Chapter 10
Chapter 10
Deaf Granny hugged the pine branch tight to her chest, smiling like a child.
“Plant it in the yard, and from now on we won’t have to fear filthy things coming to our door!”
By the time the two elders made it home, the night had turned pitch-black.
Deaf Granny reminded Wang San’s Wife to feed the baby a little rice porridge, then personally grabbed a shovel and dug a hole to plant the pine branch.
Wang San wanted to help, but she blocked him.
“You kids are all thumbs. You’ll end up offending Elder Pine.”
It was downright uncanny-once the pine branch was planted, the whole small courtyard seemed to warm up.
In the side room, where he was enjoying his offerings, Eighth Master Chang muttered to himself,
“Deaf Granny actually managed to invite that old gentleman back… impressive, impressive!”
After dinner, Deaf Granny began the real work.
She took the Shed Skin Eighth Master Chang had brought back and started winding it around the infant, one layer after another.
In the end, only the baby’s eyes, nose, and mouth were left exposed; the rest of him was wrapped up tight.
Even his tiny member was covered-nothing was missed.
Then she mixed pine resin with Rootless Water and carefully brushed it over the baby from head to toe.
After that, she wrapped him again, meticulously adding another layer of Shed Skin.
She repeated the process three times before finally letting out a long breath.
“All done!”
Wang San goggled at the baby, circling him and studying him for a long while.
“Ma, he was a perfectly good-looking kid, but after you’re done with him he’s ugly as sin!”
“He looks like a squash!”
Deaf Granny couldn’t be bothered to argue with her dim-witted son. She went to the side room and lit incense at the Various Altars.
The family’s supper was simple-watery porridge with strips of pickled vegetables.
Simple as it was, the porridge filled the belly.
In those hard, poor years, eating one full meal was a wish many people never got to see come true.
After the meal, Old Li took out the jade pendant the Female Corpse had left behind and examined it closely.
The pendant was a deep, dripping emerald green-rare at a glance.
If you sold it in today’s world, it would be enough to buy a big house in the capital.
And the craftsmanship was extremely refined.
On the front was a carved lingzhi mushroom, and beneath it were four small characters:
Hanging Gourd to Aid the World.
On the back was carved one large character:
“Hua.”
Old Li turned the pendant over in one hand while holding a gold needle in the other.
“Looks like this child’s origins… aren’t simple at all.”
Deaf Granny sighed.
“If it were simple, they wouldn’t have used the Womb-Shifting Evil Fetus to wipe out his whole family.”
“This child is tied up in too much. Anything about him-don’t tell outsiders.”
Old Li nodded repeatedly.
“Right. To everyone else, we’ll say I found him while hunting in the mountains.”
“This child should take the surname Hua. And since he’s suffered so many disasters before he was even born… we’ll call him Hua Jiunan.”
And that was how the name of one of this story’s protagonists was set.
Under the careful protection of the two elders, the infant slowly grew up.
Throughout that time, he didn’t show anything particularly different from ordinary children.
Only after he absorbed the Shed Skin did a mark appear on his body, like a tattoo.
A Qiu Dragon coiled around a Green Pine.
The Qiu Dragon looked wild and arrogant; the Green Pine looked ancient and unbending.
Only then did Deaf Granny realize the Shed Skin Eighth Master Chang had brought back all those years ago was anything but ordinary.
So each time she made offerings, she would quietly give him a little extra.
That made Eighth Master Chang so happy he nearly burst, praising Deaf Granny again and again for having a conscience.
And he even quietly promised that next time danger came, he absolutely wouldn’t run.
At the very least… until Deaf Granny was killed by the filthy things, he swore he wouldn’t run…
Besides that, every year on the fifteenth day of the seventh month-Hua Jiunan’s birthday-Deaf Granny would take him to the foot of the snowy mountain to wait.
Because late at night, the Snow Corpse would appear.
Sitting on the Snow Corpse’s shoulder was the Female Corpse-Hua Jiunan’s mother, the one who had given birth to him back then.
She had long since been frozen solid, sealed tightly to the Snow Corpse by thick ice.
After Hua Jiunan finished kowtowing to his mother, the Snow Corpse would show a stiff, simple smile.
Then it would leave behind several stalks of century-old ginseng, or precious herbs like snow lotus.
Only after watching Deaf Granny carry Hua Jiunan far away would the Snow Corpse return to the depths of the great snowy mountains.
Back then, Hua Jiunan was too young to find any of it strange.
After all, every child had a mother.
His mother just happened to live deep in the mountains with a very tall uncle.
Things turned eerie again when Hua Jiunan was five.
That year, a plague suddenly broke out in the entire small mountain village.
Before long, nearly half the villagers were sick.
Those who fell ill would burn hot then shiver cold, vomiting and having diarrhea.
After just a few days of that, they’d waste away until they barely looked human.
Several old folks even died from it.
Old Li watched it all, frantic with worry, urging Deaf Granny again and again to think of a way.
Deaf Granny was anxious too, but she was a spirit medium disciple, not a doctor.
A spirit medium disciple could treat those “hollow” illnesses brought on by offending filthy things, but against a real, bodily sickness like this, she had no answers.
With no other choice, Deaf Granny tried to change the village’s feng shui.
Using the dried-up well in front of Old Fourth Tian’s house as the center, she arranged an Eight-Directional Wind Formation.
All she could do was hope it would blow the village’s bad luck away.
The plague dragged on for half a month, and the number of sick villagers kept climbing.
Even the doctors the villagers fetched from town were completely stumped.
Finally, one day, even Third Brother Wang-usually strong as an ox-fell ill.
And he was worse than the others. He quickly slipped into unconsciousness, burning with fever and babbling nonsense.
Deaf Granny was sick with worry, spending her days in tears.
“Sanwa… you can’t be like your two older brothers. Don’t be so heartless you leave me, an old woman, behind and go on your own.”
The plague was fierce, but life still had to go on.
Old Li still took Hua Jiunan into the mountains every day to patrol the forest.
And of course, he’d hunt along the way, bringing back whatever wild game he could to help Third Brother Wang build up his strength.
Old Li walked in front.
Behind him, little Hua Jiunan trailed along in thick, bulky padded clothes made from coarse cloth.
Now and then he’d trip, then roll a good distance like a ball.
With the snow piled so deep, he didn’t get hurt at all.
Seeing the child’s comical tumbling, Old Li managed a rare smile.
A small bit of cheer, carved out of hardship.