Situ Zi was puzzled: "Scarecrow? ”

Grandpa nodded and explained, "I seem to have seen a scarecrow just now, it's a little weird. ”

Situ Zi hurriedly waved his hand and said, "I've already said it, I want to avoid evil, and I don't want to touch these." ”

Grandpa said, "Just help me take a look." No need for you to do anything. ”

Situ Zi agreed.

Grandpa and Xie Xiaomi, who followed Li Mason's woman, walked for more than half an hour, and finally came to Li's house. Lijiaao is surrounded by mountains, located in the middle of the mountain col, and the terrain is extremely low. There are many ancient trees, many grasses and vines, and many birds and beasts on the mountain. Therefore, there are many more scarecrows in Lijiaao than in other villages, and they are also much more delicate and vivid.

Walking from the mountain pass to the mountain pass, along the way, Grandpa and Xie Xiaoxiao saw many scarecrows lying on the ground, as if they had just experienced a battlefield in which war and chaos had just occurred. It also adds a lot of eerie atmosphere, as if a scarecrow in the barren grass will get up at any moment.

Even though Xie Xiaomi was a parasitic grass parasitic on other people's corpses, she couldn't help but grab her grandfather's arm, and her eyes didn't dare to look at those broken scarecrows.

When they arrived at Stonemason Li's house, Stonemason's woman directly led Grandpa and Xie Xiaomi to her son's room.

Li Masons helped people carve stones outside, often eating and living outside for a long time. Li Mason's woman said that she hoped that her man would not know about this matter, and that it was better to get the child's soul back before her man returned, so as not to worry her man.

When she arrived at her son's room, her father saw a man of about twenty years old lying on the bed, with a pale face, a weak breath, eyes closed, and a mouth slightly open.

At first glance, he looks like an abandoned scarecrow on the way to Lijiaao.

Grandpa's eyes were in a trance, as if he saw that his hands were made of straw and his face was painted on white paper. Grandpa was startled by the illusion he had imagined.

Daddy stepped forward, felt his pulse, opened his eyelids and looked at his pupils, and sniffed out in front of his nose.

Li Mason's woman nervously watched her father finish all this, and asked weakly, "Ma Xiucai, what's wrong with my son?" Is there any salvation? ”

Grandpa shook his head and said, "Seeing that your son's pulse is weak, his anger is like a gossamer, and there is no blood, it shouldn't be good." However, as the old saying goes, lovesickness becomes a disease, I can't be sure whether your son misses his sweetheart like this, or if he is really snatched away from his soul as you say. Judging by his performance, both possibilities are present. ”

When Daddy was checking on the man, Xie Xiaomi was also quietly watching. When she saw her grandfather's uncertain answer, she hurriedly said, "What's not to see about this?" His soul is no longer here! ”

Grandpa pulled her aside and reproached, "What are you messing with here?" You said you wanted to see what lovesickness was like, so I let you come. If you're fooling around, I'm not going to let you stay here. ”

Xie Xiaomi said disapplausively: "Who made the peace?" Who do you say is making trouble? Have you forgotten who I am? She glanced at the woman beside the bed, afraid that she would hear the clue.

Grandpa suddenly realized. Xie Xiaomi was originally a soul parasitic on someone else's body. That's what she does best. Whether the man in front of him was only an empty body, or whether his soul was sick with thoughts, Xie Xiaomi could tell at a glance.

"Are you sure?" Daddy asked.

Xie Xiaomi lowered his voice and said, "I'm sure." As long as I come out of Miss Xie's body, I can attach it to him now. It is difficult for me to invade a soulful body, just as the owner's house is not for outsiders to occupy. I can easily get in without a soul, just as an empty house is in front of me, and I can go in if I want, without the slightest hindrance. She glanced at the man on the bed and continued, "Now he is like an empty house. ”

"I've brought you here this time." Daddy said happily.

Xie Xiaomi immediately changed from a deep appearance to a naughty one, and made a grimace at her grandfather.

"Can you see anything else?" Daddy asked.

Xie Xiaomi pursed his lips and said, "The rest is all up to you." ”

Grandpa whispered, "If he is now like an empty house as you say, then he is in danger now. It's a good thing you have a body now, otherwise you'd have taken over his body. Apart from you, I can't tell if there are other souls around here who have lost their refuge and want to take advantage of it. If another soul takes possession of his body before his soul returns, even if we find his soul, it will be difficult to drive out the soul that occupies his body. ”

Xie Xiaomi nodded and said, "That's the case." ”

So, my father asked the woman of Li Mason's to bring a handful of incense and a bowl of glutinous rice, and then told her to go out. Daddy sprinkled glutinous rice around the bed and planted lighted incense on the side of the bed, so as to protect his body from being occupied by other spirits.

