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墨書 Inktalez
I rushed to the car pickup area, handed over my ticket, and was surprised to see that the driver was the same uncle I had encountered before.
I noticed the name tag on the driver’s uniform, which read: Liu Quanzai. I smiled at him and said, "Uncle Liu, what a coincidence! We meet again!"
Liu Quanzai turned to glance at me, seemingly recognizing me. He grinned and asked, "Hey there, did you manage to get a talisman from Wu Bansian?"
"Uncle Liu, just call me Jiang!" I chuckled and replied, "There were too many people back then, and by the time I squeezed in, they were all sold out!"
After chatting with Liu Quanzai for a few moments, I realized it was almost time to depart, so I boarded the bus and found my seat.
The upper section of the bus was mostly empty, with only about ten people on board. Most of them were carrying large buckets of water and had bought plenty of drinks.
I sat next to an uncle in his fifties or sixties and curiously asked, "Uncle, my name is Jiang Ling, and I'm from Qing'an Village. Where are you from? By the way, why did you buy so much water?"
"Child, you're from Qing'an Village? What a coincidence! I'm Miao Yigui, a farmer from Qingping Village!" Miao Yigui smiled at me warmly. Then he glanced at the buckets of water beside him and sighed with a bitter smile. "You might not have been back for a while! Our area in Qingping Village has been suffering from drought lately!"
"We haven't had rain for two months now, and it's been scorching hot; even the rivers have dried up!" Miao Yigui's eyes were filled with worry as he sighed again. "It's supposed to be harvest time for rice, but with this drought, all the rice in the fields has been ruined—there's nothing left to harvest!"
As he spoke, Miao Yigui's voice trembled slightly, and tears welled up in his eyes. He wiped them away with his hand; I could tell he was deeply saddened.
As the saying goes, men don't easily shed tears. Especially for someone like Miao Yigui, who was older; it spoke volumes that he could cry.
I patted Miao Yigui on the shoulder, unsure of how to comfort him. Having spent time in the countryside myself, I understood that a farmer's entire year hinges on their harvest. This drought must be incredibly hard for him and his fellow villagers.
I had experienced droughts back home as well, but each time we fought desperately to save our crops; it had never been as severe as what Miao Yigui described. Curiously, I asked him, "Uncle Miao, since we're facing a drought here, hasn't the government organized any artificial rain?"
Miao Yigui sighed again and said, "The government’s rain specialists came by, but there weren't even any clouds; they couldn't make it rain!"
"That doesn't make sense! It's supposed to be rainy season; how could it not rain for two whole months?" I rubbed my chin in disbelief.
Miao Yigui shook his head, his expression somewhat unnatural as he said, "Child, you don't know. There's something quite strange going on! Our villages, Qingping Village, Qing'an Village, and Qinghe Village are all close together, yet only Qing'an Village and Qingping Village are suffering from drought, while neighboring Qinghe Village is completely fine!"
Miao Yigui glanced around and then lowered his voice. "I've heard from others that our two villages are being troubled by the Drought Demon and are planning to invite Wu Bansian from the city to take a look!"
"Oh, is that so?" I wasn't too surprised by Miao Yigui's words. I knew that farmers tended to be superstitious, so it wasn't hard to understand why they would think of inviting a priest to intervene.
I recalled running into Wu Bansian outside the bus station earlier; it seemed like it wasn't just a coincidence. He must have been preparing to visit us.
I felt that this situation might indeed be a supernatural event, so I chatted with Miao Yigui for a long time, asking about the details of the drought.
Before I knew it, three hours had passed, and the bus arrived at the county station. To get back home, I still needed to transfer to a shuttle bus.
Miao Yigui and I got off the bus together. As we stepped out of the station, it was already starting to get dark outside. I turned to Miao Yigui and asked, "Uncle Miao, are you heading home? Why don't we go together?"
Miao Yigui smiled simply at me and said, "Jiang, I still need to deliver these drinks to my daughter. I'm not going home today; you go ahead!"
Curious, I asked, "Uncle Miao, isn't there enough water in the county? Why did you go all the way to the city to buy some?"
Miao Yigui scratched the back of his head and replied, "It's because we're experiencing a drought; the price of water in the county is five times higher than usual. Since I have nothing else to do anyway, I might as well go buy some drinks from the city!"
I nodded and chatted with Miao Yigui for a few more moments before heading toward the shuttle bus area. My luck was good; as soon as I arrived, I encountered a shuttle that was about to depart.
Sitting in the back row of the shuttle, I felt a surge of excitement at the thought of returning home.
Since middle school, I've been living in the city with my dad while my mom worked elsewhere. It had been a long time since our family of three returned home.
Now, my only relatives back in my hometown were my uncle and his family. Whenever my parents weren't around, I'd stay at my uncle's house for meals and sleep.
Thinking about my cousin Jiang Bao, who was about my age and lived with my uncle, made me smile involuntarily. I remembered how we often got into trouble together when we were younger; somehow, it was always Jiang Bao who ended up in hot water.
Once, the two of us decided to poke a hornet's nest, which resulted in a swarm of hornets chasing us. In the end, we split up to escape, and those hornets ended up stinging Jiang Bao, while none came after me.
Later, when I returned to Uncle's house, I saw that Jiang Bao was covered in welts from the stings. The most outrageous part was that his face had been stung multiple times, so swollen that his eyes were completely shut.
Thinking back on that embarrassing incident made me shyly touch my ear and chuckle lightly, "Hehe, I wonder how Jiang Bao is doing now?"
I pulled my thoughts back and glanced at the time, realizing it was almost seven in the evening and the sky outside had already darkened. Fortunately, I estimated that I still had about twenty minutes to reach Uncle's house.
"Uncle and the others shouldn't be sleeping too early!" I thought to surprise Jiang Bao and hadn't called Uncle beforehand.
After about five or six minutes, the shuttle suddenly slammed to a stop. I wasn't paying attention and bumped heavily into the seat in front of me.
There were about seven or eight people on the shuttle, and the driver didn't give any warning before braking; everyone else seemed to be in a similar situation.
I grimaced as I rubbed the spot where I had hit, then stood up and walked toward the front of the shuttle. I knew the experienced driver wouldn't brake suddenly without reason, so I asked, "Driver, what happened?"
The driver pointed toward the middle of the road and stammered, "Just now... I saw a girl in white standing in the middle of the road!"
Upon hearing this, I furrowed my brow and looked out into the road ahead, but there was no sign of anyone at all.
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