The animal world of the head of the village

Chapter 50 Bloody Sacrifice Ceremony
On the 22nd of the twelfth lunar month, before dawn, Huang Xiaohu received a call from Hu Xiaomei, asking Huang Xiaohu to come to the village committee to help as soon as possible.

The first ritual of the Mountain God Sacrifice is to offer sacrifices.

When Huang Xiaohu arrived at the village committee, it was already full of voices and bustling.

Seeing Huang Xiaohu coming, Hu Xiaomei said to him, "You can participate in today's ceremony with me. There will be a sacrifice ceremony soon, and those animals have already been pulled to the altar. You can kill sheep. Can it work?"

"Killing sheep? I still won't go. I haven't even killed a chicken."

"Others will teach you how to do it, isn't it just to kill a sheep?"

"Secretary Hu, this can't be forced, right? Anyway, I definitely won't do the killing of sheep. Going to see the sacrifice is already a great way to save face."

"Huang Xiaohu, you still want to choose the village head? The folks in Huilong Village will be watching today. You can see how active Yu Changqing is. Later, Yu Changqing will personally hold the knife when he presents the head of the cow."

"No way? Changqing doesn't seem to have killed a cow before. Will he do this?"

"As for me, as the village secretary of Huilong Village, mountain god sacrifice is a tradition of Huilong Village, and it is a folk custom. In addition to respect, I also have the obligation to continue to inherit and carry forward. Although I dare not kill, but I am a woman , Is it still possible to talk about it? Huang Xiaohu, you are a big man, you would cringe at killing a sheep, what kind of man are you?"

"Hu Zhishu, I don't like to hear you say that. What kind of big man? If you dare to kill a sheep, you are a big man? If you kill an animal, you are a big man? I know that mountain god sacrifice is a tradition, so I respect it, but it doesn't mean that I should do it because of traditional folk customs. And do things against your will.”

"Well, if you don't dare to kill, you won't kill. I didn't warn you at the beginning. It's just that something happened to a fellow villager. It happened that one of the sheep killers was missing. I want you to blame me. Then I will Discuss with the village chief, it will start soon, I have to hurry up."

Just as he was talking, there was a sudden sound of gongs and drums, and a bull with big red flowers on it and a big red robe was led to the open space under the altar.

Only at this time did Huang Xiaohu realize that there were several wooden stakes standing in the open space, and the bull was tied to the central stake, and the noose just caught the bull's head and hind legs.

Someone started to set off firecrackers, and a huge firecracker rang for five or six minutes.

Huang Xiaohu saw that a few people appeared near the altar with cameras and microphones on their shoulders. They should not be villagers from Huilong Village, but they were probably invited to take pictures.

Another set of firecrackers exploded for a few minutes, followed by the sound of gongs and drums.

The sound of gongs and drums is very tight, with such a warm rhythm.

More and more villagers watched the excitement, and the altar was already full of people.Needless to say, almost all the villagers who could come to Huilong Village should have come, because those old people and children living alone appeared in the crowd.

Several goats hung with red flowers were led to the open space under the altar, and then tied to the surrounding wooden stakes.

Huang Xiaohu saw five goats, with the silent bull in the center.

When the auspicious time came, a horn sounded.

Woohoo, sounded the horn, and seemed to sound the death knell for the sacrifice.

Five villagers in black came out amidst the sound of horns, each holding a shining long knife in their hands.

The sound of the horn stopped, and the whole crowd fell silent.

Village head Yu and several respected elders in the village walked up to the altar together.

Hu Zhishu also helped Blind Chen to go up.

Village head Yu looked at the villagers below, cleared his throat, and began to speak.

"The Mountain God Sacrifice was handed down from the ancestors of our Huilong Village. The ancestors used the ceremony of worshiping the mountain god to pray for our Huilong Village, bless the stability of Huilong Village, and the safety of the villagers in Huilong Village. After all, this It is the 200th year of the mountain god ceremony."

Hearing this, the crowd started to riot.

"200 years of sacrifice? But who counted it?"

"Is it really 200 years? No wonder this time is so grand."

"If it's 200 years, we should really do a good job, no wonder there are still cameras."

"Now I know why the living sacrifice was. It turned out to be the 200-year mountain god sacrifice."

……

Village head Yu cleared his throat again, signaled the villagers to calm down, and continued, "We have asked the birthday man in the village, Zhang Changsheng, who is also known as the living god, to pull the red rope for the mountain god sacrifice!"

Huang Xiaohu had also watched the Mountain God Sacrifice, but it had never been so grand, so even Huang Xiaohu had never seen many ceremonies.

Zhang Changsheng is the oldest elder in Huilong Village. Just like his name, Zhang Changsheng has a very long life, which can be described as immortality.

It is said that Zhang Changsheng is 99 years old this year, but he walks and talks very normally, and even continues to do farm work.As long as there is someone in Huilong Village to handle errands, whether it is a celebration or a funeral, there is one person who must be invited, and that is Zhang Changsheng.

Zhang Changsheng is sacrificed at the Mountain God every year, and in recent years he has been pulling the red rope.

