Suddenly, a bolt of lightning streaked across the sky. In that instant of brightness, I saw The Village Chief lying on the bed. His entire body, except for his face, was shrouded in a mass of black mist. His eyes were open, the whites of his eyes standing out starkly in the darkness, staring blankly into the air.

After the lightning, the room returned to darkness, and immediately a clap of thunder exploded in the sky. I looked toward the kang, the roaring in my head even louder than the thunder.

Taking a few steps forward, I suppressed my worry, nervously placed my finger under his nose—there was no breath at all!

He’s dead?!

Startled, I stepped back, bumped into a nearby box, and fell to the ground, caught off guard.

“What’s wrong?” A beam of flashlight shone on my face. My expression must have looked terrible, because Big Lee, who had hurried over, became anxious as well.

“The Village Chief…” I had to steady my breathing before I could say the next words, “He’s dead…”

“Is something wrong with you two?” An old voice interrupted me. I whipped my head around. The old man on the kang, who had just stopped breathing, slowly sat up. “It’s so late, what are you doing in my room?”

“That room is leaking,” Big Lee said discontentedly. “We’re planning to sleep in the car, just came to let you know.”

“Oh, do as you like.”

I stared fixedly at The Village Chief, the flashlight illuminating his face. That wrinkled face looked especially eerie.

The black mist that had covered his body had vanished, as if it had never appeared.

The Village Chief turned to look at me. In the dim flashlight beam, I felt that the wrinkles on his face formed a strange smile. He was mocking me.

A chill crept into my heart. Did he deliberately hold his breath to scare me? But what was that black mist on his body?

Big Lee dragged me, full of suspicion, out of the room. Just as we were about to leave, The Village Chief suddenly said, “You dropped something.”

Puzzled, I looked down at the ground. Even with the flashlight, it was hard to see anything on the uneven earth.

The Village Chief slowly walked over to us, picked something up from the corner, and handed it to me. It was a coin, probably dropped when I fell just now.

The Village Chief ignored us after that. Once we stepped outside, he shut the door tightly behind us.

Back in the car, Big Lee and I exchanged glances and said at the same time, “The Village Chief is lying!”

It seems part of what the informant said was true. At the very least, we saw that night vision ability in The Village Chief. Besides, I had a feeling that this strange village had more oddities than just this one.

Chapter 12: Eye (4)

No crowing of roosters, no barking of dogs—the village greeted the second morning in complete silence.

It was hard to fall asleep in such a strange and eerie environment. When I woke up, I found the rain outside had stopped. I took out my phone to check the time; it still showed no service, and it was already past 6 o’clock.

By rights, at this hour, people in the countryside should be up and working, but we didn’t see any villagers coming out of their homes.

As the sky brightened, we weren’t as scared anymore, so we got out of the car and randomly picked a house to knock on the door: “Excuse me, is anyone there?”

No response. We knocked on another door: “Is anyone home?”

We knocked on several houses in a row, but not a single one opened.

Big Lee scratched his head, spat on the ground, and said, “Damn, it’s like they’re guarding against thieves! How about…” He made a gesture, and I understood he meant to secretly film. Normally, I don’t like this approach—if people don’t want to be interviewed, secretly filming them is unethical. But curiosity got the better of me, and I nodded.

We walked down a small alley and saw a section of a wall had collapsed. I gave Big Lee a look. He nodded, hoisted the camera, and climbed onto the wall, while I stepped back a few paces to keep watch.

A few minutes later, Big Lee jumped down from the wall, looking flustered. “There’s someone inside. He—he’s eating!”

I couldn’t help but laugh. “Eating? Isn’t that normal?”

“Normal, my ass!” Big Lee cursed. “He’s not eating cooked food, you know? He’s eating raw rice!”

I shuddered. “Raw rice?”

“Yes! I saw it clearly! He took it straight from the rice sack, one grain at a time, and shoved it right into his mouth.”

A strange feeling welled up in me. I remembered the informant had said that another peculiar thing about this village was that everyone seemed almost ageless, showing hardly any signs of aging. If this were a normal interview, hearing about such a scene, I’d probably think it was one of their secrets to longevity. But now, I just felt this village was getting creepier and creepier.

Big Lee’s expression was odd. After holding back for a while, he finally said to me, “Peter, I really think this place is a bit scary. How about we just go back?”

I was about to nod when I suddenly thought of something. I turned to Big Lee and said, “We can’t just go back empty-handed, can we? Since that informant has been here and knows all this, there must be a way for us to get some information from the villagers too, right?”