"Quick, we still have to travel,"
"Oh, I got it, junior brother," Mu Anxiao said, swaggering towards the courtyard gate, swinging her arms.
Shen Yan calmly watched Mu Anxiao's retreating back and muttered, "If I knew it would turn out like this, I shouldn't have brought her back to the past. What a hassle." He shook his head.
Mu Anxiao arrived at the gate and gently knocked.
Soon, a voice came from inside.
"Who is it?"
"Oh, I'm Lu Yan's..." Mu Anxiao stopped mid-sentence, calculating the years, she felt speechless.
The next moment, an old woman in coarse linen pulled the door open and asked, "Do you know Lu Yan?" As she spoke, she scanned Mu Anxiao and was stunned.
Mu Anxiao gave a wry smile, "I am Lu Yan's... friend's son."
"Oh," the old woman sighed in relief and asked, "Is there something you need?"
"My father asked me to come and see his old friend. May I ask him..."
"My younger brother died decades ago."
"Is that so? Then may I see your parents? My father really wants me to see them for him," Mu Anxiao lied.
The old woman's eyes darkened, and she asked, "Why doesn't your father come himself?"
"Oh, my father is lazy. He makes me do everything. Coincidentally, I recently closed a business deal nearby, so I came." Mu Anxiao tried her best to sound credible.
"You're only in your teens," the old woman said, looking Mu Anxiao up and down again. "You're truly young and promising."
"Mhm, thank you for the compliment." Mu Anxiao pointed inside, "May I come in?"
"No," the old woman shook her head.
"Why?"
"My parents said not to let strangers into our courtyard because, who knows," the old woman pulled out a talisman, "you might be a demon."
Mu Anxiao looked at the demon-warding talisman in the old woman's hand with surprise and, thinking of the villagers' memories, asked, "How do you have this?"
"Ever since my brother passed away, my parents started researching various talismans. To be frank, people in the village come to us to buy them."
"How did your brother die?" Mu Anxiao asked, pretending to know nothing.
"My brother was killed by the vine demon in that dry well. But... if it weren't for that tree demon, my brother wouldn't have been harmed. It's all because of her that my brother died," the old woman began to cry as she spoke.
Mu Anxiao looked at the old woman grieving over events from decades ago and consoled her, "Don't be sad. Um, may I go and see your parents? I'm not a demon." As she spoke, she reached out and snatched the talisman from the old woman's hand, casually sticking it to her forehead. "See? It's fine."
The old woman looked at the talisman on Mu Anxiao's forehead and said, stunned, "Alright then. But I'll tell you in advance, my parents are a bit unstable. They might hit you."
"Huh?" Mu Anxiao was taken aback, then raised her hand to remove the talisman from her forehead and said, "Are your parents crazy?"
"No. Ever since my brother died, they've been having nightmares. Every time they have a nightmare, they become abnormal the next day. They haven't come out all day today. I think they must have had another nightmare. So," the old woman stepped aside, "be careful."
"Okay," Mu Anxiao agreed reluctantly, her heart filled with trepidation.
The old woman noticed the slightly panicked expression on Mu Anxiao's face and uttered a single word: "Please."
Mu Anxiao nodded dryly. As she took her first step, she tripped over the threshold. As the old woman's eyes widened, Mu Anxiao fell to the ground.