The morning sun sheds golden light and spreads into golden scales on the river surface.
In front of Wutong Ferry, several boats were tied to the shore. Men, women, old and young gathered on the shore where the boats were docked, either giving instructions to the boatmen on the boats, or taking out their money to prepare for the long journey.
The boatman helped him buy some rare items in the big city that could not be seen in the village.
outside the ferry,
Under the river embankment, next to a row of thatched houses in disrepair, villagers from various villages gathered around the open space. From time to time, a cry of sorrow could be heard from the gathered crowd.
"Little sister Sun!
This person is the wife of Zhang Erlang from Zhangjiazhuang. I heard a few days ago that she and her husband had a quarrel, so she went back to her parents' home in the next village. Unexpectedly, she also drowned in the Minjiang River!
Hey, she's still pregnant..."
"With all the female corpses present, which one was not pregnant and drowned in the river?
I think this is Jiang Dragon King asking for sacrifices from us!"
"What are you talking about here?!
Who is that! Since you know this female corpse, hurry up to Zhangjiazhuang and inform that Zhang Erlang and ask him to claim his wife’s corpse!"
"Okay, okay, I'll go right away!"
In the open space, elders from the surrounding villages were walking back and forth on crutches around the twenty female corpses placed in the open space.
The village elders were all white-haired, looking at the corpses on the ground with solemn eyes.
The surrounding villagers gathered to recognize each other,
It didn't take long to figure out the identities of all the female corpses on the ground except for the few hooked up women. Villagers were already helping to run errands and went to every house to inform the news.
More and more villagers gathered here, and the noise became louder and louder.
"These twenty female corpses are all pregnant!
I was pregnant, and I don’t know what happened, so I just fell into the Min River and drowned!" The "village elder of Xiuliu Village" frowned and lowered his voice while talking to the elders of the Huang clan in Jinxi Village next door.
"It's weird, it's weird.
If the Dragon King of Minjiang only swallows pregnant women, wouldn’t the villages around us be depopulated in the future?
If this continues, maybe our four local surnames Chen, Huang, Zhaoliu will all be extinct!" The elder Huang family of Jinxi Village was worried and thought further.
The village elders gathered together and whispered to each other.
The crowd gathered around burst into noise and noise.
Someone squeezed out of the crowd and hurriedly asked several village elders: "Li Zheng, old clan leader - my wife has also been missing for three or four days! I heard them say that these drowned female corpses on the ground are all pregnant women."
Pregnant...
My wife is also more than two months pregnant,
Could it be that Jiang Dragon King ate her?!"
"My son's wife has also disappeared!
Now I have a month of charm!"
"Uncle Clan, what should we do?"
"Rimasa..."
The panic that had accumulated to its peak suddenly exploded as someone announced it, and could no longer be suppressed in the hearts of the villagers!
People are panicked!
Su Wu led Xianzheng and one or two others and stood in the corner behind the village elders. At this time, he heard the shouts of the surrounding villagers and frowned - just as he and his master had guessed,
In many surrounding villages, there are many pregnant and missing women.
They all probably drowned in the Minjiang River!
These twenty corpses on the ground are not all the creatures swallowed by the Minjiang River!
The village elders had never seen anything so strange and evil. Looking at the shriveled female corpses on the ground, they were at a loss for a while, and finally turned their attention to the purple-robed Taoist in the corner - Su Wu.
After Su Wu ordered Huang Liuzi to spread the news to the village elders,
Everyone arrived in time, but they didn't pay attention to him as a young Taoist. They were busy identifying the corpses and summoning the villagers to claim them, ignoring Su Wu's existence.
this
The next time I really encountered a difficult problem, I thought of Su Wu instead.
Su Wu didn't feel dissatisfied.
The red-headed master of the "Tianwei Taoist Altar" is highly respected in the surrounding areas. He is a foreign Taoist priest who has just arrived and naturally has trouble reciting sutras. Now that he is involved in the situation, he also has the purpose of improving the current situation.
Although several village elders did not believe that a Taoist from the "Beilu Mountain Sect" could solve the current problem, they did not dare to be too disrespectful to Su Wu. On the surface, they still treated Su Wu with sufficient courtesy.
After the salute, one of them hesitated and said: "Little Taoist Priest, look at this situation, what is going on?"
"The top priority should be to count the number of missing people in the surrounding villages.
Compile a list of pregnant women in each village, pay more attention to them, and warn them not to leave home." Facing the hesitant looks of several village elders, Su Wu directly put forward his opinion.
"If that's the case, why don't we just ignore those missing pregnant women?" A village elder frowned and asked Su Wu, "If we don't eradicate this scourge, pregnant women will disappear every day in the villages around us, and Fujian will drown.
Jiang incident.
If things continue like this, it is inevitable that the population will wither.
If the situation becomes more serious, we may have to leave our hometown and flee somewhere else!"
"The purpose of counting the number of missing persons is to verify whether all the missing persons are pregnant women and no men are missing. Only in this way can we gather the young and strong villagers to patrol each village and take into account the safety of each village.
The purpose of compiling the roster is to better take care of pregnant women.
With this roster, targeted control can be carried out on those people who are more likely to go missing, and waste of manpower can be avoided.
Under such circumstances, if one person is missing, the situation can be brought under control in an instant and more clues can be unearthed.
Your Excellency, who has been a Zhangzhuang villager for many years, doesn’t even understand this truth?!" Su Wu looked directly at Zhangzhuang Villager, who was frowning and questioning him, and a cold light suddenly appeared in his eyes.
Zhang Zhuangli was immediately overwhelmed by his momentum and could not speak for a long time.
