horror effect

Julian and Stephen visited Anna Boai on the second day after their return. They first expressed their regret for the death of Mr. Boi, and then hoped that Anna could describe in detail the circumstances of Mr. Boi's death.

"Why do you guys need to know this?!" Ana said angrily, "at a time when everyone wants to forget about it?"

"We don't mean to offend you. Stephen and I believe your husband's death has something to do with a small town legend."

"White lion?" Anna said, as if startled.

"Yes. Stephen and I have been investigating for a long time, and we found that several recent deaths in this town are related to that legend, and we have reason to believe that your husband was not the last one to die, so, hopefully It helped us a lot if you could tell what was going on."

"You say it saves someone else from dying?" Anna asked.

"I believe so."

"...I think I can tell you guys."

She walked towards the garden of the mansion, Julian and Stephen at her side.

"It was Wednesday night, and I watched Dr. Blagosh give Mikhail a small dose of sedative, because he was getting better. He fell asleep shortly after, and I went back to the Sleeping in his own room, the doctor went to rest in his guest room, leaving a servant on duty in the coat room of Mikhail's room. Everything was as usual in the first half of the night, very calm. The time of the accident was about one o'clock in the morning. I heard a sound similar to the day he fell ill. Then I heard the sound of servants running in and out. I got up and put on my pajamas and wanted to rush to Mikhail's room, but I was stopped at the door by Dr. Blagosh who had already arrived He said that the situation inside is not suitable for a pregnant woman to see. I immediately realized that Mikhail's situation was critical. So I insisted on going in with the right of the hostess. The doctor had nothing to do with me and allowed me to go in there after warning me bedroom."

Dr. Bragosh was right that the situation was indeed appalling.Mikhail was lying on the bed with three servants holding his hands and feet. There were wounds all over his body, bleeding, and the sheets were stained red.

A dagger was thrown on the floor. It was obvious that Mikhail had cut those wounds himself.

Nobody knows how he got that dagger, since we've taken all the sharps out of the room since he first got sick.

The servant on duty said that when he broke in, he saw Mikhail cutting his own chest, as if trying to dig out his heart.

"Mikhail was relatively calm when we went in. Everyone thought that the second attack had gradually passed, and the doctor began to check the wound. But at this moment, taking advantage of our slight negligence, Mikhail pulled out from under the pillow. Another dagger was stabbed in the chest several times, and blood gushed from the wound. We panicked immediately, and the doctor ordered everyone to give first aid and contact the helicopter, but we all knew that with such a serious injury, It is impossible for a person to come back to life. When we were in a hurry, Mikhail said happily with his mouth that was constantly foaming with blood, "You can't torture me anymore. I will give you the corpse." Knowing what he meant, just feeling very scared, I think he was totally crazy at the last moment."

Herbert Wernstein was driving through the valley.

Yesterday he was still in Drobeta-Severinburg. The warm sunshine of the past few days made him enjoy the fun of staring at the gray-green water of the Danube. Nested ripples spread across the surface of the water and are then submerged by the flowing water.

It might be a boring activity, but he can play it all day.The dead leaves go up and down with the waves, it comes from a beech tree seven kilometers upstream, the leaves are green in spring and darken in summer, they have hidden people kissing in the breeze, they have provided themselves to seep green sap The flesh was chewed by insects, and once shivered in the autumn wind.The leaf resisted to leave the towering mother body, and it succeeded in becoming one of the few dead leaves left on the treetops, dried, curled, wet with snow, rotted and blackened, and finally its fibers were soft and brittle, and could no longer stand Swayed by the wind, he twirled and fell into the river. After traveling seven kilometers, he was glimpsed by a human named Herbert Wernstein.

It will still travel, it will be smashed by the oars of the steamer, it will sink into the water, and the mud on the river bottom; The fish bites its jaws and then is discarded; it may be unfortunate enough to be collected by human sweepers, dried and dumped in an incinerator to a handful of ash; or it may be lucky enough to drift into the sea and see it The vast sights that the mother's mother would not be able to see in immortality, and contentedly become a delicious meal for marine microorganisms.

Another dead leaf fell from the air and touched the river bank lightly.Herbert stooped to pick it up.

The leaves slowly deformed in his palm, the folded leaves stretched, the protruding petioles shrank, the reticular veins became smooth, and the dark brown color faded.

Finally the leaves become folded letters.Herbert smiled.

He likes this method, romantic and magical, if postal agencies all over the world can use this method when sending letters, what a pleasure it would be to write and receive letters, but unfortunately, only between him and Bernus Your communication will change shape because of your imagination at the moment.

Letters from Bernus have been sent to him in the form of poached eggs, ampoules, chicks, distant love flowers, Portuguese warship jellyfish, and so on.

This time it's dead leaves.

As his hand unfolded the folded paper, the scenery around him withered like the leaf, which was another pleasure for the recipient.

