Lan Ruling is from Xiu'an County, Sichuan and Hunan Province, and is a villager of Phoenix Village, and the story of her mother and the old man is closely related to the choice of the entire era.

Twenty years ago, Xiangxi opened its port. Yueyang is close to Dongting Lake, naturally has an excellent river port, the former government decided to bypass the provincial capital Shatan, open a port in Yueyang for trade, and intended to use Dongting Lake as a freight hub in the southwest inland area, in order to change the closed and backward economic situation in the Huxiang area, ordered the governor of Huxiang to step up the handling.

On the one hand, the Hunan Provincial Government built a new port to attract investment, on the other hand, it also stepped up the dredging of the river along the way, as much as possible to widen the river, so as to escort the upcoming frequent freight.

Phoenix Village, is the border village of western Hunan Province, there is a Huayuan River implicated from the Youjiang River near the village, and Dongting Lake is implicated in communication, it is one of the larger inland routes in western Hunan Province, in order to investigate the navigable ability of the waterway, these foreigners were invited by the government to Huayuan County to communicate about the canal.

In the past, foreigners were limited by the trade treaty of the former dynasty, and only operated near the Yangtze River Delta, but with the continuous signing of the treaty of the former dynasty, shipping has been opened to the southwest, and they have never seen the verdant thousand mountains when they first arrived, and if there is no person who is familiar with the mountain road and mountain situation as a guide, they may not be able to walk out of the 100,000 mountains until they die.

I am not familiar with the place, and the foreigner exploration group asked the local armor to find a guide in order to find a way, and this person is Lan Ruling's mother-in-law, Lan Qingping.

At that time, Lan Qingping was the medical woman of Phoenix Village, using Gu as a doctor, treating acupuncture and acupuncture for the villagers, and prescribing medicines.

In the process, she noticed a young man who was accompanying the photographer, a young man with blond hair, a high nose and deep eyes, a tall, yellowish skin, wearing jeans, hiking boots, and a pistol at his waist, and clicking the shutter everywhere he went.

She heard the old man in the village say that there is a shadow in the camera, as long as the person is photographed by the camera, the three souls and seven spirits are immediately attracted to it, with the fear of the camera, she intentionally or unintentionally avoids the camera, even if the young man wants to shoot him, she is also avoided.

This behavior aroused the curiosity of the young foreigner, and one day the young man couldn't help but be curious, and saw her avoiding the camera, copying half-baked Chinese and asking: "You are so beautiful, why do you always avoid my camera." ”

"You foreigner don't have any rules, what to do with me, we villagers don't like to take pictures, we will lose our souls." This statement provoked the foreigner to laugh, this laugh was not a mockery but a feeling that she was cute, the young foreigner took out the camera and handed it to Lan Qingping, telling her to fiddle with the black bump, telling him what the lens is, what is the shutter, what is the focus, what is the film...... The principle of taking a photo with a camera divided by two is clearly introduced.

Only then did she know that the camera was a powerful machine invented by foreigners, just to take good pictures, and it would neither accept people's souls nor hook their souls.

This experience became Lan Qingping's talking point, and when she went back, she told the old people in the village, thinking that these old people could open their eyes, but after they listened to it, they blamed her for being bewitched by foreigners and couldn't believe the nonsense of foreigners.

At this time, Lan Qingping felt that the old man was conservative and pedantic, bored, they said that the camera would hook the soul, but the camera took pictures of people as if they were real, they also said that repairing rivers and rivers was also bad, it was just convenient for the government to plunder them, and they also said that foreigners were all red-haired and green-eyed, and they would become animals at night and eat people and drink blood...... These statements were gradually discarded from Lan Qingping's heart, and there was no longer hostility towards foreigners, and the two became friends, and she also learned at this time that this person's name was Joseph, a photographer in the magnesium country, and a business translator in China.

After that, she became friends with Joseph, and she told Joseph about the legends of Xiangxi's corpse chasing, Gu Technique, Gu Doctor, and Falling Flower Cave Girl, and would also bring her slate tofu, folded ear root, and leaf glutinous cake.

Joseph told her that the god of Westerners is God, and also told her that on the other side of the ocean, there is a very prosperous metropolis, and they are building the Empire State Building, which will be completed in a few years, a hundred-meter-high building, Lan Qingping can't even think of it.

She walked through the highest stilted building, which was only four or five floors, and that person didn't walk into the sky. Whenever she longed for a foreign country, Joseph would throw her colorful toffee cubes, the outer packaging shone in the sun, brighter than the flowers in June, at that time in the village, salt and rock sugar were luxuries, and they could only be licked after the New Year.

After half a year of exploration, the relationship between the two was matured, and the love between them was also matured, and Lan Qingping was also pregnant with Lan Ruling at this time.

There is no banquet in the world, and after the exploration is over, Joseph once invited Lan Qingping to settle in his country, but Lan Qingping felt that it was inconvenient to go to a foreign country, Joseph should stay and take care of her and the child, the two love themselves more than each other, since they are unwilling to give in, they can only go their own way.

Before leaving, Joseph said that he had a task to stay in, and when he completed the task, he would definitely come back to pick up the two of them.

Since then, the two have nothing to do with each other, the only thought left for her is a group photo of the two standing on the top of the mountain.

After her daughter was born, she saw that her daughter's eyes were blue, and named her Lan Ruling, now, everyone in the village knew that she and the foreigners had a relationship, and the villagers just began to introduce her to relatives, and after she all refused, she began to say that she was hooked by the foreigners, and her heart was not in the Phoenix Village for a long time.

The rabble often came in groups, and the villagers originally thought that the foreigners were monsters, and the children left by the foreigners were of course also monsters, so they expelled her and her daughter to the crested mountain.

Here, in addition to the Yizhuang of Phoenix Village, there is only the house of the old corpse chaser. This old corpse chaser is ugly but not bad, and they pity them to take in this girl.

In the following years, Lan Ruling has been living in Yizhuang with her mother, and after the old corpse chaser accepted the apprentice, this village will be more lively, and Lan Ruling will have a playmate, so she will not be so lonely.

"Since I arrived in Yizhuang, my aunt seems to have really been hooked, she doesn't work or treat every year, she only knows how to dress up, the day she died, it was the master who found her by the river, and she was happy to hear that she had no pain on her face when she died."

"I don't know why I'm looking for death when I'm happy."