Chapter 12 Strange Town

Looking back, the alley they had come from had disappeared, replaced by a tavern with a scattering of customers inside.

The waiter, with a rag draped over his shoulder, was busy pouring tea and water, his face obsequious.

Many people were moving back and forth nearby. The setting sun meant it was the busiest time of day on the street. Some vendors, eager to close up shop and go home, were shouting loudly, hoping to sell their goods quickly.

Just as everyone's tense nerves began to relax a little, Chen Qiang swayed and then collapsed to the ground.

Pi Ruan's face went white at the sight. He opened his mouth, but no sound came out.

Contrary to expectations, Chen Qiang did not die instantly, transforming into a corpse with a bizarre smile.

From everyone's perspective, his eyes were tightly closed, his body was trembling violently, his chest was rising and falling, and he was breathing rapidly.

He hadn't died; it was more like he had used some unknown means to forcibly escape the Nightmare Assault (E meng jing xi), resulting in a backlash.

"Impressive," Zhao Xingguo said with an ambiguous tone. "I didn't expect this young man to have such methods."

His words were clearly directed at Jiang Cheng. Luo He was one of the Watchers, so it wasn't surprising that he had some tricks up his sleeve, but these people with Jiang Cheng didn't seem ordinary either.

"Hey! What's going on here?" Seeing someone fall, a street vendor walked over. It was an old woman selling roasted sweet potatoes, her stall not far from them.

With a dark complexion and fine wrinkles around her eyes, the old woman squatted down, first wiping her ash-covered hands on her apron before reaching out to push Chen Qiang. "Wake up, are you alright?"

Chen Qiang curled up into a ball, as if enduring great pain.

Soon, a few more people came over, including kind-hearted passersby and vendors with stalls nearby, like the old woman.

Finally, even the tavern owner ran out, shouting, "Whose sick wretch is this? Hurry up and take him away, don't affect my business!"

The landlady waved her hand dismissively, looking fierce.

"How can you say that? The man is already this sick," a young woman immediately retorted. "Don't you have any sympathy?"

"I just want to make money," the landlady snapped, then, as if suddenly remembering something, she put her hands on her hips and said sarcastically, "If you're so concerned, why don't you take this pretty boy home with you? I bet you two are having an affair, that's why you're protecting him so much?"

"You... you're talking nonsense!" The woman was both anxious and angry. If others hadn't held her back, she would have started a fight.

At this moment, the old woman who appeared first noticed Jiang Cheng and his group. The distance between them wasn't far, about 5 or 6 meters.

The old woman sized up Jiang Cheng with her cloudy eyes. After a few seconds, she asked tentatively, "Young man, do you... do you know him?"

"No," Jiang Cheng replied cleanly.

The moment he heard Jiang Cheng's answer, Fatty's face twitched. Then, seemingly realizing something, his eyes became wary as he looked around, and his thick neck shrank back.

But he looked for a long time and found nothing unusual.

The people nearby were busy with their own affairs. The customers in the tavern were in high spirits, and peanuts were scattered on the table.

Around them, vendors were haggling with customers, and a sugar painting master was very skilled. He had just bent down to hand the sugar figure in his hand to a child whose face was filled with admiration.

From Fatty's perspective, he could even feel the child's heartfelt joy at receiving the sugar figure.

Could all of this be...

"Oh dear, what should we do?" The old woman was very kind. She squatted in front of Chen Qiang, whose face was full of pain, her face filled with concern. After a moment, she looked up again, her eyes pleading as she looked at Jiang Cheng and his group. "How about this, can you lend a hand? My body has been weak for years, and I can't exert myself too much. Can you help me... help me carry him near my house?"

"There's a local doctor there, maybe he can help," the old woman said sincerely. Looking into her eyes, Fatty even felt a moment of恍惚 (huanghu) [恍惚 means absentmindedness].

Just as his consciousness began to blur and his mouth opened, instinctively wanting to agree, a sharp pain suddenly shot up his arm.

He snapped back to reality and saw that Pi Ruan's hand was tightly gripping his arm.

Sensing Fatty's questioning gaze, Pi Ruan said with a bitter face, his trembling lips squeezing out a few words: "I... I'm scared, Brother Fugui, you can't leave me."

Before he could think further, he heard a familiar voice, with a hint of coldness that kept people at arm's length. "We don't know him at all, why should we help?" Jiang Cheng asked very frankly.

"This is about saving a life. He's our countryman after all," said the woman who had almost gotten into a fight with the tavern owner earlier because her reputation had been damaged.

She seemed very angry, as if she had classified Jiang Cheng and the landlady as the same kind of people: extremely selfish.

"Yes, you don't have to do anything, just help carry a person," someone nearby chimed in casually. "Just think of it as doing a good deed."

Jiang Cheng glanced at this person and said in a tone that was not at all conciliatory, "Then you do it." After saying that, he didn't stop, turned around, bypassed these people, and left.

Leaving Chen Qiang alone, lying on the ground, still twitching from time to time.

After walking a long way, they turned at a corner. Just as their figures disappeared around the street corner, the street they had just walked on suddenly became quiet.

No, quiet was no longer the right word to describe it. It should be... silent!

Whether it was the pedestrians on the street, the vendors who had been haggling, the men in the tavern playing drinking games, the beggars begging at the entrance of the alley...

Even the kind-hearted old woman and the righteous young woman.

At this moment, they all stopped at the same time, turned their heads, and stared stiffly in the direction where Jiang Cheng and his group had disappeared. Dozens, hundreds of gazes all focused on the same direction, the scene was silent and eerie.

After a moment, as if a switch had been flipped, eerie smiles appeared on their faces.

Fatty, his train of thought interrupted, swallowed. He had many questions in his mind, but with Doctor sandwiched between Zhao Xingguo and Fu Fu, it wasn't convenient to ask directly.

He was curious as to why Doctor had determined that there was something wrong with Chen Qiang after he fainted.

At least until now, apart from the somewhat extreme attitude of the people around them, he hadn't noticed anything else wrong.

"It's not Chen Qiang's problem," a voice came slowly.

Fatty was stunned, then slowly turned his head and saw Lin Wan'er's profile. "The problem is with the street, we've seen everyone who appeared on the street."

"In the photos on the wall of the photo studio."

Lin Wan'er's clear and cold voice was devoid of emotion.