Ning Ning's eyes flashed and she asked, "…Can I still trust you?"
"Of course, how could I lie to you?" The village chief hurriedly swore and said a lot of words of comfort, but what Ningning was waiting for was not his answer.
She looked over his shoulders and looked at the little brother in Tsing Yi behind him.
"Of course you can trust me." A gentle laughter came from under the hideous mask, "... After all, I'm just your granddaughter."
Although he had already guessed in his heart, when he got the answer, Ning Ning couldn't help but stunned.
"I should have loved you more, holding hands to teach you how to walk, and carrying you on my shoulders to watch the rapeseed fields, but unfortunately I became a masked man early." Tsing Yi said with a smile, "...but even if I become a masked man , I can't let you go."
After he finished speaking, he walked around to the village chief.
The village chief was still talking, Ning Qing suddenly reached out and grabbed his beard—pulling it out.
"Ouch!" The village chief cried out in pain, the door behind him opened, and his two sons rushed in from outside: "Dad, what happened?"
"It's okay, it's okay." The village chief pinched his beard, then froze.
There was a snort from the other side, I don't know if it was the wind blowing, or someone pouted and blew.
A small bunch of beards blew at him randomly, blowing on his face, and on the faces of his two sons. The two sons raised their hands and wiped their faces, feeling inexplicable, but the village chief turned blue.
He suddenly turned around and ran away, the two sons behind him looked at each other suspiciously, and hurriedly chased after him, and the one who came out didn't forget to lock the door with his backhand.
Chase to the living room and see the village chief pouring water with a fat teapot.
There were only a few drops of water in the cup, but the table was half full, and the tea kept dripping down the corner of the table.
"Dad, what's wrong with you?" The eldest son took the teapot and poured water for him.
The village chief was helped by another son to sit down, shook his hand and took the teacup, took two sips, and said, "There is one more person in the house"
The two sons looked at each other and laughed together: "Dad, have you been too tired recently?"
The village chief raised his hand and wiped his face, then looked down at the few white beards in his palm, and muttered, "I was in the house just now, and I was talking when someone suddenly pulled out a whole bunch of beards..."
"What did Ningning do?" The eldest son frowned, "Is this too much? You are her elder."
"It's not her." The village chief still looked down at the palm of his hand and whispered, "It's not her, who could it be?"
He suddenly raised his head and looked at his two sons, his eyes shining strangely: "It's Ning Qing."
As soon as the voice fell, the night owl outside the house cried, and the three of them shook at the same time. Under the light, everyone's face turned pale.
"How is this possible? He has been dead for so long, hahahaha..." The younger son smiled reluctantly, trying to liven up the current atmosphere with a big laugh.
The eldest son interrupted his laughter with one sentence: "What if he becomes a masked man?"
The laughter stopped abruptly, and everyone fell silent.
"...No." The village chief suddenly said, "With the gatekeeper, the masked person can't come out. Besides..."
He held his younger son's hand, stood up tremblingly, walked slowly to the window, pushed the window and looked out.
It's quiet in the middle of the night. Usually at this time, the village is quiet without a dog barking. Today, it's uncharacteristically. Every house is lit with lights, and the streets are full of people. , All because of the excitement of tomorrow's ancestor worship ceremony, unable to sleep.
"...Even if he comes back as a masked man, won't the ancestor worship ceremony be held tomorrow?" the village chief murmured, "That doesn't require him to do anything at all, the group of people below will be able to eat us raw. …”
The night passed.
The next day, the weather was clear, no wind and no clouds, it was a good day for ancestor worship.
From the village head's door, there are people everywhere, and there is almost no place to stay on the road. Everyone had excitement on their faces, and a mother stroked her child's head: "Don't worry, you will definitely be admitted to Peking University this time."
The former lottery winner and now the pauper is calling his ex-girlfriend: "Xiaomei, if I win the lottery again, can you come back to me?"
A famous person who always appeared on TV was sitting alone in the car. Before the sacrifice started, he opened a small book, which was full of people remembering the changes in the past ten years. He turned a page and recited the words carefully .
Desire to change, to make a comeback, to go further... Countless people's hopes are pinned here, behind the door in front of them.
With a creak, the door opened.
The village chief came out with a cane, wearing a new coat of blessing pattern on his body, a mask of a longevity monkey on his face, a wooden whisker hanging down from the mask, and a white beard hanging from his lower jaw. Slowly looking around at the person at the door, he suddenly turned sideways, revealing the mask behind him.
