A Single Flower Of The Village - Chapter 4

Chapter 4

The small single-room on the rooftop she rented was reported as an illegal structure and had to be torn down immediately, otherwise a fine would be imposed, so the landlord kicked her out. What was even unluckier than this was that before a new job was settled, she was dismissed. The reason given was that she stole things from the office area of the office building. She hadn’t taken anything at all, yet the things were searched out from her locker. She was unable to defend herself, and no one was willing to speak for her. She was wronged just like this, and then packed her bedding roll to get lost in disgrace, without being able to get a single cent of compensation. Searching online for how to protect her rights, a netizen whose family owned mines and who didn’t worry about food and drink told her to apply for labor arbitration. She followed the guide to do so, but just after submitting the information on the back end, the company’s phone call rang on her mobile phone, threatening her not to cause trouble, otherwise they would make it impossible for her to find a job in the entire Yunqian.

So many days had passed without a reply, one didn’t even need to think to know someone was messing with her. These pieces of trash truly wanted to force her to death. Fortunately, the landlord refunded her the two hundred yuan deposit. The landlord originally didn’t want to refund it because she was too anxious when renting the room and didn’t sign a contract, it was all spoken verbally. It was because she threw a tantrum and made a scene at the main gate like she was going crazy that the landlord refunded the money.

Two hundred yuan could only allow one to stay in an ordinary hotel for a night, renting a room was impossible. So she went to stay in a youth hostel, 20 yuan a night. She had no academic qualifications, and the jobs she could find wouldn’t be very good. If she couldn’t work as a security guard, she could only go to restaurants, hotels, and milk tea shops to try her luck and see if they wanted waitresses. It wouldn’t be possible to have a job and get money so quickly, so she could only find part-time jobs settled daily to do first. No matter what, she had to fill her stomach first to have the strength to think about other things.

At night she went to food stalls to do chores, earning seventy or eighty yuan. However, this kind of work wasn’t available every day. During the day she worked in a milk tea shop, and the money was also settled daily. The two time periods of noon and evening after school were the busiest. Ruan Jingluo wore the uniform uniformly provided by the shop and a baseball cap, with a mask covering most of her face, lowering her head busy taking orders for customers.

“Hello, what would you like to drink?”

A bell-like voice rang out, “Want a cup of taro paste milk, Hehe~”

Ruan Jingluo’s movement of taking the order paused, her line of sight raising slightly, but quickly dropping down again, signaling with a hand gesture, “Scan the code over here.”

There were still many people lining up behind, now was not the time to speak. After paying the money, Lu Shouqiu stood by the side waiting.

She had asked many ghost constables before learning Ruan Jingluo was working part-time here. She had also gone to look at the youth hostel where Ruan Jingluo temporarily stayed. The bed spaces were squeezed like a sardonic can of sardines, and it was still a mixed residence of men and women, with all kinds of people. Hearing the ghost constables on duty nearby say, at night there were always ill-intentioned people secretly photographing Ruan Jingluo while she slept, and they would also rummage through her things when she wasn’t there.

There were several candidates for guarding the main gate, but Ruan Jingluo seemingly obtained Master Shouqiu’s favor in particular, so the ghost constables also paid attention, frequently helping Ruan Jingluo drive away those bad eggs in the dark, allowing her to sleep a peaceful sleep under the circumstance of being exhausted to death to earn money, and the luggage placed on the bed that couldn’t be brought to work was not lost either.

When Lu Shouqiu’s number was called, Ruan Jingluo asked indiscriminately, “Pack up or drink now?”

“Drink now, drink now, hehe…”

Ruan Jingluo endured and endured again, before not punching and exploding this face that deserved a beating. After playing her like a monkey, she still had the face to laugh?

She was also muddled in the head by the braised fatty intestines and mutton rice noodles, truly believing this big liar Lu Shouqiu, and attempting to contact the other party when she was driven into a corner. As a result, there was not a fart, and the other person ignored her entirely. In a fit of anger, she blocked Lu Shouqiu. Now she still dared to seek her out, did she truly think she didn’t hit people? Go to the hospital to see what kind of end that idiot who sexually harassed her had.

