surname teacher

Chapter 127 Young

"Book of Surnames" says that descendants of fish and fish ghosts are born in the water in the womb.

Dong women often feed fish with fetal water. When the fish lands in ten months, it makes a sound like a child's cry, and when it reaches twelve, it returns to the river water. After finding the mother fish, it continues the blood, so it is called descendant fish.

—— "Surname Book·Yang's Chapter"

Xinyou year, Xinchou month, Gengxu day, the penultimate days of the Lunar Year of the Rooster

In the entrance hall of Dongshan County Maternal and Child Health Hospital, Shi Rongxiu, a nurse who has been in charge of registering and prescribing medicines for patients for decades, is changing clothes with a young colleague beside him in a single room, and they are talking about opening the small window outside the registration room.

She is 48 years old, a native of Dongshan County, and belongs to one of the many Dong ethnic groups who have been semi-Sinicized there.

Like people of the same age around her, she can speak a small amount of Dong language, but now she basically communicates with people around her in Mandarin. Since her elderly parents passed away in the Dong village in the mountains, she has basically settled down with other brothers and sisters in the family. county seat.

Her husband, Fan Dongming, works in Dongshan Transportation Management Company. He is 49 years old this year. He also has a son who is just 21 years old. He has been going to university in other places and rarely comes back.

This is basically the normal life of most people in Dongshan County. Although there is a famous intangible cultural protection tourist area on the other side of the mountain not far from Dongshan, it is rare for a family to travel together in this remote small county. Tourists and all kinds of chattering and curious young students will take the initiative to set foot here, so over the years, the local economic development has always remained in a relatively backward situation.

Of course, ordinary people don't pay too much attention to this kind of thing. A nurse of a certain age like Shi Rongxiu has worked diligently in this maternal and child health care center for nearly 24 years. For her, such a monotonous and ordinary life is not boring Her life is precisely the whole of her first half of her life.

However, because they are close to the Miao and Dong settlements where the Wu Nuo culture is widely spread, they have also existed for many years, and the medical equipment is slightly backward in maternal and child health care. As for Shi Rongxiu alone, from time to time, young nurses who have just arrived here will inquire about such interesting and frightening ghost stories.

"Sister Shi, let me ask you something quietly... I heard from the nurses upstairs that you were in our hospital many years ago... have you really seen... have you seen ghosts and monsters? I used to I heard that many people from the Miao family and the Dong family can catch ghosts and demons... Have you ever seen such people... Are they powerful... What do most of them look like? And these ancestral temples God, is there any basis for the dragon gods on the wall..."

The curious little nurse next to her asked her in a low voice and pointed out the registration window. As the Spring Festival was approaching, the local Dong people held corresponding sacrifices to the gods every year, so even the most deserted county hospitals usually posted It is full of simple inverted blessing characters and famous local dragon statues and ancestral temple statues.

Hearing this, Shi Rongxiu, who was working seriously with her head down, was taken aback for a moment, and after she frowned and looked at the little girl who had just been assigned from the health school not long ago, she sighed again, and then the middle-aged woman looked outside noncommittally Those strange and magnificent portraits of gods said helplessly,

"How many times have I told you before that here in Dongshan, things like ghosts and gods cannot be casually talked about... There are a lot of taboos and customs in the Miao and Dong areas... Be careful what you get offended by talking too much trouble……"

"Well, isn't there no one around the two of us right now? Hehe, just tell me in a low voice. I've heard the head nurses upstairs mention it mysteriously many times...you really I have personally seen a pregnant hen come to the hospital in the middle of the night by a man wearing a rooster mask? He even hand-carried a Dong girl with a fish in her belly? And the one who gave birth the day before, arrived In the evening, there was a group of out-of-land women dressed in strange clothes who came to deliver things to their children. Tell me, what is going on with these stories, have you really seen them with your own eyes..."

Shi Rongxiu was a little caught off guard by a lot of questions, but since these strange things were brought up today, Shi Rongxiu did not pretend to be mysterious all the time, but seemed to be a little emotional There was a moment of silence, and like countless times before, with a hint of memory on his face, he slowly and vividly described to the little nurse some of his horrible or miraculous experiences over the past 20 years.

"... Well, these are almost things I have seen with my own eyes... The hen incident happened when I first came to work in our hospital... That day was the traditional rice festival of the Dong people, and Doctor Wang was going to pick him up in the evening My daughter got off work early, so in order to save some electricity bills, I didn't turn on the headlights for the department downstairs. At first, when I heard someone knocking on the glass window with my hand, I thought it was someone going to the emergency room in the middle of the night. When I probed, I saw the hen and her husband standing outside the registration window and staring at me, and I was almost scared to death..."

