Chapter 255 This Village Has a Big Problem
"Come with me, I'll take you to Rhett's place!"
The old man led Emily and York across a pond, then through winding paths before finally arriving at Rhett's home.
When Violette married Rhett, he was running a business outside the village and doing pretty well, so they didn't come back to the village for the wedding.
Back then, the Johnson family was well-off, and Rhett probably worried that Violette would look down on him and refuse to marry him.
It seemed that later, when Rhett's situation got worse, plus Violette had kids, her figure changed, and she was worn down by housework, looking more and more haggard.
That's when Rhett started coming back to his hometown more often.
As soon as Emily and York were led into the courtyard, an old woman came up to greet them.
Emily frowned.
She had seen Fallon before, and this wasn't her.
Emily frowned and looked at the old man with deliberate displeasure. "Who is this? Don't tell me this is Rhett's mother."
Her eyes said, "Don't try to fool me."
The old man had originally planned to have his wife pretend to be Rhett's mother to get through this first, then after they ate...
He didn't expect Emily, who seemed so naive, to see through it.
The old man was the village chief. He immediately laughed heartily, "How could that be? Rhett looks like his mom - you'd recognize her right away. It's just that Rhett went to visit relatives, so I was worried you'd come and not find anyone. I thought I'd bring you to my house first, then have someone notify them to come back."
The village chief explained with a smile.
But Emily frowned, looking somewhat disappointed. "That's really unfortunate. But don't you have phones? Why don't you give me the number and I'll call Rhett directly? Actually, I get along pretty well with Rhett's son and daughter - maybe when they hear I'm here, they'll come back right away."
"Ah, phones! You see, we're so remote here, there's no signal. Even if there is, you might not get through on a call right now. It's better to just go notify them in person."
Hearing this, York became even more convinced that something was very wrong with this village.
He suddenly got angry. "I told you not to come here, but you wouldn't listen. There's no signal, it's boring, can't even watch videos or play games online. No, we're leaving right now."
York looked impatient and pulled Emily to leave.
Emily had also noticed something was wrong with this village.
But this time it wasn't just intuition.
It was her professional expertise.
She was a doctor. This place looked scenic on the surface, but as soon as she entered the village chief's house, she smelled certain substances that shouldn't be there.
Emily knew the problems in this village might be even bigger than she'd expected, so she also planned to leave first.
Of course, that was assuming they could leave!
Emily went along with York's actions. "York, don't be so rude. If you want to leave, we'll leave."
While being pulled away by York, she apologized to the two old people. "Sorry, my husband has a bit of a temper. He's usually into entertainment, and without internet, he definitely can't stay put. It'll probably ruin my mood for gathering inspiration too. Since no one's home at Rhett's, no need to notify them. We'll just go."
By normal logic, since they were leaving anyway, there was no reason to stop them.
But the village chief suddenly blocked their path, moving so fast they could even see a flash of viciousness on his face.
"You can't leave!"
Both York and Emily's hearts sank when they were blocked.
York immediately turned hostile, deliberately saying, "What do you mean? Why can't we leave? What are you trying to do?"
He also acted wary, positioning Emily behind him.
The village chief realized his sudden movement had scared them. His wrinkled face immediately broke into a smile.
"Misunderstanding, misunderstanding! Young people, don't be nervous. I don't mean anything bad. It's just that on your way here, you ran into villagers, and I already had someone go notify Rhett. If you leave now and they rush back to find no one here, they'll think I was playing a trick on them!"
The woman beside him immediately chimed in, "You can't leave. Rhett's famously difficult. If he thinks we're fooling him, our house won't have peace for weeks."
"What are you talking about? Don't badmouth Rhett in front of outsiders!"
The village chief pretended to scold his wife.
But the village chief's wife said coyly, "I'm not lying, it's the truth. You'd really let me get bullied later?"
The two were playing off each other.
Emily knew that she and York definitely weren't leaving today.
After that, wherever Emily and York went, the village chief followed.
Seemingly to prevent them from getting lost, he showed them around and introduced the scenery, but really he was probably afraid they'd run away.
The village chief's wife busied herself in the kitchen.
Saying something about how since she was Rhett's sister and this was her first visit, they naturally couldn't be poor hosts.
Seeing they couldn't leave, Emily made an excuse, wanting the village chief to show them around the village so they could appreciate the rural scenery.
The village chief naturally couldn't refuse.
Then Emily noticed that as the village chief led them around, he deliberately avoided a house at the end of the village near the mountain.
Though from the front, the house didn't look big.
But Emily could tell that the slightly hidden area behind the house was probably quite spacious.
Emily took the chance to exchange words privately with York.
"Ms. Johnson, the atmosphere in this place is too weird. Those people we met on the road while touring the village - their smiles all seemed fake to me."
He had seen blood during his overseas training before.
So what he didn't say out loud was that he felt these people had been involved in deaths.
Their eyes didn't have the gentleness of ordinary people.
Emily nodded and silently mouthed, "Human trafficking, drugs!"
If it was really as she suspected, this village might be even more dangerous than imagined.
She suddenly understood why Rhett had started coming back to the village frequently.
She just didn't know whether Rhett might be involved in these illegal activities.
Though York knew these people had been involved in bloodshed, what Emily said still shocked him greatly.
These people could no longer be called human - they were animals, doing inhuman things.
"This time, we'll probably need Daniel's help!"
At this moment, Emily was extremely grateful that she had accepted Daniel's necklace, which would let her contact Daniel on the outside at a critical moment.
She needed backup.
And she needed to call the police.
Actually, even if Emily hadn't contacted Daniel, with York there, York was in constant contact with Daniel anyway.