The morning light is faint, and the night has not faded in the sky, but the city gate of Guobei County has already been opened.
According to convention, the city gates in various places are opened at Chen hour, that is, at eight or nine o'clock in the morning. At that time, the sun is already shining, and the people outside the city are preparing to enter the city with their goods for trading. There was a bustling scene outside the door.
Guobei County, on the other hand, opens its doors at Mao hour, and the city gates are opened as soon as the sun comes out.
This is also a solution.
Because of the unique ecology of Guobei County where humans and ghosts live together, every household has a habit of putting yellow symbols on the doors and windows before the sun goes down, and then closing the doors and windows tightly.
The time of day when people can safely move around is closely tied to the sun, and people in Guobei County have developed different living habits.
All life in Guobei County is closely tied to sunrise and sunset. It begins slowly after sunrise and stops abruptly after sunset.
After all, the occupation with the highest mortality rate in Guobei County is the night watchman.
Before daylight, merchants and people entering the city came to the shed one after another to wait to enter the city.
They are either carrying goods or carrying poles and preparing to enter the city to work, but they all have a clear characteristic, that is, they keep their mouths tightly shut.
The common conversations of businessmen and the daily talk of common people are all missing here. Everyone is observing quietly with black eyes and white eyes, almost indifferently.
Su Che counted the doornails on the city gate. The brass doornails were already rusty, like yellow teeth on the black city gate.
Second Master Su felt that Guobei County was not lifeless, but just a little lifeless.
The big ghost Taigong Chong stood in the shed wearing his black robe, and he remained silent. When those observing eyes saw the black feathers on his hat, they seemed to be stung by something. He closed his eyes and immediately looked away.
We stayed like this until the city gate slowly opened, and the people waiting in the shed began to enter the city one after another as if they were completely invisible to Taigong Chong.
It is interesting to say that both the gatekeepers and the common people entering and leaving the city turned a blind eye to the big ghost Taigong Chong, who was dressed in black, as if they had not seen him at all.
This made Su Che suspect for a moment that this bald man was some kind of magic wizard, and the blindness was so blinding that Master Su, who had a keen spiritual sense, could not detect it.
Just when I was about to cross the city gate, I still asked a child to break the gong.
A sturdy little boy, who looked about five or six years old, followed an old lady into the city with a basket. He pointed at the hat that Grandpa Chong had made and followed the old lady.
"Grandma, run, there's a black bird ghost here."
Then the old lady quickly covered her mouth with her wrinkled and chapped hands.
The child's eyes were darting around, and his small chest was rising and falling. The old lady looked at Grandpa Chong with fear and fear in her eyes.Despite the numbness, Suche even saw a little bit of envy in it.
The people walking around immediately quickened their pace, and ice seemed to condense in the surrounding air.
Tai Gongchong smiled, nodded to the gatekeeper, and then led Su Che and Lu Bai into the city through the city gate.
Not long after, the cry of a child and waves of whispers came from behind.
Su Che smiled, and the boy cried very painfully. I guess the grandmother was really educating her child with her heart.
Ghosts in the Yin and Yang Realm have a bad reputation.
"Black Bird Ghost?"
Su Che was a little curious as to where this name came from.
"The ghosts in the world all have a feather of the three-eyed ghost crow stuck in their hats, so the people around them call the ghosts the blackbird ghost."
Tai Gong Chong smiled and said: "In recent years, my lord has not been too strict in controlling the world. The ghosts often do mischief, and their reputation is not good. When I first entered the Yin and Yang Realm, the ghosts actually had a bad reputation. Not bad."
"When did you enter the Yin and Yang Realm?"
"It was more than three hundred years ago. I was a young military attaché in the former dynasty. When Daliang was in Longxing, I led troops to fight against Liang Jun and lost my life. At that time, the Lord was searching for ghosts on the battlefield, so I entered the realm of Yin and Yang."
"Three hundred years. , That’s a long life.”
Su Che praised sincerely, as a ghost, Taigong Chong’s ability to survive for so many years is somewhat legendary.
People have life and death.
Life is the number of years a person can live happily.
After death, a person transforms into a ghost, and the time he or she exists as a ghost is called Mingshou.
Su Che read in "Xuanzhongji" that there are generally two views on so-called ghosts in the spiritual world.
One school of thought believes that ghosts are transformed into human souls. The so-called lingering ghosts can also be regarded as a continuing form of life.
The other school believes that ghosts have little to do with the original living people, just like the shadows of people and people. When a person dies and turns into a ghost, an irreversible change has occurred in itself. Therefore, there is a saying in Buddhism: "Once the human body is lost, it will be difficult to recover."
No matter which school's view is right or wrong, there is a core argument here: turning into a ghost after death is better than being born as a human being. A very unstable state.
Mainly manifested in two aspects, one is that one has a short lifespan, and the other is that spirituality is hard to find.
The lifespan of ghosts can be long or short. Most people can only live for more than a month after death. There are always words in the scriptures such as "In seven or seven days, life and death are difficult to know." That is to say This ghost body lasts only a short time.
However, the ghost body can also be practiced. By guiding the moonlight and swallowing incense, the life span of the dead can also gradually increase.
That’s why lonely ghosts are the most miserable. Because there is no one to worship them, they often cannot live longer.
For the sentient beings in this worldIt is said that the lonely ghost is really a vicious curse that is real and true.
As a former military minister of the dynasty, Taigong Chong was able to be taken to the Yin-Yang Realm by the Yin-Yang Dharma King after he died in battle, and he survived for more than three hundred years. This luck and practice are indeed worthy of praise.
In addition to the difficulty of longevity, another important factor is the so-called difficulty of finding spiritual enlightenment.
When a person is alive, as long as he is willing to make progress, whether through reading or observing his surroundings, his mind will always grow little by little.
From a young age, I was ignorant, and then practiced to be transparent, and finally matured. Just like a sapling, although it grows slowly, it will eventually bear fruit over time.
For ghosts, it is the opposite process. Once they die, the biggest problem is the irreversible decline of their intelligence.
Sometimes the lifespan may not be over yet, but the spirit has been lost and eventually turned into a ghost.
As a lonely soul who died in battle, Taigong Chong has lived for more than three hundred years, and his spirit has not died.
Su Che felt that on the one hand, this showed that the Taigong had something extraordinary about his ghost, and it also showed that the opening of the Yin and Yang realm by the Yin and Yang Dharma King was not a good thing for the people of Guobei County.
But for a group of ghost cultivators, it is indeed a pure land, providing more possibilities.