"Are you still digging? You must be crazy!" Wang Defa frowned, his expression slightly displeased.
Truth be told, it wasn't entirely his fault. After all, the grave contained his subordinate, and another was a comrade who had fought alongside him for many years. The thought of digging up his comrade's grave was something no one would find easy to accept.
If anyone else had said this to me, with my temper, I would have likely slapped them across the face, and I wouldn't have been in the mood to talk calmly here.
I understood Wang Defa's feelings, but the grave still had to be dug. It was true that a corpse had escaped from it, but I had to know whose corpse it was. It was highly likely to be Hu Yuan's, but it was still uncertain.
Based on Yue'er's observation, she thought the one fighting the Sleeping Daoist and Old Heavenly Master Fang resembled Hu Yuan, but without seeing the actual body, no one could be sure.
"Captain Wang, I understand how you feel, but this grave must be opened. I need to know if the corpse that ran out is Hu Yuan's. If it is his, we might still have a chance. If it's not his, we might have to flee."
"Is it that serious?" Wang Defa still looked skeptical. In his opinion, although the black shadow was powerful, it was nowhere near capable of contending with the Sleeping Daoist and Old Heavenly Master Fang. While there was a gap in strength, the advantage in numbers was something that strength couldn't compensate for, especially since we had more people.
"Yes, because I suspect another soul is residing within Hu Yuan's body. If the person who came was Hu Yuan, but in reality, his soul was attached to someone else?" I stated resolutely.
"What evidence do you have to prove that another soul resides in his body? Isn't this just your speculation?" Wang Defa still seemed unconvinced, as he considered these matters to be nonsense, or at least something he had never heard of.
"Whether you believe it or not, this is indeed possible, because it has happened to me before."
"It happened to you? How come I didn't know?" Zhang Dabiao looked at me in surprise from the side.
I glanced at Yue'er. Seeing she didn't react, I said, "This is something only I know, and I cannot speak of it. Otherwise, great misfortune will befall us." Seeing Wang Defa still hesitating, I continued, "If you don't believe me, I can swear by our Ancestor that everything I say is true."
Anyone who has come into contact with the Yin profession knows that they rarely swear by their Ancestor. If their words are inconsistent with the truth, they will inevitably be abandoned by their Ancestor. At best, their cultivation will be crippled; at worst, they will become foolish and insane, which is also known as mental illness. Even worse, they could directly perish.
Seeing that I had even brought up the Ancestor, Wang Defa could no longer object, no matter how much he wanted to say something. After all, I wasn't digging graves for personal gain, but for everyone's benefit. If it was truly an outsider residing in Hu Yuan's body, perhaps there would be a chance to restrain them using his physical form.
"Since you've gone this far, I don't think you'd lie to me. I'll go back to get things, and we'll start digging now."
"I'll go with you to get things."
Zhang Dabiao also went back with Wang Defa to fetch their equipment. Only Yue'er and I remained at the graveyard.
"You shouldn't have revealed Master's affairs. You know that once you mention Master, they will sense it, and it will cause unnecessary trouble," Yue'er said to me with a faint look.
I gave a wry smile and explained, "Trouble can be dealt with later. Solving the current trouble is more important. If it's truly an ancestor of the Hu family hiding within Hu Yuan's body, it will be difficult to survive then. How would I have the time to worry about trouble?"
Yue'er sighed and said, "Do you really care about life and death?"
"Who doesn't care about life and death? Who would want to die if they could live? Eating without taste, seeing everything in gray. Being a ghost is nowhere near as good as being human. If I die, I wish to be reincarnated quickly and live another life, to once again enjoy the beauty of the human world..."
I spoke very quickly, not noticing Yue'er's expression at all. It wasn't until she said they were back that I stopped speaking and looked at Yue'er with some surprise.
What was wrong with her just now? Why did her voice sound so cold?
Zhang Dabiao and Wang Defa each carried a large bag of items and held shovels. After putting down their things, they discovered that Zhang Dabiao was carrying a small generator, while Wang Defa was holding several kilowatt portable heaters.
Once the equipment was set up and the lights were turned on, Zhang Dabiao handed me a shovel and began digging himself. Wang Defa said nothing, only digging with a dark expression. Yue'er stood by with her arms crossed, not even listening to her favorite music, her pretty face hidden within her cloak, and no one knew what she was thinking.
Seeing the two of them working so enthusiastically, I couldn't help but join in. I knew that the next shovel might unearth a hand or a head, but I still put all my strength into it.
According to Wang Defa, too many people had died at the time, and the pit was dug very deep, but the soil layer on top was thin, less than a meter. However, even though the three of us dug together, we had already reached a depth of nearly two meters, yet we hadn't seen any corpses, nor had we seen any bloodstains in the soil.
I stuck the shovel into the ground and looked at Wang Defa, panting, "Captain Wang, did you remember the location incorrectly? Or did you dig too deep? It's already as tall as me, how can we not see a single corpse, not even a speck of bloody soil!"
"That shouldn't be the case! It was clearly buried here back then. We went to a lot of trouble to dig this large pit for convenience, so how could there be no corpses?" Wang Defa, unwilling to believe it, dug a few more shovels, but the result was the same: only soil and more soil, with no traces of buried bodies.
"This is truly鬼了 (guǐ le - uncanny/supernatural)! Did those corpses run away too?" Wang Defa threw his shovel aside and said, panting heavily.
Zhang Dabiao leaned on his shovel, not caring about the scolding, and said, resting against the edge of the pit, "Brother, do you think it's possible that the escaping corpse ate all these bodies?"
"This... is that really possible? This isn't raising Gu, and I've never heard of corpses eating corpses. Even if the corpses were eaten, there should be some bloodstains in the pit! It's not like they ate the soil too, right?"
I felt a churning in my stomach. When he said it, that image appeared in my mind, even reminding me of the scenes of zombies devouring corpses in Resident Evil.
"It's hard to say! Why don't you cast a divination for Wang team's subordinate to see where his corpse is, and then it will be clear?"
I gave Zhang Dabiao a thumbs-up. How could I not have thought of such a simple method just now!
We didn't pack up our things and just left them there. The group ran back to the campsite.
After offering incense to the Ancestor, I asked Wang Defa for the birth date and time of the subordinate who had died and began to cast a divination.
When the reflection appeared in the iron bowl, I couldn't help but gasp. Yue'er on the side even cried out in surprise.
"How could it have gone there?"