Chapter 203 Xiangxiu
In theory, such notices are usually only issued during winter and summer vacations, or when similar incidents occur in the jurisdiction, to remind parents and children to be careful and prevent related incidents.
But no matter how frequently the notices are sent out, there are always children who drown every year due to playing too much or due to their parents' negligence.
Qi Gu folded the pink notice and put it in his book, planning to show it to his master after returning to Fu'ai Temple.
On the way home, eight-year-old Qi Gu, as usual, was looking for food to bring back on the small dirt road up the mountain. His master had very little ability to make money, so Qi Gu learned from an early age to take on part of the responsibility of supporting the family and would "hunt" some wild fruits, pheasants and the like to bring back.
Halfway up the mountain, he met Wang Xiangxiu, whom he hadn't seen for a long time. Wang Xiangxiu seemed to be thinner than before, and there were a few scabby abrasions on her tanned wrists. When she saw Qi Gu, she didn't smile gently as before. Her eyes were dull and gray, as if her life was taken away by fog.
Xiao Qi Gu did not have the ability to read faces as powerfully as he did later, and could not figure out why Wang Xiangxiu had become like this. He walked closer to Wang Xiangxiu, stared at the wild orange tree, and then said, "There's another ripe one on the left."
Wang Xiangxiu said nothing, crawled over, picked the orange that Qi Gu mentioned, and handed it to him.
Qi Gu didn't understand many things, but he could vaguely sense what had happened to Wang Xiangxiu: "What's wrong with you?"
"It's okay, it's okay..." Wang Xiangxiu shook her head, and suddenly her misty eyes shone with light, driving away the thick fog. "I want to go home. Juanjuan is still waiting for me at home. She loves eating oranges."
Qi Gu then thought of the little girl again. She was about the same age as him, but she couldn't go to school. He suddenly thought of the pink notice in his schoolbag. "This is a notice issued by the school to prevent drowning. Tell Juanjuan not to play in water areas."
"Okay, okay." Wang Xiangxiu showed her usual gentle expression, "Thank you for reminding me."
Wang Xiangxiu walked away quickly, as if she was in a hurry to go back and tell Juanjuan these words. Qi Gu had long been accustomed to her anxious look whenever she met Juanjuan, as if the gloomy and embarrassing things just now were completely forgotten.
A few more days.
When Qi Gu was at school, he heard a few classmates whispering together. They didn't like to play with Qi Gu, so every time when Qi Gu came over, they would lower their voices and only start communicating normally after Qi Gu walked away.
That's a very natural defensive mentality.
But Qi Gu's hearing was good enough that he could hear their discussion clearly even if they lowered their voices.
"I asked why we issued a drowning prevention notice a few days ago. It turned out that a child in our village drowned when she went out to play. I heard that she used to go to school here, but she had intellectual disabilities and was soon expelled from school... The child's mother couldn't bear the blow and is now crazy. Sometimes she thinks the child is dead, and sometimes she thinks the child is still there. My mother now won't let me pass by her house, for fear that she will go crazy and steal other people's children and pass them as her own."
Fellow villager, intellectual disability, this was a clearly pointed description, Qi Gu quickly connected this to Juanjuan, and also thought of Wang Xiangxiu's performance that day.
Qi Gu actually didn't pass by Wang Xiangxiu's house on his way home, but that day, he changed his route and took that road.
This matter is now the number one hot topic in this small village. No matter where Qi Gu goes, he can hear their discussion. Qi Gu learned the whole story from their discussion.
Outside Wang Xiangxiu's small bungalow, there is a ditch that carries sewage from the village. The water is about 20 to 30 centimeters deep. That day, Wang Xiangxiu went out to pick peach gum and let Juanjuan play at home by herself. When she came back, she saw Juanjuan lying upside down in the ditch. Only her head was submerged in the water, and the skin on her face was white and swollen from being soaked in the dirty water.
Later, forensic identification showed that Juanjuan was walking carelessly, fell down and hit her head on the stones on both sides of the ditch, fainted, and her body was stuck in the ditch, with only her head immersed in the sewage. She was drowned.
Qi Gu saw the swollen Juanjuan in the ditch. She was looking inside the half-open wooden door with her black eyes, her hands on the edge of the ditch.
Juanjuan died in the water and became a water ghost. She had to find a substitute to leave, but no normal person would drown in sewage that was only 20 to 30 centimeters deep.
