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墨書 Inktalez
Do you know why you shouldn't go out at noon?
As the saying goes, "At noon, the ghosts show their heads; at noon's peak, the ghosts glare."
It is well known that 12 PM is when the yang energy is at its strongest, but with great strength comes decline. The so-called "three quarters past noon" is the time of day when yin energy is most potent, making it the easiest time to attract unclean things.
My cousin, Li Zongping, experienced a strange incident related to this.
The event took place in 2010 in Cai Xu Village, Yincun Town, Longyao County, Xingtai City, Hebei Province.
That year, Li Zongping started an ecological farming venture and raised some ducks. Every day he would take them to the riverbank on the west side of the village to let them roam freely.
As usual, Li Zongping herded his ducks to the river, greeting the villagers along the way.
He didn't dare raise too many ducks, just over a hundred. He let them forage for small fish and shrimp in the river without feeding them pellets. This way, the duck meat would be of better quality and fetch a higher price.
He was determined to get rich through his ducks.
Once the ducks were in the water, he didn't return home but sat by the river watching them.
At around 12 PM, he began to feel drowsy. Just as he was about to doze off, someone slowly approached him from behind.
The person came up behind Li Zongping and suddenly said, "I'll be waiting for you in the woods at eight tonight."
This startled Li Zongping awake.
He turned around and saw that he didn't recognize the person. The stranger stood rigidly behind him, mumbling, "I'll be waiting for you in the woods at eight tonight."
After saying this, the stranger turned and walked away, leaving Li Zongping bewildered.
By the time he gathered his wits and thought about asking what was going on, he noticed that the person had walked into a patch of grass by the riverbank.
The more Li Zongping thought about it, the stranger's identity puzzled him. Why did they say they would wait for him in the woods at night? He wanted to run after them to ask for clarification but in the blink of an eye, the person vanished.
Li Zongping pushed through the tall grass and found himself facing a grove of trees where many villagers' graves were located. The person who had just startled him had walked into this graveyard and then disappeared without a trace.
Although it was noon, Li Zongping couldn't help but feel a chill run down his spine. Was he seeing things? With that thought, he dared not linger and hurried to leave the place.
After this incident, he lost all desire to let Duck out and sent it home early.
That night, he didn't mention anything to his wife. After dinner, he went to bed early.
However, around 11 PM, Li Zongping's wife was awakened by a faint rustling sound. When she opened her eyes, she noticed that Li Zongping was missing, which puzzled her. Normally, once he fell asleep, it was impossible to wake him up. Where could he have gone in the middle of the night?
Just then, there was a noise at the door; it sounded like someone was leaving.
At that moment, her cousin-in-law saw that the wardrobe had been ransacked, clothes and pants strewn all over the floor.
Cousin-in-law thought a thief had broken in, and with Li Zongping missing, she felt both anxious and scared about what to do.
Suddenly, she heard dragging footsteps outside. Gathering her courage, she quietly approached the door and peeked outside, only to see Li Zongping dragging his feet toward the front door.
Li Zongping had changed into his wedding suit and walked out with a vacant expression. No matter how Cousin-in-law called him, he did not respond; it was as if he had lost his soul, stumbling out aimlessly.
In the dead of night, Cousin-in-law didn’t dare to go outside. She thought that Li Zongping would return soon since he must have gone out for some reason. However, little did she know that something terrible would happen once he stepped out.
Around 2 AM that night, two brothers from the the Song Family were preparing to fish with an electric net in the river.
Feeling uneasy in the dark, Song the Second kept urging his older brother to go back. boss Song scolded him for wanting to catch more fish.
The two of them waded into the water with a battery on their backs, using bamboo poles wrapped with wires and connecting them with iron wire on their heads. They plunged both poles into the water; once electrified, they could stun the fish in no time.
After a short while of fishing, they saw fish floating on the surface of the river. This thrilled boss Song as he scooped up the larger ones while tossing aside the smaller ones. Just as he was enjoying himself, Song the Second stumbled back into him. Thinking his brother had lost his balance, boss Song scolded him again. But when he turned around, he saw Song the Second's face pale with fear as he pointed at the river and said, "There’s a ghost over there."
Seeing his brother's terrified expression didn’t seem like a joke at all. Following where Song the Second pointed toward the woods, they spotted a shadow standing among the graves; it was covered in tentacles swaying in the wind. Song the Second nearly wet himself in fright and wanted to pull his brother away quickly. But boss Song didn’t believe in such things and insisted on investigating further.
As they cautiously approached while calling out Li Zongping's name, they realized that it was indeed him standing there in a daze. They couldn’t figure out what he was doing out there at this hour.
As they got closer and recognized him clearly, they felt less afraid and greeted Li Zongping. However, they found him staring blankly ahead without any reaction as if possessed by something sinister.
Realizing something was off with him, they decided to carry him back home first before figuring things out.
Fortunately, the village was not far away. The two brothers exerted a great deal of effort to bring him home. Since Cousin-in-law never knew when Li Zongping would return, he had left the main gate open for him.
As soon as the brothers arrived at the gate, they called for Cousin-in-law to come out and help with Li Zongping. The Song brothers helped Li Zongping onto the bed and removed his torn clothes. However, when they saw the injuries on Li Zongping's body, all three of them were stunned.
Li Zongping was covered in scratches, some deep and some shallow, densely packed and enough to make anyone's scalp tingle. Yet, he seemed to feel no pain at all, lying on the bed and falling into a deep sleep.
Seeing that there was nothing more they could do to help, the Song brothers remembered the electric fishing device they had left by the riverbank. They exchanged a few words with Cousin-in-law before leaving, who gratefully saw them out the door.
The next day, when Li Zongping woke up, he had no memory of going out dressed as he was. There was no other option; Cousin-in-law could only let him rest and recover from his injuries. Due to this incident, cousin Li Zongping had become quite weak and took over twenty days to recuperate.
During these days of recovery at home, Li Zongping felt increasingly restless and wanted to get some fresh air. While he said that, deep down he wanted to figure out how he had gotten all those injuries. He made his way alone to the graveyard. He truly could not remember what had happened that night but carefully walked around the graves. At that moment, an old grave overgrown with weeds caught his attention.
The grave looked quite old; the tombstone was broken, and the grass on it had grown tall.
Strangely enough, there were scattered footprints around the grave. Although Li Zongping could not recall what had happened that night, he could tell that those footprints belonged to him.
As he approached, he realized that the footprints on the grave were made by ducks. This indicated that the woods were close to the riverbank, so some ducks would wander into the woods to forage. But in this area, it was just him who had been there.
Though he dared not ask anyone about it, Li Zongping had a rough idea in his heart: running into a graveyard at night and ending up covered in scratches must have something to do with those duck footprints. From that day on, he never dared to come here to let ducks roam again.
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