"What's wrong with this village! Why would they worship this kind of thing?" Wu Weiwei couldn't accept it and thought that the people in the village must have something wrong with their brains.
Chen Ling stared at the bronze statue intently, and after a while he looked away: "Let's go in and take a look first."
Wu Weiwei nodded, and before leaving, he couldn't help but look at the bronze statue of Huang's father ghost again, his heart filled with disgust and rejection.
There are almost no modern products in the village, not even motorcycles. A tassel made of bright yellow cotton thread is hung on the door of every household.
According to the Huangfu ghost's habit of wearing yellow clothes, these things should be used to please him.
The three of them walked around the statue again, and when they didn't see anything else, they headed towards the road to the east.
The road is narrow, with sparsely populated small buildings on both sides.
The structure of the small building is very uniform, with a vermilion wooden door and a small window on the second floor.
Not far away, they saw an old lady in a headscarf through a small window.
The old lady was leaning on the windowsill with her hands, talking to an older lady next door. When she heard footsteps below, she lowered her head and frowned.
Not afraid of offending anyone, she complained directly in broken Mandarin: "Why is there another person here?"
The person next door was holding melon seeds in his hand. He cracked them while glancing at the person below, rolled his eyes, and slammed the window.
Wu Weiwei muttered: "If you don't want people to come in, just put up a sign at the entrance of the village. It's so weird."
Chen Ling pulled him and said, "Stop talking. I heard that people in some villages are united. If you piss off one person, you piss off the whole group. Be careful that you might get chased and beaten."
There have been similar news reports before, and Wu Weiwei quickly covered his mouth.
Jiang Yu looked at the road ahead and reminded, "Let's go."
The buildings in the village were arranged in no regular pattern and the roads crisscrossed at random. I don't know how I got lost.
Chen Ling took out his mobile phone, but couldn't load the map.
After a closer look, it turned out that there was no signal.
Wu Weiwei said: "I have a compass app here."
He also took out his phone, fiddled with it for a while, and cried, "Why is the compass spinning in circles?"
"There's something wrong with the magnetic field." Jiang Yu didn't take the current situation too seriously. He took Chen Ling's phone, put it in his trouser pocket, and pulled his hand to point in a direction.
"How do you know which way?" Chen Ling asked.
Jiang Yu: "That's where the Yang energy is strongest. It should be the direction of the hot spring hotel."
Chen Ling: “…” I have always been curious about what kind of nose our ancestor had!
Wu Weiwei also sighed, Jiang Ge is the most awesome, he can tell the direction just by breathing normally without doing anything. From this point of view, is he better than Chen Ge
Jiang Yu pointed to the east, and they walked straight along the way. Soon they returned to the courtyard where they had originally parked the car.
What was surprising was that a corner of the courtyard that had been empty before was now surrounded by a group of people, all of whom were elderly people in their seventies and eighties.
They stood close to each other, forming a thick human wall, as if they were surrounding someone.
Chen Ling glanced at Jiang Yu and said, "I'll go over and take a look."
He ran over, but before he got close, someone had already spotted him, pulled himself out from the crowd, and blocked his way.
Chen Ling was stunned for a moment, then smiled and said, "Grandpa, I just came to see so many of you gathered here, I was afraid something might happen."
The old man was in his seventies, looking very energetic. He was wearing a black cotton and linen buttoned suit, a scarf of the same color on his head, and holding a cigarette in one hand.
He looked the young man up and down and snorted coldly: "We welcome you to be our guests, but if you come to meddle in other people's business, please leave immediately."
The other party's hostility was obvious, but Chen Ling pretended not to feel it and continued to smile and said, "Grandpa, of course I'm here to visit you, but..."
A cry suddenly broke out from the center of the human wall, followed by a faint cry for help.
Chen Ling's mouth was still open when he was halfway through his sentence. He thought of a clever idea and changed the subject: "I just didn't expect that you actually worshipped the Huangfu Ghost Immortal here."