"The hen's husband? Isn't the hen's husband a rooster? So the one who came that night was actually a rooster turned into a monster?"

"Well...according to my later observation, it doesn't feel like...the hen was carried from the mountain with a cloth on her head, she looked really sick, her husband looked like a A normal person like us, but he always wears a permeable rooster mask on his face...he doesn't want to show his face to outsiders, and he doesn't talk to outsiders at all...but he is really good to his wife. I was trying to keep her from getting tired and walking, and I kept comforting her, because the doctor happened to be off work, so after that, the couple just took some medicine from my window and left..."

"Hey, so that man treats his wife so well, then did this hen and her husband come to our place afterward?"

"Of course it has never happened again. Is it possible that this kind of bloody night can happen to me every day..."

Shi Rongxiu's straightforward answer made the little nurse let out a little disappointment. After all, it feels a bit torturous to have only heard half of this kind of story.

But after thinking about it, she just pestered Shi Rongxiu in front of her and continued talking. Shi Rongxiu didn't rush to say anything when she saw that the little girl was getting excited today, but just pointed at the tea poured into the enamel cup in front of her, and then slowly and thoughtfully open the mouth,

"The second one is the story of the Dong girl with a fish in her stomach. This incident happened on a summer night 12 years ago. It is definitely far away from the incident that there is no hen today, but it is not the same as the Dong family. It is related to a legend that no one believes now, if I hadn’t seen the fish come out of the woman’s belly like this, I really couldn’t believe my eyes..."

"Legends? What legends?"

"Children and grandchildren, the story of fish from generation to generation... When I was a child in the Dong village, I often heard the old people mention this saying, saying that the fertility rate was low in the past, and the probability that women in the mountains can give birth to children is very high. Little one, at that time a Dong village wizard named Luoxiang thought of a way to help women give birth in a special way, because pregnant women were born with a peaceful lake in their stomachs, so every woman who came Babies in the world first live in the womb of their mothers in the form of fish, but ordinary people seldom discover it.”

"..."

"Water is the mother of all things. Children who died prematurely or were born safely all swim out of the water at first, so the Dong girls raised their unformed babies in the river near the mountains and waited for 12 years. After growing into a human form, I will come back to pick up my own child..."

"..."

"However, the risk caused by this is that the Dong girls themselves are likely to be forced to leave the place where they gave birth to their children for various reasons when they conceived their children and grandchildren, so many newborn children and grandchildren have not yet grown up. , was abandoned in the river since then and no one was feeding it... In addition, after the development of modern medicine over time, this method of conceiving the next generation, which is unique to the Dong village, has gradually been lost, and now it is almost impossible to see anyone. Bring up the story..."

"Hey...so that's how it is...it's amazing...then, what happened to the last story I just mentioned, Sister Shi? Why are there so many strange things happening in the ward of the foreign-born mother in the middle of the night? Weird people... I heard that the head nurses also specifically mentioned this, saying that besides you, there were several other nurses who also saw it... Those people were carrying rice, noodles and all kinds of chicken, duck and fish. It’s the same as it suddenly came from ancient times, is this all true?”

"Um...it's true, but it's true, but I don't know exactly what happened...that woman is a foreigner, and she came here specially to travel to Fanjiamiao. At that time, it seemed I encountered heavy rain and landslides on the mountain, and after I finally escaped, I passed out on the side of the road..."

"..."

"But after she gave birth, she was hurriedly picked up by her family members who came from the big city, so I haven't seen that child with my own eyes... I heard that the child seemed to be born with some genetic defect? ​​But What I knew at the time was that the background of this mother was quite big, she was the only daughter of a rich family... Although she never came to Dongshan County again, she has donated a lot of money to our county government and helped her. The people who build roads and bridges in the local area are very nice... You see, the current county government building and the cement road up the mountain were all given to our local area by this kind Miss Chen..."

Shi Rongxiu still seemed very grateful when he said this, and the little nurse also looked a little curious and looked outside after seeing this.

But when they were talking about this topic, there was a strange sound of horns from several cars stopping together on the road outside the hospital.

