Chapter 41#

Those Who Listen to Stories (Part 8)#

Ye Sheng stood by the lake for a while.

At this moment, an old lady who was taking a walk in the university in the evening suddenly called out: “Young man, don’t get too close. This lake is not deep, but people have drowned here.”

Ye Sheng was stunned, turned around, and found an old lady with gray hair but full of energy. She was wearing a simple and loose silk white coat. She should be a nearby resident, living a happy life, with bright eyes and an air of auspiciousness.

Ye Sheng stared at her and frowned. Perhaps compared to the students at Huaian University, the people who lived nearby and often visited the lake were the ones who knew Lover’s Lake best.

Ning Weichen’s gaze had been on his face from beginning to end. Seeing Ye Sheng’s expression, he immediately knew what Ye Sheng was thinking. Ning Weichen withdrew his gaze, turned his head, and showed a smile that elders liked very much to the old lady, asking in surprise: “Grandma, people have died in this lake?”

The old lady nodded: “Yes, quite a few have died. Every summer, there are always a few people who come here to swim and get entangled by water plants and drown.”

Ning Weichen showed a shocked expression just right: “Then can you tell us about it? My friend and I just got admitted to Huaian University this year. We came here specially during the summer vacation to have a look and want to know something about this place.”

The old lady’s eyes lit up: “Oh, you are top students.”

“Not really.” Ning Weichen showed a shy smile. His voice was clear and his eyes were bright, completely like a green youth who had just entered university and was full of apprehension and hope for the future.

The old lady said confidently: “Don’t worry, I’ve been here for almost sixty or seventy years. I know whatever you want to ask.”

Ning Weichen: “Thank you.”

He raised his arm, waved to Ye Sheng in the setting sun, and smiled brightly: “Ye Sheng, come here.”

Ye Sheng: “…”

Ye Sheng twitched the corner of his mouth and walked over. Because of his grandmother, he was always a little cramped with female elders and didn’t know what to say. Fortunately, he had Ning Weichen beside him, the king of social circles, who chatted happily and harmoniously with the old lady in a few minutes.

The old lady also had a strong desire to talk and said with full energy: “Let’s go, let’s find a bench to sit and talk.”

There were many benches beside Lover’s Lake. There were many mosquitoes in summer, so the old lady specially prepared a bottle of floral water and sprayed it around herself.

Ning Weichen held Ye Sheng’s hand and asked with a smile: “Why do you look so bad? You clearly said you wanted to go down to the lake to play just now. Now that you know people have died there, are you afraid again?”

Ye Sheng had long experienced his ability to talk nonsense, but he also knew that Ning Weichen was “paving the way” for him.

Hearing that Ye Sheng wanted to go down to the lake to play, the old lady immediately became anxious and put down the floral water dissatisfiedly: “Oh, why don’t you kids listen to advice? You should know that those who drowned were all able to swim. Accidents happen every year, but no one learns from them.”

Ning Weichen echoed with a smile: “Yes, why doesn’t anyone learn from them?”

Ye Sheng rolled his eyes at him secretly.

The old lady’s attention was now on Ye Sheng, and she took the initiative to say to him: “Little doll, this Lover’s Lake is full of grass underneath, and the water is dirty. There’s nothing fun about it.”

Ye Sheng looked at the old lady quietly and asked: “If it’s full of grass underneath and people have drowned, then why is this place called Lover’s Lake?”

He wanted to figure out a cause and effect. Was there Lover’s Lake first, or the ghost in the lake first?

The old lady became interested and said: “The origin of Lover’s Lake was fifty or sixty years ago. It’s quite romantic if you really talk about it.”

“A long time ago, there was a very famous campus couple at Huaian University. The boy was the campus hunk, and the girl was the campus belle. They were a match made in heaven.”

“The male and female protagonists were childhood sweethearts. They studied together all the way from Huaian Attached Primary School to Huaian Attached Middle School, but they never clarified their relationship. One year on Girls’ Day, the School of Literature held an event here. The girl accidentally fell into the lake. The boy jumped directly from the second floor through the window and rushed into the lake to save her.”

She pointed to a lecture hall on the second floor of the teaching building next to Lover’s Lake. Her eyes looked through the sparkling lake water and the afterglow of the setting sun, and her smiling tone seemed to recreate March 7th of that year.

“At that time, the boy was still in class, but his gaze kept looking at his sweetheart through the window. The moment the girl fell into the water, his face changed suddenly, and he stood up instantly. The whole class looked at him. Ignoring the teacher’s scolding and the classmates’ exclamations, he rushed out of the window. He jumped out of the window, crossed the bushes, ran across the bridge, and jumped directly into the lake. In front of everyone, he held the girl and walked towards the shore through the lake water.”

