Kuaishi Zhuangzi, the backyard of the funeral hall.
Bang bang, there were two knocks on the door, and then a girl with a bun on her head pushed the door open and walked in.
Although his face doesn't look very old, there is a sense of maturity and calmness between his eyebrows.
"Xiao Yun, you're here!" Kuai Alua, who was lying on the bed, saw the person coming and quickly sat up.
Xiaoyun is also a daughter of a branch of the Kuai family. She is about the same age as Kuai Alua. However, because she was not chosen by the gods during the marriage, she stayed in the master's family to get married to a useless son of the master's family. Although she is a little freer than Kuai Alua, the light in her eyes is gone.
Seeing Kuai Alua struggling to get up, Xiaoyun hurried over to the bedside and held her down. "I heard you had a stomachache. What's going on?"
"It's nothing serious, just some bloating." Kuai Alua smiled apologetically and naturally took Xiaoyun's hand.
Her fingers are slender and her skin is fair and clear. It is not an exaggeration to say that they are delicate hands. They are in sharp contrast to the rough working hands she had when she first came to the master's house. Therefore, Xiaoyun has a love-hate relationship with her fate.
I love this life of having no worries about food, and having plenty of money to spend as soon as I open my eyes.
I hate this inescapable prison, where there is no freedom and laughter, and I have to live cautiously every day.
However, when she saw the red cloth wrapped around Kuai Alua's waist and ankles, she felt relieved. No matter how hard her life was, it was not as miserable as this girl's.
At the beginning of every month, a maid would come with a tape measure to measure Kuai Alua's waist. If it was too thick, she would immediately add another piece of red cloth. This would continue every month from her 15th birthday to her 85th birthday when she got married.
Xiaoyun looked at the girl who was getting thinner and thinner. She felt a little scared but also a little relieved that the gods did not choose her.
"Don't you usually eat your meals well? Why did I hear that you fell out of the window today?" She held Kuai Alua's hand, which was soft and small.
Kuai Alua smiled sheepishly, "When we were eating, the window was open, and I saw a butterfly fly by and land on a spider web on the eaves. Seeing it fluttering its wings looked so pitiful, I wanted to help it, but I was too stupid. The butterfly couldn't be saved, and it fell out on its own."
"You're in this state, and you still want to help Butterfly." Xiaoyun gave her a glare, "You're really lucky you didn't get hurt."
Kuai Alua curled the corner of her mouth and looked out the window, as if she was looking at something through the closed door.
"You know, Xiaoyun, I met a girl today. She must be a stranger who came to give me some wedding money. She was wearing a gray and white sweatshirt. It was a very ordinary outfit, but she looked very pretty."
Xiaoyun blinked: "Is he a stranger who got lost during the banquet?"
"I don't know, I think so." Kuai Aluan slowly stood up with her hands on the bed, her eyes bright as she said, "That girl was amazing. She jumped up and rescued the little butterfly and put it in my hands."
Xiaoyun still didn't understand what she meant. The old house was low, and anyone except Kuai Alua, who was wrapped in red cloth, could touch the eaves by jumping. She didn't understand what was so great about saving a butterfly, but then she thought that what she said was unintentionally touching on her sore spot, so she smiled slightly and said, "Yeah, it is quite impressive."
But unexpectedly, Kuai Alua became more and more excited as she spoke, and she became inexplicably excited, with a light in her eyes that had never been seen before.
"I've never seen such a beautiful girl. Just standing there, I felt like I was looking up at her. It was amazing, like she was glowing. It was a very comfortable feeling."
Recalling the surprise when they first met, Kuai Alua had a smile on her lips.
In her memory, the girl gently helped her up, and was very kind to help her save the butterfly. She also placed the butterfly in the palm of her hand. Her fingertips swept across her palm, which was warm and itchy, a mysterious feeling she had never felt before.
She also wanted to be a beautiful girl like that, someone who could shine even under the bright light of a lantern.
Seeing Kuai Alua's infatuated look, Xiaoyun had no choice but to poke her with her hand, which brought her back to her senses.
"It's no wonder the master of the house doesn't allow the Kuai family to have contact with outsiders. You're about to have your soul taken away, aren't you?" Xiaoyun said with a deliberately stern face. "Luckily you're a girl. If you were a man, I'm afraid even the gods would think your heart is impure."
"Gods are gods, but what's the point of talking about something that can't be touched or seen?" Perhaps because he had heard too many words from gods, Kuai Alua felt inexplicably irritated every time he heard them.
