Winter Returns

Chapter 133 "Clay Figure" (Seeking monthly votes!)

"This is the first time I've ever seen that thing either."

"Wait a minute," Zhang Shutong interrupted her, "Let me process this..."

He didn't stay in bed anymore, whether lying on his back or down, but struggled to get out of bed, his head buzzing.

It was already terrifying enough that someone who had been dead for many years had appeared, but now Lu Qinglian was telling him that the thing was not only not a living person, but it didn't even have anything to do with "humans".

Zhang Shutong tugged at the collar of his hospital gown and suddenly felt a little short of breath.

To be honest, he hadn't thought about these issues in detail. From taking Gu Qiumian out of the villa, to that dream, to opening Lao Song's diary, and then to stopping that woman, all he was thinking about was how not to repeat the same mistakes.

After waking up, the time travel was triggered again. At that time, I already had a fever and my mind was foggy. I was only thinking about why I came back and what happened on this timeline.

Once I was sure I was in a hospital room, I started thinking about what I had missed this week. My hospitalization had a significant impact, and figuring out how to explain it to everyone was a real headache.

It could be said that his mind never stopped, but after running for so long, he never seriously considered what the woman's existence itself meant.

There was something unusual about the island. He had long anticipated this. Whether it was the folklore and legends he had heard as a child or his past experiences, he had long been certain that the deaths of Gu Qiumian, Lu Qinglian, and himself could not be explained by a typical "serial murder case."

But these secrets have always been shrouded in mystery for him.

Now they have taken the initiative to unveil themselves, appearing unexpectedly before my eyes.

Some of those supernatural and ghostly things are just stories to be heard, some are half-believed, some are just things you scare yourself with, and some you subconsciously believe, but you are overwhelmed by the fear of the unknown, so you subconsciously hide them in a corner of your brain and are unwilling to think about them deeply.

But now it's different.

It's not a story, a tale, or a legend, but reality that forces you to unveil them and explore their naked truth.

Zhang Shutong vaguely remembered Lu Qinglian telling him that his problems could be roughly divided into four types.

One is what she knows, and the other is what she doesn't know.

There's another kind of thing she knows but can't say.

The last one is the one you're unaware of.

Zhang Shutong used to think nothing of it, believing that this woman always liked to speak in suspense and unclearly.

But now I realize that, in a sense, it was for my own good.

Perhaps in her eyes, she really didn't need to know so much. Wouldn't it be better to just be a student and return to a normal life?

As the saying goes, curiosity killed the cat, but it's not just cats; people can be killed by it too.

You stumbled upon a door, and out of curiosity, opened it and stepped inside, entering a new world. You forced yourself to take a few steps, but as regret welled up inside you, a gust of wind suddenly rushed behind you—the door had already closed.

But you can never go back.

It was already dark, and the corridor outside was noisy, but the room was quiet. The lights were off. Zhang Shutong stared at Lu Qinglian's back. Under the cold moonlight, they seemed to be in another world.

Lu Qinglian was waiting for his answer.

If you nod, she will say what follows.

If she shook her head, Zhang Shutong had no doubt that she would turn around and leave.

He wouldn't say something like "Can you wait a moment while I think about it?" Zhang Shutong just thought wearily that the time rewind he had just experienced was so timely. Without it, he probably would have hesitated. His original wish was to devote himself to a peaceful life, and he thought that saving Gu Qiumian would fulfill his mission.

But this time, the time travel happened, placing the future world before him and saying that it was far from over, that he was still living a miserable life, that Gu Qiumian had still left the island, and that Lu Qinglian would still die.

Humans are contradictory beings.

When he was on the cold-blooded line, he was abandoned by everyone, so he made up his mind that if he had to do it again, he would not be so cold-blooded.

Now, I think with almost helpless frustration, "Please, can't you be a little more cold-blooded? You should just pack up and leave, otherwise you'll be living a life of constant running around. Oh, I've got an idea! Let's just call this timeline the Wild Dog Timeline."

Now Zhang Shutong looked at Lu Qinglian. She had saved his life, and it was really not in his nature to just leave.

Besides, leaving would be equivalent to returning to the life of the original timeline. Transferring to a school in the city or even further away, and gradually losing contact with friends, is not the life Zhang Shutong wants. To put it bluntly, it's tantamount to escaping this island.

Moreover, he may have no choice now. Zhang Shutong even suspects that if these issues are not resolved thoroughly, he will be trapped in the cycle of eight years ago and now.

“You’ve been hesitating for too long,” Lu Qinglian said slowly.

"It's not that I'm hesitating." Zhang Shutong let out a breath and peeled an orange. He wanted to say, "Don't you think I'm pretty busy?" but then he remembered that Lu Qinglian was the one who was always on the go, so he couldn't bring himself to say it.

Let's get straight to the point.

"This is the first time you've seen it, which means you don't know where it came from either?"

