Chapter 85: Drought Demon

  A lithe figure darted through the thicket, and the rustling of leaves caused by the occasional brushing against branches did not attract anyone's attention.

  The grave was chosen at the waist of the mountain, which is a place with extremely good feng shui. The burial steps were all carried out according to procedure. Du Si Lin crouched on a tree trunk not far away for a long time, and only when his legs had become numb did the entire ceremony come to an end.

  A group of people returned along the same path, preparing for a banquet with white wine at night.

  Du Sulin casually picked up a leaf, green and transparent, but not moist. The edge of the leaf was curled into a small roll, looking like it was suffering from insufficient water supply. Looking around, he found that it wasn't just the leaf in his hand that was like this, only some newly grown tender leaves were lush and didn't know thirst.

  He stretched out his hands and let the leaves drift away, and Douglas Lin stared at the grave again, lost in thought. Until a sudden clap of thunder rang out in the sky.

  Thunderstorms in the south are common, but they shouldn't be happening at this time of year.

  Dou Sulin gazed at the flashing electric light in the air, a smile playing on his lips. With a few leaps, he vanished into the shadows of the trees.

  The streets were still not crowded, with scattered white paper money all over the ground. The square hollow in the middle was like a twisted lip, outlining a mocking expression, and also like a slightly curved eye, with a smile that made people shudder between their eyebrows.

  The water element in the air seemed to have been evaporated by the scorching heat of this vast land, making it unbearably hot and dry. Du Siling rushed back to his hotel room at top speed, so fast that he didn't even enter through the main door, but instead climbed in through an open window.

  The four people in the room stared at each other, looking at this person who almost fell from the sky. The first to react was Dong Shuanghe, who chuckled twice and teased: "When did Taitang also learn not to walk through the front door?"

  Du Sulin shook his head, walked a few steps to the bedside table, poured himself a glass of water and drank it all in one gulp, seemingly wanting to calm down his emotions. He then raised an eyebrow, with a hint of a smile, saying: "Take advantage of the opportunity to make fun of me now, after tonight, you might not even have the chance."

  Listening to Du Sulin's words, Dong Shuanghe and Lan'er's expressions were still calm, with almost no change, after all, the two had been through life and death, while Haozi was still confused by Du Sulin's words, only Chen Zhouyuan's heart sank inexplicably, he thought, his guess was indeed correct, something very serious had happened.

  "What's going on?" Chen Zhou Yun couldn't help but ask, his face longer than a donkey's at this moment, with a serious black silence hanging on his originally white and refined face. "Lan'er went to the police station, and that corpse actually turned into a mummy." He thought of Lan'er's incredulous expression when she came back not long ago, wondering if this matter had any connection with what Du Si Lin was thinking about, so he added.

  "Has it become a mummy?" Du Si Lin glanced at Chen Zhou Yun, his gaze quickly falling on Lan Er, "What specific characteristics does it have?"

  Lan's eyebrows furrowed, her bright red lips slightly pursed as she recalled, "The skin all over the body was dry, but it still felt elastic to the touch, and it was black in color, with a slight reddish tint. I touched it too, but there wasn't any black jade pillar inside. However, there didn't seem to be any soul left in that corpse either, it had been dead for quite some time, probably scattered already. Oh wait," Lan's eyes suddenly lit up, her index finger tapping a few times as she said, "It seems like he was bitten twice, one on the left and one on the right!"

  "I think I roughly understand," Du Sulin sat down, supporting his forehead with one hand, thinking to himself that this was no ordinary zombie.

  "What do you understand, come and tell us!" Chen Zhou's forehead was covered with dense small beads of sweat, either because he was too hot or because Du Si Lin had rushed him. He loosened his tie and the buttons on the collar of his white shirt, took a deep breath to calm himself down a bit.

  Dou Sulin glanced at Chen Zhouyuan, who seemed unusually restless today, unlike his usual calm demeanor. Was the hot weather making him irritable? She looked at Haozi again, but didn't notice anything different, except that he had drunk a few more cups of water than usual.

  "What's in that coffin, I think it should be a jiangshi, and a dry one at that." Du Siling withdrew her gaze, her fingers interlocking as she tapped them on her knee, and lazily added another sentence, "I think the whole city of Tiaoqi is in trouble, and the worst off will probably be me..." She fell silent for a moment, then looked at Lan'er, "With you."

  "What does it have to do with me?" Lan Er retorted incredulously, rolling her eyes.

  Originally, Du Sulin didn't have such a guess, but the corpse Lan'er saw at the police station made her think of this idea. The desiccated corpse was clearly an undead that had been drained of its vital energy, and it was only because the body hadn't fully dissipated into nothingness after being drained that it didn't become a desiccated corpse, with all its essence sucked away.

  Douslin remembered the grandmother he met some time ago, as well as her son, daughter-in-law and grandson Beibei. Zombies can devour each other, and after absorbing another zombie's essence, they will become even more powerful.

  Lan'er is not a zombie, but a fairy who has cultivated for ten lifetimes! Her soul is surrounded by auspicious purple, not the black and gray of ordinary yin souls. Even though Lan'er's cultivation time is still shallow at this time, the purple color is not thick and condensed, but a fairy is a fairy after all. Her essence is absolutely incomparable to that of ordinary people.

  Du Sulin repeated his idea simply to a few people, this time Lan Er surprisingly didn't get angry but instead smiled back.

  Her smile is like a flower, not beautiful but charming, captivating people's hearts.

  She said: "It turns out that Orchid is actually a fairy! The fetal light was deceiving Orchid, how bitter!" Although the words were tinged with blame, they made people feel numb from the bones.

