Hunter of Mysterious Creature-Chapter 345 - 16: Blessing_2

He didn’t destroy those plastic mannequins, but instead directly pushed over a mannequin dressed in sexy lingerie and climbed on top of it...

Just as Sun Hang was trying to turn the nightmare into a spring dream, he woke up.

Sun Hang did this not because he was really that desperate, but because he had seen a post online.

The post said: The eerie fear those who do evil, but the eerie fear perverts even more.

Just as Sun Hang was pondering whether he would be recognized as a pederast if he did something perverted to these two "little girls," one of the little girls suddenly spoke: "Do you really think everything you see is false; and everything that appears in the mirror is true?"

"I don’t think so," Sun Hang answered honestly, "I’ve always been wondering who’s real and who’s fake."

"There’s no need to wonder; it depends on your own choice," the little girl said, "Zhuang Zhou dreams of being a butterfly, but is it Zhuang Zhou dreaming, or the butterfly? Who can tell the difference?"

"Some kind of idealism theory..." Sun Hang rubbed the tip of his nose, "But to be fair, you do have a point. If you want to live a normal life, you don’t have to do anything; if you want to pursue the novel or the exciting, then observe the world through the mirror... After all, whether it’s a beautiful facade or deformed flesh, it’s just a piece of information received by the brain. For those whose perceptions are twisted, maybe the deformed flesh is even more alluring."

"Your powers of comprehension are not bad," one of the little girls said.

"The village chief might like you a lot," the other little girl followed up.

"Just now, a new question popped into my head," Sun Hang squatted down, looking into the little girl’s pupils devoid of whites, "Do you know Anna Demosheva?"

The two little girls looked at each other, then shook their heads in unison.

"Never mind then, I thought you were her transformation." Sun Hang stood up, speaking somewhat disappointedly.

"Why would you think that?"

"You know too much, even know the story of Zhuang Zhou dreaming of the butterfly, which doesn’t seem like knowledge a person your age would have," said Sun Hang.

"There’s a library in town, with many books," one of the little girls said.

"In the books, there’s the story of Zhuang Zhou dreaming of the butterfly, and much more," the other little girl added.

"Much more? Like what?"

"Newton’s classical mechanics, Einstein’s general and special relativity, Maxwell’s equations..." the little girl listed off like a treasure trove.

"Wow, geniuses, huh?" Sun Hang was slightly stunned, "Compared to you guys, I feel like an illiterate."

"Actually, we haven’t read these things either; I’m just naming them," the little girl suddenly took a sharp turn, "At first, the people in town would also pass the time by reading, but as time passed, everyone began to become more and more abnormal. Some people would tear books to shreds as they read, some would roll up entire books and shove them into their throats... Until someone burned down the library, people turned their attention to other things."

"Other things? Like what?"

"Anything they could find," the little girl replied.

Sun Hang suddenly remembered the "junk" sold on the stalls and shops.

"You are special," the little girl suddenly said, "You seem to have the power to resist the curse."

"Huh? Resist the curse? What do you mean?" Sun Hang was a bit perplexed by this statement.

"Since you’ve become part of Maoyun Town, you should feel hungry," the little girl said.

"Part of Maoyun Town? When? I’m just a passing outsider, my car is still parked outside the town," Sun Hang said.

"When you accepted the village chief’s gift, it meant you already shouldered the curse of this town," the little girl said.

"Gift... You mean the bait piece and that fifty cents?" Sun Hang pouted, "I knew that old lady didn’t have good intentions."

"No, she was saving you," the little girl shook her head, "Without food, you’ll never be able to leave this place, you’ll starve to death out in the wilderness."

"I have food," Sun Hang said, taking out a piece of compressed biscuit, opened the packaging in front of the little girl, bit off a piece, chewed it up, and swallowed it.

But the next second, the lump of biscuit mixed with saliva rolled down Sun Hang’s chest.

Sun Hang was startled, reaching his hand to his throat—only now did he realize, at some point, there was a large, painless hole in his throat.

"Is this the curse then..."

"If you didn’t become part of Maoyun Town, you would never have found Maoyun Town," the little girl said, "You’ve been cursed, but at least, you can survive."

"Can I leave here then?"

"Of course you can, but leaving doesn’t mean the curse is lifted," the little girl said, "There was once an outsider too, he lived in the town for a while, then left, but who knows if he ever returned to that ’world of his.’

"Outsider? Are you talking about... humans?" Sun Hang was slightly surprised, could someone have intruded into this eerie town before him? 𝒇𝒓𝙚𝒆𝔀𝓮𝓫𝒏𝓸𝙫𝓮𝓵.𝓬𝙤𝙢

"He said he killed someone, was wanted, kept running and running, crossing countless rivers, climbing countless mountains, finally collapsing in the wilderness... The village chief found him on the roadside, nearly dead from hunger, gave him food, let him survive, let him become a member of the town."

"Why does it sound, the village chief is a really good person?" Sun Hang quipped.

"The village chief is indeed a good person, he’s just trying to let everyone survive," the little girl’s tone remained emotionless, but for some reason, Sun Hang seemed to hear a faint sigh hidden between the lines, "But the village chief doesn’t have the ability to create food, people can survive, but still have nothing to eat."

"Then this food... The bait piece the old woman gave me... Where did it come from?" Sun Hang asked, though he had an inkling about the answer in his heart.

"It’s meat cut from oneself, from others," the little girl said, "No one remembers who started doing this first, but it’s indeed the only food available in town. This food doesn’t alleviate people’s hunger, but at least it lets people remember the feeling of eating."

"If food is that easily obtainable, why do the townsfolk still fight for it? When they’re hungry, can’t they just cut a piece of themselves?"

"What you cut off is bloody rotten flesh; only after being blessed by the village chief does the rotten flesh turn into grain, into cattle and sheep, into chickens and ducks... Rotten flesh is everywhere, but blessed meat is rare... Only during the monthly sacrificial ceremony does the village chief perform a blessing. The ’food’ that’s blessed can be stored for a month, so even though it’s just something to provide solace, not everyone can enjoy it," the little girl replied.

"Then you all..."

"We are the reserved food; we will offer ourselves at the next sacrificial ceremony," the little girl replied.

"How many days until the next sacrificial ceremony?"

"It’s tomorrow."

"Looks like I came at a good time," Sun Hang murmured, "By the way, the last outsider, how did he leave?"

"He couldn’t bear the eternal hunger, he said he wanted to return to the original world to find food... even if it meant spending his whole life in prison."

"And you let him go?" Sun Hang was surprised, "Didn’t stop him?"

"Why stop him?" the little girl retorted, "The village chief took him in out of empathy, not to imprison him forever."

"... Can I watch tomorrow’s sacrificial ceremony?"

"Of course."