Lu Qinglian nodded.

"Then how do you know about its existence?"

"You should still remember those frozen snakes."

"Are there any other distinguishing features or clues about her?"

“No, I checked her clothes later,” Lu Qinglian said bluntly. “I tried to find some answers from her identity, but now it seems there’s no connection.”

"So what exactly is this 'mud person' you're talking about? It's too vague, I don't quite understand. A mud person, a swamp person?" Zhang Shutong asked, puzzled. "I do remember you saying that her body is very soft, like an king oyster mushroom. What do you mean?"

Hey... wait a minute.

A terrifying answer suddenly occurred to him:

"You didn't kill her and then find there was no blood, did you?"

“Zhang Shutong, what are you thinking?” Lu Qinglian tore off the white pith from the orange with her nimble hands and said casually, “I took it to that place you called the ‘forbidden zone,’ and then it became something else.”

She gently tapped the thermos on the bedside table with her finger:
"A small clay sculpture, about this size."

"It's that simple?"

"It's that simple."

"It feels like some strange thing is haunting us, or perhaps the dead have come back to life?" Zhang Shutong wondered. If sending the haunting "dead" to the "forbidden zone" would be equivalent to them finding peace, then how did these dead come back to life?
Is the key also in the restricted area?

He seemed to have heard similar stories somewhere before. Apart from the shipwreck incident back then, the reason why the restricted area was called the restricted area was because it was short for "no-man's land." It was the lowest point on the entire island, where the dead would rise from the mud and return to the world.

And every time Gu Qiu Mian died in that place, if that mud figure wasn't dealt with, it might mean... Zhang Shutong suddenly touched his neck, where goosebumps rose, because he remembered the murderer who killed him on the Cold Blood Line.

She had something wrapped around her face, much like Gu Qiumian's red scarf.

Zhang Shutong was stunned for a long time.

The person who killed him, who had puzzled him for so long, seemed to have been resolved in that instant.

He opened his mouth silently, feeling the muscles at the corners of his eyes stretch little by little, but he couldn't make a sound.

Assuming that both the woman named "Yun" and Gu's mother's remains were resurrected because they appeared in a restricted area, then...

What was the story behind Lu Qinglian that he saw?

Zhang Shutong's breath hitched.

He slowly turned his head, and Lu Qinglian was looking at him with her back to the moonlight. Her eyes, which were usually amber in color, now had a dark light.

Zhang Shutong suddenly realized that when he asked her how clay figures came about, she always gave vague answers because it was something that simply couldn't be explained!

There are three known individuals. If the first two are dead people who have come back to life, then what about the last one?

She stared blankly at herself, her lips moving.

Suddenly my phone rang.

Zhang Shutong's heart skipped a beat. Both of them looked at the glowing phone. Lu Qinglian had placed it on the windowsill not long ago, and now a phone call had broken the silence in the room. Zhang Shutong stared at the phone, but before he could speak, Lu Qinglian handed it to him.
"From Teacher Song."

"..."

Zhang Shutong answered the phone, and a man's voice rang out:
"Shutong, how are things on your end?" Song Nanshan was still weak. He said intermittently, "I haven't seen Du Kang. Did he go back to the island? Where are you and Qiu Mian now?"

“It’s been resolved.” Zhang Shutong glanced at Lu Qinglian.

After a long silence:
"That person... is Qiu Mian's mother?"

"Hmm." The man suddenly seemed a little anxious;
"H-How was it resolved? Could it be that her mother didn't actually die, or...?"

“You should have had the answer by now,” Zhang Shutong said softly. “The dead cannot be brought back to life.”

"..."

Old Song's rapid breathing gradually calmed down. He didn't ask why the dead person had appeared in the mortal world, nor did he inquire about what it meant to "deal with a dead person." His voice lowered:

"I see."

Song Nanshan's already weak voice became even weaker.

As if the last glimmer of hope in her heart had been shattered, Zhang Shutong could almost see the man lying on the hospital bed, staring blankly at the ceiling.

The night wind howled past.

After an even longer silence, Zhang Shutong thought he was no longer paying attention to the phone call, but then Song Nanshan whispered again:

"You should have seen what's in my room. I'm sorry, Shutong, I shouldn't have dragged you into this."

"Would you like to rest for a while?"

"I know you must have a lot of questions for me. Wait for me to find a secluded place." You could almost hear him struggling to get up, as if the conversation had been forgotten in the blink of an eye. Old Song, slipping on his slippers, habitually muttered, "I knew it was a county hospital, even has a private bathroom. I'll go in, lock the door, and we can talk in detail later..."

He spoke carelessly and meaninglessly, but because he smoked too much, his voice was so hoarse that even clear speech was difficult for him.

Zhang Shutong didn't intend to expose him; she simply waited for the door to close before asking:

When did you spot the long-haired woman?

"Four years ago, or three years ago, to be honest I can't remember exactly, but it was around that time."

