After going ashore, there are only two roads in the village, one runs through the village to the back mountain, and the other goes around the village, which is also the road to the back mountain.

The village is built on the mountain, and the Haihe River also goes around the mountain when it arrives here, and I walked into the village on the bluestone paved road, and the sight was full of ancient ancestral halls and courtyards, which looked antique and showed no signs of dilapidation.

It's hard to imagine that in a modern society, there is still such an ancient village dormant here, which is a bit unreal no matter how you look at it.

Moreover, the door of every house is lit up at the moment, the lintel is hung with a big red long cloth, the red lanterns on the left and right sides are also pasted with the big word "Xi", the door gods on the door panel are all newly posted, the paste is still stuck on it and there is no air drying, the river wind blows, all the lanterns are placed in one direction, as if the whole village is moving.

I stood at the entrance of the village and grinned, the old man on the ferry sent me ashore and left directly, it didn't look like a person from Hezi Village, but along the way, there was no one in a radius of dozens of miles, not to mention, not even a ghost shadow, the old man did not live in Hezi Village, where would he go?

At this time, the sun was shining overhead, but there was an inexplicable cold air on his neck behind him.

Maybe it's the custom of Hezi Village, after all, the old professor still comes here to do academic research, and the National People's Congress has traveled all the way from the capital to come here, if you don't have some rare things, it's not worth the trouble of people to run, isn't it?

But what about the old professors?

I carried my baggage to the village, the village was not too big, there were not many forks in the road, a straight road walked for about ten minutes, not only did the old professor not see, not even the people in the village, did not see a single one.

"Hell ......"

I muttered, but I startled myself and scolded myself for being more and more useless. The painter does not kowtow to God, I have carved jade for so many years, if there are really ghosts and gods, then I should also be invasive, there are no taboos.

After walking a little further, I finally heard footsteps in a courtyard, which was fleeting, but it also added a little popularity to this quiet village.

I followed the sound of my footsteps to the door, the wooden gate was slightly more dilapidated than the ones I saw along the way, and the red lantern hanging under the lintel also had a hole in it, it seemed that no matter where it was, the gap between the rich and the poor and the class level were objective and unavoidable.

I looked left and right, raised my hand and knocked on the wooden door, and said, "Fellow, can you ask for directions?" ”

Maybe the village was too quiet, and the gentle knocking on the door seemed a little harsh to the ears, and the barking of the dogs that could be heard on the other side of the river before was gone, as if they were all locked up in the house, anyway, the whole village looked so strange from the bones.

"Fellow, just ask for directions, can you delay for a minute?" After hearing no movement in the courtyard for a long time, I raised my hand and knocked on the door again.

"Are you looking for someone?"

I was startled by a voice floating out of the crack in the door, and at the same time I saw an eye peeking out of the crack in the door, and the people in the courtyard had been lying on the door and peeping at me.

I took a deep breath and asked, "Yes, is there a family surnamed Ji in this village?" ”

"Season?" The eyes in the crack of the door blinked, and said, "No, Hezi Village is surnamed Wu, are you looking for the wrong place?" ”

"Won't it?" I asked unwillingly: "Isn't there any foreign, surnamed Ji, it should be from Tianjin, think about it." ”

As I spoke, I took out a cigarette from my pocket and was about to pass it through the crack in the door, but at this juncture, three crisp gongs of "Dangdangdang" floated from the direction of the ancestral hall in the village, crisp and piercing, which made me shudder.

What's that?

I was turning my head to look in the direction where the gong was coming from, when I heard a "squeak", and the courtyard door was suddenly opened, and a hand reached out from inside, grabbed my arm, and dragged me in.

"Shh......h

Before I could speak, a rough face pressed against my face, raised a finger in a silent gesture, and spat on my face.

I wiped the spit on my face, not too understanding the situation, but I also lowered my voice and asked, "What's wrong?" ”

"It's fine."

As the rough face gradually faded away from sight, I realized that standing in front of me was a middle-aged man in a gray cloth short coat, with a simple face, which looked like a perennial wind and sun, leaving a ravine-like mark on his face.

Seeing that I was confused, the man smiled embarrassedly: "The ancestral shrine was calling people just now, I'm afraid that you will be discovered by others, don't be surprised." ”

I nodded understandingly, glanced at the gate and asked, "Why, your village doesn't allow outsiders to enter the village, what kind of custom is this?" ”

"It's the rule." The man corrected me and said: "Today is a good day for our patriarch to marry his daughter, every time we are happy to avoid God, everyone has to hide in the house and can't go out, otherwise they will be caught by the river god and ask what is going on, the patriarch's daughter will suffer at night!" ”

The man's matter-of-fact tone stunned me for a moment, but in the early years I once received a customer from Daliang Mountain, he is a Yi nationality, I heard him say that in some Yi villages, the bride has to go on a hunger strike for 10 days before marriage, do not eat anything, if thirsty take a sip of water, and then spit it out, can not swallow. This custom is known as "Zaokong", and the longer it persists, the more loyal and polite the bride is, and will be praised by the clansmen, and the status she will have after marrying into her husband's family.

At the time, I still didn't believe it, after all, no one can survive without eating or drinking for ten days, but compared to today, it is a bit of a small thing.

But one side has its own customs, African cannibals get married and have children, and I, a person who runs errands and delivers goods for others, don't need to the hearts of experts and professors.

"Then I can't go out before dark?" I asked.

The man nodded solemnly, and looked as if I was going out now, and he was the first to tie me up.

"Is there a surname Ji in the end?"

"Yes." The man said: "You said that I remembered that he came from Tianjin, he is not from our Hezi Village, so he did not live in the village, and he rarely had contact with him, so he didn't think about it for a while." ”

"Where do you stay?"

"Inside the back col."

I sighed, my heart said that it was difficult to do, the third master and the woman specially instructed me to let me leave here before dark, but I can't get out now, not that I am afraid that the river god will drag me into the river, but after five o'clock the boatman on the river will collect the stall and go home to sleep, I have to think about how to go back.

I looked at the time, although it was still noon, but looking at the mountains outside, I naturally knew the truth of running a dead horse in Wangshan, which was an hour away from running back and forth, and it was dark late in summer, and there was no car in the village, so I was afraid that there was little hope for completing the task in the expected time.

But he couldn't just waste it in this ghost place, so he asked, "Is there really a river god?" ”

The man sat next to me, lowered his voice and said: "I also heard from the old man, but I heard that every winter when the Haihe River is dry, many people in the village can hear the sound of an iron chain at night, from the riverbed of Erdaokou, there is the sound of iron chains, and the sound of women singing, like a singing hall, the next day when everyone went to look, they found that the mud on the riverbed, all the footprints, big and small, the old man said that this is the footprints of the water ghost, the river is dry, the river god holds a meeting, The water ghost came up to breathe. ”

"Have you seen the footprints with your own eyes?" I wondered.

The man nodded: "I have not only seen it, but I have also gone down to the river to touch it." ”

I handed the man a cigarette, lit the fire, and asked softly, "Didn't you go to see it at night?" ”

The man took a breath, squinted his eyes in the smoke and said: "I didn't dare to look, but there are those who have the courage to go, saying that as soon as it gets dark at night, the second crossing is full of green light, and the sound disappears as soon as the people get close to it, and there are three people who went at that time, and they came back two, and one disappeared after going down the river after dark, and the old patriarch didn't let us go to find it, for fear of alarming the river god, so no one dared to go at night again." ”