The villager listened to the fat man’s roundabout talk for a long time. Although he couldn’t guess the fat man’s thoughts with absolute certainty, he clearly understood that the fat man was interested in the sheep they raised and was curious about the sheep in their village.
He sat up straight, no longer lying lazily on his recliner as if boneless. Instead, he turned to the fat man and asked, “Alright, alright, you’ve been beating around the bush. What exactly do you want to ask? Just say it directly. Listening to you talk like this, I feel tired just for you.”
The fat man, realizing his intentions had been exposed by the villager, could only make his curiosity appear more genuine and less self-serving.
“I don’t have any other intentions. I’m just trapped here and can’t get out. So, I have nothing else to do. I’m just chatting, looking for topics, and naturally, I’d talk about things related to everyone’s daily lives. So, I’m just asking casually.”
The fat man scratched his head, his expression appearing somewhat innocent and naive. “Have I, my two brothers, and the folks responsible for raising the sheep in this village met each other?”
“I remember when the three of us brothers arrived in this village, there were quite a few villagers we met that day. Were they present too?”
The villager whom the fat man was questioning thought for a moment, sized up the fat man a few times, and then slowly replied, “Hmm? Hmm… yes, you’ve definitely met them. You must see them every day you’ve been in the village these past few days. It would be strange if you didn’t see them, wouldn’t it?”
The fat man was stunned for a moment and then tried hard to recall carefully, remembering all the villagers he had seen in the past few days, trying to deduce which ones were the targets he was looking for.
However, unfortunately, due to insufficient clues and evidence, and relying solely on facial recognition, no one had pointed out to him who looked like what or what their names were, and who was responsible for raising the sheep. The fat man had no choice but to rely on his own memory to determine which villagers he wanted to find.
Thus, the fat man had to shamelessly ask the villager in front of him again, “Oh? Is that so? So I’ve seen them every day… That really makes me curious who they are. Thinking about it, I can’t quite match them to anyone. Are they from the village chief’s house? Or whose house?”
As a result, the fat man’s question was not well-received. The villager immediately showed a hint of displeasure. “You said you had no intentions, so why ask so much? What does it have to do with you? You’ve strayed too far from casual conversation. You ask about this and that, it’s simply bizarre.”
The fat man was suddenly rendered speechless, stammering for a while. He didn’t dare to ask any further questions and quickly tried to appease the villager by explaining himself.
“Hey! I really didn’t think too much about it… I, I think you misunderstood me, didn’t you? I didn’t think too much. It’s just that my two brothers, they really like eating your meat here. This shows that your sheep are raised exceptionally well! How can I not be curious and ask a few more questions when I have the chance? I really have no other intentions.”
The fat man waved his hands, trying his best to prove his innocence. “If you don’t believe me, then I won’t ask anymore. I don’t really like eating meat myself, so there’s no need for me to scheme anything.”
Whether the villager believed him or not in the end, he stopped discussing the sheep with the fat man. The fat man also didn’t dare to show any further doubts and could only pretend that he was genuinely curious and asked casually, without any ulterior motives, so that the villager would relax.
This was to prevent the villager from getting upset and causing trouble, or from going back and telling others, which might lead to the other villagers in the village also becoming displeased, and eventually, Ye Tiancheng and the little fox would hear about it.
The fat man really didn’t want Ye Tiancheng and the little fox to know anything about this matter. Although he himself hadn’t figured out what was going on, and he didn’t always have such an intuition, he was subconsciously doing this all along.
It was like how he had been hesitant to eat meat before, or how he had suppressed his doubts about the village’s sheep farming, or even more so, how he hadn’t revealed half a word about eavesdropping last night to Ye Tiancheng and the little fox.
Some things were not even done by the fat man deliberately, but rather seemed to be an instinct, a unique instinct of a thinking life form, an instinct of seeking advantages and avoiding disadvantages.
It was another day of finding nothing. The fat man tried to figure out who the sheep-raising villagers were, but ultimately found no clues. Moreover, he was afraid of alerting others and didn’t dare to ask for too many details from anyone.
He could only wait until dusk and dejectedly return to the dilapidated earthen house where the three of them were temporarily staying.
Unexpectedly, halfway back, the fat man heard the noisy sound of many people talking. He followed the sound and saw a large crowd of villagers gathered in front of the village chief’s house.
This was the first time the fat man had seen such a lively scene since he first arrived in the village. After he and Ye Tiancheng and the little fox settled down in the village, he realized that the villagers did not often gather together, and even situations where three to five people would gather to chat or fool around were not common.