Only after the busiest time period passed could Ruan Jingluo get off work. When she changed clothes and came out, she still saw Lu Shouqiu sitting under the tree opposite the entrance. It had already been three hours, during which she ordered every single drink in the shop. It wasn’t that she drank it herself. As soon as a number was called, someone would come in from outside to take it away. Every single one knew Lu Shouqiu, and would go over to greet her and chat for a couple of sentences before leaving.

“Don’t follow me.” After crossing two streets without throwing off this small tail behind, Ruan Jingluo was extremely exasperated, turning around and saying viciously.

Lu Shouqiu was like a child who did something wrong, standing in place lowering her head and twiddling her fingers. She knew Ruan Jingluo was angry, very angry, and WeChat hadn’t been added back until now.

It was all to blame on Calico, why hide her phone for no reason, causing her to fail to receive Ruan Jingluo’s call for help at the first moment. With Ruan Jingluo’s awkward personality, if it weren’t for having truly no choice, it would be impossible for her to look for her proactively. Such a good opportunity, seeing that Ruan Jingluo could guard the main gate for her, was missed in vain just like this, and Ruan Jingluo was still angry with her now.

Explaining wouldn’t work, maybe Ruan Jingluo would even think she was quibbling. She could only play pitiful, while twiddling her fingers, she secretly shifted small steps to edge in front of Ruan Jingluo, revealing two rows of big white teeth in a radiant smile, “Hehe, look at you, been busy for half the day, are you hungry? Taking you to eat mutton rice noodles.”

Ruan Jingluo turned around and ignored her, walking fast.

Lu Shouqiu ran in front of her, walking backward, just wanting to block Ruan Jingluo’s way, having a stance of ‘if you don’t agree I’ll keep following you like this’, making Ruan Jingluo lose her temper entirely, stopping to see what monster she was going to act out again. Anyway, she wouldn’t believe a single word of what Lu Shouqiu said anymore, this was just a liar.

Lu Shouqiu used all her skills wanting Ruan Jingluo to go with her to eat mutton rice noodles. Having no reaction, she turned circles around the person acting foolishly, until Ruan Jingluo’s attitude loosened and she agreed to go.

“Hehe…” Lu Shouqiu dragged her to arrive beside an unremarkable small sedan car parked on the roadside, enthusiastically and bootlickingly opening the car door for her, bending slightly to make a gesture of invitation, “Princess, please get into the car.”

Ruan Jingluo clenched her back molars, squeezing a few words from between her teeth, “Can you be normal!”

Lu Shouqiu no longer talked nonsense, pushing her into the back seat, and sitting in herself, saying fast and fluidly, “The luggage you placed at the youth hostel, I have already called someone to go over and pack it up, we are going back to the farm now.”

Ruan Jingluo was greatly shocked, “Hey! I haven’t agreed yet, on what grounds do you move my things randomly.”

The car had already started. This was the shuttle bus she borrowed from Xie Bi’an, and the one gripping the steering wheel was a ghost constable. The car speed was fast as a rocket, and the road walked was not the highway of the human world either. In order not to scare the person, she still used a bit of cover-up trick.

“Proactively asking represents agreeing, I actually have evidence.” She turned out the chat records. Don’t think blocking could destroy the evidence. She came over to catch the person today, Ruan Jingluo shouldn’t think of backing out.

To still be able to play rascal like this, Ruan Jingluo felt she still underestimated human nature. She turned her head to look outside, having completely lost the desire to communicate with Lu Shouqiu, and having an attitude of not caring about her current situation either. Like her, a person who lived in the gutter since birth, whatever fate bestowed she had to accept, with no choice. She wanted to see what other tricks Lu Shouqiu was going to pull.

The scenery outside the car became more and more unfamiliar, flashing too fast, and looking for long made it easy to get dizzy. Closing her gradually heavy eyelids, Ruan Jingluo’s head tilted, leaning on the side and falling asleep.

