"Kneel properly!"

The rattan cane lashed hard across his buttocks, followed by a searing pain. Feng Bingwen's rosy face contorted in pain, but he endured it.

"I've told you so many times not to go behind the village, but you just won't listen."

A stern voice rang out in the old, dilapidated hall. The child quietly raised his head and saw an old man dressed in a plain gray shirt holding a rattan cane. His thick eyebrows trembled, revealing the old man's anger.

"Alright, alright, you've hit me so many times, that's enough. Wen'er has remembered and won't go again next time."

Seeing the old man pick up a rattan cane, ready to hit him, an old woman who was sewing shoe soles nearby couldn't hold back any longer.

"He won't learn his lesson unless I hit him a few more times."

The old man was not appeased by his wife's pleas for mercy. He raised the rattan cane and once again struck the child's bottom, making a crisp cracking sound.

"You old bastard, when will you ever stop? Wen'er is so young, and you hit her so hard. If you hurt her, I'll never forgive you."

The old woman, who had been standing to the side, became enraged. She rushed to the old man and blocked the child who was being punished by kneeling behind her.

“I’ve disciplined countless students in the private school. I’ve been careful with my strength, because the children are so young, that’s why I have to discipline and teach them.”

The old man holding the rattan cane trembled even more violently, his thick eyebrows shaking even more violently. He showed no sign of backing down; instead, he grew even angrier.

"It's because you always protect him when we hit him that he never learns his lesson. Today he actually dared to take a few of the village kids to play in the back."

"They're all back safely, why are you still angry?"

The old woman looked at the old man with a reproachful expression.

"Safety? Let's talk about that after tonight!"

The old man looked up at the outside. The sunlight was already turning slightly yellow; the sun was setting and dusk was approaching.

"snort!"

The angry old man threw down the rattan cane and stormed back into the side room.

"Wen'er, does it hurt?"

The old woman looked at the child who had endured several lashes from that old man without uttering a sound or shedding a tear, and asked him with concern, her face showing heartache.

"Grandma, I'm fine."

Feng Bingwen looked at the kind-faced, white-haired old woman in front of him and quickly shook his head.

Although he estimated that his hot and swollen buttocks had been whipped until they were swollen, he thought that since he had already suffered the pain, why should he make his grandmother worry? Besides, it was indeed his fault.

"Why did you run to the back? I've told your grandfather so many times not to go to the back."

“I didn’t want to go to the back either. We were originally a group of people playing in the village, but we ended up going there.”

The child scratched his head, quite puzzled.

He couldn't understand why the two elderly people in his family were so wary of the wasteland behind the village. He had looked at it from afar many times and couldn't see anything wrong with it. It was just a piece of wasteland with slightly undulating terrain and overgrown weeds.

If we're talking about real danger, it's actually Wolong Lake behind the wasteland. The lake is vast, stretching for hundreds of miles, but he was very self-disciplined. None of the kids he was playing with were allowed to go into the water, or even get close to the lake.

"Don't go there again next time."

As the old woman spoke, she stretched out her calloused and wrinkled hand and was about to pull down the child's pants to take a look.

"Come here, let Grandma see how badly he's been beaten?"

"grandmother!"

The child immediately reacted like a cat with its fur standing on end, crying out, quickly pulling up his pants, covering himself tightly, and showing a mixture of shame and anger on his face.

"That old bastard, he actually hit me so hard, I'm going to settle the score with him."

The old woman paid no attention to the child's embarrassment; instead, she complained about the old man, picked up a rolling pin, and stormed into the side room.

"hiss!"

After the two elderly people left, Feng Bingwen's tense little face twisted into a grimace. He gasped and cautiously reached out to touch the little bottom.

"Ouch, that hurts!"

Touching the red and swollen welts on his buttocks, Feng Bingwen grimaced.

However, despite being beaten, he had a strange feeling. It seemed like he had experienced something similar before, but after searching his memory, this was the first time he had ever been beaten.

"I've had a similar dream!"

Feeling as if he had experienced something similar before, Feng Bingwen's attention was drawn away from himself. After trying hard to recall, he finally remembered where he had experienced something similar.

"I was beaten in my dream."

Feng Bingwen's face twisted in shock. Ever since he could remember, he had had bizarre dreams every now and then. Some of his dreams were similar to his current life, but most of them were scenes he couldn't understand.

When he was younger, he told the adults about a dream he had, but the result was that he was given talisman water by a Taoist priest invited by the elders in his family for three days.

A carriage that can travel a thousand miles in a day without being pulled by a horse, a giant steel bird that can carry hundreds of people in its belly, and even a giant steel snake that can swallow thousands of people and traverse mountains and valleys... Undoubtedly, when he mentioned these things, the villagers immediately thought he was possessed.

From then on, Feng Bingwen never told anyone about his dreams again, but these dreams continued intermittently.

Among these incidents were instances where he was beaten for running around, and not just once like he was, but three times at different times.

"I remember going there, those kinds of places seem to..."

As Feng Bingwen recalled the scene from his dream, he suddenly realized something quite terrifying: as a child, if you go to those remote and secluded places, you often encounter...

"Wen'er, stop kneeling, come down and eat."

As the sun set, wisps of smoke rose from the chimneys. The child who had been forced to kneel heard a call from behind him, and his thoughts snapped out of his reverie. He was allowed to get up, and then, with a sour expression, he rose from the bamboo chair, stumbling as he stepped onto the ground.

"They're here!"

After the soreness and numbness in his legs subsided, Feng Bingwen took the initiative to set out the table and chairs, waiting for the meal to begin.

"You're sleeping with me tonight!"

At the dinner table, the old man, holding a glass of cloudy wine and taking sips from time to time, looked at his grandson who was wolfing down his food. Upon hearing this, Feng Bingwen looked at his grandfather beside him in astonishment.

"No need, I'm all grown up now."

Feng Bingwen's little face was full of displeasure. He had gone to great lengths to earn the right to sleep in a bed by himself. He had never liked sleeping with others since he was a child, which made him different from other children his age.

"You have to sleep with me tonight. After tonight, whether you sleep sideways or diagonally is none of your business."

The old man's tone left no room for argument.