The Twentieth Day (3) Nursery Rhyme

  Children's song?

  I was stunned for half a day, what nursery rhyme?

  Do you clap once and I clap once, or does the sun shine in vain?

  It's impossible for a nationwide nursery rhyme. Since Jujube asked this way, it must be a nursery rhyme from Hongyi Village, and he must know it.

  I was at a loss for words, when I suddenly heard Xiaoyi calling me from upstairs. This call saved me. I said to the dwarf, "Master, wait for me, I'll go and see what's going on and come back to tell you right away, just wait for me."

  I ran up and said, "What's wrong?" as Xia Ai stood on the stairs.

  Xiao Ai said, "Nothing much, I'm already up anyway. I saw you looking a bit lonely just now, so I wanted to keep you company, but it turns out you're not even in the room."

  I whispered, I'm talking about something down there. By the way, the nursery rhyme of Gucun, do you know? Only belongs to Gucun?

  Xiao Ai said, nursery rhyme?

  I said, yes, is there a nursery rhyme that we used to say when we were young, which only belongs to our ancient village?

  Xiao Ai thought for a moment, then her eyes lit up and she said, "Yes, yes! It's what we little girls sing when we jump rope."

  Red dress, flowered sedan chair, inside sits a beautiful young woman.

  Beautiful lady, sitting in a flower sedan chair, with only her lover's smile in her eyes.

  Mountains of gold and seas of silver are nothing compared to a house full of children.

  Xiao Ai said that, and I suddenly remembered it. Although the memory is a bit fuzzy, I'm absolutely sure I have an impression of this nursery rhyme, which I used to sing often when I was little.

  I said to Xiao Ai, okay, I'll go down for a bit and come back up to keep you company in a little while.

  Xiao Ai pouted and said, "Obviously I'm the one accompanying you."

  I said, okay, okay, isn't it all the same anyway?

  I ran downstairs and sang the nursery rhyme to the dwarf again. The dwarf listened and nodded, saying, "Alright, I'll believe you this time. You want to hear a story? I'll tell you one, just for fun on these rainy days. As for what you said about gold, let's just treat it as a story too. Neither of us should take it seriously, or something bad might happen in this desolate mountain wilderness."

  Isn't this a blatant threat? However, Heaven said I still have more than 20 days to live, and it's not like this dwarf is my nemesis or anything. I don't want to provoke him, so I nodded and said, Don't worry, just idle chatter.

  The dwarf said that the nursery rhyme you just mentioned actually has a second half, but it's not suitable for children and hasn't been passed down. The whole nursery rhyme goes like this.

  The dwarf finished speaking and suddenly burst into song.

  Red dress, flowered sedan chair, inside sits a beautiful young woman.

  Beautiful lady, sitting in a flower sedan chair, with only her lover's smile in her eyes.

  Mountains of gold and seas of silver are nothing compared to a house full of children.

  An old locust tree, a dilapidated temple, when the moon is half full, I hear her laughter.

  Defy Heaven and fight Earth, Heaven and Earth are useless, ghosts and gods flee.

  Hidden in a ruined temple, unwanted by anyone, yet the maiden insists on calling it a lustful demon.

  Beautiful jade, unwanted, hangs in a ruined temple on a moonlit night.

  Beautiful and delicate, hanging in a dilapidated temple, the heartless person does not know.

  Dying for love is the most laughable thing, a hundred years of resentment in the temple cannot be dissipated.

  Cry for love, grow old for love, but a heartless man is like a tiger or leopard.

  Mei Jiao Jiao is gone, Hong Yi Niang Niang guards the ancient temple.

  The dwarf's voice and the content of the second half made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.

  What a tragedy!

  Obviously, the legend and story of Hongyi Village are related to this nursery rhyme. From any aspect, the story follows the traditional Liao Zhai's routine: a foolish woman and an unfaithful man, then comes the legend of revenge.

  The dwarf looked at me and seemed to be suspicious of my expression. He said, "Do you know or not? If not, don't waste my time."

  I was humming this nursery rhyme in my mouth, although there's no problem with the meaning, but as a writer, I immediately spotted a big problem grammatically, which is that this nursery rhyme doesn't have an ending and is missing two sentences.

  I saw that the dwarf was already suspicious, so I quickly thought of something to say. I said, "I know what's going on, it's just like the thing behind the nursery rhyme." You believed me, didn't you?

  The dwarf was stunned again, then he said, "Do you really know the next few sentences?"

  I nodded, and unexpectedly got a bit of inspiration this time. I said, if I didn't know the last two sentences, could I have said it? Alright, since you don't believe me, then forget it, I don't want to listen either. Something's come up, I'll leave first.

  The dwarf shouted and then said, anyway, it's just telling a story, it's not a big deal, I'm just saying it to you, don't take it seriously. Have you heard of the Fire Worship Sect?

  I said, Mingjiao?

  Juru said, it is also not. The Huo fire teaching is also divided into several kinds, there are original intention teachings, and there are also variant teachings. What you say is the Mingjiao, which is a variant teaching that has merged with China's Confucianism, and what I am saying is the original intention teaching, which is a teaching that follows the ancient method, of course, it no longer exists now. However, during the Yuan and Ming dynasties, several Huo fire teachings flourished, with many believers.

  I nodded and said, I probably know a bit too, you continue speaking.

