Hongcun, where I grew up, I am familiar with every mountain, every piece of land, every river, and every inch of grass here. In the words of adults, I can walk back with my eyes closed, and now I appear at the entrance of Hongcun, the ancient archway slightly carries the vicissitudes of history, and the mottled stone plaque is engraved with strong and powerful handwriting, this is my hometown, the place where I was born and raised.

I rubbed my face vigorously and said, "Hallucination, damn wake up!" ”

The blood on his face began to solidify, the slimy feel was mixed with a strong fishy smell, and the coolness around him filled every pore. Behind the archway of Hongcun is a small road, on both sides of the path there are some old buildings, these buildings are mostly black and white, the roof is covered with the most common stone slabs in the Taihu Lake Tiaoxi Basin, the wooden beams of the house are picked outward, and there will be several branches of large bowls with the thickness of the bark cut off on the top. There is a round stone between the trunk and the road, and there is a shallow pit in the stone, which is the indentation left over time.

When I was a child, this was the street of Hongcun, and those old houses would have rice shops, cloth shops, and grocery stores, and a total of four or five shops engaged in state-run trading were the only commercial centers in Hongcun.

It's a pity that all this was destroyed after the Cultural Revolution, a fire burned down the old houses next to each other only with blackened bricks, and then when I returned from the northeast, the new two-story buildings here, the original shops are still there, but the identity has been changed to the villagers themselves, but there is no taste that should have been had when I was a child.

Now the old street of Hongcun appeared in front of my eyes, everything is the same as before, but the streets that should have been bustling are empty, and the doors of every house are hung with white lanterns with the word "lay" written on them, a depression and silence, and occasionally the paper money cut into the shape of copper coins and pieces of yellow table paper float in front of me.

Murakami slowly walked a team, the people in the team tied white cotton linen, and at the front of the team were several children playing with the white wreaths in their hands with the support of adults. The mighty procession stretched from afar, when was there so many people in Hongcun?

A huge black coffin began to appear in the crowd, these people passed by me with expressionless faces, except for the sound of the wind blowing the paper money on the ground, everything was so quiet, I had a little hesitation, I wondered who was lying in the coffin?

"What's going on?" I subconsciously moved to Ye Qiu's side, this is like a trick, at least the "Hongcun" that appeared in front of me is not the current Hongcun.

"This is the Hongcun many years ago, the Hongcun in my memory." Ye Qiu said softly: "Look, it seems that it has never changed, it's just that the people here have changed round after round, and Hongcun is still the same Hongcun." He smiled softly at me, "Xiaoyi, this scenery is beautiful, right?" ”

"Beauty?" There was a little more tremor in my voice, can this be called beauty? Soon, I reacted from his words: "What did you say? What do you remember? "It seems like this guy has been amnesia for a long time, what the hell is he talking about?

Ye Qiu glanced at me and said, "Xiao Yi, there is something I have always wanted to tell you. There was something strange about his expression, and I could even read a hint of sympathy in his eyes.

I smiled awkwardly: "Don't be like this, it's a little unacceptable, you can say something about it." ”

"I'm not a man of few words." Ye Qiu said: "In fact, there are many times when I can't see you at all, and I can't hear what you say to me. He paused and said, "Wen Bin has never let me say it, but I think people can't deceive themselves all their lives, right?" ”

"Hmm!" Although I didn't understand what he meant, I still felt that what he said today seemed to make sense, so I smiled and said, "It's rare to listen to you so much, anyway, he's not here, let's say anything." ”

"Do you want to know who the person I buried just now is?" There was already some pain in his expression.

I was surprised and asked, "Aren't you fat?" ”

"It's not." He shook his head and said, "That person...... It's you! ”

Suddenly, a dark feeling began to hit, what the hell are you talking about this guy!

My lips trembled, and I reluctantly replied, "You, what are you kidding?" Don't be like this, buddy, let's talk about things if there's something, I can bear it, but I don't have to be so scary. Looking at his painful expression, I really had a bad premonition in my heart, who is Ye Qiu? What are the odds that he will lie?

