The Man Who Appears Once a Year
Author: Red Mouth and White Teeth
Original post: Jinjiang Literature City
"Ruan Qiuping!" Siming looked around.
No one answered.
"Teacher, Ruan Qiuping definitely didn't come. When have you ever seen him attend class?" a student said with a smile.
… Fortunately, he didn’t come again.
Siming breathed a sigh of relief and raised his hand to mark the name on the roster.
"Teacher, sorry, I'm late!" A young man wearing a golden long-sleeved shirt and golden trousers rushed in, exhausted.
Ruan Qiuping actually came to class? !
The students' spirits suddenly became tense, and they all touched the bad luck dissipating talismans on their bodies. Some top students even immediately opened a spell barrier around them.
Ruan Qiuping saw that the three rows at the back left of the classroom were empty, so he sat down in the middle of the empty seat. However, as soon as he sat down, the chair fell apart and Ruan Qiuping fell to the ground with a thud.
Ruan Qiuping rubbed his butt in pain, then reached out to pull a chair. However, when he looked up, he saw that dozens of classmates who were closest to him jumped up in fright and ran away in panic.
Ruan Qiuping sighed heavily, tugged at the golden clothes on his body, and said helplessly: "Is it necessary? Is it necessary? Even if I am the God of Bad Luck, there is no need for you to hide from me like this, don't you have the talisman given to you by the God of Good Luck?! And you see, in order to change your luck, I specially bought the golden clothes of the God of Good Luck in the trading forest. Come here, come and get some of the golden light..."
A classmate muttered quietly: "Auspicious gods never wear gold clothes. You must have bought a fake one. It is indeed the god of bad luck..."
That’s right, Ruan Qiuping is a born unlucky person.
The previous God of Bad Luck had died of bad luck, and now the position of God of Bad Luck in Heaven is temporarily vacant. Although Ruan Qiuping has not been canonized as a god due to his insufficient cultivation, he is already the only candidate for God of Bad Luck in everyone's mind.
Ruan Qiuping's bad luck was no less than that of the previous God of Bad Luck. For example, when he was born, the Ruan family, which was originally quite wealthy, became extremely poor. Even when people in the heaven mentioned their Ruan family, they no longer referred to them as "the Ruan family that lives in the far west and has two very vulgar big golden lions in front of the door", but as "the poorest Ruan family in the west", which is abbreviated as "the poor Ruan family in the west".
Ruan Qiuping's bad luck was far more than just making his family poor. It was a contagious and radiant "bad luck". Immortals with low magical powers would have minor bad luck if they saw him, and would have major bad luck if they spoke to him. Two hundred years ago, a young immortal accidentally touched Ruan Qiuping, and the next second he fell to the ground and fainted for half a year. Since then, no immortal dared to approach him.
Ever since they heard that Ruan Qiuping was going to take classes at Siming Academy, all the teachers and students prayed to the gods for talismans to dispel bad luck, and wore them day and night, which barely dispelled Ruan Qiuping's bad luck.
The so-called harmony of yin and yang and balance of all things. Ruan Qiuping felt that the birth of the auspicious god Yu Huan was to defeat him.
At the same time that Ruan Qiuping was born, a child with great fortune was born at the easternmost part of heaven.
The moment the two men landed, the west side of the Heaven was instantly covered with dark clouds, strong winds blew, and heavy rain poured down. However, the east side of the Heaven was shining with colorful lights, thousands of birds sang, and thousands of flowers bloomed.
After Ruan Qiuping was born, he brought poverty to the whole family and brought bad luck to the people within a radius of ten miles. However, after the birth of the auspicious god Yu Huan, the Yu family's wealth and reputation soared. The immortals within a radius of ten miles who were slightly ill became refreshed and full of energy. From then on, the Yu family was called "the auspicious family in the east", or "the Dongxiang Yu family" for short.
Not long after, all the people in the west of the heaven moved eastward without any prior agreement. The Ruan family became the most desolate place in the west, while the land price next to the Yu family continued to rise, becoming the most prosperous area in the entire heaven except for the Heavenly Palace. This greatly changed the original land price structure of the heaven.
