Maybe it's because the weather has been too hot recently, maybe there aren't many people coming to burn incense in the afternoon, or maybe it's because the people's livelihood and economy in Yidu are obviously in decline now, and the fly restaurants on this street are a bit deserted. There are not many people eating in the restaurants.
, on the contrary, the streets are full of flies. Some shops will use fans to drive them away, while others simply turn a deaf ear and don't even bother to take a look.
Song You chose a restaurant that knew how to catch flies and sat down. He wanted to eat meat but did not dare to order fresh meat for fear that it would not be fresh, so he ordered a plate of cold wild vegetables and asked the store to cook a piece of bacon to cut it.
Of course, I also want a bowl of hattou.
"okay!"
The store owner was also smiling.
On weekdays, this street mainly serves pilgrims, small vendors doing pilgrim business, and ordinary people attracted by the vendors. The wealthy pilgrims will naturally go to restaurants after offering incense, while those who stay in this street will only eat.
There are ordinary people left. Hatou is the most commonly sold. Some people are tired and come to do business, or bring their children to the city to go to the market. If they have some spare money, they will order a bowl, but there are far fewer who can add a plate of vegetarian dishes.
, there are even fewer people who can still order a plate of meat.
The shop owner looks young and moves quickly.
The hat had been steamed a long time ago, but I didn't rush to serve it to him. The wild vegetables were mixed in two or three times, so I didn't rush to serve it to him. Instead, I took the bacon off the beam and scraped it.
After it was washed and cooked, the cold wild cabbage and hat head were brought to him, and then he cut the bacon, cutting it quickly and thinly. In this way, the dishes were served in just two or three times, and there was no need to wait too much.
"Your Majesty, please use it with caution."
The shopkeeper said something, then picked up the cattail leaf fan and continued to chase away the flies.
Song You paused the chopsticks in the palm of his hand to make them flat, then picked up the bowl of hat. The white rice was filled with a little finely chopped oatmeal, some mung beans that were also crushed, golden oatmeal and green beans.
The green mung beans make it look a lot more colorful and appetizing, and it still bulges high in the bowl. It is a little more colorful than the hat head that Wu Nuxia used to treat her to when she was out of town.
Song You asked for an extra small bowl and gave some rice to the little girl opposite.
The hat looks awkward when you first look at it.
"Eat."
The Taoist lowered his head and dug his rice.
The girl also lowered her head to dig her rice.
When the Taoist picks up the dishes, she also picks up the dishes.
The leaves of the amaranth are green with a hint of red. I used soy sauce and vinegar, a few drops of sesame oil, and a little bit of other unknown sauce. It tasted okay, a little salty, but it was quite satisfying on this hot day.
The so-called watercress is Houttuynia cordata.
Also called Zheergen.
Yizhou people eat Zheer roots, and Yizhou cats naturally eat Zheer roots too.
This plate is for leaves, not roots.
Song You chewed the food and made a crisp sound.
The girl on the opposite side also bit her, making a clicking sound. She looked calm and showed no intention of resisting him. She only observed the Taoist's expression and movements. When the Taoist lowered his head to dig rice again, she immediately lowered her head too.
When the Taoist was planning the rice and picking up the vegetables with his chopsticks, she couldn't lag behind at all.
Only occasionally when a fly flew in front of her, her smart and bright eyes would turn involuntarily, changing her gaze from the Taoist to following the fly.
Until he stretched out his hand like lightning——
"brush!"
A fly was caught in her hand.
I pinched it gently, just enough to crush it, but not to break it, and then put it on the corner of the table.
"brush!"
If you stretch out your hand, you will surely catch it, and you will never miss it.
It was okay once or twice, but after a few more visits, the shopkeeper who was chasing flies next to him couldn't help but feel a little sluggish, and stretched out his hand to scratch his head.
I don’t know how many times I did this.
By the time the meal was almost finished, the flies on the corner of the table had piled up into a small pile, and it was a small, pointed pile that was almost perfect in shape.
Girls never fail.
The store owner was stunned for a moment.
Until the Taoist stretched out his chopsticks for the last time and picked up the last piece of bacon on the plate. The bacon was golden and semi-transparent, and the skinny and bright red meat was trembling on the chopsticks, dripping oil and water. The girl opposite stood up almost at the same time, and said:
With a serious face, he waved his hands and caught a fly above his head.
The Taoist put the bacon into his mouth.
The girl also pinched the fly, held her breath, moved closer and carefully placed it on the top of the pile of flies. The small pointed pile that was approaching perfection suddenly became perfect.
"Store, collect money."
"My guest, I charge you forty-two coins."
"Thank you."
"My guest, this boy..."
"Oh, my children are naughty by nature, and their thinking is different from ordinary people. I have long been used to it. Don't be surprised if the store finds it strange."
The Taoist counted the money on the table, then dug it down and handed it to the shopkeeper.
"Don't dare, don't dare..."
The shopkeeper took the money with both hands and replied repeatedly.
With a casual glance from the corner of his eye, he saw the girl also plucking the pile of flies off the table and holding it in her hand. Her movements were almost the same as that of the man plucking money. He was really worried about this for a moment.
The little girl will hand the handful of flies to herself.
But he saw her put it into the bag he was carrying.
