Kaleidoscope of Death

Chapter 86: The True River God

Lin Qiushi and Gu Longming sat in the hall and listened to a story about Yu Manor.

The story contained the Yu Landlady, the sacrificial son Yu Caizhe, along with many plot elements they hadn't guessed.

After the Yu boy was sacrificed, the ceaseless rain stopped, as if the god in the river truly had been moved by the sacrifice. The townspeople were overjoyed, and as a holiday, declared the day to be the River God's birthday. To celebrate, they even hung the streets full of red lanterns, and the whole town was rife with festive cheer.

But this celebration couldn't last for even a few days before another incident happened.

People in the town began to die. The bodies of those who died seemed to have been gobbled up by something; not even bones were left, only bits of hair and nail strewn on the ground.

At first people thought it was some beast that had gotten into town, but very soon this speculation was dismissed. After all, no beast could eat a human so silently. The riddling deaths were very soon solved—what was eating the townspeople wasn't alive at all. It was swollen-cheeked, sharp-toothed little ghouls from the river.

The people instantly sank into a panic. Nobody had seen anything like this before, nor did anyone know what to do about it.

Just before the fear could go to everybody's heads, the Yu Landlady came forward. She said her sacrificed son had sent her a dream and told her a solution to this situation.

Just as the crowd grew happy again, they heard the Yu Landlady's solution. "Only oil lamps made from humans can stop the river ghouls."

The townspeople went silent. Human oil lamps could stop those things, but where would they get human oil...

The Landlady wasn't in a hurry. She only waited in silence.

And very soon, her goal was achieved—people who couldn't take the terror moved on their own kind.

"It was them, they're the ones who said we should sacrifice children to the River God," voices from the crowd began to say. And thoughts like this only grew increasingly fervent.

Finally, those who first brought forth the idea to sacrifice the Yu boy became the first victims.

They were mercilessly slaughtered. The Landlady rendered their bodies into oil lamps with a genteel expression on her face.

The oil lamps were distributed to citizens, and there were no more deaths at the hands of the river ghouls.

The citizens thought the issue was resolved, until the next birthday, when that endless rain started again.

The citizens sank once again into panic, but the Landlady told them a solution.

"A new River God," she said. "We need a new River God." Her red-nailed finger pointed—pointed at a simple, innocent child in the arms of his mother. She smiled. "Look. This adorable child. You're very fit to be the new River God."

The child's mother looked stunned, then began to furiously curse, just like the Landlady had before.

When the Yu boy had been chosen to become the River God, the Landlady had cursed like this as well. But it had been to no avail—her child was still taken from her, brought to the river, and tossed into the river rapids.

He had been so small, and knew only how to call mama. He was taken from her side just like that, to never come back.

For someone else to experience what she had experienced, the Landlady was very pleased. She watched the separation of mother and child, watched the child get thrown into the river. Watched the pouring rains stop, watched the human oil lamp brightly shining in her hands.