Chapter 39 Chapter 6: The Cattle Trader is buried in peace

Seeing the two women leave, Tian Gudao was a little depressed, and the ghost cubs seemed to be less lively than before. I ignored them, the three of them drove the two dead bodies forward silently... After the two women left, the joy was less and the atmosphere was very dull.I was thinking about a question along the way: Why are women not allowed to join the business of exorcising corpses?Is it just because women are more negative than men? Tian Gudao said it was because women were naturally timid and lacked physical strength.If the woman has a heroic spirit, these are not problems.Generally speaking, women who run the rivers and lakes and practice martial arts have stronger yang energy than ordinary men.

"Xiu Cai, why don't we further develop the Ming School?" Tian Gudao, who had been dull for a long time, became interested again. "How to carry forward?" "If you don't do anything, let's get rid of the dead with a flower pie!" "What do you mean by Huapai chasing corpses?" "In the past, the corpses were all men, so the road was too boring. I think it's better to let women join in, change the corpses from all men to a mixed group of men and women, and ensure that each corpse team has more than one woman. Chasing away the mortician. We are now recruiting female disciples from the sect..."

"Hunting corpses has been a business for hundreds of years, only men are allowed to chase corpses. There must be a reason for him. We have already broken the rules that we must keep a low profile and keep a low profile. If we break the rules again, we are afraid that we will insult our teacher." door, being laughed at by the rivers and lakes." "I'm afraid of a bird! Anyway, we have become a Ming faction to chase corpses, and we have already broken the rules. Isn't it pretty good now! Besides, the rules are also made by people. Since they are made by people, they can be changed."

"This issue should be cautious, it is much more serious than the Ming faction expelling corpses! Do you know why everyone has followed this rule for hundreds of years?" "why?" "I think our ancestors and seniors have thought it through carefully. Think about it, the corpse hunter must maintain a boyish body. If mixed with men and women, there will definitely be problems." "What's wrong?" "Which man doesn't fall in love, and which woman doesn't cherish spring! When a man and a woman mix together, they will inevitably fall in love with each other for a long time. Who can guarantee that they won't do anything out of line? Even if they really love each other, they can't keep their virginity. I think this is probably to catch up with each other. The corpses are all men."

The two of them didn't come up with anything interesting, but they finally found a topic, which added a bit of fun to the lonely journey. While chatting, I unknowingly came to the abduction slope. Knocking Slope is one of our destinations for exorcising corpses this time. The hometown of cattle dealer Wu Liucong is here. We came to an old house and inquired about Wu Liucong's relatives. An old man leaned on a cane and said that he was Wu Liucong's elder brother.We told him about the situation, and the old man's eyes turned red immediately, and the dry eye sockets were filled with dirty tears.

The old man asked: "It seems that the exorcist we hired is not you, why did you change?" It was only then that we remembered that we were entrusted by two morticians, one tall and one short, to exorcise Wu Liucong. In order to prevent accidents, I hastened to say: "The person who picked up the corpse at the beginning was my senior brother from the same sect. Because they had something to do temporarily, they entrusted us to remove the corpse." Only then did the old man feel relieved.We handled the handover and were ready to leave.The old man refused to let us go, and ordered someone to call Wu Liucong's wife and children over.

"My God, you cut off your head, you just left me so cruelly and left..." An old woman cried when she saw Wu Liucong's body, and several adult men and women followed behind him Weeping, these men and women should be Wu Liucong's son and daughter-in-law.Several children timidly tugged at the hem of the weeping adult's clothes, probably Wu Liucong's grandson. Hearing the cries, the dead body of cattle dealer Wu Liucong fell to the ground.Seeing this, the neighbors hurriedly carried the dead body into the coffin that had been prepared. Because those corpse-hunting men have already paid their full rewards, and we didn't expose their old background, leaving them a way to make a living, we are doing them a favor.