Fangs on all sides, ferocious and terrifying.
"Welcome to the landlord!" the village chief shouted.
"Welcome to the landlord!" the mother shouted, pulling her son. "Welcome to the landlord!" shouted the former Lotto winner. "...It's finally here." The celebrity sighed, closed the book and got out of the car.
The drooping mask slowly lifted, revealing a pair of cold eyes.
Those eyes slowly looked around from left to right, looking at the frenzied faces in front of them, and then snorted.
"Let's go, landlord." The village chief made a gesture of invitation, and the two women wearing masks immediately walked behind Ning Ning, holding her hands from left to right, but Ning Ning shook her shoulders and shook them off. hands and said, "I'll go by myself."
She raised her foot across the threshold, the golden bells on her ankles rang, and her red dress was dragged behind her. Step by step, she walked towards the ancestral hall like a prisoner.
The stage in front of the ancestral hall has already been repaired.
The stage was empty, and there were neatly carved chairs under the stage.
The masked people come and go between the chairs. At first glance, they are strikingly similar to the Cinema of Life.
The play didn't start so soon. A group of people advanced to the ancestral hall to worship. Behind the misty white smoke, there were ancestral tablets with names written on them. , was a third-rank official in the Qing Dynasty, and his daughter entered the palace to become a concubine." "This is the old lady of the Wu family, and the richest party in the Republic of China." "This is..."
After the incense was served, the village chief led the crowd to kneel and said: "Blessed by our ancestors, our Ningjia Village will continue to carry on the incense forever, and we will be beautiful from generation to generation..."
Everyone bowed, but Ning Ning did not. Everyone looked at her strangely. She looked around and asked, "Why didn't you see my ancestors?"
"Here, here." The village chief hurriedly led her to a corner, a place full of dust, where a few tablets were erected alone. There were incense in front of the other tablets. Only these tablets stood empty in front of the incense burner. ,Nothing at all.
"What did they do?" Ning Ning asked, "Have you ever been an official, or have you been an empress in the palace?"
"None of them." The village chief said, "The Ning family is quiet and indisputable, and they live in the village from generation to generation..."
"That's weird." Ning Ning interrupted him, looking at the tablet that was out of place next to him and said, "Everyone's ancestors are wandering outside, and they all return home, only my ancestors all died in their hometown?"
"Everyone has their own aspirations." The village chief explained, "Not everyone likes to wander outside."
Ning Ning looked at him for a while, then said lightly: "Everyone is dead, you can say whatever you want."
The village chief did not have a seizure on the spot, but after Ning Ning went out, his eyes signaled his eldest son to come over, and he lowered his voice and said to him, "Tell Ning Yuren and ask her to prepare."
The eldest son was surprised: "Ning Yuren? She is not qualified to be the landlord at all, didn't the people from the Li family say that? She has already entered the cinema of life, and her body is already showing signs of decay, 80% of which is about to change. A masked person, this kind of person... can't be considered a living person, he is already half dead."
"At least she's obedient." The village chief stared at Ning Ning's back and said, "I have an ominous premonition in my heart. If nothing happens, it's fine. If something happens... there is always a spare."
Playing gongs and drums, pipa and suona.
After the ancestor worship was over, it was a banquet. The tables and tables were already prepared. The best table belonged to Ning Ning, and the chopsticks didn't need to be moved.
Ning Ning waved his hand, indicating that he didn't need it, but stopped one of them and said with a smile, "You are so familiar with them, could it be that your ancestors were also from this village?"
Li Boyue turned back and smiled at her: "Maybe it really is."
A group of children in masks passed by him giggling, and heard their conversation. One of them stopped and looked up and said, "It was originally, I heard from my father, you are from the Li family, and you are a ghost killer."
The other children called him in front, and he hurriedly left the two and ran away.
Ning Ning stared at Li Boyue, Li Boyue shrugged and said: "...My dad seems to be from this village, he has a friend named Pei Xuan, and the two of them study some things of the gods and Taoism all day long, what kind of life movie theater? The theater of life, the gatekeeper, the mask man... As a result, after research and research, Pei Xuan stole a mask from my father and ran to his hometown to impersonate him."
Only then did Ning Ning notice that he was not wearing a mask.
Among the group of masked people, he seemed out of place. From time to time, someone came to remind him that he was annoyed, so he reluctantly took the mask out of his briefcase, put it on his head, and followed the group in a proper manner. Compared with the person wearing a mask, it seems even more out of place.