The store owner couldn't help but was stunned again.
"My guest, this boy..."
"Don't be surprised if you see something strange. Don't be surprised if you see something strange."
The store owner glanced out of the corner of his eye again, and saw the girl raising her head, with a fair face without much expression, staring at herself doubtfully, with eyes that seemed to be asking questions.
"Don't dare."
The store owner quickly bowed and retreated into the store.
All I thought in my heart was, weird people, weird people.
The sky gradually darkened.
One after another, Yidu people began to return home from work, or come out from home. When dinner was cooked, they would eat at the door with bowls in hand, or walk around, enjoy the cool and chat in crowded places. For a while, the city seemed like
It's back to the way it was in Song You's memory.
Sanhua Empress walked and looked at the goblins and ghosts hiding in the city who were greedy for the prosperity of the world or had ulterior motives.
The Taoist smacked his lips and savored the taste of bacon.
Two quarters of an hour later, we returned to the inn.
The little girl was still sitting by the window with her robe on her shoulders. She was holding a handful of flies in one hand, and she kept twisting one up with the other hand and handed it to the front.
There is a swallow standing on the windowsill.
The swallow carefully took the fly from her hand, raised its head and opened its mouth, and the fly was swallowed.
Then he continued to stare at the girl.
In fact, this weather is when mosquitoes are most abundant. He doesn't need Sanhua Empress's feeding at all. He only needs to go out and fly and play for a while, and he will be full naturally. And he doesn't like eating flies very much, but Sanhua Empress's feeding is enough.
It was something that even the husband could not refuse completely, so he had no choice but to accept it.
Just after eating the fly, the girl took out a bunch of candied haws from her bag and handed it to him.
Yanzi is really helpless.
Night slowly fell.
The little girl was still sitting by the window, lying on the wooden coffee table, looking down, especially at the alley diagonally opposite, in a daze. It wasn't until she heard the sound of Taoists walking around behind her washing, that she asked without looking back:
"How long are we going to stay here?"
"You won't be able to stay long."
"How long are you going to stay here?"
"Let's take a few days to rest and go back to the Taoist temple. I'll go back to see my master and then go to Yunzhou."
"A few days..."
The girl murmured quietly.
With a squeaking sound, he transformed back into a cat, then jumped up on the coffee table by the window again, lay down and continued to look down in trance, his eyelids began to fight.
Maybe I was tired after a long day, and I fell asleep without realizing it because of the night breeze.
In dreams, memories surge and the past is unearthed.
Sanhua Empress seemed to have seen the calico cat from when she first came to Yidu.
That calico cat is so weak that it can't even turn into a human. It's also timid and pretends to be brave. When it comes to a strange place, it feels really uneasy, for fear of intruding into someone else's territory.
When I walked into Tai'an Temple and saw such a big temple and such a big golden Buddha statue, I was so scared that I didn't even dare to enter. After I mustered up the courage to enter, I didn't dare to speak easily. I just tried my best to pretend to be myself.
Just an ordinary cat so as not to be recognized.
That calico cat is so stupid and doesn't understand anything.
Naturally, I am smart now.
The cat huddled up in a ball and slept deeply.
The Taoist sat cross-legged on the bed, closed his eyes and meditated, thinking of the past.
In the next few days, the two of them wandered around the city.
He even went to the Yuewang Shenjun Temple and offered three sticks of incense to the Yuewang Shenjun. That night, the Shenjun Master came in a dream and complained to him about the cumbersome things in the ghost town, the pressure from the Heavenly Palace, and the infiltration of the West.
As for how tiring it was, it was not as relaxing as Song You said before.
By the way, I also informed him of the progress of the construction of the ghost town and the city god system.
The tall butcher who bought the yard where they lived was indeed a hospitable person. Every night, as long as there was meat cooked at home, he would definitely come to the inn to invite him to eat. If he didn't go, either because he was embarrassed or because he was out.
Before returning home, everyone would bring him a bowl, and friends from all over the world would often come to see him, and he would warmly entertain them. No wonder the butchering business was growing bigger and bigger.
Song You also asked him about Wu Nuxia.
It’s just that in today’s world of Yidu, there doesn’t seem to be a figure like Wu Suowei. At least Gao Tutu and his friends have never heard of it. Asking about the Xishan Sect, this kind of top famous party in the world has nothing to do with Gao Tutu.
He and his friends seemed to be a bit too high-end. I had only heard of many rumors about the Xishan Sect, about which disciple had shown great power somewhere, and which disciple was actually defeated by so and so. I had never heard of anyone named Wu in the Xishan Sect.
Experts or elders or something like that.
Song You didn't explore too much.
Thirteen years have passed, and some parts of Yidu have remained unchanged, while other parts are already different from those years ago.
Walking in Yidu City several times, I felt that the people I passed by seemed familiar. Some seemed like my former neighbors, some seemed to have come to him to ask for talismans, and a few times I seemed to have encountered people who had eliminated evil spirits.
At that time, one of the group of merchants on Jinyang Road, or maybe two of them, but they just met each other and felt that they were alike but not alike. They looked at each other and walked away separately.
One has become too much, and the other has never changed.
It seems that an old friend passed by, and his head suddenly turned gray.