Chapter 98 Witch 2

"A Qi."

Perhaps Xia Qi had been daydreaming too intensely, so his mother called out to him again, more deliberately.

Xia Qi snapped back to reality. Ever since being tormented by someone, his mental state had been poor, making it easy for him to lose focus.

"I'm not going today," Xia Qi firmly refused to participate in the large matchmaking event known as the "Bianbian Field."

"Ah?" His mother was taken aback, her voice rising an octave. "Why not? You're already 18 years old. All the other boys have gone. It's time for you to follow the ancestral custom of marriage by courtship."

18 years old...

Xia Qi gasped. What kind of bizarre setting was this?

"I'm tired," Xia Qi raised his hand and pressed his temples. "I need to rest for a while."

Seeing that Xia Qi refused to participate in the matchmaking event, his mother was anxious, her head practically smoking. She continued to natter on, "If you don't go to the Bianbian Field soon, all the good boys will be chosen..."

Chosen or not, he didn't care. Whoever chose him would be out of luck.

From his mother's expression and words, Xia Qi felt that this NPC was quite intelligent. She hadn't been frightened by him and even knew how to adapt her strategy on the fly.

"In my current state, even if I went to the Bianbian Field, no one would find me interesting," Xia Qi rubbed his face to look more exhausted. He coughed, "I'm really tired. I might even faint."

Ever since he realized there was something off about his identity in the dungeon, he had wanted to try changing the method to clear the dungeon. So this time, he wanted to see what would happen if he didn't go to the Bianbian Field.

By staying home, he wouldn't meet his destined love, thus avoiding the subsequent marriage by courtship.

After saying this, Xia Qi turned and headed upstairs. Upon reaching the upper floor, he "willfully" lay back on the bamboo bed, right in front of his mother.

"Oh, A Qi, what's wrong?" His mother stood beside him and touched his forehead.

His mother's expression changed again, from the earlier urgency to get him to attend the matchmaking event, to one of concern.

"I have a headache," Xia Qi tilted his head to avoid his mother's rough hand.

"I'll go get the shaman to treat you," his mother persisted.

A shaman?

Worrying that the shaman might also cause trouble, Xia Qi declined outright, "No need. I just need to rest for a bit."

Seeing that her persuasion was in vain, his mother had no choice but to go downstairs, frustrated.

Once his mother had gone down, Xia Qi, taking advantage of the daylight, got up again from the bamboo bed.

According to his mother, his destined love would climb in through the window. His room had two windows. One was a large window on the sunny side, and the other was a small decorative window on the shady side, right next to his bamboo bed.

He first went to observe the large window. It was also made of fir wood. The window frame was adorned with a butterfly pattern made of wooden strips, which looked quite beautiful. This window did not open from the center but had to be lifted from the bottom and secured with a wooden strip.

Xia Qi opened the small decorative window and looked outside.

Outside, he saw lush bamboo groves. On the layered hillsides and flatlands, stilted houses with upturned eaves were densely scattered like stars. A few rooftops had wisps of smoke rising, lending the entire mountain scene a warm and peaceful atmosphere.

Xia Qi carefully observed the stilted houses in the village and mentally mapped them out.

After noting all the positions, he realized his residence was in the central area of the village. Below his house was a wide flagstone road, which seemed to be the main thoroughfare in the village.

"Not a bad location," Xia Qi assessed his house.

After finishing his observation of the larger environment, he began to examine his immediate surroundings. At that moment, he was standing on the second floor of his house, which was built on stilts. From what he could see of the decorations, his home appeared fairly affluent.

However, amidst this seemingly normal and affluent exterior, Xia Qi still keenly noticed something unusual.

At the entrance of his house grew a crooked wutong tree. The tree’s main branches were extremely thick and looked very strong. Even more bizarrely, he had never seen a wutong tree so contorted before; the branches reaching towards his window were sturdy enough to serve as a slide.

"Excellent."

Xia Qi gritted his teeth and continued to scan other areas. Soon, he noticed that his neighbor’s house had a woodshed filled with tools, and the woodshed was wide open, revealing a bamboo ladder sticking out from the door.

