Chapter 2 Everyone is evil

Chapter 2 Everyone is evil

Chapter 2 Everyone is evil
When boys are eight or nine years old, even dogs are annoyed by them.

Chen Shi is already eleven years old and is past the age where dogs are annoyed. However, he is naughty and mischievous, and has become a bully in Huangpo Village. Wherever he goes, chickens and dogs are disturbed. Even ducks have to lay eggs before passing by him. It can be said that he is hated by both people and dogs.

That morning, after Chen Shi finished his breakfast, he put down his bowl and chopsticks and ran out excitedly, shouting, "Grandpa, I'm going out to play!"

Grandpa was tall, wearing a black robe embroidered with large peony flowers. He stood in front of the altar in the main hall, lowered his head, and responded in a muffled voice: "Don't run too far, don't go to the river, come back early at noon..."

"understood!"

Without waiting for his grandfather to finish his words, Chen Shi ran away without a trace.

In front of the altar, Grandpa still faced the altar, chewing slowly, and after a long while, he rolled his Adam's apple with difficulty and swallowed the food. Then, he put the candle in his hand into his mouth, took a bite, and chewed slowly.

There were two candlesticks and an incense burner on the altar. The candle on the other candlestick had been eaten away, leaving only the wax at the bottom of the candlestick, while the incense in the incense burner was emitting wisps of smoke and was about to burn out.

Grandpa put down the half-burnt candle, took out a few incense sticks, lit them, inserted them into the incense burner, took a deep breath of the smoke, and showed an intoxicated look.

Behind the incense burner, there is a black memorial tablet.

The name written on the spirit tablet was my grandfather’s name.

The ancestor’s virtues are passed down, and this is the spirit tablet of Chen Yindu of the Chen family.

"When you are full, you won't eat people."

Chen Shi beat the dog of Yuzhu's grandmother until it howled and the big black dog surrendered. Then he took three or four dogs from the village to fight with the dog from the neighboring village. After returning from the victory, he climbed up the tree to take the bird's nest, but was pecked on the head by the mother bird and almost fell off the tree.

A moment later, the young man picked up a dead snake and scared Erni at the east end of the village into crying for her parents. Not long after, he came to old lady Wuzhu's melon field to steal melons. He was chased by the murderous old lady Wuzhu for three miles before he was able to shake her off.

This is Chen Shi’s simple and unpretentious morning.

At noon, Chen Shi came to the Yudai River outside the village. Although he was sweating from the heat, he still resisted the urge to go into the water.

There were sounds of laughter coming from the river. Three boys of the same age as him were having a water fight in the middle of the river, looking very happy.

They were three water ghosts who had drowned the year before last, so Chen Shi didn't dare to go down to the river to play.

The last time he jumped into the river to play in the water, he was dragged into the deep water by these three guys. One of them hugged his feet, one hugged his waist, and one strangled his neck, almost drowning him.

Grandpa jumped into the river and beat up the three water ghosts before he rescued him.

"Chen Shi, come and play with us!" a child waved at him.

The other two children had innocent smiles on their faces and waved to him, "Come and play together! It's fun to have a water fight with four people!"

The older kids laughed and said, "Don't be afraid, it's not deep at all, it's only up to our waists!"

"Come down quickly! What's the point of playing alone?"

……

Chen Shi ignored them and turned to walk under an old willow tree on Huanggangpo.

The three children were still standing in the middle of the river, but there was no more noise or smiles on their faces. They slowly sank into the river.

"You bad seed from the Chen family, sooner or later you will be drowned and used as a scapegoat!" a child cursed angrily.

The river water gradually covered their lips, noses, eyes, and heads, and finally the three children disappeared.

A pair of feet slowly hung down from the willow tree and swayed in front of Chen Shi.

A scholar was hanged on a willow tree. When he saw Chen Shi looking up, he stuck out his scarlet tongue, which was about a foot long, at him.

Chen Shi didn't care. The scholar had been hanged for a longer time, and his body had decayed long ago, leaving only his soul hanging there.

He came behind the willow tree, put a piece of watermelon in front of the stone tablet under the tree root, and kowtowed to the stone tablet: "Godmother, I came to see you again and brought you a piece of watermelon. It's so sweet."

The stone tablet is his godmother. When Chen Shi was very young, his grandfather said that he was good in everything except his luck. He needed to worship a godmother with a luck so that he could be raised. So he took him to the crooked willow tree and asked him to worship the stone tablet as his godmother.