The people in Jinxi Village were hurriedly trying to smooth things over. They apologized to Su Wu and said with an apologetic smile: "Little Taoist, little Taoist, I'm not questioning your plan. Let's do this -"
He scanned the crowd gathered around him and shouted: "There are a few young men from all the major surnames in Jinxi Village. Bring with you some old gentlemen who can read and write. Let us tell you whether anyone in our village has gone missing recently? Or who has not returned home after being away for many days.
Do the statistics!
In addition, find out how many women of childbearing age there are in the village,
How many of them are pregnant? Make a list and bring it to me!"
This "Jinxi Village Master" must have been quite prestigious in the village. Not long after he spoke, more than ten young men picked up their errands and left the crowd to go back to the village to do business.
After ordering this matter in front of Su Wu, Jinxi Village just turned to Su Wu and continued: "Little Taoist Priest, the method you proposed is indeed useful, but what I mean is - is there anything more useful?
Solution?
For example - directly grab the evil spirit behind him, open the magic altar and kill it.
To resolve this matter once and for all?”
Su Wu's expression brightened slightly, and he acted as if he was talking to the people in Jinxi Village sincerely, and said: "Someone really has a plan in mind regarding what is going on here."
As soon as he said this,
Everyone around them pricked up their ears.
Several village elders turned their attention to him.
"Everyone must be aware that these twenty female corpses were all salvaged by Pindao and his disciples from the mouth of Shaxi River to a certain section of Minjiang River. The cause of this incident was that Huang Liuzi of Jinxi Village capsized on the river.
The boat encountered some strange things,
I went to Wutong Temple for help, and happened to meet me and my group.
We immediately went to the riverside to investigate the situation, and then we salvaged the twenty female corpses.
Huang Liuzi should have discussed this situation with the village elders this morning.
I might as well say more now.
Lao Miaozhu's heart was gouged out and he died. There were no traces of sharp objects tearing the skin and flesh on his chest - the chest injuries were beyond human control and were more likely related to ghosts and gods!
He served Wutong God all his life, and now
But he died in the Wutong Temple.
In this matter, Wutong Temple is inseparable!
The Tianwei Taoist altar is inseparable!
And the fact that many pregnant women drowned in the Minjiang River, I suspect, is also inseparable from a certain god!"
Nowadays, Su Wu's speech was inevitably tainted with some accent of Chilong Zhenren, and he gradually began to call himself "someone".
As soon as he said this, the crowd was in an uproar!
The God of Wutong is widely worshiped in the local area and has a long-lasting incense. This god has long been closely related to various production and life activities of the local people. Naturally, they cannot accept Su Wu's statement.
The village elders listened to the uproar of the surrounding villagers and looked at Su Wu with subtle eyes.
Zhang Zhuanglizheng, who had just been intimidated by Su Wu's momentum, now gained courage and support from the onlookers and said to Su Wu: "Old Miao Zhu died in the Wutong Temple. This matter should indeed come out from the Tianwei Taoist Temple."
Clarify one or two, distinguish right from wrong.
But this Taoist priest, you said that many pregnant women drowned in the Minjiang River, which is also closely related to Wutong God.
Do you have any evidence for this?"
"Do you know why those goulan girls Huang Liuzi was carrying were sold by the goulan owners in the big county to the secret door of the small town?" Su Wu glanced at the surrounding villagers who looked at him with hostile looks, and suddenly said in a loud voice
.
His words contained a talent for "argument".
He can make people listen to his words without even realizing it.
The villagers were confused for a moment, not knowing what Su Wu meant by his question.
Everyone turned their eyes to him, waiting for him to tell the answer.
Zhang Zhuangli was squinting his eyes and asked, "What's the reason?"
"Those women who were hooking up were pregnant at the same time!
They worshiped the Wutong God at the "Wutong God Parade" in the first month of the year, and soon after that, they each became pregnant. Considering that they were from prostitute families, the owner of the bar was most taboo about their pregnancy and could not make money for them.
He must be on strict guard against the bellies of these prostitutes. He would do a small check every three days and a big check every five days - but under such circumstances, these hooker women were pregnant at the same time!
Even after taking several abortion pills, the fetus in the belly was not lost!" Su Wu said.
"Even so, it doesn't mean that this matter is related to Wutong God?
Maybe they were unlucky enough to become pregnant with the guest's child?" Someone in the crowd asked hesitantly.
Zhang Zhuangli was relatively close to Su Wu and was unknowingly persuaded by Su Wu's words, so he did not raise any objection at the first moment.
Su Wu looked at a young villager in the crowd who asked a question, then glanced at the surrounding villagers, smiled suddenly, and asked: "Everyone who has a wife--you might as well recall it carefully.
Approximately when did your wife become pregnant?
Not long before she was pregnant, had you worshiped the Wutong God together? Did you also make a wish before the god to give birth to a child as soon as possible? Once the child is born smoothly, you must send a gift to the god to fulfill your wish.
?!"
What Su Wu said was originally to use his talent for verbal confrontation to make the people around him subconsciously agree with his words.
But he never thought,
At that moment, he made these implicit guesses,
But it hit the nail on the head!
Among the villagers watching, the expressions of many people suddenly changed!
"This, this, this! How can this be good?!"
"Taoist priest, real person!
You have to save my wife and my children!"
"Please ask the Taoist Master to open an altar to save people!"
Among the people watching around, the men with families fell to their knees with cheers!
They knelt down towards Su Wu, causing their parents, relatives, and followers to kneel down too!
But in just a moment,
Only a few village elders were still standing in the field.
One of the village elders also suddenly fell to his knees!
The village elder kowtowed to Su Wu repeatedly: "Taoist Master, my daughter-in-law is also pregnant - it was the old man who ordered them to offer incense and make a wish for a child in front of the Wutong God!
Not long after the incense ceremony, my wife was happy!"
