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Chapter 183 Dead without a corpse
Lu Qing glanced at Zhu Yu silently, and Zhu Yu shook his head slightly.

She was very sure that her father knew nothing about this matter. Otherwise, no matter how much he disliked supernatural things, he would not have allowed half of the able-bodied men in a village to disappear inexplicably and ignored it.

This also made her sigh.

It's not that she looks down on her father. Emperor Jin sits high above the temple and is respected as the common ruler of the world. Even if something unusual or strange happens in Lizhou, he can know everything clearly and send people to deal with it immediately.

Zhu Cheng, who was only guarding the small fiefdom of Shuo Kingdom, was completely unaware of such a big event happening outside the capital.

Obviously, he only knew what was happening outside through the reports from the officials below. As for whether anyone exaggerated the situation or concealed the truth, Zhu Cheng was obviously not aware of it.

With such cunning and cunning tactics...treason? Haha, just thinking about it makes Zhu Yu laugh out loud.

This is clearly the perfect cannon fodder.

"Father-in-law, does this kind of thing only happen in your village, or does it happen in other places as well?" Zhu Yu collected his thoughts and asked the old man who ran the tea stall.

"It's not just our village, there are many such incidents around here," the old man said with a gloomy face, sighing, "If it was a young girl or wife, or a young child who disappeared, it would be easy to deal with. At most, we could just hide the person in the house and not let them go out.

But a young and strong man can't just stay in the house every day. He has to go out to work. And who knows when he might go out and never come back."

"Did all these people disappear within a short period of time?"

"Not really, it happens intermittently, with one or two people disappearing every ten days or half a month." The wrinkles on the old man's face were squeezed together, "Every time, when everyone thinks there's nothing wrong, someone disappears again.

It's hard to guard against, it's hard to guard against!

It was rumored everywhere that some evil spirit had occurred, or that the mountain god had been angered somehow, so all the strong men were captured?

So everyone thought, could we invite some Taoist priests or wizards to come and see what was going on? Was it to exorcise evil spirits or pay tribute? There had to be a way after all.

Now it’s all good! Someone invited some Taoist priests over, it looks like we’re saved!”

"Father-in-law, where did those young men you mentioned disappear?" Zhu Yu asked.

The old man waved his hands and said, "I don't know about that. I'm alone and run a tea stall here. There's no one else at home.

I heard those things from other people in the village and from people who came and went.

They said all sorts of things, and I couldn't figure out what was going on. I just knew that a lot of people had simply disappeared without a trace."

The old man obviously had high hopes for Zhu Yu and the other five people, so he was particularly attentive and poured a bowl of his own tea for each of them one by one as if he were presenting a treasure.

Especially when it comes to talismans, the old man is extremely enthusiastic.

Originally, Fu Wen was worried that his brother's fierce appearance would scare the old man, but he didn't expect that the other party would trust him more because the talisman looked like a furious King Kong. He thought that the old man might be the most accomplished among these Taoist priests, and was afraid that he would be unhappy if he didn't treat him well.

This really made everyone feel a little bit amused and helpless.

Even Fu Lu himself was at a loss, not to mention feeling very uncomfortable. There was no way there was any good tea in a teahouse in the wild. Even the tea here didn't taste like tea leaves.

Zhu Yu didn't even want to touch the bitter tea. He took a sip of the salty tea and felt it was a bit strange and not very palatable.

The bowl of sweet tea was quite good, lightly sweet with a hint of preserved fruit aroma. After drinking a bowl of it, it relieved a lot of the dry mouth caused by the journey.

After drinking tea and resting in this teahouse, the group set off again.

Although the old man was determined that they were masters who came to help exorcise evil spirits and refused to accept money for the tea, Fu Lu still kept the money as Lu Qing instructed, and the five people continued on their journey.

This time they slowed down their pace and paid attention to their surroundings along the way. They soon discovered that it was just as the old man said. Wherever they passed, they could see women working in the fields and elderly women changing clothes by the river.

When they passed a forest, they met an old woman who looked to be in her seventies, who was struggling to drag a bundle of branches tied with cloth strips. Her frail body could barely pull the bundle, and every step she took was very strenuous. She had to stop after a few steps, standing there gasping for breath and wiping the sweat from her forehead with her worn sleeves.

Fu Wen looked at Lu Qing, and when Lu Qing nodded, he quickly jumped off his horse and went to meet the old woman: "Old lady, let me help you!"

The old woman was taken aback when she heard a young man talking to her. She looked up, but when Fu Wen came closer, her dim eyes could clearly see that the man was a strange man. He looked tall and strong, and seemed to have a lot of strength.

Seeing the person coming clearly, the old woman hurriedly waved her hands at Fu Wen, "No, no! Child, hurry up and leave. Don't stay in this forest or in the mountains! Go as far as you can! Don't let the goblins catch you!"

"Old lady, don't panic, don't panic!" Fu Wen hurriedly comforted her, "Look at who I am."

The old woman blinked her eyes vigorously, pulled Rune closer and looked at him carefully. Seeing that he was wearing a Taoist robe, she breathed a sigh of relief and patted her chest: "Oh, it's a little Taoist priest! That's good, that's good! After all, that demon won't dare to kidnap a Taoist priest!"

"Come on, old man, I'll help you take the firewood back!" Fu Wen picked up the bundle of firewood from the ground with one hand, put it on his shoulder effortlessly, and said to the old woman.

The old woman was very grateful and thanked him repeatedly, then she took the rune and walked towards her home.

The other four followed them and returned after Fu Wen sent the old woman back home.

"Master, I just sent the old lady back home and asked her about the situation here." Fu Wen got on his horse and said to Lu Qing, "The old lady told me that many of the able-bodied men in her village had accidents in the mountains."

"He was kidnapped when he went up the mountain?" Lu Qing frowned, feeling a little confused.

If such a large-scale kidnapping is to be carried out, it will naturally require a large number of people and a big scene.

In this case, how could the local officials and King Shuo Zhucheng be unaware of this?

Fu Wen shook his head with a strange expression: "No, I heard that they all went up the mountain to work during the day, either hunting or chopping wood, and went home normally at night.

But after returning home, they have no energy and go to bed early. At night, when others have gone to bed, they will quietly get up, walk out of the house, and never be seen again.

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　　(End of this chapter)