seven relics

As for where to find that Muzhu Taoist, and why he left in such a hurry, it wasn't until the two of them arrived at the airport and had a moment of leisure while waiting for the plane that Xingshan told Lian Jiangyue the ins and outs of the matter.

Xing Shandao: "I searched everywhere for information about "The Record of Seeing Demons" and Crying Rain. I searched the title of the book many times on the Internet but couldn't find anything. Then I searched with a paragraph of text and found this book A new edition was published three months ago. It was renamed "Notes on Folk Interests". It is included in a complete series of ancient legendary novels. After reading it, the content is "Jijian Yaomolu", but there are a lot of deletions, so I won't mention it. The author's profile on the book is clearly written, Yuan Jianxia, ​​a native of the Ming Dynasty, liked to dance, write, and listen to the countryside since he was a child. Gossip, I wrote it at the age of 20, and wrote this book at the age of 30, but it is enough to ask the audience to smile.

"I checked the classics earlier, and I also asked some university professors who study Ming and Qing novels. No one has ever heard of the Taoist Wood and Bamboo. Some people said that it might be written by modern people under the guise of ancient people's names. I was very curious if this Yuan Jianxia was the real name of the Taoist Muzhu, or if this Jianxia Yuan plagiarized the novel of the Taoist Muzhu. After all, the book "Seeing Demons and Demons" can be said to be little known, so I got in touch Editor in charge of the publishing house."

He took out the "Notes on Folk Interests" from his backpack, and turned to the page of publication information, where the name of the editor in charge and the contact information of the publishing house were clearly written.The publishing house is located in Xiamen.

"I claimed that I was a graduate student studying folk novels of the Ming and Qing Dynasties. I wanted to learn more about the creator and background of this book. The editor listened and kept introducing me to other novels from their publishing house. I found it even more strange. I made a special trip to Xiamen and found the editor. After asking, I found out that this book was a manuscript received by them. The pen name was given by the person who contributed the manuscript. They made up the number of books in the series. Brother San, you have read this book too. The descriptions in it are very explicit. Although there are some cuts, compared to many novels on the market, it is more exciting. They I just want to play around in the name of Gu Ben."

Lian Jiangyue looked at Xingshan, and said with a smile: "I'm afraid you asked him so frightened that you asked me?"

Xing Shan was a little embarrassed, lowered his head slightly, blushed, and scratched his cheek.Lian Jiangyue said again: "Don't call me third senior brother, I am no longer your senior brother."

Xing Shan lowered his head even lower, and muttered, "Let's talk about the business first."

He said: "Anyway, that editor didn't know there was such a novel as "The Record of Seeing Demons". You also know that Master, on weekdays, he likes to collect miscellaneous books that no one cares about, old books, wild books, casual books..." At this point, Xingshan stopped, knowing that he had slipped his words.Lian Jiangyue just said that he is no longer his senior brother, so he will definitely not recognize Bian Rugou as his master.He glanced at Lian Jiangyue, and as expected, he saw a sullen look on Lian Jiangyue's face, and the black shadow under his feet was getting longer and longer.Xingshan hurriedly changed the topic, and said: "I want to get the contact information of the writer, who is also in Xiamen, so I met the writer in the name of signing a contract with a draft. A girl came, I'm not very old, so I asked..."

Lian Jiangyue laughed, and when Xingshan saw him, his anger disappeared completely, and he became gentle again. Xingshan relaxed a little, but when he thought about the rapid ups and downs of Lian Jiangyue's emotions, he felt sad again. Feeling worried, she couldn't help but look at the shadow at Lian Jiangyue's feet.The black figure slanted, leaning against the chair, there was no abnormality.

Xing Shandao: "This time it's really just a question."

"What's the question?"

"The girl is a middleman. She works as a cashier in a supermarket. One day she received a text message asking her to take a manuscript from a locker downstairs in the supermarket and send it to a certain publishing house. As long as the manuscript is delivered, The other five hundred in the locker belonged to her. She took the money at first and didn’t send the manuscript, but when she got up the next day, she saw two big blood-red characters on the wall, “Send the manuscript.” She was terrified , originally wanted to call the police, but it is a fact that she took other people's money. She bought new clothes on the same day with 500 yuan, ate a big meal, and spent it all. If the police ask her to pay back the money, she still owes her credit card. She owed money and didn't come out at all, so she thought, collect money from people, help people eliminate disasters, and just run an errand, so she gave up the idea of ​​calling the police.

