snake coffin

Chapter 26
I have known since I was a child that there was a swarm of snakes when I was born, so the village did not want to see me, and my parents rarely took me back to the village.

Grandma would go to town to see me if she wanted to see me.

The only time I went back to the village was during Chinese New Year to worship my ancestors. It was very lively at that time, and there were many people of my age.

But now looking through the roster, I suddenly discovered that none of those so-called peers was younger than me.

I flipped through the roster three times and went through it in my head.

Really do not have!

In the roster, the last one born was named Long Liuze, whose birth date was the same day as mine, only more than an hour behind me.

Because I wasn't on the roster, I saw him at a glance.

There are only three words in the annotation behind his birthday horoscope: village guard.

In other words, this person is Niu Er.

Holding such a large roll of rosters, I tried to recall who had children brought back during the ancestor worship.

I thought about it, but there was none.

As if my throat was being strangled, I put the roster down and rummaged through the office.

But except for the official seals and official accounts and the messy information, there was nothing left.

The whole room was silent. I hugged the roster and suddenly felt a little flustered.

Is it because there have been no children born in the village for 18 years, or is it because those people outside gave birth to children later and wanted to cut off contact with Huilong Village and did not report to the village, so they were not included in the roster?

Niu Er's loud shouting voice seemed to be heard in the distance. I held the roster in my arms, locked the door and came out.

This kind of thing can only be known by asking grandma.

When I walked to the square outside the court, I felt something was looking at me, so I couldn't help but look back.

I saw a three-story tiled building with a half-story attic above the third floor.

In the past, before the New Year's Eve dinner, the village chief's uncle, Long Xia's father, would display the ranks of the ancestors and put them in the main hall of the court.

People in the village, based on their families, all knelt in this square and worshiped together in front of the memorial tablet in this three-story building.

Now it seems that they are worshiping this building!

Although I didn't believe this before, after the worship, the uncle would bring the older generation to give everyone a red envelope, which was distributed from the village's public account, and there was a lot of money, so I was very happy to worship.

Looking back at the building, I slowly stepped back and knelt down slowly.

Just when I was about to kowtow, I suddenly raised my head.

Sure enough, there was a flash of darkness at a window on the third floor.

I stared at the window, my gaze fell back slightly, and looked at the locked door of the main room.

When worshiping the ancestors, there were many memorial tablets, each with their names written in traditional characters...

Long Xia has been studying in the county since she was a child, and she knows more characters than I do. One year, she deliberately showed off in front of me, reading to me the names in traditional characters on those plaques.

"The spiritual seat of the ancestor dragon's alias, the spiritual seat of the ancestor dragon Huaying..."

ancestors...

Panting heavily, I stuffed the thick roster into the backpack, picked up a firewood next to it, and smashed it at the glass next to the main room.

When I climbed in through the window, all the memorial tablets in the main room stood there quietly.

The pieces are like stacked hills. I scanned the top three words one by one.

Ancestor dragon!
Ancestor dragon!
Ancestor dragon!
Shouldn't women be able to offer memorial tablets?Why are all of them men, and all of them have the surname Long!
The motorcycle driver's words flashed through my mind, and I was about to run up the stairs of the main room.

But just as I was going up the stairs, the black snake jade bracelet on my wrist moved, and Mo Xiu stood in front of me, stopped me, and shook his head at me.

"Moxiu..." I panted slightly and looked at him: "Let me meet her? I want to ask her a few words."

"She can't speak." Mo Xiu shook his head at me and said softly, "Don't go."

Niu Er hummed a song outside the house: "The daughter of the Long family was entangled by a snake, she became a snake woman, and gave birth to a snake baby. She gave birth to a snake, but her surname is Long. Do you think it's weird or not?"

He got closer and closer, and shouted outside the square: "Long Ling, I'm so hungry, I want to eat."

Mo Xiu was still standing in front of me, stopping me and shaking his head at me: "Go back, you know enough."

I looked at the quiet staircase going up and smiled bitterly at Mo Xiu: "I will find out."

Turning around, he still crawled out through the smashed glass window. When he turned his head, those carved wooden tablets with red lacquer looked like monsters squatting there.

As soon as he came out, Niu Er immediately said to me: "Long Ling, I'm so hungry, eat! Eat!"

I looked at him, nodded, and took him out of the village.

So many people died in the village, people in the nearby villages all walked around.

So I couldn't get a taxi at all, and what was even more strange was that so many people died, except for the sixth uncle, no one else returned to the village.

I took Niu Er to the boundary of the next village before I hit a motorcycle.