  Jurchen said, however, after Zhu Yuanzhang relied on the Mingjiao to start his family, he felt the ability of the Baihuo teaching to deceive people's hearts. He was afraid that he would be subjected to the same trick again, so he ordered the elimination of all Baihuo teachings that did not conform to the Mingjiao, and the Yuánzhāi teaching just mentioned was one of them. This Yuánzhāi teaching was originally the purest Baihuo teaching. Although the Mingjiao was very powerful at that time, it was one of its branches according to reason. In the past, the Mingjiao also had to worship the holy girl of the Baihuo teaching, and it can be said that its status was extremely high.

  I hummed in agreement, but Juru seemed to have deliberately left out a crucial point - that the so-called offerings had accumulated a huge fortune for this fire-worshipping cult.

  The dwarf paused for a moment, avoiding the topic of money. He said that the Fire Worshipers like to wear red clothes, and red represents flames. You're so clever, you probably know what I mean, right?

  I said, your meaning is not, in the past that red clothes village actually was a place for Zoroastrianism to escape.

  The dwarf said, yes, this place is so remote, it must be the best place to take refuge. The Huo fire sect took refuge here for a hundred years, isolated from the world. Hunters occasionally came in and saw that everyone inside was wearing red clothes, so there was a name called Red Clothes Village. Qinghe Town has a Red Clothes Village, which is not surprising. However, after thirty years, when the new generation of Shengnu grew up, something happened, just like the children's song sang. The new generation of Shengnu met her heartthrob, and because the Huo fire sect required the Shengnu to be a pure virgin, she gave up her identity as Shengnu in order to marry that man. What's strange is that she didn't see red, this man was already suspicious, and when he accompanied Shengnu back to her hometown, they happened to encounter their monthly night festival, which led to the misunderstanding later on.

  What is Tsukimi?

  The dwarf said: The fire worship was originally a foreign religion, and some customs were not accepted by the people. They would hold hands and jump over the bonfire on the night of the full moon to show their purity and fearlessness. How could this be accepted in the past when men and women did not even touch each other? So the men who saw this ritual thought that the holy girl was a slut, and they quarreled with her on the spot and divorced her. But the holy girl had already consummated her marriage with the man and was divorced again. This was a big deal in the past, let alone when she gave up her position as a holy girl and quarreled with the village elder. So the village could not tolerate the holy girl either, and she could only run to the ancient temple in the village to ask her god. But heaven did not respond, and finally, she hanged herself in the ancient temple.

  I said, is it so miserable? Then what? Is there anything else?

  The dwarf said, of course, the Holy Maiden had already abdicated, but suicide was a big deal, and the villagers felt humiliated and wanted to settle accounts with this man. But the man was cunning and ran away at night. He also had a strong desire for revenge, and since he had already learned that the village was a remnant of the Fire Worship Sect, he secretly reported it to the authorities. At that time, the wind had already died down, but the severity of the matter lay in the fact that there was only one Holy Maiden in the country, and the sacred objects brought with her were secretly hidden by them and did not fall into the hands of the Emperor. At that time, the Ming Cult had not found the sacred object, although they had established their own Holy Maiden, but it was all in name only. Among the few things stolen by this man, there was one of the two great sacred objects of the Fire Worship Sect. This news was passed on to the high levels of the Ming Cult, and so, under the guise of the authorities, troops were sent to kill everyone in the village, while the external explanation was that the village had been afflicted with a plague.

  This man is really ruthless, I was shocked and then said, isn't this man the later Liu Ci? The one who found the gold?

  He nodded, saying that this Liu Ci knew many secrets in the village. When he returned, the village had become another village. What Liu Ci did not expect was that Hongyi Village was exterminated, but ultimately forgot one person - a statue. The body of the suicidal Holy Girl was preserved by the Zoroastrian priests using ancient methods and enshrined in an ancient temple. Later generations did not know the origin, saw a red-robed female flesh in the ancient temple, thought it was a flesh Buddha, named Hongyi Niangniang, and renamed the village Gumi Village, worshiping her like this. Liu Ci was very afraid, but he was also very greedy, trying every means to find some gold. In the end, possibly due to guilt or fear, he cast a golden body for Hongyi Niangniang, which preserved her remains.

  What does it mean by "plasticizing the body"? I don't quite understand. Does a flesh-and-blood Bodhisattva need that too?

  The dwarf said, it's inevitable. Otherwise, even if the corpse doesn't rot, it would still be scary to put it there. If you make a clay figure and stick gold foil on it, then it's no different from a god statue. It's also a kind of respect for the deceased.

  I nodded and asked, is there anything else?

  The dwarf said, "That's all, these are the stories I've collected over the years. What about you?"

  I didn't know the second half of the sentence. But since my dad told me that sentence, it just so happens that my brother is also a writer, with 100,000 fans backing him up, he made something up, not caring about the rhythm or not. I said, there are two more sentences, listen carefully.

  The dwarf nodded seriously and I said, what are its first two sentences?

  The dwarf took a deep breath and said, "Silly girl, gone, the Red Maiden has occupied the ancient temple. Unfaithful man, heartless rogue, once met by the Maiden, there's no place to escape."

  I say, the gates of hell are open, and gold mountains and silver seas cannot be brought back.

  This is what I heard from my dad, the entrance of hell is actually the entrance of Jinshan, but people who go in can't come out.

  Look, I'm still very talented. These two sentences are not only easy to recite but also so apt. I just felt a little proud of myself, and that dwarf frowned and said, "These two sentences are wrong."