Chapter 31 Redemption Tang Suzi opened his eyes and found himself in a...
When Tang Suzi opened his eyes, he found himself in a small courtyard of a thatched house.
The main house consists of three rooms with the door wide open. There is a small room next to it, which should be the kitchen, because smoke is rising from the chimney on the roof.
Green vegetables are planted in one corner of the yard, and next to it is a camellia tree full of white camellia flowers.
Where is this?
Why do I feel an inexplicable sense of familiarity?
"Tiao'er, come here for a moment."
Um?
Is anyone there?
Tiao'er? Who are you calling?
Tang Suzi turned around following the sound and found a little girl about six or seven years old standing by the stone table in the yard picking vegetables. When she heard the call, she put down the work in her hands and ran to the kitchen.
The moment she raised her face, Tang Suzi was stunned.
Why does this little girl look so much like me?
Also, can't she see herself?
Without thinking too much, Tang Suzi followed her footsteps and walked towards the kitchen.
What caught my eye was an old woman with a kind face squatting down and looking into the eyes of the little girl.
As soon as she saw that side of her, Tang Suzi felt an indescribable pain rising from her heart to her throat, and her eyes began to feel sore.
who is she?
Just as she was wondering, she heard the little girl's childish voice.
"Grandma, what's wrong?"
The old woman touched the little girl's head lovingly. Her hands were covered with thick calluses, her finger bones were bent and deformed, and her skin was dry and wrinkled like the bark of an old locust tree.
Then, she took out a gold pendant necklace tied with a rope from the pocket of her blue patterned shirt.
"This is a safety lock. Grandma had a gold bracelet as a dowry. A few days ago, she used it to make two safety locks, one for Jin'er and one for you..."
Before he could finish his words, a young woman came into the yard from somewhere. When she passed the kitchen door, she glanced inside and muttered,
"What can I do for her? My daughter will get married sooner or later, so I should leave everything to Jin'er..."
The young woman came too close when she passed by. Tang Suzi held onto the wall and tried to move aside, but the moment she stretched out her hand, her hand actually passed through the wall!
She lost her balance and fell through the wall into the house.
She is transparent!
What’s going on? Am I back to being a lonely soul again?
"Grandma, why don't you leave it to your brother?"
The little girl spoke, and her voice, which had just been clear, began to become low.
Tang Suzi's attention also fell back on the grandparents and grandchildren.
When the little girl raised her hand to take off the safety lock, the old woman held her hand.
"Tiao'er, Jin'er already has one. You, like Jin'er, are unique."
She gently stroked the little girl's arms,
"My dear Tiao'er, grandma gave you this safety lock. I hope you will be safe and happy..."
Not long after the old woman finished speaking, Tang Suzi suddenly felt a darkness in front of his eyes.
When she opened her eyes again, she was standing in a small room.
But why is it dark?
"Grandma, it's so hot, I can't sleep..."
With the light of the butter lamp in the house, Tang Suzi could see clearly that the old woman and the little girl were lying on a bed made of mud blocks and covered with a worn mat. The old woman was holding a palm-leaf fan and fanning the little girl over and over again.
"Grandma, please fan Tiao'er. He won't feel hot anymore. Go to sleep..."
The old woman gently coaxed her granddaughter to sleep while fanning her tirelessly.
Only when the little girl's breathing gradually calmed down did the old woman stop her movements and close her eyes.
She seemed to be asleep too.
But when the little girl in her sleep happened to mutter "hot" unconsciously, the old woman's hand immediately began to wave the fan to fan the little girl.
It turns out that she had been in a light sleep to take care of her granddaughter...
The scene changed and snow suddenly started falling outside.
In an instant, the scene before my eyes dispersed like a ball of sand, and then quickly converged into another scene:
The cold wind hit the bamboo paper windows inside the house violently, and also on the mud bed covered with straw.
The old woman and the little girl are sleeping.
Most of the yellowed quilt was covering the little girl, and almost half of the old woman's body was exposed to the cold air.
The little girl hugged the old woman unconsciously in her sleep. When she touched the other arm of the old woman, she seemed to be awakened by the cold.
She slowly opened her eyes and saw the old woman who was only covered with a small quilt.
The little girl stood up slightly, gently pulled the quilt on her side over the old woman, and slowly fell asleep beside her, even though her back was stiff from the cold...
The snow was getting heavier and heavier, and heavy snow began to drift inside the house.
Snowflakes as big as goose feathers hit Tang Suzi's face, and everything in his sight was white.
She subconsciously raised her hand to cover her forehead, turned her face away and lowered her head to avoid the wind and snow.
In that instant, the blizzard seemed to stop.
“Chirp, chirp, chirp…”
There are sounds of birds singing
Looking around, Tang Suzi found himself in a valley.
The sunlight poured through the sparse treetops on both sides of the mountain wall, illuminating a thin figure who was standing sideways on the rocks at the bottom of the cliff.
It seemed to be the old woman, but she looked much older.
At this moment, she was reaching out to pick a Ganoderma lucidum on the steep wall.
