Stone Fairy!

Upon hearing Xie Ning's agreement, the girl's face immediately lit up with a bright smile. She tucked the flute into her waistband, turned around, and walked briskly into the depths of the mist.

"Sister, come with me!" The girl's voice echoed in the mist.

"The road is difficult to walk on, sister, please be careful."

Xie Ning followed behind her, his steps steady and unhurried.

The two walked and talked, the girl's mouth almost never stopped, chattering away.

"What's your sister's name?"

"Xie Ning".

"Xie Ning...that sounds nice. My name is Li Lan, you can just call me Alan."

"Alan".

"Okay!" Li Lan responded, leading the way with light steps. Her bare feet trod on the stones. She would occasionally glance back at Xie Ning to make sure she was following, then turn back and continue leading the way.

Xie Ning pieced together some information from her fragmented words.

The people of Lilan Village have made a living by raising Gu (a type of insect-borne disease) for generations, living in isolation and rarely interacting with the outside world. They believe in the insect god and consider raising Gu to be a way to communicate with the spirits.

Li Lan grew up in the village and raised a red snake as her natal Gu (a type of poisonous insect), with her flute serving as a magical tool to control it. Today, she came out to gather herbs and heard Xie Ning's footsteps in the distance. She then played her flute to summon insects to investigate and only revealed herself after confirming that he meant her no harm.

"Sister, please don't blame me." Li Lan stuck out her tongue. "These days, some strange people have come from outside the mountains. The chieftain told us to be careful."

Xie Ning's heart skipped a beat: "A strange person?"

"Hmm." Li Lan wrinkled her little nose. "Wearing brightly colored clothes, a scary mask, and speaking in a strange way."

"I wandered around outside the village for several days a few days, and then I don't know why I left."

Xie Ning paused slightly in her steps.

Brightly colored clothes, a terrifying mask.

She remembered that the demons who caused trouble on the Black River were dressed in strange five-colored clothes and wore ferocious masks.

Xie Ning continued walking without showing any emotion, but he made a mental note of the incident.

About an hour later, the mountain road suddenly opened up.

A valley surrounded by mountains appeared before Xie Ning.

The valley was not large, only a few miles in circumference, and was surrounded by steep mountain walls covered with vines and shrubs, which isolated the valley from the outside world.

The village was built in the middle of the valley.

The houses are wooden stilted buildings, built against the mountainside, layer upon layer, arranged in a staggered and orderly fashion. The roofs are covered with dark blue-green tiles, and some unknown wild grasses grow between the tiles, swaying gently in the wind.

In the very center of the village stands a huge ancient banyan tree. That banyan tree is probably over a thousand years old, its canopy blocking out the sun and casting its shadow over a large part of the village.

Aerial roots dangled from the branches, some of which had already taken root in the soil and grown into new trunks, making it look like a small grove of trees from a distance.

Beneath the ancient banyan tree stands a stone altar.

The altar was low, only knee-high, and several pottery jars were placed on it, their mouths sealed with red cloth. Around the altar were several wooden pillars, covered with totems and runes, identical to the patterns on Li Lan's skirt.

Li Lan turned around, smiled at Xie Ning, revealing two small tiger teeth.

"arrive."

"Sister, this is our village."

The old turtle, hanging from Xie Ning's hair, narrowed its emerald eyes slightly and transmitted its voice: "This village is not simple. There's something pressing under that banyan tree."

Xie Ning followed Li Lan into the village, where stilted houses of varying heights lined both sides.

The dark blue tiles gleamed with a somber light in the afterglow of the setting sun, and strings of herbs and dried flowers hung on the wooden walls, swaying gently in the wind and making soft rustling sounds.

The village is small; it takes only the time it takes to burn an incense stick to walk from one end to the other.

As Xie Ning ventured deeper into the village, he gradually noticed something strange.

When the villagers saw Lilan, their gazes became complicated.

A woman who was drying herbs stopped in her tracks when she saw Li Lan approaching from afar. She lowered her head and hid her face behind the herbs until Li Lan was out of sight. Then she looked up at Li Lan's retreating figure and sighed softly.

