Chapter Forty-Four: The Fragrance of Hair

  "Zhi Yu, Miss Huai, come, smile," said Zeng Weili, holding up a German camera, which was the most advanced thing at that time.

  Dong Zhiyu was just hearing Huaijin's sentence "If I can live to get married", her heart skipped a beat, not wanting her uncle to take pictures at this time, so she sat up, looking at the wooden box with an unpleasant expression, and her originally delicate lips also flattened.

  "Zhi Yu, why are you looking like you're about to cry?" Zeng Weili said.

  Huai Jin turned her head to look at her, with tender feelings in her eyes, and said softly: "I was just joking earlier. We will all live a long life. If I get married, you will still be my bridesmaid."

  "I'd rather not be a bridesmaid." Dong Zhiyu said stubbornly.

  "Hey, who is Dong Zhiyu going to marry?" Zeng Jiali shouted across the table.

  "You!... Auntie, look at her! What's the use of having two ears?" Dong Zhiyu was already anxious and her face turned crimson.

  Everyone burst out laughing, thinking that the two girls were just bickering, but it was actually quite interesting. This laugh made them feel more at ease. Dong Zhiyu felt warm all over, as if there were no more obstacles in the world that they couldn't overcome. She leaned against Huaichen's side, laughing with a gentle and beautiful smile. Huaichen also slightly leaned towards Dong Zhiyu. Tonight, she seemed to be thawing out from her accumulated snow, with a long-lost warmth spreading across her heart. Zeng Weili pressed the shutter, capturing this touching moment.

  You spoke a word, I replied with a phrase, you had a cup, I had a bowl. Before long, it was approaching midnight, and the busy households had already set off firecrackers, from which came the distant muffled sounds of "Boom! Boom!" announcing good news.

  "It's time!" Zeng Jiali exclaimed happily.

  Wu's mother's son Abao had already held the firecrackers and led everyone to the front yard, where neighbors from left and right also came out to welcome the spring.

  "Come on, four kids, each light one and wish for good luck!" proposed Big Uncle.

  Huajing was momentarily stunned, wondering who the four children were. After some thought, she realized that she herself was included among them. For many years, no one had called her a child, not even over ten years ago, and she had never considered herself as a child either.

  "Come on, are you afraid?" Dong Ruo Zhao handed one over to Huai Jin.

  Huajing smiled and shook her head, took over the firecracker, Abao handed her a lighter, walked to a slightly distant open space, put the firecracker on the ground, bent down and lit it.

  For a moment, all the women covered their ears. Huai Jin also retreated and stood with Dong Zhiyu together. Dong Zhiyu saw her just standing there, anxiously pointed to his own ears, Huai Jin smiled, having been used to the sound of gunfire for many years, this was nothing.

  "Bang!" A loud and clear sound, only to see a column of firelight shooting up into the sky, exploding in the air with a "crackling" sound, forming a large red star.

  "Good! Open the red door!" Zeng Weili applauded and cheered.

  After firing the firecrackers, Dong Ruo Zhao urged everyone to go to the Jade Buddha Temple to burn incense. This incense must be burned before noon to show sincerity.

  The Zeng family drove two cars, carrying a big family to the Jade Buddha Temple. As they got closer, more and more people gathered, many Shanghai citizens rushed to burn incense and pray for divine protection in these chaotic times, placing even more hopes on the gods in the temple.

  The temple entrance was already crowded with people, and the car couldn't get in, so it stopped far away. After getting off the car, he followed the crowd to move forward, only hearing the sound of chanting scriptures rising and falling. Huai Jin walked silently, a person's ears can choose to listen to the surroundings, if it is an ordinary person, they will only hear the noise, but if they are destined, the chanting voice in this bustling scene will be isolated from the world, with a bit of Zen flavor.

  "What are you thinking about?" asked Dong Zhiyu.

  "I wonder if Buddha really blesses all living beings?"

  "If there were a Buddha, he would now be letting the common people suffer in the 81 difficulties," Dong Zhiyu and Huai Jin walked side by side, but felt not as close as before in this bustling crowd. Huai Jin's arm occasionally touched hers, she knew her hand was hanging by her side, but no longer had the courage to hold that hand like before. Many things only need a catalyst, "Protecting you is none other than yourself, it's the determination of your ideals."

  Huaichen was taken aback by these words, her eyes filled with confusion and perplexity. Ideals? This seemed like a lofty and abstract term.

  People lined up to donate money, burn incense and pray for blessings. Huai Jin was very quiet, as if she had a lot on her mind and even some doubts. Dong Zhiyu felt her silence, paused for a moment, and carefully asked: "Are your... family members all buried in Yan State?"

  A flash of light in Cui Yu's eyes, "One big fire burned everything."

  Dong Zhiyu's throat choked, and he turned his hand to hold hers. His long jade-like hands couldn't fully grasp hers, but he wanted to give her all the warmth he could. He held her hand tightly, and his throat also tightened, unable to speak for a moment.

