Chapter 92: Persona

Chen Ling thought for a moment and decided to follow.

As the Executor responsible for Frost Street, Chen Ling needed to keep track of the street's population. Even natural deaths needed to be recorded, let alone if some malicious incident had occurred...

Furthermore, he also wanted to know who on Frost Street had died to cause such a big scene.

Under the dim sky, Chen Ling trailed behind the crowd, following them to a wasteland on the back mountain. Along the way, people were whispering things like "better to send him far away" and "don't come back," which left Chen Ling even more confused.

Under Boss Xu's direction, several residents with good physical strength began to shovel dirt. Before long, they had cleared a space large enough to hold the coffin, and they slowly lowered it into the ground.

"Alright, cover it with dirt, burn some paper money... and that's it."

Boss Xu threw the bags containing the two bags of hearts into the hole, and the others immediately began to bury it.

Seeing the bright red coffin disappear beneath the soil, everyone felt a slight sense of relief, and their whispering grew louder.

"Now, it should be completely over..."

"They say this place has good feng shui, I hope he can rest in peace forever."

"After we go back, let's go to the next street and get a tombstone for him. Just a mound of dirt like this looks creepy... I keep feeling like he could come back out."

"That's impossible, could he really turn into a ghost?"

“……”

Boss Li and the others also squatted down, took out a basin from somewhere, lit the paper money, and threw it in. A cold wind blew across the wasteland, scattering the other bag of paper money beside his hand into the surroundings.

In the dim light, a figure stepped forward and bent down to pick them up one by one.

"Thank you." Boss Li couldn't see his face clearly, he just thanked him.

"Don't mention it."

Boss Li was stunned, suddenly feeling that the voice sounded a bit familiar.

The person clutched the paper money and walked to the fire basin that had just been lit, feeding it in one by one. As the fire grew brighter, the person's face was gradually outlined in the shadows.

"By the way, Boss Li, who are you burying?" The firelight illuminated half of Chen Ling's face as he slowly looked up.

Boss Li froze instantly.

He blinked hard, as if he had seen a ghost!

"Old Li, you're burning that paper money too slowly, we're already done here." Boss Xu walked behind Chen Ling, who was squatting with his back to him, and couldn't help but speak up.

"Finish burning it quickly, everyone needs to go back and rest."

"You... you you... he... he!!" Boss Li's face turned deathly pale, one finger pointing at Chen Ling, unable to say a complete sentence for a long time.

"What's with the 'he'?"

Boss Xu looked down in confusion, just as Chen Ling looked up at him. The firelight illuminated half of his face from below his chin, pale and eerie.

"Boss Xu." Chen Ling suddenly remembered something. "Where are the peaches I asked for?"

[Audience Expectation +3]

[Audience Expectation +3]

[Audience Expectation...]

Boss Xu's eyes widened suddenly. He stared fixedly at Chen Ling's face. After a long while, he rolled his eyes and fainted on the spot.

"Boss Xu?"

"Hey, what's wrong with Boss Xu?"

Seeing this, the others immediately surrounded him, not knowing what had happened. Just then, a figure stepped forward and helped him up.

"What's wrong with him?" Chen Ling frowned slightly.

The midnight wind blew across the wasteland, lifting the paper money in front of Boss Li and scattering it around Chen Ling...

The next moment, everyone's breathing stopped... They stood there like statues. A few seconds later, they turned around in terror and sprinted down the mountain!!

Watching everyone flee from him as if they had seen a ghost, Chen Ling's eyes were full of confusion.

"A-Ling?" A voice came from the side.

"Uncle Zhao." Chen Ling looked at Uncle Zhao, the only one who hadn't run, and couldn't help but ask, "What's going on?"

Uncle Zhao looked at him with a complex expression. After a long time, he let out a long sigh...

……

Half an hour later.

Under the night sky, the door to Zhao's Breakfast Shop was pushed open.

Uncle Zhao lit a kerosene lamp, heated up a bowl of soy milk in the back kitchen, and handed it to Chen Ling at the table.

"A monster that loves eating human hearts?" Chen Ling heard Uncle Zhao's description and a look of astonishment flashed across his face. "I didn't..."

"They said they all saw it. That day on the street, you took hearts out of a bag and handed them to them one by one... They were all terrified." Uncle Zhao looked at him with a complex expression.

"A-Ling... I've heard about your parents and A-Yan. I can understand how you feel right now... but you must not walk down some evil, crooked path."

Chen Ling's mind immediately flashed back to the scene where he was surrounded by the bosses on the street that day, but what he had handed out were clearly peaches...

Wait.

Chen Ling suddenly thought of the scene where the audience expectation value rose every time he handed out a peach, and his face turned a bit ugly.

He seemed to understand what was going on...

No wonder that guy tripped at his own door that day and turned around to kowtow to him three times—he had mistaken him for a perverted serial killer.

"After you finished handing out the peaches, you went to the Ancient Path... During this time, the rumors about you have become more and more bizarre. Some say you're a monster reincarnated, some say you have psychological problems, and even people outside Frost Street have heard about you."

"...It's all a misunderstanding." Chen Ling held it in for a long time before he could say that.

"I also think it's probably a misunderstanding."

Uncle Zhao brought him a few tea eggs and rambled on, "But you have to be careful, these rumors will affect your image... If this continues, no one will dare to get close to you."

Chen Ling had been rushing around and hadn't had a proper meal. At this moment, he peeled a few tea eggs and stuffed them into his mouth, gulping down the soy milk on the table.

"I'll find a time... to explain it to them."

Chen Ling replied helplessly after finishing his meal.

Things developing to this point was not what he wanted at all... but the trolls in the audience were too twisted. He had no idea how much his image had been tampered with while he was completely unaware.

Just as the two were talking, a weary figure walked down the street and pushed the door open.

"Chen Ling?"

Zhao Yi saw Chen Ling at home, was stunned for a moment, and then said unpleasantly, "Why are you running to my house to eat in the middle of the night?"

Zhao Yi was a reckless person. Even though Chen Ling was now an Executor, he had no intention of being humble. He was still as overbearing as he was when they were kids, and no matter how he looked at Chen Ling, he didn't like him.

Most importantly, regarding the time his old man misunderstood that he liked men, Zhao Yi had pondered for a long time and still felt something was wrong. He guessed that it might have been Chen Ling who was secretly causing trouble... Unfortunately, he had no evidence.

Seeing Chen Ling now, he naturally wouldn't give him a good look.