Chapter 4: Bai Yuehu

The rooms in the old house that needed to be used on a regular basis were all taken care of, but there were still a few rooms in Lu Qingjiu that had not been touched, as they were in a state of disrepair and the roofs were all a bit broken.

Lu Qingjiu has been in bed almost as soon as he arrived, and the insomnia that used to plague him has disappeared.

The air in the countryside is good, especially in the morning. Lu Qingjiu got up at seven o'clock, had a simple breakfast and then took the beans that had been soaked in advance last night out of the water and carried a big bag of beans to the big mill at the village head.

Today he and Yin Xun had agreed to grind some beans for douhua, which Yin Xun had taken from his house yesterday.

Most of the people in Shuifu Village knew about Lu Qingjiu's return from the city. On the way, the villagers greeted Lu Qingjiu warmly and were very cordial, they seemed to like this university student. Lu Qingjiu responded.

When he arrived at the mill, Yin Xun was already sitting next to the mill with a handful of fried winter melon seeds in his hand, and when he saw Lu Qingjiu coming, he stood up and greeted him: "Here you are.

"Hmm." Lu Qingjiu said, "You're so early."

"I didn't sleep too well yesterday because my head was so swollen." Yin Xun said, "I only got up in the morning and my face was better."

Lu Qingjiu looked at Yin Xun and was relieved to find that his face was indeed swollen, saying, "You put the beans in, I'll push the mill."

"Okay." Yin Xun didn't argue with Lu Qingjiu either.

So the two men divided the work and grinded the beans on the fly.

This mill has been in the village for decades, and Lu Qingjiu has memories of climbing onto it as a child and being spanked by his grandmother.

He had followed a group of his friends around the mountains and ran around almost every corner of the village. But now almost all the village friends have left, and Yin Xun is the only one left in the village.

The beans are grown by the Yin Xun family and are of very good quality. The bean paste is white and fine and smells of beans. Bring it back to the boil and add some marinade to it, and when the bean paste has set, the bean flowers are ready.

The pot of beans turned into milky white pulp and Yin Xun put the dregs in a bag, which was good for feeding the pigs and could not be thrown away.

The two of them, Yin Xun with the bean curd and Lu Qingjiu with the bean paste, returned to the old house.

"I'll go and feed the pigs." Yin Xun raised the object in his hand.

"Go on." Lu Qingjiu thought for a moment, but spoke anyway, "By the way, yesterday the neighbour's children named those two little wild boars."

Yin Xun said, "Li Xiaoyu, what name did he give to the pig?"

"The older one is Xiao Hua and the younger one is Xiao Hei." Lu Qingjiu replied.

"Why Xiao Hua," Yin Xun said, "do you have to bring up my sad story?"

"It's a child's name, and I can't argue with him." Lu Qingjiu explains helplessly to Yin Xun.

"Oh." Yin Xun didn't say anything else after hearing that, but just said with a face full of vicissitudes, "Then the big ones must be better than the small ones"

Lu Qingjiu: ""Please shut up quickly.

While Yin Xun feeds the pigs, Lu Qingjiu pours the bean paste into a pot and then lights the fire, bringing it to a boil over high heat and then slowly cooking it over low heat, adding the marinade and pressing it down with a spoon. If you press it hard, it will be too old, if you press it lightly, it will not take shape. Lu Qingjiu has done this before at home, so it's quite an experience.

While working on the douhua, Yin Xun shouted from the courtyard, "Someone's looking for sake."

"Who is it?" Lu Qingjiu answered, "Who is looking for me?"

"You'll see if you come out and see." Yin Xun replied.

Lu Qingjiu turned to the courtyard and saw Yin Xun standing in the courtyard, but it was the man next to him that caught his eye.

"Hello to you." Lu Qingjiu wanted to greet him, but he still had a spoon in his hand, so he could only wave it awkwardly in his hand.

"Hello." The man opened his mouth, his voice soft, but audible.

"Lu Qingjiu was inexplicably nervous about being stared at by a man like this. The man was very good looking, still the same languid look he had seen a few days before, with distinctive Danfeng eyes and a high nose, his whole body full of ink-like classical beauty.

"I said I'd come for you." The man said, "I'm coming."

Lu Qingjiu :""

He remembered the man's name, Bai Yuehu, and what he had said when they met in the marketplace, but he hadn't expected him to actually come to him.

"What, you forgot" Bai Yuehu stared into Lu Qingjiu's eyes.