The ghost constable gripping the steering wheel immediately locked the car doors. The shuttle bus was like sitting on a rocket, arriving near the farm with a sou. Determining there were no living people’s vehicles on the road, it quietly revealed itself to restore normal car speed, driving slowly toward the main gate, and only stopping when driving in front of the drum tower.

Lu Shouqiu shook awake the person beside her, “Arrived, get out of the car.”

“So fast?” Ruan Jingluo was still muddled, how long had she slept after all.

Feet stepping on solid ground still felt unreal. She stood in front of the drum tower raising her head, blankly looking at this ancient fir-wood type building. The villages of Yunqian had many such drum towers, heard this was a place specially used for large-scale sacrifices before, and also had the implication of expelling evil and avoiding disasters. She had also only looked from afar. Going inside to visit required buying a ticket, and she wouldn’t spend this money.

Lu Shouqiu pushed open the wooden door, shouting loudly inside, “Children, I’m back!”

Knowing it had caused trouble, Calico had already hidden outside long ago, and it was impossible to return without ten days or half a month. Owls were nocturnal animals, sleeping during the day. When Lu Shouqiu pushed the door, she knocked it down from the door beam, knocking it dizzy and disoriented. It took great difficulty to stand up, yet its left foot tripped its right foot and then it plunged headfirst to the side of Ruan Jingluo’s shoe, almost being stepped on.

Ruan Jingluo was not lightly scared by the sudden situation. No matter how uncultured she was, she also knew owls were protected animals, if it was stepped to death by herself…

Daring not think of the consequences, it seemed prison food was already waving at her.

“You…” her eyes stared as large as copper bells, “actually raise an owl?! Don’t you know this is breaking the law?!”

Lu Shouqiu’s eyeballs rolled, very innocent, walking over and kicking the obstructive owl to the side with one foot, nonsense coming out of her mouth as soon as it opened, “Not raised, it’s that its wing was injured and I took it in out of kindness, I have already reported it to the relevant department.”

There had been such news before. Ruan Jingluo knitted her brows, still feeling very strange. She lowered her head wanting to look at that owl again, um? How did it disappear, it was still there just now.

Seeing the couplet pasted at the entrance, she finally knew where the sense of strangeness came from after all, “Living people keep away, dead ghosts free of charge?”

She extended her hand, pointing back at herself tremblingly, then what did she count as?

“Ha, ha… this, listen to my quibbling, ah pah, no, it’s explanation.” Lu Shouqiu was in a flurry wanting to block the couplet, but the couplet had two sides, how could she block it alone? Anyway, the posture of running back and forth was quite comical.

Ruan Jingluo crossed her arms standing there to see what medicine she was selling in her gourd.

“Actually, this is just what I pasted to play with when I was young and ignorant, later I felt it had personality, so I was too lazy to change it.” She spoke the truth.

Ruan Jingluo let out a cold snort, not saying she believed it, nor saying she didn’t believe it.

Lu Shouqiu knew she had no credibility in front of her, but it didn’t matter, there would be in the future.

The car delivering luggage arrived right after. Ruan Jingluo didn’t let Lu Shouqiu help, carrying the things herself and following behind to go in. The drum tower had more than ten layers, but above the third floor there were no rooms. Lu Shouqiu arranged for Ruan Jingluo to live on the second floor.

“My room is over here.” Lu Shouqiu pointed diagonally opposite the door.

Ruan Jingluo looked around for a turn, “You live alone?”

“Now there are two.” She danced in circles out of happiness, the silver ornaments on her dress making ding-ding dang-dang sounds.

Ruan Jingluo suddenly heard the sound of drum music, very much like when she first arrived in Yunqian and out of curiosity ran to watch a free sacrificial activity, turning her head in puzzle to search everywhere, “Who is playing music, did your phone automatically connect to Bluetooth?”

Lu Shouqiu immediately stopped her movements, saying with a straight face, “Didn’t expect you to have auditory hallucinations at such a young age.”

