dragon pen

The place Zhang Ziyao and the others came to is called Pai County.

Pai County, as a small town on the edge of Tiancang Kingdom, is different from the capital city which is open-minded but has lost many customs of the ancestors. This small town on the edge still retains very old traditional customs. They call the first spring thunder every year "" "Awakening of Insects", on the third day after the "Awakening of Insects", people will hold grand sacrifices to worship the god of spring and call on the god of rain, in order to pray for good weather and good weather for the year.

According to legend, the real body of Chunshen Jumang is a phoenix, and the phoenix always stays on the branches and leaves of the plane tree——

then.

On the day of the sacrifice, people in Pai County will use fresh phoenix leaves to boil water for the children who have not yet grown up. The children wash and put on new clothes, and take a "Spring God falls on my shoulders, sheltering the smooth growth of this year" Auspicious meaning; in the morning, people eat green balls made from the wild vegetable "Thunder Shit" that emerged from the ground after the "Awakening of Insects", which are wrapped with sweet sesame seeds, peanuts, sugar and five grains; after eating the green balls, people eat Putting on white robes and masks of various birds, it is called "Hundred Birds Facing the Phoenix"; the people wearing the masks finally come to the Spring Temple and start the beginning of the year under the auspices of the great witch. The most important sacrifice...

In order to record the ancient spring god sacrifice, Zhang Ziyao simply stayed at the inn in the town of Pai County, put away his luggage, washed and washed, and spent days in the carriage thinking about it, finally came into contact with people, and the young man was a little bit out of time Pulling Su Lian to the streets to get popular and relieve himself by the way——

The next day was the spring god sacrifice, so the streets were already bustling.

The hawkers on the street were so bustling that they could barely get in, and everyone was shouting hard to attract business.

Zhang Ziyao stood in front of a booth with all kinds of bird masks. He touched one and looked at the other. He couldn't put it down because of the exquisitely carved bird masks. He took off an oriole at random and gestured on his face. Turning around, he took off a crane and put it on Su Lian's face - the God of Disaster standing next to the boy was no longer what he used to be. The young and handsome appearance and the spotless white clothes had already attracted the attention of young girls all the way, but he But he didn't seem to notice it at all, he just bent down a little, and let the young man beside him raise his hand to put the crane mask on his face...

"Hey," Zhang Ziyao let go of his hand, "This mask really suits you!"

Behind the mask, the calamity god's golden pupils flickered. He paused and raised his hand to touch the mask: "It's fine if you say so."

Zhang Ziyao: "I bought this one, I'll have one too..."

Su Lian took off the kingfisher mask hanging on the top, pecked at the emerald feathers, and gently hung it on the boy's face.

Su Lian: "This is beautiful."

Zhang Ziyao: "This is the female kingfisher! The mask the girl wears!"

Su Lian: "Are there still male and female birds?"

These inexplicable words made the mask sellers at the booth laugh. He turned around and found a male kingfisher mask for Zhang Ziyao. Zhang Ziyao happily accepted it. He lifted the mask up slightly and hung it on his forehead. He lowered his head and prepared to give money... At this time, the gaze inadvertently turned to a goshawk mask in the corner. The mask was only half of the mask, with sharp eyes, slightly raised nose, and the main color of black, giving people a cold and noble feeling. , Zhang Ziyao let out a "huh" and picked up the mask——

Su Lian lifted the crane mask on his face.

Zhang Ziyao held the goshawk mask and looked at it for a while, and the stall owner said enthusiastically in his ear, "It's really hard to meet someone who is worthy of this mask." ""That person must be rich and handsome"...

Zhang Ziyao was silent for a while.

The stall owner also stopped: "Brother, do you know someone who is worthy of this mask? Even if it’s free—”

"do not know."

"..."

The boy smiled, and hung the mask back with some regret: "It's a pity, this mask is so beautifully made."

After all, without waiting for the stall owner to say anything more, he put down the mask and gave the money for the two he wanted to buy, then turned around and pulled Su Lian to squeeze into the crowd...

It's just that even though he walked around all the way, the boy didn't stop at any stall to buy anything, he just walked through the crowd, as if those people wearing various bird masks around him could give him a sense of security generally.

Strolling from the street to the end of the street, Zhang Ziyao finally stopped in front of a tofu stall with a sweet smell.

Turning her head, she looked at Su Lian and smiled: "Niu Niu, please drink tofu nao."

When Su Lian came to the booth, he watched the owner stir up a spoonful of tofu nao and added a spoonful of thick sweet-scented osmanthus syrup. He was stunned: "Aren't all tofu nao salty?"

The bustling people drinking tofu nao at the booth raised their heads one after another.

Zhang Ziyao quickly reached out to cover Su Lian's mouth, then turned around and smiled apologetically with the stall owner: "Sweet tofu nao is the delicacy in the world, you don't understand—boss, give me two bowls of tofu nao, there is more sugar, I will add money .”