"After sending away the manuscript, she thought that the matter was over, but not long after, the editor of the publishing house contacted her and dragged her into a chat group, where some manuscript acceptance information was often posted in the group, and she didn't even get involved. After these, the group was blocked. One day, she received another mysterious text message, which instructed her to apply for a call for papers, and said that she would be paid a share of the manuscript fee. She wondered, how did the person who sent the text message come from? Did you see the information on her mobile phone? Could it be that her mobile phone was monitored? She took the mobile phone for repair, and found no problems with the software and hardware. She was suspicious for a while, but she continued to publish She is the middleman between the agency and the mysterious writer. After all, the mysterious man did give her money, and she really needs money.

"I wrote down the manuscript she said she sent out."

Xingshan took out several other books from his backpack, and Lian Jiangyue was dumbfounded for a moment. From social sciences to psychoanalysis, to novels, chicken soup for the soul, there are all kinds of them, everything.He picked up a book called "How to Get Along with Another Self", flipped through a few pages, and said, "These pseudonyms are also different."

What Meng Xiaoqing, Peter Thomas, Wang Guozhu, Chinese and foreign friends gathered together.The identities of these authors are also varied, ranging from lecturers at famous Ivy League schools to writers of emotional columns.

Xingshan continued: "The day I asked the cashier girl to meet, a payment for the manuscript happened to arrive, so she went to withdraw the money and sent it to the supermarket locker."

"You followed her?"

"No..." Xingshan blinked, and hesitantly opened his mouth, "That girl brought it up, she said, help me see if I have a split personality, maybe I have a talented second person personality."

Lian Jiangyue smiled and said: "You have quite a lot of experience, and then? Is it her split personality?"

"No, we waited and waited, and we found a high school student, a boy, but he was just an intermediary, between the cashier girl and the mysterious writer. Someone sent it in a courier. He checked the delivery address of the courier, but it didn't exist at all, and the courier couldn't tell where the courier came from. The money was wired by the post office, and he also got a commission. The money was all used for games. "

"What did the wire transfer account find?"

"I found an old man surnamed Tang who died ten years ago and whose household registration was in Shenzhen."

"How did you find out?"

"I called the police, and I said that I was the elder brother of that high school student. My younger brother was defrauded by someone online. The police found out as soon as they checked. The matter is strange. Mr. Tang has been dead for ten years, and a lot of money has accumulated in his account , The remitters come from all over the country, basically every six months will change the remitter, the first remittance is from Guilin, no one has withdrawn the money in ten years, and the money is just stored in the old man’s account.”

Lian Jiangyue said: "Is the clue broken like this?"

Xingshan smiled: "I thought so too at first." He clenched his fists and was a little excited for a while, "I just didn't give up. I went to Shenzhen, found Mr. Tang's house, and explained my purpose. Because of calling the police, I I talked to Mr. Tang’s son several times on the phone. After the old man passed away, his family didn’t cancel the account, but they didn’t care about it. They didn’t know that someone had been sending money into it. When the son saw it, I thought I'm here to get back the money, and I'm going to be kicked out."

"You 'asked' again?"

Xingshan smiled dryly, and said: "I have no other choice...Mr. Tang's family can't say anything. I asked who Mr. Tang had contacted before, and if he had any friends who wrote books. They also asked. I didn’t know, so I walked around their house, their house was being redecorated, and there was a lot of cardboard on the floor, it was from the yuba factory in Yangshuo, and I didn’t see yuba at home, so I asked.”

Lian Jiangyue said at this time: "The first remittance came from Guilin, isn't Yangshuo in Guilin?"

Xing Shandao: "Yes, I just asked this because I thought it was a bit suspicious. It turned out that Mr. Tang used to work in a yuba factory in Yangshuo, and he retired ten years ago. I often send bean curd sticks to him, even after the person dies.”

"You went to Yangshuo?"

Xingshan nodded: "The owner of the yuba factory said that Mr. Tang did work here for decades, until he became the factory manager. The yuba was sent from their factory. The boss didn't know that the old man had passed away. He recalled that before Mr. Tang was going back to Shenzhen, he rescued a young man by the river. At that time, everyone in the factory served drinks for the old man. After the banquet was over, everyone walked back to the factory dormitory. Someone fell into the water, so he jumped into the river to save people. The old man is usually warm-hearted, and the water quality is still very good. The man who fell into the water was rescued by him. He was fine and said a word to the old man. .

