One Steamed Bun Made Me a Rural Occultist

[No heroine] [Feng shui and metaphysics] [War of resistance in the Republican era]

In the twelfth lunar month of 1935, I was thirteen years old and down to my last steamed bun.

I gave it to the old Taoist priest who was freezing to death in a ruined temple.

The old Taoist rubbed my eyelids. From then on, I could see things no one else could.

Everyone had three flames above their head, and houses were wreathed in signs of good or ill fortune.

I knew at first glance that trouble was coming for Liu Mazi's family: a cloud of gray mist hung over their home.

The night the Japanese invaded our village, seventeen people died.

I hid in the ruined temple. The temple doors closed by themselves, and Lord Guan's eyes seemed to move.

Zhang Laosan had a hole the size of a bowl in his back. I slapped a talisman on it, and the bleeding stopped.

When the Japanese searched the mountain, I moved a stone weighing two or three hundred pounds all by myself.

Now my comrades call me “Little Master” and say I have supernatural powers.

The compass spins by itself in my hands, always pointing toward a way out.

True or not?

Even now, I still can't make sense of what happened that winter.