She Was Sentenced to Life Imprisonment [Unlimited] - Chapter 31

Chapter 31: Beauty Porcelain (13)

She’s Not Mother Ci

The biting cold wind struck the pale hand that was reaching out, making the owner of the hand stiffen.

Jiang Nan was in a daze for a moment. When she caught a glimpse of Luo Ning out of the corner of her eye, she finally placed her hand on the door.

However, the cold wind seemed to be possessed, rushing in entirely. An invisible, repelling force was preventing her from opening the door.

[Player, please focus on making the Beauty Porcelain. Do not disturb Mother Ci.]

The system’s voice suddenly echoed in her mind. It was a warning directed solely at her.

Why would it give a warning now?

The sound of shattering porcelain came from inside. It was a chaotic sound, as if someone was angrily smashing things.

“I just want to go in. I’m not looking for her.”

Jiang Nan calmed down. Her hand on the door had no intention of leaving.

[Player, please focus on making the Beauty Porcelain. Do not disturb Mother Ci.]

[Dungeon NPC’s autonomous will is out of control. Now cleaning up…]

The system warned her again, but the second message caught Jiang Nan’s attention.

Jiang Nan glanced at the old wooden door, then lifted her foot and kicked it open without hesitation.

Luo Ning stood to the side, a smile on her face the entire time. She wasn’t scared by Jiang Nan’s violent action.

“The door wasn’t sturdy enough.”

Luo Ning said with a playful smile. She wasn’t talking to Jiang Nan, but rather, she seemed to be explaining to the ever-present system.

After a few “shh shh” sounds, the system fell completely silent.

The pain in her ankle made Jiang Nan frown. It was a little uncomfortable, but she only subtly moved it, her face showing no expression when she looked back.

Most of the porcelain on the display shelf was gone. The only one left intact was the lotus porcelain.

The ground was covered with shattered porcelain, making it impossible to walk.

Jiang Nan picked up a shard of porcelain and examined it. She felt it was much rougher than the porcelain Mother Ci usually put on the shelf.

Her eyes were lowered in thought. The edge of the porcelain shard in her hand was sharp, and she accidentally cut her skin, causing bl00d to ooze out.

The sting on her finger pulled her back to reality. But she only casually looked at the wound on her hand and quietly clenched her fist, hiding her hand that healed in just a few seconds. She looked up and scanned everything in the room.

A rampant aura tried to rush out of the room. When it failed, it charged around, knocking everything onto the ground. This was why the room was so messy and why Mother Ci wasn’t there.

The moment they stepped into the room, that aura instantly rushed toward them.

But the two of them looked up at the same time, their identical fierce expressions and a pressure that was several times stronger than the aura seemed to push its sanity out of it. It obediently changed direction and crashed into the door.

“Mother Ci,” Jiang Nan called out, not seeing anyone.

This room had an inner room. They guessed Mother Ci was probably in there, but with all the shattered porcelain on the floor, they couldn’t walk.

Jiang Nan waited for a long time but got no response. Instead, she felt the other person’s aura getting weaker and weaker.

Remembering the system’s words, a cold look appeared in her eyes. She was about to take a step, but her body suddenly floated into the air. In her panic, she grabbed onto something.

When she came to her senses, she saw Luo Ning’s almost perfect profile. She was a little annoyed.

“Luo Ning, what are you doing?”

Luo Ning looked down at her and smiled. The gentleness in her eyes made people forget how terrifying she was.

“I just saw you cut your hand. Of course, you can’t get hurt again.”

Having never been held like this, Jiang Nan was not only annoyed but also instinctively nervous. She grabbed the other person’s arm with so much force that her fingers dug into the flesh.

The muffled sound of high heels seemed to drive away people’s fear.

The inner room wasn’t far. Luo Ning’s legs were long, and she reached it in just a few steps.

The inner room was not as messy as the outer one. Although it wasn’t much better due to Mother Ci’s loss of control, there weren’t many things inside, so it wasn’t a complete mess.

Mother Ci was on the old bed, her expression twisted and distorted in pain. Under the layers of pressure, she was still stubbornly muttering something to herself.

The two child attendants beside her were huddled together in the corner, trembling.

When Luo Ning came in, she seemed a little picky. She looked around and found a clean spot to put Jiang Nan down.

The moment her feet touched the ground, Jiang Nan immediately moved away from Luo Ning and walked toward Mother Ci.

When she got closer, she could vaguely hear what Mother Ci was saying.

“Why… why can’t I see her…”

The shackles loosened. The splitting headache gradually calmed down. She looked up at Jiang Nan, her eyes filled with confusion.

“How could you… come in.”

Jiang Nan had no intention of wasting words with her. She said directly.

“There’s a ghost here. Do you know that?”

Jiang Nan knew the other person should know. Otherwise, why would her expression have been like that before she left the room?

She asked this not for an answer but simply to confirm something.

Mother Ci opened her mouth, but the final answer became “I don’t know.”

The oppressive feeling around her was like a resistance that knew what she was going to say. But she clenched her fist and fought against the invisible pressure.

“It doesn’t want you to meet. But it promised you and then lied to you. That mute person, you know them.”

Every affirmation she made would bring a fear that would tear her apart. A crimson stain appeared on the corner of her mouth. The bl00d that seeped out was particularly glaring on her pale skin.

“Yes.”

Mother Ci’s eyes became moist. In a trance, she seemed to see that person.

“Where is it?” Jiang Nan continued.

She was gambling, betting on Mother Ci’s resistance to the dungeon and the system.