As soon as the three words "Huang Fu Gui" came out, all the villagers present turned their heads and looked over.
The people trapped in the center took the opportunity to break free and stumbled out of the encirclement: "Help, help me! They want to kill me!"
She was a young girl, probably in her early twenties.
Her hair was disheveled, her clothes were not the traditional costume of the village, one of her feet was bare, and the shoe on the other foot was dirty from being stepped on, and she looked disheveled.
Chen Ling caught the person rushing towards him and asked anxiously, "Are you okay?"
"Hurry up, there are only crazy people here, let's get out of here!" Before the girl could even stand firmly, she grabbed the young man's arm and pulled it hard.
Jiang Yu walked over and calmly pushed the girl's hand away, "What's going on?"
"They are going to kill me!" When she found that the group of villagers were coming towards her, she quickly backed away to the car, put her hands behind her back, and tried to open the door.
Unfortunately, the car was not unlocked and the door could not be opened at all. Instead, a sharp alarm sounded because of her rash action.
The sound echoed throughout the entire area, startling many birds that were resting in the forest.
The old man in black who had spoken to Chen Ling first came over with a pipe in his hand. He narrowed his eyes slightly and glanced at the people huddled beside the car. He said to Jiang Yu who was standing in the front with a smile: "Young man, these are all our village affairs. It is not your turn to interfere. If you know what's good for you, hand over the people and leave honestly, otherwise don't blame us for being rude."
"Old man, this is a society ruled by law. Your actions just now restricted personal freedom. If the police find out, they will come to arrest you." Wu Weiwei stated the matter in the most easy-to-understand way.
The old man in black remained indifferent. He turned around and signaled to the others present, asking them to cordon off the exit of the courtyard.
It seems like we won't let you go unless you hand over the person.
Seeing that the situation was not right, Chen Ling wanted to call the police, but he took out his cell phone again, but there was still no signal.
Wu Weiwei also took out his cell phone. Not only was there no signal, but the battery was almost out of power. His luck was really shit!
"Calm down." Jiang Yu spoke to comfort her, and then the usually cold expression on his face melted away, becoming gentle and amiable. He turned around and walked to the front of the car and pushed the girl towards the crowd.
"No, I won't go." The girl wanted to go back in panic.
Jiang Yu whispered, "Go back first, I'll save you at night."
The girl was startled and looked back.
There was no emotion in the man's eyes, and the kind words and promises he had just made seemed like he was just reciting a pale line.
A person who has no intention to save others will certainly not have any compassion. Everyone has their own destiny. Jiang Yu took action only because of Chen Ling.
Chen Ling didn't know all this and thought that the old man was cold on the outside but warm on the inside. When he saw the girl looking at him, he smiled and nodded at her, giving her a reassuring look.
Jiang Yu glanced at him coldly and said, "Chen Ling, come here."
Chen Ling hurried over, stood next to him, and asked quietly, "What should we do now? Are we really leaving at night?"
"Yeah." Jiang Yu whispered, "There are secrets hidden in the village. Do you want to find out?"
Of course I do. How could I not want to
The bronze statue of Huang Fu Ghost in the village was enough to make him interested in staying.
Chen Ling nodded repeatedly, feeling somewhat worried. He had already offended the person, and it might not be easy to get him to stay.
Jiang Yu raised his hand and tapped him on the head, reminding him: "Have you forgotten how those people reacted when you mentioned Huang's father ghost just now?"
Chen Ling suddenly remembered.
Surprise, caution, and admiration.
This kind of reverence was naturally not directed at him, but at the three words "Huangfu Gui".
After the girl walked into the group and was suppressed by them again, Chen Ling walked over and called out to the old man in black who was about to leave with the villagers.
The old man was still angry about their meddling in his affairs, and asked coldly, "Why don't you leave?"
