old gentleman
After restoring the interior furnishings as much as possible and laying out the blankets borrowed from Xiaoling's house, Meng Yan, carrying large and small bags, along with her and Yue Lang's luggage and the folded sheets, headed to the west of the village.
On second thought, it seems a bit presumptuous. It's one thing to stay at an elderly person's house, but now I'm going to hang someone else's sheets in the yard...
But she couldn't bring herself to do something as unconscionable as letting her sleep with the object without washing it and then "returning" it to its original owner as if nothing had happened.
After much deliberation, she came up with a foolproof solution. She could simply take care of washing and drying the bedding herself, while leaving the more important tasks of communicating with the elderly to someone else.
At this moment, Yue Lang, who was secretly carrying a heavy responsibility, rolled over on the bed. Before he hit the ground, he woke up as he wished and then landed on the ground in a daze.
When Meng Yan rushed back to his room, he saw him sitting there drinking tea with a serious expression.
"You woke up so early? Why don't you go back to sleep a little longer?"
Yue Lang was too embarrassed to say that he hadn't woken up naturally, so he stammered to find a suitable reason for himself, "I remembered something, looked around but didn't see you, and then I figured you wouldn't abandon me, so I just sat and waited for you to come back."
The reason sounded very serious and reasonable, so Meng Yan nodded in acceptance, pulled out a chair next to him, and sat down to wait for him to explain.
Yue Lang: "..."
During the time it took him to drink a cup of tea, he glanced at Meng Yan five or six times, but the other man seemed to have no intention of speaking at all, resting his chin on his hand and waiting quietly, which made his already dry mouth even drier.
"I suddenly forgot," he continued, rambling on.
Meng Yan nodded vigorously without changing his posture, and only after finishing did he remove his hands, gesturing, "Then I'll ask you a question and you answer?"
Yue Lang placed his arms respectfully on the table, his back straight, just as he had when he listened to his teacher's lecture many years ago. He blinked and asked her to begin.
"First, could you explain the copper chain?"
"Oh, most people don't know much about this, but we have some particular customs there." Once the topic of expertise came up, Yue Lang quickly launched into a long explanation.
Copper belongs to the metal element and can suppress evil spirits. It is often used as a talisman against evil spirits and is usually found in the form of copper coins or various small ornaments. However, the old man cast it into a chain and tied it behind the front door. The effect of warding off evil should still be there. However, after he turned it, whether intentionally or unintentionally, it became a lock of spiritual energy, separating the inside from the outside.
“What’s locked away is bad luck,” Meng Yan said bluntly, holding his teacup. The seashells carved on the bottom of the cup floated gently in the tea.
"To be precise, it's what the old man considers bad luck." Yue Lang gently clinked glasses with her. "Do you remember what Xiao Ling said?"
An elderly man who rarely went out lived in that courtyard. He had lived there for decades and should have been enjoying a happy and harmonious family life. However, he encountered a shipwreck on one of his voyages. On that day, he was the only one in his family who did not board the ship and escaped the storm alone.
The wife, the son, and the daughter-in-law who had been engaged and moved in for a short stay—none of them were able to return from the sea.
From then on, he rarely went out, and his daily routine differed from everyone else's. Whenever neighbors came to visit, he would mutter to himself about bad luck and misfortune, and never open the door. Over time, no one saw him again, and these words became one of the few known aspects of his life.
"As for the truth of it all, and even the so-called 'bad luck,' we have no way of knowing. All that remains is this story passed down by word of mouth."
Yue Lang sighed as he summarized what he had heard, picked out the relevant parts, and swallowed a sip of tea. “Since the old gentleman has not communicated with anyone for many years, these words must have gone through several twists and turns, and even the old man himself may not recognize the main characters in the story.”
"So, the rumors that this courtyard and its owner are an ominous sign are all false," Meng Yan said indifferently.
“You never took it seriously either?” Yue Lang raised an eyebrow, mimicking her. “But it seems that the old man and the rest of the village really believe this rumor. Otherwise, they wouldn’t have forged this intricate copper chain, nor would they live together in one place yet be at odds with each other.”
This is easy for the two outsiders to understand; they can almost spot the flaw at a glance. But for those who have been involved for a long time, it is difficult to discern. Imagine if someone was told about a matter of life and death from birth, and heard about it mysteriously every day as they grew up. Over the years, when this matter is mentioned again, would they boldly question it, or would they believe it deeply and stay away from it?
"The truth is getting further and further away."
Meng Yan picked up the teapot, added water, and poured a full cup for Yue Lang, who hadn't stopped eating. After sitting down, he asked his second question: "How come I've never heard you mention... that you're an expert in feng shui?"
The cool tea that Yue Lang was about to drink suddenly became scalding hot. He blew on it for a long time before taking a sip and looking at the reflection in the water in the cup, he replied, "I wouldn't call myself an expert. If I had to describe it, I'd say I'm completely clueless."
"It all started when I first started learning. Back then, I was young and arrogant, thinking I could understand everything just by looking at me. I slept like a log during the teacher's class, only to find out later that the class was about feng shui, our livelihood." Yue Lang's face showed no remorse, and even a hint of gleam. "I thought to myself, 'That's it, my rice bowl is about to fall to the ground, but I can't go without eating.' So I pulled my fellow students together to study diligently, catching up on the basics, just enough to make a living."
