Chapter 1 There is no place to come and no way back
Two days later.
On the way to Dongzhou Mansion, there is a wasteland, which no one cares about on weekdays, but on the fifteenth it has become a bazaar for exchanging goods in ten miles and eight villages. Egg-sellers, glutinous rice cakes, basket-weavers, and silverware sellers all found their own places to stay, and began to sell them in mule-drawn carts. Jiang Mi took the silver money to buy a silver hairpin with compound petals, and inserted it into the double bun with great interest, she looked at it for a long time with the bronze mirror: "It turns out that I am so beautiful." "Fortunately, the old man who sold hairpins never heard her whispering, otherwise he would have to laugh out loud.
She was wearing a red hemp cardigan, and a silver immortal lock around her neck. She was born petite, with a slender waist, and the breeze blew through her hair and skirt corners, and she was fluttering; her facial features were ordinary, but her eyes were bright and bright, her lips were shallow, her lips were red and her teeth were white, and she was not a beautiful woman who was captivating the country and the city, but also a delicate woman.
At this moment, her eyes were attracted by the direction of the circle of people, and when she saw that it was bustling, noisy, and the crowd was talking about something, she became curious, and like a little beast that only needs to drink milk, she cut off her head and drilled into the pile. She went to the front of the crowd and saw a tall and thin man, holding a judgment deed, swaggering in front of people, Jiang Mi could only hear the second half of what he said: "...... Both parents are thieves, burning, killing and looting are all evil, and everyone is full of evil. If it weren't for the Japanese government exterminating the thieves' cave some time ago, I am afraid that it would still be acting for the tiger and bullying the mountain people. Now all you have to do is buy the contract, and you can take him home, cut wood, boil water, herd cattle and raise sheep, obey his words, and spend the rest of his life to atone for his sins. ”
It was the first time Jiang Mi had encountered the business of buying and selling human beings, and he was very curious. It's just that the man in the coarse linen shirt and torn trousers and straw sandals is now wearing his long hair and hanging his head down, as if he wants to sink his head into his neck. The tall and thin man stretched out his hand to lift the man's chin, and the audience could see the true face of Lushan, and the crowd sighed for a while, but it was just a young man with clear eyebrows.
At a cursory glance, he was about twenty-eight years old, and he should have been a young man with high spirits, but he was blind, expressionless, and unconscious being pinched around by a tall and thin man, like a lamb to the slaughter. He doesn't listen, he doesn't see, he doesn't hear, he doesn't know, he doesn't know, he doesn't have emotional waves, he doesn't have chest fluctuations.
Jiang Mi felt pity, and because of the goodwill brought by his skin, he felt that this person was not a very evil person. So, her fingers gently stirred the air, and in an instant, countless ice crystal-like fragments were surging in the air, colorful and distinct, some bright colors, some obscure and dark, gradually merging together, like a grand narrative picture, slowly unfolding, like the Hani terraces under the noon sun, broken and complete. These fragmented memories disappeared with Jiang Mi's still fingers, and her originally playful expression turned into indescribable surprise
- Only him, without any fragments of memory, without any place to come from, without a way back, he is not a living person.
"Memory is the greatest difference between humans and animals, because of memory, self-consciousness can be formed, so that the spirit can survive, and then there is an individual and a group, which can be the same but not harmonious, and can be harmonious and different. Unlike the other five realms, the memories of the human world are stored in the most fragile mortal body, and compared with the eternal mountains and rivers, they are nothing more than fireflies and phosphorus, fleeting. The memories passed down orally by the predecessors were gradually written into history, and the later generations followed the pioneers, and the bones gradually turned into a stone in the torrent of history. How sad and how great. Jiang Mi remembered what his master had said, and couldn't help but be a little embarrassed.
The tall and thin man's shouting pulled her back to reality from her memories, and he ran diligently, pulling passers-by forward to knead the young man, and even making him show his white teeth, as if he were a mule and horse that could not speak, and he was just resigned to it, without even the slightest resistance. Jiang Mi frowned inadvertently.
After the tall and thin man showed off for a while, he said aloud, "...... I don't know how many folks are willing to bid?"
"Fifty Wen!" "One hundred Wen!" "One hundred and fifty Wen!"
"Is this enough?" Jiang Mi's petite palm was spread out, wrapped in a tael of silver, and thrown to the center of the crowd, where he was picked up by the tall and thin man.
"Yo, the girl is very good, I don't know if I should take it back for the family to work, or use it myself?" As she spoke, the tall and thin man walked towards Jiang Mi, showing a malicious smile, and when she got closer, she found that his yellow and black teeth were exposed to the air, which made her disgusted, and she unconsciously took a step back. The thin and tall woman only understood what she was saying, but she was quite proud, probably thinking that she was harassing a yellow flower girl with words for a pleasure that was difficult to buy.