We were about to leave and continue on our way, but we were stopped by the dutiful sons. According to local customs, when the deceased is buried, he must ask a magician with high morality to do the magic.The filial sons invited us to practice rituals for Wu Liu.We didn't excuse it either.I let the ghost cub watch over the killer's nameless dead body, so as not to surprise Wu Liucong when he was doing the dojo. Folk burial ceremonies are inherently very particular.I pointed them out according to the rules. Before digging the tomb, sacrifices should be made to open the mountain, and the filial son should burn incense and light candles to perform the mountain opening ceremony.Then I drew Tai Sui, and when opening the mountain, we should avoid the direction of Tai Sui, otherwise it will be "breaking ground on the head of Tai Sui", and the mourning family will suffer disaster.

When digging a mountain, a wooden pile is built in front of and behind the place where the tomb is to be, and then the filial son is asked to dig three times with a hoe within the range of the wooden pile.Then invite someone to come over to make the acupuncture point, and then burn the portrait of Tai Sui after it is done. Then came the sacrificial tomb.During the sacrifice, Tian Gudao killed a rooster and used its blood to sacrifice.The rooster will not die immediately, but repeatedly flops in the tomb. At this time, which part of the rooster dies in the tomb, the descendants of that part will prosper.The feathers flopped down by the rooster are called "phoenix feathers" and must be picked off.According to the place where the rooster fell to the ground, I investigated and found that the descendants of the Wu family did not have any abnormalities.

During the burial, I asked my filial son to weave a five-grain hoard out of straw, which was filled with whole grains and placed in the tomb, with a small pancake covering the mouth of the hoard.Put a ceramic pot in the tomb, and put a soybean oil lamp on top of the pot, which is called a long-bright lamp.At the same time, a bronze mirror was embedded in the tomb, symbolizing the sun. When Wu Liu was put into the tomb from the coffin, I asked people to fire cannons one after another, as a farewell trip to the underworld for the deceased. If the cannons were not fired, the deceased would return to the underworld because they could not bear the loneliness on the road to Huangquan. If so, the soul of the deceased would die Will wander around the hometown.

