I made myself the protagonist

Chapter 167
Li Ying's family lives in the southernmost part of the village. It is a single household. Compared with most peasant households, it can be said that the conditions are quite poor.

Ling Yun and his party walked for more than 20 minutes on foot before they found this place.On the open land in the south, there stood a dilapidated black-tiled earthen house all alone.

The tiles on the roof were broken a lot, and the dead leaves stacked on them were blown by the wind, mixed with the yellow and white paper money scattered on the ground in the yard, dancing all over the sky, looking particularly desolate.

The walls around the earth house have long since fallen off, exposing the gray stone walls inside.A lot of dense weeds grew from the cracks in the bricks on the ground, and thick dead leaves paved the ground, creaking when stepped on.

Strangely, the fence outside the yard was not closed tightly, but was only concealed. When the wind blew, the door frame rattled and swung back and forth, adding a bit of a weird atmosphere to the already gloomy house.

"Is anyone there?" Ling Yun stepped forward and yelled several times into the empty yard.After about ten seconds, everyone heard a hoarse voice mixed with intermittent coughing, coming from the room: "Come in..."

Walking into the yard, looking at the paper money flying around, Zhao Sicheng couldn't help feeling a little more vigilant.The room was pitch black, and the windows were tightly shut.As soon as they entered the room, everyone smelled a pungent herbal smell.

On the table in the living room was a needle basket, stuffed with a half-embroidered red handkerchief.The handkerchief is exquisitely embroidered and the patterns are lifelike. It can be seen that Li Ying is an ingenious girl.

Following the sound and entering the bedroom, they discovered that an old woman with a starved face and sunken eyes was lying on the kang.

After hearing the sound of footsteps, the old woman slowly turned her head, her lips were chapped, and her tone was trembling.Her pupils were clouded with gray and white, and she had obviously been blind for many years.

"Is it Ah Guang..." Due to poverty, this old woman suffered from diseases and her bones were extremely weak.It seems that it will die at any time.

"Old man, we are from the village. We passed by by accident, why is there no one to take care of you?" Ling Yun sat by the bed, quickly took out a bottle of water from his backpack, and carefully fed the old man to drink.

However, the old woman's sanity seemed to be a little unclear, she did not hear what Ling Yun said just now.After drinking the water and lying down, she pursed her lips, looked at the beam with dull eyes, and said tremblingly: "Ah Guang, Ah Guang, help me find, where is that girl Xiaoying? not going home……"

"Grandma, don't worry." Ling Yun didn't continue to explain.Instead, he turned his head to signal Zhao Sicheng and others not to enter the room, and followed the other party's words and asked, "When did Xiaoying disappear?"

"Three days."

The old woman murmured: "Before she left, the girl told me that the village chief asked her to get the medicine, which could cure my illness. But she went out and never came back... After that, she still The two brothers Jia Ren and Jia Yi came to deliver the medicine. But I asked them where Xiaoying had gone, and they said, they said..."

The old woman stopped suddenly, as if thinking of something, two lines of turbid tears trickled down the corners of her wrinkled eyes: "Xiaoying, girl, is no longer here."

"Mother-in-law, what happened? Xiaoying was taken away by the village head?" Ling Yun asked.

The old woman gave a trembling "Mm", and then remembered what Jia Ren told her back then, that Xiaoying had been chosen by Lord River God to be his bride.No other girl in the village could enjoy such a blessing.

"But what kind of blessing is this? If I had known that Xiaoying would trade her life for those medicinal herbs, my poor old woman might as well be smashed to death." The old woman burst into tears.

Seeing that the old woman seemed to know something, everyone was shocked.After Ling Yun caught the clues in the other party's words, he immediately asked the other party if he knew about the sacrifice.

The old woman stretched out her hand, grabbed Ling Yun, and tremblingly said:
"I heard my father talk about this. When he was young, in order to treat his mother, he ignored the village's warnings for a hundred years and went to Qingyuan Mountain alone to collect medicine. After that, his father accidentally fell He injured his leg. Qingyuan Mountain is full of fog and miasma, and wild animals come and go at night. Therefore, he has to spend the night in the mountain and wait for the dawn to find a way to go home."

"In the middle of the night, my father, who had been resting in the cave, suddenly heard movement in the woods. At that time, he stepped forward to take a look, and found that the former village head was leading a few people and carrying something, and was walking towards the forest. Head towards the top of the mountain."

The old woman recalled: "When I saw that scene, my father knew that this should be a river god sacrifice every 20 years."

In Guxun Village, such sacrificial offerings have long been a tradition; previous offerings were conducted by the village chief and several of his clan members.

The village chief told everyone that being selected as the bride of the river god is the supreme honor of a girl; and her family will receive the best treatment in the village because of this.

But the strange thing is that sacrificial ceremonies have always been held at night.The village head and his party will carry the bride in full dress to the Yongjiang River on the mountain for sacrifice, and during this process, except for the village head, even the girl's parents are not allowed to follow, so as not to offend the river. Lord God.

Therefore, for thousands of years, no villagers have ever known the true face of the ceremony.

"At that time, my father was young, so he couldn't restrain his inner curiosity, so he quietly followed behind the village chief and the others," said the old woman.

Except for the village chief, the four people behind him were all wearing black cloaks, and their faces were completely covered, making it impossible to see their faces clearly.They carried a big dark red box and held torches in their hands, and walked along the path towards the mountain.The whole process was very quiet, not even a little humming.

Seeing the disappearing figures of the five people, my father only felt a chill on his back, and suddenly felt horrified: This is already halfway up the mountain. In memory, the Yongjiang River is at the foot of the mountain. Even if it is to sacrifice, the village chief and the others should not This is the way to go.

Father looked at the pitch-black woods, and unexpectedly, he raised his feet and followed secretly.He wanted to see what the village chief and his clan were going to do when they went up the mountain in the middle of the night.

At night, the mountain is filled with erratic mist, but it is surprisingly quiet.

The narrow old path in the mountain is winding, the moon is covered by the coming black clouds, only the mottled and sparse light shines on the ground through the branches and leaves of the trees, and the mountain wind is blowing in the forest, making a burst of slow rustling sound .

Because he was not familiar with the terrain in the mountains, his father almost lost him several times.The further you go, the more rugged the road becomes.

For some reason, looking at the backs of the village chief and others in front of him, a feeling told his father that there was some unknown secret hidden in the forest ahead.

Although he was already very scared in his heart, he gritted his teeth and sped up, following.

By midnight, my father gradually began to feel a little tired.He leaned on the tree and panted heavily, wiped the sweat from his temples, and hesitated whether to give up.However, when he raised his head, he suddenly found that the fire in front of him suddenly disappeared.

My father was shocked, thinking that he had lost him.When he hurried to catch up, he found a bush in front of him.

He stooped forward and looked forward, only to find that there was a large open space behind the bushes.And right in front of the open space was an ancient well covered with moss.Not far from the ancient well, there is also a ruined temple.

It turned out that before I knew it, I followed them to the top of the mountain.

"Father said that he had heard the legend about the mountain temple on Qingyuan Mountain from his grandfather since he was a child. But the mountain god master has long since become a fairy and left. The village chief and the others held a sacrifice to the river god. Why did they go to the mountain temple?"

At that time, my father suppressed his fear and hid in the grass without moving.He quietly watched the village head and others put down the box, and then, a young girl in a wedding dress was lifted out of it.

The girl was only fifteen or sixteen years old, and his father immediately recognized her as Xiaolian, the only daughter of Widow Li in the west of the village.

(End of this chapter)