Back at Qin Mipo's house, she was cooking while coughing.

After I took a look at grandma, I helped her on the sidelines, and she looked up at me from time to time: "Did you find Long Xia?"

"No." I also wondered why Long Xia didn't return to the village.

Turning to look at Qin Mipo: "Aunt Qin, can you make horoscopes?"

Qin Mipo looked at me with weird eyes, then shook her head suddenly: "No."

When she said this, her eyes fell on the black snake jade bracelet on my wrist.

I just nodded, and after dinner, I left Niu Er with Qin Mipo. I directly called the motorcycle driver and asked him to take me to town.

I didn’t dare to ask him to send me directly to the Snake Hotel, so I just asked him to send me to the corner of the street.

When I got home, I looked for the key and found the little electric donkey my mother was riding.

When Aunt Liu heard the movement, she ran over to take a look. Seeing that it was me, she seemed to breathe a sigh of relief: "It's Long Ling? Why are you back?"

"Aunt Liu." I pushed the little eDonkey outside and locked the door.

She said to her: "Do you know where my uncle's house is? I have something to ask my uncle."

"You don't have an uncle!" Aunt Liu clapped her hands and looked at me with sympathy.

He laughed dryly: "I have known your mother for nearly 20 years, but I have never met her mother's family, and I have never even mentioned it."

"They say your mother was kidnapped by your father from outside and eloped. Your mother's family may not even know about it." Aunt Liu said with a smile on her face.

Patted me: "Did you miss your parents? I need to find my aunt. Come on, I haven't eaten, and my aunt will cook noodles for you!"

"Really never heard my mother mention it?" I tried to think back, as if it really didn't.

The driver of Kemo said that people from Huilong Village should marry their wives according to their horoscopes.

Anyone who eloped would be caught and even the children they were carrying were aborted.

"You don't know if you have an uncle?" Aunt Liu tentatively reached out to touch my forehead and asked worriedly: "Do you have a fever?"

I shook my head, tried the small eDonkey, and said to Aunt Liu, "I have something to do, so I'm leaving first. If you need anything, please call me."

The little electric donkey is what my mother usually rides to play cards, and I sometimes ride it to study, so it rides smoothly.

I rode to a deserted place, took out the thick roster from my backpack, and copied down the birthdays and horoscopes of the aunts who married into Huilong Village.

Then I rode to the bridgehead in the town, where there were many people who were setting up messes, setting up stalls, trying to tell fortunes and test horoscopes.

I went in and walked back and forth twice.

Finally, I found an old man who seemed more reliable: "Help me measure the horoscope."

A bunch of people are either playing cards and chess together or playing with their mobile phones.

If you don't see me, you will immediately call out: "Little girl, tell fortunes, draw lots, measure horoscopes, and arrange four pillars!"

Only that old man was wearing presbyopia, it was almost summer, and he was wearing a ragged jacket, flipping through an old book.

Seeing me sitting down, I put down the book: "The little girl is testing the horoscope, is it for marriage?"

"Yeah." Let me think about it.

But the old man glanced at me, then moved his nose slightly, and his eyes went down my shoulders and towards my wrists.

At this moment, the black snake jade bracelet on his wrist moved.

Slowly swimming under the clothes on my wrists, Mo Xiu whispered in my ear: "Let's go."

I froze for a moment, but stood still.

The old man looked at me, suddenly picked up a yellow bamboo stick next to him, and pulled it toward my arm wrapped with a black snake jade bracelet: "The old Taoist is here, why don't you show up yet!"

But before the bamboo stick reached my arm, there was a "click", and every joint of the whole bamboo stick split instantly.

The old man stood up abruptly holding the bamboo stick, looked at my wrist and asked, "What is on your wrist?"

I thought about it, and pulled off my sleeves, revealing the black snake jade bracelet.

The old man pushed the reading glasses, looked at the black snake jade bracelet, his eyes flashed.

Looking at the black snake jade bracelet, he nodded respectfully: "I'm offended."

He turned to look at me and said, "Show me the horoscope you are going to make."

I handed over the copied horoscope, and the old man looked at it and said, "The horoscope you gave me is blessed with no children, but blessed with descendants. It is a good life! It's a pity that it has been in vain, and there is nothing to calculate."

"What about this one?" I handed it over again.

Mo Xiu seemed to sigh softly in my ear, but he didn't stop me.

The old man took it over and looked at it, and suddenly he couldn't hold it still: "You are from Huilong Village, right? This is the horoscope for Huilong Village to marry a daughter-in-law. Your surname is Long?"

(End of this chapter)