Sometimes, thinking quickly can save a person from death, but sometimes it can make him die faster. At that time, I had no time to think about whether my method would work. In order to avoid death, I had to give it a try.
As soon as I straightened up, the old wolf behind me started pulling its claws backwards. Its two hind paws made a loud noise as it pushed the bike back with all its might.
I was only ten years old at that time. Even if a country child was used to being wild, how much strength could he have? In a few seconds, the wolf dragged me to the side of the car.
I don’t know if the ghost in front of the car was afraid that I would let the wolf eat him and he would not get any benefit, but just when I was about to be dragged under the car by the old wolf, he suddenly let go of his hands that were covering the animal’s eyes.
The old horse pulling the cart started running forward, and the cart suddenly jumped out three or four meters away. I fell on the cart with my legs spread out, and the old wolf behind me was also thrown out.
I didn't care about the pain in my body, I got up and pulled the horse's tail hard.
In the countryside, adults always tell children: Don't bother with the tails of animals, don't pull them casually, it's easy to pull the hair of the animals. If the animals are hairy, they will kick you, but if the bridle is not tied and they rush out and hurt people, it will be a big disaster!
I pulled the horse's tail just to make the animal run quickly. No matter whether I could shake off the wolf or drive away the ghost, it was better than waiting to die here.
I grabbed it so hard that I pulled a bunch of hair off the horse's tail. The animal was frightened and ran out with all its might. I was lying on the carriage and couldn't see what was happening in the front or back, but I knew the carriage was shaking and trembling as it moved forward.
I held onto the shaft of the carriage with both hands and didn't even dare to raise my head. I held my breath and waited for the carriage to stop. Who would have thought that every once in a while, a loud "bang" would come from under the carriage, and then it seemed as if something flew out along the side of the carriage.
It's pierced with a stone!
As soon as this thought came into my head, the carriage turned sideways and fell to the ground. I was thrown directly to the side of the road. The coffin in the carriage fell next to me, and the big money inside was scattered all over the ground.
As soon as I looked up, I saw the old wolf chasing me. Its pair of green eyes was only three or five meters away from me. I could even see its white fangs, but I couldn't find even a stone around me.
I was forced to do nothing, so I grabbed the big coins on the ground and threw them at the wolf. As a result, the wolf rushed over and howled at the big coins, turned around and ran away.
I quickly got up and looked towards the carriage. The animal pulling the carriage had broken free of its reins and had run off somewhere unknown, but a figure was squatting beside the overturned carriage. The figure was leaning against the carriage with half of his head sticking out, as if he was looking at me, or as if he was hiding from the coffin next to me.
I picked up two handfuls of big coins from the ground and threw them at the man. As soon as the big coins rained down on him, he let out a cry like a woman and disappeared in a flash.
When I was trapped by a ghost and a wolf, I was thinking about how to survive. Now that the wolf has run away and the ghost is gone, I feel scared. But in the middle of the night in the wilderness, I dare not even cry. I hold two handfuls of money tightly in my hands and don't know what to do.
Just when I was holding back my movements and not daring to make a sound, a sigh suddenly came from behind me.
Grandpa? I recognized the noise coming from my grandpa, and turned around quickly, seeing him standing not far from me.
I threw myself into my grandfather's arms and started crying loudly, but he stroked my head and sighed, saying over and over again: "It's God's will, it's all God's will!"
When I stopped crying, my grandfather got the animal back from somewhere, harnessed it to the cart again, and put the big money on the ground into the coffin with the dirt on it: "Get in the car, let's go!"
I got in the car and asked, "Master, where did you go just now?"
"I didn't go anywhere. I was just near you. I invited the wolf and the ghost." My grandfather's words took me a long time to recover.
My grandfather drove the carriage and said, "The ghost coin in the coffin chose you, which means you are the successor he wants. The soul of my ancestor is telling me that it's time to pass on my skills to you. Money in hand, life in hand. If the ghost coin doesn't come to you, I can pass on my family's skills or not; but if the ghost coin comes in hand, I must let you try."
"Although our family's skills are passed down from generation to generation, they also depend on fate. You are not destined to have those skills. Even if you are a descendant of our Wu family, I cannot pass on my skills to you."
My grandfather pointed at the coffin on the car and said: "Whether you are destined to be together or not depends on whether you grab the big money in the coffin. If the Wu family grabs the big money, it is equivalent to grabbing their own lives, and they will be entangled with it for the rest of their lives; if they don't grab it, it is equivalent to handing their lives over to God, and the future good or bad fortune depends on God's will."
