PCJ – Chapter 67 Snake Disaster

There was only one Eight Immortals table in the house. Zhang Jiaohua had placed an old newspaper on it, which was brought over by Zhang Youping from Zhang Dechun’s house. Zhang Dechun was the village party secretary, and the only newspaper subscribed by the village, Zijiang Daily, had basically become Zhang Dechun’s family’s newspaper. In this era, many things were wrapped in paper. Newspaper paper was much better than straw paper. So, everyone liked to use old newspapers to wrap things. Liu Qiaoye also asked Zhang Youping to get a few newspapers from Zhang Dechun’s house to use for wrapping things at home.

The Eight Immortals table was very high, with four long benches. Zhang Jiaohua was of average height in the first grade, but in front of the Eight Immortals table, only his head was visible, so he couldn’t reach high enough to draw symbols on the table. Zhang Jiaohua could only climb onto a bench, kneel on it, and stick his butt out while lying on the table.

Zhang Youping and his wife came back from outside and couldn’t help but laugh when they saw Zhang Jiaohua’s funny appearance.

Zhang Jiaohua heard his parents’ laughter and turned around to look.

“What are you doing, kid?” Zhang Youping put down the farm tools in his hand and walked over. Liu Qiaoye was busy with household chores.

“I drew a protective talisman at school today and sold it to Teacher Gong. Look, he gave me five yuan.” Zhang Jiaohua took out a wrinkled banknote from his pocket.

“You kid, how can you ask the teacher for money? If he wants your talisman, just give it to him.” Zhang Youping smiled bitterly and patted Zhang Jiaohua on the head.

“Isn’t it expensive? You said these things are expensive.” Zhang Jiaohua scratched his head.

“It’s expensive indeed. But you can’t ask the teacher for money.” Zhang Youping said.

“But the old Taoist said that even we of the Meishan Water School can’t work for others for free. Otherwise, others will look down on us. Master also said that we should respect our parents, respect our teachers, and also support our families. We need to save money in our daily lives.” Zhang Jiaohua had experienced a lot with the old Taoist in his dreams.

When Zhang Youping heard the phrase “support our families”, he couldn’t help but chuckle, and Liu Qiaoye, who was busy in another room, also laughed. She had been listening carefully to what her son was saying.

Zhang Jiaohua didn’t care about his parents laughing at him. He earnestly drew the symbol. The symbol for the protective talisman was very complicated. If he was a little careless, he would make a mistake in drawing the runes. In his dreams, Zhang Jiaohua had been beaten many times while drawing symbols. The harder he was beaten, the more painful it was, and the deeper the memory became. Zhang Jiaohua didn’t understand why he was beaten so hard in his dreams, but he could still remember it vividly.

“Kid, tomorrow, return the five yuan to the teacher. How can we take money from the teacher? By the way, I don’t know what happened today. Everyone said they saw snakes everywhere. Be careful when you go outside. Pay attention to snakes.” Zhang Youping reminded.

Normally, at this time of year, snake activity would have decreased significantly, making it rare to encounter snakes in the wild. But today was unusual. Snakes that should have been hiding came out unexpectedly.

Zhang Jiaohua heard his father’s words and thought to himself, “Could it be because of what happened this morning?”

Zhang Youping stood by the Eight Immortals table, watching Zhang Jiaohua earnestly mix cinnabar and other materials into ink, and then draw a very complex and mysterious symbol on yellow paper.

It took Zhang Jiaohua forty to fifty minutes to draw a protective talisman. After drawing it, he had to recite a spell to activate it. Then he folded it into a triangle and placed it under the incense burner on the altar.

At first, Zhang Youping was skeptical about whether the protective talisman drawn by his son would work. After all, Zhang Jiaohua was so young and, although he knew a little about the Meishan Water School’s spells, his level of cultivation was not very high. But after Zhang Jiaohua placed the protective talisman, Zhang Youping suddenly felt very relieved. Zhang Youping didn’t know if it was just his imagination.

In this era, although there were electric lights, most people in Meizi Village still followed the routine of working at sunrise and resting at sunset. By eight or nine o’clock, the sky was completely dark. In the village, apart from the houses with television sets, which still had lights on, other households either watched television at someone else’s house or turned off the lights and prepared to sleep. Because Zhang Jiaohua was not well-liked in the village, Zhang Youping and his wife never took him to other people’s houses to watch television. They had saved some money and planned to buy a television for the Lunar New Year.

Zhang Jiaohua hadn’t paid much attention in school, so he didn’t know if there was any homework after class. So when he got home, there was nothing to do. After drawing a talisman, he felt tired, took a hot bath, and went to bed.

For Gong Ziyuan, this night was quite tense. Seeing so many snakes under the school wall in the afternoon had put him in a bad mood. He spent the whole night on edge. He somewhat regretted not following Zhang Shunlin’s suggestion to stay at his house for the night.

However, it was strange that after entering the room, he felt much calmer. After carefully inspecting the room to see if there were any snakes inside, he leaned against the bed frame with a book and started reading. Maybe his recent sleep quality hadn’t been good, but Gong Ziyuan felt tired after reading for a while. He lay down on the bed and soon fell asleep.

Early in the morning, roosters in every household in Meizi Village started crowing, announcing the beginning of a new day in Meizi Village. But today, the atmosphere in Meizi Village was a bit different from usual.

The Dumb’s family had been squeezing in with the grandparents since their house was burnt. Early in the morning, Ma Jinxiu got up to do the housework. However, as soon as she entered the backyard, she let out a high-pitched scream.

“Snake! Snake!”

When Ma Jinxiu stepped into the pigpen, she saw several snakes hanging on the eaves of the pigpen. Ma Jinxiu almost bumped heads with the snake closest to her. With just a glance around the pigpen, she found several snakes. Ma Jinxiu quickly retreated from the pigpen, but found that her legs were weak, and she sat on the ground.

Zhang Benrui quickly came out, “What’s wrong? What’s wrong? Wife, what happened?”

Ma Jinxiu’s face turned pale, and she couldn’t say a word. She pointed into the pigpen with her hand.

Zhang Benrui was about to walk into the pigpen but was grabbed by Ma Jinxiu’s leg, “Don’t go, don’t go, snakes, many snakes!”

Zhang Benrui quickly stopped and looked through the crack in the door. Oh! Sure enough, there was a snake hanging in the pigpen, spitting venom towards the door.

In the afternoon, Zhang Shunlin was also scared while working in the school garden and didn’t sleep much all night. At dawn, he closed his eyes for a moment, only to be awakened by a rustling sound under the bed. He quickly got up and took a flashlight to shine under the bed, only to be frightened to the core. There was a thumb-thick black snake under the bed!