She had heard before that people who were destined to marry according to heaven would be sent to the underground palace of Kuaishi Zhuangzi after they got married at the age of eighteen. That was where the gods truly lived, and after the bride was sent to the altar, she would stay there forever.
If a child was born, the Kuai family would send someone to the underground palace to visit. When the child was one month old, they would beat drums and gongs to take the god's child to the Kuai family's manor to raise him well. The bride who was married to the gods in a celestial marriage could only accompany the gods in loneliness until her death.
Xiaoyun's face changed, and she quickly covered her mouth: "What kind of poison has possessed you, child? How dare you say such outrageous words in front of the master's house?"
But it was too late. With a bang, the ten-year-old young master Kuai Weihang eavesdropped from the corner and kicked the door open.
"Well, you Kuai Aluan, you actually dare to speak ill of my father, the God Father, here! I'm going to tell the old patriarch right now!"
The sons of gods all serve the master. Although Kuai Weihang is only ten years old, he is of the same generation as the current master of the house, Kuai Weitian. Therefore, he is spoiled by the Kuai family. He wants stars but is not allowed to pick the moon. He is definitely a naughty child who will not listen to any tricks or threats.
Kuai Alua and Xiao Yun were so frightened that their faces turned pale and they quickly knelt on the ground.
Because of his seniority, no one in the Kuai family dared to contradict him. Seeing him was like seeing the master of the family.
Soon, the entire host family who heard the noise knew the news—
Kuai Alua, the bride chosen by the gods, was extremely disrespectful to the gods.
In an instant, the Kuai family was in chaos. The two teenage girls were forced to kneel on the ground as they were dragged from the room to the front of the gods in the ancestral hall.
Due to the rule that men and women should not touch each other, the punishment of Kuai Alua and Xiaoyun was presided over by several women of a slightly older generation. The old lady in the lead knelt in front of the statue with a frown on her face, telling fortunes for the two daring young women and asking the gods how they should be punished.
After two divinations, Kuai Alua was punished with thirty strokes of the cane, while Xiaoyun had her nails cut off, with all ten fingers being pierced.
The old lady just waved her hand, and several old women holding wooden sticks and pliers obeyed her orders.
In an instant, the whole house was filled with the two girls' shrill screams.
On the other side, at ten o'clock in the evening.
Qi Mi finally finished making the wooden board to sleep on before the children woke up. Doudingban and Sister Li's four children all squeezed together to sleep on the clean big bunk bed.
Chen Banxianer stood by the bed and neatly placed the shoes that the children had taken off by the bed one by one. The tips of the shoes must not hit the bed, otherwise it would violate the rule of "shoes hitting the bed, ghosts getting on the bed".
Qi Mi and Zheng Yuanyuan had just squeezed onto the bed, and when they heard this, they obediently did as they were told, putting their shoes in place so that the toes of their shoes did not touch the bed.
The place where the two of them lay was facing the daily rules posted in the temple by Chen Banxianer. There were a lot of densely packed rules. After reading them carefully, they found that even sleeping in this shabby place had a lot of troublesome rules.
[Don’t talk while eating or sleeping. Don’t talk while lying in bed at night, even in your sleep.]
[You are not allowed to drink water or eat in the middle of the night. When you get up at night, you must pat the bed three times before you can get up.]
[If you are sleeping with multiple people, you cannot sleep facing each other. You can only lie flat or with your back to each other.]
…
There are many more, and Qi Mi quickly read through them and decided to give up, thinking that at worst she could just make a few more paper figures tomorrow. So throughout the night, she would keep hearing the reminder [Your durability -1], so she woke up early in the morning and found that her durability was only 85.
She got up and touched them one by one, but none of them were much better, basically their health had dropped to over 80. Wang Xiaohu, who was grinding his teeth and farting in his sleep, directly reached a new low of 75 health points.
For fear of disturbing their rest, Qi Mi left the temple first.
The scene before my eyes was as dark and gloomy as ever, with barren yellow land above and below. It was not as open as the end of the polar night.
After a while, Sister Li, who had gotten up early, came out to say hello to her, and then took her eldest daughter Pan Jun to work at the embroidery and weaving workshop. A few minutes later, Kuai Liang went to the paper-making workshop with half a corn left over from yesterday in his mouth.
As if afraid that Qi Mi would not let him play with his cell phone, Chen Banxianer kept surrounding her and persuading her not to worry. He would take them to the paper-making factory in the morning and help him find the pass in the afternoon.