  Du Sulin couldn't help but shudder, and dryly laughed twice, saying: "As for the part about the immortal, I was just guessing too, that's why I didn't tell you, it wasn't intentional to keep it from you."

  "How can you still be so relaxed!" Chen Zhou's eyebrows were almost locked into a dead knot, he looked at Du Silin and Laner who were joking with each other, and then glanced at Dong Shuanghe who was smoking by himself, his heart racing with anxiety. As for the drought demon, how could he not have heard of it? The saying that "when the drought demon appears, the land will be dry for thousands of miles" is something even a child would know, and thinking about Du Silin's pale face earlier, he couldn't understand at all why she was so calm now.

  "What's wrong?" Du Sulin stretched out her hand to touch the pillow, leaning against the headboard, her tone lazy. Yes, before that, she was indeed serious, but maybe after telling this matter to the people around her and seeing Chen Zhouzong who was even more nervous than her, she relaxed a lot. "Don't be so tense, he hasn't become a demon yet, but it's almost time. Otherwise, the city of Rong would have been in a severe drought long ago, and it wouldn't be as peaceful as today."

  Du Sulin sighed inwardly, actually the goblin that was about to become a dry corpse wasn't easy to deal with either. The thing that goblins feared most were black dog blood and the urine of a thousand children. However, this black dog blood had to be from a dog born from the combination of a wild dog and a fox, and the urine of a thousand children had to be mixed together. Both of these things were extremely troublesome to obtain, if it was said that one more thing was needed... The first thing that appeared in Du Sulin's mind was a pair of bright, black and white eyes, when smiling they would always narrow into a crescent shape, attempting to squint into a bridge but never succeeding. If only the little guy were here, Du Sulin thought to himself.

  But it seems that there is no way here, and soon she denied the idea just now. The drought demon and dragon are mutually restrictive, the little guy's teeth are not even grown, and his soul is not complete, how can he restrict a drought demon who has been unknown for many years! If you go, you will definitely be eaten first.

  That white and plump butt, taking a bite of it would definitely be satisfying to death, Du Siling thought.

  "Lan'er, let's go ask for food tonight." Du Siling said subconsciously.

  No one answered her, Du Siling suddenly came back to herself and found that the four people's eight eyes were staring at her in unison. She slapped herself hard, knowing in her heart that she was in trouble! Sure enough, Lan Er saw Du Siling come back to herself, so she walked up with her hands on her hips, looking fierce, and reached out to pull Du Siling off the bed, saying: "What did you say? You want me to go beg for food? I'm not going! Let me tell you, when it's time to eat, you have to take the lead and rush forward saying 'Eat me, eat me!' Although you don't have much meat on your bones, you should still need a few days to digest it! Do you know that?"

  Douslin's clothes in front of her chest were grabbed, and she didn't resist. She was originally taller than Lan'er, and now she was standing on the bed, so Lan'er simply floated up a distance to make the difference between them not too much.

  "Know, know..." Du Sulin echoed, "We'll take Seventeen with us to beg for food tonight, seventeen big heads." As she spoke, she lay down again.

  Before Dong Shuanghe could react, Du Siling suddenly lay down with her arms open, and Lan'er was caught off guard. Instead of letting go of Du Siling's hand, she was pulled down along with her.

  "Ah——!" Along with a scream that couldn't be fully expressed, Lan'er discovered her face was wrapped in something soft. She lifted her head and happened to meet Du Si Lin's gaze looking at her own eyes. The next moment she found the soft thing wrapping around her face suddenly turned red, and she quickly scrambled up from Du Si Lin's body, saying: "It has nothing to do with me, you fell down by yourself, who sleeps like this, aren't you afraid of hitting your head..."

  The words were spoken in a softer and softer tone, with no hint of the previous momentum. At this moment, Lan'er only felt her face burning hotly, but she was a ghost, no, she was an immortal, not supposed to have such feelings of heat or cold. And why was her heart beating so fast? She subconsciously touched her chest, her heart almost jumping out of her ribcage. According to reason, these were all symptoms that shouldn't be appearing on her! Hadn't she already died?! Lan'er for the first time deeply yearned to become a lifeless corpse once again. She left her puppet body and took deep breaths as quietly as possible. The strange sensations from her body suddenly disappeared, leaving her feeling somewhat empty. She didn't understand why she had made those consecutive actions before.

  Looking at Du Sulin, she found that her gaze had always been on herself. In that deep and profound gaze, there seemed to be... scrutiny? Lan'er didn't like Du Sulin's gaze very much, just as she was thinking of speaking up to shift her attention, Du Sulin spoke first, causing her words to only pass through her mind before being strangled in the cradle.

  "Tonight should be the time of drought," the thunder outside made Du Sulin recall his thoughts, "all of you stay in the room, don't go out."

  "No matter what noise is outside or what news you receive, don't go out unless I come back." She thought for a moment and added another sentence.

  The author has something to say: I didn't update yesterday and I'm really sorry, because some things happened that left me feeling weak from head to toe.

  A good friend's family was subjected to domestic violence last night. The 13-year-old brother was beaten by his father until he broke a bone while trying to protect his sister and mother, but still couldn't protect them well. To save on the expensive surgery fee, the brother insisted on not having surgery and letting the bone heal on its own. Although it took longer due to being in a cast, the bone eventually healed slightly crooked, but otherwise without any major issues. I'm deeply moved by the child's understanding and feel very helpless and frustrated.

  Can only stare and listen helplessly.

  Today's chapter is a supplement for yesterday's. Once again, I'd like to apologize to everyone.