But when she heard the noise that was incompatible with the small county town, she was stunned for a moment, and the little nurse who looked out from the registration window first muttered doubtfully, when will anyone in our dilapidated county town afford to drive so well? After the car that came to a stop at the door, and behind the car window looming half a handsome pale face and that head of white hair like snowflakes, I was stunned for a moment and felt strange The ground blushed.

And Shi Rongxiu saw why this little girl who was usually quite noisy suddenly turned her eyes wide, her face flushed and she was a little bit guilty, but just as she was about to speak, Shi Rongxiu saw a middle-aged man in a suit and leather shoes rushing into the hall , poked his head in politely with sweat on his head again, waved and smiled at them and said,

"Hey, hello, hello, we are from City Y, if you bother me a little bit, can you tell me where the Dongshan County and Township Government is?"

……

Xinyou year, Xinchou month, Renzi day, one of the traditional festivals of the Han nationality.

In the remote Dong village in the Dong and Miao settlement in H Province, the first ray of sunshine in the winter forest is projecting through the old window frames of the small wooden building into the small bed in the house.

Lying vaguely on the hammock was a little girl with black hair and yellow skin, about eleven or twelve years old, sleeping soundly with her bare feet.

Beside her small wooden hammock, there are also a row of goldfish dolls stitched out with needles and threads, some colorful shell beads collected from the stream, and a picture of her and a picture of her because she was holding her in both hands. , so only half of his face was exposed, but also a photo of a long-haired man wearing a local blue cloth coat.

These things are all the little girl's property, other than that, all she has is this poor and simple wooden bed and this small hanging building with a broken roof, but it is unexpectedly clean and warm, and they are still here to accompany her looking at her.

It wasn't until the little girl who was lying on the bed in a drowsy sleep heard someone outside calling Yang Hua, Yang Hua, are you home, that the girl named Yang Hua shuddered and sat up from the bed, After grabbing her messy hair and flying to the window, she stared at the white-haired mother-in-law standing downstairs with her hair in a bun and a sky-blue embroidered bib around her waist in embarrassment.

"Uh, Fan...Mr. Fan Xi, you... Good morning..."

"Well, you're early too, but today is the holiday, don't you know? Why don't you get up early and dress up to worship the family temple and the dragon god? Your father is away from home, so you catch rabbits and fish in the mountains every day like a wild child Play and then go to bed and be lazy? Is that plausible?"

"Um……"

The slightly reproachful eyes of the old lady standing under the wooden building made Yang Hua, who poked her head out and lay on the window of the wooden building, touch her nose with a little blush.

But there was no other way, after all, every time before that person went out, he would specifically ask Granny Fan Xi, who was close to her home in the same village, to come and watch her.

So even if she wanted to just be lazy for a day and not wear those cumbersome and heavy national costumes and silver jewelry to go to some temple to worship some gods in winter, she would always have no way to escape smoothly.

And Granny Fan Xi, who is full of wrinkles and has very local facial features, saw her procrastinating and dawdling look and knew that she made it clear that she didn't want to go again, so she wrapped her white hair in a blue cloth towel. The old lady also sighed helplessly at the moment, then waved to her gently and said slowly,

"Forget it, your father guessed your wild girl's temper again... Come on, wash your face well, put on new clothes, and go to my house to eat the first meal of the new year." Let's have a meal of camellia oleifera and flower rice... Ah Bao happens to be at home too, you can play with him at home for a while in the afternoon..."

Yang Hua would definitely not refuse this kind of invitation from Granny Fan Xi. After all, the one in her family hadn't left the house yet, but she had to say something every day or two. She must be obedient and polite, especially for Granny Fan Xi She wanted to be polite, so she nodded vigorously at the moment, then raised her voice and said something very sensible.

"...Okay! I'll come right away! Grandma Fan Xi, wait for me!"

The voice fell, and before Grandma Fan Xi could finish her sentence, "Oh, oh, oh, please slow down and don't fall, the little girl who chirped like a little gray bird flying in the mountains and forests had already rushed back to the wooden building and changed quickly." The indigo dress hanging on the head of the bed rushed down from upstairs to Granny Fan Xi's arms when she bit her hair tie and hurriedly tied up her long messy hair.

Seeing this, the mother-in-law Fan Xi naturally had nothing to do with her, she could only quickly greet her, took her little hand and led the noisy girl back home.

Seeing this, Yang Hua scratched her head and laughed, and followed Granny Fan Xi obediently as she walked to her small wooden building, and the two chatted one after another on the road. .

"Do you like my oil tea and flower rice? My cooking skills are not as good as your father's, but I should still be used to it, right?"

