In the late Ming Dynasty, Huang Zijie from Yuncheng, Shanxi Province was a businessman selling wood. He traveled south and north to the mountains and forests and had seen countless rare woods. Whenever he went to a place of wood production, he first checked around and then bought it after he was sure. When he encountered good materials, especially strange wood, he often spared no expense.
One year, Huang Zijie went to South to hike timber on a ship. After loading a large ship, a white-haired old man came over with a cane and asked Huang Zijie to take his daughter back to his hometown in Shanxi. Huang Zijie agreed. When the old man brought his daughter, Huang Zijie suddenly felt regretful. The old man's daughter is beautiful, but her face is pale and thin, and she looks weak and looks like she is very ill no matter how she looks. Because of the long distance, Huang Zijie was worried that the old man's daughter would have a short and bad luck on the boat and he couldn't get rid of it. The old man said that if he sent his daughter back to his hometown, he would give her two big nanmu trees. Huang Zijie couldn't resist the temptation of Da Nanmu and agreed to send the old man's daughter back to his hometown.
Huang Zijie took care of the old man's daughter carefully along the way, but he couldn't help with anything. Except for sleeping in the cabin most of the time, the old man's daughter did not speak when she woke up, and did not respond to her questions. She did not eat anything, but only drank some fresh water. Her dying look made Huang Zijie very worried, afraid that she would die silently on the boat the next day, so that she would not only bear the unexplained responsibility, but also ruined two large nanmu trees.
After the boat marched into the Shanxi territory, the woman became more energetic and was willing to get up and sit down at the window to see the scenery along the river. Every time a woman passes a lush place, a smile appears on her face and looks foolishly, and her expression looks like the joy of returning to her hometown. Huang Zijie asked her where to get off the boat. The woman just looked at Huang Zijie and smiled, but still kept silent. Huang Zijie suspected that she was a mute, but she didn't know where to send the woman off the boat. The old man only told him that he would not need Huang Zijie to send her off, and someone came to pick her up.
When the boat arrived at the abdomen of Shanxi, the woman's spirit was even better. She walked up to the bow of the boat and pointed at the shore to signal her to get off the boat in this area. Kunlin Ferry has always been known for its original forests, with deep ravines and dense forests, and few people are active in this area. When Huang Zijie saw that the woman was about to get off the boat, he still asked someone to stop the boat even though he was wondering how people lived here.
As soon as Huang Zijie and the woman got ashore, they saw several people carrying two large logs over. They told Huang Zijie that these two large nanmu worth thousands of taels of silver were rewarded for escorting the woman back to her hometown. After saying that, the few people put down the nanmu and carried the woman away with the bridge. The woman looked back at Huang Zijie on the bridge, smiling, her smile as beautiful as a flower, and she wiped out the exhausted appearance of being seriously ill and dying on the road. Huang Zijie felt aroused and he felt admiration.
That year, Huang Zijie's wood was sold for a good price, and two large nanmu made him earn a lot of money.
The next year, when Huang Zijie's ship passed through the Junlin Ferry again, he remembered the smiling woman, and went ashore to search for the woman's whereabouts, hoping to see her again. Huang Zijie got lost as he walked and accidentally entered a valley covered with dense forests and could not find his way back.
Huang Zijie walked around, hoping to meet a woodcutter or a wild family, and ask for directions or accommodation. Later, he finally saw a house where he was happy and didn't even think about how there would be someone in such a remote place. The so-called family can only see a circle of pink and white walls that are as high as a person's shoulders. There are no buildings inside except for an unprecedented tree that is covered with clouds.
Huang Zijie walked around the wall and wanted to find the gate to go in, but found that there was no entrance or exit at the wall. Huang Zijie was looking up at the wall when he suddenly saw a woman's head and face appearing on the wall, looking at him with good eyes. Huang Zijie was shocked and saw that the person in the wall was the woman he was looking for! It's really a place to search for something without any effort. The woman's head poked out of the canopy, which was obviously higher than Huang Zijie. Huang Zijie guessed that she was sitting on the branch.
"Is this your home?" Huang Zijie raised his head across the wall and asked the woman. The woman did not answer, but nodded and smiled.
"Don't you remember me? I just took you back here from the south by boat." Huang Zijie continued, and the woman nodded and smiled. Huang Zijie was so confused that he said more, and asked the woman why she was here and what her name was. No matter what Huang Zijie said, the woman nodded deeply at the pause of each sentence, and her smile became brighter and brighter every time. Later, she couldn't control herself.
The woman smiled more and more like a flower blooming. Huang Zijie was so crazy about her magical smile that she was even more rumbling. The woman nodded repeatedly. If it were a fruit, if it was a fruit, it would have broken the stem and fell to the ground.
The woman's head suddenly rolled down from the leaves when it was deep again, just like a huge fruit breaking its stem and falling to the ground. Huang Zijie was shocked and didn't know what had happened. He climbed into the wall and found the woman's head in the knee-high weeds. The head was soft and fragrant, and still had a smile on his face. But no matter how he looked, it looked like a mango-like thing, but his eyebrows, eyes, mouth and nose were complete.
Huang Zijie later walked out of the strange valley. After returning to the boat, he just crossed his eyes and dreamed of the white-haired man who asked him to send the woman back to his hometown. The white-haired man said that he was a wood essence, and a woman was a human wood. After the wood essence lifted the human wood from his hometown to the south, the human wood was severely dissatisfied with the water and soil, and he was so sad that he was dying. Then the wood essence asked Huang Zijie to bring the human wood back to his hometown. Human wood is a different wood, and the fruits produced are like human heads. When you meet someone who doesn’t know the truth, you talk to human wood. Human wood is unintelligent, but you will nod and smile. The consequence of frequent nodding is falling on the branches. (Author Wu Weihua )