My grandfather kept on rambling, "Originally, since you have the money, I should teach you my skills. But, from the bottom of my heart, I don't want you to make a lot of money! If you learn the skills, you won't be able to live like an ordinary person. This road we are on is not easy to walk on. If you make a mistake, you might not even leave a complete body behind."
"I attracted the wolf and the ghost just to make you jump out of the car and run for your life, so that you can't catch the big money, and I can legitimately end our family's inheritance. But you won't leave! Oh... This time you can't get in!"
I asked in a trembling voice: "Master, what exactly does our family do?"
"You're playing with your life!" My grandfather cracked his whip, "You've been playing with your life since you started using the fate-testing method."
I half understood what my grandfather meant: "Grandpa, what would happen if I didn't catch the big money?"
"I will save you! But I may not be able to save you!" My grandfather shook his head and said, "You should get some sleep first. You are fine now."
I wanted to sleep but I didn't dare to, for fear that my grandfather would disappear as soon as I opened my eyes. It was not until I was extremely sleepy that I fell into a daze and opened my eyes to see if my grandfather was still there.
My grandfather knew I was scared, and every time I opened my eyes he would say a few words to me and comfort me. We walked with the coffin for several days, stopping and starting, until we finally reached a village.
My grandfather told me that that village is our hometown.
But I don't think he is. If it's my hometown, even if the families in the village don't all have the same surname, they should at least be relatives. But no one in the village knows my grandfather.
My grandfather found the village chief with a household registration book and told him that the house on the back mountain was our old house. The village chief searched for a long time before finding out that thirty years ago, a family surnamed Wu had indeed settled in the mountain and registered their household registration, but later left for some reason. If it weren't for the fact that no one wanted the house on the mountain and that we didn't occupy any farmland, the village chief might have kicked us out.
My grandfather took me to clean up the house for two or three days before we could barely live there. But at night, he moved away the kang mat and took me into the cellar under the house.
The cellar was not very big. In the middle there was a long table for burning incense. On the wall behind the table was a piece of red paper with half of the word "life" written on it with a brush.
Yes, it was half of the word "命". Because the left half of the word seemed to have been torn off, without any trace of writing, only the right half remained.
I was staring at the words in a trance when my grandfather said, "Read the couplets on both sides!"
Only then did I notice that there was a couplet next to the strange characters.
First couplet: If you do one good deed, the merits and demerits will be offset.
Second line: Save one person and kill one person in exchange for his life
After I finished reading it, I asked my grandfather, "Grandpa, what does this mean?"
My grandfather said, "Let me first tell you what the half word 'life' means."
"My family's skills are inherited from the Dao of Half Life. Didn't the elders say that everything is determined by fate. It is not up to man. That is to say, when you are alive, your fate is in the hands of God. God has already arranged what you will do, and you have no choice but to do it."
"Half Life means that we snatch half of our life back from God. In other words, half of what we want to do is in our own hands, and we don't need to listen to God. But..."
My grandfather changed the subject and said, "But God doesn't want us to control half of our lives, so he has to make trouble for us and find a reason to take back the half of our lives."
"In order to survive, we have to let God find no fault with us. So, we can't be a bad person, nor can we be a good person. We have to live in between good and bad, so that God can't find fault with us."
My grandfather talked for a long time, but I was confused and didn't understand anything. But my grandfather didn't care: "Come and worship half of your life! After you worship, you will be admitted!"
"Grandpa, why don't we worship our ancestors?" I haven't experienced this, but I've seen it on TV. Isn't it always about worshipping the ancestors to get started? Why did my grandpa just let me worship a piece of paper and that's it
My grandfather's face darkened: "I told you to worship, so just worship. Why are you talking so much nonsense! We don't have an ancestor!"
I didn’t know what “no ancestors” meant at the time. It was not until I made my debut that I understood that these five words “no ancestors” were actually a taboo.
After I kowtowed three times and nine times to Banming as my grandfather instructed, I was formally accepted into the sect and began to learn skills from him.
That day I realized that the skill of Half Life Dao all lies in big money.
To outsiders, people who practice Ban Ming Dao are just fortune tellers who take large sums of money to predict good and bad luck. In fact, those inconspicuous large sums of money are not only tools for us to calculate yin and yang, and avoid misfortunes and seek good luck, but also deadly weapons to slay ghosts and gods and fight powerful enemies.
If I were to describe the details of this matter, I would not be able to finish it in a short time, so I can only leave it for later. In short, Banmingdao is not an ordinary fortune teller.
Because the rules of Ban Ming Dao and fortune tellers are different. (To be continued)