How did hiring someone to press a pig image during Chinese New Year become a top trend?

Xu An's gaze fell on the bag.

Green canvas. Brass buckles. Type 65 canvas straps.

His back stiffened slightly.

"Grandma, is the bag in this photo his own, or did someone else give it to him?"

The old lady glanced at him.

"He said it was given to him by a surveyor when he went to the market in town. The surveyor said the bag was sturdy and would be useful for walking on mountain roads, so he has been carrying it ever since."

Xu An didn't ask any more questions.

When he returned the photo to the old lady, he noticed a small crease in the upper left corner of the photo. The crease covered half of another person's face in the background, revealing only a foot wearing a liberation shoe and a section of trouser leg.

Several comments in the live stream chat scrolled slowly but were very long.

"Did you see that bag? It's exactly the same as the one An Shen is carrying."

"It's a Type 65 canvas bag again, and it was given by someone who does surveying. Just how many people did the GS survey team actually come into contact with in this area back then?"

"The person in the upper left corner of the photo who is folded up, wearing a liberation shoe, reminds you of the size 42 liberation shoe that An Shen found in the overturned jeep at the bottom of the ditch."

Xu An tightened the strap of the canvas bag over his shoulder, and when he stood up, all six old men were looking at him.

He took out the bag of peanuts he had bought at the market from his bag and poured a small pile on the table.

"If you practice what you've learned a few times, you won't forget it. If you do forget, that's okay. Just follow the order I'm telling you: unlock, find the green icon, tap on contacts, find the name, press the green button. Five steps, simpler than farming."

The old man wearing a baseball cap took out a crumpled ten-yuan note from his pocket and stuffed it into Xu An's hand.

"Young man, take this to buy water."

Xu An did not answer.

"It would be better if you gave this ten yuan to your son to recharge his phone number than to give it to me."

The old man withdrew his hand, his eyes reddened but he didn't shed a tear.

When Xu An stepped out of the service station, the sun was already setting, and the heat had changed from scorching to sweltering. The sticky sweat in the air clung to his skin and wouldn't evaporate.

He had walked about twenty steps when he heard a voice behind him.

It was that old lady in her early sixties who chased after them, holding that yellowed photograph in her hand.

"Young man, wait a minute."

Xu An turned around.

When the old lady walked up to him, she took a couple of breaths and then turned the photo over so he could see the back.

There is a line of pencil writing on the back, the writing is so faint that it is almost illegible, but it can still be recognized.

"GS-07 Chen Jiaqing, get ready, number four is here."

Xu An stared at the line of text for three seconds.

GS-07.

This was a number he had seen on the road; it was GS-07 engraved on the stone tablet in Shibeigou.

"May I take a picture of this, Mother-in-law?"

"Go ahead and take the picture."

After taking the photos, Xu An returned them to the old lady.

The old lady folded the photo and put it back in her pocket. As she turned to walk towards the service station, she said something in a low voice, but it was picked up by the phone's microphone.

"Your bag is the same as his; did you two take the same route?"

Xu An did not answer.

He continued south, the canvas bag swaying on his shoulder twice, revealing another clue about what was inside.

My phone vibrated about ten minutes after I started walking.

News about Zhao Nian.

"Brother Xu, there's been a bit of a problem at the post office. The administrator just called me and said that last week someone came to the post office to ask about that locker. He didn't have the key, didn't give the locker number, and just asked where the child in that locker was. The administrator said the person was wearing a very old coat and carrying a green bag. After saying that, he left."

The second one followed immediately.

"The administrator said that the person sat under the mango tree in front of the post office for a while before leaving, looking down at something. When the administrator came out to bring water, the person was gone, but there was something extra under the bench."

"What is it?"

"A white enamel mug with GS-01 engraved on the bottom."

When Xu An arrived at the western end of Batou Town, the sky began to change. It didn't get darker, but rather it was the kind of change that occurred at six o'clock in the evening when the sun was still hanging on the mountaintop, but the light had already changed from white to orange. The heat dropped by 20%, but the stuffiness actually increased, and the air felt like a layer of paste stuck to the skin.

He filled his water bottle under a large banyan tree at the end of town. The tree's aerial roots hung down, creating a shady spot. Two dozing yellow dogs sat under the roots, too lazy to even lift their eyes when he walked over and squatted down to get the water.

When he finished filling the water tank and stood up, he glanced ahead.

The provincial highway forked about 500 meters ahead. The left one turned into the mountains, narrowing by half. The asphalt was broken into pieces, like jigsaw puzzle pieces embedded in the soil. The weeds on both sides were waist-high, clearly not a road we usually traveled on.

The road on the right is the main road, leading to Mangshi.

Just as Xu An was about to turn right, he heard a sound coming from the road on the left.