What happens in between?

"Just like in the notes, I gained nothing and it suddenly disappeared."

"If I'm not mistaken, at that time you were still searching for your teacher's wife, but you didn't know Gu Qiumian's mother. Yet you included her photo in the package. Does that mean..."

"Just as you guessed, the same one, she, became her, in that wasteland in the west, I even drove you and Qiu Mian there."

"I understand," Zhang Shutong said goodbye. "Please rest for a while, I still have some things to take care of."

Zhang Shutong hung up the phone.

Actually, there were two guesses at the time. One was that the three people were three separate individuals.

Another point is that those three people are actually one person.

Zhang Shutong believed it was the latter because Lao Song had slipped in an insignificant photo.

He looked at Lu Qinglian again. Zhang Shutong had turned on the speakerphone, so she could hear the conversation between the teacher and student clearly. Zhang Shutong stared silently at Lu Qinglian's chest. She was wearing a thick blue robe and breathing very lightly, so her chest was not visible.

"What are you looking at?" Lu Qinglian frowned and turned to the side.

Zhang Shutong ruled out the possibility that Lu Qinglian was dead.

A dead person's sprained ankle never swells.

“You heard everything,” he said.

"Ah."

The two looked at each other.

In fact, they all frowned almost simultaneously when Lao Song said the words "four years ago".

If this is the first time Lu Qinglian has seen this thing.

So--

How did the woman from four years ago come back to life? And how did she find peace?
Why was she awakened again?

"There's only one clay figure?" Zhang Shutong asked again to confirm.

"only one."

Zhang Shutong wanted to ask if he could take a photo over when he had time, but then he remembered that Lu Qinglian didn't have a cell phone. She almost died in the avalanche because of this lack of timely communication, which was quite a headache. Zhang Shutong remembered that he still had some prizes to collect at the police station because of Zhou Ziheng's matter. Why not just ask for a cell phone?
He was about to say, "I'll give you a phone," but then he hesitated and paused.

Cell phone, photos.

Zhang Shutong suddenly remembered where he had heard of clay figurines.

Because I've seen it, not just heard of it.

In the Cold-Blooded Line, he found two photos in the hidden album on his phone: one of Gu Qiumian and the other of the interior of the temple.

Inside the temple stood a sculpture of a green snake, dimly lit. On the altar below, besides a few candles, were several small clay figures, all facing the phone camera, giving off a slightly eerie feeling. He had initially thought it was a unique custom of the temple, but now it suddenly occurred to him—

What he saw back then was a clay figure!

Even someone on the cold-blooded line knows about the existence of the clay figure!

Zhang Shutong then remembered the three tattoos on his arm.

Snake, little person, circle.

Aside from that snake, he may never have come close to the right answer. The "petty person" doesn't refer to the temple keeper or superficial notions like Lu Qinglian, but rather—

Clay figure!

Snakes, clay figures.

If that's the case, then what does the last circle represent?
But an even more troublesome problem soon followed.

When exactly was that photo taken?

If there is only one clay figure sculpture in the temple now, but there are many in the photo, wouldn't that mean that these things will still appear in the next eight years?
Ruoping said back then that she had been hanging out with Lu Qinglian throughout the second semester of her fourth year of junior high school. Was it to deal with those mud people?
Zhang Shutong directly told Lu Qinglian about her discovery, naturally using the excuse of a dream. He thought Lu Qinglian's perpetually icy expression would show some surprise, but Lu Qinglian's focus was quite unique:

"So you've been to the temple?" she asked thoughtfully.

“Don’t worry about that, I was referring to those clay figures,” Zhang Shutong emphasized.

"Are you sure when they'll appear?" she countered.

"I don't know."

"In that case, let's take it one step at a time." Lu Qinglian popped the last segment of orange into her mouth. "I should go."

"What happened four years ago?"

"do not know."

"do not know?"

I'll ask.

Zhang Shutong was completely confused about her meaning, but it was already very late. He glanced at his phone; it was almost nine o'clock. He was also very tired today and had many things he needed to think about. So he said goodbye and sat back on the bed.

Lu Qinglian unlocked the door, but did not go out immediately.

She stood at the boundary between light and shadow in the doorway.

"Zhang Shutong, I'll assume you didn't lie about everything you said tonight, and I'll believe you one last time." She sighed softly, "Although my reason tells me that believing you every time seems to bring a lot more trouble."

Zhang Shutong, who was already lying in bed, felt a little embarrassed upon hearing her words. One sprained ankle and one avalanche, it seemed that she had unknowingly incurred many favors.

The night should come to an end. Although I still haven't found out what I missed, I have undoubtedly figured out a lot of things.

As the door closed, he sighed and expressed his gratitude:

"Thank you for saving my life."

"It's good to know."

Through the crack, Lu Qinglian added softly:
"Also, don't call me Mom next time."

(End of this chapter)