"Two taels of silver!" There were good deeds in the crowd who deliberately raised the price, but Jiang Mi didn't know, and the boy untied an embroidered bag embroidered with mandarin duck patterns from his waist, looking at the outline and weight, even copper coins are worth a lot. The tall and thin man was annoyed, thinking that he was deaf and clear-sighted, but he didn't notice the big customer's money bag, and almost let go of this business.
"Three taels of silver. Jiang Mi untied the money bag, took out two pieces of silver and threw them to the tall and thin man, and the tall and thin man weighed the one or two pieces of silver that Fang had just given him, which added up to more than three taels.
"Four taels of silver!" another voice in the crowd shouted deliberately. After going back and forth like this, Jiang Mi was so annoyed that he simply threw the entire money bag to the thin and tall man, rushed straight to the young man's side, took his hand, and walked out of the encirclement. The young man has been kneeling for a long time, his legs and feet are numb, and he can't help but stumble when he stands up, but his expression still does not fluctuate.
"Girl, you still need to get ——? deed"
Jiang Mi looked back and smiled, a thousand charming, the rice paper that was as light as thin wings was blown by the wind and fell into her slender jade hand, the young man's expression was a little more surprised, although it was only in the blink of an eye, "Now, he doesn't owe you," Jiang Mi waved his fingers, and a broken jade knot in the arms of the tall and thin man flew into her left hand, "You don't owe him, we are clear, and we will meet indefinitely." ”
Ignoring everyone's surprised and frightened eyes, Jiang Mi pulled the young man straight towards the hillside outside the wasteland. It is spring, the azaleas bloom, the flowers are gorgeous, like a cluster of fire clouds, thick ink and color, the fragrance is overflowing, and the beauty is breathtaking.
The two of them are more delicate than flowers.
"Wushuang?" Jiang Mi read his name on the deed like this, and a fire ignited on the side of the paper, and the tongue of fire instantly turned all the white paper and black words into black smoke, and slowly flew into the blue sky, nothing else mattered, "I don't like the word Wu, I'll call you Ah Shuang, how about it?"
Ah Shuang was stunned, looking at the girl in front of him in a daze, at a loss. A mischievous gust of wind blew his shirt open, revealing a snow-white chest and whip marks one after another.
Jiang Mi looked at these shocking scars, and unconsciously put his hand on his chest, Ah Shuang's cold skin felt a trace of warmth, and he couldn't help but shudder and shrank back.
Jiang Mi smiled, compared to Fang Cai's wood-like expression, he had recovered some of his fireworks. Her palms glowed with blue glow, like ink dripping into water, rippling layer by layer, the original skin and flesh bloomed, and even the places where the spurs and sores were formed, gradually healed, like a new life.
"I know you're scared, you see, I'm so far away from home by myself, and I have to go to a farther place day and night, and I'm just as afraid. Jiang Mi opened his round eyes and looked at Ah Shuang sincerely, making him embarrassed to dodge. Seeing that he was no longer afraid of himself, Jiang Mi took a step forward, stood on tiptoe, and pressed his warm forehead against his cold forehead.
In front of Ah Shuang's eyes, a vast and boundless sky and a patchwork of rivers and mountains appeared in an instant. On the country road, a young girl dressed as a Nanban is walking towards the east with a relaxed step. She drank dew, slept in the wilderness, smelled the flowers, picked wild fruits, ran with a flock of sheep during the day, and at night she cooed with the frogs in the pond.
These memories of hers are compassion and redemption for Ah Shuang's life, and she took it as a gift and handed it over to the confused teenager in front of her. She has no purpose and no demands in return. Life belonged to the flesh as well as to the spirit, and she wanted to save him completely, nothing more. It's her instinct, it has nothing to do with who she is, with what she's been given to her.
Ah Shuang looked at the girl in front of her, she was so close that even her eyelashes could be counted, and her skin was pink and tender, with a different fragrance from azaleas.
"You...... Where did it come from?" Ah Shuang's originally chaotic eyes gradually became clearer, and he was no longer a piece of paper crumpled into a ball of paper and thrown randomly in a dark and damp corner, moldy and rotten. He was a brand new, freshly written piece of rice paper.
His world is no longer a white void, there are mountains and rivers, there is also sunshine, and everything is as new.
Jiang Mi pushed him away without a trace, tilted his head, and smiled lightly: "Who is my surname, where do I live, where do I come from, are these past events important to you?"
Ah Shuang was stunned, of course these are important to him, he doesn't believe that his past will disappear completely, without a trace, he doesn't believe in heaven, he doesn't believe in fate, he only believes in himself. He doesn't have a memory of his own, but he's not stupid.
"I can lie to you that my name is Rose, I live in the Buddha Temple, I came from the Western Heaven Elysium, and I went to the surging East China Sea, would you believe it?"
"If you say so, I believe. ”
"Fool," Jiang Mi smiled sweetly, tiptoe and scraped Ah Shuang's nose with his fingers, "My surname is Jiang, you can call me Ah Mi." ”