Seeing her son still trembling in her arms, Yang Chuxia intuitively felt that there was something strange about this matter. Encountering such people in two different places made her wonder.
Yet, Mu Shaoling did not respond to her.
Commandery Princess Dongyang also wanted to inquire, but she saw that his gaze was fixed straight past Yang Chuxiaâs shoulder. Following his line of sight, Yang Chuxia turned around and saw that everyone at that table was as gaunt as could be, though they seemed a tad better off than the person outside earlier.
At least their faces werenât completely covered in blue veins.
When Mu Shaoling looked over, they even smiled at him.
After finishing dinner, Yang Chuxia and her party returned to their rooms, and Mu Shaoling left the inn. He didnât go anywhere else, just aimlessly wandered the town, then noticed quite a few similar figures. Due to their excessive thinness, their clothes hung on them like costumes, fluttering about.
By the time he returned to the inn, it was quite late.
The innkeeper immediately addressed him upon his return, "Oh dear, why did you go out at this hour? And to come back so late, if something had happened, wouldnât your family blame our inn? For someone of your prestigious status, we really canât afford the responsibility."
Mu Shaolingâs eyebrows raised slightly as he said, "Innkeeper, what do you mean by that? Am I not allowed to go out?"
"Oh, itâs not that you canât go out, just that you shouldnât at night," the innkeeper explained. "Didnât you see those living dead during the day? Werenât their faces and bodies frightening? Each one of them could make children cry outright in daylight, how much scarier would it be at night?"
"Not to mention far away instances, just the day before yesterday, an old lady from the countryside came to town to visit her daughter and ended up being scared to death by those people. But really, that old lady was too curious for her own good, wasnât she? Insisting on wandering around late at night, and in the end, bumped into the living dead and was literally scared to death."
The innkeeper sighed heavily while discussing the matter, "The old lady passed away, which was bad enough, but then she brought a whole heap of trouble to her daughterâs house. Not one in that daughterâs family is easy to deal with; they all came to make a fuss, demanding compensation. Itâs truly an ill-fated mess."
By the end, he again addressed Mu Shaoling, "So Iâm telling you, donât go out at night. Itâs one thing if you scare yourself to death, but itâs another if you implicate our inn."
"Hey, how can you talk like that?" protested the servant following behind Mu Shaoling.
Mu Shaoling raised his hand to send the servant back, not taking offense at the innkeeperâs harsh words but simply asking, "Innkeeper, you just mentioned those people are like the living dead? Whatâs going on with them?"
"Ah, donât they look like theyâve been dead for days? Look how skinny they are!" The innkeeper paused before continuing, "Oh, right, you asked me whatâs going on, didnât you? To tell you the truth, I donât know either. It just suddenly happened one day to one person, and not long afterward that person died, then more and more people started to look like that."
"Ah, everyone is saying itâs a contagious disease, a lot of people have fled this place," he added.
"This isnât a contagious disease," Mu Shaoling countered, "At first, people were fine, but gradually they became thinner, until their organs failed, and they died."
"This isnât a contagious disease?" The innkeeper eyed Mu Shaoling, then scoffed, "If itâs not contagious, how come more and more people are getting like this? Are you a doctor? All the doctors here say itâs a contagious disease."