The Rural Doctor of the Mountain Spirit

  The countryside at night is very dark, because there are no lights here in the evening. The rural area also has the most ghost stories, one reason is that rural burials are more common, and another reason is that it's too dark here, if there's no moon in the sky, you can't see anything.

  Fear of darkness is human nature. Darkness can make people feel fearful, and in fear, these ghost stories spread.

  When a kerosene lamp is lit in the house, every standing object in the house will cast a shadow. Have you noticed that one of the shadows looks like a person?

  I stared out of the house and saw a half-dead moon hanging in the sky, with white all around, and tree shadows everywhere.

  As I looked on, I felt that one of the shadows seemed to be moving. On closer inspection, it appeared to be a person. On even closer inspection, it was not a shadow at all, but clearly a person.

  That man looked up with his hands stretched out in front of him and walked step by step towards the village.

  At that moment, I had already figured out who the person was, but I still broke into a cold sweat. It would be strange if I didn't break into a cold sweat, after all, the person's appearance was really too terrifying.

  I watched him walk closer step by step, but his movements were so strange that my heart couldn't help but start to feel a chill. I wanted to retreat, yet at the same time reminded myself not to back down.

  At this time, the person had already walked very close, and I could see clearly. The one entering the village was actually that dead child.

  He quickly walked to the door of my house, and as he got closer, I felt even more hair standing on end. At this moment, he was less than ten meters away from me, looking up with his head tilted back. It seemed that his eyes were rolled back, showing only the whites, and his hands were stretched out in front of him, as if grasping for something.

  He walked away and I slowly came back to myself in a daze. By then, he had already reached the door of the room where he died.

  Although I was afraid, I still went out.

  I restrained my fear and ran towards him wildly. I ran all the way to behind that child, where I stopped, with every hair on my body, including my head, standing up like a porcupine's quills at that instant.

  The little boy tilted his head back, and when I stood behind him, I found that his head was already tilted to the point where I could see it from behind. His eyes rolled up, showing the whites, and as I stood behind him, I could just see his black pupils.

  This action is just like someone standing in front of me, straining his neck to look back at me. His eyes are staring at me.

  If I didn't know that there was a corpse in front of me, perhaps I wouldn't be afraid. If I knew that it was a living person in front of me, I also wouldn't be afraid. But precisely, I knew he was just a corpse.

  I only felt that at this moment, a cold current poured from the sole of my foot to the top of my head. My body lost consciousness in an instant and couldn't move.

  At this time, the child's corpse slowly walked into that room with its head almost raised and eyes rolled back.

  There was a piece of black cloth in front of the door. He pushed the black cloth open and entered the house. When he did, the black cloth fell back down, and then I couldn't see the little kid anymore.

  After a long time, I felt a wave of weakness in my body and gradually regained consciousness. I stared at the black cloth for a moment, but couldn't help thinking of escaping again.

  But I didn't run, instead I gritted my teeth, and despite feeling like the whole world was spinning around me, I still rushed towards that black cloth.

  Because I remembered Wu Xianyi's words: "In five years, you must become stronger in these five years. Five years later, I will come back and take you to resolve all the grudges."

  I want to become stronger, so I cannot retreat. Perhaps, I don't even have the right to retreat.

  After entering the house, nothing could be seen. I held a match in my hand and struck it alight. The dim yellow light of the match illuminated the room, and I saw that the child was deathly pale, standing stiffly under the wooden beam, motionless.

  His head was still tilted upwards, but I felt as if he was staring at the beam.

  Perhaps because I was too scared, I suddenly felt not so afraid. I walked up to the child and came behind him. Plucking up my courage, I also looked up at the beam.

  As a result, I saw on top of that beam, unexpectedly a large piece of cloth, and that piece of cloth was stained with blood, the blood seemed to be like a five-clawed print.

  I pointed at the piece of cloth with some horror and looked at the child: "Is this what you're talking about?"

  The child's body slowly turned its head, with that pale face facing me. Suddenly, his two hands waved in the air, drawing a large arc. Then, he turned around and faced the inside of the house, thudded to the ground, and stopped moving.

  At this time, I was already trembling all over. But I still walked up to the child and touched his body. However, his body suddenly became completely stiff at that instant.

  I looked at the child's chest and found a bruise on his chest, but this bruise was disappearing bit by bit.

  This bruise is a sign of the walking corpse. When the corpse walks, the resentment will spread to the chest and form a bruise. The disappearance of the bruise indicates that the resentment of the walking corpse has dissipated bit by bit.

  I let out a breath of relief, almost collapsing to the ground.

  I didn't disturb the child's family, before leaving I found a chair and lit it up, took down the red cloth with bloody paw prints from the beam, and finally looked at the corpse of the child kneeling on the ground one last time before walking out of the house.

  The little boy's body knelt inside the house, never moving again. In fact, he couldn't move anymore because his wish had come true and his resentment had dissipated. And as for why he was kneeling in the house, I guessed that he was kneeling to his parents.

  The fear in my heart is no longer so strong, and that little kid has touched me deeply.

  I left the house and lay down on my own bed, sleeping until the next day. Before dawn, I was startled awake by a cry, it turned out that his parents got up early, but after getting up, they found the child's corpse kneeling in front of their room.

  The two old men were crying loudly, while the little boy's body remained in a kneeling position, no matter how hard they tried to straighten it.

  Their crying soon caused the people around them to sob quietly, and it's really touching. Thinking of last night when I saw the child kneel down, my tears couldn't stop flowing either.

  And I quietly grasped the piece of cloth with blood-stained claw marks in my pocket, this little kid came back several times as a walking corpse just for this piece of cloth. It can be imagined how important this piece of cloth is.

  I stood silently, quietly following the child's family, watching as the child was buried for the third time. The first two times he had been buried, he had crawled out of the earth, but this third burial would be his last.

  After the body was put down, the child's parents had cried into tears. Back in the village, this crying sound did not stop for a moment.

  I stood by silently, quietly listening to their wails.

  During lunch, I took out the cloth strip and waved it in front of Auntie Pang. Auntie Pang was full of confusion: "What's wrong with you, why are you acting crazy at such a young age?"

  I didn't respond to him and directly spread the cloth on the table. When Fat Aunt saw the bloodstains on the cloth, her expression changed instantly. Then, his expression turned to surprise: "What is this thing, where did it come from?"

  I asked Fat Auntie: "Do you know what this thing is?"

  Auntie's face turned serious: "Hm."

  At this moment, I was so surprised that I almost jumped up. The piece of cloth in my hand was very rough and white, with bloodstains and some dirt on it.

  Fat Auntie told me that this piece of cloth is likely to be from a bachelor in the village. In the whole village, only this bachelor likes to wear white clothes. In rural areas, people also like white very much, but white is too easy to get dirty, so not many people wear it.

  This bachelor is different, he's extremely lazy, spending his days idling about.

  In the village, this bachelor is notorious for being a rogue. Fat Auntie said that because he was single, he liked to flirt with the women in the village every day, and even came to find Fat Auntie, but was driven away by Fat Auntie with a stick.

  And this bachelor also seduced the mother of that dead child and later seemed to have been beaten up.

  I heard this and felt that things were getting clearer.