During festivals, Chen Shi had to come to worship his godmother and offer sacrifices and incense.

This is often the custom in rural areas.

Country people worship godmothers. Some godmothers are ancient trees, some are stones of unknown origin, some are temple gates in the mountains, and some are unknown and dilapidated stone statues on the hills. They just pray for peace and protection from external evil.

Grandpa once said that this stone tablet had an ancient origin and must have magical powers, and could protect Chen Shi, so he let Chen Shi worship her as his godmother.

However, in the past two years, Chen Shi has been kneeling down to worship his godmother, but he has not felt anything supernatural.

The stone tablet is old and you can vaguely see a few words, vaguely "lao" and "ji".

There were other words buried in the soil, and the stone tablet was entangled by the roots of old trees and could not be dug out.

After Chen Shi paid his respects to his godmother, he said to himself, "Godmother, Grandpa is becoming more and more strange. He always has his back to me. I haven't seen his face for a long time. He also eats with his back to me. I don't know what he eats... Yesterday morning, several chickens in my house died. It wasn't bitten by weasels. Weasels don't dare to come to my house to steal chickens..."

The stone tablet did not respond to him.

But he didn't know if it was because of his eyesight, but Chen Shi seemed to see the words on the stone tablet. There was a faint light flowing for a while, but it disappeared immediately.

The young man didn't care. He took out a few incense sticks, lit them, and stuck them into the soil in front of the stone tablet.

When the scholar hanging from the tree saw this, he kicked his legs in anxiety.

"You have your share too."

Chen Shi took out a stick of incense and lit it up under the scholar's feet. The scholar hanging on the tree smelled the incense and looked intoxicated.

Chen Shi stretched out his body and lay lazily under the tree, with his hands behind his head. He was not afraid of the water ghosts in the Shusheng River hanging on the tree. He didn't know when he could see these "people" that others couldn't see, and he had long been accustomed to it. "Grandpa is almost ready for lunch, but in recent times, the food he cooks has become less and less delicious. The chicken he cooked yesterday was still raw and bloody when it was served. Godmother, I always feel that something is wrong with Grandpa recently, as if he wants to eat me."

Chen Shi held a straw in his mouth, his eyes blankly fixed, with a maturity that was not in line with his age. He whispered, "Last night, grandpa made medicine for me again and asked me to soak in the medicine jar, but he burned the fire too strongly and the water boiled. I think he wanted to cook me..."

After a while, the scholar ghost hanging on the tree finished smoking an incense stick, stretched his body, and said, "I'm fine. Xiao Shi, you can ask now."

——Xiao Shi is Chen Shi’s nickname. Some people in the village also call him Xiao Chengshi, although it is often ironic.

Chen Shi put his worries aside, took out an ancient book, and while reading, he asked: "I still don't quite understand this passage. Confucius said: The first person to make clay figures for burials, will he have no descendants? How do you interpret this?"

Huangpo Village is located in a remote area, there is no private school, and the Chen family is very poor, so Chen Shi has no place to study, but fortunately the person hanged on the tree is a scholar. So Chen Shi dug out some ancient books from home, and came under the willow tree whenever he had something to do and asked the scholar for advice.

When the scholar ghost had absorbed enough incense, he would answer his questions, so even though Chen Shi was only in his teens, he had already read a lot of poetry and books.

"What this means is that the Master said that the first person who offended me would be beaten by me to the point where he would have no descendants."

The scholar ghost explained, "The master wants to tell us that we must root out the problem, especially those who have offended us."

Chen Shi nodded in confusion and read it word by word, then asked, "Since we are here, we should make the best of it. How should we interpret it?"

"Since the enemy is here, don't leave. Bury him here."

"Then what is the meaning of this sentence: Time flies like a flowing river, never ceasing day or night?"

"The Master stood by the river and said: A truly powerful person should stand by the river like me, watching the bodies of his enemies drifting downstream along the river day and night. The Master is so powerful that the bodies of his enemies float all over the river. Scholars like me should learn a lot from the Master."

……

After Chen Shi asked all the puzzles, the scholar ghost answered fluently, which made the young man admire him very much. He looked up and said, "When I grow up, I want to be like you and win people over with virtue! By the way, Mr. Zhu, you are so talented and well-read, why did you hang yourself here?"

