Fishing village, back mountain.

In the gloomy morning, a few messy paper money was blown by the wind, and the straw paper swirled and flew to the field ridges, or hung on the treetops.

The crowd was walking in the field carrying a thin-skinned coffin, with a rooster tied to the dark coffin. It was dull and depressing.

The girl from the fisherman's family was in a trance and was in a trance. Her grandfather fell asleep and never woke up. He suddenly passed away. From now on, she was the only one left in the family, with no family members.

Fortunately, the neighbors helped arrange the funeral arrangements, but the girl was like a puppet and could do nothing.

From home to the hillside behind, the road I have walked countless times is both familiar and unfamiliar.

I don't know when the crowd stopped. The old men in the village were busy according to the rules, but the fisherman girl couldn't hear anything. Her ears were buzzing, as if everything was so unreal. She watched helplessly as the coffin was put into the pit and the moist and fresh soil was sprinkled on it.

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The soil slowly covered the coffin and piled it into a new grave, which was so conspicuous in the green grass.

Neighbors are going down the mountains and returning to the village one after another. Life has to continue with farm work and waiting. There is no leisure in the world of the living.

There are no tombstones, only a few stones, and the ashes of burned paper are blown everywhere by the wind. I can recognize several graves around, grandma, dad, mother...

All the relatives I miss day and night are here.

The lonely figure has been kneeling in front of the grave, her eyes swollen from crying have long been gone.

After kneeling for a long time, he spoke in confusion.

"I don't have a home anymore..."

"I don't have a grandpa anymore..."

Repeated over and over again, my heart is completely empty, nothing is left.

From now on, there will be no lights to guide me home at night, no one to teach me how to repair the boat, and no chance to call my grandfather who is working in the fields to come home for dinner.

The sobbing and crying in the wild grass on the hillside is heartbreaking.

Dragging my tired body back to the courtyard gate, I didn't hear any familiar voice, and realized that I was the only one left now.

Walking into the yard, Grandpa Xue sat on the polished black bench with his back against the wall, not wanting to do anything.

Excessive grief can cause a person to lose his appetite and not want to eat or drink.

At noon, the neighbor's aunt came to deliver food and said some comforting words. After leaving, the small courtyard became quiet again. After a few mouthfuls of food, the food tasted like chewing and I put down my chopsticks. I didn't feel hungry at all.

I sat leaning against the wall until the red sun set in the west. The chickens, ducks and geese that had gone out gradually returned to the small courtyard, and there were finally more sounds in the house.

As night falls, candles are lit in every house, and the doors and windows of my own house are dark.

He stood up silently and closed the fence gate of the yard, picked up the dishes and chopsticks and went back to the house. He didn't make a fire or light an oil lamp. He lay on the bed and when he opened his eyes, all he saw was darkness.

I felt dizzy and fell asleep unconsciously.

Half asleep, half awake, not sleeping soundly.

The cockcrow broke the dawn, and the girl who opened her eyes was in a trance for a moment before she remembered that she was the only one at home.

Without saying a word, he went to bed, rubbed his face with cold water, opened the courtyard door and let the chickens, ducks and geese go out to look for food.

Returning to the outhouse, I moved a bench and sat in front of the stove, which was not hot at all. I picked up a bowl and ate yesterday's leftovers. The rice grains on the surface were dry and hard after being left overnight. My cheeks were very tired from chewing, and it was obviously tasteless.

You have to force yourself to eat, and you still have to live.

After eating, wash the dishes and chopsticks freely with cold water and put them in the cupboard.

You can't go to your neighbor's house to return dishes and chopsticks for the time being. You can't go to other people's houses for seven days. You can't forget the rules. You respect others as well as yourself.

Put on your straw hat and go out, pick up a wooden stick and bolt the door from the outside.

He used a long bamboo pole to carry several bamboo fish cages and left the small courtyard, walking silently to the lake alone.

