Chapter 30 Chapter Twenty Nine

Da Ya and I were going to sleep in the empty room of the village committee, but Meng Xing's child woke us up again and asked us to go to his house to sleep.I found out afterwards that it was Meng Xing who was very interested in the laptop we were carrying, so he took the initiative to convince his family. In fact, Da Ya and I also felt that living in a villager's house was more comfortable and convenient than living in a neighborhood committee, so we lived in the wing of Mr. Meng's house.But of course he was tortured by that kid till midnight, after teaching him how to play computer for a while, he played a movie for him, the kid opened his mouth wide open, screamed in surprise, and flushed with excitement.

Meng Xing's nickname is "Monkey". For the past few days, he often lingered at night. If he wanted to see dinosaurs, aliens, flying saucers, etc., I found some pictures for him on the Internet or put a In the movie, this kid runs out to show off to his partners during the day, and often sees such a group of children surrounded by the mound in front of the door, listening to his vernacular, I guess he is the happiest and proudest these days . After a few days, we found nothing, and Da Ya and I also felt that there was no point in continuing to live here, so we packed up our things and prepared to go back.After breakfast the next day, he greeted Mr. Meng and left the courtyard with Big Ya, intending to bid farewell to Mr. Gu, after all, he had troubled him for so many days.

The old man was still sitting on the kang, basking in the sun.We have also come to sit and sit frequently these few days. Seeing us coming, we are very familiar and greeted us directly to sit on the kang and make a pot of tea on the ground.The tea leaves are very broken, which is the cheap scented tea, but it is not easy to drink good tea in the countryside. Most people do not prepare tea leaves, and there are few people in the countryside who have the habit of drinking tea. After I took a sip of water, I smiled at the old man: "Master Gu, I've really bothered you these few days. My colleagues and I are planning to go back. Our work is almost over. This time I'm here with you." Say goodbye."

While talking, he took out a red box of Changbaishan cigarettes from his bag and put them directly in front of the old man: "Master Gu, thank you for your support to our work these days. We bought this cigarette with our own money. The money given to you is not public money, and it is almost Chinese New Year, which represents a little heart from both of us." When the old man saw me taking out a cigarette, he was stunned for a moment, and waved his hands again and again after hearing what I said: "Little Hu, you are too polite, old man, I am used to smoking pouches, and this cigarette is not enjoyable to smoke, you keep it for yourself Smoke it, I will be blind if I smoke, I accept your wishes, but this cigarette can't be accepted."

Da Ya put the cigarette directly next to the old man and said, "Master Gu, what's the matter, do you still treat us as outsiders? It's not for anything else to give you a cigarette. It's said in the countryside. Where can there be empty hands during the New Year? Those who come to the door are all from the countryside, and they all know this. When we return to our hometown during the New Year, we have to bring some cigarettes and alcohol to our family. We also treat you as our uncle. If you don’t accept it, why do you dislike us?" When the old man heard what Da Ya said, he didn't refuse any more, and continued to say thank you a few times.

At this time, a whirlwind blew up outside the window, blowing the snow in the yard and firewood leaves swirling into the sky. Although we were in the house, we all felt a little wind blowing in. We sat for a while and got up to leave. The old man looked at us, sighed, and told us that he had indeed dug a stone statue before.When I took it home, it didn't look like the current thing. I didn't dare to put it outside for fear of being seen by others, so I put it in the newly dug small vegetable cellar to the east.A few days ago, you asked me about this stone statue, but I didn’t say anything. I was thinking that one was afraid that you would take it away, and the other was that it would cause some trouble because it was not a good thing to say.

Hearing this, Da Ya and I were really overjoyed. We had no intention of cutting willows, but we hit the right one. Unexpectedly, a single cigarette made the old man tell the whereabouts of the stone statue by himself. The old man looked at me and said to Da Ya, we don’t look like bad people, it’s useless to put this thing here, if we like it, we can give it to us.As we talked, we were about to go down to the ground, and our temper was still very anxious. Seeing this, Da Ya and I hurried down to the ground, and followed the old man out of the house. We can't let this old man be busy, after all, he is not young, he went up and down, hurt his tendons and twisted his waist, so Da Ya and I followed the old man's command and opened the vegetable cellar.