If one bickered with Lu Shouqiu, sooner or later one would be angered to death. Ruan Jingluo carried her luggage into the room.

She actually didn’t have many things either—a box of old clothes worn for who knows how many years, two quilts, one thick and one thin, a pillow, two pairs of shoes, and some toiletries. She was usually very frugal, and lived a coarse life. For skincare products, there was only a bottle of Dabao, not even using facial cleanser. People who were naturally beautiful were just this fearless.

Lu Shouqiu was like a diligent little honeybee, following behind to help.

The room was very clean, bed, wardrobe, table and chairs were all there. The window faced south, and opening it allowed one to see the green pasture in the distance, with herds of cattle and sheep. This was the first time Ruan Jingluo lived in such a good place.

Lu Shouqiu pulled out an employment contract like performing a magic trick, a full hundred pages. She let Ruan Jingluo look at it slowly, not rushing to sign, and then dragged the person downstairs to go to the market to eat things. It wasn’t dark yet, the Ghost Village hadn’t opened for business yet, and mutton rice noodles could only wait until night.

Ruan Jingluo couldn’t understand these restrictions and conditions very well either. If she intentionally pitied-tricked her, she wouldn’t be able to see anything either, so signing now and signing later were the same. She flipped through it casually twice, and signed her name on the last page, at the same time handing over her ID card.

“Need a photocopy?”

Lu Shouqiu raised an eyebrow, “Not looking at it in detail? In case there are unfair clauses or a contract of indenture or something, you are going to suffer a loss.”

“You aren’t even willing to give a salary, already being very skinflint, what else can I expect? Soldiers come to block, water comes to cover with earth.” Ruan Jingluo abandoned herself to despair.

“Ha, ha…” could only use an awkward laugh to adjust the atmosphere, but it seemed to have no effect.

The hundred-page employment contract was not nonsense literature. Every single clause inside was of vital importance. Ruan Jingluo signed without looking in detail. If she found something after officially taking office and turned back to blame her, she wouldn’t bear the responsibility, hmph.

While what Ruan Jingluo thought was to work here first, having food and drink so she wouldn’t starve to death, and if she didn’t work smoothly she would leave. No salary was a loss, but she couldn’t think that far ahead now either, taking one step and looking at the next.

The farm was larger than imagined, and the environment was very good. Encountering many people on the road, there were original residents of the farm, and also citizens coming in from outside to purchase. Ruan Jingluo paid attention just now. Outside the main gate were parked many cars in a mess, blocking the road thoroughly, no wonder Lu Shouqiu wanted to recruit someone to guard the main gate, it was indeed needed.

Change to ordinary times, Lu Shouqiu would cook at home to eat herself. Today the situation was special. Ruan Jingluo had just arrived at the farm, and she wanted to take the other party to familiarize with the surrounding environment first.

In fact, there weren’t many places the living could reach. Except for the Ghost Village and the Immortal Market, there was also the small village located behind the market. The medical clinic co-opened by the King of Medicine, God of Medicine, and Buddha of Medicine was there. Enjoying lifelong free medical treatment at the clinic after retirement was also one of the benefits. Ruan Jingluo, after hearing it, didn’t have much reaction though, only letting out an “oh.” She felt she wouldn’t even live past thirty.

“You can ask for a piece of land on the farm, to grow some melons, fruits, and vegetables to give to people or sell,” Lu Shouqiu continued, “Although I can’t open a salary for you, this also counts as income, the things of our farm sell quite expensively.”

The clause of no salary was truly lacking in human nature, just to make the person guarding the main gate go to work with a stomach full of resentment every day. However, she couldn’t let the resentment increase all the time either. Everything paid attention to balance. If there was too much resentment and it couldn’t be dispersed, the accumulated resentment would seep into the internal organs, and after death it would turn into a fierce ghost, which was a big trouble. So Lu Shouqiu would additionally get some benefits to make the gatekeeper let off steam. Resentment occasionally existing was enough for her to consume, it must absolutely not be too much.