Great, a ladder was already prepared. Why don’t they just fly up to heaven?

Xia Qi: “……”

Next, he moved to the window on the shady side of the house. He had thought the shady side would be harder to climb, but when he pushed the window open, he saw a row of bamboo as thick as a person’s waist growing below. Of course, the straight bamboo wasn’t the most absurd part; what was even more ridiculous was the large slope behind his room. The slope was almost vertical, meaning that anyone who dropped a rope from above could directly climb into the window next to his bed.

Standing in the center of the room, Xia Qi glanced at the window on the sunny side, then the window on the shady side. It must be said that the design of this scenario was so well-done that he was exposed on both sides.

Xia Qi observed the windows for a moment and noticed that his Ama seemed to be in the kitchen, which was a low-roofed house behind the corner tower. The clatter of pots and pans suggested that Ama was cooking.

Xia Qi carefully walked down the stairs and headed to the woodshed of the neighboring house.

With a cold smile, he first took the neighbor’s ladder, moved it under the wutong tree, and climbed up to saw off the large branch that extended towards his window.

Then, he sawed the ladder into four pieces and brought them into his room.

After dealing with the window on the sunny side, Xia Qi sneaked to the backyard and fetched several buckets of water.

"Splash!"

Standing by the window on the shady side, he poured several buckets of water onto the moss-covered slope. The ground was already muddy, and after he finished pouring the water, the mud became incredibly slippery. The smell of the mud and moss mixed with the water, making it clear that the surface was now dangerously slick.

Anyone trying to come down would likely slip and fall to their death.

After finishing these tasks, the sounds from the kitchen ceased, and Xia Qi quickly returned to his room.

After lying down, Ama didn’t come upstairs but called for him to come down for dinner. The dinner was quite sumptuous, mostly spicy dishes common to the area, and Xia Qi found them quite to his taste.

Xia Qi couldn’t help but eat a few more mouthfuls. Ama looked at him and said with a smile, "A Qi, you're too thin. You need to gain some weight."

"Mhm," Xia Qi nodded, not wanting to engage with her chatter, and quickly scooped a few more bites of rice into his mouth, afraid she would say something about being healthier for marriage or more marketable.

After finishing dinner in the main room, Xia Qi placed the stool on the table. He had considered helping with the dishes, but since he was pretending to be sick, he went back upstairs.

Lying quietly on the woven bamboo bed, he awaited nightfall.

In the dead of night, the sweet calls of nightingales echoed outside the window. The dense insect sounds filled his ears, yet instead of feeling annoyed, Xia Qi unexpectedly felt a sense of calm.

Lying on the bamboo bed, he rolled over, feeling like he was on vacation.

He wondered how the other players were doing. Did they participate in the matchmaking event?

From the current situation, it seemed he had entered another role-playing game. This time, he didn’t have to choose a character—the system had automatically assigned him a family.

After thinking for a while, Xia Qi suddenly heard Ama downstairs. After a while, she lit a lamp and came upstairs. Seeing Xia Qi lying in bed, she glanced around the room and suddenly said, "A Qi, why didn’t you close the window by your bed?"

Hearing this, Xia Qi raised an eyebrow but didn’t touch the window.

Would closing it make a difference?

Closing it is not as effective as pouring water on a slope.

"A Qi, you need to close it. Don't be so careless," Ama blinked her eyes, glanced nervously at the shaded window, and whispered, "They caught a spy in the village today. They say he’s already been flayed..."

Flayed...

Xia Qi was so shocked that he sat up from the bamboo bed. Someone was flayed?

Did he mean what I think?

He quickly followed up, asking nervously, "What did the spy look like?"

Ama placed the lamp on his bamboo cabinet and replied, "The spy had short hair, wore round glasses, and was dressed in long clothes entirely different from ours. While walking on the road, he was spotted by our patrolling men, tied to the banyan tree at the village entrance, and flayed."

Hearing the dead man wore glasses, Xia Qi breathed a sigh of relief. It wasn’t Xiao Ou.