"Huh? I'm used to eating, I'm used to eating as long as it's made by you haha..."

"It's good to get used to eating... But if you do the math, after the Spring Festival this year, you will be 12 years old, Yang Hua?"

"Ah? Well, it seems to be..."

"What do you mean, you can't even remember this kind of thing... Your father mentioned it to me several times before he left... However, when he went out this time, he told you when he would come back ?"

"Uh... no, he told me to stay at home, and said that if the moon outside starts to turn red again, don't run around the mountains alone, let alone get close to any place like a river, and don't Swim in the river with anyone...and then...obediently wait for him to come back..."

"Well, you should really listen to what he said, and don't run up the mountain all day long. Dongshan's generation of mountains has been very uneasy for so many years, and the mountain spirits have disturbed the villagers more than once or twice. Thanks to Long The gods and the ancestral temples of each village are there, so that we can protect and bless us for many years, so that our remote Dong village can have good weather every year, and every family is safe..."

Fan Xi’s clichés made Yang Hua nod listlessly after listening to her ears for so many years. After all, this is a Dong village. The local people generally have high respect for natural civilization, and the mountains and rivers can bring They have the most wealth and a treasure trove of mysterious stories, and the gray-haired old lady was slightly relieved to see her faintly listening, but she still stared at her soft hair and sighed worriedly, and spoke slowly and tirelessly road,

"Don't take my word for it, I heard that those cannibal 'old boys' on the chicken coop rock have recently started appearing again... there are all kinds of goblins and monsters there, and they come into the woods at night It's a narrow escape, if something happens to you, your father will definitely die in a hurry..."

"Hmph...he doesn't worry about me...I remember when I was young, I didn't dare to sleep at night, and he even told me on purpose that he would send me to the mountain to be eaten by the 'old boy'..."

"Nonsense, why doesn't your father worry about you? Without your father who carried you to Dongshan County Hospital in the rain all night to seek medical treatment, you don't know where your little life has gone... He has been doing you for so many years." I seldom leave here, just such a person takes you to live, and there are no family members or friends who can come and go during the holidays, and you are alone all day long. Do you think there is no one else in this world except your relatives who can be there for you? Do it, not to mention that he is still a man of the right age, who can obviously marry a wife and have children normally..."

This last sentence made Yang Hua, who was still young, prick up her ears with a sense of crisis. After all, the people around her did not mention this kind of words in front of her once or twice, but she had never taken it seriously before. .

And obviously a little unnaturally nervous, in fact, I have always cared about the person who happened to be away at the moment, but the little girl who always didn't want to show it to outsiders thought about it, and deliberately pretended to be 'indifferent' With a snort, he puffed out his chest and put his hips on his hips to brace himself, and said,

"No, it's impossible...he doesn't have much money, his house is still so dilapidated, he looks...he doesn't look good at all, and he doesn't look young at all...he wears rustic clothes all the time, I don’t know what to do in the mountains all day, and I don’t go home at all... Plus... and I am such an oil bottle by my side, no woman in the village can look up to him... let alone the ones from the outer counties Now... of course young girls like a handsome and good-looking man like Dragon God... No one would like him..."

"Bah, bah, bah, you nonsense girl, how can anyone call yourself an oil bottle, and the dragon god is something you can put on your mouth casually? Be careful to offend the gods in the river and let the gods on the mountain The 'Old Boy' really took you away..."

"..."

Granny Fan Xi's stern eyes made Yang Hua a little speechless, but she bit her lip and thought for a while, she still frowned and said nothing, and the old lady probably understood what she was thinking when she saw her like this, she just touched her. He touched her head and said nicely,

"Okay, okay, I'm just talking casually, your father told me several years ago that he probably won't find anyone else until he dies in this life... Sigh, it's a pity for your father Such a good-looking person, do you remember? A few years ago, after the vernal equinox, everyone went up to the mountains to plow the land, and every time it was your father who helped deliver water to the mountains... Po’s parents have long since passed away, only the young The little Abao is by our side. In the past, I had to carry all the heavy water up the mountain. Thanks to your father, how much you have helped our family..."

"..."

"Although this is a trivial matter in the eyes of others, my old woman has noticed it a little bit over the years, and you only need to go to the village and ask casually to know that the people in the surrounding villages have been trained for so many years. Your father's kindness is not limited to us, otherwise, why would everyone like to help your father take care of you from time to time, these little things are all produced by each other..."

"..."