She lay in the ditch every day to spy on what was happening at home and to see Wang Xiangxiu.
She was a fool and clumsy in many aspects, but she also knew who was good to her, so she was foolishly attached to Wang Xiangxiu and lay in the ditch looking at Wang Xiangxiu.
"Brother." When Qi Gu passed by Juanjuan with his schoolbag on his back, he heard Juanjuan calling him.
But in fact, Juanjuan should be older than Qi Gu. She just always feels that she has not grown up. No matter how old Wang Xiangxiu tells her, she feels that she has always been that age.
Qi Gu wanted to pretend that he didn't see her. Based on past experience, agreeing to a ghost's words would only bring trouble.
But Juanjuan handed over a dirty White Rabbit candy: "Brother, I'll treat you to some candy."
This bag of candy was bought by Wang Xiangxiu with the money she earned from selling peach gum after her death, and was thrown into the ditch where Juanjuan drowned.
The reason why she went out to pick peach gum that day was to buy some candies for Juanjuan.
Juanjuan was not brought along because she is difficult to control and always disturbs her while she is working, which can easily affect her efficiency. It was also to earn more money so that I could buy more candies that Juanjuan wanted to eat.
But unexpectedly, she didn't get to eat every last piece of the candy she bought.
Qi Gu was only eight years old, and children were very soft-hearted. He took the candy, squatted down and looked at Juanjuan: "Yeah."
"Brother, can you see me?" Juanjuan was surprised.
She had been lying in the ditch for many days, crying and calling for her mother every day, but Wang Xiangxiu never paid any attention to her. She thought she had made her mother angry, but her mother threw her a bag of White Rabbit milk candy that day... She thought her mother's anger had subsided, so she happily waited for her mother to hug her, but her mother cried very sadly.
Juanjuan realized later that no one could see her.
But she also felt that her mother should be able to see her. After all, after her mother finished her sadness, she returned to her normal smiling face, shouted words like "Juanjuan, mother is back", and opened the door.
Occasionally, he would cry with a pale face and call out, "Juanjuan, where are you?"
Juanjuan thought that the current "Juanjuan" of her mother was really a bad child. She always bullied her mother and hid from her mother.
Juanjuan wanted to get rid of the bad "Juanjuan", so she told Qi Gu her demands.
Qi Gu knew, however, that there was no bad Juanjuan at all, but only a Wang Xiangxiu who had gone mad because of the loss of her beloved daughter.
Qi Gu remembered what the villagers said.
——How can we cure this kind of madness?
——How can this be cured? I guess it can only be cured when her daughter comes back.
Qi Gu was inspired and thought that if Wang Xiangxiu could see her daughter again, her illness would be cured. After she recovered, he would let her accept the truth... This was a white lie.
At least Wang Xiangxiu doesn't have to be as crazy as she is now, and Juanjuan can't leave this ditch, and can't be reincarnated. After Wang Xiangxiu accepts her daughter's death, she can still see Juanjuan's soul in the ditch. She just needs to collect more cow's tears.
Qi Gu felt that this was a good way to have the best of both worlds.
He wiped cow's tears on Wang Xiangxiu and told her that this way she could see Juanjuan again.
However, Juanjuan spoke ghost language and Wang Xiangxiu spoke human language, and the language barrier was a problem. So Qi Gu taught Wang Xiangxiu some simple ghost language, which was enough for communication between mother and daughter.
Wang Xiangxiu's spirits gradually improved. She felt that her life was still the same as before, except that her daughter had to live in a ditch.
She instinctively avoided accepting the fact that her daughter was dead and went up mountains and down rivers to find food for her daughter as she used to.
When he ran into Qi Gu, he shared half of the food he had found with him to thank him for his help.
Qi Gu had never done anything like this before, and was still very worried about something unexpected happening. After all, the books he had read all talked about the different paths of humans and ghosts.
But he also felt that the mother and daughter were in a very good condition now, and maybe... the book was wrong.
Qi Gu often visited Wang Xiangxiu's home to check on the situation. Gradually, he discovered that Juanjuan's hostility had become more serious, and it was possible that she would become a ghost in the long run.
So when asked if anything had happened to Wang Xiangxiu recently, she just shook her head and then hugged her arms calmly.
When Qi Gu grew up, he could tell at a glance that Wang Xiangxiu was hiding something.
But Qi Gu now doesn’t understand.
Qi Gu began to look through ancient books to find ways to eliminate the evil spirit, and at the same time warned Wang Xiangxiu not to let Juanjuan be provoked.
