At that time, although green plants could be seen in the winter in Xianyang countryside, there was no grass over half a meter tall, as if it was meant just for me.
Although grandma was with me, I didn't dare to stay longer at that moment. I plucked the piece of grass and followed the white rooster back. In the instant I entered the door, I suddenly felt as if I had been reborn, extremely comfortable all over like nothing had happened.
The black rooster in the yard seemed to be dyed red under the light. I nervously grabbed grandma's arm, and she patted my head to signal me not to be afraid.
There were more than ten burning candles placed in the yard, and the candles were connected by a white thread, forming an irregular circle, with the black rooster in the center of the circle.
When it saw me, the black rooster seemed to go mad, clucking as if it was questioning me desperately, just like Luo Changsheng standing in front of me.
Grandpa sat in a deck chair, vigorously tapping his pipe, and asked if I was Luo Changsheng. Surprisingly, the rooster nodded.
Grandpa asked, "Do you have anything on your mind?" After the rooster clucked for a long time, Grandpa thought for a moment and said, "Rest assured, as long as you don't harm my grandson, I will do my best to fulfill your wish."
Strangely enough, after Grandpa finished speaking, the black rooster suddenly lay down on the ground, shaking its head vigorously. I was extremely nervous at the time, staring straight at the rooster's head, and I saw that the rooster was crying, or it could be said that Luo Changsheng was crying.
When the rooster raised its head again, Grandpa said that Luo Changsheng had already gone and instructed me to go back to my room and sleep immediately. No matter what happens in the yard in the middle of the night, I shouldn't open my eyes.
I was already scared as a child, and nodded repeatedly before lying down next to grandma and closing my eyes. In the middle of the night, I heard sporadic crying and the frantic crowing of a rooster coming from the yard. Although I was very curious about what was happening, I remembered Grandpa's words and obediently lay on the heated brick bed.
At daybreak, I eagerly looked out the window. The yard was in a mess, with feathers strewn everywhere, and the two roosters were lying in the middle of the candles with their bellies split open. Grandpa said that Luo Changsheng had done all this and that he had used these two roosters as me to vent his grievances.
Every time it was the seventh day since Luo Changsheng's death, Grandpa would take me to the roadside to burn paper money. And on the final seventh day, our family laid out a table of lavish food, with eight candles placed on the table, said to be the ghost feast for Luo Changsheng. After waiting for an hour, Grandpa let me sit at the table to eat, but as soon as I took a bite, I spat it out. The food had no flavor at all.
Starting from the day after the final seventh day, I never saw Luo Changsheng again, nor did I hear his crying. I never asked Grandpa what condition Luo Changsheng had talked to him about, and Grandpa never told me.
Starting from my thirteenth birthday, every night, I would have a very strange dream.
In the dream, I would be alone at the edge of a mountain ditch behind the village. The ditch was filled with water, with an iron chain as thick as a wrist on top of it. I would uncontrollably step on the chain and sway forward.
But every time I reached the center of the chain, my body would suddenly lose balance and fall heavily into the water.
The water was icy cold and bone-chilling, and no matter how hard I struggled, it was of no use. As my strength was drained, I would eventually sink to the bottom. At the deepest part of the water, there was a coffin, and as I arrived, the coffin lid would open, revealing a beautiful woman dressed in wedding attire lying quietly inside.
Every time the woman opens her eyes, I wake up from this dream.
This dream has been troubling me for half a year. Finally, my grandfather grabbed me to ask what was wrong when he saw that I was absent-minded.
When I spoke about the dream, my grandfather's brow furrowed. He told my grandmother to prepare a white candle and a piece of white paper. Seeing me looking at him, my grandfather lit a piece of yellow paper and muttered incantations under his breath. After the yellow paper burned out, he mixed the ashes with water and made me drink it before holding me to lie down on the bed.
The sensation was very strange. I had no drowsiness at all, but as soon as I lay down on the bed, my eyes became heavy.
The dream appeared in my mind again. When the woman in the coffin opened her eyes, I woke up abruptly. The first thing I saw was my grandfather standing at a table with a lit candle on it, holding a piece of white paper in his hand.
Confused, my grandfather waved me over and handed me the white paper, asking if this was the woman. The flame of the candle roasted the paper, making a woman's face appear, but it was just a headshot, not a full body. The woman's eyes were slightly open, as if she had just woken up, just like the eyes that appeared countless times in my dream.
Seeing me nod, my grandfather sighed and said that what was meant to happen would happen, then he packed up and walked away.
I was extremely puzzled and no matter how I questioned my grandfather as I followed him outside, he refused to tell me who had come. Frustrated, I ended up asking my grandmother, who eventually told me that the person my grandfather referred to was my ghost daughter-in-law.
Ever since the incident with Luo Changsheng, I had long since forgotten about the matter of the ghost daughter-in-law, and now that it was mentioned again, I was extremely uneasy, fearing that the ghost daughter-in-law would come and take me away.
My grandmother chuckled, stroked my head, and told me not to worry. She said that my grandfather would find a way to handle the matter for me.
From that day on, I rarely saw my grandfather at night. Over half a month later, my grandfather returned home in the early morning, dragging his tired body. In a daze, I heard the old man telling my grandmother that the matter had been resolved, and the ghost daughter-in-law had promised to come find me when I reached adulthood.
At that time, many things could not be explained from a scientific perspective, just like when I saw two dark figures crouching in the middle of the road, clearly not just ordinary people.
But then again, for these matters, it was a case of believing or not believing, and I happened to belong to the type that believed.
For over half a month, my grandfather would spend the night at the place where the body of the woman from the late Qing Dynasty was buried. It was through this method that he brought me a peaceful decade.
However, I had no idea what agreement they had reached during that time. My grandfather had always been an extremely mysterious person, and there were many things that even my grandmother didn't want to tell me, let alone me.
I spent my primary and middle school years at home, and when I entered high school, I began living as a boarder. I could only return home on weekends, but on Sunday afternoons, I had to pack up and take a bus ride of over an hour to get to the county high school.
I had thought that all these strange occurrences had already left me, but when I was in my second year of high school, an unimaginable event occurred again.