Vanish into thin air

  Vanish into thin air

  Separate when you should separate, unite when you should unite. The affinities of the world are to be seen through. A couple's hundred-year bond in this life is a debt from a past mistake. Those without feelings won't come, and relatives with grievances are hard to avoid - what's the use?

  This year, I got married. After a peaceful and safe 26 years, in recent years, I have visited all the Buddhist holy sites in China, just to fulfill my mother's wish when I was young. She said that it is better for oneself to pray than to rely on others, only if one is sincere, the Buddha will bless naturally. I don't believe in Buddhism, but I believe in my mother.

  I quit my job before getting married, and after marriage, I had nothing to do, relying on my wife for support. When I'm at home with nothing to do, I go online to read books. I like reading books, no matter what the content is. In middle school, I had already read "Romance of the Three Kingdoms" three times. Now it's very convenient to read books online. Previously, there was a period when tomb-raiding novels were extremely popular, and I also enjoyed reading them. I was attracted by the tense plots and incredible ancient tombs, sometimes fantasizing about becoming a treasure hunter myself, but unfortunately, there's no way for me to learn from anyone. We have a local street market that also sells antiques, but it's far inferior to Panjiayuan in scale. Everything on the ground looks fake, only suitable for buying back to amuse children. In fact, I know that current society does not allow tomb raiding, and there aren't many graves left to raid anyway. Many have been raided in books, and in reality, China has also excavated a few. As for me, it's just a pipe dream.

  My wife told me today that her younger brother is back from Beijing. My wife's younger brother, who is also my younger brother-in-law, has been working in Beijing for several years and is a typical "northern drifter". I heard that this time he's back for good and plans to find a job at home and get married. Actually, we often play online games together and are quite familiar with each other.

  He came home and played today.

  "My brother-in-law is great."

  "Yuanpeng, hello." He called Yuanpeng, my wife is called Yueli, they are all from the "Yuan" generation.

  After saying a few tricks in online games, he said to me with a somewhat solemn expression:

  "My brother-in-law, actually this time I came back for something more important."

  "What's up?"

  "Do you believe there are still ancient tombs now?"

  "Of course, China is so big, there must be more that hasn't been discovered yet."

  Pengpeng smiled at this time and then said to me:

  "That's good, I've been in Beijing for a long time but haven't made a name for myself. This time going back home to marry and not being able to save money for several years, so I thought of taking a risk."

  "Brother, robbing a bank is no good, you'll lose your head."

  "Who says I'm going to rob a bank?"

  "The crime of selling drugs is even greater."

  "Stop interrupting and it's not about that. Take a look at this first."

  He took out a piece of tattered cloth from his backpack and put it in front of me. I picked it up to take a look, only to realize that it was a painting, and a poorly done one at that. It looked like the kind of drawing a first or second grader would do, just random scribbles.

  "What is this?" I asked in puzzlement.

  "Can't you see? I got this from Panjiayuan."

  "I have an eye for this too, I'm a connoisseur."

  "I didn't know, this was given to me by a friend from Beijing, he said it was originally placed in an eight-treasure glass box, and an old farmer brought it out to sell. My friend took one look and knew it had age, but the other person didn't understand its value, so my friend bought it at a low price. Later when I went to his place to play, I accidentally knocked over the box, and the lock was already rusty, after I shook it, it completely broke. My friend was heartbroken and insisted that I compensate him. Later, I saw a piece of tattered cloth appear inside the box, I didn't know what material it was, when I opened it to look, it had those weird symbols on it. My friend was extremely nervous and told me not to look at it, and to return it to him immediately. Anyway, I couldn't understand it so I gave it back to him, who knew that when I handed it over to him, the cloth dispersed like ash."