Although Xie Xiaomi is no longer afraid of glutinous rice, he is still very disgusted with this kind of thing, so he hid out when his grandfather was doing this.

Grandpa made the glutinous rice and incense before he came out of the house, and asked the woman of the stonemason Li to tell the story more carefully.

Li Mason's woman told her father and Xie Xiaomi everything she knew.

The woman of the Li stonemason said that she had noticed her son's abnormality for a long time. Her son's name is Li Xiaocheng, and he is 19 years old. His father wanted him to learn the crafts of stonemasonry, but Li Xiaocheng had been weak since he was born and could not do that kind of rough work. With a hammer in his hand, he couldn't hit the stone for a few days, and he became dizzy and sick. Li Mason had no choice but to give up the expectation that his son would inherit his father's business.

Although Li Xiaocheng was naturally repulsed by the carving of stones, this did not prevent him from using his dexterous hands to do other handicrafts.

He loves to be a scarecrow.

The scarecrow he made was just like the real thing, and the effect of scaring birds and sparrows was much better than what others did. He inherited his father's discerning eyes. The father carved what he saw into stone, and he applied what he saw to the scarecrow. The thickness of the scarecrow's arms and the size of the waist are all controlled by him. After dressing the scarecrow, it was a living corpse. As a result, if someone in the village died, people often came to him as a scarecrow stand-in.

This kind of scarecrow stand-in is not used to scare birds and beasts that steal food, but a real stand-in for the dead. At Granny Wu's funeral, there was also a scarecrow stand-in in her mourning hall to accept the kneeling of those who came to mourn. However, Granny Wu's scarecrow stand-in is very crudely made, and it is simply a bunch of straw in the clothes and shoes that Granny Wu wore during her lifetime. After Granny Wu's coffin went up the mountain, this stand-in was burned along with the things that Granny Wu had used.

Therefore, the final result of the scarecrow stand-in is the same as that of the scarecrow in the rice field. Exist when people need it, and discard it when people don't need it.

And the scarecrow stand-in made by Li Xiaocheng is exactly the same as the deceased. Li Xiaocheng will decide the amount and method of grass used for each part of the scarecrow stand-in according to the figure of the deceased, which is no different from a tailor-made excellent tailor. He could not carve an image into stone like his father did, but he could draw it on paper. The face he painted was simply a picture of the deceased.

So much so that some people did not dare to light a fire when burning the scarecrow stand-in, for fear that the deceased would really be burned to death by themselves.

Although he was able to make a scarecrow like this, he didn't make any money to make a living from it. Scarecrow stand-ins are rarely used, and scarecrows are only used in the corresponding season. No one would spend much money on either of these things. So Li Mason and his woman have been worried about Li Xiaocheng's future.

But seeing that Li Xiaocheng was obsessed with making scarecrows, the couple couldn't stop it. One is because Li Xiaocheng enjoys doing this kind of thing, and the other is that he doesn't know what else he can do.

After Li Xiaocheng turned sixteen, Li Mason and his wife began to worry about Li Xiaocheng's marriage. Although Li Mason's craftsmanship has accumulated some money for the family, and life is quite nourishing, the clear-eyed girls know that Li Xiaocheng has nothing to support the family, and they don't know how he can maintain a family after marrying him. Therefore, several girls who helped him get along with him rejected him.

This made Li Xiaocheng withdrawn and depressed, and when he was a scarecrow, he was more depressed, and he was not as happy as before.

Li stonemason began to persuade Li Xiaocheng not to be a scarecrow, not to do the work of a stonemason, but also to learn others, such as carpenter, well-drilling, bricklayer and so on.

Li Xiaocheng didn't listen.

When Li Mason saw that he didn't listen, he inevitably scolded some ugly words. What is not filial piety has three nos, what must have a family first, what has a family first has a woman, and so on.

Li Xiaocheng was in a hurry and shouted: "I'm not afraid if there is no other woman to marry me, I will be a woman myself!" ”

For a period of time after that, Li Xiaocheng specialized in making all kinds of straw women. Those scarecrow women are doing a very beautiful job. However, some men with ulterior motives made fun of him, saying that he had a room of women, but none of them could untie their clothes.

Li Xiaocheng's face changed suddenly when he heard them make fun of them like this.

Once, Li Xiaocheng found that all the straw women he had carefully made were gone.

The next morning, he saw beautiful scarecrow women standing everywhere in the paddy fields of Lijiaao. It turned out that the gang who deliberately made fun of him had stolen the straw woman in his house and inserted it into the paddy field to drive away the birds.

Li Xiaocheng went berserk and got into a fight with the person who stole the straw woman, almost killing the man.

Li Mason did not help his son, but beat his son who was in trouble, and scolded his son: "Can those straw women talk to you? Can I cook for you? Can I make a bed for you? Can you give me a fat grandson? They're nothing! And you hurt people because they fought with them? ”