Chapter 10 Death River (6)

The mother said softly again: "I have asked my parents since I was a child, why the tearfish cries, why it has blue scales, and why it appears after the first snow, but my parents can't answer anything. Aunt Jixi, do you know?" Jixi lowered her hands in a lonely way, and murmured: "What can I know? If you want to ask, you have to ask Shichuan, it can know." The mother groaned again. It was completely dark.The bonfire beside the dying river gradually lit up, and the river water began to make a faint whimpering sound. The fishermen quickly occupied each water section and cast down the silver nets one by one.The water in the wooden basin has already been prepared, and the fisherwomen are walking up and down on the shore in gray or blue headscarves.The mountains on the other side of the River of Death are covered with silver trees, and the moon rises strangely.The deserted moonlight shines on the river, the bonfire, the wooden basins and the dark faces of the fishermen. The desolate sound that overflows without the moonlight has been transmitted from the upper reaches of the dead river.

woo woo woo woo woo woo woo woo woo woo woo woo woo woo woo woo woo It seemed as if thousands of boats came down from the upper reaches, as if all the fallen leaves in the world were rushing towards the river of death, as if the most sentimental tunes played by all the instruments were gathered together.The death river, its unabashedly desolate sound, immersed the people in the Ajia fishing village in a religious atmosphere.A fisherman caught a tearfish first, and the poor fish wagged its tail gently, tears streaming from its eyes.The fisherwoman of this family hurriedly put the fish into the wooden basin, and comforted softly: "Okay, don't cry; okay, don't cry..." The orange fire turned the fisherwoman's face into bronze, And the turban she was wearing turned pale blue.

woo woo woo woo woo woo woo woo woo woo woo woo woo The night was getting deeper and deeper, and Hu Dao had already killed seven tearfish from the river of death.He took the time to run home to see if his wife had given birth.The poor woman stared blankly at the ceiling with wide open eyes, a look of despair. "Does this child have to wait until the tearfish has passed?" Ji Xi thought. "Aunt Jixi, I'll watch over her for a while, you go to the River of Death. I've already caught seven tearfish, and you haven't caught one yet." Hu Dao said. "What's the use of guarding her, you don't know how to deliver babies." Ji Xi said.

"When she is going to give birth, I will go to the death river to call you, maybe—" Hu Dao stammered, "Maybe she will be born tomorrow." "She won't make it through tonight, and she will be born before twelve o'clock." Ji Xi said. After drinking a cup of tea, Jixi regained some energy. She put on a new candle and told the mother some jokes she had made when she was young.The mother listened intently for a while, and couldn't help laughing.Ji Xi felt relieved when she saw that she was relieved of her burden. At about eleven o'clock in the middle of the night, the mother was once again surrounded by labor pains.At first, he moaned softly, and finally he cried out loudly.Seeing Hu Dao going in and out in a panic, she seemed to have found the source of her pain, and she was about to growl.Ji Xi asked Hu Dao to light another candle, and she stood beside the mother holding it.After the amniotic fluid broke, Jixi finally saw a baby's head slightly exposed like a ripe apple. This ripe fruit showed a drunken look, and Jixi felt a burst of joy.She tried her best to encourage the mother: "Keep harder, I'm about to come down, keep working harder, don't be so delicate, I'm still going to catch tears..."

The scarlet fruit finally fell from the mother body, and the vivid cry was like the sweet aroma of the fruit. "Oh, little girl, you have a really loud voice, and you will definitely love raw fish when you grow up!" Ji Xi quietly waited for the birth of her second child.Ten minutes passed, twenty minutes passed, the mother's breath became short of breath, and another ripe fruit was slightly revealed.The mother howled, and a child with an unusually loud voice rushed out of the mother's womb. It was a cute baby boy! Jixi yelled: "Hu Dao Hu Dao, you are really lucky, you can have both children in one go!"

Hu Dao was as excited as a bee collecting pollen. He looked at his wife gratefully, as if he was a hero.The mother finally calmed down. She lay stretched out on the wet reed mat dotted with blood, feeling happy that she could successfully add a baby to the Hu family. "Aunt Jixi, maybe there's still time, you can go to Shichuan." The pregnant woman said wearily. Ji Xi washed his bloody hands, drank another cup of tea, and then wrapped his turban and walked out of Hu's house.Passing by the hall, I wanted to take another look at the portrait of Hu Hui on the wall, but unexpectedly, there was no portrait on the wall, only a wooden gourd and two wooden shuttles hanging there.Ji Xi was quite surprised. Could it be that what she saw just now was Hu Hui's ghost?Jixi came to the courtyard in surprise, the air was so fresh that it seemed as if she had an extra lung, and she felt extremely comfortable.The Hudao was burning something, and a cluster of flames danced actively.