Ducks on the path quacked and gave way, frogs plopped and jumped into the ditch, grasshoppers lay on the green grass and swayed in the wind, and when they got close, they flapped their wings and flew away.

The girl lowered her head and hurried on. The fish trap was so heavy that the bamboo poles creaked loudly.

As I walked, I raised my head and looked towards the outside of the village.

I heard the cawing of crows.

There are several crows circling in the sky in the distance, as if they are besieging an eagle.

In fact, many people don't know that crows can also bully hawks. This happens often in the wilderness. A single crow can fight alone against a hawk of similar size. If two or more crows attack in a group, the hawk can only be driven away by the crows.

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Crows are very smart and are good at attacking and even stealing eagles' homes. They are not just scavengers.

The battle in the airspace was very exciting, as the four crows fought and forced the falcon to continuously lower its altitude, and the battlefield gradually flew over the lake.

The girl frowned and had a serious expression on her wheat-colored face with freckles. She had been fishing by the lake for many years. She had seen all the eagles and raptors nearby, but she had never seen this kind of falcon. She had a bad feeling for some reason.

The crows croaked to drive away the hawks.

Two more crows flew out from the mountain behind the village. Following their crows, they caught up with the team and worked together to besiege the falcon.

After watching for a while, the girl continued walking towards the fishing boat by the lake.

When we got to the water's edge, we threw all the fish cages into the cabin, rolled up our trousers and took off our shoes.

Then I picked up a small basket and collected snails in the shallow water along the coast. When I saw the big ones, I bent down and picked them up. They were everywhere in the water, and I quickly picked up a basket full.

Cut some more weeds and weeds.

Put the small basket filled with snails in the cabin, untie the rope, put your hands against the bow of the boat so that your body is at an angle, so that pushing the boat is easier.

Stepping on the sand with bare feet, I pushed forward step by step, my wheat-colored calves tightening and exerting force.

The fishing boat left traces on the sand and slid into the water.

The girl pushed the boat into the water, took a few steps, climbed onto the boat skillfully, grabbed the oar and rowed into the distance.

While rowing, I did not forget to take a look at the sky. A few crows were still chasing away strange hawks. They seemed to be planning to drive them away completely. This shows that crows have very strong territorial awareness.

There is a strange phenomenon. The eagle keeps trying to fly towards the town.

But every time he changed direction, he would be driven back by the crow, and he was determined not to let the eagle come back again.

In fact, strictly speaking, the fishing village and the crows are from the same hometown. The girl always felt that there was something wrong with the origin of the eagle.

When I was wandering around, I passed by the rocks. A long time passed, and some weeds grew in the cracks of the rocks. Water birds rested on them, leaving a lot of white guano.

The boat continued to move forward, and the rocks behind it became farther and farther away.

The worried girl arrived at the place where she fished, an inlet close to the hillside, far away from the fishing village. The good thing was that no one was competing for the land.

Take out the wooden stick, place the snails on the board of the ship, and use the wooden stick to smash them one by one into pieces.

Wrap the crushed snails with mulberry and weeds, and put them into the fish cage together with the pebbles.

The fish cages tied with hemp ropes gradually sank into the water.

After finishing it, I was stunned for a while, sighed, bent down and used a ladle to scoop out the water that had seeped into the boat.

Prepare the harpoon and row along the hillside waterside to inspect the trap that was previously arranged, a small fishing trap made of bamboo branches and reeds.

Not long after rowing, I saw fish stirring and struggling in the water in front of me.

Find a string tied to a branch on the shore, carefully pull it up, judge the size of the fish by the strength of the string, and find the right moment to stab it with a harpoon.

There were quite a lot of fish in the lake, and within a short time I had harvested six or seven fish weighing more than a pound.

While the fisherman girl was busy fishing, she suddenly heard the sound of gongs in the village, and it was very rapid.

It took him a moment to realize that there was an emergency in the village.
Chapter completed!