"Did you find the key?" As if our silence had made the mermaid feel a little uneasy, she spoke again, "The key is definitely in the castle, please help me find it, I am willing to exchange the key to the Wall of Thorns." ”

"Keys? Isn't that what you found earlier? The ghost heard the mermaid's words and said to me, "This is a deal between us, you promised me, I will help you open the door, you help me get her out, you promised me!" ”

I was silent and didn't answer anyone's words, and my mind was full of thoughts. It's not that I'm going to break my word, the key is in my pocket, and helping the merfolk is just an easy thing to do, but I can't decide right now, whether to let her go or not. After all, I'm not sure if there are other dangers in her.

None of the others spoke, and the deal with the merfolk was only clear to me and Wolffang, who looked at me, waiting for me to speak.

"I've found the key." I thought about it for a moment and said, "I found it in their room before." ”

As I spoke, I raised my hand and pointed to the queen who was holding the king's corpse, and I saw a happy look on the mermaid's face, but before she could say anything, I preemptively said, "I can give you the key, but you have to tell me the truth." ”

"Honestly? What truth? The mermaid was stunned, I saw a strange look on her face, she was playing dumb.

"About what happened between you." I looked at the merfolk and whispered, "I mean you, the prince, and the two of them, all the things that happened between the four of them. ”

The mermaid was silent for a few seconds before sighing, and seemed to have made up her mind to say, "Most of what I said before is true, and the place to deceive you is that I am the one who changed my mind first." ”

My eyes twinkled, and I didn't speak, just listened to the mermaid continue.

"The power of my blood is not to stay in the same state as I said before, but to be able to make people young and regain their youth. I had no intention of letting the prince take my blood, and I thought I would still love him no matter what became of him. It wasn't until he grew old, he had wrinkles, his black hair turned white, his teeth were loose, and one day I suddenly realized that I could no longer bear to have such a lover, that I decided to use my blood to change him back to the way I loved. ”

"You mean you decided to let him take your blood after you didn't love him?" I frowned, "But I remember you said that the blood effect is based on your love for him, and since you don't love him at that time, this method can't succeed at all?" ”

"At the time, I thought it wasn't a problem." The mermaid showed a wry smile, "As long as I let him go back to his youth first, and then I fall in love with him again, it will take a while for the curse to take effect, as long as I fall in love with him again during this time, then the curse will naturally not take effect." ”

Is that okay? I'm a little shocked by the idea of a mermaid, is love such a thing that can control what is produced and what dies? Or to put it another way, the so-called love, its foundation is actually built on a skin?

With that in mind, I didn't tell him about the curse at first. To my surprise, my blood attracted the greed of others. The merfolk said and looked at the queen to the side, "His parents also want my blood to be rejuvenated, but I can't fall in love with his parents, and I know that a curse will inevitably belay them, so I refuse." ”

I'm afraid I can't refuse this

"What I didn't expect, however, was that my refusal would be exchanged for persecution of me." The merfolk whispered, "They imprisoned me and took my blood from me, and the prince didn't stop me. ”

"It's not like that," the ghost muttered, seemingly shocked by the mermaid's words, and didn't know what to say for a moment, so it fell silent.

Didn't stop me from thinking back to the version the ghost had told me, and I was afraid between the two of them

"He allowed his parents to hurt me and imprisoned me here, without even even coming to see me! I hated him for being ruthless, so I couldn't fall in love with him again, and the curse on him and his parents took effect one after another. What I didn't tell you before is that the curse cannot be lifted once it takes effect, and only by harming your own kind, that is, eating the flesh of your humans, can you sustain your life, otherwise you will accelerate aging until you die. ”

In other words, if they don't eat people, they will die, right? I lowered my eyelids and thought, in this way, cannibalism seems to have become a necessity for survival, but the king's crazy appearance is probably enough to lift the curse even if he stops taking the blood of the mermaid, and the temptation of eternal youth is enough to make him fall into the abyss of cannibalism. If the curse is lifted by stopping the blood, will he give up the chance to regain his youth? I can't bear to think about a person who has regained his youth after aging.

