented a house before. They talked a lot and finally explained to the experts, pointing to the building where I fell and said, "Look, although the buildings here are tall, most of the people living here are working people. There are many clothesline hanging in front and behind the building, and there are many awnings and billboards sticking out of the shops at the bottom. So even if someone really fell from the roof of this building, it is very possible that nothing serious will happen."
As he spoke, the camera was focused on the messy ropes and various lines in front of the building, and the commentator began to say that when a person falls from here, he will keep hitting these ropes, and the force of falling will keep weakening, and finally he will fall to the ground. It may be very painful, but it is far less serious than everyone thinks. This situation has also happened. Therefore, when he fell to the ground and couldn't get up, everyone thought he had died. Finally, he stood up after a while, and everyone was scared for a while, thinking that the dead had resurrected. But this is already a blessing in disguise.
Later, the camera turned back to the studio. When the host mentioned the video circulating online, the expert laughed and said that there were actually a lot of such things on the Internet. But this video was even worse than other fake ones, and it was obviously a spoof by netizens.
The host asked why, and the expert replied, "Don't say anything else, just watch this part."
He pointed to the scene in the video where I hit the head of the corpse with a stick, and said that although the human cervical vertebrae are relatively fragile, they are very resilient, and judging by the force of the man swinging the stick, it is absolutely impossible to hit the head of a person from the shoulders in one blow. Moreover, let alone a stick, even a blunt knife would not be easy to cut off a person's head in one blow.
In short, in the end, various types of evidence denied the authenticity of these videos.
After the show was broadcast, the ratings did go up a lot. After all, it gave an answer, and many people still believed the official statement. Although there were always different opinions, as time went on, this matter became like the face-eating incident in the United States. Whether you believe it or not, it has been concluded and it was eventually left unresolved.
After watching these programs, I couldn't help but smile bitterly. On the one hand, I was sighing that this matter finally didn't involve me and it was finally in the past. On the other hand, I admired the reasoning ability of these experts. Anyway, no matter whether it was true or false, they always spoke so confidently from their mouths.
But I had a lot of free time, so I didn't continue to pay attention to this matter.
But this peaceful life lasted only a little over a week, and my injuries had healed a lot, but I didn't expect that everything would end like this.
It was still night, I was half asleep, and suddenly I heard someone knocking on my window. I opened my eyes and saw no one outside the window...