"It's our fault for what happened just now. We shouldn't have asked about your village affairs without knowing anything. I hope you don't take it to heart, grandpa." Chen Ling clasped his hands together, his eyes full of apology.
The old man in black frowned, as if he was judging the truthfulness of the other party's words.
Chen Ling continued, "Actually, I'm a tourist at Fengling Hot Spring Resort. I heard there's a traditional village here, so I drove over to take a look."
The old man in black lowered his head and fiddled with the tobacco in his pipe, saying with a fake smile, "It's none of my business."
Chen Ling seemed not to be aware of his rudeness: "I just didn't expect to see the bronze statue of Huang Fugui here."
A golden light flashed in the old man's eyes and his pupils shrank.
Chen Ling smiled modestly, but with a little more enthusiasm than before: "Father Huang has great supernatural powers. He can change everything and call the wind and rain. He is also a god worshipped in our place."
The old man snorted coldly: "Since he is a worshipped god, why do you still call him a ghost? This is disrespectful!"
Chen Ling said calmly, "The gods said that ghosts and immortals are just empty titles. He only needs to protect the people in the mountains and forests, and doesn't care about anything else."
The old man continued to sneer.
Chen Ling said: "Since we have seen each other, we must pay our respects, but now the sun is high and the offerings are not ready. I wonder if we can stay in the village for a while and leave after the worship is over."
The old man hesitated. He was very unhappy about what these people had just done. Moreover, they called the gods "ghosts". He wished these people would get out of here immediately.
But on second thought, I felt that it would be good if they could stay.
There are no young and middle-aged people in the village, and the older ones are not able to move around easily. No fresh livestock has been offered to the gods this month.
After a brief thought, the old man in black said with a reluctant look: "You can stay, but you are not allowed to ask questions or run around. I will place you in the ancestral hall. Once everything is ready and you have finished worshipping, you must leave immediately."
Chen Ling probed: "But you can see that we don't have anything to offer sacrifices, so we may need to go out of the mountain..."
"The chickens, ducks, sheep and rabbits must be from our village." The old man in black said in a tone that could not be disobeyed.
It sounds like they are trying to rip me off!
Chen Ling endured it and forced a smile, "Okay, everything is up to you."
The ancestral hall is located in the northwest of the village, and is also a stone building. It is cool and quiet inside, and the roof is made of dark blue tiles, with four transparent tiles mixed in to let the light from the sky fall down.
As luck would have it, the four beams of light fell in four directions.
If the middle is connected, it will be a regular square.
Wu Weiwei wrinkled his nose, sniffed carefully, frowned and said: "Brother Chen, do you smell it? It smells weird here."
Chen Ling walked over and squatted, lifting a corner of the hand-woven carpet in the middle, revealing the dark black floor underneath.
Wu Weiwei came closer, stood up suddenly and stepped back, quickly fanning with his hands: "The smell is coming from there."
Chen Ling also felt it was disgusting, but there was nothing he could do. He was very curious, so he crushed a little bit with his fingers and raised it into the air to examine it carefully.
It's more like an overly dark red than black.
Just as he was about to put his nose close to identify it, Jiang Yu's hand suddenly reached out, grabbed his hand, and wiped it clean with a tissue.
His jaw tightened, as if he didn't like this place very much: "Don't smell it, it's blood, animal blood."
The animal blood that could not be washed away accumulated layer by layer over a long period of time, forming a thick, dark layer.
Wu Weiwei avoided it with disdain: "This place looks weird no matter how I look at it."
Who says it isn't? Putting aside the Huangfu ghost that is being worshipped, the population structure of the village alone is quite strange.
Chen Ling observed carefully that the people who had surrounded the girl were all white-haired old men, and one or two of them were even using crutches. He thought that the young and middle-aged people in the village might have gone out for something or did not come out to participate in the blockade, so he observed carefully on the way to the ancestral hall.