"The boss of the yuba factory said that sentence was so strange that he was so impressed that he couldn't forget it. What the man said was, you saved me, you saved my story, and my story will repay you Yes. Everyone thought he was mentally abnormal, and Mr. Tang didn't take it seriously."

Lian Jiangyue patted her thigh: "That person is the mysterious writer? He sent all his manuscript fees to Mr. Tang in order to repay his kindness? But what is the relationship between this mysterious writer and Taoist Mu Zhu?"

At this time, the radio announced that their plane was starting to board, and the two went to line up.Lian Jiangyue asked again: "Did that person be rescued and sent to the hospital? Does the hospital have his records?"

Xingshan said: "After he got ashore, he left by himself after saying that." His voice sank, and he looked at Lian Jiangyue with deep eyes: "Five days later, someone found his body on the mountain, and he hanged himself on a tree."

He continued: "Because no one claimed it, the body was sent directly to the funeral parlor. Two days later, the body disappeared. This matter made the local news."

Xing Shan took a deep breath: "I had a strange feeling at the time, probably this is the so-called intuition. I went online and found out all the news about the mysterious disappearance of corpses in funeral parlors. A forum for discussing urban legends, posting posts asking netizens if such strange things have happened in anyone’s hometown, rumors and stories, you can talk about anything.”

Xing Shan took out a map from his coat pocket: "I made such a map."

The map is hand drawn and shows almost the whole of China, with the names of some cities written on it.Some cities are drawn with red circles, and some cities are drawn with blue circles, with a few lines of small characters written on the sides, and the cities are connected by black arrows.

Lian Jiangyue saw the Sanqing Mountain painted with a red circle at a glance, leaned over and carefully read the words on the side: "Jiangxi Sanqing Mountain, according to folklore, during the Han Dynasty, the Taoist temple caught fire, and the whereabouts of the charred corpses are unknown..."

An arrow pointing to Hangzhou extends from Sanqing Mountain: "Folk legend, during the reign of Zhenguan, buildings collapsed and the remains of the deceased disappeared."

Before Sanqing Mountain, it can be traced back to the Qin Dynasty: "In Puyang, Henan, it is said that a hunter caught a giant deer, opened the deer's carcass, and found a dead man. The whereabouts of the dead body were unknown the next day."

There are no more arrows before Puyang, where everything started.

Lian Jiangyue suddenly remembered something, and asked Xingshan to bring out the new version of "The Record of Seeing Demons", Xingshan said: "You also found out, Puyang, Sanqingshan, Hangzhou, and the cities after that are all The place where the stories in "The Record of Seeing Demons" took place."

He took out the book and handed it to Lian Jiangyue, and Lian Jiangyue hurriedly turned to the last story: "It finally happened in Yangzhou."

"Yes, such a legend also appeared in Yangzhou 300 years ago, and the corpse disappeared for no reason."

Lian Jiangyue said: "Then those who draw the blue circle..."

"After Yangzhou, such things seemed to disappear until ten years ago." Xing Shan said, "The blue circles are the places where there have been rumors of missing corpses in the past ten years. Every two years, they are concentrated in two or three months. Well, this kind of news will appear in different cities."

He pointed to the blue circle in Zhangzhou, beside which was written: "News, May [-]rd, Xiamen, fell from building, body missing."

It was their turn to board the plane. As they walked, they said, "The last news about a missing body was in Zhangzhou. It's been exactly two years since the last news."

His eyebrows furrowed suddenly, he found his seat on the plane, sat down, fastened his seat belt, and continued: "On May [-]rd, the cashier girl contacted me, she was very scared, One night, when she came home from work, she was pulled into an alley by a man. The man asked him where is Zhuxinmu. She had never heard of such a man. The man asked again, did you send the manuscript? Did you go to the publishing house?"

"Who is this person? Could it be that Zhu Xinmu he was looking for was the real name of that mysterious writer?"

Xingshan shook his head: "I don't know, I asked the editor and the high school boy later, and some people also went to them. According to their description, the other party was an adult man, not very old, and he was also looking for A man named Zhu Xinmu."

Lian Jiangyue sat next to him, and the more she listened, the more puzzled she became: "Zhuxinmu...it sounds like it has something to do with Taoist Muzhu."

He asked: "How did you confirm that Taoist Muzhu is in the mountain we are going to?"

