The Otherworldly Adventures of a Super Naive Girl

Chapter 407-408: Replicas, The Palace

407: Replicas

“Xiao Wu?” Ming Xi took Feng Wu’s hand and worriedly looked in the direction she was staring at.

Feng Wu turned to Ming Xi and seriously said, “There are many people here, many identical people.”

As if in unison, the spirits displayed an identical ugly expression while Feng Wu and Ming Xi talked.

Instead of answering Feng Wu’s question, the spirits disappeared.

“You mean there are evil spirits here?!”

For evil spirits to come out under the red moon was incredibly rare.

Feng Wu shook her head and said, “No, they are not evil spirits. There is nothing entangled around them.”

“Not evil spirits?!” Ming Xi wanted to ask Feng Wu what was going on, but their location was too dangerous for questioning.

“Did you just say there are evil spirits around us?! Is this place actually a ghost town?” Ghost town, yes, the name was very appropriate thought Rui Baby.

Yifu broke out in a cold sweat upon overhearing.

They were all afraid of the unknown and ghosts were something they all feared. Except for necromancers, no one would voluntarily want to see the departed spirits of the dead.

“Little girl, you’re a necromancer?!” The middle-aged man looked at Feng Wu with bright eyes.

They had mages, sword masters, and pharmacists in their group, but no necromancers. He had felt eyes watching him as soon as he entered the city. Now with Feng Wu’s revelation, he knew there really were eyes watching him.

A bunch of ghosts had been staring at them the entire time they were in the city! No wonder they felt jittery every time they entered.

“No, it’s that I can see some things.” Feng Wu was honest. She had the qualifications to be a necromancer but she preferred being a sword user.

“It’s good you can see, it’s good you can see. Can you tell us what you saw?”

Feng Wu didn’t think there was anything she needed to hide so she repeated everything she saw.

The spirits of the king’s attendants began to gossip wildly.

“Oh my goodness, the legends were true. I never expected the czar was this kind cruel, heartless person.”

“That’s why I say people can look good but still be dogs. This czar guy was a dog through and through, completely inhuman.

“That’s too much. It’s just excessive, holding all these people accountable just because of one person.”

“That czar guy was an abomination; he would do something like that.”

The spirits gossiped and bad mouthed the czar.

“What’s going on? Do you guys know something?” Rui Baby flew over when he saw the furious conversation the spirits were having.

They didn’t hide anything and spilled all the czar’s affairs to Rui Baby.

Rui Baby’s mouth puckered more and more the more he heard about the atrocious czar.

“I thought it was a just a tale people imagined, but it turns out it is true after all.” Ming Xi took a deep breath and spoke.

“Ming Xi, do you know what’s going on?” Ze Ye looked over at Ming Xi, hoping the other could explain.

Ming Xi coughed before speaking. “If I’m guessing correctly, the spirits of the dead Xiao Wu saw were the original citizens of the Kingdom of Sand.”

“And everyone in the kingdom looked exactly the same?” It was just too unbelievable.

It was hard to find two people who looked identical in everything from height, weight to coloring. To say the people in the kingdom were born the same, was too hard to believe.

“Of course it is impossible. The reason why they became like so was because. . . ”

And Ming Xi proceeded to tell them the tale.

Ten thousand years ago, before the kingdom was unified, most of the people living there were just ordinary people. But one day a demon person became stranded in the desert. He was just a normal foot soldier in the demon realm, but in front of these ordinary people, he was practically a godly existence.

The demon forced people to pay tribute with wine and women, and for a people with precious few food resources, this made their lives even more difficult. On top of that he also demanded the most beautiful women.

He was cruel by nature and killed people for every little thing. Later, one of the tribute beauties became pregnant. She died during childbirth when the baby sucked her life and burst from her body.

No one dared harm the child because the demon was there. But one day everything changed when a passing master killed the demon.

The dead woman’s brother adopted the child. He didn’t do it to care for the boy though, he did it to get vengeance for his dead sister. He just wanted to torture the child and make it pay.

This was a price that should have been exacted from the demon, but the demon was no longer there, so the brother took out all his anger and hate on the child.

The child, who didn’t understand anything, was beat from his head to his toes every day from then onward. No one interfered.

Everyone looked at the child like it was a dirty thing, an object to be used as an anger outlet.

As expected, the child grew to hate everyone, especially his uncle. And as the boy grew, the demon blood in his body eventually awoke and caused his cultivation to explode. josei

He ruthlessly murdered his uncle in a most cruel manner with his newfound strength. Afterwards he forced everyone to wear his uncle's face with a demon curse. Let them see the face he saw every day.

Soon after this, the Kingdom of Sand was established and every citizen inside had the same face as his uncle. None of them ever regained their original appearances.

408: The Palace

The imprisoned became the czar’s anger outlet. Anytime he was in a bad mood, he would pick a random person that had his uncle’s face and vent his anger on that individual, abusing them in every way imaginable. He went through as many people as needed until his anger was completely spent.

