You have mastered the art of thunder and you tell me that it is in a strange world?

Chapter 29 The Poor Monk

When Wang Erniu brought Zuo Chen and others to the courtyard of the village chief's house, it was already completely dark.

There were many torches in the village, and even though it was the first night, the whole village was brightly lit.

There were few people on the road. Zuo Chen looked around, his eyes passing over the neighboring houses of the villagers. He could see the gazes looking out from the houses.

Those were all people from the village, all frightened and uneasy.

When they arrived at the village chief's courtyard, Erniu stopped first:
"Master, please wait outside for a while. I will go in and call the village chief."

He sighed:
"Since the village chief had an encounter with that beast, he has been in a state of daze every day. If I bring a stranger in directly, I'm afraid the village chief will be frightened and scream and make a fuss."

After saying that, Wang Erniu entered the house after getting Zuo Chen's approval.

When Wang Erniu's voice disappeared, Caiyi came to Zuo Chen and asked in a low voice:
"Master, I have something I've always wanted to ask you."

"You said."

"It seems that this village can't produce much money, and it's not certain that we can get any treasure. If you say you want to save people, people die every day in this world, and it's impossible to save them all. Don't you have a little bit of..."

Caiyi didn't utter the words "a thankless task" in the end.

After asking Zuo Chen, Caiyi immediately shrank her head like a turtle, waiting for Zuo Chen to lecture her.

She thought Zuo Chen might immediately become stern and then use some of the sayings of Zhihu people such as "Be the first to worry about the world's worries, and the last to enjoy the world's happiness" and "If you don't save the suffering, how can you save the world?" to teach her a lesson, but she didn't expect Zuo Chen to just smile and say:

"Guess what?"

Caiyi: “???”

What kind of answer is this?

Zuo Chen smiled and didn't say anything else.

He did this mainly for merit.

Zuo Chen's cultivation of Taoism is not yet mature enough, and his cultivation on the mountain is incomplete, so he wants to go down the mountain to seek supernatural powers.

But the Taoist magic in his hands was not unrecorded.

The Shangqing Leifasi is in charge of the punishment of thunder, and must act in an open and aboveboard manner.

This means that the greater his own merits and virtues, the better the effect of his thunder magic.

That's why he meddles in other people's business.

Seeing that Zuo Chen was silent, Caiyi didn't know why. She thought for a moment, gave up thinking, and moved on to the next topic:

"Then why did you accept me as your disciple? Is it because I have some talent?"

Caiyi's eyes lit up. Since she was a child, she liked to listen to storytellers talk about various people with destiny, and she fantasized that one day she would be able to transform herself and become the master riding on someone's neck.

Could it be that I really have some hidden talent that I don’t even know about?
Zuo Chen looked at Caiyi and fell into deep thought.

Caiyi: “?”

Taoist priest, please say something! I am very scared if you don't say anything!

"First of all, you are not my apprentice yet. You are just a registered disciple at most. Secondly... because you are good-looking? I am in need of an errand boy, but I don't want to find a big and strong man..."

Zuo Chen's tone was very hesitant.

Caiyi: "???"

"Master! Are you really that honest? Think about it carefully. Is there nothing about me that is worthy of your extra attention?"

Zuo Chen fell into hesitation, as if he was facing a major and difficult decision in his life.

Damn, so infuriating!

Wang Erniu also came out of the house and interrupted their conversation. Following behind him was a trembling old man. After stepping out of the courtyard, he looked back every few steps. If Wang Erniu hadn't followed him, he would have run back to his own room.

"This must be the immortal Taoist priest, please come in quickly, please come in quickly!"

If other people's "please come in quickly" was somewhat polite, then this village chief's was simply a plea.

Without staying in the yard, they entered the house.

When they arrived at the not-so-spacious main house, the old village chief quickly closed the door.

When the wooden door separated the inside and outside, he heaved a sigh of relief, his face half-crying and half-smiling. "Master, I've heard from Erniu that you are a capable person, please save our village! If that beast keeps messing around, there might be no one left in the village in a month or so!"

The village chief pulled out a chair and asked Zuo Chen to sit down. After Zuo Chen sat down, he asked:

"First, tell me what disaster happened in your village. I have to see whether it can be handled or not."

"It's all my fault that I was looking for a bargain and found a street monk, which caused so much trouble."

The village chief sighed and told the whole story:

"My old man passed away some time ago. He usually liked to eat vegetarian food and chant Buddhist scriptures. Thanks to the Buddha, he passed away at the age of over 80 without suffering from any serious illness.

"When the body was ready for burial, I thought about finding a few masters to perform rituals for the old man. This would show how pious he was and would give our family a lot of face. But I took some silver to the nearby Anming Temple and asked. Wow! One day of rituals costs fifty taels of silver! And that's just to send over the stacked talisman paper. They don't even come to our door in person!
"Fifty taels of silver! Even if we are a wealthy village, this is enough for my family's annual revenue.

"I was so scared at the time that the monks in the temple laughed at me and called me a poor bastard. I got so angry that I left.

"It so happened that a poor monk passed by my village that day, so I thought of asking him to preside over the ritual. He didn't ask for money, but only asked for a bowl of porridge and pickles. He actually helped my old man to perform the ritual properly.

"After the show, he wanted to leave, so I asked him where he was going, and he just said he was going up the mountain. But once he got up the mountain, he never came down."

The old village chief recounted to Zuo Chen everything that happened when he met the monk, and what happened afterwards was exactly the same as what the roadside shop manager had said before.

That night, a dark figure in a cassock came to the village chief's door and knocked. The village chief was afraid and did not go out. The next day, the person next door was killed.

However, this is not the end of the story.

The dark shadow did not leave, and the entire village was harassed for a whole month!

Every night there would be a knock on a family's door, and when one looked out the window, one would see a black figure in a cassock.

If the door is not opened, animals will be killed, pigs will be killed, cows will be killed, and horses will be killed.

Some villagers couldn't bear the sight of their property being taken away, so they prepared their weapons in advance and opened the door at night.

Then the next day the whole family would be disemboweled and their limbs cut off.

As time went by, the people in the village became panic-stricken and no one dared to go out.

After listening to the village chief's introduction, Zuo Chen frowned slightly.

Was this a prescription given by someone?

It sounds really weird.

After thinking for a moment, Zuo Chen felt that he should see what was knocking on the door.

"Village chief, how many households are left in the village now?"

"There were originally 72 households, 6 of which were killed, and 27 of them went to their mother's home in the city for refuge."

The village chief counted on his fingers, and Caiyi answered first:

"There are thirty-nine households left."

Thirty-nine households...

Focusing his eyes on the spiritual energy and looking around, Zuo Chen memorized the positions of all the remaining people.

He walked to the door of the house and pushed it open. Under the worried and horrified eyes of the village chief, Zuo Chen walked into the yard and groped around.

With the help of the oil lamp light in the room, he found a piece of dogtail grass.

Using the flower-blooming technique he had learned before and circulating his Qi, Zuo Chen blew gently at the dogtail grass in his hand.

"go with!"

He shook out the dogtail grass, and the small green particles on it instantly flew towards the door beams of the only thirty-nine households left in the village, and whooshed into the ground.

Then a small foxtail grass quickly grew out of the soil, swaying in the wind.

After doing all this, Zuo Chen returned to the house.

"Go and rest first. I'll see who is here to do this evil tonight."

The village chief's eyes widened.

Is this over?

(End of this chapter)