Bait

Undoubtedly, everyone was stunned the moment my words were spoken!

After a while, Old Zhang with the gold tooth let out a long sigh, "It seems that this trip was not in vain, at least all our previous speculations were confirmed—the perpetrator is some unclean entity, and it targeted Qin Hongmei specifically. The other victimized girls were just caught in the crossfire! Let's look around and see if we can find any other clues."

No sooner said than done, we started searching carefully in Qin Hongmei's room, not willing to miss a single page of any book. Unfortunately, apart from the words on the ground and some unwashed bloodstains, we found nothing else, which inevitably led to some disappointment among us who had high hopes. As it got dark, we finally left the place, closed the door behind us, and returned to the old village chief's house. The old chief's wife had already prepared the meal, and we ate dinner in silent gloom.

After dinner, the old village chief brought up the matter again: "Priest Zhang, what should we do now?"

"Wait!"

Old Zhang with the gold tooth took a deep breath: "We have looked for the clues we could find, but none were conclusive. We have no understanding of this harmful entity, so now we can only use the simplest method—wait for the rabbit! I have summarized the characteristics of this entity; it specifically targets unmarried girls. It seems to have a special interest in them. Old Chief, find out which unmarried girls are still in the village later, make a list, and then we'll secretly protect these girls. We're bound to intercept this malicious entity!"

The old village chief's face looked troubled.

But Old Zhang with the gold tooth thought the chief was reluctant to risk the lives of the villagers and immediately assured: "Rest assured, since I have taken on this matter, I will definitely resolve it. As long as I am in Dingtao Village, I will not let that thing harm another soul! I've considered possible oversights in protection, and it's very unlikely that they will happen. That thing has just taken its tenth life and must be hiding somewhere we don't know to digest its action. But I bet, on the night of the full moon three days from now, it will surely appear. The full moon night has the strongest yin energy, a prime time for unclean entities to harm people. It will definitely come knocking, which means we only need to wait three more days at most. Grit your teeth and hold on, there won't be any mishaps!"

"You misunderstand me, I'm not worried about whether you all will do your best. Since you came here yesterday, you've been busy investigating. I've seen all this, and I'm not ungrateful. I can tell who to trust and who not to!"

The old village chief shook his head and sighed: "It's just that Dingtao Village is small with few people, and there were not many unmarried young girls to begin with. And with this ongoing issue these past months, the villagers are terrified. Anyone who can, fled elsewhere to hide, leaving behind less than half. There are pitifully few unmarried young girls left... Erniu... is the last one!"

Upon hearing this, Old Zhang with the gold tooth's expression changed: "Are you saying that there are no more unmarried young girls in the village?"

The old chief nodded.

"Not good!"

Old Zhang with the gold tooth immediately stood up, his face looking very troubled: "This entity specifically harms unmarried girls; and when Dingtao Village had unmarried girls, it mostly operated within the vicinity. But if Dingtao Village no longer has its targets, I'm afraid it will start targeting the surrounding villages. If the search area expands, it's likely we won't be able to find it. If it harms more people, it won't just be a disaster for the Dingtao Village area, but it might become a scourge for the entire world of the living!"

I was startled by Old Zhang with the gold tooth's words and asked, "Does that mean there's no solution?"

Old Zhang with the gold tooth's eyes shone as he looked at me: "There is one more method."

His gaze made me feel uneasy, and I couldn't help saying: "Just spit it out, will you? Why look at me like that?"

Old Zhang with the gold tooth chuckled, his big gold tooth shimmering under the light: "Since Dingtao Village has no unmarried girls, but we can't create a fake one?"

"A fake?"

My eyes lit up: "That's a good idea, but it's probably not easy to find an unmarried girl from another village to come here, right? After all, our situation is quite dire, and almost everyone within miles knows about it. Unless they are particularly short on money, I guess they wouldn't come here to earn this dangerous money."

"Who said creating a fake means hiring an unmarried girl from another village?"

Old Zhang with the gold tooth rolled his eyes at me: "You just pretend to be one, wouldn't that suffice?"

"Are you crazy?"

I was upset: "You want a big guy like me to dress up as a woman, isn't that deceiving ghosts?"

"Correct, deceiving ghosts!"

