In this way, several people got on the boat and went down the river.

The slender man's boat can't withstand the wind and waves, so he follows the river bank all the way, but the speed is still very fast, after all, the boat goes down the river, and it is downwind, even if the slender man doesn't row well, just simply control the direction, and the speed of travel is still very fast.

After the boat sailed, even the more talkative man fell silent.

In this way, the group went all the way south, and the journey was smooth and smooth, and they did not encounter any bad weather for a few days.

Every half day, the slender man would dock the boat on the shore, firstly, because he needed to rest, and secondly, those on the boat also needed to get off the boat and go to the surrounding villages and towns to replenish their supplies, and even if they did not need supplies, there were some personal problems that needed to be solved.

Stop-and-go, stop-and-go.

The terrain is getting steeper and the current is getting steeper.

As usual, the slender man rowed his boat to the opposite shore.

On the surface of the river, where the water is so fast, it is easy for a small boat to have an accident, but no one says anything at all.

From the broad Songbai River to the tributary Lianghe, it will turn from downstream to countercurrent, and the interface of the river, because of the hedging of the water flow, has formed a reef, the direction of the water is uncertain, and the flow speed is more and more turbulent rapids, it is very difficult to cross the rapids into the waters of the Lianghe River.

Because the river beach is shallow and the reefs are all over the place, the big boat can only make a detour after coming here, and if you want to enter the cool waters along the river, only a small boat can do it.

The boat has a shallow draft and will not run aground, so it is relatively more likely to survive after entering the rapids.

But even so, if you want to go up the rapids and enter the waters of the Lianghe River, you need a very experienced slender man, and ordinary young slender men would not dare to do such a thing, and even if he did, no one would dare to get on his boat.

The slender man is an old water ghost, and he has decades of experience as a sailor on the ship, and after retiring, he has rowed here for many years, and then slowly someone dares to take his boat across the rapids bay, and there are no more than three such slender men near the entire Liangshui River, and the rest of the people can only honestly do the business of crossing the river.

Of course, there is danger and there is gain, the business of entering the Liangshui River is more dangerous, but the money is a lot of money, and the old man can not go out for two months without going out for such a trip.

It's much better than those ordinary slender men who have to go back and forth on the river through ups and downs.

It's just that there are not many people who are willing to risk flowing water from the east of the river into the waters of the Lianghe River, except for those desperate and anxious things, everyone is willing to honestly take a boat around that circle, get off the boat at a relatively stable place in the downstream waters, and then come back in a circle.

It's a hassle, and it's a lot of time and time, but it's safe.

The big ship has a heavy draft, relatively speaking, it is also very stable, even if it encounters a stormy weather, there will be no major incident, the so-called wealth and disaster, everyone is willing to spend more money, for a safe journey.

After all, although the money required to pull the boat through the rapids bay is more, it is impossible to spend more money than the big boat, and it will take a few more days to return when it comes downstream.

The old man was a diligent man.

In the early years, because the family was poor, he was not able to marry a daughter-in-law, and he was not sensible, after the death of his parents, he followed the older sailors on the ship, and finally got some money for his work.

In this way, people do not realize the importance of saving money until they are middle-aged, but by then it is already too late.

After all, he is too old, and it is not easy to find a wife, and he also found a widow with a child in the early years, and said that the two of them will live together, but they never thought that after the son who is not related by blood grows up, he will not recognize him as an old man, the mother and daughter are as strong as iron, cold as frost, cross the river and tear down the bridge, and drive out his old bones.

Fortunately, the old man suffered too much in his early years, and he kept an eye on it, and he didn't hand over all the money in his hands to the woman over the years, and after being kicked out, he was angry, but he didn't worry too much about his future.

Although he is not young at this age, he can still exert some strength, with his early experience, he has done a business of pulling fiber between Songjiang and Liangshui River, and has been doing it for a few years, and the money has been almost saved.

But the old man is greedy, he still wants to leave some money for himself to buy medicine and wine, plus he doesn't have to bother to serve the mother and son in the past two years, there are a lot less bad things, but the mood is better, the mood is better, and the body is surprisingly much better, of course, the money spent on the mother and son in the past, now the old man can use it generously on himself, and the food and drink are much better than in previous years, he thinks this is also an important factor.

Therefore, while he still has the strength to do it, the old man thought, make more money, earn more, this time, he doesn't want a cold-hearted mother-in-law, he went to pick up a child who no one raised, hand in hand, teach him what is called filial piety, the old man thinks, according to his current physical condition, it is not a problem to live for more than ten years, although everything is empty after death, it doesn't matter if someone takes care of the aftermath and no one cares about it, but when the time comes, it is always good to have a person who can support the elderly and send him to the end.

