Xia Dong's family is in a good financial situation in the Xia family's courtyard.
Her husband has been working in the city outside all year round and has become a small contractor, earning a lot of money.
The money I send back during the holidays is five figures!
In the late 1990s, this income was considered very good even in urban areas.
So Xia Dong's family demolished the wooden and earthen house left by their parents more than a year ago and built a three-story cement building.
She has an eight-year-old daughter named Xia Mi who is studying in a rural primary school—she can be considered an alumnus of mine.
After all, there is only one primary school in Shilibaxiang, and children from more than a dozen nearby villages go to school there.
One day about a little over a week ago.
Xia Dong was washing clothes in the yard.
Xia Mi ran to the rooftop to play by herself.
The three-story small buildings built in rural areas usually have a rooftop on top, like a small dam. It can be used to dry millet, store sundries, and people can also go up to see the distant scenery. In short, it has many uses.
Xia Mi also likes to play "Old Cow" on the rooftop.
The so-called Lao Niu is the Sichuan and Chongqing dialect, which is also the Mandarin word for top.
Use a thin, soft whip and whip it hard, and it will spin. It is one of the toys that country children like.
Unexpectedly, Xia Mi accidentally slipped while playing "Old Cow" and fell directly from the rooftop!
It just happened to fall in the yard in front of the door and fell in front of Xia Dong.
It stands to reason that if you fall from the rooftop of a three-story building in a rural area, you will most likely end up with a broken arm or leg... The possibility of death is still not very high.
But maybe Xia Mi was unlucky. When she fell, she hit the ground headfirst!
Moreover, his head happened to hit a raised stone in the yard.
He died on the spot.
When Xia Dong saw the scene in front of him, he was so frightened that he yelled like crazy and was hysterical.
It was the neighbor next door who heard the loud crash and her crying and rushed over to help.
Call some brave young people in the village to watch the scene, and then ask them to go to the health center in the countryside to find a doctor.
In fact, where do we need a doctor?
A normal person would know at one glance that Xia Mi was definitely dead and could not be saved.
But the process still has to go...
After the doctor from the rural health center looked at her, he issued a death certificate. The village began to look for people to prepare for the funeral.
Xia Dong's husband was not at home, and she was already in a trance, so of course she couldn't handle it.
Fortunately, at that time, the feelings of the villagers were relatively simple.
Everyone is a clan relative, and Xia Dong is also very popular, so the village chief and village party secretary took the lead and helped find a husband to do the work...
Xia Dong's husband, who was working in the city, also rushed back the next day after receiving a call from someone in the village.
When he saw his daughter's body in the coffin, he burst into tears.
What a tragedy!
The folks in the village kept sighing when they saw it.
A happy family fell apart because of an accident.
But things have already happened, and there is no choice but to accept the reality.
Unexpectedly, Xia Dong refused to let his daughter's body be buried even if he was alive.
If anyone came forward to persuade him, she would pounce on him like a mad dog, bite, punch and kick him.
At that time, Xia Sanjin's hand was bitten!
As a result, no one dared to do it.
Now that Xia Dong's husband is back, the folks in the village have naturally dispersed.
But one day later, Xia Dong's husband rushed out of the house in panic and said that the bodies of his wife Xia Dong and his daughter were missing!
This time, the villagers were frightened.
Quickly follow Xia Dong’s husband out to look for him.
After searching for a long time, they finally found Xia Dong in the nearby mountains...
She was sitting in front of a small bulge of earth, her hair disheveled, covered in dust, crying and laughing.
The fingernails were all curled up, and all ten fingers were dripping with blood.
Seeing Xia Dong's appearance, everyone had already guessed it without asking.
It must have been last night that she took advantage of her husband's sleep to secretly carry her daughter's body in the coffin and go up the mountain overnight. I dug a hole and buried my daughter!
But everyone thought it was strange.
Now that Xia Dong could finally accept the fact that his daughter died unexpectedly, he buried her daughter's body.
Why don't you want the Taoist priest to finish the rituals, choose a place with good feng shui, and then have a professional coffin bearer take him away for burial?
Do you want to do it yourself, take your daughter's body to the mountains, dig a grave and bury it yourself?
Her behavior is really strange...
But at that time, no one, including Xia Dong's husband, thought too much.
I just thought that maybe it was because in Xia Dong's view, only by burying his daughter with his own hands could he soothe his injured heart.
Because of this incident, Xia Dong's husband, his name is Xia Degui, decided not to go to the city to work for the time being. Spend time with your wife at home.
After things have calmed down a bit, the couple will leave here together and go to the city.
Maybe after leaving the sad place of Xia's courtyard, his wife's mood will become better.
But unexpectedly, something weird and terrifying happened soon!
Late the next day.
Xia Dong has fallen asleep, but Xia Degui has some insomnia.
He lay on the bed, eyes open, looking into the darkness of nothingness.
Sudden!
He heard a very slight sound coming from the hall outside, like someone walking.
The movements are slow and light.
At first, Xia Degui thought he had heard wrongly or that there was a mouse in the house, so he didn't think much about it.
But the sound didn't stop.
It kept making a rustling sound in the main room. It's like... there's someone walking back and forth there all the time!
Suddenly, an idea came to Xia Degui's mind.
"There's a thief!"
Although the Xia Family Courtyard is in the mountains, the village is full of clan members.
However, it is not impossible that sometimes a thief comes from outside or a lazy person from the village comes into the house and steals something.
Xia Degui was extremely sad when his daughter died.
If you come to the house to steal things at this time, wouldn't that just add fuel to the fire?