It would be better to clean the ditch more carefully - Qi Gu thought that this was the source of Juanjuan's anger.
Wang Xiangxiu did as she was told. She cleaned the numerous ditches in the village on a voluntary basis without receiving any pay. She also set up a fine fish net upstream of her home's section of the ditch, which could capture most of the solid dirt. Wang Xiangxiu would get up early every morning to pick up the dirt and throw it into the village garbage pit.
During that period, some people praised Wang Xiangxiu for her diligence, while others thought that she must have taken the wrong medicine.
But Wang Xiangxiu ignored all the eyes looking at her and just focused on doing her own thing.
Because Qi Gu told her that this would protect Juanjuan from being stimulated.
*
In order to look up solutions in ancient books, Qi Gu stayed up late for several nights by lamplight until midnight. Dark circles soon appeared on his fair face, making him look like a juvenile panda.
The result did not disappoint his efforts. He found a way, and when he carried his schoolbag to Wang Xiangxiu's house, his steps were lighter than before.
But what greeted him was a floor covered in blood and a mad Juanjuan.
Qi Gu looked at the scene in front of him in horror, his heart chilled.
Juanjuan was covered in blood and dirty water, her hair was wet, her eyes were bloodshot, her sharp fangs sank into Wang Xiangxiu's soul, biting her spirit bite by bite. On the ground, where the blood was coming from, was a man torn into pieces with his soul scattered, his eyes wide open in fear, looking like he had died after suffering great torture.
On the other side, Wang Xiangxiu's soul was being devoured, but her body was quiet and peaceful, as if she had not suffered any harm before death and died willingly.
"Juanjuan, what did you do?" Qi Gu realized that he had done something wrong.
"I beat my dad... because he beat my mom..." All the clues were connected in an instant. Wang Xiangxiu always had scars on her body, and the anger that quickly accumulated in Juanjuan's body was all because of Wang Xiangxiu's husband, a domestic violence man.
He and Wang Xiangxiu were arranged by their parents. When they first got married, they had a sweet time together. But gradually, the man began to be dissatisfied with Wang Xiangxiu's discipline. In fact, they were just small things, like Wang Xiangxiu not allowing him to litter or fold his bedding. But when the man was new to Wang Xiangxiu, he listened to her and did what she said. When she was no longer new to him, he thought she talked too much and finally he couldn't help it and beat Wang Xiangxiu up one day.
Wang Xiangxiu returned home that night with scars all over her face. She thought she would be greeted with support, love and support from her parents and siblings.
But the moment she returned home and knocked on the door, what appeared behind the door was her husband's ordinary face.
Wang Xiangxiu was extremely terrified and the wounds on her body became more and more painful. She screamed and ran back, but was soon pulled into her home by her husband.
She thought she was going to be beaten again, but her husband apologized to her, said he was wrong, and asked her to go home with him.
Wang Xiangxiu believed it, and soon there was a second and third episode.
Wang Xiangxiu gradually found that she had become a joke. When she ran home for the first time, her parents still felt sorry for her and had tears in their eyes, but after it happened many times, they became impatient and felt that the man was an honest man in the eyes of others, so why did he hit only her? Did she do something wrong?
There were also rumors in the village that Wang Xiangxiu had an affair. If not, why would her husband beat her so hard and why did her family not care about her?
Later, Wang Xiangxiu learned the lesson of "keeping dirty laundry in the family private", and her past deeds were forgotten over time. After she gave birth to a daughter with mental disabilities, these deeds were completely replaced by this new incident.
She began to get used to being beaten every few days, and no longer looked into the reasons. She just endured the days. As time went by, she became more and more timid. From being able to resist a few times in the beginning, she became completely refusing to resist.
Later, when Qi Gu discovered that Juanjuan was showing signs of violence and asked her if there was anything unusual at home recently, she didn't think that being beaten by her husband was anything unusual.
What's abnormal about this? To her, this is just like eating and drinking.
So she shook her head to Qi Gu and said everything was normal at home.
Qi Gu also believed it to be true and made a wrong judgment.
Everything has gone to the wrong crossroads. It seems to be a coincidence, but also seems to be destined, because even if it happens again, Qi Gu will choose to help Wang Xiangxiu, and Wang Xiangxiu still does not think that "violence" equals "abnormality".
Qi Gu's white lie resulted in a difficult resolution.
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