Pulling the red rope is to pull a red rope, which means the initiation of the ceremony.When the red rope is pulled, the flag of the Mountain God Festival will be raised, but this is the red rope that was pulled a few years ago.

This time Zhang Changsheng walked to the edge of a red rope under the watchful eyes of everyone, and pulled the red rope.

Hearing the whirring sound, the red curtain at the back of the altar was pulled down, revealing three large characters "Mountain God Sacrifice!"

When Huang Xiaohu saw these words, they were all bigger than a person, with black characters on a red background, the scene was really shocking.

There were cheers, applause and screams from below the altar.

The sound of gongs and drums sounded again, and with the sound of gongs and drums, the crowd dispersed automatically, leaving a circular open space.

Five wooden stakes, five goats tied with big red flowers, and in the center is a bull that is starting to restless.

The gong stopped and the drums continued.

Stepping on the beat of the drum, five knife-wielding men in black walked into the open space and began to circle around the five goats.

Turn forward three times, reverse three times, and start raising the knife over the top.

The gong sounds and the drums stop.

Following the sound of the gong, five black-clothed knife-wielding men lined up one by one, and then each walked up to a goat.

test knife.

The knife-wielder in black wipes the long knife on the goat's body. At this time, the knife-wielder needs to find out where to cut the knife later.

The sound of gongs and drums sounded again, and a rush of gongs and drums suddenly stopped.

Five sword bearers in black showed their long swords, and the sacrifice ceremony began.

Five goats waiting to be slaughtered, of course, should also be aware of what will happen next.

One of the knife holders shouted: "Sacrifice!"

Five knife holders came out at the same time and slashed at the goat's neck.

Maybe it was because the parts were not accurately grasped, maybe it was because the goat was dying, or maybe the knife holders were inexperienced. In short, there were many reasons why the five knife holders did not directly cut off the goat's head.

The booing, shouting, screaming and jeering drowned out the cries and whines of the goats.

The knife holder continues to draw out the knife, cut down, one knife, two knife, three knife...

A goat's head had been chopped off, and the knifeman picked up the goat's head and held it over his head, and the blood ran down his face, but he didn't care at all.

A second goat was beheaded, then a third, and a fourth.

Only one goat persisted to the end. At this time, everyone in the audience was staring at the knife holder and the goat with such tenacious vitality.

The goat is tied to a stake, but the rope goes around the goat's neck but not around the goat's legs.Goats can run around the stakes, and the knifeman seems to have slashed a few times, only to the back of the goat. Although the goat looks bloody, it has not died yet.

In order to prevent the rope around the goat's neck from being cut off, a double rope set was used, one fixed to the neck and the other to the goat's horns.

Huang Xiaohu saw that the rope around the goat's neck seemed to be cut off, but the goat was still alive.

The sacrifice of the living sacrifice requires the person holding the knife to cut off the head himself, and no one else can help.

At this moment, Huang Xiaohu recognized the knife-wielder. It turned out to be Zhang Jianwei, who was probably called there temporarily to help.

Huang Xiaohu thought to himself: If he agreed to Hu Zhishu's request and participated in holding the knife, would he still have the courage to continue killing?
Amidst the laughter of the crowd, the knife-wielder hacked a few more times, and finally felled the goat to the ground.Then he walked over to the goat, which could no longer resist, and chopped it down again.

The head of the fifth goat was cut off.

The five knife holders hung all the goat heads that had been chopped off alive on the hooks on the wooden stakes.Then wait in place.

The sound of gongs and drums sounded again, followed by the sound of a large number of firecrackers.

After a while, the gong stopped and the drums continued.

A knife-wielding man in red walked into the arena, and Huang Xiaohu recognized this person as Yu Changqing.

With the sound of drums, the red-clothed knife-wielder led five black-clothed knife-wielders to circle around the bull.

Suddenly the drums stopped, and the sword bearers suddenly fell on the bull.

The gongs and drums sounded again, and the knife holders circled the bull again.

The bull is tied to a central stake, and the back legs are also covered with a rope along with the head. In this way, the bull can only turn around in circles, and there is no room for escape or resistance.

Just now the bull was hacked several times by the knife holders, and there was a wound on the back, and one cut seemed to be deep, and a red piece of flesh was already exposed.

Huang Xiaohu was horrified, he never thought that the living sacrifice would be so cruel.

The gong stopped and the drums continued.

Suddenly the beating of the drums stopped, and the knife-bearers fell on the bull again.

The gongs and drums sounded again, and the knife holders circled the bull again.

After repeating this several times, the bull had begun to lose his strength and half-kneeled on the ground, his body was bloody and bloody.

It seemed that it was time to sacrifice, and a rush of drums sounded, and the knife bearers rushed to the half-kneeling bull, and began to slash directly at the bull's neck with their knives.

Several people hacked for a while, and finally separated the bull's head from the bull's body.

The red-clothed knife-wielder is in the middle, and there is a black-clothed knife-wielder on each side. The three of them raised the bull's head together!

Cheers, shouts, exclamations, and applause drowned out Huang Xiaohu's cries.

(End of this chapter)