Then, Xia Qi looked down at his white shirt and touched his self-cut short hair.

He hadn’t changed his clothes. Why wasn’t he taken as a spy?

Xia Qi carefully considered Ama’s words. The spy who was caught and flayed was discovered by the patrol team while out on the road, whereas Xia Qi had stayed indoors, so he wasn’t taken as a spy.

No wonder Ama had asked him to groom himself when he first arrived. Grooming was the first step in blending in with the villagers.

"Ama, please help me groom tomorrow morning," Xia Qi said, feeling secretly relieved.

Fortunately, he hadn’t encountered the patrol team when he went out to saw the tree during the day, or he would have been taken as a spy and flayed.

"Oh, you’ve finally seen reason," Ama said with a gratified smile, "I’ll wake you up tomorrow morning."

Seeing Ama’s ambiguous gaze, Xia Qi helplessly lowered his head. He had only said he would groom himself, but he hadn’t agreed to participate in any matchmaking activities.

After closing the shaded window to reassure Ama, Xia Qi quietly moved to the sunny window.

He gently pushed the window open a crack and peered outside.

Most of the ancient village was immersed in the night, shrouded in darkness, with many windows of the stilted houses still lit.

Xia Qi counted the lit windows and found nine were illuminated.

Why nine windows?

Xia Qi pondered for a moment, recalling that there were usually about 10 to 20 people in the dungeon. These nine windows likely represented half of the players.

After closing the window, Xia Qi lay back down.

This time, he found himself unable to sleep.

The sounds of the wind and insects outside the window, and even the fluttering of insect wings, were so clear. Xia Qi tossed and turned on the bamboo bed, wondering if he would come tonight.

After about half an hour, Xia Qi gradually calmed down, thinking that since he had blocked all the entry points, he probably wouldn’t come tonight.

Just as he was about to sleep, there was a sound near the sunny window, like a knock. In the quiet night, it sounded particularly light, eerie, and a bit timid.

"Knock, knock, knock."

...He really dared to come?

Xia Qi’s temple throbbed as he flipped over, accidentally twisting his waist again.

"Sigh."

An aching sensation crawled back onto Xia Qi's waist, and two cold sweat droplets slid down his forehead. Suddenly, his chest was filled with a surge of fiery anger.

His body hadn't recovered yet, and it was happening again?

Xia Qi could hardly contain his rage. In a fit of rage, he snorted coldly and grabbed a flower pot that had been prepared next to the bamboo bed. He threw it towards the window facing south.

The window hadn't been properly closed, only partially closed. The flower pot smashed into it, the window burst open, and the pot flew out.

"Crash!"

The flower pot shattered upon hitting the blue stone tiles on the first floor, making a loud cracking sound in the quiet night.

Xia Qi clenched his teeth, not even glancing at the window, and angrily lay back down.

After the flower pot shattered, the tapping at the window ceased.

Xia Qi thought the thing outside had left, so he slowly closed his eyes.

Just as he was slipping into sleep, footsteps echoed beneath his window once more.

"Thud, thud, thud."

The person below took a few steps and gradually stopped.

"Thud, thud, thud."

The person seemed to pace from left to right, unwilling to stop.

"Thud, thud, thud."

The person took a few more steps and stood directly beneath Xia Qi's window.

Would this person never leave?

Listening to the footsteps below growing more frantic, Xia Qi's breathing grew rapid. The flames in his chest erupted into a raging volcano.

"Smack."

In a fit of rage, he leaped up from the bamboo bed and grabbed a copper basin filled with water from the shelf. He yanked open the window and poured the water down.

"Splash!"

The person below was soaked from head to toe, hair plastered to their scalp, and clothes hanging heavily on them.

After pouring the water, Xia Qi was about to throw the basin down too. But just as he was preparing to do so, the person below suddenly called out to him, "Xia... Xia Qi? Why is it you?"

Hearing the familiar and "affectionate" call from below, Xia Qi felt a wave of nausea rise, nearly causing him to vomit his dinner.

"Cha Gong? You’re still alive!"