"No, I haven't forgotten." Lu Qingjiu said, "I'm here, I'm here, want some bean curd?"

Bai Yuehu said, "What are bean flowers?"

Lu Qingjiu said, "Do you have any luggage to put in the house first?"

Bai Yuehu nods.

Lu Qingjiu then led him to the guest room, which had just been cleaned, and was relieved to see Bai Yuehu go in.

Yin Xun looked on in amazement and reached out to Lu Qingjiu and whispered, "Hey, you just invited someone in like that."

"He's good." Lu Qingjiu said.

"How do you know?" Yin Xun glared.

Lu Qingjiu said, "Because he's good-looking."

Yin Xun :""

Lu Qingjiu was joking, of course, but in fact he had dared to call Bai Yuehu into the house because of the sack Bai Yuehu had given him, and the gecko's tail in the sack confirmed some of Lu Qingjiu's suspicions that what had happened that night was not a dream, but a real fact, and that if it had not been for the man, he might have been the food of the giant gecko. If it hadn't been for the man, he might have become the gigantic gecko's food.

"You don't have to worry about me, I'm a big man, what can happen to me?" Lu Qingjiu patted Yin Xun's shoulder and comforted his friend.

Yin Xun looked at Lu Qingjiu and then at the man in the room and muttered, "What's wrong with men, they're not safe these days either, although the one who's not safe isn't necessarily you"

Lu Qingjiu was shocked: "What do you mean?"

Yin Xun: "You heard me wrong I didn't say anything."

"I'm too lazy to talk to you, the douhua is still in the pot, go and cut up the meat, I'll stir fry back the meat for dinner later." Lu Qingjiu carried Yin Xun back to the kitchen.

The meat was bought by Yin Xun in the morning. After Lu Qingjiu has ordered the beansprouts, he cuts the pork into even three-finger widths, heats the oil and stirs-fries it with garlic and bean cloves. The white fatty parts of the meat were fried and turned into an attractive golden colour, and the whole piece of pork curled up.

Yin Xun couldn't wait to take a piece with her chopsticks and after two chews she exclaimed, "It's delicious, and the meat smells so good."

"You serve it out and I'll cook another cabbage and egg flower soup." Lu Qingjiu reached out and wiped the beads of sweat from his chin, saying, "Serve the rice and bean curd too, I'll make the ingredients for the bean curd later."

"Okay." Yin Xun went on his way.

Lu Qingjiu finished the rest of the food and the two people outside were already sitting in front of the table, waiting for him with bated breath. Even Yin Xun was waiting, but Lu Qingjiu could see the look of anticipation on Bai Yuehu's face.

Lu Qingjiu put the items in his hands on the table and said, "Eat."

Next to them, Yin Xun and Bai Yuehu picked up their chopsticks together at the sound of their voices and rushed to the meat.

Lu Qingjiu also took a chopstick of the meat in the pot and tasted it. His cooking skills were actually quite mediocre, but I don't know if it was because of the ingredients, but the meat in the pot was extraordinarily fragrant, the fatty meat on the pancake was not greasy at all, but very soft and sticky.

Lu Qingjiu tasted some more bean curd, which was also a success, soft and firm, with a little of the specially prepared ingredients, and Lu Qingjiu could eat a big bowl of it by himself.

He was almost full after two bowls of rice, and Yin Xun had eaten almost as much, but Bai Yuehu had no intention of stopping, and the strangest thing was that he was eating with such grace that it was as if he were eating some exotic delicacy rather than some home-cooked dish.

Yin Xun rubbed his belly and said, "I'm full."

"I'm full too." Lu Qingjiu said, "Bai Yuehu, you can wash the dishes later."

Bai Yuehu nodded naturally at his words, seemingly fully integrated into the collective family.

Lu Qingjiu didn't see anything wrong with letting him do the dishes, although he didn't know why he wanted to live here, but now that he was here he had to get used to doing them.

When Yin Xun had had enough, he got up and said goodbye, saying he was going home to take a nap.

Bai Yuehu picked up the dishes and rolled up his sleeves and went to the kitchen. Lu Qingjiu was also ready to take a nap, so he moved a chair into the courtyard and prepared to sleep in the sun. The early spring sun was much gentler than the summer sun, and it shone through the clouds, making people feel warm all over.

Lu Qingjiu was sitting in his recliner, dazed and on the verge of sleep, when he felt something drip on his face. He woke up with a start, only to find that the sun, which had been brilliantly shining overhead, had disappeared at some point, leaving only a black, dark cloud. Tiny drops of rain fell from the clouds and pattered down on his cheeks.

