"It was a late July day, the sun was hanging in the sky like a fireball, and my five friends and I woke up in the afternoon and ran to the river to play as usual. This time, we unknowingly ran a long way downstream. In the process of playing, a child named Ergou had sharp eyes and saw a stone lion in the riverbed not far away. So everyone ran over happily, looked around, and rode up boldly. The stone lion has been washed by the river water at the bottom of the river all the year round, and it is already very smooth, and although it is now exposed to the water, it is still cold under such a poisonous sun, so several children are scrambling to climb onto the stone lion's back and head. Because the five of them belong to a village, and I am only an outsider, the people who climb up must have followed them first, and the five of them have completely occupied the stone lions, and there is no place for me, so I can only touch the cold stone lions underneath, and look at them with my eyes, hoping that someone will have enough to play and give me a place. ”

"At that moment, I suddenly heard an angry roar from the river: 'What are you doing?' I turned my head to look over and saw a scruffy, unkempt old lady with a large bag of what seemed to be scrap, standing on the riverbank and yelling at us. 'You don't want to die?' That's the river god, and if you offend, you will be damned! ''You bunnies, come down!'' But no matter how much she shouted, my companions didn't care about it, and didn't pay any attention to it. I asked a few friends who the old lady was. They told me that it was the crazy old lady in the village, who had no children, who was crazy and talking nonsense all day, and that he was left alone. The mad old lady saw that we ignored her, and screamed for a while, then turned away, but kept muttering things like 'You can't offend the river god' and 'You will be punished.' ”

"And then?" Xu Yunshu was very interested in the story of the altar, so he asked him.

Suddenly, for some reason, the crazy old lady fell to the ground and did not get up for a long time. A few friends didn't care, and then played around on the stone lion. I couldn't bear it, although the old lady was a little crazy, but after all, she was an old man, and there was no one to help her, which was really pitiful. So he ran up to the river embankment and helped the crazy old woman up. The crazy old lady said to me vigorously, 'Son, you have a good heart, and good people will be rewarded.' I don't understand what that means. But at this moment, there was a rumbling sound far away from the upstream direction, like the one we had heard before. ”

"Yes...... Flood? Zeng Xiaomi asked tentatively with surprise.

The jar nodded bitterly: "It's a flood!" I've never seen so much water, and I couldn't see a shadow at one glance, but when I looked at it again, I was already there. The flood poured over the river, and the deafening roar froze me completely. When my friends saw the flood, they also desperately tried to run from the river to the embankment, but no matter how fast they were, they couldn't get faster than the raging flood. Only one wave swept over, and they were no longer to be seen...... I distinctly remember the child named Ergou who rushed to the front, and his eyes were full of tears and fear at the moment when the flood swept away. His eyes seemed to be longing for me to lend a helping hand to save him, but I really couldn't do anything but watch them being swept away by the flood, and I can't forget that look in his eyes even now......"

Xu Yunshu asked, "What about later?" ”

"Later, I went back to the village to ask for help, but everyone came to the embankment and looked at the flood. Only when the flood waters receded could we start the search and rescue. Tanzi sighed, "Later, I heard from my grandmother that the five children were finally found more than thirty miles downstream from the village, but it was three days later...... My grandmother told me that although the sun was shining near the village that day, there was torrential rain in the mountains dozens of miles away, and the heavy rain caused a torrent to flow into the river, which led to the tragedy......"

"That'...... What about that crazy old woman? Zeng Xiaomi asked.

"I haven't seen it since." "I also once wondered if the tragic death of those children was really a curse as the mad old lady said?" If I had climbed the stone lion that day, would I have been like them? ”

"If you hadn't helped that crazy old woman, you'd have died in the river. It has nothing to do with whether you climb the stone lion or not. I said to the altar.

"So I'm also wondering, could the damnation that the crazy old lady said about actually be caused by the crazy old lady herself?" "Did she do this on purpose, in order to punish us children who offended the river god?" ”

"You can get out of the big trouble, thanks to your kindness!" Zeng Xiaomi said.

"If it's a punishment, it's too heavy, right? Five lives, take it away? "I've never heard this story tell it, but now that I've said it, I've raised my own questions.

"You mean it doesn't really have anything to do with that crazy old woman, it's just an accident?" Jar asked.

I shook my head, "I can't say if it's accidental, but I do know what that stone lion you found is!" ”

"Does it really have something to do with the stone lion?" Jar asked.

I didn't answer the altar's question, but said directly: "Actually, it is not a stone lion, but one of the nine sons of the dragon." ”

"Kisses? What for? The jar showed his ignorance.

"You can ask our archaeologists about this." I pointed out a clear way for the altar to seek advice.

The altar looked at Xu Yunshu and Wei Peng. Wei Peng explained to him: "The kiss, also known as the owl tail, the owl kiss, one of the nine sons of the dragon, the dragon-shaped spine swallowing beast, ranked ninth, with a wide mouth and thick noise, easy to swallow in life. It is the capuchin dragon head that we often see at both ends of the roof of the palace, and it is often used as a thing to ward off evil spirits. ”

I then Wei Peng said: "Because the kiss belongs to water, its stone statue is often placed in the river as a river beast to suppress the water and soil. ”

"The River Beast?"

"The Zhenhe Beast is a stone statue that people used to put on the bottom of the river in ancient times. It is often used in places where floods are frequent or where underwater monsters are suspected to be haunting. Xu Yunshu explained.

"And eighty percent of the river beasts you see are used to contain the perennial flooding of the river." I said.

"But the river near my grandmother's house doesn't often send water?" Jar said.

"That's where the Zhenhe Beast comes into play!" I say.