The Village Chief Found Out

Chapter 24

The Village Chief had gone to town for a meeting. This time, the meeting specifically mentioned the medical clinic in Xinghua Village.

Naturally, it was to offer praise.

“I heard the doctor at their clinic is a top student from Yuncheng Medical University.”

“You all should learn from their village. Exchange ideas more often and study their advanced experiences.”

The Village Chief was quite pleased. He felt this was all due to the protection of the Immortal Lady.

Indeed, if not for the Immortal Lady’s protection, how could a Trafficked Bride turn out to be a city doctor?

Now, the clinic’s income was also quite good.

On his way back, he happened to see Ming Wen leading Sha Niu and Li Qingqing while digging for medicinal herbs in the mountains.

“Doctor Ming, out digging for herbs again?” His gaze fell upon the three baskets, and he naturally spotted the yams they had unearthed.

Li Qingqing immediately spoke up, “Ming Wen found these. The stalks were so thick and had no leaves; I really wouldn’t have noticed them at first.”

The Village Chief was actually a bit displeased because Li Qingqing had interrupted. In his view, he was speaking to Ming Wen, so Ming Wen should have been the one to answer.

Of course, this was a minor matter. Although the Village Chief was unhappy, he did not show it.

Those yams were truly large. He didn’t know how the three of them had found them, but it suddenly reminded him of the yams Honggu used to dig up back in the day.

He just wondered if these yams had attained a spirit.

After returning home, he asked his wife to prepare sesame oil and spirit money, planning to go to the Immortal Lady Temple again to thank her for her protection.

His wife was outside whispering about something with another woman from the village, but they stopped immediately when they saw him return.

The other woman then left.

“Why did you stop talking as soon as I came back?”

“It’s just women’s business, you shouldn’t listen,” his wife said as she walked inside. “Nothing happened at the meeting today, right?”

“What could happen? Just the usual stuff. At the end, they praised our village clinic,” the Village Chief said while rolling a leaf cigarette¹. “By the way, prepare a bit more sesame oil this time. I’m going to thank the Immortal Lady.”

His wife went inside to get the oil and remarked:

“The clinic owes its success to Ming Wen. You know, that doctor Ming Wen really does have a bit of our Immortal Lady’s air about her.”

Honggu had been a doctor back then, treating people in the village. There were always young people helping her dig for herbs, and all the children in the village loved following her.

Now, the children in the village all liked Ming Wen.

The Village Chief was about to tell her not to talk nonsense. One must not offend the Immortal Lady like that. How could one say a common woman was like the Immortal Lady? If that wasn’t an offense, what was?

But before the words could leave his mouth, he remembered the yams they had dug up. Then, he thought of those two girls, Sha Niu and Li Qingqing.

It wasn’t anyone else, but specifically Sha Niu and Li Qingqing. There were many young people in the village who liked this Outsider Wife, but why were Li Qingqing and Sha Niu the only ones found by her side at all times?

The next day, when the Village Chief went to the clinic, he happened to see Sha Niu standing to Ming Wen’s left and Li Qingqing to her right.

Ming Wen was talking about medicinal herbs, and both were listening. Li Qingqing, in particular, nodded from time to time, respectful and obedient.

But Ming Wen wasn’t much older than them; the three were of the same generation.

A memory suddenly jumped into the Village Chief’s mind, something he had almost forgotten.

It was about Li Qingqing.

As a child, Li Qingqing was the eldest daughter of her family.

Policy dictated that for rural families, if the first child was a daughter, they could have another child, but there were conditions; they had to wait three years.

But things in the world are rarely so coincidental. When Li Qingqing was two years old, her mother became pregnant again.

This immediately caused trouble. The new child might be a son, so it certainly couldn’t be aborted; it had to be kept. But the problem was the two year old Li Qingqing.

So, Li Qingqing’s family thought it over and decided they could only “deal with” the elder daughter. After all, this child’s gender was already determined, while the gender of the child in the womb was still uncertain.

That night, as the Village Chief, he had taken Li Qingqing to the Immortal Lady Temple.

He told the Immortal Lady about the situation, explaining everything clearly.

“I beg the Immortal Lady to have mercy on their family. This is a matter of no other choice. This child can only be sent back to heaven. I ask for the Immortal Lady’s instructions.”

He cast the divination blocks². A Shengbei. The Immortal Lady had agreed.

This was normal. In his view, the Immortal Lady watched over the villagers every day and naturally knew these things were done out of necessity.

He carried the fast asleep Li Qingqing to the back of the temple and handled the matter.

When he returned, a fierce wind was howling on the cliff. The temple doors had been blown open, so he hurried to close them.

Just as he reached the doorway, the scene inside gave him a fright. The Immortal Lady statue had fallen to the ground. He rushed in to see what happened, thinking perhaps the wind had been too strong and blown her down.

However, in the next second, he was scared out of his wits.

The statue’s limbs were broken, and there was blood on its face, as if it had shed tears of blood.

His head spun with dizziness. He felt as if the Immortal Lady on the ground was glaring at him with fury. He had indeed heard what sounded like a woman’s cursing from behind the temple earlier, but at the time, he thought he had misheard.

Seeing this scene now, how could he not understand?

The Immortal Lady was angry.

He hurriedly brought Li Qingqing back and found her parents, telling them that the Immortal Lady would not allow Li Qingqing to die.

After doing this, he found the Heavenly Master that same night. The Heavenly Master reshaped the Immortal Lady’s body, and only then was the matter considered settled.