It was going to rain Lu Qingjiu reached up and touched the tip of his nose and felt a little wetness. He got up from his chair and was about to go into the house when he heard a strange sound clink, clink, clink, as if someone was hitting something hard with a stone, something that must have been meat or something like that, because Lu Qingjiu clearly heard the slimy sound of meat being smashed.

Lu Qingjiu's footsteps moved slowly as he rounded the corner and saw the backyard shrouded in rain. A man had his back to him, a heavy stone in his hands, stained with bright red blood, and he was bent over, smashing the object in front of him, one after the other, with great force. Lu Qingjiu could see clearly what he was smashing, even though he was far away, it was a man whose face was already a bloody mess, his long hair mixed with the smashed flesh, there was no way that man was still alive.

Lu Qingjiu breathed a sigh of relief at the sight of such a gruesome scene and shouted, "What are you doing?"

He slowly turned his head, allowing Lu Qingjiu to see his face, which was no longer a human face at all, covered with dense black hair, and only vaguely visible features. The man let out a harsh scream when he saw Lu Qingjiu, and then the black hair grew longer and longer, eventually enveloping the bloodied man completely.

Lu Qingjiu was awakened by the sound of a heavy object falling into the water. He realised that he was still lying on the bench and Bai Yuehu, who had finished washing the dishes, was standing next to him, looking at him with a blank expression.

"I seem to have had a dream." Lu Qingjiu said vaguely.

"Yes." Bai Yuehu said, "You had a dream."

Lu Qingjiu said, "I dreamt that there was a dead man in the well in the backyard."

Bai Yuehu looked at him without speaking.

Lu Qingjiu said, "Is it really there?"

Bai Yuehu is silent for a moment and asks instead of answering, "So what did you come back here for?"

Lu Qingjiu frowned, "I just feel tired in the city and want to come back."

Bai Yuehu said, "Just so"

Lu Qingjiu closed his mouth, the fact that he had returned here for reasons he did not want to mention because they were so absurd, so absurd that it seemed like a joke to say them.

Lu Qingjiu didn't say anything, and Bai Yuehu didn't ask either. He looked at the sky and said it was going to rain, then turned around and went back to the house.

Lu Qingjiu looks around the courtyard and suddenly feels the biting cold of spring.

He got up from his chair and walked to where the backyard was, only to see a black well standing in the empty backyard. Lu Qingjiu saw the sight and nodded and went back to the house.

As Bai Yuehu said, it soon began to drizzle.

Spring rains are as precious as oil, and this is especially true for farmers. Lu Qingjiu felt as if he had also experienced a touch of Zen as he watched the rain moisten everything.

But Bai Yuehu, who was sitting next to him, obviously didn't think so, as he held out his hand to Lu Qingjiu and said, "Give me some melon seeds too."

Lu Qingjiu said, "Oh, I'll share the melon with Bai Yuehu.

Bai Yuehu said, "You saw the courtyard earlier, do you have any ideas?"

Lu Qingjiu said, "The time is not right."

Bai Yuehu's eyes sank: "When are you going to wait?"

Lu Qingjiu: "Summer"

Bai Yuehu: "So what if we wait until summer," he was about to say that things in the well would come out in spring and summer, when Lu Qingjiu let out a long sigh: "You don't understand, do you? The yard is so small that you can only grow these vines."

Bai Yuehu: "All you can think about is dumping the yard"

Lu Qingjiu is baffled: "Or what?"

Bai Yuehu: "" He continued to eat the melon in silence.

Lu Qingjiu propped up his chin, spat the melon rind into a nearby bin and sighed, "I'm just kidding, better call the police first, there must be something in that well."

Bai Yuehu said, "Well."

After a few moments of silence between them, Lu Qingjiu found the courage to turn his head and look at Bai Yuehu: "I have another question."

"I am a fox." Before Lu Qingjiu's question could be asked, Bai Yuehu spoke with extra seriousness, "The kind of demon you humans like best."

Lu Qingjiu: ""He hasn't even asked yet.

Not knowing what Lu Qingjiu's expression had made Bai Yuehu misunderstand, he stood up and turned his back to Lu Qingjiu, "I am really a fox." At the end of his sentence, several large, fluffy tails poked out from under Bai Yuehu's clothes.

The tail was pure white fur, soft and fluffy, and looked very nice to touch. Lu Qingjiu's hand tickled a little, but didn't dare to reach out, just said, "Oh, I know."