"So, the old saying of the Dong family says that to judge a person is not only to look at his beauty, ugliness and wealth, but also to try to look at his heart. Your father is the kind of person whose heart is better than appearance... so that, Sometimes when I look at you and look at him again, I suddenly feel that if you can add another person to your small family, even when you grow up and really want to get married, someone can stay with your father, Don't let him be so lonely all his life, it would be nice to stay in the Dong Village with no one to rely on..."

Mother-in-law Fan Xi also felt a little emotional when she said this. After all, so many years have passed, she really has always thanked Yang Hua's father from the bottom of her heart. She still cares about her daughter.

And pouting her lips, she seemed to want to refute something, and when she heard this, she was stunned for a while and then hummed with a complicated mood. Yang Hua, who was immersed in some kind of unspeakable emotion, did not talk to Fan Xi again. The mother-in-law debated the issue.

He just went to her house with his head down absent-mindedly to finish the first New Year's breakfast, and then took advantage of the time when the old man was cleaning up the house in the kitchen, with Grandma Fan Xi's grandson A Bao, and other people in the village. Several children played around for a while.

But I don’t know who suggested it. The group of children who usually play around in the village suddenly mentioned a game that local children like to play very much in their spare time—catch the rooster. At home, Yang Hua, who had never heard of this at all, only looked at A Bao beside her with a puzzled face, frowned and asked,

"Huh? Cock catching? What is cock catching? Why haven't I heard of it before?"

"Um, it seems to be a game of catching ghosts that came over from Fan Village. I heard it's very interesting. It's much more interesting than the ones we usually play to catch rabbits... First of all, we have to find it in the middle of the night. Among the nine people in the forest, one of them is the rooster who eats chickens at night, and the other eight are roosters. The rooster can order the old children to help him catch the prey. How to die, the more roosters he kills, the more powerful he will become, but the smartest rooster can escape... But as long as he is finally caught by the rooster in the forest, he will be killed Vigorously yank out the intestines, then chop off the brain alive—"

"Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!"

Several children around were yelled in fear by Abao's frightening, Grandma Fan Xi's grandson laughed out loud when he saw this, and after laughing to his heart's content, he raised his eyebrows and smugly rushed at Yang Hua, including Yang Hua. Several other children said,

"I knew you cowards would be afraid haha, don't be afraid, don't be afraid, these are all fake, where is there any cock guy on the mountain...Yang Hua, you are so rare, do you want to play with us, add you We happened to be nine of us today, anyway, your father just doesn’t allow you to touch the water casually, and he didn’t say that you can’t go to the mountains to play with everyone..."

"...Uh...Okay..."

Yang Hua, who was hesitant, was taken aback by these words, but after thinking for a while, frowning and rubbing her chin, the little girl who was obviously interested in this game reluctantly stood aside and agreed, and when Ah Bao saw She seemed very happy that she was willing to come today. She only waved her hand to greet the children next to her, and started to explain the rules of the game on the ground like a little adult.

"Since Yang Hua came here for the first time today, let Yang Hua be the rooster who catches us, and the rest of us will be the cocks who handle it. The rooster can only kill when the old children start singing, later Let’s sing loudly together, if Yang Hua hears the sound, go and catch us... In addition, everyone must remember to listen to the content of the lyrics clearly, if Yang Hua catches you, you can only become dead people, do you understand? ?”

"Uh, I understand, I understand..."

Perhaps because of Ah Bao's patient explanation, although Yang Hua was a little confused about how to play the game at first, she quickly found out the rules.

Afterwards, with some unconcealable excitement, he climbed up to the Chicken Coop Rock not far from the entrance of the village with several other children in the village, and took their positions in the wild forest according to the initial role assignment.

Yang Hua, who was lying on the tree, covering her eyes and secretly laughing, vaguely sensed that the children behind her were laughing and running away one by one in the dusk, unaware of the last ray of sun on the hill behind her, the little girl who was slowly setting It was only then that he sang that gloomy ballad with everyone who ran into the woods with a sweet voice...

……

【Rooster man, want to kill a chicken】

【Eight Chickens in a Cage】

【A chicken wants to go into the forest】

[The neck was cut off! 】

【Two chickens want to jump into the pit】

[The head and the body are completely separated! 】

【Three chickens want to hide in the hole】

[The eyeballs are pierced to death! 】

[There is also a little cock]

[She was crushed to pieces and sank to the bottom of the river! 】

【Only the last chicken left】

【The rooster must catch you, catch you——】