Chapter 26: Little Devil

  Huang Aunt walked very quickly, and in the blink of an eye she was out of my line of sight. I followed her with Huang Shigong without saying a word. When I jumped out of the door, however, that black figure had vanished.

  Was I seeing things just now?

  "Huang Shi Bo called out: 'You haven't taken your medicine yet!' As he spoke, he followed me. From a distance, I saw Huang Shu go into the outhouse, and I felt embarrassed to stay any longer. Besides, it was already dark, so I bid farewell and headed home. Huang Shi Bo wanted me to stay for dinner, but I politely declined."

  From Huangshi Shu to my home is about four or five minutes' walk, during which we have to pass by a large Chinese scholar tree in the lower courtyard. This tree is hundreds of years old, withered and sturdy, requiring three people to hold hands to hug it. When I was young, we often played under this tree.

  When I came here, I saw a child standing under the pagoda tree from afar. Judging by his figure, he should be around eight or nine years old, wearing black clothes and standing upright there, facing me with eyes fixed on me without blinking.

  How to say it? I've seen a lot of strange things in these days, and my courage has also been exercised. But when I saw that child, I was indeed frightened. Firstly, the sky is already dark now, and the child's shadow looks very vague, giving people an inexplicable sense of eeriness; secondly, there are no children aged 8 or 9 in our village now, so where did this child come from? Thirdly, why doesn't that child move at all? Like a wooden stake, and still staring at me. Although I couldn't see his eyes clearly, I was stared at until my whole body felt hairy.

  So I immediately slowed down my pace, carefully approaching the child's opposite side, two or three meters away. When I looked at him, his face was ashen due to the dim light, and his eyes seemed even darker, like two black holes. What's more depressing is that these two black holes were staring at me at this moment, and his mouth corners slightly raised, as if smiling, but it was a cold smile, just like the kind of smile a hunter has when he finds his prey hooked, triumphant, sinister and... eerie!

  Originally a young and innocent child, yet he let out such an eerie smile, my heart skipped a beat. Having experienced so many things, I'm actually not one to be easily startled, but at this moment, my heart inexplicably tensed up.

  Suddenly, the child moved, slowly stretched out his hand and pointed straight at me.

  I had now walked to the same line as him, but I deliberately took a detour, keeping a distance of about two meters from him. Seeing him pointing at me with his hand, my footsteps stopped involuntarily, and my whole body hair stood upright. With a sunken gaze, he had already retracted his cold smile and replaced it with an extremely icy face. I began to realize that he might not be human.

  I recalled what my father told me before he left, that when I see something strange, don't be alarmed or approach it, just pretend you didn't see anything. But now, although I haven't gone up to talk to him, we've made eye contact, and even more terrifying, he's reaching out his hand towards me.

  What does he want to do?

  At this moment, a man came out from behind the tree and called out to the child.

  "Child!"

  The voice was low and hoarse, and it turned out to be an old man.

  The old man walked up to the child, grabbed his hand and said: "It's late, time to go home." The child looked at the old man with a gloomy face but didn't say anything. The old man raised his voice again: "If you don't go home now, I'll teach you a lesson." After that, he glanced at me, dragged the child's hand and walked behind the tree. When they reached the back of the big tree, their silhouettes disappeared simultaneously.

  I finally came to my senses, the child I saw earlier was a ghost, and the old man was also a ghost. The little ghost seemed to want to do something to me, but at the critical moment, the old man appeared and pulled the little ghost away. The old man was obviously helping me.

  Why did the old man want to help me?

  Suddenly, a man appeared before me, an old man I had once given a ride!

  That's him!

  I remembered a sentence he once told me: You give me a ride, I'll bless you for life. I was touched, the old man didn't go back on his word, although it can't be said that he blessed me for life, but he really helped me.

  After returning home, my mother saw that I didn't look too good and anxiously asked me about Huang Shu's situation, thinking that something had happened to her. I pretended to be calm and said it was nothing, but in my heart I was worried. Just now on the road, I found that the shadow of the little ghost under the locust tree looked very similar to the black shadow hugging Huang Shu's waist. Could it be that the little ghost was haunting Huang Shu's house?