Old Zhang with the gold tooth stared at my face and chuckled: "Let me tell you, unless it's an unclean entity with thousands of years of cultivation, generally these entities actually can't see human gender. They distinguish between the sexes of the living mainly through one thing—detecting the yang -qi on a person's body! You should know that living humans' yang-qi is stronger in men than in women. Generally speaking, virgins have the strongest yang-qi, while unmarried girls have the most yin-qi. Once they are married and have that kind of relationship, the yin and yang neutralize each other, and the yin and yang on both sides will balance out! That is to say, if that unclean entity comes to the village to harm people again, it will definitely choose the one with the strongest yin-qi!! And now in Dingtao Village, in terms of who has the strongest yin-qi and resembles an unmarried girl the most, that would definitely be you!"

I was angry, so it turns out it was because of my weak yang energy?

Old Zhang with the gold tooth stood up and patted my shoulder: "Since you've already agreed to help the old chief resolve this matter no matter what, then I would ask you to be the bait. Rest assured, I will ensure your safety, and tomorrow another friend of mine will come over, a real expert. With him here, you are in even safer hands!"

With that said, I suddenly lost my temper; it seemed that whether I accepted this task willingly or not, I had no choice. No help for it; who made me assure the old chief that I would resolve this matter this morning?

Once the matter was settled, Old Zhang with the gold tooth immediately became excited, exchanged some whispers with the old chief, and then dragged me to his room.

In no time at all, the old village chief came with a set of women's clothing and some cosmetics, placed them on the table, and left.

Seeing these things, my heart sank, and I had a bad premonition, which indeed happened. After seeing the things, Old Zhang with the gold tooth immediately demanded that I change into women's clothes. It annoyed me so much I almost rushed at him, but after he said that if this task were completed, he would give me two percent of the reward as labor fees—more than twenty thousand yuan—I reluctantly went to the bedroom to change. Thankfully, the clothes the old chief brought were the ones the village women wore when working in the fields, which didn't inconvenience my actions except for the constant discomfort in my heart. This was perhaps a blessing in disguise; had he brought me a dress, I would have been utterly devastated.

But that wasn't the end!!

After I changed clothes, Old Zhang with the gold tooth praised me loudly for a while and then took me to the mirror, took the cosmetics, and started to apply makeup to my face. After he was done, I looked in the mirror and my anger surged.

At that moment, my face was covered in thick foundation, looking pale and ghostly; my lips smeared with bright red lipstick, terrifyingly red like blood—this appearance in the mirror was simply scary—I was clearly painted up like a corpse!

Is this not cursing me? I was about to grab Zhang gold tooth's collar and give him a good beating when he seriously said, "I'm not joking with you, I know this makeup is not auspicious, but you are not attracting the living, so naturally, you need to wear this kind of makeup for the dead to see!"

Hearing this made me a bit disheartened and I had to relent. Just as I let go, Old Zhang with the gold tooth said that from tomorrow on, whether day or night, I needed to wander around the village to attract the harmful entity, while he would protect me from the shadows.

This was too much! Wasn't this humiliating me enough? To throw me onto the streets for a public display?

I was so frustrated I didn't know what to do, I just stayed away from this bastard and slammed the door to go to sleep. I vaguely heard Zhang gold tooth shouting from behind, reminding me to be careful not to rub off the makeup on my face while sleeping.

...

That night, I fell asleep full of frustration, and to make things worse, before dawn the next morning, that beast Zhang gold tooth came knocking on my door—for what, no need to say—it was to show off on the streets and attract the dirty thing!

And so my nightmare began. No matter where I went, a bunch of village kids laughed and pointed at me from behind. The villagers of Dingtao Village also laughed when they saw me, making me feel like a monkey, wanting nothing more than to find a crack to crawl into. If I hadn't been afraid of scaring these villagers, I really wanted to tell them—I'm definitely not a buffoon invited by monkeys; I'm here to resolve a deadly matter for you, not to make you laugh!

And thus, I performed public displays in the village for three full days. I never saw the "expert" friend mentioned by Zhang gold tooth. I even began to think it was a lie to trick me into being the bait. I've asked him several times, but Zhang gold tooth just chuckled, saying his friend had been following me in the shadows all along. However, I am now quite skeptical of his words; whoever trusts him will die the fastest!

Fortunately, the day I was so eagerly looking forward to finally arrived. Tonight is the night of the full moon, and it should also be the last day of my "public display" in the village. It's time to give me a quick resolution—life or death!