Chapter 81: Memory Reconstruction
Bang! Bang! Bang!
Outside the coffin, the rhythmic pounding of iron echoed relentlessly.
The middle-aged woman’s stone servant raised its hammer again and drove another nail into the crimson coffin lid.
Clang!
The villagers clapped happily.
"Good!"
"Wonderful!"
"A perfect wedding!"
"The bride and groom shall never be separated!"
Their jubilant voices sent chills through the courtyard.
Outside the burial pit, Mohan stared at the completely sealed coffin, his face dark with disbelief.
"Damn you, Shen Yu!"
His voice echoed across the courtyard.
"How dare you ignore my orders?"
"I told everyone to search the room on the right!"
His fists clenched tightly.
Since the moment they met, Mohan had never truly regarded Shen Yu as an equal.
In his eyes, Shen Yu was nothing more than a lucky newcomer—someone with an E-Class talent who had somehow survived where stronger people had died.
Useful...
But disposable.
A perfect test subject.
Whenever Future Echo failed to reveal a complete path, Mohan instinctively expected Shen Yu to stumble into the correct answer through trial and error.
After all...
Future Echo had repeatedly told him that Shen Yu survived far longer than anyone else.
If Shen Yu explored first, even if he triggered another deadly rule, he probably wouldn’t die immediately.
That would provide valuable information.
Mohan had intended to use him exactly that way.
Yet...
Instead of obediently following the team...
Shen Yu had jumped into the coffin.
Now Mohan’s greatest "experiment" had disappeared.
His heartbeat suddenly accelerated.
"...Wait."
His expression stiffened.
The words he had shouted earlier...
"The answer isn’t stopping the burial..."
Those words...
They sounded eerily familiar.
Almost identical...
To the fragment of Future Echo he had heard moments before.
Cold sweat trickled down his temples.
"Did I..."
"...accidentally repeat the future?"
His breathing became uneven.
Future Echo had always allowed him to hear pieces of what was yet to happen.
But what if...
Some of those voices...
Were actually his own?
Had he unknowingly become part of the future he had already heard?
The thought unsettled him more than anything else.
Behind him—
Creak...
The tombstone protruding from his spine swayed violently.
The stone figure growing from it twisted unnaturally.
Although carved from gray rock, its body bent like a living serpent.
Its chest had already emerged completely.
Its waist slowly wriggled free.
Soon...
Its legs would follow.
The stone creature rested its chin beneath Mohan’s own.
Its icy lips parted.
"Hehehe..."
"You’ll all die..."
"No one leaves Cemetery Village..."
Its frozen breath brushed against Mohan’s neck.
He shivered involuntarily.
Then...
A heavy hand landed on his shoulder.
Thump.
He turned.
Taishan stood behind him.
The silent giant glanced toward the wooden house on the right.
"Should we go inside?"
Mohan forced himself to calm down.
"...Give me one second."
Golden light shimmered around his ears once more.
Future Echo activated.
Buzz—
Countless distorted voices flooded into his mind.
Most were meaningless.
Some were screams.
Others sounded like fragments of conversations.
Then...
One sentence rang out clearly.
"Damn it..."
"There’s no way to survive here..."
"How can anyone escape..."
Mohan’s pupils shrank.
"...What?"
That voice...
Was his own.
Exactly the same tone.
Exactly the same despair.
He slowly opened his eyes.
"But..."
"I just said that."
"If it’s appearing in the future..."
"Then what triggers it?"
Before he could think further—
An icy stone hand suddenly wrapped around his throat.
The creature behind him had crawled even higher.
Its fingers tightened.
Mohan coughed violently.
"Ghk...!"
The pressure nearly crushed his windpipe.
He no longer had time to analyze.
He immediately barked an order.
"Luxian!"
"If you don’t want all of us to die..."
"Use your ability!"
"I need to know what happened here!"
Unlike Shen Yu, whose actions constantly escaped every prediction...