The balloons, banners, and colorful ribbons of Girls’ Day seemed to be the background at that moment.

Everyone witnessed a childhood romance come true.

“Both the boy and the girl were influential figures at the time. Because of this lake, they confirmed their romantic relationship, which was passed down from person to person. From then on, the name Lover’s Lake was passed down. That bridge…” The old lady said: “Actually, it used to be called Magpie Bridge.”

Ning Weichen listened thoughtfully, smiled very sincerely, and flattered: “It is indeed very romantic.”

The more the old lady looked at him, the more she liked him, and couldn’t help saying a few more words: “Yes. This was originally a holy place for love, but I don’t know when Magpie Bridge became Verification Bridge. I really don’t understand you young people—why arrange a ghost for a perfectly good dating place?”

Ye Sheng said calmly: “Do you know when that strange tale appeared?”

The old lady thought for a while and said: “It appeared a long time ago, forty or fifty years ago. I don’t know how it spread.”

Ye Sheng was silent for a moment and asked cautiously: “Since the male and female protagonists were influential figures when they were in school, they should also be outstanding in their respective fields after graduation. Does no one know their story later?”

The old lady said: “I’m not clear about this.”

Ye Sheng stopped talking, his gaze sinking into the quiet and peaceful lake under the setting sun. The bridge was covered with green plants and moss. Not far away, the window on the second floor of the red teaching building was open.

At this time, Ning Weichen opened his mouth and smiled: “Grandma, you have lived nearby for so long, do you know Huaian University very well?”

The old lady was confident: “I know it well. My son and grandson both graduated from here.”

Ning Weichen was curious: “Then besides Lover’s Lake, are there any other widely circulated stories in Huaian University?”

The old lady’s face suddenly changed. She said: “There is one, but students probably don’t know about it. Only old people like us know. And the news has been suppressed. Whether it is true or not remains to be verified. You can just listen to it casually.”

She said: “Huaian University used to have an old sports and art gymnasium in the East Campus. I heard that when the building was being built, a worker accidentally fell into the cement mixer. No one noticed at first. When they found someone missing later, the worker’s bones and flesh had already been mixed into the cement and built into the wall.”

Ye Sheng was stunned.

The old lady felt a little creepy when talking about this matter herself and said: “Now many classrooms in the old sports and art gymnasium have been sealed off, leaving only the auditorium on the first floor. However, that building cost 300 million to build back then, and its appearance is magnificent. It can be considered a campus landmark. Although Huaian University has built a new sports and art gymnasium, they still like to shoot the old one for promotional videos and photos.”

Ye Sheng pursed his lips.

He originally thought that the Verification Bridge of Lover’s Lake was already the biggest strange tale of Huaian University.

Unexpectedly, there was also an old sports and art gymnasium with “someone in the wall”.

The old lady didn’t chat with them for long before being called away by her family.

Night fell gradually, and there were fewer pedestrians here.

Ning Weichen said: “What are you checking?”

Ye Sheng sat on the bench, quickly searching for information about Luohu Mansion on his phone.

He had a photographic memory and superior memory. Everything he had heard would be sealed in the memory palace and actively retrieved by him when needed.

For example, “childhood sweethearts” and “campus belle and hunk”. In the story Xia Wenshi casually told while eating barbecue after returning from the haunted house exploration, there were these words. And… the wife in the haunted house threw herself into the lake and died.

However, the names of the male and female protagonists of Luohu Mansion could not be found on the entire internet.

Ye Sheng said: “Help me check two things.”

Ning Weichen said: “What do you want to check?”

Ye Sheng said: “The names of the two protagonists of Lover’s Lake, and the names of the male and female owners in the Luohu Mansion dismemberment case.”

Ning Weichen smiled and said: “Received.”

Ye Sheng said: “At midnight later, I will go to the bridge alone. Don’t follow me.”

Ning Weichen nodded.

At midnight, Ye Sheng walked onto the bridge alone. The moment he stepped onto the bridge, he felt a seeping chill. That day he was the one holding the camera, and this time he stood on the bridge.

From the old lady, he learned that Lover’s Lake existed first, and then the ghost in the lake.

If his guess was true, then it was really ironic.

Lover’s Lake witnessing love.

Verification Bridge testing lies.

From beginning to end, the female protagonist was that one person.

The Verification Bridge was old, and time had urged many cracks. The damp moss witnessed decades of wind and frost.

On the other side of the bridge was that red teaching building, with clusters of flowers surrounding a window.