  She stood still for a moment, waiting for the tears to dry in her eyes, then turned around and looked at Dong Zhiyu's face, which seemed even more painful than hers. She smiled slightly and said, "It's nothing, it's all over now."

  As they spoke, it was their turn. Dong Zhiyu let go of her hand and she and Huai Jin each put a large sum of money into the merit box. The incense master gave each of them a stick of incense as tall as a person. The two lit the incense in front of the god stove, led by the master to offer the incense, then turned around and knelt in the hall.

  In the distance, a ronin wearing dark clothes and wooden clogs stood still. Beside him was a Japanese man with slicked-back hair, chatting and laughing as he explained to the ronin the customs of incense burning. The ronin smiled, his gaze suddenly falling on two women kneeling in the great hall, his smile warm but his eyes gleaming with sharp intensity like an eagle's.

  The woman on the platform clasped her hands together in prayer.

  Heaven blesses our great undertaking. Dong Zhiyu thought to himself.

  Heaven blesses our great plan. Huai Jin also silently recites it in his heart.

  Wipe out the invaders as soon as possible.

  Drive out the powerful nations as soon as possible.

  Let the people take back their homes.

  Bring peace and prosperity to all people under heaven.

  May you and I be at peace.

  May you and I be at peace.

  Heavenly blessing great treasure.

  The first volume is complete.

  Author's note: The first volume has come to an end. I would like to take this opportunity to express my heartfelt gratitude to all the readers who have accompanied me for the past two months.

  Today's small green characters are irrelevant to the text itself, those who are interested take a look and skip if you're not interested, don't waste your time.

  As everyone knows, I'm a newcomer. This is my new article. Not long after arriving, I signed a five-year author contract with Jinjiang (hereinafter referred to as "selling oneself"). The reason for signing the contract is simple: a sense of belonging to the organization (haha), and I hope the organization can help promote my work/guide my writing/protect my copyright.

  Here is the translation:

  A few days ago, an editor asked me about joining V. Of course, the editor made it clear that joining or not was voluntary. Am I willing to join? No need to hesitate, unwilling. Let's put it this way, those who write sincerely are a bit self-righteous, but I don't want to say those self-righteous words here. Looking at it purely from a benefit perspective, there are two reasons why I don't want to join V: From the result, joining V may lead to a loss of readers. They have to pay to read articles (although I heard it's just one cent for over 3,000 words?), and readers who aren't particularly fond of my work won't come. Some will give up because they don't recognize the author, and some will go read pirated versions instead. Isn't the purpose of writing on Jinjiang to be read by people? Having comments and ratings below is warm enough for me. If a Jinjiang author comes to tell me that she writes just for her own amusement and clicks on her own articles, I'll drown her with saliva (just kidding, if someone actually says this, it's purely coincidental, and I'm not responsible). From the motivation perspective, I have zero interest in earning that little income from joining V. If you saw my pay stubs with all sorts of deductions by the federal government, state government, and various taxes that make me want to cry, you'd realize that even if I joined V for a year, my writing income wouldn't be one-tenth of what I lose in taxes each month. The income from joining V is just a joke to me. Today, I chatted with a yuri author and calculated it out - the monthly income from joining V is equivalent to my daily food expenses. If I eat well, it's still not enough. You understand correctly, authors are showing off their wealth on the internet, and this platform gives poor people like me a stage to show off.

  So I asked the editor, what are the consequences of not entering V. The editor told me patiently that basically no list will be arranged. Later, the editor reorganized the language and said it's not that no list will be arranged, but rather V articles take priority. Even if they make it onto the list, they won't have a good position. Good positions are all taken by V articles.

  What's the point of me signing a contract if I'm just going to gaze up at the sky with both eyes?

  This is a perfect closed curve, commonly known as a circle.

  But what's adorable is that I completely understand. JJWXC isn't Lei Feng, JJWXC is out to make a profit, which website told you they weren't in it for the money but just to discover good authors? I'll drown them with my saliva (just saying, if there really was a website that said this before, that's purely coincidental and I'm not responsible).

  So I put myself in Jinjiang's shoes and boldly made the following suggestion: Can't you make an exception for my "Broken News" first, help promote it, stabilize the reader group, and then write again later? In other words, don't V "Broken News", but please help promote it. This time, Jinjiang also stood from the author's point of view and told me that this would be unfair to other authors whose first article was V'd.

  I am ashamed and embarrassed, with no place to hide my shame.

  I wrote up to here and suddenly felt numb, my brain short-circuited. Fortunately, this is a small green character that doesn't care about quality, so I'll just post it like this. This is a chaotic society, Jinjiang is not easy, editors are not easy, but having such a platform allows me to meet you all and present my writing to you, which feels like a fortunate thing no matter what.

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