At this point, the future gods of bad luck and good luck in heaven have been determined.
Ruan Qiuping glanced at the noisy classroom and said lazily, "Teacher, why aren't you teaching yet?"
Siming subconsciously lowered his head to check the bad luck-removing charm on his body, then flipped through the textbook while looking up at Ruan Qiuping, muttering, "Why are you so positive all of a sudden..."
"It means that I have started to study hard!" Ruan Qiuping grinned.
After saying that, he took out a pen and paper from his schoolbag and actually started listening to the class.
Ruan Qiuping lowered his head and took notes. The relaxed and playful expression on his face gradually faded, and what followed was a silent fighting spirit in his eyes, like a life-and-death battle.
Ruan Qiuping's fighting spirit is not for anything else, but only for his beloved sister.
Ruan Qiuping's sister is called Ruan Dongdong. She just turned three this year. In this fairy world where the average age is hundreds or thousands of years old, she can hardly be called a seedling. She can barely be considered a small seed that is just about to sprout.
But such a tiny seed was actually engaged by the Heavenly Marriage Stone.
A few nights ago, Ruan Qiuping accidentally heard his father and mother talking, and learned that the Heavenly Marriage Stone, which had not moved for hundreds of years, suddenly showed two lines of words a few days ago.
The east is prosperous and the west is poor.
This heavenly marriage stone never determines anything else but marriage. However, the only unmarried child in the Yu family of Dongxiang is Yu Huan, and the only unmarried woman in the Ruan family of Xiqiong is Ruan Dongdong.
Yu Huan and Ruan Dongdong are the newly-destined marriage of Heavenly Marriage Stone.
This marriage was destined... I don’t know what the Yu family thinks, but Ruan Qiuping’s parents are so happy that they are smiling from ear to ear.
But Ruan Qiuping didn't want to.
Quite unwillingly.
He was so unwilling that he wanted to kill Yu Huan with a knife.
Let's not talk about other things first. Who is Yu Huan? He is a 221-year-old young man who was born on the same day as Ruan Qiuping.
Who is Ruan Dongdong? He is a little kid who just turned three years old.
A three-year-old kid who can't speak clearly or walk steadily is planning to send her to the man's home in a couple of days, get married and have a baby after a dozen years
What is this? In modern human terms, this is a fucking crime!
Ruan Qiuping gritted her teeth in her dreams and wished she could break off the engagement.
But this marriage determined by the heavenly marriage stone has a rule that it cannot be destroyed or broken. If anyone violates the marriage determined by the heavenly marriage stone, he will be punished by 7749 thunderbolts.
Ruan Dongdong didn't have any magical powers at all, let alone being struck by thunder. On ordinary days, he would be frightened and cry loudly when he saw thunder or lightning.
But Yu Huan is different.
Almost all the gods in the heaven praised Yu Huan like a flower, saying that he was the youngest person to experience tribulations in the heaven, the first immortal to be canonized as a god in the history of the heaven, the record holder for defeating the ferocious beast Xiqu in the shortest time... and so on.
Since Yu Huan is the favored child of heaven and the hope for the future of heaven, can a mere forty-nine heavenly thunders really kill him
Besides, he is a lucky god appointed by heaven. Maybe when forty-nine thunderbolts strike him, none of them will hit him.
Thinking of this, Ruan Qiuping gnashed his teeth.
In fact, Ruan Qiuping had never met Yu Huan.
Although both are well-known beings in the heavens, wherever Ruan Qiuping goes, there is no one there, while wherever Yu Huan goes, there are people everywhere.
Ruan Qiuping seemed to have seen the afterimage of Yu Huan more than a hundred years ago. The legendary auspicious god was surrounded by people, and no figure could be seen at all. Only the white jade hair crown on his head could be vaguely seen.
Later, when it was heard that Jishen was troubled by being besieged by people, he practiced the art of invisibility on his own. He became invisible when he went out and remained invisible at home. On weekdays, he only wrote a few talismans to dispel bad luck. He ignored all other requests and was very cold.
Ever since Ruan Qiuping learned about his sister's engagement with Yu Huan, he has been paying close attention to Yu Huan's movements. Finally, he got a piece of inside information—Yu Huan was going to descend to the mortal world to experience trials and tribulations.