Ye Sheng walked step by step to the center of the bridge.

At the same time, Ning Weichen also obtained all the information after a few simple instructions to someone.

The female protagonist of the Luohu Mansion haunted house was named Duan Shi.

Exactly the same name as the belle of the School of Literature at Huaian University sixty years ago.

In the dismemberment case of the haunted house back then, besides the black plastic bags filling the refrigerator and the hostess who jumped into the lake and died, the police also found a diary on a table by the window in a room. Three hundred and sixty pages, three hundred and sixty entries, each recording what Duan Shi saw standing by the window on the third floor after her miscarriage.

At first, she wrote the diary to heal herself. Recording flowers and plants, recording the lake and bridge, until one day, her husband appeared in the scenery. That husband who was always busy with work changed his disgusted and indifferent face in front of her, flirting with the nanny and being ambiguous with the secretary.

In the later stage of Duan Shi’s illness, her emotions and desires were already very numb. In that detached and crazy state, like a bystander, she recorded her husband’s affair for half a year.

Until the last page, Duan Shi concluded all this with bright red handwriting.

She said.

[You stand on the bridge looking at the scenery, and I look at you from under the bridge.]

Ye Sheng stood in the center of the bridge and looked at the lake surface.

He could feel that a pair of eyes were looking at him through the dark and cold water surface.

Black and white reversed chaotic eyes, meeting his gaze under the bridge, bloodthirsty and hateful.

Lurking here and stained with so much blood, the ghost’s already abnormal mind had long been disordered.

Ye Sheng supported himself on the bridge with both hands. At midnight, his eyes were cold, and he jumped directly from the center of the bridge.

Not falling backward into the lake in panic like Li Guangyun!

But jumping down directly.

The female ghost raised her head under the lake surface, watching him rush straight towards her.

In an instant, her white pupils constricted, and her blood-red grinning mouth froze, as if recalling something.

Her facial features were swollen and greenish underwater, weird and twisted.

Her messy black hair was full of corpse worms, and her severed feet under the white dress were entangled with water plants.

The moment Ye Sheng jumped into the lake, the first thing he smelled was a strong and pungent smell of blood.

The surrounding water seemed to have become thick blood. And underwater, after a moment of stiffness, the female ghost reacted quickly and screamed. A pair of hands with rotting flesh and only white bones grabbed straight at Ye Sheng’s face.

Ye Sheng was prepared, looked straight at her, and grabbed her hands.

The lake water was very irritating to the eyes. He kept his eyes open the whole time when he fell into the water. All the irritation entered his eyeballs, overflowing with physiological tears.

Ye Sheng’s eyes had a kind of demonic cold beauty in the unpredictable light and shadow at the bottom of the lake.

His voice was very light, completely in a declarative tone: “Do you really have the ability to distinguish true hearts?”

The Fetal Maiden’s Spirit Calling was equally deterrent to C-rank anomalies.

The female ghost stared at him, her face twisted, but found that she couldn’t break free from Ye Sheng’s restraint.

However, before Ye Sheng could make the next move, the female ghost of Lover’s Lake suddenly stopped struggling.

A gloomy and strange atmosphere spread in the lake.

She quieted down and fell into a very weird state. Her eyeballs were strange and gloomy. After a long time, she grinned at Ye Sheng. Her body began to turn into foam and water worms from her hair.

Staring at Ye Sheng like locking onto a target, she said spitefully.

“I, have.”

The voice in the water was distorted, hoarse and twisted.

Ye Sheng watched her turn into foam and flee, but made no other move. He knew—the strange tale was being continued again.

The moment Ye Sheng jumped off the bridge, Ning Weichen walked quickly to the lake. Ye Sheng poked his head out of the lake surface and didn’t say much in the face of Ning Weichen’s disapproving expression.

He walked out of the lake soaking wet, said thank you, and then directly said he wanted to go back to the dormitory to change clothes.

Ning Weichen stared at him for a long time under the moonlight and didn’t stop him again.

Ye Sheng clutched a strand of the female ghost’s hair in his hand and walked quickly back to the dormitory.

He knew that the female ghost’s last look meant that the target had changed to him.

The phone contained a pile of messages from Ning Weichen about the murder case in Luohu Mansion back then.

Her name was Duan Shi.

Ye Sheng sat on the chair, picked up his phone, and quickly took a photo. He saw the Story King’s second post scriptum from half an hour ago.

[post post scriptum:

Quietly, lightly.

I will not meet you like this,

I want to reunite with you in a dream.

The bright moon decorates your window,

You open the window to look,

I am outside your window door.

——July 9th, 0:01 AM]