Those who stuck their heads out to watch the fun were all elderly people.
Jiang Yu took the backpack off the young man's shoulders and held it in his own hands. He took out the kettle, opened it, and handed it to his lips: "Drink some water first."
Chen Ling raised his head and took a sip, wiped the water stains from the corners of his lips, and asked: "Brother Jiang, have you noticed that there are no young people in the village?"
"Yeah." Jiang Yu raised his head, looking across the skylight to the foggy sky. "There is no youthful energy here, only the dead air of old age."
Wu Weiwei was stunned and asked, "Where did those young people go?"
"Maybe she ran away?" Chen Ling guessed, "Just now the old man in black said that the siege of the girl was their village's business, which means that the girl should also be from the village."
"But if they were villagers, why did they treat the girl like that?" Wu Weiwei was puzzled and felt a little contradictory.
Chen Ling handed the water to Jiang Yu. When he took it, he shook his head and said, "I don't know. Maybe we should ask him in person."
Wu Weiwei walked to the door, grabbed the door frame and looked out, "Are you going now?"
"Yeah." Chen Ling nodded his chin and his eyes fell on Jiang Yu.
When they couldn't use mobile phones, the only one who could successfully inform them of the news was the ancestor. No one else could travel thousands of miles and see in all directions.
Jiang Yu found the young man's calculating look somewhat amusing, but his face remained tense.
Chen Ling moved closer, looked up at him, and grabbed the man's sleeve with one hand. Feeling that this was not too intimate, he slid his fingertips down, held the man's casually drooping fingers, and whispered: "Weiwei and I are going out for a while and will be back soon. Brother Jiang, can you stay and keep watch?"
Jiang Yu pursed his lips, unmoved.
Chen Ling glanced at Wu Weiwei, making sure that he didn't even glance at him, then he stood on tiptoe and kissed the man on the lips, "Okay, huh?"
Jiang Yu was so aroused that his mouth was dry. He licked his lips and lowered his head to help the young man put on his backpack. "This benefit is not enough. I will make up for it when we go out."
"Okay." Chen Ling agreed readily.
Jiang Yu's palm slid to the young man's waist and pushed him out gently, "Go ahead."
There was no one guarding outside the ancestral hall, but there was a small building on each side. In each building, an old lady was sitting by the window, chatting and shouting from a distance of ten meters, while staring at the entrance of the ancestral hall.
It's obviously impossible to go out through the main gate, so it seems I can only climb over the wall.
Fortunately, the wall was also made of stone, and they could climb up smoothly just by stepping on the gaps with their toes. Soon, the two climbed up to the top of the wall one after another and jumped to the ground together.
Chen Ling looked at the empty alleys on both sides, unsure which way to go.
Wu Weiwei asked: "What should we do?"
Chen Ling didn't know either. After thinking for a while, he gave a very unreliable suggestion: "Call the troops and generals, whichever side you point to will be the side?"
“…” I’m unfamiliar with the place and it seems this is the only way I can do.
Wu Weiwei closed his eyes and moved his fingers left and right as he read. When the last word fell, his fingertips were hanging in the west.
"Then go left." Chen Ling turned and left.
Wu Weiwei gritted his teeth and followed, his steps were fast but light, he kept moving forward along the wall.
Not long after, the person in front suddenly stopped. He didn't have time to brake and bumped into Chen Ling's back.
Chen Ling almost cried out in pain. He covered his mouth with both hands and gestured to indicate that someone was passing by.
The two of them clung to the wall and waited until someone left before walking out again.
The roads here were winding and complicated, and the two could only run blindly. Just when they were once again in a dilemma of whether to go left or right, they heard a cry.
Chen Ling listened carefully and concluded that the sound should come from behind.
Wu Weiwei looked at him and was the first to climb over the wall behind him. There was no one in the yard, but there was movement in the house.