The reason she chose her was because the other party’s resentment was different from ordinary ones; resentment as a thing was also divided into classes, and the varieties were manifold. She didn’t want just anyone’s resentment.

Regarding the matter of being able to farm land herself, Ruan Jingluo still expressed a lack of interest. Her hometown was in the countryside, and she had enough of farming land when she was a child, not wanting to continue that kind of nightmare.

During the conversation they arrived at the entrance of the market, a very long ancient path, with wooden houses on both sides scattered among the hills, surrounded and covered by green trees, filled with green smoke and white clouds, quite immortal-spirit floating, like arriving at a picture scroll of the Journey to the West celestial world, but the boiling human voices also had a very human world smoke-and-fire atmosphere.

When the sun went down the market would close. Lu Shouqiu lined up for the last number today, dragging Ruan Jingluo, who was curiously looking around, to enter the shop and sit down.

“Look, what would you like to eat.” She pushed the handwritten menu over to Ruan Jingluo.

On this were all kinds of specialty dishes she hadn’t eaten and couldn’t imagine. Seeing that the treasure of the shop was Cow Bile Hot Pot, Ruan Jingluo immediately threw the menu back, “I don’t know which ones are delicious either, you are more familiar, you better order.”

These past few days she hadn’t eaten a proper meal (before it seemed there wasn’t either…), and today she was busy in the milk tea shop the whole time, not having time to eat either. If Lu Shouqiu hadn’t suddenly sought her out, she originally wanted to go back to the youth hostel to scrounge a meal from the proprietress’s family, saving a meal where she could, her skin was quite thick.

Lu Shouqiu’s finger deliberately paused on top of the Cow Bile Hot Pot, making Ruan Jingluo’s heart leap in fear, opening her mouth to speak but stopping, wanting to escape so much.

Teasing the person enough, Lu Shouqiu then laughed telling the shopkeeper she wanted a traditional Sour Soup Fish.

The delicacies of the market and the Ghost Village had overlaps, and also differences. Over here, they used the sour soup of cold water pickled vegetables as a soup base—vegetables or wild vegetables scalded with boiling water were placed into a pickled vegetable jar/bucket after cooling, submerged by boiled and cooled mountain spring water, then cooled cooked rice grains were added, playing the role of pickling and fermentation. Sealed for six or seven days and it could be eaten. Pickled vegetables could be stir-fried with meat, or fried with rice, and the ways of eating were diverse. The remaining sour soup could be used to make sour soup fish and sour soup beef, unique in flavor and widely welcomed.

The species of fish could also be self-chosen. The one with the highest popularity was Yellow Catfish, followed by Rice Flower Fish, which were both raised by immortal citizens themselves, netted fresh upon eating, guaranteeing the freshness of ingredients to the maximum extent.

Lu Shouqiu ordered a portion of Bamboo Shoot Cake, which was also one of the signature items in the shop, not sold over on the Ghost Village side. It was made by crushing steamed fresh and tender bamboo shoots together with glutinous rice, Sichuan peppercorns, a kind of fragrant leaf unique to the farm, and dry chilis, kneading into a round cake the size of a walnut pastry, dipping with white sesame seeds and frying until cooked. The skin was crispy, and the inside carried the tenacity of glutinous rice, scorch-yellow in color, numb-spicy and rich-fragrant in mouthfeel, usually very good taken as a snack. At home during leisure time she also frequently made it, it was just not as delicious as what the shopkeeper made.

The staple food wanted was Flat Rice, made from late-autumn ripened high-stalk fragrant grass glutinous rice. The rice ears were plumper and thicker than ordinary rice ears, and the harvesting method was also different, using a picking knife shaped like a crescent moon, a iron-sheet style, very sharp, worn on the finger to cut the rice ears down and tie them into small bundles.

Making flat rice chose the rice ears that still carried green, threshing and roasting first, then pounding the husks. The finished product was white with green showing through, extremely good-looking. After being steamed across water it was fragrant and glutinous, and making rice cakes or rice pastries was also delicious. Quite a few living people would specially come to the market to buy prepared flat rice to take home to eat.