"What are you burning?" Jixi asked. Hu Dao said: "The portrait of my grandfather. He said when he was alive that if he couldn't see his great-grandson, he would look at his portrait. If the great-grandson was born, he wouldn't have to be hung on the wall." Looking at the gradually extinguished flames, Ji Xi thought desolately: "Hu Hui, you really saw your great-grandson. But the blood of the Hu family was not passed down by Ji Xi." Hu Dao said again: "My grandfather said that people can only manage the affairs of one or two generations, and no more than four generations. After four generations, the old man will be regarded as a monster by the children, so he said that his portrait will be destroyed at this time , so that no one will remember him."

The flames melted a piece of snow, and it finally shrank and disappeared.The snow was lemon-coloured by the candlelight reflected in the house.Ji Xi couldn't help crying when she heard the slight sobbing sound of Shi Chuan.She can't bite raw fish anymore, how the textured scales made a happy sound between her teeth back then.Her teeth had fallen out horribly, and her gums were no longer bright red, but purple, like an old wall that had been smoked for a long time.Her hair was thin and gray, very much like a lonely tuft of weeds beside the entrance of a winter cave. Just like that, Ji Xi returned to her wooden house with tears in her eyes. She put the fishing net on her old shoulders, and with a wooden basin in her hand, she strenuously walked towards the river of death.The bonfire in Shichuan was exquisitely carved, and many fisherwomen stood in front of the wooden basins filled with tearfish and looked at Jixi.There was no sound of sorrow floating out of the water, the passing river looked so peaceful, and the white snow on the other side was reflected by the bonfire like a piece of gold on the ground.Ji Xi went down to the river together, filled the wooden basin with difficulty, and then stood on the bank blankly waiting for the tearfish to come online.The darkness after midnight was not long, and Jixi heard many people walking up and down behind her.She thought about the pot of fish water she poured on Hu Hui back then, she was not afraid of anything at that time, she was too strong.How sad it is when a person loses his strength.It was getting colder, and Jixi tried to pull the corners of the scarf down towards her chest, and she began to draw the first net.The net brushed across the water, and the feeling of lightness made her heart sink.Not a single tearfish was caught, it was an empty net, and the pale net was spread out on the white snow on the bank and blended with the snow.Jixi is not discouraged, there will always be a tearfish that will fall into her net, she does not believe that she will leave empty-handed.After another period of time, when the twilight had already appeared slightly, Jixi started to set up the second net.She carefully pulled the second piece of net ashore, feeling that the net was heavy.Her legs trembled and she thought there were at least a dozen beautiful blue tearfish embedded in the mesh.She collected the net wholeheartedly, and the nets that were collected were all snow-white, and she didn't see anything.When the end of the net was lightly revealed, dejected, Ji Xi suddenly realized that what she pulled up was another empty net.She cursed God in a low voice, and fell down on the river bank.She was thinking, why does it feel like the net is heavy, but she can't get anything?At last she understood that it was because her strength was no longer what it used to be, and the net seemed heavy when she started.

The sky gradually became clear, and the bonfire was extinguished silently.The mountains on the other side of the River of Death loomed large, and many fishermen began to return the fish they had caught to the River of Death.Jixi heard a "popping" sound from the surface of the water, which was the sound of a tearfish entering the water.The tearfish went downstream of the River of Death one after another, and Ji Xi seemed to see their blue backs and red fins, and their tails were dexterously swinging, swimming so fast.They come from the upper reaches of the dying river, and then go to the lower reaches of the dying river.Ji Xi thought, what a marvelous tearfish, with a body hundreds of times smaller than a human, can swim the entire river of death year after year.But people can only guard a section of the passing river, those who guard it will live and grow old, those who cannot guard it will become graves on the bank of it, listen to its sound of water, and still look at it.

Ji Xi's voice became hoarse, and she really wanted to sing a song on the bank of the River of Death, but she felt that she could no longer speak.The two empty nets are spread together, and the morning light caresses them tenderly, making each mesh glow with a soft luster. The fishermen who released the tearfish went home one after another.They brought wives, children, and dogs, and the wives brought tubs and fishing nets, while the dogs' lively paw prints were left in the warm ashes of the campfire.Jixi stood up slowly, gathered two pieces of fishing nets together, stood on the empty river bank, and turned around to get her wooden basin.She struggled to get close to the wooden basin, at this time she was surprised to find more than a dozen beautiful blue tearfish swimming in the clear water of the wooden basin!They danced so leisurely that Jixi's tears couldn't help but flow down.She looked up at the fishermen and fisherwomen who had returned to the fishing village. Their figures were erratic, and they were about to return to their wooden houses.A crimson glow appeared in the sky, immersing Ajia Fishing Village in a conception-like peace.Jixi shook for a while, she really wanted to praise God, but what she said was still a curse.

Ji Xi dragged the tub to the shore with all his might.She knelt down on the shore, panting heavily, and put the plump tearfish back into the river of death with her bony hands.Once in the water, the last tearfish headed swiftly downstream.