Furrowing his brow, the sword in Huo Zaiyuan's hand disappears in a flash, replaced by a stack of wooden talisman. "There's something off about this entire situation. Older brother Long, you, Qin Jun and Li Qing go out to search the other houses in the vicinity and check on the situation there. I will remain here to set up a few arrays. We'll need to depart promptly early in the morning tomorrow."
The atmosphere here is very tranquil due to the absence of people, and it ought to make him feel happy or relieved. But for some reason, his heart feels very restless, as though there is something hiding in here waiting to catch them off guard. Or to pounce on them and drag them away...
"All right." Long Zhanye gives a curt nod.
After the other three leave the house, Huo Zaiyuan starts to lay arrays in the courtyard. The stack of tile talismans currently in his hand is the remaining ones from his second attempt at using ink created from ant crystals, so the spiritual power within is relatively large.
Once the first layer of arrays is laid down, Huo Zaiyuan pauses to ponder for a while, then takes out a few coin talismans and added a second warding boundary. This array is precisely the Heaven Concealing Array he learned after breaking through to the third level. The runes on these coins were drawn with spring water, so the amount of power within is still unknown. Might as well use this opportunity to test it out.
Long Zhanye leads the other two to search the surrounding houses, but the end results are all the same. Vacant without the slightest trace of any inhabitants. The interior of each building also sports a layer of dust, as though this entire town has been abandoned for quite a while. On top of that, within each home, they found a store of foodstuff left behind.
"Eldest brother Long, this doesn't seem like everyone in the village fled when the apocalypse arrived, taking whatever they can. We've already gone through quite a few houses and they're all the same, with sacks full of rice and containers full of flour. There're even meat and vegetables in the freezer." Qin Jun pursed his lips as he opens the icebox, revealing food gone bad due to the power disconnecting for a relatively long period of time.
"Hmm, indeed." Gaze wandering all over this room, Long Zhanye nods. He has carefully scrutinised the interior of each house they searched, but no matter how carefully he looks, he didn't even manage to find a single strand of cobweb.
"Eh? There's something odd shining below the table." Li Qing crouches down, bending his head to look beneath the piece of furniture, both eyes wide open.
His voice draws the attention of Qin Jun and Long Zhanye, and both dash over, quickly spotting what Li Qing pointed out.
At the bottom corner of the table placed against the wall, a small object is glowing fluorescent green, but they can't exactly make out what it is.
"What is that?" Qin Jun asks Long Zhanye.
Shaking his head, Long Zhanye's eyebrows draw together. "Don't know. But it could be a fluorescent organism that glows in the dark. I'll take it out to see."
Squeezing through the legs of the table, he removes a napkin from his pocket to retrieve the unknown thing.
"So what is it?" Li Qing leans forward to take a better look at the object wrapped in the napkin.
"A glow-in-the-dark fake nail." Long Zhanye studies the delicate pattern on the fake nail as he answers.
"There's blood." Qin Jun pinches the corner of the napkin, then reaches out to flip the fake nail over, glancing at Long Zhanye. "Eldest brother Long, under what kind of situation will the fake nail be torn out along with the real nail?"
Hearing his question, Long Zhanye blinks, as though a thought struck him. Instantly, he kneels down on the floorboards in search of something. Eyes taking in everything as he carefully scrutinises the area, he finally comes back to the bottom corner of the table. At the edge of the wooden furniture, one can see several thin gorges, and if one follows the same path forward a little more, upon the surface of the white tiles is another handful of faintly discernible scratches.
"These scratches...why would someone claw at the tiles?" A sliver of panic surfaces on Li Qing's face as he turns to the other two men.
Just now, most of their focus was on the glow-in-the-dark fingernail on the floor, thus missing the small scratches left behind on the tiles and the furniture.
"When they were being dragged away, these scratches were left behind as the result of struggling, and finally their fingernail was torn off." Qin Jun answers blandly.
"That makes sense. Only...what sort of creature will drag a human away?" Long Zhanye's brow knits together, gaze shifting outside. "I think we had better quickly return to find little Yuan."
The sky has already darkened, and unknown dangers will no doubt seize this opportunity to emerge.