Although they are of the same age, the levels of cultivation of Ruan Qiuping and Yu Huan are very different. Ruan Qiuping has basically been standing still, no different from a hundred years ago, while Yu Huan's cultivation has been rising all the way. It is said that after he comes back from this calamity, he will be officially canonized as a lucky god, becoming the youngest person to be canonized as a god in history.
As luck would have it, Ruan Qiuping was studying a life-destiny course that dealt with human destiny.
After knowing that Yu Huan was going to descend to the mortal world, Ruan Qiuping knew that his chance had come.
Among the trials and tribulations that gods and immortals have come down to earth to experience, there has always been an eternal problem, which is the difficulty in overcoming the tribulation of love.
Many gods who came down to earth to experience tribulations would fall in love with mortals in the mortal world. Some of them could not forget the mortals after returning from the tribulations, thus giving rise to a tragic love story between gods and mortals. In order to solve this problem, nowadays, gods who came down to earth to experience tribulations and returned must drink the love potion. However, even so, every few decades, there are a few gods who inexplicably recover their memories, and then cry out to the sky and go to the Yama Palace to find their lovers in the mortal world.
This has become a major feature of the immortals' tribulations.
This was the trick Ruan Qiuping wanted to use on Yu Huan.
He just needs to help Yu Huan find a lover in the mortal world who he is madly in love with, and then do some tricks to prevent Yu Huan from drinking the love potion. Then, after Yu Huan survives the ordeal, he will naturally take the initiative to break off his engagement with Ruan Dongdong, and then wholeheartedly think about how to stay with his mortal lover forever.
Absolutely perfect!
Ruan Qiuping stretched, tapped his head with a pen, and praised himself: What a smart head!
"Snap!" The pen in his hand broke into two pieces for unknown reasons, and the black ink flowed down Ruan Qiuping's forehead.
… Ah, the usual bad luck.
Ruan Qiuping silently used magic to wipe off the ink on his head, touched his head, and praised again: "… What a strong head."
After listening carefully to several classes, Ruan Qiuping finally understood the process.
The course that Ruan Qiuping took was an introductory course in the subject of life-span analysis. The theoretical course ended some time ago, and the practical course started today.
Today and tomorrow they will first visit the "Fuhua Gate" where the gods descended to the earth and various instruments for changing and recording human destinies. The next two days will be spent observing the mortal world with Sima Ming and the assistant. It will not be until the fifth day that these apprentices will officially begin the practical courses of descending to the earth. From then on, for the next two months, they will have five minutes of time on earth every day.
These five minutes should not be underestimated. Nowadays, the management of the passage from the celestial world to the human world is becoming increasingly strict. Under normal circumstances, the only gods who can go to the human world are those who come down to the mortal world to experience tribulations and the students who take the Siming course. If a normal god wants to travel down to the mortal world, he has to get stamps from more than a dozen departments and go through the process. It would take several decades for a god to go through the process.
In this light, the five minutes of daily privilege that Ruan Qiuping obtained through his student status is truly precious, not to mention that according to the time conversion mechanism of one day in heaven equals one year on earth, these five minutes in heaven are equivalent to 30 hours on earth.
30 hours a year... If he works harder, he can always find a good partner for Yu Huan before he dies.
Thinking of this, Ruan Qiuping finally felt at ease.
"Students, please follow teaching assistant Senior Qi Yue to Fuhua Gate first. Uh... cough... Ruan Qiuping, please stay for a while." Siming said.
After most of the students had left, Ruan Qiuping stood up and went to the podium: "Teacher, what's wrong?"
"It's okay, just stand there, no need to come over..." the old man Siming said hurriedly. He reached out and touched the sweat on his forehead, then said, "Ahem, Ruan Qiuping, you come to class now because you think the course is about to end, and you are afraid that I won't give you a pass. Actually, you don't have to worry about this. You are gifted and an indispensable and important person in our Siming Academy. Even if you don't come to class and read books at home, I will still give you an excellent grade..."
