Under the eyes of the whole village, the pile of thick paper money was finally about to burn out, and the wax dripping from the pairs of red candles in front of the grave had already dyed the small patch of ground red. Meng Dawei threw it sadly into the sky. The last pile of paper money was given, and then he kowtowed three times to the grave again.
"Old man, my son is not unfilial, but if you become that thing, you will harm the whole village! This is a rule handed down from our ancestors, and my son has to follow it. But, old man, don't worry, if it is I have been wronged, and my son will risk his life to seek justice for you." Meng Dawei shouted these words almost at the top of his lungs, and all the villagers present heard them clearly.
But no one spoke, and the silence at the scene was terrifying. This is not easy for anyone to accept. If you have been wronged, it is normal to seek justice.
Gao Yan silently helped Meng Dawei up, and the two stood aside. Around 11 o'clock, they would start digging the grave. The time for opening the coffin is usually at 3:00 noon, which is around 11:45, when the yang energy is at its strongest. After this time, the yang energy will suddenly turn into yin, and there will be terrible consequences.
The worship was completed at this time, but it was a little after 10 o'clock, and everyone was waiting silently. Although this does not happen every year, in many villages in this area, which one will do this once every two or three years? This was nothing new to the villagers who were watching.
Almost no one goes to work in the fields today, because the rules stipulate that men over 5 years old and under 70 years old must come to use Yang Qi to control the situation, so naturally no one will work.
Gao Bin is Gao Yan's younger brother and Meng Dawei's brother-in-law. He is also at the scene at this time. He is a man who has seen the world. He has traveled to several cities as a construction worker. It is not easy for him to come back for a vacation and catch up on this kind of thing. , can be considered unlucky, but the important thing is that one of the next eight coffin-openers will be him. Who calls him Meng Dawei's brother-in-law
Seeing his sister and brother-in-law looking sad, Gao Bin was a little irritated. He took out a red plum cigarette from his pocket and lit it. He ran through many cities and gradually felt that the rules of the village where he was born were really unreliable. You can hear about burning corpses in other places, but they are far less frequent than here. Even the children here know about zombies. After gaining some knowledge, Gao Bin often wondered if this was spreading rumors. ah? Every little thing is so suspicious, and it makes people so sad.
At this time, Taoist Yuan happened to come over, handed Gao Bin a small cloth bag, and a mask, and said: "You know the rules, right? Don't be careless for a while, be careful to let the corpse energy rush to you, then It’s hard to handle.”
Gao Bin took these things impatiently and said: "Everyone knows, put this small cloth bag in the mask and cover your mouth and nose. Don't worry."
Taoist Yuan stuffed a handful of glutinous rice into Gao Bin's chest pocket and said, "You have to do it well. You can't rest assured. Do you know Old Man Wang from the next village? He was just trying to be brave and refused to open the coffin. I covered my mouth and nose with a cloth bag and insisted on smoking his dry cigarettes. As a result, I was overtaken by corpse gas. When I returned home, my whole body was pale and my face turned black. It was too late to send me to the hospital. Then I died and had to be burned and couldn't be buried."
Gao Bin had heard about this matter. He was still a child at that time. Not only Old Man Wang, but also people who were attacked by corpse energy like this. I heard that there were several people in these ten miles and eight villages who were all careless. , unlike Old Man Wang, who is a target of personal arrogance.
Thinking of this, Gao Bin was a little convinced by the rules handed down from his ancestors. He pulled Taoist Yuan over, handed him a cigarette, and said, "Taoist Yuan, are you done? Come and have a chat with me when you're done." Son."
Taoist Yuan took the cigarette and looked at it. The red plum smoke was very good. He put away the cigarette with a slight smile and said: "Right now, there is one last person who hasn't received anything. I'll tell you when it's done."
After a while, Taoist Yuan squatted down next to Gao Bin and asked, "What do you want me to brag about?"
Gao Bin took a drag on his cigarette and asked: "Brother Yuan, you have been a Taoist priest for so long, tell me the truth, have you ever seen a zombie?"
"Zombies, where can I see them? Everyone I can see is dead! Aren't you talking nonsense to me when you ask this?" Taoist Yuan lit up his cigarette and took a puff. Obviously, Gao Bin's words of "Brother Yuan" were useful to him. , the words are no longer babbling, but very down-to-earth.
