【009】Grandpa's Shadow
The door made a squeezing sound like "How~How" and poked out the pale hands and head from the crack of the door where the gap was opened. Zhong Kui was so shocked that he suddenly woke up from the nightmare. While crying, he kicked off the quilt and turned over and got up, and never dared to continue sleeping.
Grandpa's bed is very small, so small that Zhong Kui can only curl his body to sleep all night. He is afraid that he will kick his grandpa if he accidentally kicks it. Grandpa is so old that he can't stand his tossing.
Zhong Kui turned up and wiped the clear saliva from the corners of his mouth. He glanced at his grandfather who was still sleeping heavily. When he stretched out his elbow, he felt extremely sore. His eyes fell on the door and suddenly remembered the nightmare just now. It seemed that the nightmare was caused by the wrong sleeping posture and the curling hands on his chest. He had nightmares. The key to sleeping was the one my father told him.
At this moment, Zhong Kui saw the scene he didn't want to see the most. His two mysterious friends suddenly walked in and the cold air all over his body formed a whole face. He appeared quietly in front of him like a shadow.
"You?" Zhong Kui said, feeling the heat coming out of his mouth, like aerosol. He couldn't help but tighten his body, pulling the quilt to cover his body. He knew that every time these two friends who couldn't speak appeared, the atmosphere of the space would be extremely cold. He even knew that there would be no good things when they appeared. Who did they come?
The two shadows who came in the door were like skateboards, slid silently by Zhong Kui and headed straight for grandpa.
Looking at this extremely strange scene, "Grandpa, you can't take him away." Zhong Kui exclaimed.
However, Zhong Kui's words were very small and he could not stop the two friends from summoning their grandfather's soul.
Zhong Kui can be said to be the first time in history that he saw a person who could be divided into two shapes. Grandpa's body suddenly supported another shape. It was just that this person who supported him was completely transparent, as light as the mist.
Zhong Kui stood there in a daze like a wooden look, looking at grandpa's shadow, and following the two silent friends. When he climbed to the other end of his grandpa's bed to look, he found that grandpa's body was already cold, his eyes were closed and there was a light smile remaining on the corners of his mouth.
The old man was depressed all his life and finally told the story in his heart. He was so happy! But he didn't know that Zhong Kui had something bigger to face.
Zhong Kui bought firecrackers from the agency store and did not dare to light them. Seeing his grandfather's neighbor passing by with a hoe, he was indifferent to the fact that he walked up and plopped forward and imitated the actions of the Yan family visiting his father last time, and kneeled down and couldn't get up.
Kowtow is the most respectful etiquette to others. When the man saw Zhong Kui kneeling down to him, he knew that something must have happened, so he immediately put down his hoe and asked.
"Grandpa~Woooo~Grandpa~He's gone." Zhong Kui burst into tears and whimpered. He still kept his possessed and kneeling, and said to the man.
"Ah~ When did this happen?" The man was afraid, afraid that he had unknowingly got into trouble and hit the dead man and just left.
"I don't know, but it's already cold when I touch him."
"That's good." The man said, took out the foreign matches in his pocket, and ignited the firecrackers with a sound of 'Pu'. A deafening sound was heard, and as pieces of paper were flying, a stream of blue smoke drifted in front of the door of the Laozhanren's room to inform all the people in the village, he left.
After the firecrackers rang out, the enthusiastic neighbors nearby came to help. Several aunts stood at the door to watch the movement. If the owner had the conditions, they were willing to help. If the owner was not willing to throw away and could not even afford the coffin, then I was sorry and had to leave. A few lingering women were idle and were talking nonsense.
"Tsk tsk! This old man died, and he worked hard all his life, pitiful."
"That's right, there was an old turtle called in the back mountain of our house last night. At that time, I told the head that something was going to happen if the old turtle call was about to be called. It was true."
"Who is this kid?"
"Bah, you don't know that this is a waste of time. Let me tell you..." A woman put her mouth close to another woman's ear, glanced at Zhong Kui with a slight eyebrow, and whispered in this way.
Zhong Kui ignored these talkative women. What he thought to himself was that when grandpa left, dad should be busy again. He had to hurry up and call dad, what should grandpa do about his funeral? There is still money at home, and that money is used by dad to buy piglets.
Zhong Kui ran home all the way, and what surprised him was that when he ran far away from the door, he saw that the door was open. He was happy. Dad was at home? But then he thought again, since Dad was at home, why didn’t he come to see his grandfather?
The sound of firecrackers should have reached here. Zhong Kui was puzzled and thought about it alone, so he quickly stepped up. While running, he shouted: "Dad~Dad."
Zhong Kui shouted countless times, and the door was open, but he just couldn't see his father.
"Dad~" Zhong Kui was unwilling to give up and walked into the house, leaving all three dilapidated houses, but he didn't see his father. However, he saw that the beds, quilts and pillows at home were all messy, as if someone was looking for something to mess around.
Because I had something in my mind, Zhong Kui did not pay attention to these unusual situations, but because he did not find his father, he felt something was wrong.
Zhong Kui's slopes were not much, only a few areas. He didn't find them at home, so he hurriedly ran to the slope. In addition to the crops that undulate with the wind, there were some grass growing again, without the figure of his father. "Dad~ Where are you?" Without seeing his father, an indescribable sense of ominousness suddenly surged into his mind.
Grandpa was still waiting, so he couldn't be here like this. Zhong Kui thought that on weekdays, his father liked to stuff money into the pillows. He ran home in a flash and shook out all the twigs in the big and small pillows. He had no money and had no dime.
Zhong Kui was completely confused by what was happening in front of him. What about the money? Did his father take it away? Or did he take the money to buy piglets? If so, then nothing will be true. Dad will come back sooner or later.
But why did my father rummagate his house as if he was raiding his house? Zhong Kui glanced at the house in confusion. In the end, he had to choose to go to his grandfather's house to take a look.
In my grandfather's house, except for two or three kind-hearted men, the other gossiping women had long since dispersed.
When the three men saw Zhong Kui running back alone, they hurriedly asked why his father hadn't come.
Zhong Kui told them about the search for his father in this way. They shook their heads speechlessly, and finally decided to wrap him with the old man's bamboo mat where he slept, and put him in the only house. Waiting for the neighboring village to do good deeds to cut the old man's hole.
Seeing the broken mat wrapped around grandpa's body, I felt so heartbroken. A person who cut the holes for the dead for the rest of his life was wrapped around a broken mat after his death.
Fortunately, the cave-killing man from the neighboring village was a good friend of Grandpa Zhong Kui during his lifetime. After a while, he rushed over and took out a paper and notebook to record the old man's height and fat body without saying a word. Then he took out a compass and a gossip copper coin positioning, and when dusk came, his grandfather was buried.
Chapter completed!