The time of burial is also important, the coffin must fall to the ground when the sun goes down.When the soil fell, the eight people who carried the coffin dragged the brown rope and slowly lowered it down. After the situation was stable, I asked my filial son to pick up the soil and throw it on the coffin. This is called "adding soil".After the coffin goes down, a thin layer of soil should be covered first, and then the soil swept out from the tomb should be sprinkled on it, and then a bowl should be placed on it, which is called a "clothes and rice bowl".This is done in order to move lightly when moving the grave in the future, so as not to disturb the dead and bring misfortune. According to folk customs, the soul of a person after death may run out of the grave at any time and follow the living person back home. Therefore, the buried person must go around the tomb three times, and it is strictly forbidden to turn around to visit on the way home.Otherwise, seeing traces of the soul of the dead in the underworld will be detrimental to both parties. After the burial, I asked everyone to wash their hands with wine to drive away bad luck.Finally, a ceremony of resignation was held to worship the spirit of the deceased, and drew some charms, and asked the filial son to paste the evil charms on the doors and windows of his house, burn the blessing charms, and drink water and wine orally. After everything was over, Tian Gudao surveyed it with a compass, and found nothing unusual, so we said goodbye and left. Stop and go, stop and go, I didn't realize I entered the territory of Longshan, and came to a place called Shushu Cave. The tree hole is connected to Huxi on the top, and Chengliye on the bottom.Go north from here for four or five miles, that is, to Dahuxi. Dahuxi, as the name suggests, is often infested by big insects in this area. There is a story about the origin of Dahuxi.It is said that during the Qianlong period, a local young man surnamed Xiang was a filial son.He lost his father when he was very young, and was raised by his mother since he was a child. When he was eighteen years old, his mother suffered from a strange disease. He visited all the famous doctors in the local area, but there was no improvement.Later, a doctor who wandered here gave a prescription, saying that it would be cured by taking it accordingly.The doctor did not charge them any money, and the dutiful son surnamed Xiang felt that the doctor's words were credible. However, this prescription needs the tiger's beard as a primer.The filial son didn't think much, so he took a tiger stick and went to the deep mountain to guard and prepare to fight the tiger. In this deep mountain, due to the infestation of big insects and ferocious beasts, few people usually go in, and even if they go in, they will go in groups of several people.It is said that this filial son went in for a day and a night, but no one came out. The folks thought that the filial son might have been eaten by a tiger, so they went into the mountains in groups to look for him.After searching for a long time, I finally found him in a dense forest in the mountains.When he was found, he was already dying, covered in blood, his whole body was smashed to pieces by the tiger's sharp claws, and one arm had been bitten off by the tiger. Not far from him, people found a big tiger that had died. People hurriedly carried the tiger and the filial son back to the stockade, and rescued the filial son. After the filial son's mother took the prescription of tiger's beard as medicine Yinzi, it didn't take long for her to recover. Later, the local people were moved by his filial piety, and named a stream flowing through the local area as Dahuxi to commemorate him.From the allusions and names of Dahuxi, one can know that the mountains and forests in this area are dense. The tree hole is actually not a hole, it's just the entrance of a valley.We entered through the tree hole, but there were endless stone steps. The winding and disorderly stone steps are inlaid among the dense forests in the valley, just like a pair of heavenly ladders lost here by the wandering gods.The stone steps are continuous from low to high, and it is easy to give people the illusion that they can climb to heaven by climbing the steps. We went up the stairs, turned several times, and finally saw a village in front of us.Entering the village, I found that the scale of the village is not too small, it is estimated that there are hundreds of families. At this point, it was getting late.We were worried that there would be no villages in front of us, and there would be beasts infesting again, so we decided to find a place to spend the night here. People in the village knew that we were morticians, and no one was willing to take us in overnight, but they all recommended us to stay in the haunted house in the corner of the village. We later found out that the house called the Haunted House is considered a mansion in the local area, but it has been abandoned for many years. "About half a year ago, this house began to be haunted. The owner was originally a wealthy gentry here. Because he could not bear the harassment of ghosts, his family finally moved to the city to live, and never came back. When he left, he left a message, saying who is brave enough If you go to live in it, the house will belong to whoever it is..." A local villager said. It is said that the homeowner built a new house at that time, and when the house was completed, he moved to the new courtyard.But not long after, the hall often heard the sound of many people walking, crying and laughing at night.The housewife peeped through the gap in the room and saw several men and women, all wearing ancient clothes and hats, about two feet high, standing or sitting on the ground, crying or singing, all strange.Hearing the sound of people, he suddenly disappeared.In the daytime, it is common to see big snakes more than two zhang long, with their tails hanging from the beams, their heads drooping, their tongues dropped and their beards sticking out, they are fearsome and vicious.The owner of the house was overwhelmed by the disturbance and moved to another place with his family. "Facing this mansion, many self-confident people went in and lived there, but none of them could spend the whole night. Either they fled in despair, or they