Xing Shandao: "It was in that urban legend forum, May No. 13, a person from Zhangzhou posted that he was climbing a wild mountain near Zhangzhou a few days ago and met a strange person in the mountain. When the strange person saw him, he asked, Have you ever seen a person named Zhu Xinmu, who may even call himself Taoist Mu Zhu, and showed him a portrait, the strange thing is that the portrait looks exactly the same as that strange person. The person who posted the post thought he met When he was insane, he returned home after staying in the mountains for a few days, thinking of making up for the news that happened during the few days he left, so he took out the old newspapers at home and looked at it, and saw the story about a young man falling Lou, the news about the disappearance of the body, the news has attached pictures, looking at the clothes, he felt very similar to the strange man he met in the mountains, he checked the Internet, and found a video taken by an eyewitness. Look at the man’s appearance. It’s the weird guy who stopped him! The man fell from the building on the [-]rd, and the news said he died on the spot. The netizen climbed the mountain and met the weird guy on the [-]th.”

Lian Jiangyue touched her arm: "It's become a ghost story."

Xingshan also had goosebumps all over his body, he said: "I originally wanted to find it by myself, but when I thought about it, if I really found that Muzhu Taoist, it would be more convenient for you to talk to him face to face, but I can't get in touch. I have no choice but to ask He Fengxu Wei."

Having said that, Xingshan's voice gradually became softer, Lian Jiangyue's eyebrows moved, and he was speechless.After the plane took off and stabilized in the air, he spoke again and asked Xing Shan, "Did Bian really say nothing to Zhao Youzhi while you were running around like this?"

Xing Shandao: "I said that I will go down the mountain to do business, and come back with some business."

Lian Jiangyue couldn't help laughing: "Seeing that you are usually honest and well-behaved, this time you are pretending to be a graduate student, a drafter, and someone else's brother. You are also a set of lies, so farewell for three days, really. When you look at it with admiration."

Xing Shandao: "What happened in the crying rain..." He bit his tongue, didn't look at Lian Jiangyue, and said in a low voice: "What happened to you, I want a reasonable and reasonable explanation for everyone to believe in." explain."

Lian Jiangyue said: "I have been shouting for so many years, it is difficult for you to change your mind for a while, but the third senior brother sounds really harsh to me, why don't you call me senior brother directly."

He also didn't expect that his junior brother would work so hard for him, and thinking that he had been in Bian's family for so many years, and only his junior brother Xingshan treated him sincerely. He was not a brother to him, but better than a brother. Ding looked at Xingshan, and said: "It's hard work for you to search this way."

Xing Shan shook his head lightly, and said: "You are the one who worked hard..." His eyes became moist, his tone became choked up, and he clenched his fists and said: "I don't want everyone to treat you as a villain, you Not who they say they are."

Lian Jiangyue patted him, and smiled: "Why do you care what others think?"

He looked at Xingshan with a smile: "You know what kind of person I am, so it's fine?"

He folded his arms, closed his eyes and took a nap.

Xing Shan watched Lian Jiangyue silently, his third senior brother was quite different from before.His shoulders seem to be wider, his hands seem to be stronger, his words and deeds are so free, and his demeanor is so carefree.

For so many years in Bian's house, he has never seen Lian Jiangyue smile so easily, nor heard him speak so casually.In the past, Lian Jiangyue also liked to laugh. When he smiled, he was decent and gentle, and his every move and dealing with people were just right.Now that I think about it, these decency and appropriateness may be the result of years of depression.

Indeed, several times, he looked at Lian Jiangyue and Master, and when he got along with Senior Sister, he felt that his eyes were heavy, and his shoulders seemed to be pressed by something heavy - he always thought it was the condensation of Master's expectations for the third senior brother or the burden that the third senior brother placed on him due to the expectations he placed on him.But perhaps it wasn't any expectations that suppressed Lian Jiangyue, but just the eyes of others.He is an abandoned child under the shelter of others, he doesn't want to be homeless, and he doesn't want to be abandoned again, so he can only live by observing his words and feelings, using the rules set by others to restrain himself into a look that others are satisfied with, and using a smile to draw closer the relationship between himself and everyone , to create a loving life circle.

Xingshan couldn't help but think that if Lian Jiangyue didn't take good care of him, if he was wronged or injured, he would go to him to ask for favors. There are some quarrels and disputes among the teachers on weekdays, and Lian Jiangyue defended him He, what kind of life will he live in Bian's house?

At this time, he had a lot of things he wanted to talk to Lian Jiangyue, and there were many things he wanted to ask him, but the Taoist Mu Zhu's whereabouts were a mystery, and it would not be easy to find him. He had to keep up his energy, so he just got closer to Lian Jiangyue, sat with his arm leaning on his arm, and closed his eyes to rest his mind.