Qi Mi couldn't bear to let the children touch the paper figures anymore. Their health points were dropping so low that they had to replenish them quickly. After packing up the children, the three teachers prepared to take the ten children from the Douding class to work to earn health points. Seeing that there were only three young children left in the courtyard, Zheng Yuanyuan asked worriedly, "Is it okay for them to stay here?"
Chen Banxianer: "It's okay. Sister Li leaves these three children here every day, and they all come back for lunch at noon."
Zheng Yuanyuan said "oh" and told the three children left behind to get the cooked sweet potatoes and potatoes from the pot if they were hungry, then she left with peace of mind.
Ten minutes later, everyone arrived at their workstations with some snacks to fill their stomachs.
I don’t know if it was built on purpose, but the paper-making field and the embroidery workshop stand opposite each other, half white and half red. The two major events in life are condensed here.
Following Chen Banxianer's suggestion, Qi Mi and the others preferred to make paper-cut items together, so they registered their birth dates at the door and entered the factory with their work badges.
The paper-making factory is very large. As far as the eye can see, it is filled with standing paper figurines, some of which are painted and some are newly made, white and bright. Those paper figurines with red faces have black and round eyes, as if they can speak.
Occasionally, you can see a few workers getting up and then sinking down, constantly making paper-made things with their hands.
Qi Fan secretly glanced at the expressions of the kids. Fortunately, no one showed any fear. Even Wang Xiaohu, who had been scared by the paper man, did not have any weird expression. He even seemed eager to try.
It was worth it for Zheng Yuanyuan to let the black ball heal them for a long time.
Chen Banxianer was a veteran worker here. As soon as he came in, he arranged tasks for them: "Children, take your pens and paints over there and draw little people. But remember, you must not draw people who are alive. You can draw anything except living people. Do you understand?"
"I heard it—"
The kids took their painting supplies and ran over, each choosing a clean white paper figure.
Afraid they might let their imagination run wild, Chen Banxianer quickly instructed them, "Draw like the other paper figures you've already drawn. Don't make them too weird, okay?"
"I know!" As he was answering, the children had already found their seats and placed their small backpacks under their buttocks as Qi Mi taught them to avoid catching a cold.
Chen Banxian nodded affirmatively. Just as he turned around, he suddenly thought of something: "Also, remember to put dots on the paper figurine's eyes. Got it?"
"I know!"
You can tell that these kids are getting impatient.
Chen Banxian curled his lips and couldn't help complaining: "One by one, they are quite fierce."
Yu Jiaojiao looked at the already drawn paper figures and frowned, "Uncle Banxian, I remember my grandfather told me that these paper figures cannot have eyes, otherwise they will come alive."
Chen Banxian's eyes lit up. He had long noticed that this little girl was gifted in metaphysics. He walked over with great interest and said, "Yes, your grandfather is right. Paper figures usually don't have eyes, otherwise they will come alive. But we make them to bring them to life, so of course we have to add eyes!"
At this time, Qi Mi realized something was wrong and walked over.
"Why do we have to make these paper figures alive?" She frowned.
"Didn't I tell you?" Chen Banxian blinked. "The families here all rely on their souls to live in paper figures, rising to the surface to live, thereby blessing the families underground to live better and better. Otherwise, how do you think the Kuai family and several nearby families survive? Just relying on the breath of the dead? How is that possible? The paper figures are the key, okay!"
The three teachers looked at each other and were even more shocked by the customs here.
Chen Banxianer glanced at the expressions of the three of them and continued to explain, "The paper figurines in the paper-making workshop are used for the purpose of [blessings from the deceased]. The embroidery and weaving across the street are used as [marriage gifts]. Aside from the Kuai family's arrangement of heavenly marriage with the gods, other families also arrange marriages for their descendants."
"Take the Li family, second only to the Kuai family, for example. Although they don't have any gods to prevent celestial marriages, they still ask fairies to arrange marriages for their offspring of appropriate age. The chosen ones, regardless of gender, will receive valuable betrothal gifts or dowries. This is also their only chance to leave the underground and reach the surface."
Qi Mi: "But didn't you say before that there was skyfire on the ground? How would the chosen ones survive on the ground?"
"Well, that's what our ancestors said. Who knows now if it's true or not?" Chen Banxianer said, "Anyway, every family has its own way of continuing for a hundred years. It's either marriage or death. These are the two ways."
At this time, Zheng Yuanyuan was the first to react and tugged at Qi Mi's sleeve: "A family member died and was resurrected to the earth through a paper figurine. The paper figurine then asked a fairy to arrange a marriage for them, and the match was with someone from the same family. Isn't this a mess?"
