Zhenghe 6th year, April. Pen, fun, and www.biquge.info

Shuncheng, south of Dongting Lake, is about a two-day drive.

This small city, which was not affected by the rebellion, showed a vitality that did not match itself after the flow of refugees receded.

The reconstruction of the south did not go well, and when the rebellious army retreated, the Xianmen disciples also left.

It was then that people discovered that in addition to the destruction of the land and homeland, the Shinto system had been completely destroyed.

All the city god temples in various places have been leveled, and there is no one in the temple of the Buddha Temple on the main avenues, and the ghosts are rampant in the south for a while.

This led to a four-year purge and the restoration of Shinto. Two years ago, the court finally announced that the south had begun to rebuild in full swing, and the refugees had returned to their hometowns.

The scope of this reconstruction was extremely extensive, and the material requirements were huge, which naturally attracted many profit-seeking merchants. Although it is not as a transportation hub as Dacheng, there are a lot of various materials operating here, which brings many benefits to Shuncheng.

It has passed noon, the whole city is still lively, the major markets are busy, the city gates are also full of traffic, and the peddlers and pawns are endless.

Of course, not all places are so bustling.

The backyard where Lu Xiaozuo is staying now is surprisingly quiet.

This is the backyard of a scholar's house surnamed Tan. This scholar had obtained a book on the art of guidance from Lu Xiaozuo a few months ago, and he had been practicing it diligently for several months. Seeing that the results are about to be released, Lu Xiaozuo wants to take a closer look here.

At this time, Lu Xiaozuo was peeking into the room with his eyes against the crack in the window. And underneath his head, a smaller head was peeking with him.

This is his apprentice Ame.

After a while, Ame turned around. Amei is a little girl, looking about six or seven years old, fair-skinned, with two big eyes and bright water, and two ponytails tied with pink red ropes on her head, although she is wearing a plain robe, she is still very cute.

At this time, she had sat down against the wall, her hands spread out, and the small bag hanging on her body also fell to the ground, she immediately grabbed it, patted the ashes, and carried it back into her arms. It is a small gray cloth with two pink plum blossoms embroidered on the lower left corner of the front of the bag.

Then she raised her head, looked at Lu Xiaozuo, and whispered pitifully, "Master, I'm hungry." ”

Although Lu Xiaozuo is Amei's master, he is only a teenager about sixteen or seventeen years old. He looked average, and he was also wearing a plain Taoist robe, with a bun on his head, and a peachwood sword on his back, just like a Taoist priest. He also had a cloth bag that was not too big or small, and he hung a cloth belt on his left shoulder and carried it cross-body. The small right corner of this bag also has two plum blossoms rusted.

He also turned around at this time, but he didn't pay attention to Ah Mei immediately, but first stood upright, began to shake his head left and right, then stretched his waist again, and then began to turn his body left and right, and actually moved his muscles and bones.

After the activity was completed, he looked at the little girl sitting on the ground and felt a little distressed. The two of them have been here for several days, and only when the scholar surnamed Tan in the house sleeps can the two of them go back to the inn from here to rest, and they will come here before dawn in the morning.

And yesterday the dry food forgot to replenish, the two of them had no lunch, and now they can only starve.

But if he just left, he was afraid that he would miss the opportunity, and he was not at ease to let Amei buy it alone, so he had to cheer up: "Amei, if you persist, doesn't the master often tell you that persistence is victory." We'll hold on for a while, and when this task is completed, we'll buy you rock sugar gourds to eat. ”

"Really?" the little girl's eyes lit up when she heard the rock sugar gourd.

"Of course it's true, the master never lies. ”

"But, master, I'm still hungry. ”

Lu Xiaozuo didn't answer Amei's words again, but put his head on the gap in the window again to observe the situation inside.

In the room, a young man was sitting cross-legged on the edge of the bed, his eyes closed, his hands on his laps, palms facing the sky, obviously practicing the guidance technique given by Lu Xiaozuo. The man had been sitting like this all morning, and the two men outside the window had been staring at him all morning.

Suddenly, the man spoke: "You can hear me." ”

The man's voice in the room was not loud, but Lu Xiaozuo could hear it clearly. He perked up, patted the little girl sitting next to him and said, "Amei, there's movement, get up quickly, and act as planned in a while." ”

When Ah Mei heard this, she was also refreshed, and immediately got up from the ground and leaned into the crack in the window.

When she saw inside, something floated out of the ear of the man in the room, and the little thing was just a small black dot at first, but after floating out of the ear, it began to rotate, and the volume gradually increased, and by the time it landed on the ground, it was already three inches in size.

It turned out to be a villain, and this villain had a hideous and vicious face, like a yaksha.

It's ugly, Amei said secretly.

