Chapter Twenty-One: Theft, Journey, and Silence?

Living together as a family always made things more convenient.

Even though Esther was cautious by nature, she couldn’t prevent Emma, who was determined to steal her secrets, from getting close.

One day just before the holidays, while Esther and David went out shopping, Emma took out a spare key she had made during her free time and slipped it into the lock.

Click.

“So, she did lock the door.”

After trying a couple more times, the front door finally opened. Emma stepped into Esther’s room for the first time. Everything appeared ordinary.

Only the series of castle paintings hanging in the center looked exceptionally beautiful. By the painting desk, besides brushes and paints, there was also a purple light lamp and a book.

It was the black-covered Bible that Esther always kept close at hand.

Emma smiled subtly and began leafing through the Bible carefully. She wasn’t flipping aimlessly but comparing colors and creases to focus on the pages likely to be frequently referenced.

Yet, this loose black Bible yielded few clues. She only found a few pages containing Bible passages with keywords like father, lover, and murder.

But that was useless!

“Could it be that I need to know what’s beneath those black ribbons as well?”

Emma thought as her fingers turned to the last page of the book cover. The tactile difference immediately caught her attention.

Her gaze sharpened, and she noticed a line of embossed letters on the corner of the book.

“Printed by the Sarn Institute.”

Heh, Esther, you’re done for!

Emma lifted her head slightly, a cold smile curling at the corner of her lips.

She made a mental note of the name, planning to ask her father to buy her a computer later to look it up—it would be much faster and more convenient than searching by name alone.

By now, computers had become quite common among middle-class families. Compared to borrowing someone else’s, she still preferred to have her father get one.

She really didn’t like getting too close to many people.

Having thought this through, Emma didn’t leave immediately but took a careful look around Esther’s room, wanting to find more traces while she had the chance.

She paced slowly.

Suddenly, she switched on the suspicious small purple light and swept it around the room, quickly spotting something unusual.

---

On the castle painting, tiny blood-red figures were struggling, and the castle itself was ablaze. Under the purple light, an atmosphere of destruction filled the scene.

Watching this, Emma narrowed her eyes.

...

Emma’s wish for a computer was unsurprisingly approved by David, though it would take some time—perhaps after the trip she could get one.

It had to be said, David truly doted on his daughter.

Meanwhile, David also finalized the destination for their trip.

A beautiful lake island in the neighboring state of Mississippi, a place Angela had learned about from chatting with her sisters. It was said to have stunning scenery, and David had business to attend to in Mississippi anyway.

So the choice was perfect.

Just two days later, the holiday arrived as planned, and the family officially set off on their road trip.

In America, due to social reasons, little attention was paid to building public infrastructure that wasn’t profitable. As a result, every household owned their own car, and for every American child, the most coveted coming-of-age gift was a car of their own.

David and the family sat in a spacious car and hit the highway—David driving with Angela beside him, while the three children sat in the back.

Since it was just the neighboring state, the journey wasn’t far—only a day’s drive. Yet, at midnight, they stopped for the night in a small town called Ravensfall.

For some unknown reason, the town’s population seemed sparse, and a funeral was just underway at a nearby house.

Louie sat on the bed in the inn. After buying a rooster’s head from the cook and calming himself with a few words, he stepped outside and tossed it over the roof of the building.

Yes, he was performing a chicken-head exorcism.

The day before, he had mastered the blade-spitting technique and purchased a freshly slaughtered rooster to perform the ritual once.

The chicken-head exorcism wasn’t just about chopping off the head and throwing it over the roof; there were conditions. First, the rooster couldn’t be one he’d killed himself. Second, the older the rooster, the better.

This folk method was simple and quick. Louie had just learned it, and he used it again today both to practice and as a precaution.

After throwing the head, Louie went to the back of the house. On the ground littered with dry leaves, he found the rooster’s head—and his eyes widened sharply!

The head had withered completely!

The bright red comb had turned a dull black!

“Holy crap?”

Louie blurted out an instinctive curse.

---

A withered chicken head indicated the presence of evil nearby, and the blacker the comb, the more severe the situation.

Frowning deeply, Louie was momentarily at a loss. He had never encountered anything like this before.

At that moment, his gaze shifted to the back of the house, where he saw a line of graffiti resembling a child's rhyme.

Beware the gaze of Mary Shaw;
She has no children, only dolls;
If you see her, do not scream;
Or she will rip your mouth open and tear out your tongue!!!

Louie’s pupils contracted. The next instant, he stepped back two paces, covering his mouth with both hands.

Mary Shaw, screaming, tongue ripping...

This was *Dead Silence*!

He knew it—the folk tales offered many methods to deal with ghosts and monsters not just because those stories abounded, but because there really were ghosts here!

He couldn’t recall all the details of *Dead Silence*—an older film—but he remembered the gist: a paranoid ventriloquist who used people as dolls; anyone who screamed in her presence would have their tongue torn out.

It seemed this was the town where the *Dead Silence* story unfolded.

Damn, what rotten luck!

Looking at the dark sky, Louie realized driving at night here would be suicide. So many horror movies had victims killed while moving at night.

Looks like they’d have to stay put for now.

Louie tried to calm himself. He remembered Mary Shaw mainly hunted the family of the boy she had cursed; everyone else was incidental.

Given the funeral he had just seen and the still somewhat inhabited town, it seemed Mary Shaw hadn’t gone on a massacre rampage. As long as they didn’t cause trouble, they should be safe.

“Wait, those two troublemakers, Emma and Esther!”

Louie’s eyes snapped open as he immediately thought of the two.

They couldn’t be allowed to cause trouble here—if they screamed, that would be a whole other level of disaster.