"That's right." Qi Mi snorted coldly, and suddenly felt that he was not so interested in these white paper dolls in front of him.
Paper figurines marrying living people, what kind of bullshit is this?!
But no matter how angry she was, under the pressure of her health, she could only grit her teeth and do it reluctantly.
But this moment Chen Banxianer lost his tact and kept harping on Qi Mi's little details.
Chen Banxianer: "Hey, you should make a woman's breasts."
Qi Fan: "..."
Chen Banxianer: "Where's that stick? Where's that big stick stuck there?!"
Qi Fan: "..."
Qi Mi frowned and crushed the wooden stick in his hand. He gave her a murderous look and asked with a forced smile, "What stick?"
Chen Banxianer immediately shut up.
I wanted to check the results of Du Rui and Zheng Yuanyuan's work, but I found that the three of them seemed to have discussed it beforehand, and each of them was acting like a pure and asexual person.
When Zheng Yuanyuan and Du Rui raised their heads with innocent faces, under the pressure of Qi Mi, he could only nod and smile: "Well done, very good."
I just don't know which family is going to become extinct.
Nearing noon, after making a dozen or so paper figures that represented the end of love and detachment with anger and rapid movements, Qi Mi was the first to complete the health value indicator of 100.
Du Rui and Zheng Yuanyuan were slow and only finished two. The kids were about the same progress as them, so they had to come again in the afternoon.
After a quiet lunch, everyone went back to their factories and embroidery workshops to work.
Thinking that they might have to live there for a while, Qi Mi thought about renovating this relatively large temple and dividing it into different areas, which would make life more convenient for everyone.
As the owner of this place, Kuai Liang immediately refused: "No, this temple must not be touched!"
"Why?"
"I'm not the owner of this temple. I'm just in charge of watching over it. The owner told me not to destroy a single brick or tile of this temple, especially the eight hundred eternal lamps." Kuai Liang spread his arms to block, fearing that Qi Mi would impulsively smash the wall without any care.
After all, she was holding a metal axe for chopping wood in her hand.
"Which god was once enshrined here?" Qi Mi was a little curious.
Kuai Liang shook his head: "I don't know. As far as I can remember, there has been no statue here, and there is no words written on the plaque. Maybe it's not a god that is enshrined here."
Qi Mi was lost in thought, and he put the axe on his shoulder: "Okay, then I won't move, and I'll just build a wooden house next to it."
"Build a... wooden house?"
Kuai Liang blinked. Did she hear correctly? This girl wanted to build a wooden house by herself?!
"Yes, the wooden house." Qi Mi turned around disapprovingly, carrying his axe and walked to the few remaining dead trees. He asked again, worried, "These trees should be able to move, right?"
Kuai Liang nodded hesitantly: "It should be possible. The master didn't say, and you have already cut down one tree."
"That makes sense."
Qi Mi nodded his left eye, grabbed the axe, and struck with one strike, chopping off another section of the dead tree. The upper part of the tree was probably stuck in the ground above, so even if it was cut in half, it wouldn't fall off.
In an instant, the view opened up.
There were seven dead trees in total. When the last dead tree was cut into pieces and fell to the ground, I don’t know if it shook the temple, but with a clang, a piece of green tile suddenly fell from the roof and broke into pieces in an instant.
"!" Kuai Liang pointed at the tiles on the ground and shouted in surprise, "Broken, a tile is broken!"
Qi Mi moved the chopped wood and heard Kuai Liang's alarm. She walked over, picked up the broken tiles on the ground and looked at them carefully: "Don't worry, they are not very broken. I will find a way to glue them together." As she said that, she turned around and walked into the crack of time and space and disappeared out of thin air.
Kuai Liang was so shocked that his jaw dropped: "Where are the people?!"
Meanwhile, the ground.
Lang Yu looked at his wrist with a gloomy expression. The stone hanging under the red and gold rope was shaking rapidly, as if it was wailing miserably.
"Gui Chen..." He moved his thin lips slightly, and softly called for a small black fan, looking coldly at the paper people surrounding him in front of him.
The moment he stepped into the portal, he separated from Qi Mi and the others and came to this unfamiliar street.
Except for the solid yellow mud under your feet and the distant sky above your head, everything here is made of paper: paper villas and high-rise buildings, paper flowers, plants and trees, and even the cars driving slowly on the street are all made of paper.
He spent the whole day and night looking for Qi Mi.
He just didn't know what happened, the nearby paper figures rushed over and surrounded him in three layers. As soon as he finished with one batch, a new batch would come to replace him, and the flow continued.