It was his favorite game and those that supported him called it the “Czar’s Game”.

The group’s expression changed after listening to Ming Xi. For a moment, they didn’t know what to think.

“So the czar was actually half-human half-demon.” Mayleen whispered.

“Exactly the same faces though? This czar really lived up to his ruthless reputation as a half-human half-demon.” LeChen had never even heard of the czar until now, but the more he learned, the more he didn’t like the man.

“The people here are so pitiful to have such a master.” Yifu sighed.

“He probably had something to do with the people who recently disappeared.” Caesar guessed. Though the citizens of the Kingdom of Sand were worthy of being pitied, he didn’t feel any particularly way about it.

“That’s quite possible.” Ze Ye agreed.

“Be careful everyone. The city is full of the departed spirits of those who used to live here. We don’t know what they’re capable of.” Zhaki warned everyone.

“Yes, be careful everyone.”

There was a flash of understanding on the middle-aged uncle’s face. He sighed as he said, “Turns out it the spirits of the departed dead were responsible for all the disappearances. Don’t know if the disappeared were the subject of vicious attacks or not.”

They were all uncomfortable knowing there were so many spirts watching them.

“Let’s go farther in. We still have to find a way out of this place.” Zi Cheng reminded everyone.

The others nodding in agreement with Zi Cheng.

The group walked along the empty streets through the silent city. There wasn’t a soul in sight. If they didn’t know they were surrounded by ghosts, they would have thought the city was deserted.

“Xiao Wu, if you can see the dead, maybe you can communicate with them, maybe they know where the exit is.” Zi Cheng turned and asked Feng Wu.

Her words reminded everyone how useful Feng Wu’s ability to communicate with the dead was. It would save them a lot of effort if they used it well.

“I’ll give it a try.” Feng Wu didn’t refuse and agreed automatically.

She walked off in a random direction and said a few words to the empty air. She came back to the group two minutes later.

“So? What did they say?”

“Did they agree to lead us to the exit?”

Feng Wu shook her head. “They ignored me. They’re very strange and won’t talk to me.” It was the first time she met spirits who didn’t want to talk.

Though the group was disappointed, no one blamed Feng Wu for not being able to do it. They expressed their understanding and told her not to take it to heart.

It was a big city but they managed to walk all around it. They did not encounter any instances of anyone disappearing like the middle-aged uncle had talked about.

But they didn’t dare linger in the houses.

Their goal was the palace. If there was a way out, it had to be through there.

They entered the palace through the now unguarded gates. It was the biggest, grandest structure in the city with an interior befitting a king. They were met by a stunning garden with beautiful enchanting flowers in full bloom – a rare sight in a desert.

They passed through the garden to get to the great hall that housed the throne. It was a resplendent hall lit with night pearls while the throne itself was richly decorated with so many jewels and gems, that if sold, would have allowed ordinary people to live a life of comfort many times over.

The throne was attractive but no touched it or even thought about taking it. The city wasn’t a good place and any small mistake could lead to catastrophe. The throne was the symbol of the king’s rule so no one was foolish enough to move the throne.

“Let’s all split up and search the palace for clues.” Ming Xi said.

It was such a big place; they wouldn’t be able to search it properly if they stuck together as a big group. It was more productive to split up.

Caesar nodded. “Let’s all meet in the main hall in half an hour.” He was confident of his strength so he wasn’t afraid of any dangers that could come up from moving on his own.

No one else had an opinion on the matter so they broke into smaller groups to investigate the palace.

Feng Wu stayed with Ming Xi. With her simple mind, there was no way Ming Xi was going to let her form a team with anyone else.

“This man is really good. Xiao Wu has good eyes.” Ming Xi’s appearance gave him a lot of bonus points with some of the minor maids. They liked his good looks very much. They liked his looks so much, they were practically drooling. Who knew what Ming Xi would have thought if he knew a bunch of spirit maids were eyeing him like candy.

Half an hour later, everyone was back in the main hall. There was no teleportation point in the palace anywhere, but LeChen and Fang Li were lucky and found a notebook in a maid’s room.

A few things of interest were recorded inside.

In hopes of finding some clues, everyone gathered to listen to LeChen read from the notebook.

One entry: “My face changed again today. It looks more and more like everyone else here. I don’t know how long I can remain clearheaded. When will I forget who I am? When will I become just like them?”

Another entry: “Someone recently entered the city. Watching them desperately risk their life to escape reminds me of me when I first came here, but they, like I, will become like everyone else in this city. No one can leave, no one can die.”

Another: “Big news! Our king was killed today. Will this release us? Without our king’s curse, will we finally return to our original selves?”

Another: “The king is dead but everyone will be buried as a sacrifice along with him. I don’t want to die. . .  I don’t want to die. . . ”