As soon as the top panel of the vegetable cellar was lifted, a dark and musty smell came out. It felt suffocating. Da Ya and I jumped to the side holding our noses. After airing for a long time, the smell was not so bad after the air circulated. Obvious. The depth of the cellar is about three meters. After going down a trembling wooden ladder, I found that there are not many things stored inside. I found that stone statue, which is not very big, the diameter of the bottom surface is estimated to be about 30 centimeters, and the height is only about half a meter. It is very inconspicuous and sticks there.

Da Ya and I took a lot of effort to lift the stone statue up. This thing is too cloudy to be brought directly into the house, but placed directly in the yard to bask in the sun. Da Ya and I walked around the stone statue several times, and the more we looked at it, the more surprised we were. The stone statue was carved very finely, it was simply a work of supernatural craftsmanship, the carving was smooth and lifelike, the head of a beast was human, and the head was a bit like a bird's head. Looking at his body and his demeanor, there is always a gloomy feeling, and I don't know where there is that weirdness.

This kind of strange stone carving is somewhat similar to the "Weng Zhong" in front of ancient buildings and ancient tombs. Weng Zhong is a stone carving of stone men, stone horses, and stone lions standing in front of ancient tombs.But I looked at this thing for a long time, and the head and shape don't look like Weng Zhong, but it looks a bit like a tomb-suppressing beast. The tomb-suppressing beast is a common monster in ancient Chinese tombs; it is a kind of ghost device set up to suppress ghosts and protect the souls of the dead from intrusion.It was first seen in the tombs of Chu in the Warring States Period, popular in the Wei, Jin, Sui and Tang Dynasties, and gradually disappeared after the Five Dynasties.But generally it is mainly made of pottery or Tang Sancai.Stone products like this are extremely rare, so I dare not draw conclusions decisively.

From the style of clothing on his body, we can't tell which dynasty this stone statue belongs to. He has a burly body and is wearing a majestic general's armor. It seemed to be staring at us all the time, and suddenly felt a little numbness in the scalp and chills all over the body. Seeing that we had been standing outside for a while, the old man told us to come in and warm up first. Da Ya and I also felt a little uncomfortable all over, so we rubbed our hands and went into the room. The old man saw that Da Ya and I were more interested in this thing, thought that we were embarrassed to ask for his things, and repeatedly said that this thing was of no use to him, and he really wanted to give it to us and let us take it away.After repeated explanations by Da Ya and I, the old man believed that we just wanted to study it, not really want it, so he didn't say any more. With this discovery, everyone and I did not leave right away. At night, we imported the photos from the camera to the computer and looked at them one by one, but did not see any clues. Later, we simply sent an email to Liu Ye , sent the pictures over. After a while, I called Liu Ye, and I could feel that Liu Ye seemed very tired. I briefly talked about the things here. When I talked about the mysterious stone statue, Liu Ye seemed to be very tired. Very interested, while receiving the email, she talked about the past few days after she returned to Beijing. While talking, suddenly there was a scream from the phone, which frightened me a lot, so I hurriedly asked Liu Ye what happened. Liu Ye repeatedly said sorry on the phone, and then told me that it was because she opened the email I just sent, and she knew the stone statue in the picture, and it was the "magpie guardian" of Usa. The bird head carved on the stone statue is the god magpie, which is actually the crow. The crow is the god of happiness and protection of the Manchu people.There is a legend of "the crow saves the ancestors". The descendants of Manchuria all regard the crow as a god and should not harm it. The mountain people in the northeast also have the tradition of "sprinkling meat and wine to sacrifice to the crow". And this kind of stone sculpture of a magpie with a human body and an animal head is generally seen in the "Usa" dojo. It is used to protect the Dharma during the opening of the altar. Generally, there should be eight stone statues, four characters and four martial arts, which are arranged in eight directions, including the southeast, northwest, and so on. , the one we found was dressed as a general, and correspondingly there is a stone statue of the "magpie protector" in civilian attire. The discovery of this kind of stone statue is enough to prove one point, that is, it must be related to the post-Jin Dynasty, that is, the era of Nurhachi. Only in that era, and only Usa would use this kind of stone statue of the god magpie as a guardian. Da Ya and I were dumbfounded when we heard that, and Jier was a little inexplicably excited, because judging from this, at least we didn’t come in vain this time, and now we can be sure that this place must be related to “Usa”, and maybe it is also related to what we are looking for "Xingdi Qigong" is related.In any case, it seems that we must find time to go to the ruins of the Niangniang Temple to find out.