Luxian’s Memory Reconstruction remained a reliable variable.
She was now his only source of information.
Luxian glanced toward the buried coffin.
A complicated emotion flickered through her eyes.
"...Shen Yu..."
She whispered softly.
Then she turned toward the wooden house.
"...Fine."
Walking slowly to the entrance, she pressed both hands against the weathered wooden door.
Her fingertips immediately began peeling apart.
Thin layers of skin fluttered away like sheets of old paper.
White bone emerged beneath.
Her pupils turned pale.
"Memory Reconstruction."
Buzz—
The world around her dissolved.
Darkness swallowed everything.
Then...
Images emerged.
A little girl.
Barely seven or eight years old.
Both wrists were locked in rusty iron shackles.
Heavy chains connected her ankles.
She knelt on the cold floor.
Not sitting.
Not standing.
Crawling.
Like an animal.
In front of her sat a cracked porcelain bowl.
Inside...
Only cold leftovers remained.
She buried her face into the rice desperately.
"Woo..."
"Woo..."
"Father..."
"Mother..."
The child cried while eating.
No one answered.
The room remained silent.
Only the sound of chains scraping across the floor echoed endlessly.
The vision abruptly shattered.
Luxian opened her eyes.
She stared toward the crimson coffin.
"...I understand."
This was already the third memory she had witnessed.
At the village entrance...
She had seen a little girl desperately trying to escape.
At the banquet...
She had learned that girls weren’t permitted to sit at the dining table.
And now...
She had witnessed that same child imprisoned inside this very room.
The three fragments connected together.
Like broken pieces of a mirror.
Luxian finally understood.
"She..."
Her voice trembled.
"She wasn’t born here."
Everyone looked toward her.
"The little girl..."
"She was bought."
Silence filled the courtyard.
Luxian continued.
"Someone purchased her from another village..."
"They imprisoned her."
"They raised her..."
"...only to become today’s bride."
Her gaze slowly shifted toward the buried crimson coffin.
"Yun Han..."
"...is that little girl."
Mohan frowned impatiently.
"That’s it?"
Luxian nodded.
"That’s everything I could see."
"Damn it."
The information was important.
But it didn’t tell them how to survive.
Behind Mohan, the stone creature tightened its grip around his neck again.
He could feel the cold face pressing against his own.
No more time.
He looked toward Taishan.
"We’re done waiting."
"Break the door."
Taishan gave a single nod.
"Understood."
Boom!
His enormous shoulder slammed into the wooden door.
The ancient wood exploded inward.
Dust filled the air.
Everyone instinctively stepped back.
Then...
They looked inside.
And froze.
None of them had expected such a scene.
The gloomy horror outside seemed completely isolated from the room beyond.
Instead of darkness...
Warm amber light illuminated every corner.
A spotless kang bed occupied one side of the room.
Its red bedding had been neatly arranged.
On an old Eight Immortals table sat wedding offerings—bright red dates, peanuts, longan fruit, melon seeds, and steaming tea.
Everything looked untouched.
As though a newlywed couple were about to enter.
On the aged wooden windowsill rested a colorful plastic rattle from decades ago.
A simple toy.
One that belonged to a child.
Above the bed, several delicate paper cranes hung from crimson threads.
Red.
Blue.
Green.
They swayed gently despite the absence of any wind.
The entire room radiated warmth.
Comfort.
Home.
It felt impossibly peaceful.
Almost...
Like someone had desperately tried to preserve the happiest memories of a lifetime within these walls.
For several long seconds, nobody spoke.
The horrifying courtyard outside and this cozy room inside were like two completely different worlds.
Mohan slowly stepped across the threshold.
His brows furrowed.
"This..."
"...doesn’t look like a prison."
Luxian shook her head slowly.
"No."
"It looks..."
She glanced once more toward the child’s toy.
"...like the home she always dreamed of having."
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