Su Lian: "..."

Su Lian: "Why don't you let me talk?"

Zhang Ziyao: "I'm afraid you will be beaten to death."

Su Lian: "?"

A while later, Zhang Ziyao and Su Lian were sitting on the small bench at the tofu nao booth. The young man picked up the hot tofu nao with somewhat cold hands and blew it, and drank it into his mouth. Sweet and warm, he finally showed a satisfied expression——

"It's like returning to the world. What about spring returning to the earth? These days, I was almost frozen to death along the way!" Zhang Ziyao said.

Su Lian tasted the tofu nao bit by bit with a small spoon, elegantly like a rich man: "That's so exaggerated, it's just colder than usual spring."

Zhang Ziyao moved his lips, and was about to say something, when the man at the next table who was feeding a baby tofu brain probably heard their chat, turned around and said, "Are you two from out of town?"

Well, listen to the standard gossip opening tone.

Zhang Ziyao nodded: "What's the matter, does this little brother know something?"

"I don't have an accent like the people here—hey, I don't know something, I just heard about it, ah, I heard—you probably don't know, we used to wait for the first spring thunder, the first spring thunder The Spring God Festival will be prepared after a spring rain! This year, we can’t wait until the first spring rain. Refer to last year. We have held the sacrifice about ten days earlier, so everyone can’t sit still now. Rumors are spreading everywhere, that's why the great witch of the Spring God Temple couldn't sit still, and forced the Spring God Festival to be scheduled for tomorrow..."

"Rumor? What rumor?" Zhang Ziyao asked strangely.

The man put down the bowl to feed the child, looked around mysteriously, approached Zhang Ziyao and said in a low voice, "My aunt next door's man's nephew is a priest at the Spring Temple. The spring god seat and rain god seat are empty for some reason, so this year's spring has been delayed, and the rain has not fallen for a long time..."

Zhang Ziyao: "?"

Su Lian: "?"

Zhang Ziyao and Su Lian exchanged puzzled looks, and when the man turned around and went back to feed the child's bean curd, Zhang Ziyao asked Su Lian with his mouth: Is this the case?

Su Lian paused for a moment, and his golden pupils turned into a deep and thick honey color. After a while, he shook his head slowly, and said in a deep voice: "These days, I have never left your side for half a step. What happened in the sky What, I don't know."

Zhang Ziyao said "Huh" and had to move his head away.

……

Day two.

On the day of the sacrifice.

Zhang Ziyao and Su Lian walked towards the Temple of Spring among the crowd, surrounded by men, women and children wearing bird masks and white robes, and everyone was holding a new branch of Chinese parasol...

When people gathered in front of the Temple of Spring, Zhang Ziyao took a seat in a nearby restaurant where the temple could be seen, and spread out the rice paper. If anyone came to ask questions, he smiled and said that he was a wandering painter. To record anecdotes—

With such an answer, those people will not ask any more questions; even if they still want to ask, they will be suppressed by the low pressure emanating from the person wearing the crane mask behind the young painter.

Zhang Ziyao just spread out the drawing paper, waited for a while, and the sacrifice began——

In front of the crowd was a big witch wearing a ghost mask. Amidst his yelling, people raised their sycamore branches, lit a fire, and sprinkled wine.

The big witch sang: "Jiawu Lichun, the three dragons report good news."

People reply: "Okay!"

The big witch sang: "Spring returns to the earth, and all things are new again."

People reply: "Okay!"

The big witch sang: "Welcome the spring and welcome the blessings, Kecheng Sanyangtai."

People reply: "Okay!"

The big witch sang: "The god of spring protects and blesses all people."

People reply: "Okay!"

……

In this way, the eulogy was repeated, and the priests of the Spring God Temple performed the Spring God Dance.

"Niu Niu."

"how?"

"Is such a large-scale sacrifice enough to attract the gods of spring and rain?"

"enough."

"Oh."

Zhang Ziyao stretched his neck and was engrossed in watching it. At this time, his shoulder was patted, and Su Lian's calm voice sounded from behind his ear: "It's almost there."

Suddenly, Zhang Ziyao realized that it was time to get a glimpse of the secrets of God, so he held his breath, hung the dragon brush on the rice paper, looked at the tip of his nose with full expectation, and waited for the dragon brush to paint and describe his appearance——

however.

After a cup of tea.

The sacrifices in front of the Spring God Temple are lively, the young man in the restaurant is engrossed, the young man hangs the pen in his hand for too long, his wrist trembles slightly, the pen ink drips and smudges on the rice paper, turning into an ugly ink dot...

And so on, but nothing happened.

It is impossible to miss the movement of the gods within a hundred miles with a keen eye——

Chunshen Jumang did not come.

The rain god Chisongzi did not come either.