The scholar ghost sighed and choked up, saying: "The court is now full of treacherous people, and villains control the literary fortune. I am full of knowledge, but I have failed the examination ten times. I have disgraced the teachings of the sages. I am ashamed to see my family, so I simply hang myself here and put an end to it all."

Just as he said this, there was the sound of rumbling wheels.

Chen Shi closed the book, stood up and looked, and saw a few fine horses surrounding an exquisite and gorgeous carriage coming towards them on the country road.

Sitting on the horse was a sturdy man in a red flying fish suit. He looked very capable and had a sharp gaze as he looked over here.

"Sir, there is a child!" One of the men sitting on horseback bowed to the people in the car.

"Child? The child is fine, the child is fine."

A female voice came from the car, and she said with a smile, "The child is innocent and has no ulterior motives. He is easy to deal with and won't cause any trouble. Fang He, go ask the child."

"Yes!"

A man in flying fish clothing jumped off his horse, walked quickly to Chen Shi, took out a piece of silver the size of a finger, smiled kindly, and said gently: "Little boy, this piece of silver is for you to buy candy. I want to ask you something. When you were playing in this village, did you see some children? The kind of children who look strange, not like living people. They are like, like... a group of porcelain dolls!"

Zhu Xiucai hung on the tree and said vigilantly, "Xiao Shi, don't pay attention to him! He is the Jinyiwei in the city, a lackey of the rich and powerful, and has no good intentions. The money of Jinyiwei is called life-buying money. If you take his money, be careful not to lose your life!"

Although it is still the Ming Dynasty, the imperial power is weak and local dignitaries are rising. The Jinyiwei is no longer the royal guards, but has become guards kept by the aristocratic families, mostly working for the aristocratic families.

Chen Shi stared at the silver coins in the Feiyu suit man's hand and wanted them very much, but then he shook his head and said, "My grandfather said that we can't take things from strangers."

The man in the flying fish suit became more friendly and said with a smile: "My name is Fang He. We didn't know each other just now and were strangers, but now you know my name, don't we know each other and are no longer strangers? This is the reward I give you, so it doesn't count as something given by strangers, right?"

Chen Shi nodded happily and took the piece of silver.

Fang He smiled and said, "Since we are friends, can you tell me if you have ever seen those children who look like porcelain dolls?"

Chen Shi nodded: "Are those children you are talking about less than a foot tall and appearing in groups?"

Fang He showed a look of joy, nodded quickly, turned around, and said in a trembling voice: "Sir, that thing is really here..."

Before he finished speaking, a figure suddenly flashed in the carriage. Chen Shi only felt a fragrance coming towards him, and then saw a dignified and beautiful woman in purple clothes appear under the tree.

The other men in Feiyu suits hurriedly dismounted, hurried to the tree, and surrounded Chen Shi and the woman in purple.

The purple-dressed woman had a pretty face and fair skin. She wore a flying fish suit on the upper body and a horse-faced skirt on the lower body, also purple. She looked a little excited, but pretended to be calm. She smiled lightly and said, "Little brother, have you seen those porcelain dolls? Where are they?"

Chen Shi did not answer, but looked at the shoulder of the purple-clothed woman with a strange expression.

The woman in purple was slightly startled, she turned her head to look over her shoulder, and didn't find anything wrong.

"Little brother, the master is asking you a question!" A man in flying fish clothes stepped forward and shouted, showing his majesty.

Chen Shi withdrew his gaze. The reason he was looking at the woman's shoulders was because the scholar's feet happened to be resting on the woman's shoulders at this moment.

The place where the woman was standing was exactly where the scholar was hanged.

The purple-clothed woman glanced at the man who had spoken, her face darkening, "How insolent!"

The man in flying fish clothes retreated hastily.

The purple-clothed woman said in a friendly manner, "Little brother, we are from Xinxiang, we are not bad people..."

Chen Shi raised his head, met the woman's gaze, and smiled sweetly: "Big sister is so beautiful, even more beautiful than Zhu Youcai!"

The purple-clothed woman was delighted when she heard this: "This child can talk. We can leave him an intact body later. But the name Zhu Youcai doesn't sound like a woman's name. I think it belongs to a beautiful woman. It's a pity that the country bumpkin gave her such a vulgar name."

————After failing in stock trading, I came back to write a book!

(End of this chapter)