After Shen Lingxue left, Zhao Hao immediately hung his head in disappointment, looking regretful.
"Fatso, I was just being nice, why doesn't she believe me?"
Ever since Zhao Hao found out how useless Liu Shuai was, he stopped calling him "handsome guy" and started calling him "fatso" instead.
"Haha, wipe your drool before speaking next time. Also, don't call me Fatso. I joined the Investigation Bureau first, so please call me Handsome Guy or Senior."
"You fatso, make yourself clear! Who was drooling?" Zhao Hao erupted in anger: "Do you think everyone is as disgusting as you?"
"Haha, when you were talking just now, you kept staring at her collarbone. Do you think everyone is blind? You're really something. She's wrapped up so tightly, with only the collar slightly open, just enough to see a hint of her collarbone, and you're practically trying to bend your eyes to peek inside.
If you were to sleep together at night, wouldn't you take advantage of the darkness to go up and lick her collarbone?"
"You're full of it! How do you know I was looking if you didn't see me?"
Fang Xiu watched the two argue without expression. At that moment, he fully understood the meaning of the term "useless teammate."
He ignored the two and turned to leave, heading back to his room to sleep.
"Hey, hey, Brother Xiu, where are you going? Aren't you going to sleep with us? Aren't we supposed to keep watch?"
Fang Xiu ignored them and walked away on his own.
He was more concerned about the strange absence of people gathering together than keeping watch.
Moreover, he had noticed something unusual today—their hair.
Wang Village Chief and the others had hair that was too good to be true. Wang Guifang and Wang Fugui were young, so it made sense, but Wang Village Chief was nearly eighty, yet he didn't have a single white hair.
Fang Xiu had considered the possibility that they had secretly dyed their hair, but it seemed unlikely.
In this relatively backward mountain village, there was no need for hair dye. Everyone knew each other, and they were constantly in each other's presence. Especially since Village Chief Wang was an elderly man in his seventies. Secondly, hair dye was hard to come by here, and one would have to walk several hours through the mountains to the town to buy it.
The most crucial point, however, was that since he had arrived in Heishui Village, he hadn't seen a single strange creature!
He couldn't be certain that there were no strange creatures in Heishui Village, as he hadn't explored the entire village yet, and the sky was now very dark, impairing his vision.
But this was already enough to make him feel curious.
After all, in the city, strange creatures are everywhere. Even on the way to Heishui Village, though they were rare, there were still some.
But since arriving in Heishui Village until now, he hadn't seen a single strange creature.
This situation had only happened to Fang Xiu once before!
That was in the strange realm of Qing Shan Mental Hospital!
Because entering the strange realm meant detaching from reality, his vision could no longer perceive illusory strange phenomena; he could only see real ones.
But now in Blackwater Village, he still couldn't see any strange phenomena?
Could Blackwater Village also be a strange realm?
But why does the phone have a signal?
Back at Qing Shan Mental Hospital, his phone had no signal at all.
This was why Fang Xiu suspected something was off—because he knew Black Water Village was abnormal. With such caution, any slight anomaly would be magnified endlessly.
With these doubts, Fang Xiu soon fell into a deep sleep.
He was covered in two layers of blankets, as the nights in the mountain village were cold. Even though he was a Spirit Tamer, he was still human at his core, not a superhero.
Deep into the night, at three in the morning...
Gurgling...
The sound of flowing water reached Fang Xiu's ears. In his sleep, he suddenly felt a dampness and the surroundings seemed to grow colder.
Swoosh!
Fang Xiu instantly opened his eyes.
"Has it appeared?"
He muttered to himself, then suddenly sat up and looked around. All he could see was darkness; he couldn't make out anything.
What was most peculiar was that he faintly felt the bed moving!
He suddenly realized something, pulled out his phone, and turned on the flashlight.
The bright light pierced the night, illuminating the scene beneath the bed.
Beneath the bed was no longer the hard limestone floor, but water!
River water!
The bed was actually floating on the Black Water River!
The sound of flowing water he had heard earlier was the sound of the Black Water River flowing.
Around Fang Xiu were several dark figures. He shone the flashlight on them and was startled to discover they were Shen Lingxue, Zhao Hao, and the others, all sound asleep.
Their beds were also floating on the river surface.