At this moment, Lu Xiaozuo pressed Ah Mei's head and opened the window. I saw that there was an extra piece of pale yellow rune paper in his right hand at some point, and he pinched it with two fingers, pointing diagonally upward.

"Array!" he shouted, and the rune paper in his hand immediately burned, and white flames burst out. As soon as he closed his eyes, he sensed that the rune paper around the courtyard had also ignited, so he said to Amei: "Go in, let's work." ”

Amei is also familiar with the road, and she is not surprised or scared by this. She climbed through the window and pulled out an ancient mirror from her pouch.

At this time, the villain who had just landed seemed to be frightened by something, and was running around the house in a circle, while the scholar surnamed Tan was sitting there and did not react to the situation in front of him.

Amei used the ancient mirror to shine at the villain, and the villain was hit by the ancient mirror, and the action immediately stopped, only to see it trembling all over and falling to the ground. The strange thing is that as Ah Mei approached step by step, the little man began to slowly get smaller, and by the time Ah Mei came to the side, it was already the size of a flea, as if it had just come out of the man's ear.

Amei took out a small ceramic bottle from her bag, put the villain in it, plugged it tightly with a small wooden stopper, and then used another small piece of pale yellow paper to wrap around the mouth of the bottle, and finally took out a small red rope and tied it.

When she was done, she picked up the bottle and shook it towards Lu Xiaozuo, shouting, "Master." ”

"Collect!" Seeing this, the young Taoist priest drank lightly, and with a shake of his right hand, the white fire on the rune paper disappeared, and the rune paper was still intact.

Putting the rune paper back in his bag and jumping into the room, Lu Xiaozuo came to the bedside. At this time, the young man on the bed was glazed over, his eyes were blank, as if he had lost his soul.

Lu Xiaozuo helped the man back to the bed. Amei also walked over and looked at the lying man a little worriedly: "Is he okay?"

"It's okay, let's pretend to be a master of the tour when we go back, and give him some requiem prescriptions, and he will be able to recover soon. ”

"Oh, that's good. As she spoke, Amei handed over the ceramic bottle containing the villain, "Here, this little demon is so ugly." ”

"It's ugly, but it's worth a lot. Lu Xiaozuo took the bottle, smiled, stuffed it into his bag, turned around and said, "Let's go, the task is complete, let's eat." ”

"Eun, and rock sugar gourds. ”

Half an hour later.

On the edge of the market, a young Taoist priest and a little girl came out of the market street and walked from east to west. The little girl followed the young Taoist priest with a sugar gourd in each hand, eating happily as she walked.

"Master, don't you eat it, it's delicious. Amei shook her baby sugar gourd.

"Don't eat. You eat so much at once, beware of tooth decay. ”

"Master, what is tooth decay? ”

"Tooth decay is when a tooth is going to rot. ”

"Master, will the teeth still rot, Amei's teeth are amazing, you see. Ah Mei jumped in front of the young Taoist priest and opened her mouth to reveal two rows of large white teeth.

"Yes, yes, Amei is the best. ”

"Master, where are we going now. ”

"Chenghuang Temple in the west of the city, let's go and hand in the task to get the reward. ”

"Master, are you going to sell that ugly little demon?"

"yes. ”

"Master, this ugly demon is so pitiful, we don't sell it. ”

"Eh, does Amei know that little demon?" Lu Xiaozuo felt a little strange, he stopped and turned to look at the little girl.

"I don't know, but master, you see, it's so ugly, it must have been bullied by other demons since it was a child, so it must be pitiful, so let's not sell it. Ah Mei also paused and thought for a moment.

"The master told you, this little demon is called 'Evil Fate Little Demon'. The young Taoist priest took out a small porcelain vase from his bosom, pointed to it, and then pointed to his ears, and said: "It is born in the ears of people, and it will affect the life of the master with sound, and finally make the master have a bad relationship with the wrong person." This is not a kind youkai. Also, it was born in the sky and died in the Tao, but no friend will bully it. ”

Ah Mei looked at the bottle, lowered her head, and stopped eating the sugar gourd, and her voice became quieter: "Then the master must sell it?"

Lu Xiaozuo looked at Amei and lowered her head, she always felt that something was wrong, she had caught a lot of little ghosts to sell before, what was going on with this little girl this time. Then he asked: "What's wrong with Amei, it seems that I don't want the master to sell this little demon today." ”

Amei lowered her head and did not answer.

Lu Xiaozuo suddenly felt something, so he squatted down in front of Amei and asked carefully, "What's wrong with Xiao Amei, did someone tell you something?"

Ah Mei slowly raised her head at this time, her eyes were red, her face was already full of pear blossoms and rain, she looked at the young Taoist priest and cried: "Master, don't you want Ah Mei anymore?"