PD -Chapter 49 A Kitchen Can Drown Someone Too

The water in the kitchen sink had finally receded by more than half. Liu Xiaopeng and Tang Shanshan immediately grabbed the man from behind and pulled him out with all their strength.

By then, however, he was already taking more breaths out than in.

I had them lay him flat on the floor. Kneeling beside him, I compressed his chest to force the black water from his lungs, used spiritual energy to clear the remaining contaminated water from his respiratory system, and performed cardiac stimulation.

Fortunately, we had arrived in time. Had we been even a few seconds later, the man would likely have been dead.

Letting out a sigh of relief, I turned to the tearful Wang Ke and said, “His life isn’t in danger anymore, but he still needs to be taken to the hospital.”

Wang Ke told us that the nearest hospital capable of providing emergency treatment and observation was in the town, so we immediately drove his father there.

By the time Wang Ke’s father was settled into a hospital bed and hooked up to an IV drip, it was already midnight.

At last, we had time to ask Wang Ke exactly what had happened.

He explained that earlier that evening, his father had been washing vegetables in the kitchen while he was doing homework. Not long afterward, he heard strange noises coming from the kitchen.

When he went to check, he found his father’s head submerged in the sink, whose water had become incredibly murky.

At first, he thought his father was joking with him. But he quickly realized something was wrong. He immediately tried to pull his father up, yet no matter how hard he tugged, he couldn’t move him.

Looking at the black water in the sink, he suddenly remembered how the pond water had turned thick, black, and viscous after the nine children entered it that night. He concluded that the incident must be related to the creature in the pond, meaning ordinary people would be powerless to help.

Desperate to save his father, he thought of us. Knowing that we would likely investigate the pond after leaving the school, he ran there as fast as he could to seek help.

“How did you know we could save your father?” I asked.

Wang Ke looked at his father lying in the hospital bed, then glanced at Tang Shanshan standing nearby.

“Back at the school, Sister Tang said she had seen Granny Zheng’s house. And… she seemed to know things about the pond and the monster. I figured you definitely weren’t ordinary people.”

I had to admire Wang Ke’s powers of observation. For a child his age, he was remarkably perceptive, and that very intelligence had saved his father’s life.

Still, the whole incident was far too strange. There had to be more secrets hidden beneath the surface.

“Your village uses tap water, right?” I asked.

Wang Ke nodded.

“Yes. The system was upgraded two years ago. The water plant installed pipelines to pump groundwater, purify it, and distribute it throughout the village.”

“You think that thing in the pond is causing trouble through the pipes?” Tang Shanshan asked.

I nodded and thought aloud.

“The tap water comes from the underground water system. Today we also saw that the deep pond has a spring at its center connected to that same underground network. I think it’s entirely possible that the creature can extend its influence through those connected waterways, reaching much farther away—even into the pipes inside villagers’ homes.”

Given everything we had learned so far, the thing in the pond was probably not a Water Monkey.

Neither folklore nor any records I had ever read mentioned Water Monkeys possessing the ability to extend themselves through connected water systems and attack people remotely.

Moreover, the footage we captured underwater showed nothing resembling a Water Monkey.

According to Tang Shanshan, the face we saw belonged to Granny Zheng’s son—Wu Yi.

After some thought, I left Wang Ke at the hospital to stay with his father. I gave him my phone number and told him to call us immediately once his father regained consciousness.

I had a strong feeling that there was a reason Wang Ke’s father had been targeted. The creature couldn’t simply be attacking random people without discrimination.

As Tang Shanshan, Liu Xiaopeng, and I left the hospital, I asked Tang Shanshan to return my phone.

Back in the car, I opened the infrared camera footage and reviewed it again. When I reached the final frame, I discovered that the face that had suddenly appeared in front of the camera looked almost identical to the photograph Granny Zheng had shown us earlier.

That face was unmistakably Wu Yi.

“It looks like Wu Yi really did drown in that pond all those years ago.”

I stared at the final frozen image on the screen.

What should have been the face of a carefree, innocent child appeared terrifyingly pale under the black-and-white infrared footage. An evil, sinister aura permeated his features.

“Do you think…” Liu Xiaopeng suddenly asked from the back seat, “that Wu Yi’s death might have had something to do with the villagers? Maybe he’s come back for revenge.”

I considered the possibility and found it highly plausible.

What I couldn’t understand was why he had waited more than thirty years before acting.

If Wu Yi had truly been murdered, and his body had been drawn into the spring beneath the pond, eventually becoming a vicious spirit bound to the water system, it shouldn’t have taken this long.

For more than three decades, he should have had countless opportunities to take revenge.

Even before the village’s water supply became connected to the underground water network, the pond had always been close enough for him to act.

And another question troubled me.

Why target those nine children?

The events of thirty years ago couldn’t possibly have involved them directly.

That meant the connection had to lie with their families.

With that realization, I immediately called Wang Ke’s father.

Wang Ke answered the phone instead.

I asked for detailed information about the nine children and their family backgrounds.

What I discovered was that all nine children, like Wang Ke himself, were left-behind children.

Their parents worked away from the village.

More importantly, Wang Ke revealed a crucial piece of information.

The parents of those nine children—and Wang Ke’s father as well—had all attended the town’s elementary school. Furthermore, they had been in the same grade as Wu Yi.

My heart skipped a beat.

At that moment, I became even more convinced that Liu Xiaopeng’s theory was correct.

The water-bound spirit that Wu Yi had become had very likely returned for revenge.

The people from Wang Ke’s father’s generation might have been deeply involved in Wu Yi’s death.

It was even possible that they had been the ones who killed him.

Now that Wu Yi had returned seeking vengeance, he discovered that those responsible were no longer in the village.

Unable to find them, he turned his wrath upon their children.

That would explain the tragic disappearance of the nine children.

Fortunately, Wang Ke had not accompanied the other children to the pond that night.

Then, shortly afterward, his father returned to the village.

As a result, Wu Yi chose to target Wang Ke’s father directly that evening.

If this theory was correct, then the spirit Wu Yi had become would not stop so easily.

Once a spirit’s resentment accumulates to a certain degree, it becomes extraordinarily difficult to disperse.

Until he avenged the grievances of his previous life, he would likely never leave.