Not two days later, he heard that the daughter of Gangzi’s family had become a “fool.”

The Outsider Wife in Gangzi’s family said that the child was supposed to die, but she had begged the Immortal Lady to help keep her. Seeing how bitterly she cried, the Immortal Lady returned the child to her.

Gangzi’s wife also said she had dreamed that the child was originally supposed to be a Child Attendant by the Immortal Lady’s side, which was why the Immortal Lady had wanted her to return.

A child attendant… the Immortal Lady’s child attendant? Gangzi’s kid? How was that possible?

If there were to be a child attendant, the Village Chief felt the Immortal Lady would be more likely to favor Li Qingqing.

The Village Chief had a dream that night. He dreamed that Li Qingqing was covered in light, riding a phoenix to the Immortal Lady’s side.

In the shifting light and shadow, he saw another child beside the Immortal Lady. He couldn’t see the face clearly, but in the dream, he knew it was Sha Niu.

As it turned out, Li Qingqing was also supposed to be the Immortal Lady’s child attendant.

When he woke up, the Village Chief still remembered the feeling of seeing the Immortal Lady in his dream. People in the village had always claimed to dream of her, but this was the first time in all these years that he had experienced it himself.

In that instant, the Village Chief understood everything!

Li Qingqing and Sha Niu were roughly the same age. Originally, these two children were meant to become the Immortal Lady’s child attendants at the same time.

But Sha Niu’s Mother had gone to beg the Immortal Lady, and she had kept Sha Niu behind. Consequently, Li Qingqing, the other child attendant, had also remained.

In the days that followed, the Village Chief kept observing Sha Niu and Li Qingqing, and he soon confirmed his suspicions.

None of the children in the village liked Sha Niu, nor were they willing to play with her.

Li Qingqing was a normal child who originally had nothing to do with Sha Niu. After all, their families didn’t live near each other, and they weren’t relatives.

But suddenly one day, Li Qingqing started playing with Sha Niu.

Her relationship with the other normal children in the village was average, yet she took extraordinary care of Sha Niu, the simpleton.

For no apparent reason, these two children became the best of friends in the village. Even when the other normal children mocked Li Qingqing and refused to play with her, she remained close to Sha Niu.

The Village Chief understood it all now; his previous guess had been correct. They were originally a pair of child attendants by the Immortal Lady’s side.

Since the child attendants had arrived, he naturally had to treat the two girls well.

So, he told the Heavenly Master about this. The Heavenly Master didn’t quite believe it at first. Weren’t these just two ordinary girls?

The Heavenly Master then performed a divination to ask the Immortal Lady. Only then did she learn that all the children who had died in the village were actually child attendants.

These two child attendants had simply been forcibly kept in the mortal world, and the Immortal Lady was actually displeased about it.

The Village Chief looked again and saw that indeed, Sha Niu was a simpleton, and Li Qingqing didn’t seem particularly bright either. It appeared the Immortal Lady didn’t actually like them very much.

Since there were so many child attendants, the Village Chief stopped paying much mind to these two children.

But now…

One was Sha Niu, the other was Li Qingqing.

They seemed to… instinctively stand behind Ming Wen. When Ming Wen spoke words that the other villagers couldn’t understand, these two children would relay them.

This was exactly like how the Immortal Lady’s will usually required divination to be relayed.

The Village Chief was startled by his own thoughts.

Impossible. Absolutely impossible. How could he have such thoughts? It was an insult to the Immortal Lady.

Ming Wen couldn’t be Honggu; she couldn’t be the Immortal Lady.

His mind blindly rejected the idea, yet he couldn’t find a single reason to refute it.

The Immortal Lady’s previous incarnation was a doctor who healed the sick and saved lives, undergoing tribulation and cultivation in the mortal world before finally ascending to immortality.

Ming Wen was a doctor. Under her care, both animals and people recovered quickly.

Back then, the Immortal Lady was unwilling to marry, saying that if an immortal married a mortal, the mortal would die.

And now!

The Village Chief thought of the deceased son of the Zhang Family. He remembered that the Zhang family’s son had been bitten to death by a pig.

Immediately after, he thought of all the animals on this mountain. They all seemed to have a special affection for Ming Wen, seeking her out to treat their wounds whenever they were hurt.

This was clearly a situation that only an immortal could command.

The more the Village Chief thought about it, the more he felt that Ming Wen was the Immortal Lady.

In the afternoon, Sha Niu saw the Village Chief from a distance.

“Village Chief, are you here for the money?”

The Village Chief used to come every day to tally and take the money earned by the clinic.

Hearing this, the Village Chief nearly tripped. He quickly waved his hands. “I was only worried you wouldn’t know how to manage it before. Now that you’ve got the hang of it, you can handle it yourselves.”

With a smile, he returned all the money the clinic had previously handed over.

As he spoke, he looked toward Ming Wen.

The young deity simply looked at him without saying a word. She stood in the sunlight, her gaze seemingly already aware of everything.

The Village Chief didn’t dare step forward, nor did he dare ask. Ask what? Ask if she was the Immortal Lady?

Across from him, the young deity offered no explanation. She seemed to know what this middle-aged man was thinking, and she seemed to know he suspected her identity.

But she didn’t need to prove who she was.

Why would a deity ever need to prove her identity? She simply stood there, watching everything just like the divine statue in the temple.

How to interpret her was a matter for mortals themselves.

Translator’s Notes