Fearing that the other party might suddenly come out, he didn't dare to let Chen Ling act rashly. But the noise inside was getting louder and louder, and just when he wanted to climb down the wall to hide, a man suddenly rushed out of the house.
She was an elderly woman, her clothes were tattered, she was as thin as a stick, and her hair was long and dirty, covering most of her weather-beaten face.
She seemed not to see the person on the wall. She mumbled something and walked straight to the door.
There seemed to be a lock on the door, which fell to the ground with a clang after she pushed it a few times.
Outside the door, Chen Ling was startled and was about to run away when he heard voices coming from his left.
When he was in a dilemma, a disheveled man walked past him, and the words he said vaguely sounded like: "Dead, dead, all dead..."
Realizing that the man was not mentally normal, he brushed past him neatly along the wall and entered the yard directly through the main gate.
Wu Weiwei quickly jumped down and pulled his brother Chen away: "I feel that the girl is locked in the house at the back."
They climbed over the wall again and found the girl's trace in the small stone building behind the yard.
The girl was crying and shouting inside, and outside the door, an old man was waiting.
There was a bowl of wine at his hand and peanuts on the table. He seemed a little bored, so he turned his head and yawned.
Chen Ling took out a talisman and threw it out, hitting the other person's back exactly.
The man yawned and found that he couldn't close his mouth. He tried to sit up straight, but was stunned. He couldn't even move his body.
Chen Ling came behind the other person, took the key easily, and threw it to Wu Weiwei.
Wu Weiwei opened the door, went in and brought the person out. When he sent her to the top of the wall and saw the girl jump into the crazy woman's yard, he whistled.
Chen Ling walked backwards towards the top of the wall and was about to climb over it when he suddenly heard Jiang Yu's voice: "Someone is coming."
The familiar yet unfamiliar cold breath touched the skin of the ears, causing goose bumps.
Chen Ling sensitively rubbed his ear with his shoulder, "Right away."
He and Wu Weiwei had just been running around randomly before, and finding the right place was all thanks to luck. Now it was undoubtedly a big challenge for them to return to the ancestral hall in the shortest time possible.
Chen Ling climbed the wall and whispered, "Brother Jiang, show me the way."
"Go straight east after landing, and turn right at the third house." Jiang Yu's body seemed to be wrapped around the young man. Seeing that the other party shivered due to his cold breath, he could not help but chuckle and deliberately licked the other party's earlobe with the tip of his tongue.
In broad daylight, you can't just act like a jerk just because you can hide.
Chen Ling ran breathlessly and said to Wu Weiwei in front of him, "Turn right at the third house in front, hurry up."
Wu Weiwei pulled the girl and ran unsteadily, "Brother Chen, is someone going into the ancestral hall?" Otherwise, why would they be so anxious suddenly.
Chen Ling nodded randomly and continued to direct Jiang Yu, "Turn left after you reach the end."
Wu Weiwei was still in the mood to gossip: "But our cell phones have no signal, how did Brother Jiang contact you?"
"Just now there was a bar suddenly, and now it's gone." In order to prove that he was telling the truth, he took out his mobile phone and let Wu Weiwei take a look. Sure enough, it showed "No Signal".
Wu Weiwei sighed: "Then we are lucky enough that the signal appeared just when we reported the news."
Chen Ling didn't respond. He turned around and looked at the girl who was staggering and asked, "Are you okay?"
The girl was panting heavily and had no time to speak, so she nodded quickly.
The road Jiang Yu was talking about was a shortcut. After turning at the end, they saw the gate of the ancestral hall.
As soon as I entered the door, I heard voices outside. Then, it seemed that another group of people came to chase the escaped girl.
The two groups met at the ancestral hall and rushed in aggressively.
They found that all three were standing in the ancestral hall. One of them gritted his teeth and said, "Where did you hide them?"
Chen Ling showed a confused expression: "What's wrong? Who is it?"