Therefore, in the past two years, the old man has been very active in taking over the work of the rapids, just to save more money, even if he can't find a pensioner to send him to the end, he has to earn more money to make a coffin for himself, and when it is time to die, where to go, cover the coffin board and forget it.

"Ladies and gentlemen, hold on!"

Halfway through the boat, the current was more rapid, and the old man shouted as a reminder.

Of course, this reminder was a bit redundant, and when the speed of the boat's movement in the current increased, everyone subconsciously grabbed everything around them that could be grasped.

However, in a way, this sound is not superfluous.

After all, whether others realize it or not is one thing, and whether you say it is another thing.

If you don't say it, when that person falls into the water and drowns or something, the people who are traveling with him will definitely use this excuse to trouble his old man.

The old man is a cautious man, because a few years ago he ran to the rapids in vain because of such a sentence, and he was almost not beaten by others.

Decades of crawling and rolling in the river, the old man has a few reefs in the rush bay, where are the reefs, where are the reefs, when to that position should turn, when to get off the oar, etc., he is very clear, since he became a slender man, he has never capsized the boat, although there are a few who fell into the water, it is because they themselves are disobedient, they don't grasp when they should grasp something, they are not careful when they should be careful, then it is no wonder that people row.

The rapids are rolling, but the old boatman's hand is extraordinarily steady.

Grabbing the hull with one hand and rocking the oar with the other, the whole person swayed with the hull and stood at the bow of the boat, but it was like a tumbler, and it would not fall down no matter what.

If this rhythm is followed, as long as nothing goes wrong, it won't be long before everyone can come to the surface of the cool river safely.

But the heavens did not fulfill the wishes, and when the boat was halfway through, dark clouds came, and a strong wind suddenly arose on the river, followed by a bean-sized scoop of rain that sloped down from above the nine heavens.

It is located in the middle reaches of the Songjiang River and the lower reaches of the Lianghe River, and when it rains, the rainwater collects from the various tributaries and above the river, and the water becomes more turbulent and turbulent.

In particular, the area of this rapids bay is originally at the junction of two waters, and the water flowing down the Songjiang River and the water flowing into the Lianghe River collide from the side, and the water is very sad, and the wind and rain help to abuse, and it is even more difficult to cross the river.

The old man had not encountered such a scene in all these years, and for the sake of safety, every time it rained heavily on the river, he would choose to return the way he came, and return half of the boat money to those people.

This time, the old man didn't plan to go over hard.

The current water potential is quite controllable, but when the rain on the river collects later, under the action of the strong wind, the river water will even rush to the riverbank, in such a short time, if you can't return in time, even the old man, a professional water ghost, dare not guarantee that he will survive for a while.

"It's raining heavily on the river, and the water will rise a few feet in a while, so we have to go back the way we came, or we'll all die!" The old man reversed his gentle tone just now, and said in an unquestionable tone: "Hold it firm!"

"No!" the originally gentle man suddenly said sharply, "I paid the money, and I have to cross the river now!"

The old man turned the bow of the boat with great difficulty, and said, "If you want to die, you can die yourself, don't take us with you!"

Ignoring the man's objections, the old man steered the boat out of the rapids as fast as he could.

Not long after they got out of the rapids, before they could return to the shore, a torrent carried them downstream along the great water of the Songjiang River!

The rain did not end until the evening of the same day, but the flood did not subside until the next day.

When the water flow downstream began to gradually become smoother, everyone was tired and fell to their stomachs.

When everyone came to their senses, they realized that there was one less person on board.

The mild-mannered man from before was gone.

When exactly they didn't see each other, no one knew that at that time, everyone was thinking about how to survive, and there was no extra mind to take care of others.

It is not easy for a woman to save her life in such a big water, and she has to greet the baby in her arms, except for the slender man who is responsible for controlling the boat, he is the most tired along the way, and naturally he doesn't notice when the man disappeared.

"Since you have already come, the old man, I have no choice but to take a detour to send you back to Lianghe, but if you go farther, you will have to add more money for the boat!"

"No, you can't go, we haven't found my husband yet!" the woman said hysterically, tugging at the slender man's clothes.

The old man frowned, and was about to speak, when he was interrupted by another voice.

"We have been washed away by the flood for a day and a night, and if your man had fallen into the river and drowned ten years earlier, what else would he be looking for?" said another.