Her internal organs were in agony. Her already pale face became even more bloodless. In a daze, her swaying body was held up by a pair of hands. The pleasant scent of jasmine dispelled the metallic taste in her mouth.

After a long while, the agitated Mother Ci’s body trembled uncontrollably. She said incoherently.

“The altar, the altar… they killed her…”

“A fire, it burned her body to death…”

“I begged it… begged it to bring a rainstorm… but it was too late…”

With that, she collapsed into a corner, and tears streamed down her eyes.

“You’re not Mother Ci, are you?” Jiang Nan said thoughtfully.

The person who was curled up slightly nodded after hearing Jiang Nan’s words.

With the answer and what she already knew, Jiang Nan learned about the dungeon’s cruelty from Mother Ci.

The Mother Ci they were seeing now was not the real Mother Ci. The real Mother Ci had died long ago. She was the mute person who had been hanged.

The mute person had made the Beauty Porcelain. But the people from the “Lin Manor” had lost the last Beauty Porcelain competition and felt disgraced. So, they took advantage of the mute person’s inability to speak and slandered her, saying she had stolen the Beauty Porcelain from the “Lin Manor.”

The people in this ancient town were blindly obsessed with the Beauty Porcelain and blindly trusted the people from the “Lin Manor.”

Facing the rumors, they quickly believed the claim that the mute person had stolen the Beauty Porcelain.

And the mute person, under the townspeople’s crusade, finally had no choice but to hang herself to prove her innocence. But the ignorant townspeople, under the further incitement of the “Lin Manor,” dragged the dead mute person’s body to the altar and burned it.

The Beauty Porcelain, which had somehow become a spirit, only wanted to save its creator. Its obsession made it make a wish to the system and the main god. A rainstorm came down, and the fire was extinguished, but it was all too late.

Countless resentments were intertwined. The “Lin Manor” who stole the Beauty Porcelain could not escape. They were wiped out overnight and became porcelain people who were neither human nor ghost.

With the disappearance of the “Lin Manor,” the Beauty Porcelain became ownerless. Everyone wanted to get it, but without exception, they all turned into porcelain people.

The porcelain wanted to find its creator, but to ensure the dungeon’s sustainable development, the system replayed the scene of the mute person being burned to death countless times to amplify the porcelain’s resentment.

The mute person’s soul would appear every night, but at night, it could only obey the system and leave the courtyard.

The rain every night was the rain it had begged for, but it couldn’t extinguish the fire that was intentionally created for it.

That was why it hated the “Lin Manor” so much, and why the townspeople’s expressions changed when they talked about Mother Ci.

Everything made sense now…

[Other main quests have been forcibly activated. Players must destroy the ancient town.]

The system’s voice in her mind suddenly turned into a frantic female voice. Jiang Nan lowered her eyes and thought for a moment. Suddenly, a faint sound of movement came.

A sharp look came into her eyes as she looked toward the door to the inner room.

“Who’s there?”

A black shadow flashed by, followed by chaotic footsteps mixed with the sound of shattered porcelain.

The two of them, whose conversation had been overheard, had no intention of chasing after the person.

On the shattered porcelain, several bloody footprints were a shocking sight, leading all the way to the outside.

The skinny figure held onto the dirt wall, panting heavily. Cold sweat poured down his forehead, and his body trembled slightly from the sharp pain in his foot.

“She’s not Mother Ci!”

A sinister look flashed in the depths of Yi Fei’s eyes. He already had a plan in his mind. The corners of his mouth turned up. When he looked back and confirmed that no one was following him, his eyes were sinister and terrifying.

While Jiang Nan and Luo Ning were gone, Li Feng sneaked into the room on the side. He was startled when he saw Shi Hui tied up. When he came to his senses, he completely ignored the other person’s muffled “hmm” sounds and kicked him hard.

He looked at the man on the ground. A malicious glee and a sense of revenge appeared on his shifty-eyed face.

“You’re just a bully who uses his muscles. You came in here for a crime too. What’s with the high and mighty attitude with me, your grandpa?!”

Shi Hui’s eyes widened. The anger in them seemed to want to tear the person who was stepping on him into a thousand pieces, but his mouth was blocked, so he couldn’t say any curse words.

Li Feng confidently kicked his face again and sneered.

“I’ll deal with you later, you son of a b****. I have a real task to do. When I get it done, you’ll just have to watch me clear the game. You’ll stay here forever.”

He was here to find the ashes. As long as he got the ashes and made the Beauty Porcelain, he could leave this ghostly place.

After searching a few places and not finding them, Li Feng became even more irritable.

“Did those two women hide them on themselves?!”

Suddenly, he saw a woman in white with her back to him, making porcelain. Her black hair was spread out on the ground.

He was caught off guard and startled again. Just as he was about to run away, thinking he had been discovered, he suddenly remembered that Shi Hui had been tied up here for so long without anything happening. So it wasn’t a ghost. It might be one of those two women in disguise.

Thinking this, he calmed down. He walked closer to the “person” step by step.

Looking at the figure, he concluded it was the frail-looking Jiang Nan.

“Hey, little sister, where did you hide the ashes?”

The “person” with her back to him stopped what she was doing. She slowly tried to turn her head. The sound of cracking bones was hair-raising, but she just turned her entire head around and gave Li Feng a “friendly” smile.

A scream instantly pierced the sky. The resting birds were startled and flew away.

“G-ghost… a g-ghost…”

He fell to the ground and fainted.

The “person” also disappeared from the spot after his scream.