"Teacher, you don't have to treat me specially." Ruan Qiuping said seriously, "What do my classmates think if you treat me specially like this?"
"Your classmates are hoping that you won't attend class..." Si Ming muttered softly.
Ruan Qiuping pretended not to hear and said, "Then teacher, if there is nothing else, I will go to Fuhua Gate with my classmates."
"Hey, wait a minute, there's one more thing. You need me to put some more luck into this hidden dribble."
Bringing good luck to Zang Yunqiu is a part-time job that Ruan Qiuping and Yu Huan do together at Siming Academy, with the purpose of balancing the fate of the human world.
only…
"Hasn't we already blocked it this year? Why do we have to block the luck again?" Ruan Qiuping was puzzled.
Siming said, "Yu Huan is about to descend to the mortal world to experience tribulation, but he has too much good fortune, which will cause him to live too smoothly in the mortal world, which is not conducive to the success of tribulation. So, you should give him more of your luck to neutralize it and help him to successfully experience tribulation."
That legendary lucky god, I understand, I understand.
Ruan Qiuping smiled sinisterly and poured all his bad luck into the dribble.
In an instant, the Tibetan ball that was just transparent was now filled with black air.
Ruan Qiuping sneered in his heart and passed the ball.
For a moment, Ruan Qiuping almost felt like the poison queen in the fairy tale who handed over the poisoned apple. Thinking of this, he paused: Was he going too far? With so much bad luck, maybe the lucky god would die as soon as he landed.
"Not enough." Siming shook his head. "You haven't seen Yu Huan's current ability. When you were just born, your luck was indeed evenly matched, but his cultivation is not as good as before. I guess your hidden ball will be purified as soon as it touches his body, and you can't even bring it to the mortal world..."
Ruan Qiuping: …
What does that mean? What does that mean? Does it mean that the difference between his cultivation and Yu Huan's is so huge that even if he puts all his efforts into infusing bad luck, it is still nothing in front of Ji Shen? !
How dare you look down on the bad luck of a great bad luck god? !
It's a huge insult!!!
Ruan Qiuping grinned and took back the bad luck ball, saying: "It seems that my good intentions almost led to bad results. Since it is for Yu Huan's tribulation, I have to be serious no matter what I say."
After saying that, he took the dribble back, turned around, and continued to infuse bad luck into it. God knows how much effort he put in. At the moment of infusing good luck, the air in the entire classroom began to swirl, the windows and doors opened, the curtains rustled, and all the utensils on the table were suspended in the air. Ruan Qiuping smiled as if he was a villain who had succeeded in his conspiracy.
The tip of a pen actually cut Ruan Qiuping's wrist, and a drop of bright red blood fell into the Tibetan dribble as his fingers danced.
But this scene was so hidden that no one noticed it.
"Alright." Siming shook the Tibetan dribble in his hand, "It's almost done this time. It seems that Yu Huan will have the luck of a normal person after this tribulation."
Ruan Qiuping: “…” After a deity descends to the earth, his luck will be weakened by nine points. How could he have spent so much effort to neutralize one tenth of Yu Huan’s luck?!
Ruan Qiuping slammed the desk angrily.
“Boom!”
The desk suddenly fell to the ground and hit Ruan Qiuping's feet hard.
"It hurts, it hurts—"
Siming shook his head and threw a bottle of ointment to Ruan Qiuping: "Pack up first and go to Fuhua Gate by yourself later."
Ruan Qiuping hugged his feet and nodded painfully.
Ruan Qiuping arrived at Fuhuamen a little late, but it was not his fault.
Who made him meet a mad and running divine beast when he went out, two annoying and lost fairy children, and an old fairy under the moon who got drunk and insisted on talking to him, and later threw eggs at him after finding out that he was the god of bad luck.
To be honest, Ruan Qiuping is used to it.
Who made the life of the God of Bad Luck so boring and full of interest
All in all, Ruan Qiuping wasted a lot of time on the road, so that when he arrived at Fuhua Gate, it was already dark, and his classmates, his teaching assistant, and his teacher Siming had long disappeared.
The wind blew, leaving only mottled shadows of the trees, and the entire Fuhua Gate was quiet and silent.