"Scamming and deception?"
Meng Yan recalled Yue Lang's repeated vows that he was a Taoist priest, but it turned out he was a Taoist priest who had studied in many different places.
"You deserve to be punished like this. If you take money to do a service and then deceive people, the heavens would have already shattered me into dust. After learning a lot in a haphazard way, I figured out a method for feng shui on my own. In short, it's pretty close to the truth, but it's very different from the methods of ordinary Taoist priests. So, it's a case of being proficient yet completely ignorant. If you want to learn, I'll teach you later."
Meng Yan waved his hand, poured more tea for him, and pressed it back down.
Have you ever noticed the old man's accent?
"You noticed it too!" He flicked his small cup, and tea rushed towards Meng Yan in an instant, but she dodged it and turned to look at him.
The person sat obediently at the table.
"The old man's accent is different from most people here. I guess it's because he hasn't communicated with outsiders for a long time and still retains his old habits. But if you listen carefully, you can see that he has been influenced by this place in the ending sounds and stresses. Putting aside this small difference, his accent is more similar to ours. He must have moved here a long time ago."
This coincided with Meng Yan's thoughts once again, and it was precisely this similarity that allowed her to visit alone while Yue Lang was fast asleep, and that's how she happened to see the fishing net hanging on the old man's wall.
"It's not surprising." Yue Lang was puzzled as to what Meng Yan was wondering. "This is the coast. Money is earned from fishing, and food is also obtained from fishing. It's normal to have fishing nets."
"It's different. The old man shouldn't need a large net, but the ones hanging on his walls are deep nets used for going out to sea, not shallow nets used near the shore or fishing nets used on the beach. Also, the material of his nets is different from the ones used by the villagers. You can tell at a glance that they are of very high quality and won't tear or cut easily."
Meng Yan had observed the nets used by fishermen at the dock, seen sorted fishing nets in Xiao Ling's hands, and carefully examined various nets when neighbors were drying them on poles along the street. From the raw materials to the weaving techniques, they were all quite standard, but this was only without comparing them with the ones in the old man's house.
Yue Lang pressed his hand to his nose, frowning in deep thought. After a moment, as if he had figured something out, he suddenly looked up at Meng Yan and asked, "You broke into the old man's house too?"
As they looked at each other, Meng Yan raised his hand and tapped him on the forehead, waiting for him to open his eyes before saying, "He didn't go inside; the old man opened it himself."
"You're that familiar?"
"I knocked on the door."
"..."
It seemed quite reasonable. Yue Lang was speechless, unable to think of a rebuttal. After racking his brains, he smiled at her, which made Meng Yan laugh instead.
What are your plans next?
Before he knew it, Yue Lang had become accustomed to Meng Yan making the arrangements, and he was only responsible for accompanying her and leaning out to take out a talisman when she needed it.
Okay, what she might need is a talisman, not herself.
But she can have the talismans! Besides, she has countless of them! And she even brought herself with her!
Meng Yan saw his expression change, sometimes serious, sometimes relaxed, and finally his eyes looked at her with a clear, bright gaze, like a spring.
Trying her best to ignore the intense stares, she truthfully revealed her thoughts: "To go into business."
.
When the old man, seething with anger, opened the door, he was greeted by the kind faces of these two people.
"again……"
Good afternoon, sir!
Yue Lang put on his best smile, shutting down his gloomy "again," and before he could ask, he went straight to the point: "We've come to borrow a net."
The door slammed shut behind it, and a few words were thrown out: "There's no internet here."
"How could that be, sir? You are a master craftsman; many years ago, everyone used the nets you wove!"
A deathly silence spread, the blazing sun overhead had somehow retreated, dark clouds shrouded the sky, and occasionally thunder roared. Amidst the flashes of lightning and thunder, the door slowly peeked out a crack.
"How could you know?"
“I already said I’m a Taoist priest, so naturally I figured it out,” Yue Lang said, both earnestly and casually.
In fact, he didn't calculate anything; he just made things up on the spot. Fortunately, he was mentally strong and didn't stutter, managing to fool everyone present, including himself, into believing it.
"Then what else did you calculate?"
Yue Lang sensed something was wrong, but replied fluently, "I knew you would lend us your net. Not only the net, but the boat will be borrowed as well."
Hearing the person beside him becoming increasingly arrogant, Meng Yan silently lowered his head to look at the ground. Perhaps due to the approaching heavy rain, the sand surface had become somewhat sticky and heavy.
"We'll bring back a lot of things." Yue Lang stopped short of saying more after Meng Yan reminded him.
Boom—
A rumble of thunder ripped through the sky, and dark clouds rolled down from the horizon, as if to swallow the entire world whole.
"Rainy days... are not good."
Like a very soft sigh, the words drifted out from behind the wide-open door.
"It's all up to human effort, and besides, it might not even rain."
As soon as he finished speaking, the chill that had been pressing down on the roof vanished abruptly, and the thunder, which hadn't fallen but continued to roll, had now disappeared somewhere.
A few rays of golden light pierced through the churning dark clouds, striking the old tree and showering Yue Lang and Meng Yan. They squeezed through the crack in the door into the room, where wrinkled fingers trembled slightly on the doorframe.
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