Chapter 17: Darong Village (Part 2)
Just as Jiang Xian and Hong Si Niang were walking towards their gathering place, a young man came over and bowed, saying, "Master Jiang."
This is a very young man, about 27 or 28 years old. He looks very energetic and is wearing camouflage uniform.
Without waiting for Jiang Xian to speak, he immediately said, "I am Teacher Chu's seventh disciple. Others call me Xiaoqi. If Master Jiang doesn't mind, you can also call me Xiaoqi. I am here to report to Master Jiang. I have just made an agreement with the village. In the next month, they will vacate five rooms for us."
Jiang Xian nodded, and Xiao Qi continued, "There are two more things I want to report to Master Jiang. First, there are twenty of us this time. There are not so many rooms in the village. Even if we borrow five rooms, it is still very tight. So... there may be no command room."
"Wait." Jiang Xian was listening absent-mindedly - there were people to do these things. He didn't really want to listen to these reports, as being of a higher generation also had its own troubles... But at this moment, something suddenly came to his mind and he stopped.
He turned his head and looked at Xiao Qi seriously. Xiao Qi was stunned for a moment, and a look of uneasiness appeared on his face. Before he could lower his head, Jiang Xian said in a deep voice: "You said... the village agreed? Give us five rooms?"
"Yeah." Xiao Qi said in surprise.
"Who promised?"
"Village...Village Chief?"
Jiang Xian narrowed his eyes slightly: "Are you not sure that he is the village chief?"
"No... I'm not sure." Xiao Qi was facing this kind of ancestor-level pioneer for the first time, and he paused for a moment. "There's no one in this village... No, not a single family opened their doors. When we asked, a family reached out their hand from the window and pointed at the house, so we went over to ask. But... but the person in that house didn't say he was the village chief... He just promised us that we could rent five rooms here. He said that through the door."
Jiang Xian then asked, "What about the rent?"
Xiao Qi blinked: "The other party didn't mention it..."
"In the window
What about the hand? "Hong Si Niang took out a nail clipper from somewhere, shaved her nails leisurely, and blew a breath casually: "What's the difference?"
"No difference..." Xiao Qi frowned slightly: "It's just an ordinary old man's hand... Oh, his hands are very dry, like... like there is no moisture in them."
Jiang Xian and Hong Si Niang looked at each other, then nodded and said, "Got it. You don't need to report these things to me. Inform your teacher directly. Also... tell him to order everyone not to disturb the villagers."
"knew!"
As Xiao Qi left with a sense of relief, Jiang Xian and Hong Si Niang immediately quickened their pace, and soon they arrived behind the village.
This is still a mountain, but... it is filled with graves!
It was very simple, the most simple version, using a stick with five-color triangular flags. These graves were inserted in the cracks of the stones and in the soil, complementing the wild flowers. It didn't seem out of place at all.
The big trees around made gentle rustling sounds in the summer breeze, but together with the graves, they seemed to be singing a sad song, telling how they grew out of the bones. It was chilling.
There was a river just in front of the tomb, near the village. It was like the Styx that divided the kingdom of life and death, dividing the village into two halves. And the eight-armed arhat, Ling Xiaozi, was standing by the river.
"How was your visit?" Although Ling Xiaozi was no longer a Taoist priest, he obviously attached great importance to the Taoist tradition. Since Jiang Xian came to find him, he had never taken off his Taoist robe. At this moment, he looked at Xiaoxi thoughtfully and asked casually.
Jiang Xian was silent for a moment, then he said solemnly: "This place... doesn't look like a place for people to live in."
"I didn't feel anything at first, but the more I walked, the more I felt something was wrong. This place... is too quiet."
He leaned against a tree casually and said in a deep voice, "Darong Village doesn't have much communication with the outside world. It's adjacent to the mountains. There are probably no wild beasts in such deep mountains and old forests. However, there is not a single dog here. It's normal for a family not to have one, but I just walked a few hundred meters and didn't hear a dog barking. That's something wrong."
He held up two fingers. "Second, it's for this reason. I noticed their houses. You should have noticed it too. The houses here... are too far away."
"It's the same reason as before. There are wild beasts roaming in the deep mountains and old forests. Whatever the reason, they should live together. However, they... it's as if they are afraid of being too close to their neighbors. Each house is built farther away from the other."
"Finally... I specifically asked Director Ma. Because of the special geography here, no one wants to take on the task of making this nearly secluded mountain village prosperous, so... in recent decades, no one has seen any villagers here!"
He sneered and looked at the people around him who all had : "The only person who has seen the villagers here was a volunteer teacher four years ago. Unfortunately, he is crazy."
"Crazy?" The Eight-Armed Arhat asked in a muffled voice.
"That's right." Jiang Xian took out a cigarette, lit it, and took a deep puff: "When I was crazy, I kept repeating two words in my mouth: 'Immortal touches my head' and 'eternal life'."
Swish! The Eight-Armed Arhat and Hong Si Niang immediately looked over.
Jiang Xian ignored their gazes and scanned the crowd before speaking faintly, "Then here comes the question."
"In the White Jade Capital of Heaven, there are nine palaces and twelve cities. Immortals touch my head and give me immortality. These are the words I saw on the Immortal Cliff below. Why... is it mentioned here?"
"Let me put it another way. Under what circumstances would a living person know what's in the mausoleum below? And... voluntarily avoid the world?"
silence.
