When Zhou Haorui returned to the dormitory from Quanshui Street, it was already three in the morning. His three roommates were all sound asleep.
His head was much more relaxed, and the crow's voice did not ring again. After twenty days of torture, he could finally sleep, but he did not walk to his bed.
He walked to the desk beside his bed, turned on his computer, and searched online. He searched for Mary King Alley, and then searched for information on "Yangliu Qingqing" and "Jiang Qi." As expected, the search for Yangliu Qingqing yielded information on ancient poems and ancient Jiangnan customs. It did not seem like a person's name at all.
Before they parted at the alley, Zhou Haorui asked the gold-digger, "Are you really Yangliu Qingqing? This name … sounds like 'Qingwu Fei Yang.' "
"Are you really Zhou Mo?" She asked him in return. "Or Zhou Mo?"
Zhou Haorui was stunned. He was expressionless, and he did not know how to respond.
But from what Yangliu Qingqing said, it was impossible for her name to be that …
Even her online nickname was not possible. After all, a twenty-three or twenty-four year old girl would not like this kind of style.
Zhou Haorui searched for this name, adding Da Hua City, and some of Da Hua's universities, but he found nothing. Although this did not mean that the woman's name was not really that …
He continued to search for Old Jiang, and the results were surprising. "Eh?"
There was a novelist named Jiang Qi. Was that a pen name? He had published a long urban novel, "Us in the Postmodern Era", but the sales were poor. After printing three thousand copies, there were no other books and no other information … Thinking back to Old Jiang's situation, it was probably because of this that he was not doing well.
Zhou Haorui did not really understand what post-modern meant, but Old Jiang was the most passionate among them. At that time, he suggested, "We're on the same side now. From what Crow said, we might have to gather here again tomorrow night. Let's add each other's phone number, or should we add each other on WeChat?"
But Zhou Haorui and Yangliu Qingqing maintained their vigilance and rejected Old Jiang's suggestion. They did not reveal their contact information or other information.
When he returned to school, he purposely took more detours, paying attention to whether anyone was following him …
"Will we meet again tomorrow?" Zhou Haorui thought. "Or even more people?"
He thought for a while. It was almost four in the morning, and he was exhausted. He turned off his computer and went to the bathroom to wash up before coming back to sleep.
Only when he lay down did he realize how exhausted he was. Although his mind was heavy, not long after he closed his eyes, he vaguely felt himself falling asleep.
After so many days, he could finally sleep …
Blurry, hazy, chaotic, that lingering feeling of strangeness interweaved.
Lights and shadows swirled around, and he seemed to see a group of people wearing doctor's masks looking at the night sky. He seemed to hear a voice … It seemed to be the crow again. Its voice was hoarse, and it was speaking in an obscure language.
Zhou Haorui's head started to hurt again. The crow's voice kept repeating. It wasn't that the plague was coming, it was just a sentence …
"Go, use the power of the crow to eliminate the illness …" the crow said again, "Go and eliminate the plague. Sacrifice them to the crow …"
Suddenly, Zhou Haorui felt himself waking up. The dormitory was dim, and his three roommates were still sleeping soundly. He sat up on the bed.
The cold wind blew. He did not know when the wooden door of the dormitory was opened, and a few cold shadows entered.
Zhou Haorui's heart sank. Those shadows were not wearing bird's masks, but they looked like the goat-headed men from that night. They gave him a strange and dangerous feeling. He quickly got out of bed to wake Wang Jiaqi and the rest. "Jiaqi, Ziyang, Li Hui, wake up!"
However, his three roommates were still sleeping soundly, as if they had fainted.
The shadows outside the door appeared and walked in. They were all wearing black robes, with goatees, and their blurry faces looked like goat heads.
"Come with us. It's your luck to become a sacrifice. New life needs nutrients to grow."
Those people, step by step, approached him.
"F * ck …" Zhou Haorui muttered. He hurriedly shouted while looking for a weapon. This was the sixth floor of the dormitory, and there was no way to escape from the window.
He shouted very loudly, but there was no response from the outside. There was only dead silence.
He walked over and pushed and hit Wang Jiaqi and the rest, but they still did not wake up.
The six goat-headed men gradually forced him into a corner. He grabbed a badminton racket, but it was completely useless.
But when these goat-headed men came up to capture him, Zhou Haorui still struggled with all his might, swinging the badminton racket to hit them … The racket was caught by one of the men, and the other men separately pulled his limbs. Bang, bang, bang. Heavy punches landed on him, followed by a fierce kick, hitting his vitals …
Zhou Haorui was in so much pain that his whole body convulsed. Every nerve in his body was torn, and he could no longer struggle. He could only allow himself to be dragged out by these people.
It was as if the events of that night were replaying, but this time, would there still be the help of the crow …
The crow will not always guide you … You have to learn to walk in the fog … Use the power of the crow …
Your power will increase, your power has already increased …
In the intense pain, Zhou Haorui recalled the words that the crow kept saying in his dream, and the mark of the crow on his right wrist became scorching hot.
With that flame of enlightenment, he shouted out those words.
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Suddenly, the men who were dragging him let out miserable screams. Their faces, necks, and the skin on their bodies quickly turned black. Small and large pustules appeared on the black skin. Some quickly became the size of oranges, and then burst into festering, pus flowing out of their wounds.
It was just like the man in Mary King Alley who was suffering from the Black Death.
The Black Death had befallen these people, but there was no treatment with scalpels and soldering irons.
In the blink of an eye, all the goat-headed men turned into a pile of white bones and a pool of pus in extreme pain …
It was also at this moment that Zhou Haorui felt everything around him distort.
"Ah …" Like a balloon exploding, he opened his eyes abruptly and sat up on the bed. He looked around blankly, his body covered in cold sweat.
Was that … was that a dream?
The wooden door of the bedroom was closed, and there were no goat-headed men on the floor. His three roommates were sleeping peacefully.
"A dream?" Zhou Haorui mumbled. He looked at the mark on his right wrist, but it was still burning, as if there was a fire flowing through it.
The cryptic words that he shouted in his dream … he remembered them completely, as if they were carved into his mind. Was that just a dream? Or … supernatural power? Incantation?
Was it the power of the crow …
Zhou Haorui's lips moved slightly, and he paused. If he said those words out loud, would it really … have any effect?
Yangliu, Qingqing, Old Jiang, did they have the same dream?
What did the experience at Mary King Alley mean tonight …
He only understood one part of the incantation: "Crow, blood for blood."
Zhou Haorui sat on the bed and looked in the direction of the bedroom door. For a moment, a thousand thoughts ran through his mind.
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