I brought with me the few treasures that Mr. Lu had left me. I don't know if these things will work, but they are better than nothing, even if they are brave.

At dinner, Xue Qian quietly asked me: Zhao Mang, you say, will this old woman come tonight?

I nodded, and said, "If she wants to see me, then she will definitely come tonight." If nothing unusual tonight, we won't have to keep a vigil.

Xue Qian sat next to me and said lightly: I have seen all the way, from your grocery store to here, at least two or three miles, and I don't know how many supermarkets I have passed in between, she didn't go in, but found you.

I smiled bitterly: How else can I say that I am the owner of the empty house?

After dinner, it soon got dark. Secretary Wang asked Xue Qian and I to pick five people, and the seven of us were guarding the spirit at Chen Xiaomei's house.

It stands to reason that the vigil on the fourth day after death is really a bit unruly, but it can't be taken care of so much.

Secretary Wang said to me very gratefully: Brother Zhao, if this matter is successfully completed, you will be the first hero, my old king will not forget you, and the villagers in the district will not forget you.

I waved my hand: You're welcome. How do I hear this, and now I will say immortality?

Secretary Wang laughed and said: I still have a meeting to have, you can talk. We'll see you later. Then he hurried away. In that case, I was not in a hurry to have a meeting at all, but I was afraid that the evil spirits would haunt me and I wanted to escape.

Chen Xiaomei's family is very poor, so poor that there is no electricity. We pulled wires from our neighbors' houses and installed light bulbs in the yard to keep the place brightly lit.

Now there's light, plus so many people around. People don't feel scared anymore. This one tells a story, and the other tells a joke, which is also very hilarious.

During this period, I have been glancing at Chen Xiaomei lying on the spiritual bed from time to time, and there is nothing unusual about her. I stood up and poured incense on her three or five times.

By the end of the night, the man was tired. No one dared to sleep in the spirit shed, so someone mentioned playing cards. Perhaps the wake-up has evolved into a tradition, so everyone agreed.

A man took out a deck of pokers, and was about to distribute them to everyone, when suddenly a gust of wind blew away the pokers in his hand, and they fell to the ground one after another.

This time, everyone was stunned. Because poker is not a piece of paper, it has a lot of weight, and although the gust of wind just now is cold, it is definitely not strong enough to blow poker everywhere.

It turned out that the frolicking crowd quieted down. Everybody looked at me. In their eyes, I am now an officially appointed Taoist priest.

I shook the big knife and nervously asked the young man with the poker: What's going on?

The boy said with a pale face: Like, it doesn't seem to be blown by the wind.

I nodded: I know, the gust of wind just now was not so strong, what did you feel?

The young man swallowed and spit, his eyes a little straight: I was holding the cards just now, and I was holding them very tightly, and suddenly I felt as if someone had drawn my cards out of his hand. Then the pokers were scattered all over the ground.

This time the crowd blew up the nest, and the villagers were all extremely nervous, and they all said: Eighty percent of it was Chen Xiaomei who came, and she couldn't get angry when she saw that we were not good at keeping a good watch and playing poker here, so she threw away our cards.

The villagers were shouting in panic, but to my surprise, none of them fled.

I wondered for two seconds, and immediately figured it out: these villagers are not stupid, they know that once they are haunted, it is even more terrifying to run away. The safest thing is to stay with a Taoist priest. So, I'm now their backbone.

Thinking of this, I couldn't help but sigh in my heart: it's a pity that they trusted the wrong person today. I don't know how to do Taoism at all.

Xue Qian quietly stabbed me: Lao Zhao, what, where is that tooth? You give it to me, let me defend myself.

I reluctantly dug into my pocket, and was about to hand him the corpse tooth. Suddenly, the electric light hanging above our heads went out. The whole courtyard was pitch black.

The villagers did not dare to move, no one spoke, and the courtyard was quiet. It took me more than ten seconds to get used to the darkness.

By the moonlight, I saw that the villagers were still in the courtyard, sitting or standing.

I coughed quietly and asked, "Are you all right?"

The villagers said in a gossipy voice: It's okay.

I fumbled for a match and lit the candle. The courtyard was bright again.

Xue Qian asked me: This electric light, do we still care?

As soon as he finished speaking, the electric light snapped and came back on.