So he was going to teach this damn thief a lesson!
He gently opened the quilt and got out of bed.
Xia Degui casually picked up a pole placed on the cabinet next to him and carefully walked out of the bedroom...
From the bedroom on the first floor to the main room, you have to pass through a corridor.
He didn't want to alert others, so he didn't light the kerosene lamp and just walked to the main room in the dark.
During this process, Xia Degui could hear the sound of footsteps getting clearer and clearer.
Close, close!
Just when he came to the end of the corridor, he turned around and saw the main room.
The rustling footsteps suddenly stopped.
Suddenly, the surroundings became quiet and dead.
in the dark.
Xia Degui could only hear his breathing and heartbeat.
"Did that thief find me?"
This was his first thought.
In this case, Xia Degui no longer hides.
He waved the pole directly and rushed into the main room.
"Where did you come from, come out here! Otherwise I'll beat you to death."
He was furious.
To be honest, in those days, it was impossible to go out from such a remote mountain village to work in the city. And he got to the point where he became a contractor, and he could still earn tens of thousands of yuan a year without any academic qualifications...
Absolutely ruthless!
Xia Degui is usually at the construction site, competing for projects with other construction teams. There are many times when he leads his men to fight with others.
Of course not afraid of thieves entering the house.
But strangely, the hall was silent, as if there was no one there.
Yes, no one.
How should I put it... People in rural areas have lived in the mountains and countryside for a long time. People who have lived in towns since childhood are much more sensitive to things like "popularity".
In a dark place, you can probably feel whether there are people in a small area.
This is not a special ability, it is an intuition that most people who grew up in rural areas have.
"There's no one in the main room? Did he run away? It's impossible. I'm facing away from the door."
Xia Degui was confused.
At this time, there seemed to be an icy cool breeze blowing by.
He couldn't help but shudder.
A chill slowly crept up the back of my head.
An inexplicable feeling of palpitations appeared.
"Isn't... not a human being?!"
With this thought, Xia Degui, who is a ruthless person, also became a little scared.
He quickly walked to the dining table next to him and lit the kerosene lamp - although the Xia family's yard had begun to receive electricity, the power was insufficient at that time, and the village would be without power after ten o'clock in the evening.
The light of the kerosene lamp illuminated most of the main room.
Xia Degui held up the lamp and looked around. Sure enough, it was empty, with no one at all.
Sudden!
He suddenly discovered that there were lines of muddy footprints on the floor of the main room.
The footprints are so small that they cannot be those of an adult, they must be those of a child!
The footprints were everywhere in the hall, like a child with muddy feet walking back and forth in the hall, leaving footprints all over the floor.
Chaotic and without order.
The only footprints that can be clearly distinguished are... the line passing by Xia Degui!
Then it extended outward to the gate and disappeared into the yard.
Seeing the muddy footprints all over the house, Xia Degui's head buzzed, and the back of his head hurt, as if someone had hit his head with a stick.
Everyone was confused!
This is a feeling that people have when they are extremely scared and frightened.
A horrifying picture emerged in Xia Degui's mind...
In the silent darkness, a child with feet covered in mud kept walking back and forth in the main room.
When he arrived at the main room, the child walked towards him and passed by him.
Finally left and disappeared out the door.
And all this is invisible to him!
That child... must not be alive!
The more Xia Degui thought about it, the more frightened he became, and his whole body could not help but tremble.
On the construction site, he dared to pick up a knife and fight against the workers.
But now, facing the unknown fear in the darkness, he was completely cowed and withered.
Holding a pole and a kerosene lamp, he quickly walked back to the bedroom.
boom!
He closed the bedroom door and locked the deadbolt. Looking at his wife Xia Dong sleeping soundly on the bed, I felt a little calmer.
But Xia Degui, who had some insomnia to begin with, could no longer fall asleep.
At the same time, I was still a little uneasy, fearing that if someone's footsteps sounded again in the main room, I would be completely scared to death.
He was lying on the bed and heard his wife talking in her sleep.
Vague and inarticulate.
Normally, Xia Degui would not listen to what his wife Xia Dong was mumbling in her dreams.
But maybe he couldn't sleep tonight anyway, so he listened carefully.
Hearing this makes me a little nervous
Xia Dong was speaking inarticulately...
"Xiaomi, Xiaomi, are you back?"
"Xiaomi, isn't it time for you to come back and see your mother?"
"Xiaomi, mom is reluctant to let you go."
Xia Degui was suddenly startled, and a strange thought came to his mind.
"Could it be that... Xiaomi is back?"
He also loves his daughter very much.
But men should be more sensible after all.
The daughter whom she loved so much had died unexpectedly.
After death, there is no resurrection!
It would still be scary if the dead came back.
But she is my good daughter after all... If she comes home, it won't be as scary as before, right?
Xia Degui was not so scared when his daughter who turned into a ghost came home at night compared to when a lonely ghost entered the house.
Finally, in the middle of the night, he fell asleep.
Wake up the next morning.
Xia Degui found that he was alone on the bed.
He quickly got out of bed, put on his shoes and left the bedroom.
I saw my wife Xia Dong sitting in the main room in a daze, but the muddy footprints I saw on the ground last night had disappeared. The floor is clean.
As if last night was just a hallucination...
But soon, he knew that wasn't the case.
Because the voice of the aunt next door rang outside.
"Who killed it! All the chickens in my yard are dead, and the dogs are also dead."
Xia Degui ran out quickly.
I saw many villagers gathered in front of the yard next door, pointing and whispering as they looked at the yard.