I don't know if it was Lu Qingjiu's illusion, but he felt that Bai Yuehu was subtly relieved after he said that, as if he was relieved of something.

The fox was so straightforward in revealing his identity, wasn't he afraid of scaring himself? Lu Qingjiu felt a bit strange at the same time as he was a bit despondent, he always felt that Bai Yuehu was acting a bit strange, as if he was afraid he wouldn't believe he was a fox.

Well, there was no reason for him to pretend to be a fox, Lu Qingjiu explained to himself.

Perhaps the desire for a white furry tail was too obvious in Lu Qingjiu's eyes, and Bai Yuehu frowned at Lu Qingjiu before saying, "You can touch it."

Lu Qingjiu didn't react to the sound.

"It's okay to touch." Bai Yuehu repeated again, and those fluffy tails twitched gently.

Lu Qingjiu heard this and immediately put his hand on it. After touching the fluffy tail, he even heard his soul sigh with pleasure, the large tail was fluffy and smooth, it felt like soft silk Lu Qingjiu jerked it off hard, and it took him a while to withdraw his hand: "Thank you, Brother Bai. " This is the first time in his life that he has touched a fox spirit's tail, and possibly the last.

Bai Yuehu saw Lu Qingjiu's face full of happiness, nodded and got up to go back into the house.

Lu Qingjiu didn't move, he had actually encountered these strange creatures quite a few times and was overwhelmed by the variety.

If it was a normal person who met Bai Yuehu, he would have been scared half to death.

But to be honest, this was the first time Lu Qingjiu had seen a sane and sane goblin like Bai Yuehu, most of his previous sightings had been of things that were not self-aware, such as the tree at the entrance to their flat that repeated the gossip of others

After the dream he had just had, Lu Qingjiu was now sure that there was something dirty in his backyard, so he picked up his mobile phone and called the police. Of course he didn't say that he had dreamt it, but that there was something in the well water and he suspected that someone had accidentally fallen in.

The police said they would come as soon as possible and asked Lu Qingjiu to secure the scene. There are no police in the village, they had to drive from the town and it would probably be dark by the time they got here.

Lu Qingjiu then went to the kitchen, made some flour, beat some eggs, cooked a large egg cake, cooked a pot of sweet potato porridge and patted two cucumbers, and simply prepared a dinner.

The three of them were sitting by the well eating dinner. Yin Xun was a bit confused and said, "What are you doing, guarding the well?

What's at the mouth? What's in the well?"

Lu Qingjiu: "There are ghosts."

Yin Xun took a bite of pie and said vaguely, "You can't go to the police if there's a ghost, can you?"

Lu Qingjiu said, "There is always a reason for ghosts, what if the ghost's body is in the well."

Yin Xun: "" he felt as if the pie in his mouth tasted like something else he silently put down the pie in his hand.

At around ten o'clock, a police siren sounded at the entrance to the village and drove all the way to the entrance of the old Lu Qingjiu house, followed by two policemen in a car.

"Did you call the police?" the younger policeman said as he knocked on the door of the old house.

"It's me." Lu Qingjiu said.

"You said a man fell in your well," the policeman asked, "are you sure?"

"I just wasn't sure before I called the police." Lu Qingjiu said, "It was when I heard something fall into the well."

The two policemen looked at each other and the older one said, "Show us first."

So the group went back to the backyard, where the young policeman took a torch and shone it inside, then muttered with a frown, "There really seems to be something floating in here."

Without speaking, the old policeman looked carefully and then took out a rope from his bag with an iron hook on it, he threw it into the well and then stirred it hard in the water and said, "It's hooked."

"Can you pull it up," the young policeman asked.

"I'll try." The old policeman tried to push, but the water seemed very heavy and there was no way to hook it up, he shook his head and his expression became serious, "No, it's very heavy."

"It can't really be a person, can it." The young cop started to get a little nervous.

"I'll call the bureau and ask them to send some more people and equipment over to confirm." The old policeman looked at Lu Qingjiu with a subtle expression and said. "It might really be a person."

Faced with the police's suspicious gaze, Lu Qingjiu thought to himself, "It's useless to look at me, I really have nothing to do with this. Of course, the police would not believe him when he said that he was the one who called the police and said that someone had fallen down the well.

What the author has to say: Bai Yuehu: I'm really a fox.

Lu Qingjiu: Are you repeating yourself so many times because you're weak or what?

Bai Yuehu: Whatever, I am the fox.