February 12th.
In the middle of spring, in the month of Mao, all things begin to awaken.
In this chilly spring, the wind on the river is as cold as a knife, and the hundreds of thousands of mountains are dejected like dead graves.
There is a county on the bank of Yinyi River.
That was a county called Chang.
On the northern slope of Chang County, on a low, crippled mountain, three incense sticks were stuck on the ground and paper money for the dead was scattered. Two men in coarse linen clothes were squatting by a pit, with hoes and freshly dug mud thrown at their feet.
At this time, neither of them spoke, their eyes fixed on the white lacquered coffin in the pit.
According to folk customs, the colors of coffins are divided into five types: red, white, black and gold.
There are strict requirements here.
For example, when an old man dies of old age, it is a happy funeral, so a red coffin is used;
Black coffins are used for those who died suddenly or on the battlefield, because black represents Xuanshui and can suppress evil spirits.
Poor families could not afford coffins, so they mostly used straw mats to wrap the body or a few pieces of wood to make a simple coffin. These happened to be yellow, so poor families used yellow coffins.
The golden coffin was naturally only worthy of the nobles and kings;
As for the last type of white coffin, it has special requirements.
That is only used by unmarried women and unmarried men.
But according to the clues obtained by Shuanzi and Chenpi, the new grave should be buried with a pregnant woman who accidentally fell to her death. It shouldn't be a white coffin, right?
"Brother Shuanzi, this is weird. How can this be a white coffin? Didn't they say that the person buried here was a pregnant woman?"
"Could it be a woman who got pregnant before marriage?"
"Or did we dig the wrong grave?"
Chenpi's two lips trembled up and down as he spoke in a trembling voice.
You should know that if a girl gets pregnant before getting married, it has always been regarded as shameful by her parents, uncles, sisters-in-law and ancestral halls. In many places where lynching is rampant, ancestral halls will even resort to lynching by putting her in a pig cage.
How could anyone possibly collect and bury it?
So that's where the problem lies.
"You ask me, how should I know? I'm not her father. Anyway, since we're here, forget about her. Come down quickly and help pry open the coffin lid. Let's get this done sooner and leave this graveyard that makes us feel uncomfortable."
Shuanzi is a tall man in his early thirties.
Chenpi was a few years younger than Shuanzi, skinny and unassuming. Shuanzi led Chenpi down into the pit and spat into his palm. In the darkness, the two men used hoes to pry open the coffin nails, and finally, with difficulty, they lifted the lid, one in front and one behind.
But after opening the coffin and looking inside with torches, they were shocked.
Plop!
Chenpi, who was even more timid, was so scared that he sat down in the grave.
The temperature was very low at night, and even I could see the white breath I exhaled. I saw the woman in the white coffin. She didn't look very old, about 28 years old, wearing burial clothes. Her waist was like a willow branch, and her belly was flat. She didn't look like she was pregnant, but there was a circle of black stitches on her neck.
It turned out to be a head that had been severed and then sewn back together.
Just now, Chen Pi was frightened by the black stitches on the female corpse's neck.
Because my vision was dim at night, when I first saw it, I thought there was an inch-thick poisonous centipede lying on the corpse in the coffin, about to jump out and bite people.
The body of the woman in the white coffin had no black spots or corpse spots, nor did it have any foul smell. Instead, it had a light, pleasant musky smell. She must have died only a few days ago, and perhaps even the seventh day hadn't passed yet.
People are still fresh.
The female corpse looked very unique, but her face was unusually pale. This was normal for a dead person. She was wearing a bright red burial suit.
If Chen Pi hadn't been so frightened that his legs went weak and he hadn't recovered yet, he would definitely have been amazed at how beautiful this dead woman was.
Looking at the strange female corpse in the white coffin, Shuanzi's face changed slightly, but he pretended to be calm and said, "Why are you panicking? It's just a dead person."
"Speaking of the dead, this north slope is a graveyard. The very soil we're standing on is filled with dead bodies and bones."
"If you want to leave here quickly, come and help me lift the corpse up. Remember, lift the corpse up through her clothes, don't touch her directly, or you might borrow a breath of yang energy from a living person and raise her up."
Shuanzi lightly kicked Chenpi, who was sitting on the ground in fear.
Then, under Shuanzi's coaxing and threats, Chenpi, with mud on his pants and sleeves, crawled out of the grave and tremblingly went to support the female corpse in the white coffin.
Who knew.
The slender female corpse, which looked fragile, was surprisingly heavy. Chen Pi failed to lift it up the first time and fell down, almost falling into the coffin.
Shuanzi was quick-witted and managed to grab Chenpi's belt, preventing Chenpi from bumping into the female corpse and getting bitten on the face.
After Shuanzi glared at him fiercely, Chenpi gritted his teeth and continued to help the female corpse.
The dead are much heavier than the living.
Otherwise, why would there be an idiom called "dead heavy, dead heavy".
This time, he successfully lifted the female corpse without any danger.
...The female corpse was clamped under the armpits by tangerine peel, and half of her body was dragged upside down and placed on the edge of the coffin.
Then Shuanzi jumped lightly, and he turned out to be a well-known martial artist. He stood firmly on both sides of the coffin in a horse stance, ready to rise from the dead.
It turned out that they were two thieves who came to steal the dead body at night and make money from the dead.
Perhaps because the corpse was moved, the collar of the female corpse's burial suit was a little too open. Chen Pi, who had been trembling as he held the female corpse, accidentally saw the white patch near the collarbone inside the collar of the female corpse, and his eyes were wide open.
But at this moment, accidents happened one after another.
Meow, at night, a wild cat with black hair and green eyes of hunger jumped out from a pile of grass and ran to the grave to look for rotten corpses to eat.
According to folklore, there are three major taboos on the body after death:
First, the dead cannot fall to the ground;
Second, the Yang energy of a living person must never be lent to a dead person;
Third, cats, foxes, and weasels cannot touch dead people.
Because people who died suddenly have a blocked throat and can't swallow the resentment, and cats are yin, so when the two collide, it is 100% certain that the dead will come back to life.
No matter whether this rumor is true or not, in this situation, it is better to believe it than not.
"Quick! Stop that bastard cat!"
"Don't let this wild cat jump into the coffin and touch the body!"
Shuanzi was so nervous that his heart was in his throat, but when he reached out to grab it, it was too late. The wild cat had already nimbly jumped into the white coffin and landed on the female corpse.
“Oh no!”
Shuanzi had just finished speaking when he saw the wild cat that jumped into the white coffin suddenly staring at the two people outside the coffin motionlessly. Its dark green eyes were cold and numb.
Loss of any emotion.
It was as if a pair of dead eyes were staring at Shuanzi and Chenpi.
The beast just stood on the chest of the female corpse, staring at the two living people beside the coffin without moving.
"Get lost, you little bastard! You're running into this desolate mountain cemetery at night and trying to scare me, your master!"
With a shout, Chenpi, who had been frightened before, suddenly got the courage from nowhere. He picked up a stone he had dug out from the grave and hit the wild cat that jumped into the white coffin.
Who would have thought that the wild cat didn't hide or avoid.
puff.
The wild cat was directly smashed to death by Chenpi in the coffin, with its head broken and bleeding. No one expected this scene.
"I'm calling your father's tangerine peel!"
"Brother Shuanzi, didn't you ask me to smash it? What should we do now?"
"Hurry up and run for your life! Don't bother with the corpses and coffins anymore! Are you really stupid, Chenpi, or are you pretending to be crazy and stupid in front of me?"