immortal

It didn't rain in the morning, but it was very cloudy.

In the square in the center of the village, the Guzang Festival has already begun.All men, women, old and young in the whole village were dressed in costumes and formed a circle in the square, and the chief priest in the center was wearing a bird costume with extremely complicated patterns, which was astonishingly exquisite. If Wu Erbai was here, he probably I will be so excited that I can't help myself.

We outsiders naturally cannot join such a solemn and solemn ceremony, but the strange thing is that no one wanted to drive us away. Instead, a child came over and tugged at my sleeve, saying that the elder told us to go there .

I asked him how old he was, but he was shy and refused to answer me. I asked him who he learned Chinese from. He pointed to the octagonal pavilion and said, "Ah, take me down the mountain. There is a teacher."

The old man was sitting in the gazebo, and he was also wearing a bird's clothing, but it was obviously older. Seeing me staring at him, the old man smiled and said, "Are you also interested in this dress?"

Bainiaoyi, the most important dress of the Miao family, can be traced back to the ancient times of the Miao people and has been passed down from generation to generation.The production of a piece of clothing can range from three to five years to decades, and it is never easy to show people on weekdays, and only the officiant at the Guzang Festival is eligible to wear this garment.

I noticed he said 'again'.The little brother and the fat man didn't hear it from a little further away, only the blind man stood beside me and exchanged glances with me quickly.

I nodded, and the old man said: "This dress has been passed down for more than 200 years, and this is the last time I wear it."

The atmosphere suddenly became a little awkward. Hearing the old man talk about life and death so frankly, I didn't know what to say for a while.Turning his head to look at the center of the field, where the drum changing ceremony is being held at the moment.Everyone was silent, under the oppression of such a serious atmosphere, even the fat man kept his mouth shut. The heart of the ancient tree was hollowed out and made into a slender wooden drum, stretched with cowhide.There was a strange noise, very low at first, but quickly became high-pitched, and I realized someone was singing.

Soon, all the people in the square joined in. It was an ancient song with a strong and gloomy tone, without a hint of joy.The old man followed the tune and translated the libretto to us.

"In the past, our Miao family lived in Silver Dam and Jin Dam... Those Xia people robbed our Miao family of all their belongings, burned our Miao family's house, and blood flowed in ditches and roads. Our Miao family No place to live...others have a home, but we Miao people don't have a home, we wander around the world like birds..."

The reeds sounded, and the usually cheerful tune seemed endlessly sad at the moment. Men, women, young and old danced up the reeds arm in arm, holding hands, sharing the same robes with the son; holding the hand, fighting the same hatred with the son.The suffering of the ancestors seemed to be empathetic, and at that moment there seemed to be some kind of power that traveled through time and space.

"We Miao people believe that when a new drum is played, our ancestors will hear it, and he will bless us from generation to generation."

"Ancestor?" I hesitated for a moment, but still asked: "Is it Mother Butterfly?"

The old man looked at me with a half-smile and said, "I thought you were not interested in this matter." He stood up and walked slowly into the center of the field.The other part of the sacrifice, the division of the body, began.

I looked at the back of the old man in a daze, unable to figure out what he wanted to say for a while, the fat man came over and asked me: "Is it the story about the butterfly laying twelve eggs?"

I nodded and said, "Of course I don't believe in the story that butterflies are ancestors. The "Road History" I told you yesterday said that the Yellow Emperor captured Chi You in Mount Li, bound him with maple wood, and threw him at In the great wilderness. The Miao people believed that the maple tree gave birth to the butterfly mother, and the butterfly mother gave birth to the first ancestor Jiang Yang, and at the same time there were thunder gods, dragons, cows, and snakes..."

The fat man shook his head and interrupted me and whispered, "So what you mean is that the maple tree gave birth to butterflies, and the butterflies gave birth to Jiang Yang. Among Jiang Yang's descendants was a man named Chi You. He fought with the Yellow Emperor and lost. Locked up and killed by the Yellow Emperor in a cage made of maple wood... If you want to say this, the Yellow Emperor is too cruel, isn't this an insult to the ancestors?"

I sighed and thought for a while before asking him, do you think there is another possibility?

What if the order of the legends were reversed?Chi You died imprisoned by the maple wood, so the maple wood bears the imprint of the ancestors of the Miao people, but what is the deeper meaning of the butterfly?Will this butterfly worship, like the buried jade cicadas that appeared in the early days of the Central Plains civilization, represent breaking out of the cocoon and resurrecting from the dead?I haven't figured it out yet, suddenly there was an exclamation from the center of the sacrificial field, and at the same time, the little brother jumped up high, stepping on the shoulders of the surrounding Miao people and jumped into the field.

The scene became chaotic in an instant, and the blind man said, "Fuck! That old man!" and squeezed back into the crowd.