There was a clanging and tinkling sound, the crisp sound of metal hitting metal, interspersed with a man's humming voice, not singing, but the kind of humming sound that comes out when someone is tired from work.

There were just over a hundred people watching the live stream, and some were sending comments.

"Don't take that rotten road, An Shen. The right path is on the right."

"Wait, he seems to be listening to something."

Xu An was indeed listening.

The sound wasn't far away, about two hundred meters down the left fork in the road. It was hidden by bushes and no one could be seen, but the sound kept coming back, like someone was tightening screws or hammering some metal.

He hesitated for three seconds, then turned left.

After clearing away the bushes, there was a small clearing. The clearing was surrounded on three sides by old mud-brick houses. Most of the doors and windows of the houses were sealed off, with only two rooms still showing traces of curtains hanging. There were some broken bricks and rotten wood piled up at the base of the walls, indicating that no one had lived there for several years.

Two bamboo poles stood in the middle of the open space.

The bamboo poles were over three meters tall, with a horizontal bar tied to each top, and a white cloth stretched between the horizontal bars.

The cloth was quite large, about two and a half meters wide and three meters high. The four corners were secured to bamboo poles and crossbars with ropes and stretched very flat. There were a few yellowed old spots on the cloth, but it was generally clean and reflected a faint white light in the setting sun.

screen.

Xu An was stunned for a moment.

This is an open-air movie screen.

Five or six meters directly in front of the screen, a man was squatting on the ground fiddling with a machine.

The machine was mounted on a folding table. It wasn't large, but it looked quite old. Most of the paint on the casing had peeled off, revealing the natural color of the aluminum alloy. The protective cap on the front of the lens was tied with a rubber band to prevent it from getting lost. Next to it was a roll of wire and a power strip.

The man was in his early fifties, his face lined with wrinkles like a chessboard. Most of his hair was gray, but it was shaved short and he still looked energetic. He wore an old gray polo shirt with the collar turned up and half hanging down, and a canvas tool bag was attached to his waist. Inside the bag were screwdrivers, wrenches, and pliers, which jingled with every step he took.

He was adjusting the focus of the projector lens with a screwdriver, humming an old tune that Xu An couldn't recognize. His movements were steady; he would turn the screw once, pause, glance at the position of the light spot on the screen, and then turn it again, repeating this several times.

Xu An stood at the edge of the open space and watched for about ten seconds.

"Uncle, shall we show a movie?"

The man looked up at him, his gaze sweeping over his canvas bag and shoes before he nodded.

"Show a movie."

"Who are you showing this to?"

The man pointed with a screwdriver at several houses around the open space.

"Show them."

Xu An looked in the direction he pointed, and saw two old women standing in front of the mud-brick house on the east side. One of them had moved a bamboo chair and was sitting there holding a palm-leaf fan, while the other was standing by the door frame looking in this direction.

The curtain of the house on the west side was half lifted, and an old man with a hunched back slowly moved toward the open space with a cane, leaving a shallow round pit in the ground with each step.

Two more people emerged from behind the low wall at the north corner of the open space. They were an elderly couple. The man was carrying a long bench, and the woman had a bamboo basket slung over her arm, containing two handfuls of sunflower seeds and several boiled corn cobs.

Five elderly people.

The youngest looks to be at least seventy.

Then Xu An noticed the other three "audience members".

The two yellow dogs under the tree had somehow followed us over and were now lying down beside a stone at the edge of the clearing, their tails idly swishing across the ground. A skinny black dog also emerged from the corner of the wall, carrying half a corncob in its mouth, and lay down beside us.

Five old men and three dogs.

The chat in the live stream started moving.

"This lineup is hilarious: five audience members, three dogs, and nine people including An Shen."

"At least the projectionist uncle practically had the whole theater to himself."

"Stop laughing at us. It's already quite an achievement that this kind of deserted village can gather five spectators."

The projectionist tightened the last screw, stood up, dusted off his pants, and pulled a plastic box from under the folding table. He opened it, revealing a dozen or so flat metal boxes and dozens of discs. The boxes were labeled with the film titles and years, some new and some old; the oldest label was already yellowed.

He began connecting the power cord from the projector to a junction box nailed to a tree next to it.

Xu An walked over and squatted down to help him tidy up the wires.

The projectionist glanced at him without saying anything, but his movements as he handed over the items became noticeably smoother. The two of them, one pulling the cable and the other hanging it, connected the power line in three minutes.

"Uncle, how many years have you been using this projector?"

The projectionist pulled a lens cleaning cloth from his tool bag and carefully wiped the lens. The way he circled the lens with his fingers while wiping it was almost like a doctor examining a wound.

"This one was replaced in 2014. The previous one was a film camera that had been used for nineteen years and the gears were worn down and it couldn't turn anymore, so it was retired. This one mainly plays digital film, but I modified the film interface so it can also play old films."

"How long have you been running this route?"

"Twenty-three years."