"Still pretending!" He spoke Mandarin haltingly, but his curses were smooth and standard. "It's impossible for Jin Yu to escape from the woodshed alone without help. You must have helped!"
Someone nearby said, "What on earth did you do to Lao Liu? Why is he suddenly unable to move?"
"We don't even know who the Jin Yu you mentioned is, so how can we help her escape?" Chen Ling said innocently, "As for the Lao Liu you mentioned, I'm sorry, I really don't know him, sir."
"Jin Yu is the little bitch today!" a female voice shouted.
Chen Ling sighed: "Everyone, we really have never left here for a moment. If you don't believe me, you can ask the two old ladies who are guarding us."
The group of people who were looking for someone immediately called out the two guards, and the answer they got after asking them was bound to be no.
The other group of people were holding chickens, ducks, sheep and rabbits. They seemed very anxious. The old man in black who had spoken to Chen Ling at the beginning stood up and pointed out with a long pipe in his hand: "If the person runs away, chase him and find him quickly. Why waste time here?"
He spoke in the village dialect, which Chen Ling could not understand, but he could guess a little from his expression and tone.
The group of people looked very unhappy. They refused to give up and said, "We want to search the ancestral hall!"
"Who dares!" the old man in black sternly said, "The Yellow God is enshrined in the ancestral hall. What you are doing is extremely disrespectful! You will be punished by heaven!"
Chen Ling was stunned and almost couldn't close his mouth in surprise.
There are two people in the world who can be called Yellow God. One is the Yellow Emperor, and the other is the Yellow God, the messenger of the Emperor of Heaven.
Chen Ling never expected that a mountain spirit or ghost would dare to enjoy the title of god. It must be that he thinks he has not lived long enough and wants to die.
Jiang Yu sneered, and suddenly asked, "If I'm guessing correctly, that girl is used for sacrifice, right?"
The villagers all looked over, all shocked.
Chen Ling and Wu Weiwei were also stunned at the same time.
As the villagers got older, they became thinner and more hunched. They were more than half a head shorter than Jiang Yu when they stood in front of him. He half-lowered his eyes, as if he was looking down at an ant. "I was just guessing." He raised his lips, without a smile in his eyes. "If that's the case, compared to the sacrifice escaping, just searching the ancestral hall shouldn't be a big deal, right?"
The villagers who were arresting the man came to their senses, and the leader said, "Yes, if the sacrifice runs away, the Yellow God will be really angry and punish us!"
The people led by the old man in black began to waver and said reluctantly: "Then search it, but don't touch anything in the ancestral hall!"
"Don't worry, we know what we're doing." After saying that, the group of people began to search the ancestral hall in several groups.
They searched under the altar, on the beams, behind the curtains, and even the flower beds and water tanks where no one could hide, but found nothing.
The old man in black scolded, "If there's no one here, go search somewhere else! If we don't chase him, he'll really run away!"
The other group of people who had crowded the ancestral hall quickly left and went to search other places.
After taking the people away, the old man in black ordered people to bring up the livestock with their legs and feet tied up and put them on the carpet: "I had people pick these from the village. They are the healthiest and the most tender. Take a look and give me the money."
Chen Ling glanced at the pitiful little animals huddled together and asked, "Where do we hold the sacrifice?"
The old man in black pointed to the carpet under their feet and said, "It's right here."
Chen Ling disagreed: "No, according to the rules of our hometown, we must offer sacrifices in front of the bronze statue of Huang Fugui."
The old man in black refused to give in, and said with a hint of impatience: "When in Rome, do as the Romans do. Now that you are here, you must follow our rules."
Chen Ling was also very stubborn: "Then I don't want these things, let's leave now."
"It's too late." The old man in black snorted coldly, and the others immediately surrounded Chen Ling and others, "Today's worship must go on."
"We use our money to buy chickens, ducks, sheep and rabbits, and then we will help you worship." Chen Ling said sarcastically, "Old man, you have a good plan."