Meng Yan's Transformation

After September, potatoes in the Great Northern Wilderness are basically ripe. The green and yellow leaves of the ripe potatoes are covered with black spots, which look like the face of an old man, with a heavy atmosphere and a sense of vicissitudes of life. The yellow is dark and gloomy; the black is calm and calm. Some of the rolled-up leaves are like the foreheads of the old men in the Aobao Fourth Team who are struggling to make ends meet, wrinkled, as if the deep wrinkles left by the sharp blades of the ruthless years hide unspeakable misery and indifference...

The land of the production team was plowed with oxen and horses. From a distance, the plowed potato fields looked white and bright in the cool autumn sunlight. There were piles and nests of potatoes as far as the eye could see, like eggs laid by a hen. It was quite spectacular... The members followed closely behind the ox and horse plows, picked up the potatoes that were plowed out of the land and put them into baskets and bags, then loaded them onto horse-drawn carts. The cartmen pulled them to the yard of the production team, where female members peeled off the soil and dried them in piles and pieces. Before the frost fell, the moisture would almost evaporate, and then they would be distributed to the members as food according to their work points. Every household had to dig a cellar and put the potatoes they were allocated into the cellar, waiting for the winter. Potatoes are both vegetables and staple foods. They can be stir-fried or boiled. In winter, sit on a heated kang with a large clay brazier on top. Put the potatoes in it and pick up the poker stuck in the brazier to flip the potatoes a few times. Slowly, the potatoes will give off a fragrance and become soft. They are the most delicious...

Thirteen-year-old Xiaoqin carried her brother on her back, peeling potatoes in the yard of the production team, picking out the potatoes that had been plowed. This year's potato harvest was great, and they grew particularly large, plump and round... Xiaoqin picked the potatoes, with a sad smile on her pale and haggard face. The brother Sanbao on her back kept tearing Xiaoqin's beautiful long hair with his hands: "I want to go home! I want to go home!" Sanbao was four or five years old and could walk by himself, but as soon as he saw his sister Xiaoqin, he would whine and cry and ask his sister to carry him on his back or hold him in his arms.

"Xiaoqin! Don't spoil your younger brother Sanbao too much. You work in the production team, work at home, and take care of your younger brother every day. You must be exhausted!" advised female member Wang Ersao.

Wang Ersao's words really came true. In this fruitful early autumn, Xiaoqin was worked to death. There was no coffin. Xiaoqin was wearing patched clothes, wrapped in a straw mat and sent to the Hetao meadow, where she was placed on a pile of firewood and burned. However, there was not enough firewood, and Xiaoqin's internal organs were not burned to ashes. Her parents and the members of the production team dug a small hole and buried Xiaoqin's unburned internal organs into a small grave.

Unmarried people in the local area are cremated after death.

After Xiaoqin died, Sanbao's parents asked their second daughter Xiaoxia to take care of Sanbao. Sanbao's parents were extremely patriarchal.

One day, Xiaoxia took Sanbao to a deserted place and said, "Sanbao, I tell you, you have worn me to death. If you want to wear me to death again, it's impossible. I would rather beat you to death than let you wear me to death!" Xiaoxia warned Sanbao sternly.

From then on, Sanbao no longer cried every day and became well-behaved and sensible.

A few days after Xiaoqin was cremated, Zheng Fu's second brother, who had wet his bed for many years, also died. He was also sent to the Hetao meadow for cremation...

Xiao Mengyan went to the wild pear tree on the back hillside again that day and saw the elderly mother-in-law, Aunt Zhang, twisting ropes with mugwort and hanging the ropes on the wild pear tree to dry in the sun.

Dried mugwort ropes can be lit in the summer night to repel mosquitoes. The light vanilla scent can also calm the nerves and help with sleep. The elderly like to boil dried mugwort into water and soak their feet in winter. It can dredge the meridians, dispel cold and dampness, and eliminate fatigue...

Aunt Zhang once told Yunqing how she was abused by her mother-in-law when she first got married: she was hit on the head with her mother-in-law's pipe, and big bloody blisters often appeared on her head... Little Mengyan, who was playing nearby, heard Aunt Zhang's story, and a seed of hatred and fear for the "old witch" was planted in her young heart.

Today, when little Mengyan saw the old woman under the wild pear tree, she was so scared that she ran away.

The next day, Xiao Mengyan went to the back hillside again. She didn't dare to approach the wild pear tree. She secretly watched from a distance to see if the "old witch" came. When she saw that there was no one near the pear tree, she dared to walk into the wild pear tree and saw that the wild pear tree was full of mugwort ropes.

"Little puppy, tell me, do you want to avenge Aunt Zhang?" Xiao Mengyan asked the puppy buried underground.

The autumn wind blew the wormwood, making a whirring sound, as if saying, "Revenge! Revenge!"

Xiao Mengyan then pulled the mugwort rope off the wild pear tree and stepped on it with her feet, crushing it into pieces...

A sad sound of suona was heard from Aunt Zhang's house in the front yard. "Mother-in-law Zhang has passed away. Mengyan, you and your sister should stay at home and don't run around. Mom will go to pay respects to her," Yunqing said to little Mengyan.

I heard that Aunt Zhang's mother-in-law went to the back mountain to get the rope for drying mugwort, and she fell down on the hillside and died.

"I didn't want my mother-in-law to die, I didn't want my mother-in-law to die! I was wrong, I was wrong, I'm sorry! I'm sorry!" Xiao Mengyan fell ill, mumbling in delirium with a high fever.

In early autumn, three people suddenly disappeared from Aobaotun. The abundance of early autumn could not soothe the sadness and fear in people's hearts...