Chapter 470 The attic is still haunted "Is it inconvenient?" Lin Jue bowed, "I remember there is an attic in the backyard of your temple. If it is inconvenient because we are Taoists, we can also stay in the attic for one night." "Huh? How did the Taoist priest know that our temple has an attic?" "My junior sister and I are both from Huizhou, and our homes are not far from here. Before we went up the mountain, we had walked this road and stayed overnight in your temple." Lin Jue said frankly, "It is for this reason that we are passing by today and plan to stay in your temple for another night." The old monk couldn't help but look at the two of them carefully. They both looked young, with fair complexions, probably in their twenties. The so-called past could only be a few years ago at most. But he had no impression of it. "That attic..." "Is it not possible?" "It's OK, but that attic..." The old monk looked embarrassed, "Well, I'll tell you straight, it's been haunted for years..." "Haunted?"

The junior sister became interested. "Still haunted?" Lin Jue was also a little surprised. Even the fox curiously poked its head out from Lin Jue's hair, but quickly retracted its head before the old monk noticed. "It seems that the Taoist priest has stayed here before." The old monk said helplessly, "It has been haunted intermittently." "Is it still the same ghost as before?" "Who knows? Who dares to go and see?" The old monk said, stepping forward and making way. "Since you are really an old friend, then we are destined to meet. Taoist priest, please come in. I will find a room for you. There are not many people coming and going now, and it is very quiet." Lin Jue stepped in and looked around. An old monk had just swept half of the courtyard. Half of the floor was clean, while the other half was slightly dusty, with a line of fallen leaves, dust and sawdust dividing the middle. The temple does seem a bit dilapidated. There seemed to be fewer monks inside. The low guest rooms on both sides had half of their doors open and were empty, probably because someone had stayed there last night, and half of their doors closed, probably because no one often stayed there. The red walls are a bit mottled, and there are a few pine trees on the roof. "Are there still many people staying overnight on this road every day?" Lin Jue asked. "There are far fewer now." The old monk sighed. "In the past, there were many merchants going from Huizhou to Jiangnan and the capital. How many are there now? There are far fewer people than before! Occasionally, there are merchants passing by, but they don't like to stay here halfway. They leave early and rush to the city ahead in the rain. At the end of the day, it's good to have two or three people come to stay overnight." "I see." Lin Jue knew that this temple was built on the side of the road, and that offering lodging was both a convenience provided by the monks to passers-by and a way for them to make a living. “I see there are fewer monks in the temples?” "There's nothing we can do. The world is bad, and everyone wants to become a monk, but the temple can't afford to support so many people, so we have to let the younger monks go out to beg for alms."

It is said to be begging, but in fact it is just wandering and begging. A nice story about being sent away from the monastery to become a beggar. "The end of the dynasty..." Lin Jue sighed and looked towards the attic in the backyard. "Let's live in the attic." "Master, are you not afraid?" "I have heard that there are brave laymen who have a clear conscience and are not afraid of ghosts. We are cultivators, so what do we have to be afraid of?" "Then follow me, Taoist priest." The old monk said, "I'll cook some wild vegetable porridge for lunch. If you don't mind, Taoist priest, you can come and have some." "it is good." Lin Jue took his junior sister and walked towards the attic. The attic door had been locked for a long time and was covered with dust. As soon as I pushed the door open, I saw a lot of debris piled up on the first floor, many cobwebs at the door, and a smell of dust hit me in the face. "Please allow me to clean up for you." "The attic has been sealed for a long time. If it is opened specially for us, I shouldn't ask Master to clean it for me. Just give us a broom and a feather duster." "..." The old monk suddenly frowned. I always feel that these words seem familiar. I couldn't remember, so I just nodded and said: "Alright." Soon, one of them took a broom and the other took a feather duster and started cleaning the attic. Just like before, the downstairs of this attic was still a mess, with dust and cobwebs everywhere, but the upstairs was clean and spotless, and the furnishings were neat and orderly. And it’s not just that— "Senior brother, look!" The junior sister pointed at the wall on the ground floor upstairs. When Lin Jue came up to take a look, he saw a lot of pictures painted on the floor, mostly of elegant objects such as bamboo, lotus, pine, willow, etc. The walls were covered with layers of poems. "This place is indeed haunted." The junior sister said as she looked carefully at the ground and the wall. The poems were piled up one on top of another, and many of them were no longer legible. The fox and the raccoon also jumped out, and they turned into the size of cats. They ran back and forth in the house, looking left and right, and sniffing everywhere. "What's written?" The little sister was full of curiosity and read close to the wall:

"You are a guest in the cold mountains, and I embrace the frost and snow. "The night ravine fell into green phosphorus, and the desolate grave buried the pure heart. “When I first heard your conversation overnight, I thought you were looking for a soulmate. "I smiled and entrusted my bones to you at midnight, and I gave you ten taels of gold in return. "Who would have thought that the fake-faced ghost would secretly make the sound of a jackal. "If you turn the soil of the spring into water, you can chop the meat and feed the animals and birds. "... "what else…… "I don't want to shed tears and give myself to you, but I don't want to give you my heart and give you the jade without proof. "..." The little sister turned her head: "Brother, I think it's what we heard before, the poem those two ghosts wrote to curse you! “And there are those who curse you. "Well, what about the Nine Springs turning into green phosphorus fire, burning you every night until dawn, you can't see clearly under the quilt." Lin Jue walked over and looked carefully. Turning his eyes to the side, he saw in an empty space the poem they wrote out of regret when they discovered that they had wrongly misunderstood the young scholar. There are poems like "The night rain knocks on the window and brings up old accounts, only then do I realize the weight of gratitude and gratitude", "I once mistook a white candle for phosphorus fire and mistook a medicine box for a coffin", "The word regret wears through my three-inch palm, and the mark of shame burns through the five o'clock in the morning", etc., which are no longer visible because I have lived for too long. However, Lin Jue still carefully identified it. When I stayed here overnight, I met two ghosts of scholars who had gone to the frontier to join the army and were buried in a foreign land. They chatted all night and had a great time. The two ghosts thought that the young scholar was an upright person, so they told him about their bones buried behind the temple and the money they had saved from the army, and asked him to help inform his family so that they could come and take back the bones to calm his obsession of returning to his roots. The reward was ten taels of silver, which he could take from the jar. The young scholar went to the back mountain to dig silver and was afraid of being seen and discovered. In order to prevent his family from arriving here and finding the remaining silver already dug away by others, he turned back and took the remaining silver away, returned it to his family, and asked their family to come and take back the body. At the Thousand Days Drinking Party at Hammer Mountain, he got drunk all night. When he woke up, he heard his master say that after he left, the two ghosts mistakenly thought he had betrayed them and stole all their money. So they started cursing in the attic, and the monks in the temple and the passers-by who were staying overnight could all hear them. What is written on the wall is what happened after he left. Lin Jue already knew—— The ghosts here now are still those two. It was summer at that time, although a little later than that year, but the sunny bamboo forest outside the window, the deserted mountain road, the green outside the window, and the golden light on the windowsill were all the same as before. "I need to take a nap." Lin Jue walked to the couch and sat down to test its decay. "You two, stop sniffing around. Even if there is a ghost here, it must be a good ghost." The fox and the cat turned their heads to look at him. Then the fox decisively gave up the search, ran back in small, swift steps, and with a light jump, lay down next to the couch. Caili turned her head again and looked at her junior sister.

Seeing that the junior sister was standing by the wall reading the poems seriously and had no intention of looking for ghosts here, it also understood, and ran back in small steps, stood by the junior sister's feet, tilted its head and read the poems on the wall that it could not understand very well. …… Before I knew it, it was night. There were three more residents in the temple. Two young men and one old man. Lin Jue was sitting by the attic window, and the three men were just below. The old man was telling the two young men about what happened on this road. "You still say to move forward, don't you know that this road has always been unsettled?" "Why is it not peaceful?" Young people clearly want to hear these kinds of stories. "When I was young, there was a monster on this road at night. It would change into a human and pretend to be a passerby to talk to you and trick you into believing it. When you completely believed it, it would suddenly change into a monster and scare you to death." The old man said, "It is said that the monster is still there, but a master dealt with it back then. It doesn't dare to scare people anymore, but it often comes out at night and changes into an ordinary passerby to talk to you and chat with you." "What if he is just an ordinary passerby?" "Why are there so many people walking on the street at night? It's okay that I couldn't tell them apart before, but in recent years, there are not many people on the road during the day. Use your brain, where do other pedestrians come from at night? There are people every day!" "This……" "That's fine! This monster is just for scaring people, not for harming people. There are many monsters and ghosts that can harm people on this road!" said the old man. "Let's not talk about anything else. It's said that the attic at the back of this temple is also haunted!" "So we still live here?" "In troubled times, which road doesn't have bandits? Which night don't you encounter ghosts? Ghosts that don't harm people are always better than ghosts that do! This temple has been here for many years, so you can stay here without worry!" "Tell me about the haunted attic!" "You can't just talk about that!" "Tell me about it! Tell me about it!" "no……" "Go back to the room and talk!" "Why do you talk so much..." At the same time, Lin Jue's eyes moved. The fox Caili in the house also lowered its head instantly, as if its eyes could penetrate the wooden floor and look downstairs. Two ghosts have appeared downstairs. (End of this chapter)