Professor Shan's speech was colorful, and I was terrified to listen to it, and what he said next shocked us even more: "Liu Er was stunned all of a sudden, and before he could understand, he only felt that his belly was cold, and a dagger was inserted into his abdomen, and then he slammed it, and his belly was opened, Liu Er screamed in pain, his intestines had been cut off, and stinky feces flowed from his stomach."

When his subordinates heard the screams and rushed over, they found that Liu Erji was already lying on the ground, holding his stomach and screaming like a pig, and the blood and feces and urine on the ground were mixed together, and it was a mess.

People didn't know what was going on, but then they found out that this ferocious Liu Er was so afraid of death, he was hoarse, shouted and cursed, and asked his subordinates to send him to the hospital at the foot of the mountain, but in fact, he himself knew in his heart that there was at least three days from the village to the hospital, and he was afraid that he would not live for so long.

The abdomen is dissected, which is extremely painful, and those samurai who commit suicide by caesarean section will have a mistake next to it, that is, after the samurai is disemboweled, the samurai's head will be cut off to shorten the torment time after the caesarean section.

And that Liu Er was stunned and quite hard, and he didn't lose his breath until the afternoon of the next day, and the people who saw it at the time said that this Liu Er was stunned and died very miserably, because of the extreme pain, he bit off three of his fingers, and also pulled out one of his eyeballs.

Liu Er was stunned to death, when the common people beat gongs and drums and set off firecrackers, just like the New Year. In fact, when the human skin killed Liu Er, someone had already seen it, I don't know if it was because he was stunned, or because he deliberately didn't save Liu Erstun, anyway, the people who saw it didn't go over to help at all.

Not only that, but it was also published in the famous newspaper "Declaration" in Shanghai at that time, and the local county chronicle recorded this incident in detail, which also became a legend.

However, many people only regard this incident as a legend and don't believe that there is really a human skin killing, but only the locals know that this incident really happened.

The locals all said that being able to kill that Liu Erstunned was actually a shadow puppet artist's strategy, that shadow puppet artist, his skills have reached the point of 'channeling gods', and the 'human shadow puppet' he made can actually allow the soul of the foreign student to be temporarily attached to it, so that this foreign student's human skin can be regarded as avenging himself, and in the same way, he gave Liu Er stunned a heartbreak and made Liu Er stunned die miserably.

At first, when I saw this account, I didn't believe it was true, but coincidentally, an old classmate of my grandfather happened to be from the same village as the shadow puppet artist, and the relationship was also very good, although he was more than ten years younger than the shadow puppet artist, but it was also a year-old friend, when I asked him about it, he told me that this matter was indeed true, and on a moonlit night, he had seen it with his own eyes, and the human skin floated into the shadow puppet artist's house.

But after Liu Erjing was killed, the human skin never appeared again, and the shadow puppet artist never mentioned it again—even to my grandfather's classmate—no longer mentioned it.

After hearing this, it aroused my curiosity even more, at that time, my grandfather's classmate, although he had been away from his hometown for decades, still had correspondence with the hand puppeteer, he was also very curious about the 'human shadow puppet', and asked several times in the letter, but the shadow puppet artist clearly rejected - but as a close friend, the shadow puppet artist still admitted in the letter, that Liu Er's death was indeed made of human skin, as for how he did it, the shadow puppet artist did not elaborate, only said that this is an ancestral secret technique, forgive him for not being able to disclose it to outsiders.

I was studying folk shadow puppet art at the time, and I was about to go to the area to collect style, so I took a letter from my grandfather's friend and went to find the shadow puppet artist.

When I traveled a long way, in a small mountain village deep in the mountains, when I saw the shadow puppet artist, I didn't expect that he was very sick, what I didn't expect was that the shadow puppet artist had never married in his life, and had no offspring, and several nephews had already gone out of the mountains, living and working in various cities, and some also went to the United States.

After arriving, I washed his clothes, cooked for him, took care of him for a while, and also contacted the local cultural department, listed him as a master craftsman, obtained free medical treatment for him, and sent him to a provincial hospital for treatment.

In the hospital, the shadow puppet artist took my hand, and actually shed tears, and said to me with emotion, "The disease can be cured but the old is difficult to treat", although his condition has been alleviated, but he knows that he can't live too long, but his ancestral shadow puppet craft is about to be lost, and no one in the younger generations is interested in it, but I, an outsider, are so enthusiastic about this craft, so he decided to give it to me.

What I didn't expect was that he also told me about the 'human shadow puppet'.

Shadow puppet artists said that their family has a stunt, which is to make shadow puppets 'really come alive' - the general shadow puppet show is to project shadow puppet props onto a thin veil and use the shadow of props to act, and their family can let shadow puppet props go directly to the stage and do simple performances, which is their ancestral unique skill.

How can an animal skin move on its own on stage? Ordinary people think this is incredible, but this is true, but this kind of unique work, their family generally does not perform, unless it is performed for some officials and wealthy people, it is shown, so as to be able to earn more money, in the final analysis, it is also for the sake of livelihood, and it is this kind of unique skill, their family elders, but also for the royal family and nobles, in the circle of dignitaries, there is a high reputation, which also makes their family worry-free, but also a lot of industry.