The fat man couldn’t help but wonder what had happened again, or if someone else had arrived in the village. Could it be the people they fought with that day?
After all, since being teleported to this bizarre village, the fat man had not seen those people again. Logically, they had all encountered the white light emitted by a stone at the same time, and the people who were teleported away should not have been only the three of them.
At first, when the fat man realized they were not in the same place as the three of them, he thought they had been teleported to other locations. Could there be a time difference?
While speculating, the fat man squeezed into the crowd. The other villagers didn’t pay attention to the fat man who had come to watch the excitement. No one stopped him when he tried to push to the front, nor did they tell him he couldn’t.
When the fat man finally squeezed to the very front, closer to the village chief’s house, he saw several unfamiliar faces surrounded by the villagers. And next to these unfamiliar faces were several… sheep, with their legs tied?!
It was indeed sheep. So this village really did raise sheep. Then what was going on with these unfamiliar faces? They seemed to be quite seriously injured. Could they really be the people they fought with that day? But their attire didn’t seem to match, rather they looked similar to the people in the village.
The fat man immediately grabbed a villager and asked him what was happening. “Hey, hey, fellow villager, what’s going on? Why are there so many unfamiliar faces here? And they’re so seriously injured… Did some outsiders arrive again?”
Now that he had seen the sheep with his own eyes, the fat man was no longer as concerned about the sheep. Instead, his attention shifted more towards those unfamiliar faces.
The villager whom the fat man grabbed turned to look at him, then looked at the situation in the middle of the encirclement, and replied to the fat man, “What outsiders? These people are also from our village. They went to pick up the sheep, and this is what happened, they got injured and came back.”
So they were also villagers from this village? The fat man looked over in surprise, confirming that their appearances were unfamiliar. “Then why do they look unfamiliar? I haven’t encountered them in the village these past few days?”
The villager then said, “Of course you haven’t seen them. The sheep they went to pick up are the same batch as the ones we picked up a few days ago. It’s just that these few who went to pick up the sheep returned late. When you came to our village, they had already gone out, so you didn’t see them.”
This made sense. The fat man understood and felt that this was reasonable, no wonder he saw only unfamiliar faces here.
Moreover, judging by what this villager said, the sheep sent to their village were not directly delivered to the village, but rather the villagers themselves had to go out to pick them up. However, they had gone out to pick up the sheep and had now returned… Had the fog outside the village dissipated?
However, regarding whether the fog outside had dissipated and how to leave this village, the villagers generally paid no attention when asked, acting as if they hadn’t heard anything. Therefore, the fat man was no longer foolish enough to ask the villagers these questions directly. But he was also not so anxious as to immediately check if the fog outside the village had dissipated.
Firstly, Ye Tiancheng and the little fox were not here, and outside there was not only fog but also water. It wasn’t that they could really leave just because the fog dissipated.
As for the other aspect, the fat man was inexplicably concerned about what was happening here and really wanted to figure out the specific situation.
Looking at the few people surrounded in the center, and the sheep they brought back, they seemed to be fine. Moreover, the sheep looked like ordinary mountain goats from the outside, with their limbs bound and placed on the ground, yet they were unexpectedly aggressive.
Those bound mountain goats struggled desperately. Some of them had bloody wounds. The fat man even saw one mountain goat that was missing a hoof. It looked so tragic, and those few villagers were also covered in scars. The fat man suspected if it was these sheep they brought back that did it, or if they had gone into some mountain forest and encountered some fierce wild beasts.
The fat man asked the villager he had grabbed with some astonishment, his face showing shock, and stammered, “I heard my two brothers say before that you said the sheep you raise here are all sent from outside. How can picking up sheep be so dangerous? Aren’t your sheep perhaps wild, wild?”
Wild mountain goats? That couldn’t be, could it? He couldn’t do this. He had eaten that meat. After leaving, would he have to bear some responsibility for this matter and be arrested?
“Ah? Cough, of course not wild. These sheep were at most… free-range before. Anyway, they are definitely not wild. You’re thinking too much. However, picking up sheep is indeed a bit dangerous. As for the specific reason, isn’t the village chief asking about it?”
The villager coughed dryly after hearing the fat man’s question and then explained, denying the fat man’s guess. The fat man thought that it was easy to expose his true intentions by constantly questioning one person, so he didn’t stay in that spot anymore. Instead, he painstakingly squeezed to another position.