Chapter 41
The county town near Linxi Cave
The farmers' market is bustling with people early in the morning, especially during holidays when the flow of people is even greater.
The vendors at the market had been busy all morning, and when they saw the money in their accounts, they smiled with a mix of happiness and exhaustion.
The stall owner caught a glimpse of customers approaching his stall out of the corner of his eye and quickly put down his phone.
Seeing that he was a regular customer who had been coming for more than a month, he was the first to greet him:
"Oh, Sister Li is here to buy groceries! I haven't seen you for days."
"Um."
The woman skillfully picked up a head of broccoli, paused, put it down, then took a few carrots and some other vegetables and handed them to the vendor.
While weighing the broccoli, the shop owner chatted with some casual conversation: "I won't buy the broccoli anymore, your daughter loves it!"
"I'm not buying any more; she won't get any."
Li Fang spoke coldly, without the slightest emotional fluctuation.
"How could I not be able to eat..."
"She's gone!"
"Oh dear, Sister Li, please accept my condolences!"
The familiar vendor was silent for a moment, then understood what she meant and offered words of comfort.
Li Fang remained expressionless, took the vegetables handed to her, and left the market.
The boss didn't think Li Fang had done anything wrong.
I understand that she is emotionally distraught after her daughter's passing.
Carrying her groceries, Li Fang walked through the crowds and returned to her rented house in the suburbs in a daze.
I cooked the dishes numbly.
"Old Liu, dinner's ready."
"Um."
The two ate their meal with blank expressions.
Then, the two skillfully lit several incense sticks.
They knelt silently on the ground, their eyes devoutly offering incense to the wooden statue above.
"Knock knock~ knock knock~"
The couple continued to pray, ignoring the commotion outside.
"Knock knock..."
"Thump..."
The incessant knocking made it impossible for the two people inside, especially Liu Yunqing, to continue.
Liu Yunqing reluctantly got up and opened the door.
"What is it...?"
"Are you Liu Yunqing?"
Liu Yunqing nodded: "Yes, that's me."
“I live nearby and I have some questions I'd like to ask about.”
Liu Yunqing's eyes were not very clear. He hadn't been in contact with outsiders for too long, which made his expression increasingly dull. He thought for a long time and then walked into the house without paying attention to the people outside.
After a long pause, a "Good!" was heard.
As soon as Xiao Li and his companion entered the house, they smelled a strong aroma of incense.
I instinctively looked into the hall.
In the past, the shrine facing the main entrance usually contained ancestral tablets, and if there were Buddhist families, there would also be Buddha statues.
At this moment, the incense table in front of the shrine was covered with incense ash.
There were also a few incense sticks stuck inside.
Judging from the way it's burning, it was probably just inserted recently.
Inside the shrine was a wooden statue, its image flickering in the incense smoke in front of it, making it difficult to see clearly.
Below the shrine was a woman of similar age to Liu Yunqing, and Xiao Li already knew her identity.
However, even though she knew there were outsiders present, the woman remained kneeling on the prayer mat with her eyes closed, motionless.
If it weren't for the rise and fall of his chest, Xiao Li would have suspected that this wasn't a living person, but a dead one.
"Who are you? What are you doing here?"
Liu Yunqing, with a scraggly beard and his clothes all wrinkled and disheveled, stood in front of Xiao Li and asked in a hoarse voice.
The team members following behind exchanged a glance with Xiao Li.
Xiao Li stepped forward and whispered, "Oh, we heard that your daughter had leukemia before, and that you got some kind of miracle drug that cured her."
Upon hearing the mention of the miracle drug, Xiao Li couldn't help but increase his pressure.
Liu Yunqing, slow-witted, paused for a moment before replying, "Oh, yes."
Suddenly he seemed to come to his senses and denied it: "What is a miracle drug? I don't know what you're talking about."
Xiao Li chuckled and pulled Liu Yunqing aside.
“I used to live on Tianxing Road, and I heard about this.”
"Could you give us a brief introduction? The price is negotiable!"
At the same time, Xiao Li gestured, meaning that they were not short of money and should feel free to ask.
They went to the side to chat, while Li Fang, who was kneeling in worship, remained unchanged, as if her eyes and ears were covered and she was oblivious to everything else, her mind only focused on worship.
The team members took the opportunity to take pictures everywhere, especially taking a few close-ups of the wooden statue.
"No."
Xiao Li: "Nothing? Is it that you don't have enough medicine?"
He was a little out of sync with the man in front of him.
"I said I don't have any miracle drug, and I mean it! Can't you understand human language?!"
The scolded Xiao Li wasn't angry. His face darkened, and he said in a low voice, "Uncle Liu, I was only doing this for my child. She's only two years old..."
Liu Yunqing paused, her expression showing some struggle.
The team member took a few pictures and returned to the two people who were talking, asking curiously, "Where's your daughter? I haven't seen her."
"It's gone."
Liu Yunqing's expression, which had just begun to soften, darkened again, and he said coldly.
"Did you go out to play?"
"She's dead!" Liu Yunqing suddenly shouted. "She died, she came back to life, and then she died again!"
"Hahahaha..."
A madness flashed in Liu Yunqing's eyes as he repeatedly shouted:
"Dead, hahahaha..."
This news sank into the hearts of Xiao Li and his team. The information they received before they came indicated that the girl was in very good health and had recovered.
When they arrived, they were surprised to hear such news.
Xiao Li was even more confused, "Didn't you say your daughter was cured?"
Li Fang, who was kneeling in front of the hall, suddenly opened her eyes and looked at the wooden plaque in front of the hall, her eyes full of hope.
Upon hearing this, Liu Yunqing's face suddenly darkened, and without saying a word, he directly drove the two of them out.