So the sun faded behind the dark clouds, the flickering spots of light on the river disappeared, and the trees were fragile and unreal.And he seemed to see Bernus walking towards him through the letter paper, his red eyes were slightly smiling, and he whispered like singing:

//The earth has harvested another nourishment, supplying the beech to grow and the leaves to wither.Why don't you go back to the land where the bones are buried, and laugh at its gray eyelids and white fingerbones, and spread the love of pure white shadows? //

As Herbert's eyes passed over the last word, the letter turned into dead leaves again, real dead leaves this time, to be thrown in the river, to be swallowed or strangled.

So, one day after receiving the letter, he returned to the town.He was not at all surprised to read the news of Mikhail Bouy's death in the newspapers during the journey.

The cause of death given in the newspaper was suicide caused by depression.There is nothing wrong with saying that.thought Herbert.

Sickness is so sudden that no one ever gives much thought to what actually set off the idea of ​​suicide in the dead man's mind.

It's not that there are no people.

Herbert thought of Julian, the English reporter, and Stephen, the eccentric young man, like two curious fish that liked to bite anything that floated by, turning over leaves, twigs, scraps of rubber, and so on. Ah, peck.

But they still won't know all the reasons, at least as he himself knows.

Returning to the inn, Herbert found a foot and a half of affairs waiting for him to attend to.These various daily chores are like the milk in a baby's mouth, dripping everywhere, and like that milk, don't try to wipe it off completely.

He flipped through the files, dealt with the particularly important ones, and rolled up the rest and threw them into the fireplace.

The paper was engulfed in flames, glowing red before turning black into charcoal, ripe as rubies on a golden tree, and then only a heap of light, brittle black flakes remained.

He clapped his hands as if ashes were on them.Then he turned and left the office, walking towards a place that only changes in his dreams.

Bernus Moratov sits at the small round walnut table we already know and ponders whether to make it Chippendale or Hyperwhite.

On his pale body was a Moorish red robe embroidered with gold patterns, a belt of five-colored silk thread was wrapped around his waist, and a necklace in the shape of a dragonfly hung around his neck.

These colorful things piled up on his body, the gold thread, silk, emerald, and enamel all shone with a moving luster. Compared with the still pale Bernus, these decorations were more alive.

The door of the room opened, and Herbert Wernstein stepped onto the black and white checkered ground.

Bernous was still concentrating on the style of furniture, and when he had decided on the Chippendale style, he turned to Herbert and said: "If I want to use insect patterns as a decorative theme, is it better to be a butterfly, or a dragonfly, a scarab, or an elephant?" Nose bugs?"

"Why don't you use birds as the subject?"

"Because I used it 26 years ago, and I used the raven. But you reminded me, I can change to the heron theme this time."

"Sounds pretty good."

Herbert sat across from Bernous, took his white hand, and said: "Which part of your plan is Mikhail Bouilly?"

Bernus narrowed his eyes, and a beating of candlelight seemed to cast a slight smile on his face.

"I don't have a plan. I don't need to organize my life - if I have a life. I can watch Mr. Bouilly age slowly with his beautiful wife and grown children, but I cut The line, and Bois went mad and killed himself. It wasn't a plan, it was just fun, to put people under a microscope—" he rolled his fingers in a circle,"—or on a lens Below—" He gestured to draw a rectangular frame with both hands, "This is the fun of observation." He waved his hand and pushed the porcelain bottle on the round table to the ground and smashed it to pieces.

"You can see how a thing is destroyed."

"But you have a plan." Herbert raised his voice. "You told me once."

"Oh. Maybe I've used the word 'plan', but it's just a convenience. How else would I explain to you what I've done? That I'm just a freewheeling lunatic? You—" Bernous held out his index finger Pointing to Herbert, "-these living people always like to arrange their lives in a certain way. Get up at eight o'clock in the morning, eat breakfast; work at nine o'clock; eat, drink; have a meeting with Natalie, and Michelle signing the deal; vacationing in the Bahamas in the winter and Upsaland in the summer; making a lot of money at 40 so she can lie in a repainted and gilded coffin at 80. You long for this life— —or long for that life.”

"As if you hadn't longed to live in a certain way," said Herbert, staring at the heron emerging from the round table.

"That's right. I've had times when I've longed. But now, as a dead man, a soul through and through, I watch man from the outside, like a colony of termites. What are they doing?—reproduce, reproduce , multiply. Once you're eager to live, you melt into the busy 'termites', and you lose the ability to analyze on a larger scale. You know what I mean, when we want to see the whole round world of the earth To get the whole picture, you have to go to great heights where we don't see people."

"I don't believe that in order to understand the purpose of human beings we have to separate ourselves from human beings."

"Ah, you can try it." Bernus blinked slyly.

"Do you want me to die?" Herbert stared at him.

"Even if I don't want to, you will."

Herbert stared at him with wide eyes, and then smiled a strangely warm smile. "How long have you been thinking about it?" he asked.

"Same as you, for a long time." Bernus looked at Herbert.

"I know what you think, I know what you want. But I haven't decided what to do—whether it's what you want or what I want."

His smile looks like the smiles of ancient Roman emperors in the Colosseum, and you don't know what he's going to do next.

"You can't do that!" cried Herbert.

Bernus suppressed his smile and said coldly.

"you can go now."

Then he raised his pale hands and patted them lightly.