Chapter 45 Chapter fifteen

In 2011, late spring. Nanming Senior High School remained the same as before, except that there were many tall buildings around it, and the originally open and desolate skyline became abrupt and chaotic. She checked in at the gate room and walked through the familiar big playground.It's almost summer vacation, and the high school students are packing up and going home. Every time they pass by her, they will turn their heads and pay attention.Her face was fair and clean, and she was wearing a white dress as always, which slightly resembled the bangs of the ancients, and her black and bright red phoenix eyes, like the little dragon girl in the ancient tomb sect, she could not tell her real age at all.

There is a row of fences in the corner of the playground, which are still full of scarlet roses.A few red roses protruded from behind her black hair, and the petals fell on her face, like a watercolor painting in red, black and white.She took off a few pieces, squeezed them into a ball of blood, and stepped on the dirt under her feet. "Scattered into mud and ground into dust, only the fragrance remains the same." When I whispered the words of indulgence, I naturally thought of today sixteen years ago—— On June 19, 1995, during the rainy season, there was always torrential rain in the afternoon. She was in class (2) of the third year of high school, wandering on the edge of the playground, and accidentally saw the distraught teacher Shen Ming.She approached him from behind the fence, and whispered under the shade of a few roses: "Teacher Shen."

The man who had just lost everything looked at her with a complicated expression, but took half a step back. "Don't talk to me, let alone approach me." Shen Ming tried not to look her in the eye, "I'm not a teacher anymore." "I heard that you won't be in our school tomorrow, when will you leave?" "Tonight, at eight o'clock." What did he seem to remember?In hindsight, it was probably the murder plan that night. "Can you be later? At ten o'clock in the evening, I will wait for you in the witch's district." "Witch District?" He looked at the petals under his feet, which had quickly rotted into mud. "Is there anything important?"

"I have something to tell you, I'm afraid it will be inconvenient during the day." She said, looking around, in case someone passed by and noticed, why ten o'clock?Because you have to climb over the school wall, there is a section of the wall that is low and easy to climb over, and you are afraid of being seen early. "Okay, I promise you, it just so happens that I have something to tell you." At the age of eighteen, she hid in the depths of the flowers, brushed the hair on her eyebrows and said, "At ten o'clock sharp, see you at the gate of the Witch District!"

This was the last time she saw Shen Ming. Her name is Ouyang Xiaozhi. he went. Then, he died. Sixteen years later, she is still standing in this place, but does he have an afterlife or a ghost? Ouyang Xiaozhi straightened her hair, walked into the teaching building that had not changed, stepped on the stairs to the top floor, and knocked on the door of the office. "Please come in." She entered the room demurely and recognized the face behind the desk. This face belonged to the most famous teacher of Nanming High School, who is also a well-known super math teacher in the city. Ordinary people would have shown joy when they saw such a beautiful woman, but Zhang Mingsong was expressionless.

"Mr. Zhang, hello, I'm Ouyang Xiaozhi, and I'm here to report to school today." "Oh, Mr. Ouyang, welcome to Nanming Senior High School to teach. I have already received the materials sent by the Education Committee." "Thank you!" She nodded gracefully to Teacher Zhang, and turned her head to look at Duo Gong on the other side of the window. Nenglou, "It feels so good to be a teacher at my alma mater!" "You graduated in 1995, right? I should remember you. It seems that you haven't changed for so many years." Zhang Mingsong also speaks with a good accent. He has been well maintained over the years and has not looked old. There is a huge bookshelf behind him.On the eve of the college entrance examination sixteen years ago, this face left a deep impression on people. Many students came to him to make up lessons. Under his guidance and training, many science champions were born.

"The teacher has always been my idol. When I was studying in Nanming High School, I had this dream. As expected, I was admitted to the Normal University majoring in Chinese. After graduation, I went to Xihaigu as a volunteer to teach. I taught Chinese in a high school for six years in a rural village. When I came back, I taught in a high school in an urban area for another six years—so I have been a teacher for twelve years.” "It's really admirable! Teacher Ouyang, I have checked your file in our school. At that time your head teacher was Teacher Shen Ming." His voice suddenly darkened, and Xiaozhi frowned: "Yes, it's a pity that he left us in that way in the end, but killing people is obviously extremely wrong."

"Forget it, the past is unbearable, I will take you to the administration to go through the formalities." Half an hour later, Ouyang Xiaozhi completed the entry procedures and was about to become a Chinese teacher at Nanming Senior High School. Zhang Mingsong was a little cold, but waved goodbye politely, turned around and said nothing more. She walked out of the school gate alone, crossed the busy Nanming Road, did not leave for a long time, closed her eyes and recalled more than 20 years ago... the building behind her immediately collapsed, and the reinforced concrete and bricks flew into the sky, like a nuclear war at the end of the world , After the sky was full of dust and mud, it turned into a large area of ​​dirty and dilapidated shantytowns.

It was June 1988, shortly after she first met Shin. fire. From the most inconspicuous match, like the match lit by the little girl in Andersen's works, to a flame like burning paper money, with black smoke and ashes rising, it turns into a fierce and burning tongue, devouring Hit everything. In just a few minutes, the fire spread uncontrollably, and the flames covered the sky and covered the sky, turning the night in this wilderness into daylight. Coughing, calling for help, running for life, cursing, screaming, crying, and crackling like firecrackers... The little girl was only eleven years old, and the deadly gas kept pouring into her trachea. She thought that everyone was burned to death, but she didn't expect that she choked to death first.She instinctively resisted the suffocating smoke, coughed and fled around, her nose was full of the smell of burnt flesh, and the tears on her face were half from being smoked, and half from deep guilt and remorse.

Surrounded by burning garbage, the hut made of wood and waste paper was almost destroyed, and the smell of burning old tires was disgusting. Just as she was about to lose consciousness... that person appeared again. He came, like a flame, through a flame, with a flame, to the little girl, holding her close to his chest, through more flames. She rested her head on his chest, touching his flame-like body temperature and heartbeat, longing to be melted together by the flames. Finally, he rushed out of the flames with her in his arms. I opened my eyes blurred by tears and smoke, and above my head was the night sky illuminated by fire. The stars were still bright in those days, and even the moonlight was so beautiful.

The little girl took a deep breath, dispelling the poisonous gas and ashes in her lungs, as well as the strong smell of sweat and burnt on his body. She recognized him, the boy who had rescued her in the underground warehouse of the Witch District. "We're still alive." Eighteen-year-old Shen Ming whispered in her ear. She looked at his blackened face, slightly burned cheeks and scalp, and struggled to make a sound: "Brother, I didn't mean to." He could still feel his heart beating faster again, but he shook his head sadly and said, "Remember—don't say anything!" Since then, more than twenty years have passed, and she has never mentioned a word about this matter. their secret. On June 19, 2011, near dusk, Ouyang Xiaozhi returned to this land of flames.Behind it is a brand-new real estate, opposite is the gate of Nanming High School, and a few hundred meters away is the Witch's Quarter. When she was about to walk to the bus station, she saw a teenage boy from a distance, who didn't look like a student of Nanming High School. This face looked familiar until she remembered the Ghost Festival two years ago.