were so frightened that they lost their minds. Li Bold in our village was so frightened Out of his mind... There used to be a widower who bragged that he was not afraid. After he went in, he didn't come out one night. Everyone thought he was safe, but he still didn't come out the next day. Everyone went in during the day and found that he had already stiffened and died. ...the wizard who was first invited by the master to suppress evil also wet his pants and ran away that night..." There are many stories about this house. The local people said that you have magic skills to drive away the mortician, if you are brave enough, you can stay there tonight. After listening to their introduction, Tian Gudao and I expressed interest in this house.For morticians, ghosts are not scary. So, we decided to stay in the haunted house at night, and take a look at what ghosts were doing it by the way. When I came to the haunted house, I realized that it was a large-scale building on stilts, built against the mountain.The owner's wealth can be seen from its size.The front lawn of the haunted house was overgrown with weeds, and the wooden beams of the windows were covered with cobwebs, creating a desolate scene. Looking from the outside, the house was dark and gloomy. At this time, a mountain wind blew, and the leaves on the mountain made rustling sounds, which made people feel panic.The three of us drove the killer's nameless corpse towards the house, and when we entered the house, a chill hit our faces. We scanned the house.The upper and lower floors are divided into two floors. If the attic on the top floor is counted, it should be three floors. There are as many as twenty-one houses, large and small.There are some worn-out furniture piled inside, probably discarded by the owner when he moved. In order to prevent snakes and rats from harassing the dead bodies, we decided to live on the second floor. After placing the dead body in the turret, we knocked on the fire sickle, lit the candles we brought from the village, ate some snacks, wiped a dusty stool, and sat down quietly. The ghost cub, however, couldn't stay idle, climbing up and down, looking around. At this time, the sky had completely dimmed, and the entire village was submerged in the dark night, with only a few flickering oil lamps declaring that there were still people living here. We glanced out of the window, only to find someone moving. It turned out that the villagers here heard that we lived in a haunted house and invited us to watch the fun, but they dared not approach the house. They stood at a distance and whispered to each other, probably discussing whether we could Get out of this room alive. "Xiucai, those villagers watching from a distance must think that we can't survive. I think we can set up a gamble and make some money by the way." Tian Gudao always has a talent for making money. "How to set up this gamble? How to earn money?" I was very interested in his proposal. "Think about it, most or even all of these villagers will definitely think that we will be killed by evil spirits tonight, and we must guarantee that we will not die. In this way, we can make a gamble. If we don't If we die, the villagers will give us the silver we gambled on; if we really die, we will give them the silver.” "You can try it." I was bewitched by Tian Gudao, and I was also moved. So, Tian Gudao went downstairs quickly and came to Qianping.Seeing this, the villagers retreated one after another, not knowing why. Tian Gudao ignored these, and let go of his voice and shouted: "It's a bet, it's a bet, come and place a bet. Bet that we will be safe tonight and stand here, and bet that we will die in the haunted house tonight, please stand there." side." The villagers standing in the distance listened to Tian Gudao's call, understood the meaning, surrounded them with great interest, and talked a lot. "Fresh, and there are some who bet on their own lives!" "I think this group of people really don't know how to live or die." "No one came out of this house alive, and I don't believe they can come out alive." Hearing what other people said, Tian Gudao showed a smile on his face and said, "Yes, since you all think that we can't come out alive, then make a bet. Let's make a bet on this, are you interested?" Tian Gudao hurriedly moved out a dilapidated Eight Immortals table from the inner hall of the haunted house, blew it hard, then wiped the dust off with his sleeve, and sat down. "I'm afraid this man is crazy. He's betting his life! I'm willing to bet! I bet you won't survive!" A young man was the first to express his opinion. "I'm also willing to participate in the bet, but if you die, who will pay for it?" An older man next to him questioned. "Yeah, if you lose, who do we ask for money, isn't this a scam?" Everyone immediately agreed. "Don't worry, I have money in my pocket. If we are really dead, then you can divide the money privately. Brother, show them the money!" Hearing Tian Gudao's cry, I immediately asked the ghost cub to send out the cloth bag containing the silver. Tian Gudao took the cloth pocket: "Everyone can see clearly, there are white silver and heavy copper wires inside, is it enough?" Everyone clicked their tongues: "There is really so much money, it's enough." "How about betting that you lose five?" Tian Gudao was the banker and offered a suggestion. "It's too little to pay five for one bet. It's not exciting. Play bigger and pay ten for one bet!" The first young man who spoke up shouted. "Yes, it's fun to bet ten times!" The villagers yelled in unison. "Okay, then pay ten for one bet! Who will be the referee?" Everyone unanimously recommended an elder, and it can be seen that the old man is very prestigious in the village. The old man didn't refuse, and named a middle-aged man in a long robe to be the secretary, specializing in roster records. So, everyone started betting. "I'll bet a hundred coins, bet to death!" "I'll write fifty pennies! It's a dead bet!" "I'll bet money to death!" ... "I'll bet 3000 Wen, I'm gambling!" At this moment, a man came out. They were all betting on our death, and suddenly a bet on our life appeared, and he wanted to bet 3,000 Wen!If we go on like this, if we don't die, we will have to pay thirty taels of silver!Wouldn't that kill us?I regret that Tian Gudao shouldn't have played this ghost game.