"Don't you believe that there is a movie theater for life?" Ningning asked.
"...Only my dad and Pei Xuan take these things seriously." Li Boyue said disapprovingly, "Oh, no, it seems that many people take this seriously now... including your mother."
Ning Ning lowered her head and her eyes flickered.
"Don't you believe it?" she asked looking up.
"I don't believe it." Li Boyue flipped the mask off his head, covered his face, and mocked, "I want to see where there are ghosts. If there are, I, the ghost killer, will be responsible for killing them."
Ning Ning turned her face away, looked at the group of villagers singing and dancing in front of her, and thought to herself, "This is where the ghosts are."
Isn't the ghost in the heart of this group of people
"It's getting late." The village chief stood up with a glass of wine, "Everyone drink this glass of wine, and then go to the stage together!"
"Oh!!!"
Everyone had been waiting for his words for a long time. Everyone who was sitting stood up and drank the wine in their glasses. Then, some people put down their glasses.
Those who wear yin and yang masks and have musical instruments on their bodies are the musicians of the scene, sitting or standing around the stage.
Those who didn't wear masks were mostly the guests under the stage. They took their seats one by one, filled all the seats, and then turned their heads in unison.
A group of people wearing masks of different shapes, dressed in white clothes, in a long line, walked neatly past them, one by one onto the stage, following their steps, dong - the drummer raised his hand and clapped on the drum , its sound is like thunder, boom, boom, boom.
"The Theater of Life" is on.
Boom, boom, boom.
Ning Ning looked up at the sky: "Hey, it's really going to thunder."
The weather was so good just now, but now, suddenly the wind is surging, and a large piece of dark clouds swept over, covering the sky. The eldest son leaned into the village chief's ear and asked, "What should I do?"
The village chief looked up at the sky and shook his head: "Continue."
So in the strong wind, the drummer continued to beat the drum, dong dong dong, dong dong dong, accompanied by the sound of the drum, the twelve dancers knelt in the direction of Ningning, slowly raised their hands to the sky, and slowly pressed their foreheads. Earth, like begging for life in heaven, like pity on earth.
"Ah—" A woman suddenly straightened her head and sang an ancient and wild song from her throat.
Accompanied by the song, the twelve dancers were about to get up from the ground, but when they raised their heads, they were all stunned.
Da da da…
A pair of feet came towards them.
A mask looked down at them.
Fangs on all sides, ferocious and terrifying.
It's Ning Ning!
When the singing stopped, the dancers looked at each other and whispered in the audience. The village chief frowned and said to the eldest son beside him, "What's going on, I can't even look at anyone, so quickly pull her down... Wait."
Ning Ning didn't destroy the ancestor worship ceremony, she just stood on the stage with one hand behind her, and the other hand made a come gesture to the twelve dancers, then turned around and left, regardless of whether they followed or not. On, he got off the stage first, sat back in his seat, put one hand on the cheek of the mask, and watched the play again.
The eldest son breathed a sigh of relief: "I'll ask someone to watch her, don't run around."
With one hand tightly clasping his wrist, he looked down and saw the village chief staring at the stage.
"Who taught her?" The village chief's voice contained a hint of fear, "How could she dance this Nuo dance?"
The eldest son was stunned and looked at Ning Ning.
Except for him, many people's attention is not on the stage, but on Ning Ning, especially the old people in the village, the young people have not seen the full version of Nuo dance, at most they have heard it in the description of the elders... Listen In the version of the Nuo dance where the Ning family was still alive, the country was destroyed and the people were displaced. Do you want to go with yourself.
This young man calls himself the landlord, the master of the theatre of life.
At first, he didn't take the life and death of this group of people too seriously, and he just helped him casually, like throwing a driftwood to the ants in the water, or throwing a steamed bun to the starving puppy.
Casually like Ning Ning at the moment.
Appearing on the stage only for a moment, he returned to the chair, with one hand on his cheek, looking high above.
But she didn't leave the stage.
The masked person on the stage, the masked person under the stage, the people on the stage, and the people in the play, outsiders don't know, the Nuo dance called "Life Theatre" actually includes both on-stage and off-stage. everyone.
The whole village is a stage.
"Who told her to act like this?" An old man looked in Ning Ning's direction and asked softly.
Ning Ning sat silently on the chair.
"Come on." An invisible person stood beside her, smiled at her, and said to everyone in the audience, "It starts with the Ning family and ends with the Ning family... Let's end "The Theatre of Life"."