"Since you haven't seen it before, why do you still burn the body? Isn't this a bit sorry for the ancestors?" Gao Bin actually couldn't bear to see his sister and brother-in-law like that.
"What you said is wrong. You grew up here. Haven't you heard too little about it? Do you dare to say that you didn't see the animals that died inexplicably and the people who were bitten to death when you were a child? Have you passed?" This is something Taoist Yuan doesn't like to hear. As a Taoist here and a native here, although he has never seen zombies with his own eyes, he has seen a lot of things that he has heard about.
Gao Bin was silent. He had indeed seen a cow die tragically when he was a child. It died inexplicably. There were wounds all over the body, and the shriveled feeling was either that of a mummy or a shriveled feeling.
Later, after the cow died, another family in the village heard a noise in the middle of the night. Then they got up and saw that the old sow in their pigsty had also died. This caused a big fuss until a corpse was burned. The solution was found later. At least there were no so-called zombies in the village.
I heard that when the commotion was the biggest, some scientific researchers came and told everyone in a vague way what kind of infectious disease it was in livestock. The cows had wounds but the pigs didn't. It was because the cows had struggled before they died. .
Just when Gao Bin was thinking about this incident and was deep in thought, Taoist Yuan had already said urgently: "Gao Bin, you are also a male in the village. Apart from other things, you have always seen the exhumed corpses, right? In the 1970s, when the situation was so severe, corpses were burned in the village. The famous corpse was that of Li Huaili. Can you still remember it?"
Gao Bin's face turned pale. He never wanted to recall that scene. When the coffin was opened and Li Huaili's body was dragged out to the sun, there were dark red stains on his claws, teeth, and even his body. Some people said that was He sucked the blood of the animals and left traces!
Someone even turned over the coffin board and saw unclear marks on the coffin board, saying that Li Huaili had scratched it with his claws!
The rumor that Li Huaili turned into a powerful zombie spread almost throughout the villages here.
Gao Bin also remembered that when the corpse was burned, there were two inexplicable screams, a bit like a toad, and a bit like a human shouting. This memory was a bit scary. Gao Bin has always been reluctant to think about it. Due to his instinctive escape, he Almost forgotten, or has begun to become unreal.
At this time, Taoist Yuan mentioned this incident, and he finally remembered it and cursed fiercely: "Hai Zi (a Sichuan dialect that is widely used to curse people)!" Gao Bin stopped talking.
Seeing that Gao Bin was convinced, Taoist Yuan nodded with satisfaction, as if he had accomplished a major event in his career, and was about to leave. After all, it was extremely difficult to convince a person who had seen the world to believe in what his ancestors did. It's difficult, isn't it
Seeing that Taoist Yuan was about to leave, Gao Bin was unwilling. He still had the biggest question. He pulled Taoist Yuan over and said anxiously: "Brother Yuan, I just want to understand one thing. Why?" Is there a lot of zombies in our area? There are very few such claims in other places?"
This question was so tricky that Taoist Yuan scratched his head in embarrassment. After thinking for a long time, he said: "I haven't been to other places too much. Anyway, there are troubles in many rural areas, whether it is in the south or the north! Our area seems to be the most troubled area in Sichuan. I think there is only one way to say that our area has a lot of places to raise corpses."
"What is a corpse raising place?" Gao Bin really didn't understand this concept.
Taoist Yuan squatted down again, and then said: "Zombies are very easy to appear in corpse raising places, but I don't know why. In addition to being related to corpse raising places, this is also related to various taboos about burials, etc. It doesn't matter. Anyway, you know that once the corpse is raised, those zombies have eaten enough livestock. If they want to eat people, the first ones they look for are their closest relatives! Don't feel sad for your sister and brother-in-law. This is for them. good."
Gao Bin nodded somewhat heavily. The questions in his heart had not yet been completely answered, but at Taoist Yuan's level, it was not bad to be able to answer them to this extent.
Suddenly, Gao Bin remembered a question. The place where this brother-in-law's father was buried was very close to the place where Li Huaili was buried. The brother-in-law even got into trouble over this!
However, the ancestral graves of the Meng surname in this village are almost all concentrated in one area. Seeing that the ancestral graves are getting smaller and smaller, and there is too much cultivated land, I have no choice but to choose this area. Could it be...
Gao Bin felt uncomfortable again. At this moment, an elder in the village shouted: "It's time, let's start digging graves."