False evidence

Chapter 46 The Substitute (Part 2)

It was a fortune-telling stall with a sign that read—"Iron-Tongued King the Half-Immortal"!

Meng Chao's cousin-in-law sat on a small stool in front of the stall, her hand being held by the fortune teller Wang, her face as red as a newly blossoming peach.

Meng Chao said he had never seen his cousin's wife look like that before; she was shy and embarrassed, her face almost buried in her chest.

At that time, his cousin's wife had a certain attraction for him.

However, seeing his cousin's hand being held by a middle-aged man with a goatee and a lewd face made him very unhappy.

He immediately stepped forward and snapped his finger hard against the back of Wang Banxian's hand.

Wang Banxian winced in pain, pulling his hand back as he glared at him fiercely.

Upon hearing that his cousin-in-law was with him, Wang Banxian smiled and took out two pastries from his bag, handing one to Meng Chao and the other to his nephew.

Meng Chao was very greedy back then, but no matter how he looked at Wang Banxian, he couldn't tell that he was a bad person.

So, after taking only one bite, I turned my back and threw the pastry away.

At this moment, his cousin-in-law suddenly blushed and said to him, "I still need to buy some more things. You should take Xiaoxi back first."

When his cousin-in-law spoke up, Meng Chao had no choice (after all, he was still young).

However, the more Meng Chaoyue looked at his cousin-in-law and Wang Banxian's expressions, the more he felt something was wrong.

In his own words, the two of them looked just like the characters Ximen Qing and Pan Jinlian in the VCD.

So Meng Chao became more cautious. He pretended to agree to go home, but after walking a short distance, he circled back along the riverbank.

From afar, he could see that, although it was in public, the actions and expressions between Wang Bansian and his cousin-in-law were just not right.

After talking face-to-face for a while, Wang Banxian actually packed up his stall and walked towards the end of the night market.

Meanwhile, Meng Chao's cousin's wife, her face flushed, followed behind at a distance, avoiding his gaze.

Recalling the plot of the VCD, Meng Chao was furious. He told his nephew to keep quiet while picking up a thick tree branch and following them, using the branch as a hook.

Gradually move away from the crowd.

Meng Chao suddenly felt like he had drunk too much, and his head felt heavy and his feet felt lightheaded.

He was seething with anger, so he ignored that and continued to grit his teeth and follow along.

When he saw a secluded spot, his eyes began to glaze over.

It was at this moment that he saw Wang Banxian take his cousin's hand and step onto a small boat moored along the shore.

That kind of boat is rare in the area; it has a roof, meaning it has a cabin in the middle, somewhat like the covered boats of southern China described in the book.

Whenever Meng Chao arrives in town, he always goes to the video arcade.

In other words, in some ways, Hong Kong's video recordings can be considered his 'enlightenment teacher'.

When he saw his cousin-in-law board the boat, he immediately flew into a rage.

Damn it, what kind of fortune teller predicts someone's wife will end up on a boat?
"Xixi, you stay here and don't go anywhere..."

Meng Chao had just said something to his nephew when he noticed that his nephew's eyelids were drooping and he was drowsy.

Without thinking much, he took off his vest, put it on his little nephew, laid the little guy down in the bushes, grabbed a stick, and ran quickly down the riverbank to the shore.

"Damn it! What are you doing!"

Meng Chao ran straight to the bow of the boat and started banging on the cabin with tree branches.

After knocking three times, the cabin curtain was suddenly lifted, revealing a strange, double-faced figure!

It looked like a human face, but it was deathly pale, like a piece of styrofoam that had been soaking in water for a long time.

Because of the double image, this face appears exceptionally wide, as big as three normal people's faces.

Meng Chao was so frightened he almost screamed. The first thing that came to his mind was the legendary water ghost!
If he wasn't a water ghost, how could he have such a 'flour-like' face?

"Go to hell!"

Out of fear... and also out of human nature.

Although Meng Chao was trembling with fear, he still roared, gripped the tree branch tightly with both hands, leaped up, and slammed it down hard on the double-image white face.

He was extremely dizzy at the time, but his mind was still quite sharp.

He smashed the stick down towards the center of the double image. With one blow, a scream of pain rang out, and the double image's white face recoiled instantly.

Driven by malice, Meng Chao brandished a tree branch and charged into the cabin, howling.

The first thing I saw was a woman lying in the cabin with her eyes closed and her chest exposed, her face, neck, and even chest all flushed red.

"sister in law……"

"Uh……"

Meng Chao had just shouted when someone grabbed his neck from behind.

If an adult were strangled like that, it would be very difficult for them to escape.

However, Meng Chao was young at that time, and not only was his body weak, but his neck was also short.

Seeing a hairy arm right in front of it, it lowered its head and bit down hard.

"what……"

Amidst screams, Meng Chao crouched down, pulling himself out of the other man's armpit, then turned and swung a tree branch, smashing it down relentlessly.

His vision was getting worse and worse, but he kept swinging and smashing.

Meng Chao may act aggressively for a moment, but once he starts, he'll be ruthless to the end.

After a barrage of attacks, at first you could hear screams and groans, but then it went silent.

At this point, he lost his energy.

All I could see was a yellowish-white light, making it impossible to make out any figures.

But he was still somewhat clear-headed. Thinking of his cousin's situation, he grabbed a tree branch with one hand to block the way, squatted down, and groped around with the other hand.

Upon touching the obvious female signs, his heart pounded wildly. He then swung the branch twice more, finally flung it away, grabbed the woman, and dragged her away like a kitten carrying a mouse.

"Pfft!"

A sudden chill jolted Meng Chao awake. After regaining his composure, he realized he had fallen off the boat and into the moat.

My cousin's wife, who had also fallen into the water, seemed to have regained consciousness and was coughing repeatedly from choking.

Fortunately, the moat had accumulated too much garbage over the years, so it wasn't very deep near the bank.

Meng Chao is used to being wild and is an excellent swimmer.

Although his cousin-in-law was panicked and struggled desperately, he eventually used his knee to push her down into the lower back, grabbed her hair, and dragged her ashore.

……

"and then?"

I initially thought this was an extremely boring fantasy story, but as I listened to this part of it, I couldn't help but slow down.

Meng Chao retorted, "Do you believe that water ghosts can actually use body doubles?"

I shook my head: "Even if there was, you should know now that the fortune teller Wang back then wasn't like that at all."

Meng Chao nodded: "At that time, my cousin-in-law, my nephew, and I were all drugged. Wang Banxian and his accomplices on the boat were actually human traffickers."

He suddenly said, "But I really believe in the idea of ​​water ghosts using substitutes."

"Is there more to this?" I asked.

Meng Chao hummed in agreement: "Although I wasn't very old at the time, I had watched a lot of Hong Kong movies and knew that I should call the police if I encountered something like that..."

Cell phones weren't common back then, and by the time the police arrived, the night market had already closed.

The boat used by the kidnappers has also disappeared.

Meng Chao gritted his teeth in hatred, but there was nothing he could do.

Even the local police said that without catching them in the act, even if they found the boat, it would be difficult to convict those bastards.

Things took a turn for the better two months later.

During the dredging of the moat, after most of the water in that section was drained, municipal workers discovered two bodies.

The corpse was not completely decomposed, and its appearance was extremely bizarre.

Both corpses were found head down, feet up, like rice seedlings planted in the mud near the shore!
(End of this chapter)