Ruan Jingluo was still eating this kind of steamed rice for the first time, hadn’t heard of it before, strangely fragrant, paired with sour vegetable stir-fried cured meat, and quickly a bowl of rice saw the bottom.

The Rice Flower Fish, which was full of sour-fragrant flavor, had a few too many small bones, but the fish meat was very tender, she didn’t taste any earthy smell, just feeling it was delicious. Dipping it into the sour chili specially made by the shopkeeper was another kind of flavor.

Lu Shouqiu, who rarely went out during the day, hadn’t come to the market to eat sour soup fish for a long time either. This time she ate exceptionally much, and later wanted another portion of Yellow Catfish.

She touched her stomach which finally had a seven-fifths fullness and said, “Waiting until night falls to take you over to the village side to eat black-haired pig barbecue skewers, mutton rice noodles can also be arranged.”

She was truly a generous farm owner, her head full of taking her only employee to eat and drink.

Ruan Jingluo was still eating the last half piece of Bamboo Shoot Cake, also eating this thing for the first time. The clear fragrance of bamboo shoots was all mixed into the glutinous rice, it was just a bit spicy. She had to drink a gulp of oil tea for every bite of cake she ate, her stomach was stuffed, and she still ate because she didn’t want to waste.

“Your appetite is truly good.” So many things just now, where did they all go.

“The elders say being able to eat is a blessing.”

“…” Ruan Jingluo thought otherwise. When she was a child, eating one more bite of meat would cause her to be said to eat so much, and after marrying in the future it would also be a benefit to other people’s families.

Lu Shouqiu went to pay the money, and the shop owner gifted her two bamboo tube rices, letting her come frequently to patronize in the future.

Ruan Jingluo took all this into her eyes, and after walking outside she said seemingly unintentionally, “The people here seem to particularly like you.”

Lu Shouqiu walked in front hopping and bouncing, her pleated skirt turned into a small umbrella by her, and the silver ornaments and totems on her clothes seemed to have life, vivid and graphic.

“Yes, whether opening a shop to do business or raising pigs and farming land, they all have to lease my farm’s land, they can’t not like me, if they don’t like me I’ll raise the rent.”

As expected, one couldn’t harbor any illusions about human nature. Ruan Jingluo particularly wanted to take back that sentence just now.

The street that was still bustling when entering didn’t have many pedestrians left, the shopkeepers had already hung out the closing signs, and the lanterns suspended from the roof beams gradually lit up along with the sinking of the sunset.

Not seeing lightbulbs, nor seeing candlelight, Ruan Jingluo curiously went forward to look closely, finding that inside were palm-sized scales glowing.

“What is this? Uses batteries?” Not seeing any electrical wires.

Lu Shouqiu took a glance, saying indifferently, “Oh, that, it’s dragon scales.”

“Ha?” What ghost, had never heard that electric lights still had this brand, strangely rare.

“The scales of the Torch Dragon.”

Ruan Jingluo rolled her eyes, “Can you speak less of such unrealistic god and monster stories, truly given up.”

Not believing the truth, Lu Shouqiu shrugged. The Torch Dragon was exactly Zhu Jiuyin. This guy was a walking volcano. Every time he came to find her to play, he would burn down half the farm. She suffered heavy losses, so she blacklisted the Torch Dragon, not allowing him to come again. Now that guy should still be lying in the core of the earth sleeping.

The Torch Dragon would change scales once every hundred years. When new scales grew out, the old scales were sent to her to use for illumination. Accumulated for so long, now the lanterns of the farm all used scales, and she also made a bit of small modification, they would automatically light up at night, quite intelligent.

Ruan Jingluo had already signed the employment contract with her, in the future no matter what she saw on the farm she had to accept it, and before retirement she couldn’t resign, this was also written on the contract clauses, Ruan Jingluo signed without looking, don’t blame her, hmph.

Support A Single Flower Of The Village