"Even if it's a corpse, I'm going to see it!" the woman insisted.

The person next to the Jianghu man who spoke immediately retorted: "With such a big river, such a rapid water, and such a long time, who knows which corner your husband has been washed away by the water? Perhaps, his body has already been eaten by the fish in the river!"

The old slender man didn't care so much, he was washed away by the water for a day, even if he had to make a detour, he had to rest on the right bank of the Songjiang River for a while, during this time, the food on the boat was also washed away by the water, even if he was not too tired, he had to go ashore to replenish some food and water.

Therefore, taking advantage of the quarrel between the people, the old man had already parked the boat on the shore and urged everyone to get off the boat.

"Hey, what a fucking bad luck. When he had come ashore, the old man departed with a curse.

After listening to the unceremonious words of the Jianghu man, the woman's body went limp, and she sat on the ground dejectedly.

In this world, that man is her sky, if it collapses today, their orphans and widows want to live, and they don't know how difficult life awaits her in the future.

When everyone left, only the lonely mother and daughter were left on the side of the boat.

When the two went out, the money was all on the man's body, and now that the man is gone, she has nothing.

The woman stood there for a long time, and at last, as if with some determination, went to the side of the boat, and placed the baby in her arms in the middle of the boat, while she herself leaped into the river.

What is death?

Jiang Ning had also considered this issue before.

Eventually, he came to the conclusion that death is an end and the beginning of everything.

Of course, this answer is well-known, but it is general and meaningless.

So, Jiang Ning had a second answer.

Death is relative.

For people who enjoy the glitz and glamour of the world and live very happily, death is sad and unwilling.

But for those who are desperate to see the future, death is happiness.

The woman who jumped into the river, in a sense, she was also happy, because if she lived, she didn't know how many hardships she would have to endure in the days to come.

Although he was currently attached to the old slender man's body, for Jiang Ning, with such a powerful power of the primordial spirit, it was no problem to perceive such a little distance.

He himself noticed that this matter was originally a very normal thing, but when the old slender man looked back in the direction of the river in three steps, for some reason, Jiang Ning felt that he seemed to realize something.

This made Jiang Ning a little curious.

He can detect it because his perception ability is very strong, but that guy is clearly a mortal, and he doesn't even have the kung fu of a three-legged cat on his body, so far away, even if he looks back, he can't necessarily see anything.

Then the problem arises again.

Since it is not seen, then it can only be guessed.

It's just that the old man and this woman have only met for the first time, what can be the connection between a boatman and a passenger? How did he realize that something would happen to that woman, and why didn't he go back directly to take a look, all of which buried a mystery in Jiang Ning's heart.

He was indeed possessed by the person in front of him, but he still had no way to understand what the other party was thinking in his head, so he was a little confused for a while.

"Ah!" the old man sighed as he walked, "It's a pity, an innocent woman. ”

"What does this guy know?" Jiang Ning became more and more curious.

On the banks of the Songjiang River, because of the abundant water sources, there are many farmlands, and there are many villages, towns and cities, after all, if you build a city on the edge of a large river, the transportation of bulk goods to and from is also very convenient.

It didn't take long for the old man to come to a town, he bought a pot of inferior rice wine, and bought a whole roast chicken and a dozen green onion cakes, wrapped in oil paper, but he was not in a hurry to go back, but turned around and wandered aimlessly in the town's bazaar.

Although there was a pause, the old slender man was still reluctant to spend some copper coins to buy some valuable money for the dead woman to see her off.

The so-called everyone sweeps the snow in front of the door, and doesn't care about the frost on the tiles of others.

Someone else's tragedy is someone else's, and your sympathy consumes yourself.

The original old slender man had such sympathy, otherwise he would not have hesitated on the edge of the stall.

But now he did not allow himself to have it, and when he was kicked out of the house by the widow and the "son" whom he had worked so hard to raise for many years, he told himself that if he still wanted to have a good death in this life, he should never be kind again, otherwise he would not know how to die when the time came.

It was not until the three Jianghu people had eaten and drunk enough to return to the river to find that the woman was gone, the child was left on the boat, and the slender man was not there, and returned to look for him, that the old slender man slowly followed them and returned to the river.

When he saw the baby sleeping quietly on the boat, Jiang Ning could feel the excitement in the old man's heart.

He originally thought that since the woman was going to die, he was afraid and did not want her son to be lonely in this world, so she would "take it away" together.

But he never thought that the mother dared to kill herself, but after all, she had a way to kill her own child.