After a few seconds, Ling Xiaozi raised his head and said solemnly: "You can always see the essence through the phenomenon... But there is indeed a person who completely fits the situation you described."
He licked his lips and said word by word: "Tomb keeper."
These three words immediately made everyone's eyes light up. The Eight-Armed Arhat murmured, "If this is really a tomb of the Three Dukes, it's not surprising that they have their own tomb keepers. Only dignitaries of this level can afford to have living people guarding the tomb. In other words, where there are tomb keepers, there must be a large tomb. But the strange thing is that these tomb keepers are still there after thousands of years of reincarnation. This is too abnormal."
Time is the best medicine to erase everything. It is simply unrealistic for a tomb keeper to guard the tomb of one person for thousands of years.
People's minds change.
"Don't be in a hurry." Jiang Xian pondered for a long time and expressed his thoughts: "My opinion is: don't rush down. If they are really the tomb keepers, then this village may have important clues to reveal the identity of the tomb owner below!"
Knowing who the tomb owner is is very important for exploration.
You can find the other party's allusions, even the layout of the tomb, and the people involved in the historical records. For the next exploration, there will be a "degree".
No matter how difficult it is, it will not exceed this "limit", because the opponent's ability, financial resources, material resources, and human resources cannot meet higher standards. You can even infer what traps you will encounter from the records of the time. Including the layout of the tomb - sharpening the knife does not delay the chopping of wood.
"Then...how do we confirm whether they have the identity of the tomb keepers?" The Eight-Armed Arhat frowned.
This is extremely important for the subsequent exploration, and can even be said to be a breakthrough!
"Wait." Jiang Xian rubbed his chin and spoke in a deep voice: "As long as they are human, they have to eat, drink, defecate and urinate. I have looked inside the house and there is no toilet. Most toilets in rural areas are set up in pig pens or behind houses. Now they are hiding from us, but there will always be a time when they can no longer hide. They will always come out."
"Once you find their traces, you can always find clues by following the clues!"
………………………………
It gets dark very late in the summer nights.
Jiang Xian, the other three people and Chu Ziyi asked for a room together. Of course, they slept on a makeshift steel bed. Coincidentally, there was no villager in the room.
He did not hide their discovery from Chu Ziyi. He knew the opponent's level very well. If he did not arrange the team, it would be a matter of time before the opponent found out. After all... In addition to the king, there are also some "pseudo kings" who are stuck at the extraordinary master level...
Chu Ziyi agreed with their idea very much. At eight o'clock in the evening, according to the plan, all the lights in the rooms were turned off.
"Are you sure they will come out?" There was a small hole in the window. The head of Jiang Xian's bed was not far from the hole. Chu Ziyi asked while recuperating.
"Don't worry." Hong Si Niang turned over impatiently: "As long as you are a human, you have to eat, drink, defecate and urinate... Wife, just go to sleep."
A shoe flew directly onto Hong Si Niang's bed, hitting her and making her gasp with a cry.
"It's not enough that you're embarrassed at home, and you have to bring it here? You are shameless, but I still have some dignity!" The Eight-Armed Arhat turned over in annoyance, wrapping his huge body in the quilt.
For a moment, the room fell silent.
Time passed by minute by minute. Everyone who was used to the biological clock in the city was not sleepy. The croaking of frogs, the chirping of insects, and the occasional howl of a wild animal formed a melodious concerto. The lonely village in the mountains at night was particularly quiet and eerie.
One hour, two hours... three hours... just when the time on his cell phone showed half past eleven, Jiang Xian suddenly opened his eyes.
Not only him, but everyone in the room opened their eyes, because just now, a slight "sizzle" sound was heard in the air.
That was the sound of old wood being pushed aside.
Moreover, this sound... is right in the living room!
Next came the heavy breathing that Jiang Xian had heard in the afternoon, the "huff" and "huff" sounds that he had tried hard to suppress.
Is there someone hiding in the living room?
Jiang Xian quickly recalled the layout of the living room in his mind: a table, an old TV cabinet, and a wardrobe. He looked inside and found it was empty.
"Secret passage?" He narrowed his eyes and looked quietly towards the door.
The door to the dormitory was closed.
The old wooden door even had several cracks. It had the characteristics of the 1980s and 1990s, and there was a glass on the door. I don't know how long it had been since the glass was cleaned, and it was covered with dust.
The panting sound was getting closer and closer. Perhaps he thought he was hidden enough, but in the perception of several people in the room, it was as eye-catching as a firefly on a summer night . Hong Si Niang, who was lying on the side bed, tilted her head and looked at Jiang Xian, and said silently in spoken language: Do it?
Jiang Xian shook his head slightly.
The next second, a tall shadow suddenly stood at the door.
Very high, terrifyingly high. Maybe 2.45 meters tall. Looking through the glass, one could barely see the other person's shoulders. There was only a door between them!
Dongdong… The room was so quiet that one could even hear a person’s heartbeat. In this dead silence, a rustling sound that made one’s scalp explode was heard outside the door.
That was the sound of fingernails that had not been cut for years and had turned gray, accidentally scratching against the wooden door... Jiang Xian's hands in the quilt clenched instinctively, and then forced themselves to relax.
Rustle, rustle...like a ghost wandering in the dark night. The figure suddenly lowered his body, and then a bamboo tube stretched out from the gap in the door.