How did you do this incredible feat? It's also very weird and peculiar to say.

This matter has to start with the ancestors of shadow puppet artists.

The ancestors of shadow puppet artists, in addition to buying furs from hunters, had to go up the mountain to find them themselves. It's all about getting the best fur.

Because only the shadow puppet props made of the best fur are more flexible and more expressive. But to obtain this good fur, it is best to wait for the beast to die before it dies, and then peel it alive, so that the fur is softer and more tough, but the fur obtained from the hunter is stripped after the death of the prey, and the quality is much worse.

Therefore, the ancestors of shadow puppet artists often went into the mountains to hunt in person to obtain the skins of those beasts.

However, they hunt, unlike ordinary hunters, who will use bows and arrows, even muskets, or use various traps, traps, etc., which often damage the fur of animals.

And when they hunt, the part they want to hunt most is the skin of the prey, so they generally use medicine to poison the prey, and then peel off the skin of the animal while the prey is not out of breath, but even so, because of the effect of the poison, it will still affect the quality of the hide.

Once, the ancestor of a shadow puppet artist encountered a strange thing when he went into the mountains to hunt animal skins.

At that time, in the local mountains, there lived a kind of bear, this kind of bear cub is very special, its size is very small, about the same as a hunting dog, its hair is also very sparse, not very suitable for making clothes, the meat is also very sour, it cannot be eaten at all, and there is no bear paw of the ordinary bear.

However, this bear's bear bile is extremely delicious, and has a miraculous effect on invigorating qi and strengthening the kidneys, and it is said that a local rich man in his eighties gave birth to a boy and a girl after eating this bear bile.

Many men who are infertile, after eating this kind of bear bile, can generally be happy to have a precious child. Therefore, this bear bile is more expensive than gold.

However, this bear bile is not large, only the size of a fist, and it is located in the innermost part of the internal organs, and only after all the internal organs are removed, can the bear bile inside be obtained.

As a result, many hunters will take out all the internal organs of this kind of bear, and then take out the innermost bear bile, and discard the body part.

The ancestor of the shadow puppet artist, in a stone pit, saw this kind of bear that had been eviscerated out, he looked at the blood around the stone pit, it was already purple, and those internal organs that had been taken out were scattered all over the ground, and crawling with maggots and flies, it seems that this kind of bear has been killed for at least a few days.

He felt a little sorry, because this kind of bear skin is a good material for making shadow puppets, but if it has been dead for a few days, it is not of much use.

He glanced again at the gutted bear in the stone pit, and was about to leave, when suddenly he froze there—for the bear seemed to be squirming slightly!

Hollowed out of the gutt, the bear isn't even dead? And it was hollowed out a few days ago. The ancestor of the shadow puppet artist suddenly felt creepy, and the scene in front of him was really weird.

He rubbed his eyes and looked at the bear cub again, and then he was sure that he was right, the bear cub was indeed moving, so he emboldened himself and went down to the crater to get a closer look at the bear.

Unexpectedly, the bear was staring at him, but the bear's internal organs were empty! He kicked the bear with his foot, and the bear let out a few low screams.

With his profound professionalism, even if he touched the bear's fur with his foot, the ancestor of the shadow puppet artist could feel the bear's fur state, which was an excellent material for making zuò shadow puppetry.

He no longer hesitated, and immediately put the bear in his cloth bag and carried it home.

After the dehairing, the ancestor of the shadow puppet artist peeled off the bear's skin entirely, and when he was about to work on it, he encountered something even more shocking - the skin seemed to have life, and as soon as the carving knife was placed on it, the skin would tremble and squirm on its own.

The ancestor of the shadow puppet artist was a caring person, and after thinking about it repeatedly, he felt that the reason for this unbelievable phenomenon might be related to the stone pit.

Because the ancestor of the shadow puppet artist, when he observed on the edge of the stone pit, he also noticed that the internal organs scattered around the pit were crawling with maggots and flies, but in the crater, the blood-stained bear trunk part, not a single fly or maggot, this phenomenon alone is strange enough.

In order to confirm his conjecture, he peeled the skin of a fox alive next to the stone pit, and then threw the skin into the pit, and a strange thing happened, the skin seemed to have gained life in the stone pit.

Sure enough, that stone pit has a mysterious magic, and this magic power, even if the animal is only a skin, can survive, why is that pit so magical?

After many inquiries, the ancestor of the shadow puppet artist figured out that the stone pit was a meteorite crater.

After knowing this secret, the ancestor of the shadow puppet artist created the kind of "living" shadow puppet play - that is, the skin of an animal, which can not only move, but also make sounds, just like a living thing, and with this unique skill, their families can live a relatively prosperous life for generations.

Because this is their family's "way of making money", it is extremely confidential and will never be told to outsiders.

But with the great changes of the times, the descendants of their family have lost any interest in this ancient skill, so by the generation of shadow puppet artists, their skills will be lost, but it is precisely for this reason that shadow puppet artists will tell me this ancestral secret to me, an outsider. ”