Book 2: Chapter 3

Book 2: Chapter 3

It was summer when I arrived in the eighty-two villages to investigate this matter. The weather in Xiangxi was surprisingly hot and humid.

The place hadnt been called the eighty-two villages for a long time now, and the tusis were long gone. But those villages that had been established in the group of mountains were still there.

I asked many local folklore scholars about the story of the old blind man in the eighty-two villages. Some of them were even writing reports on topics related to Xiangxi, but none of them had heard of it. It was almost like the local Miao people considered it to be a top secret.

But when I asked those elderly people who were almost a hundred years old, I discovered that some of them remembered that there had once been a leader like him in the Miao villages.

Later, I changed the direction of my investigation and looked into any religious or mythological aspects. I found that a large part of the eighty-two villages was in Guizhou, which was an area much larger than I had originally thought.

There was a very transparent legend in Guizhou that some religious leaders in the Black Miao (1) villages secretly worshiped the monsters in the mountains in order to gain a longer lifespan.

Every time the monster granted your wish, the religious leaders needed to give up something from their bodies, which was usually something like their eyes, fingers, a piece of flesh, or even blood.

When Er Yuehong escorted the chief tusi to Death Valley, it was said to be a ceremony in which they presented a child who had died young to the mountain gods. Children were counted as ones flesh and blood, which meant that this legend had an extensive basis.

Ever since I was a child, I had been rebellious and thought that rules were made to be broken, so the story of Zhang Da Fo Ye hunting gods was simply refreshing and exhilarating to people like me.

What a majestic person Zhang Qishan was! When I was a child, I used to fantasize about riding a horse into the mountains and hunting a mountain god. This story also made me understand that there was nothing in the world that couldnt be challenged.

Im sorry about spending so much time and ink to clarify the ins and outs, but the next step is to copy and write down the entire story of Zhang Da Fo Ye hunting gods.

Grandpa usually spent two nights finishing the story, so Im not exactly sure what the length of it is. But its not a long story, either.

There were some details in it that were very exciting, which was a rare pastime for people before they went to bed.

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TN Notes:

(1) The Chinese traditionally classify the Miao ethnic group according to the most characteristic color of the women's clothes. According to this, the Black Miao are in Southeast Guizhou. They could also be called the Hei Miao.