"Sigh! You..."
"Bang!"
The door slammed shut right in front of them, and the two even heard the sound of it being locked from the inside.
The two who had been kicked out exchanged a glance. "Let's go, let's go ask around and see what's going on."
...
"Yang's daughter, Liu Yunqing's daughter, has been dead for almost a week."
"The doctor couldn't figure out who died. He was fine the day before he died, but when he woke up the next day, he was already dead."
"Moreover, what's rather strange is that the couple, Liu Yunqing and his wife, had undergone a significant personality change before their daughter's mysterious death. Instead of rushing to bury her, they were very concerned about burning incense."
Xiao Li went to Yang Lanling's office to report the findings of his investigation.
Yang Lanling pondered, "Could it be that they still think that there's some way to bring the dead back to life?"
Xiao Li: "The ability to revive is fake, right?"
Yang Lanling nodded in agreement. He had consulted a master on this matter, and it was absolutely impossible for anyone to be resurrected from the dead now.
"Are there pictures of the statues in that shrine?"
"have."
"Send it to me."
Xiao Li sent the picture, which clearly showed several sides of the wooden statue. The front of the statue depicted a human figure without any facial features, while the back of the statue was not carved with a human figure but with only the character "苍" (cang).
It comes from the same source as the amulet that Master Ling gave him last time.
Yang Lanling read the report of this investigation over and over again.
"Keep a close eye on the Liu family."
"yes."
...
"Master, we're here."
The large iron gate opened automatically without any wind. With permission, Jin Moli, holding her grandmother's hand, followed the guards to the living room.
As soon as Jin Moli entered the house, she took out the zongzi (sticky rice dumplings) in her hand as if presenting a treasure.
I see that more zongzi have arrived.
Lingxi felt a headache coming on and rubbed her head.
As soon as Lin Fengjuan entered the house, she saw several bundles of zongzi (sticky rice dumplings) on the table. Each family head had their own way of wrapping zongzi, so after looking at them, she knew which families had sent them.
There are only about a dozen households living in Linxi Cave.
Most of the people who came to deliver the zongzi were acquaintances of the immortal master.
The gifts from several families totaled several dozen, which made Lingxi quite worried.
Lin Fengjuan sat down and took the boiled water that Jasmine poured for her: "Master, don't worry, Jasmine specially prepared the ingredients. It smelled amazing when it was fresh out of the pot. I've been making zongzi for so many years, and I've never smelled anything so fragrant."
"oh?"
Lingxi became interested, knowing that Jasmine must have used spiritual materials. "What kind of filling did you make?"
"There are some filled with dried wild vegetables, some with peach filling, some with strawberry filling, and a few with bayberry filling."
Listening, Lingxi wondered if she had misheard.
Except for the dried wild vegetables, which are salty, all the other fruit-filled rice dumplings are sweet.
They certainly don't follow the usual path.
It's obvious that her apprentice played a significant role in this.
However, the fruit-flavored zongzi piqued Lingxi's interest, as she had never tried these flavors before.
The peaches, strawberries, bayberries, and wild vegetables are all sourced from Linxi Cave. Irrigated by the water flowing down from Xishan Mountain, the fruits grow large and sweet with a rich flavor. The remaining bamboo leaves also vary in size. The glutinous rice soaked in spiritual spring water, combined with the well-grown bamboo leaves, results in a uniquely fragrant rice dumpling.
With these powerful ingredients combined, this zongzi is bound to taste amazing.
"Grandma Lin, how are the vegetables we grew in our village this year?" Lingxi thought about how the crops in the fields around the stream were growing well after the spiritual energy was diluted in the pool.
"The vegetables look really good this year, but there are a lot more insects, so it took some effort."
"Indeed, growing vegetables isn't easy!"
The residents of Linxidong Village are doing quite well. The elderly at home can't stay idle. They can't stand seeing the land lying idle, so they plant some vegetables for themselves and also let their children eat some fresh homegrown vegetables.
“The vegetables grown in the village have been getting better and better in recent years. This year, the crops are growing even better. Look at the young people who have come back for the holidays these days. They are lucky to be able to take some vegetables back to the city to eat.”
"Wouldn't you miss it terribly after you go back and eat?"
Lingxi felt a little smug and silently mourned for them.
Vegetables grown in places imbued with spiritual energy—once you taste them, you're guaranteed to want to eat them a second, a third time…
The feeling of not having anything to eat is just too unpleasant.
Hehe~
Lingxi thought for a moment, then took a bite of the bayberry rice dumpling. The sweetness of the bayberries and the aroma of the glutinous rice intertwined, with a refreshing taste unique to fruit. The slight tartness of the bayberries prevented the rice dumpling from being too sweet, making the taste just right.
"Awoo~"
Lingxi took another big bite.
The fragrant jasmine, having just eaten a zongzi, couldn't help but swallow again.
"eat."
The sound of swallowing saliva could not be hidden from Lingxi, who had excellent hearing.
Jin Moli chuckled, picked up a zongzi and started eating.
Lin Fengjuan is getting old, and glutinous rice is hard to digest, so she doesn't really want to eat it.
"Woof~"
Taiji, the gluttonous dog, was already drooling with desire. When it saw Jin Moli, who had come in with it, get some food, it couldn't help but bark.
"You little rascal, you can't eat that much!"
"Woof woof~"
"Mmm~"
Seemingly understanding, the Tai Chi symbol on its feet spun around anxiously, its big, dark eyes looking pitifully at Lingxi.
The two polarities and the yin and yang could not resist the temptation, squatting to the side and pawing at the ground with their front paws, pitifully whining for attention.
The three of them, young and old, were so adorable that they melted everyone's hearts.
"Master, I'll go get some fruit for them to eat."
Okay~
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