Chapter 23 Yuan Yi’s home

In the detention center, Master Chen told this story with a bitter look on his face. He even forgot to smoke the cigarette in his hand. He said, “Later, I started to cheat with this kid and learned that his name was A-bo and that he was a Hmong from Xiangxi. I heard that he had another name, but he never told me. For so many years, it wasn’t exactly cheating. For ordinary people, we used simple tricks, but for big clients he valued, he would personally use the gu. Hehe, I only found out later that he was a Miao who could cast hexes.

At this point, Qin Huai asked, “What kind of people are his valued big clients?”

“He values those who are especially wealthy. He and I split everything 20/80, and I think he values money almost to the point of madness. I didn’t know what he wanted all that money for at first. It wasn’t until one time he drank too much that he let slip a little bit of information, saying that his village needed a lot of money. It was then that I remembered that the first time he met me, he said that I was the result of their investigation, as if I were a group of people. For so many years, I’ve only seen him alone.”

At this point, Qin Huai and I were both shocked. This was not just one person going crazy, according to Master Chen, it was an entire village! What was this village going to do…?

Qin Huai and I are both members of the special department, and we are particularly sensitive to these things. This discovery made us jump with fear.

But we couldn’t say anything to Master Chen. I just asked, “Your friend A Bo ran away, but before he ran away, he put a curse on a friend of mine. The curse he put on me is the same as the one he put on Grandpa Yun. Do you know anything about it?”

Now that it was out in the open, Master Chen had nothing to hide, and said very plainly, “He has many ways of inflicting the curse, but there is one kind of curse that he is said to be particularly concerned about, and he would not use it lightly. The one he used on Grandpa Yun was that curse, and your friend was probably bitten by his curse. I have seen that kind of bug before. It is a very small bug with a strange shape. It looks very scary and colorful. According to him, the bug has a liquid in its mouth that is similar to an anesthetic. It doesn’t hurt when it bites, and it is hard to defend against. Even if there are many people in their village with this kind of bug, there are not many. As for curing the bug, it needs to be bitten by another kind of bug. There is also a kind of powder that can restrain it. He gave me some of that powder to draw a talisman…

Hearing this, I asked excitedly, “Do you still have the talisman?”

“I have some at home. Also…” Master Chen looked at Qin Huai with longing in his eyes and said, “You have heard all this, and you know that I am not lying. I was forced to do it. Can you help me plead for leniency? What will happen to my family if I go to jail?”

Qin Huai said, “I can help you look into this. It’s impossible not to go to jail. You and that A-bo have done so many bad things together. Shouldn’t there be a retribution? Think about those people who have been cheated of their money or even infected with the parasite?

“But what can I do? The parasite is deadly.” Master Chen said helplessly.

On this issue, I have no intention of debating with Master Chen. If he had no intention of doing these things, he could have sought help from the police at the time. Even if he didn’t at the time, at least he didn’t choose to cooperate for ten years, and he even seemed to be enjoying it.

In this world, I believe in cause and effect. Since there is a cause, how can you avoid the effect? I just said to him, “If we can help, we will try our best to help you. I just want to know, do you know which village that Apo is from?”

Master Chen frowned and tried to remember, then said uncertainly, “I don’t know which village he’s from. He’s very cautious, and doesn’t even drink much. He only drank a lot that one time, but besides saying that his village needed money, he also said a vague place name, which I asked him about by accident, asking him where his hometown was and why he hadn’t gone back for so long. That place name was a place in Xiangxi, a place I hadn’t heard of before.”

But when Master Chen said that, I suddenly had a ‘thud’ in my heart. I remembered the place name that the man I met on the train told me. It was a place name, and it didn’t specifically point out where the village was, just a general place name.

Is that place a gathering place for the Gu Miao?

I asked Master Chen here, but he couldn’t get any useful information either. However, I had a general idea in my mind, knowing that I had to go to that place in Xiangxi once, and I was curious about what the village was going to do and why it needed so much money. What would be the consequences of their crazy move?

Master said that we Taoists must have a sense of justice, and I have always remembered that.Taoist priest

After leaving the detention center, Qin Huai and I went directly to Master Chen’s home and got the talisman with the antidote and some of the remaining powder.

According to Master Chen, the medicine on these talismans, together with the powder, can suppress the flesh-eating disease for about a year. If we don’t find A-bo, the flesh-eating disease will completely go mad and turn into a very dangerous madman, and it is very likely that he will kill himself because of his madness.

When we got home, we burned a piece of paper for Su Rou to drink. After drinking it, the effect was surprisingly good. Within an hour, the purplish-blue color on Su Rou’s body had subsided a lot. And according to what Master Chen said, Su Rou would not be delirious during the time of medication.

The matter of Su Rou was temporarily resolved, and I suggested that Su Rou first return to Beijing with Qin Huai, because I had to go to do something, that is, to visit Yuan Yi’s home in person.

I knew that Yuan Yi had a daughter, and that was worrying him.

Three days later, after we had finished everything here, I packed my backpack and boarded the train. Before I got on the train, I told Qinhuai to try to find out where Sun Kui was in the police department.

Because we were unfamiliar with Xiangxi, it was always good to have an acquaintance lead the way in that place with its fierce folk customs. Moreover, the Miao village was mostly very mysterious to people at that time, and we also felt that we had no idea where to start.

If we could find Sun Kui, we could find Sun Qiang. With Sun Qiang leading the way, things would go much more smoothly.

After spending so many days with Sun Qiang, I said that he would be my brother in the future, but once we were separated, there was no way to contact him. This was really frustrating. Qin Huai even said, “Damn it, why don’t we just get a cell phone for each of us? It’s really inconvenient. Everyone is so secretive.”

Yuan Yi is from the northeast, specifically Heilongjiang. The place he was from was a small town in Heilongjiang, far from Sichuan. When I mentioned that Qin Huai had refused to buy me a plane ticket and that I would have to take a long train ride, he said, “I’ll buy you a ticket.”

The time on the train was indeed difficult to pass, but fortunately, I was also ‘rich’ this time, and I bought a hard sleeper directly. As soon as I got on the train, I fell asleep. In a daze, I seemed to hear a voice that sounded familiar, but I couldn’t remember who it was. Plus, I was so sleepy that I didn’t care.

When I woke up, I looked around instinctively, but I only saw unfamiliar faces around me, and I didn’t see anyone I knew. Did I hear it wrong?

I thought to myself, and then I thought that the voice wasn’t too familiar, so I didn’t pay much attention.

Bored, I looked at the time. It had been 12 hours since I got on the train. Looking out the window, I could see snow. This was a scene I had never seen in Sichuan. Had I already arrived in the north?

I couldn’t help but smile when I thought about it. My life has really been a bumpy ride, but I’m only 23 years old and I’ve already been to so many places.

The train continued to move, and after almost two days and a night on the train, I finally arrived in the small city of Heilongjiang, where Yuan Yi was.

It was really cold here. I was wise enough to wear almost all the heavy clothes I could find, but I still felt the cold.

When I arrived, it was snowing heavily. I held the address in my hand and asked around, finally finding out where Yuan Yi’s home was. It was a not-so-new, not-so-old apartment building.

Standing here downstairs, my mood was not so calm. I kept thinking about many things. Looking at the people coming and going around me, I thought that Yuan Yi’s neighbors probably didn’t know that Yuan Yi’s real identity was a Taoist master.

With this in mind, I went upstairs and stood in front of Yuan Yi’s door, but I didn’t dare to knock for a long time. Suddenly, I realized that I was unable to face it and felt very guilty. But this is my own fault. Can I escape it?

Finally, I summoned up the courage to knock on the door.