Just as her hand was about to touch the roots of the Ganoderma lucidum, her foot suddenly slipped...
"careful!"
Tang Suzi shouted loudly.
But the old woman could not hear her voice, and her foot got stuck in the crack of the stone and twisted.
With a "crack", the whole person fell onto the rugged rocks at the bottom of the valley.
Witnessing this scene, it was as if ten thousand needles were piercing Tang Suzi's heart, and she felt heartbroken.
She hurried over and tried to help the old woman up, but her hands went through her body and no matter how hard she tried, it was no use.
She could only watch the old woman, who was enduring the pain, slowly raise her hand. Her hand had just fallen on the gravel, leaving several bloody marks on it from the sharp gravel.
She held her leg with her injured hand and slowly and laboriously pulled her foot out.
She slowly stood up, limped forward a few steps, and suddenly stopped.
Tang Suzi thought she saw him and walked up to her again.
But no.
She simply took off one side of her backpack, fished out a handful of gray-brown seeds from the bottom of a pile of unknown plants in the backpack, and scattered them on the gravel and exposed adobe behind her, muttering,
"I hope that after the dodder grows, next time someone slips here, they won't get hurt..."
Tang Suzi stared blankly at the old woman walking away into the distant fog.
By the time she reacted and wanted to chase after him, the fog had dissipated.
She returned to the cabin.
It was still the little girl who looked very similar to her.
No, she seemed to have grown a lot and looked like a girl of fourteen or fifteen years old.
The girl was seen squatting on the ground, holding the old woman's hand and sobbing.
From the main house next door, a woman's complaint could be heard faintly.
"My brother is also sick, but I haven't seen her care so much. She keeps yelling for money to pay for the old lady's medical treatment. It's just a leg injury, it will be fine after some care. Money, money, money, where can I get the money?"
Tang Suzi also began to notice that the old woman lying on the bed was extremely thin, with her left trouser leg rolled up, and her calf to ankle was red, swollen and black, stretching the originally wrinkled skin of her legs to the point of cracking.
The pain made her almost lose consciousness, but she was still murmuring,
"Tiao'er, don't cry..."
The girl's tears flowed even more violently.
"Grandma, I'm sorry, it's all my fault,"
She rested her head on the old woman's clasped hands.
"If I hadn't insisted on going to school, you wouldn't have sold herbs to pay for my tuition, and you wouldn't have fallen while picking herbs... It's all my fault. I hurt you..."
The sobbing little girl didn't notice that a young man quickly walked up to her, squatted down, and called her name softly.
"Tiaotiao..."
Is this... Fang Buyu?
Tang Suzi was slightly shocked when he saw the face that looked almost exactly like Fang Buyu's.
Soon her guess was proven to be correct.
"Ayu"
The little girl raised her head, with wet tear marks on her face.
The young man Fang Buyu put a silver ingot into the girl's hand and whispered,
"Tiaotiao, this is for you. Take it to your grandma for treatment."
The girl stopped sobbing.
"Ayu, where did you get so much money?"
The young man Fang Buyu gently patted the girl's hand.
"Tiaotiao, don't worry about this. Grandma's treatment is more important."
Hearing this, the girl turned to look at the old woman who was in a daze, and tears burst out again.
"I used the money you gave me a few days ago to see the most famous doctor in the city. He prescribed medicine, but it didn't seem to help. The wound is getting worse..."
"Then go ask another doctor,"
The young man Fang Bu Yu comforted him,
"Don't worry, Tiaotiao, grandma will definitely get better soon..."
The boy's voice gradually became blurred, the picture faded, the sky suddenly darkened, and it began to rain.
In the rain and fog, Tang Suzi saw two lonely figures squatting beside a coffin.
The girl hugged her knees with her hands and rested her head on them. Her eyes were red and swollen, but there were no tears anymore. She just stared blankly at the coffin.
"Tiaotiao, grandma just went to another world..."
The boy said to the girl.
The girl didn't react.
It seemed like a long, long time had passed before Tang Suzi heard the girl's choking voice.
"But where is that other world? Is she doing well? It's getting cold. Has she put on more clothes? Has she eaten well? Does her leg still hurt? Is she lonely? Does she miss me? If so, what should she do? What should I do..."
The dull pain in his heart when he first saw the old woman reached its peak at this moment. Tang Suzi covered his chest tightly and staggered to his knees.
She wanted to cry, but she couldn't cry. She couldn't cry anymore...
Amidst the heartache that felt like it was about to burst in her chest, she heard several voices.
"Zhou Tiao, why are you unwilling to enter the cycle of reincarnation?"
"I hope my grandmother will be healthy and well in her next life. I want to accumulate merit for her."
"It's not easy for the deceased to accumulate merit. After drinking Meng Po soup, you won't remember anything. You'll be alone and miserable when the time comes. Are you sure you can make it through it?"
"I can! Please, I'm willing to do anything to bring her good fortune."
"Okay, then you go to Tanshan Temple and guard the lights."
"For the next ten years, you will be the lamp keeper, Tang Suzi."
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