  If it was really him, he actually intercepted me on the road, which means he has already targeted me. Who knows if he will come to find me again tonight? I don't know how powerful that ghost's skills are. Fortunately, the old man helped me, otherwise the consequences would be unthinkable... The more I think about it, the more frightened I become. I hastily ate two mouthfuls of rice and then put down my bowl, rushing into my room to take out my father's book "Ghost Art".

  In case of emergency, I have to learn a couple of coping strategies.

  Open the book, the first move is to kill the ghost. The text was very obscure, I took out a dictionary and studied it for half an hour before understanding the explanation behind it. Translated into plain language, it roughly says: First, bite your finger and use blood to write the character "" in the air, then recite: "Left support six Jia, right guard six Ding, front has Huang Shen, back has Yue Zhang Shen Shi, kill without avoiding the powerful, first kill the evil ghost, then behead the night light, urgent like a law." Then the "" will fly towards the ghost, and once it hits the ghost, the ghost's soul will suddenly emit green smoke and scatter.

  This is a bit of a fairy tale, let's not talk about whether this move can really be used to kill ghosts, just the fact that you use blood to write "勅" in mid-air, how do you even manage to write it? I always feel that this is not very realistic, but this kind of skill has been seen many times in movies.

  But everything has to be tried.

  I stretched out my hand and gazed at my fingers hesitantly. My ten fingers are connected to my heart, how can I bear to part with them?

  Suddenly, a burst of barking came from outside the window, and then, as if summoned, other dogs in the village also started barking loudly and urgently, sounding frantic and restless. This reminded me of the night when I went to the mountain cave at Fengmenkou with Zhong Ling'er and Wu Lele to find Da Hei's soul, because Qin Shu had dug up the yellow-skinned dog that hanged itself along with Da Hei from its grave, and the yellow-skinned dog had found trouble for Qin Shu. The dogs in the village barked loudly that night, as if they were having a wild party.

  Is something going to happen again tonight? Is it related to Huang Pizi again?

  I heard that dogs' eyes are "brighter" than humans', and they can see things that people can't. Could it be that they saw the little ghost under the pagoda tree?

  Just thinking about that little devil makes me afraid he'll appear outside my window or in my room, my heart is burning with anxiety. With this anxiety, courage also came, I stretched out my index finger and bit it.

  Ouch!

  However, the pain is gone, and as the blood flows out, I quickly write the character "" in the air, then recite: Left support six Jia, right guard six Ding, front has Huang Shen, back has Yue Zhang Shen Shi, kill and punish without avoiding the powerful, first kill the evil ghost, after beheading the night light, urgent like a law order!

  After I finished reading it, I looked around in all directions, where was the " imperial decree" character? It's just that my hand hurts badly.

  Damn it! I scolded myself severely, who bites their own hand? Others will think I'm crazy!

  Many people look nervous, I guess it's just like my current situation.

  I was just about to fall asleep when suddenly a "bang bang" sound came from the left, my heart sank, I turned my head and saw that the sound was coming from my bookcase!

  My book box is an old-fashioned trunk, over a meter long, half wide and high, all made of solid wood. I clearly remember that there were only a few books in it, and it was locked, with nothing that could get inside. But judging from the sound now, it seems like there's an old mouse rampaging around inside!

  Did the mouse bite through the box and get in?

  And on this slightly terrifying night, the voice seemed even more abrupt and eerie.

  "Bang! Bang! Bang!" The sound rang out one after another, and I was stunned for a moment, unsure of what to do. Suddenly, my mother asked from outside, "Xiao Dao, what's the noise?" Afraid of scaring her, I stammered, "N-nothing... just a mouse fell into my box." As I spoke, I walked over to look at the box and found that it didn't have any holes. But the sound continued nonstop from inside. My mother called out again, "Xiao Dao, open the door and let me take a look."

  I was worried that Mother would see the book I had hidden inside, the one Father had brought back from his travels, "Yin Yang Knife". Just as I picked up the trunk, strangely, the noise inside stopped abruptly.