Ruan Qiuping took a look at the tightly closed flashy door, sighed, turned around and prepared to leave.
But at this moment, the shadow of a tree on the ground suddenly shook.
Ruan Qiuping thought he was seeing things, but when he looked carefully, he saw a man in white clothes walking out of thin air.
The man wore a white robe and a white crown, his face was as cold and clear as jade, there was no expression between his eyebrows and eyes, but there was an extraordinary aura lingering around him, and the corners of his clothes that swayed lightly as he walked seemed to give off a fairy-like air.
Even the moon seemed to favor him, reflecting his pure white moonlight.
It looks very strange.
Ruan Qiuping looked down at his golden shirt and golden pants and curled his lips.
Why are you pretending? It's the right time in this day and age and you're still wearing such traditional clothes.
You are serious and you are good-looking.
cut.
Anyway, when Ruan Qiuping saw this person for the first time, he felt very displeased.
But when he looked up again, he found that the man seemed to be walking towards him.
This feeling was very magical. After all, everyone in the sky hid when they saw him. This seemed to be the first time that someone walked towards him.
Three steps, two steps, one step.
The man stopped in front of Ruan Qiuping.
Very close.
Ruan Qiuping could see the man's hair, count his eyelashes, and clearly feel his breathing.
Ruan Qiuping's throat tightened slightly. This seemed to be the first time... the first time someone was so close to him.
Ruan Qiuping suddenly came to his senses and quickly took a few steps back.
But he retreated so hastily that his left foot tripped over a stone and he almost fell down - at the critical moment, the man in front of him suddenly took a few quick steps and grabbed his hand.
Ruan Qiuping suddenly opened his eyes wide, he stood up straight, hurriedly shook off his hand, stepped back a few steps, and said: "How dare you touch me, don't you know who I am? I am unlucky..."
"Ruan Qiuping." The man suddenly spoke, his eyebrows curved, "I know you."
"..." Ruan Qiuping frowned and muttered, "How dare you touch me if you know..."
Suddenly thinking of something, Ruan Qiuping took out a jade pendant from his bosom, threw it to the man reluctantly, and said, "I bought this for my sister at a high price in the trading forest. It is said to be the jade pendant of the lucky god. I will lend it to you for one minute to drive away the bad luck on your body. You must return it to me after use."
"Good God?"
"Yes, it's the guy named Yu." Ruan Qiuping raised his eyebrows unconvinced, his tone arrogant and contemptuous, "Tsk, rubbish Jishen, he is still somewhat useful."
The man in white robe opposite smiled, held up the jade pendant and said, "But this jade pendant is not Yu Huan's."
After that, he took out a piece of fine white jade from his bosom and said, "This one is it."
Ruan Qiuping curled his lips: "You mean I bought a fake."
Haha, no wonder you’re not afraid of me, it turns out you have something lucky in your arms.
The man suddenly took another step forward, took Ruan Qiuping's left hand, placed the two jade pendants in his palm, and said with a smile: "If you don't believe me, go back and try it yourself."
… and touched the hand again.
"I told you not to get so close to me, and don't touch me."
Ruan Qiuping shook off the man's hand, took two steps back, looked down at the two jade pendants in his palm, and asked, "Don't you want money?"
The man shook his head.
It seems that he is stupid and has a lot of money.
Ruan Qiuping took the two jade pendants into his arms and raised his chin slightly: "Then I will accept them first. If they are real, thank you in advance."
The man nodded, glanced at the gradually dimming light of the Vanity Gate, and said softly: "Ruan Qiuping, we'll see you another day."
"It's better not to meet me. It's not a good thing for you to meet me." Ruan Qiuping muttered and walked away.
Ruan Qiuping looked straight ahead, walked for dozens of minutes without looking back, and then stopped.
He lowered his head and looked at his left hand.
As far as he could remember, he had never touched anyone else, not even his parents or his beloved sister.
Two hundred years ago, a deity accidentally touched his shoulder through his clothes, causing him to fall to the ground and faint. Since then, others have avoided him.
So this is what it feels like to touch someone else.
It's warm and soft, and still a little hot from the residual heat.