Several middle-aged men who had been gossiping together stopped talking abruptly when they saw Li Lan approaching. They looked at each other, then dispersed.

Even the children are like that.

There was a deliberate, cautious distance in his gaze, as if he was afraid that getting too close to her would lead him to something bad.

Li Lan seemed to have gotten used to these gazes; she continued to walk briskly with a bright smile.

Li Lan led Xie Ning across the open space in the center of the village, around the huge ancient banyan tree, and headed deeper into the village.

The further you go in, the more exquisite the stilted houses become, and the more elaborate their decorations. The wooden pillars are carved with more totems, and strings of silver ornaments and bone pieces hang under the eaves, making a tinkling sound when the wind blows.

Li Lan stopped in front of a stilted house.

This stilted house is taller than the other houses in the village, with three stories, higher upturned eaves, and more neatly arranged tiles.

The open space in front of the building is paved with bluestone slabs, and a huge circular pattern is carved on the slabs, which looks like a coiled worm.

A wooden plaque hung above the door, engraved with several characters that Xie Ning did not recognize, the strokes ancient and mysterious.

"Sister, please stay here for now." Li Lan pushed open the door and stepped aside to let Xie Ning in.

The room was small, but clean and tidy. A faint scent of grass and wood filled the air, like the aroma of some kind of dried herbs.

"Sister, rest. I'll go get you some hot water." After saying that, Li Lan turned and left, her light footsteps fading into the distance down the corridor.

Xie Ning leaned his spear against the corner of the wall and sat down on the bamboo chair.

The turtle slid down from her hair and landed on the table, returning to the size of a palm, its limbs outstretched, while the green snake remained coiled around her wrist.

"This village is not simple." The old turtle's emerald green eyes narrowed slightly.

"When I passed by just now, I carefully sensed what was pressing down under that banyan tree. Its aura was very ancient, older than me."

Xie Ning settled in temporarily and gave Li Lan a silver ingot as payment. After much persuasion, Li Lan finally accepted it.

Xie Ning sat on a bamboo chair, her gaze fixed on the gradually darkening sky outside the window.

As the last rays of the setting sun disappeared, the entire village sank into a gray-blue twilight.

Old Turtle lay on the table, his eyes narrowed to slits: "This little girl must have a high status in this village."

"The stilted houses became more and more exquisite as you went deeper into the village. The one she lived in was at the very back of the village, and it was obviously only for people of noble status."

Xie Ning nodded; she had noticed this long ago.

Even if someone is of noble status, there shouldn't be such fear within a village.

After staying for several days, Xie Ning also learned from Li Lan that she had a father, but she had never met him.

That night, the moon was cool and clear.

The old turtle and the green snake, who had gone out, quietly returned to the house.

Xie Ning lowered his voice and asked, "Seniors, have you found the person you are looking for?"

Old Turtle shook his head: "I have a feeling for it, but it's still not quite there."

"That aura was faint, as if it were being concealed by something, and it was impossible to pinpoint it for the time being."

Xie Ning frowned slightly, about to ask again, when the old turtle spoke up again.

"However, we did hear something."

"What?"

The old turtle organized its thoughts, its emerald green eyes narrowing slightly.

"About that little girl."

Xie Ning leaned forward unconsciously.

"That little girl is the holy maiden chosen by the Gu God worshipped in this village."

"However," the old turtle changed the subject, "this holy maiden is to be sacrificed to the Gu God."

"Sacrifice?" Xie Ning's voice was very soft.

The old turtle nodded and continued, "Originally, the sacrifice was for the little girl's brother. But something happened to her brother."

"It is said that one day before the sacrifice, he suddenly went mad, rushed into the forbidden area behind the mountain, and never came out again."

"The villagers searched for several days, but there was no sign of him, neither alive nor dead."

"The Gu God can't wait any longer, so..."

The old turtle didn't finish his sentence, but Xie Ning understood.

So, it was Li Lan's turn.