"He hasn't let you say it, and you'll find out after all." Ye Qiu continued: "Xiao Yi, you are gone, long gone, it's just that you don't know it. ”

I'm already going crazy, so I don't turn my face and drink: "Nervous, I'm not alive when I eat and drink!" ”

"I'm not going to tell a lie, you can see for yourself." As he spoke, he handed me a yellowed photo, which I recognized, a group photo taken by a few of us after escaping from the Northeast educated youth that year, each with their own name signed on the back of the photo, and the one of mine has always been kept in my pocket, because he is all the memories of my youth.

I took it cautiously, and my heart beat further as I looked at the familiar faces in the photo. There are a total of four people in this photo: me, Fatty, Wen Bin and Xiaobai, one for each of us, where did Ye Qiu come from?

This photo is fairly well preserved, I remember that there was a signature on the back of each photo at the time, and as soon as I turned it over I knew who it belonged to? The answer was close at hand, but at this juncture I was a little scared, and the voice in my heart was telling me that it seemed to belong to me.

The yellowed black and white photos leave the memories of youth, and the back of the photos is our time. The slightly scribbled handwriting was clearly engraved with two words "Xia Yi", and at that moment, there was only gray and white in my world.

Is it mine, is this my picture? There shouldn't be anything wrong, but "Why?" I cried out, and the liquid began to swirl in my eye sockets, but it was not warm as it slid over my cheeks, licking with my tongue, and it was astringent.

"We can't escape our fate after all." Ye Qiu squatted on the ground and sighed: "Only you don't know about your business, Wen Bin and I have known for a long time, let's go, Xiaoyi, don't keep it anymore, go find the fat man and tell him that we will all come back." ”

"Can you tell me? What the hell do you know I don't know. "I'm begging him that everyone dies, but I don't want to die like this.

"Samsara, from the moment you are born, we are different from others. Xiaoyi, let's go. I don't know when Cha Wenbin also appeared, his eyes were red, I turned around and looked at him silently, I wanted to tell him to save me, I really didn't want to die like this, grabbed the photo in my hand, my vision began to blur slowly, and multiple figures began to appear in my eyes.

Some people say that the scene you saw before you died is the most nostalgic thing in your life, like a slide in my mind flying by, but am I really going to leave like this? I haven't even had time to meet someone I love......

"Boom", this is the last sound I heard when I left this world, and it was all over......

Why do I die? Because I have to die, someone wants me to die, who is this person? I didn't know until the moment I died.

It is said that within a few minutes of death, the brain is still awake and can still hear and see. I heard some voices faintly, and finally, I believed that I had been killed like that.

There are many ways for people to live, and there are many ways for people to die, and no one would have thought that I would die like this, because in my heart I already believed that I was dead, and no one could smooth my wide eyes with the palm of my hand, because I was unwilling, because I didn't look blind.

It's a conspiracy, a conspiracy that was designed from the start, and I'm a small pawn in the whole conspiracy, and the time has come to abandon me.

That's right, I was scared to death, because in the extreme lack of oxygen, I believed that the body was mine. Who stole that picture from my arms? Why Ye Qiu? Could it really be him? Until I die, I won't know the answer.

For the first time in my life, I experienced the feeling of death, cold and dark. Slowly, a golden light began to appear in my world, and it seemed that someone familiar to me was beckoning to me on the other side of the light. I started to feel warm, I got up, and walked briskly on this avenue, I turned around, but found that there was nothing behind me, it was pitch black, and there was endless light in front of me, so I walked to that end.

In my lifetime, I don't know how many things I didn't understand, and more than 20 years have passed. This should be called Yangguan Road, and the front should be the Nai He Bridge, will there be Meng Po at the other end of the bridge? If there is, I think I'll ask her too, what is the truth?

At this point, part of the prequel to the Taoist priest is considered to be the end, and I have left a lot of holes that have not been filled because we are about to start the second part of the volume