These paper figures included both men and women, each wearing colorful clothes and with funny red cheeks painted on their faces. When their eyes met Lang Yu's, their ink-painted eyes would roll around several times.
The stone beads let out mournful cries. Lang Yu no longer had the patience to argue with them. He waved his fan to summon the phoenix, and in the blink of an eye, the paper figures were reduced to scraps of paper.
The phoenix flew around and was about to crash back into the dust, but he raised his hand to stop it.
"No rush, there may be more fights to come."
He lightly tapped his left shoulder, letting it rest. The solemnity of the black garment clashed with the splendor of the blood-red; standing there was a scene that was hard to look away from.
Lang Yu waved his hand, and a dark, space-time rift suddenly appeared before his eyes. The familiar smell of earth filled his face as he approached. The tree trunks that had once shaded the temple had been chopped down by someone, leaving only bare stumps.
Lang Yu's face seemed to be covered with a layer of frost, and his blood-red eyes suddenly became even colder.
Looking up, I saw a piece of the temple roof tile lying on the ground, and a tall and thin man was trying to pick it up with a desperate look on his face.
"You're so brave to destroy my things."
Lang Yu walked slowly towards them, his red eyes in the darkness like an evil ghost seeking revenge.
Kuai Liang saw the bloodshot eyes at first sight and stepped back in fear.
Lang Yu frowned slightly and was about to wave his small fan when he heard a clear female voice from behind him: "Lang Yu?!"
Lang Yu froze, the hostility in his eyes instantly dissipating. He looked in the direction of the voice, and the figure he was searching for was right behind him, his amber eyes curved into two beautiful crescents.
He stared silently at the iron axe in Qi Mi's hand for two seconds, and even his voice softened a bit: "Did you cut down the tree?"
"Well, I want to build a wooden house for the children." Qi Mi took out a bag of cement from the space-time rift and said, "I heard that this temple is yours?"
“…”
Lang Yu's eyes flashed. He didn't expect Qi Mi to be here, let alone that she would hear him. After a moment of awkwardness, he lowered his eyes slightly: "Not really, I'm just looking after a friend."
"Is it the friend who has passed away?"
"Um."
Qi Mi suddenly realized and thought to himself that it was a good thing that he hadn't touched it carelessly: "I'll restore that tile for you right away."
Fortunately, she has the skills to use cement to stick the broken tiles together and reshape them so that they should be exactly the same as before.
She hurried past and Lang Yu grabbed her.
The warm touch of flesh in his palm made him pause for a moment. He loosened his hand and coughed uncomfortably. "No need. You can transform this temple as you please. She would be very happy if she knew how lively it is here."
Qi Mi was stunned for two seconds, then asked again uncertainly: "Can I? I might have to break down the wall."
Lang Yu smiled and nodded: "Okay."
Qi Mi was stunned for a moment, then looked back at the temple. After confirming with Lang Yu again and again that it was okay to take action, she carried the iron axe to the wall, and after he nodded, she smashed it down hard.
The wall collapsed with a loud bang, raising yellow mud and dust.
Lang Yu stared at her in the thick smoke. The moment he stretched out his hand, a silver scimitar appeared in his palm. He took a few steps toward her when, as if suddenly remembering something, a hint of worry crossed his features.
He looked at the exquisite scimitar in his hand, thought for a moment, and waved it away, replacing it with a homemade waist knife made of stainless steel mixed with iron.
It was the one that Qi Mi made himself. He took it back from Mo Xize when he left Carnival City.
He didn't want anything of Qi Mi to remain in that person's hands, not at all.
Lang Yu hesitated for a moment, walked to her side with a little nervousness, and handed over his sword.
Qi Mi was surprised when he saw the knife out of the corner of his eye. He quickly put down the blunt axe in his hand and took it. "Did you get it back for me?"
"Well, I happened to see it while I was doing something, so I just picked it up." He said it nonchalantly, as if it really was just 'by the way'.
Qi Mi didn't think much about it, and tried waving it twice, with a frown: "Thank you."
“No need~”
In the silence, Qi Mi finally noticed the innocent and frightened Kuai Liang standing nearby, and hurriedly introduced him to Lang Yu: "Oh, that's Kuai Liang."
"Kuai Liang?" Lang Yu repeated it in a low voice, then reacted and turned his head to look him up and down.
At this moment, Kuai Liang regained his composure and remembered something. He stared at Lang Yu's eyes for a few seconds, then hurried into the temple and drew a child's graffiti. "Are you Mr. Lang?"
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