People are always happy when they get the light, but now we are not happy. After all, the lights flickered on and off, and it was too scary.

The villagers all looked at me with blank eyes: Master Zhao Zhao, should we stay here, or should we change places?

I looked at my watch: the rooster will crow in another hour, so let's wait. Don't panic, it may just be a power outage.

When the villagers saw me say this, they all nodded and sat down again.

After a few seconds, a bald man snorted, and then said in a panicked voice: Something is wrong.

I asked him: What's wrong? What's wrong?

Bald touched his head and said, "Why is my stool missing?"

Before the power outage, we all sat on stools and circled. I looked left and right, and sure enough, the stools were full of people. There is no place for him anymore.

I said, "Did someone take your stool?" Or has it landed somewhere?

Bald counted them, and then his face was a little pale, and he said with a shudder: Master Zhao, we have one more person.

I was stunned for a moment, and then stood up with a thud.

The villagers were all sitting on their stools, not daring to move. Everyone was looking left and right, and the more they looked at it, the paler their faces became.

Bald is right, there is one more person among us.

I remember very well that there were seven people and seven stools. Xue Qian also joked that we can make a Big Dipper Seven Star Array.

But now things are not right. There were eight of us. The more one occupies the bald stool.

I told them to stop, and I looked at them one by one. The villagers were all pale and terrified. Because everybody is very raw, I can't see who is more than that.

I said to these people: Everyone, let's not joke, who just came? Stand up, let's get on playing.

But no one stood up, and everyone looked at each other. An unnatural look.

I said to the bald: Turn away, don't look at us.

Bald asked nervously: What are you doing?

I said, "If you turn around, you'll turn around."

The bald man honestly turned around, his eyes on the gate, his back to us.

I said: Think about it, before the power outage, who spoke to you and what did you say. Think about it one by one, and tell the process clearly and carefully.

Then I waved my hand at Xue Qian: You can stand up. Help me keep an eye on these people.

Bald was silent for a while, and then said: I remember so-and-so told a joke. The content of the joke is:

I nodded, I also have an impression of this joke, I said to the person on the stool: If your name is mentioned, you can stand up and walk to Xue Qian's side.

The memory of baldness took more than ten minutes. Ten minutes later, five people had been called. On that circle of stools, only one person remained.

Needless to say, the rest of the person is the one with the problem.

Everyone knew this, so they slowly formed a circle and surrounded this person.

Bald still with his back to us, he muttered for a while, and suddenly said: Master Zhao, I really can't think of it.

I hummed and said, "Don't think about it, enough people are enough."

The man left on the stool was dressed in tattered clothes. He bowed his head deeply, as if he was afraid of the cold, and wrapped his head in a torn jacket.

I slowly lifted the knife and with the tip of the knife I slammed the torn jacket off his head.

At this time, everyone all sighed and exclaimed.

Because it is not a person at all who sits on the stool. It was a torn quilt, folded and stacked, with a pair of pants and a blouse on it. At first glance, it really looks like a person.

The style of this dress is clearly Chen Xiaomei's, and it is estimated that the neighbors found it out and burned it for her when they planned to go to the grave.

The villagers all looked at each other, as if they were a little difficult to accept for a while.

Xue Qian whispered beside me: "Lao Zhao, even if I am dizzy, it is impossible for me to mistake a stack of clothes for a living person." What's more, we have so many pairs of eyes, and we are all wrong? There's something wrong with that.

I nodded: I looked at them one by one just now, and they were definitely all living people, all with noses and eyes. This stack of clothes came later. I guess Chen Xiaomei has already come.

My voice was soft, but in the quiet of the night, it reached the ears of the villagers unmistakably. They all turned pale and looked at me nervously.

I asked Bald: There were eight people just now. Right?

Bald nodded nervously: There were definitely eight people just now, all of them were alive, I could see it clearly.

I snorted and said, "The eight people just now, all of them are from your village?"

Bald nodded again and again: It must be from this village, if there is a foreigner, I will pull him out when I look for a stool. But now you're making me think about who that person is, I really can't think of it.

I nodded slightly: It seems that this eighth person has a bit of a problem.

I was thinking about this when a shout suddenly came from outside the gate: Mom, are you back? Mom, let's go home.

Then a flurry of paper money fell from mid-air, and I saw Chen Xiaomei's stupid son again.