Greed is the original sin, which is why humans are crazy. I've never doubted how evil humans can be, but I don't want to say it.

"So you told them about eating human flesh to save their lives?" I asked.

"Yes, because I'm imprisoned here, and I won't survive if they die until I get the key." The mermaid nodded, "You all know what happened next, can you give me the key now?" ”

Is that okay? Give her the keys? I waited in silence for the ghost to say something, at least as far as I could tell, this time the mermaid should be the truth, oh no, it was what she thought it would be.

I want to hear what the ghost has to say, after all, rescuing the merfolk was my deal with the ghost, and now that I've heard what the merfolk have to say, is he willing to rescue the merfolk?

However, I still didn't wait for the ghost's words, I don't know why, maybe he couldn't make a choice himself, he could only choose to be silent.

But the merfolk were still waiting for my answer, and I sighed, not knowing how to sort out this confusion between them, and not knowing whether to say what I knew, and perhaps the best option was silence.

Motioning for the Wolf Tooth to help me up, I walked towards the pool of blood with the help of the Wolf Fang. Lin Ya and the others followed me and Wolf Fang to the edge of the blood pool. I glanced at the queen, who was still kneeling beside her and holding the king's body, she was motionless, as if everything around her had nothing to do with her. I looked at the merfolk over there who were waiting for me to make a decision, and after waiting for a few more seconds, still not hearing what the ghost said, I pulled out the phalange, the key that the merfolk needed, from their pockets.

The merfolk's eyes lit up when they saw what I had taken out, and they reached out to me, and I silently reached out to hand her the phalanx. However, as soon as my hand was halfway out, a voice suddenly sounded beside me—

"He's dead."

I gestured with my finger bones and turned to look at the queen who had spoken. Of all the people present, I was probably the only one who understood this.

"I know he's dead, I killed him." The mermaid said, glancing at the corpse with a broken head, and said coldly, "He deserves to die." ”

I hesitated for a moment but didn't interject, I knew that it was the king who said the merfolk were damned, and the queen was "he".

The queen didn't seem to hear the mermaid's words, but calmly turned her head to look at the mermaid and said again, "My son is dead. ”

"Who? Who do you say? The mermaid was stunned, and a look of disbelief appeared on her face, "You mean the prince is dead?" How did he die? ”

The mermaid said, turning her head abruptly in the direction of me and the wolffang, "You killed him?" ”

"You killed him."

Before I could speak, the queen answered the question. I was slightly stunned, this truth that I was hesitant to tell the mermaid just now, but now it was told by the queen.

That's right, the prince died, and it was the merfolk who killed him.

"What do you mean? How could it be that I killed him! The merfolk shouted to the queen, "He has not been seen before me since he was imprisoned by you!" How could I have killed him! ”

After the mermaid finished speaking, she turned to me and asked, "She's lying to me, isn't she?" Have you seen the prince? He must still be alive in this castle! Even if he died, it couldn't be that I killed him! You must have seen him, didn't you? ”

I was thinking about what to say, but someone answered first.

"He's dead, and he must have been dead for decades, and it's just the woman and the man who died."

It was the wolf's tooth who spoke, and I looked at his expressionless side face, and then I realized that he had also been to the attic, and I was afraid that he had also seen the prince's bones, and with his analytical skills, it was not difficult to guess that the bones were the prince's.

"How so? Decades? The mermaid repeated in a daze, the expression on her face that I couldn't understand, with shock, confusion, surprise, and a little fear.

I think I know what she's afraid of.

The ghost still didn't speak.

"Yes, my son has been dead for decades." The queen confirmed the wolffang's words, and her voice was calm, without a hint of ripple, "died shortly after you were imprisoned, under the curse of your blood. ”

The queen's words shattered the merfolk's last luck, and she turned pale all at once, and it was clear that what she feared had happened—it was she, who had killed the prince.

Looking at the mermaid's pale face, I hesitated for a moment and sighed. I didn't want to tell the truth, but now that the mermaid already knows, I'd better tell the real truth.

"The prince is indeed dead, dead under your curse." I looked at the merfolk and said slowly, "It's not what you think. ”