Starting with the flesh-based stimulant

Zhou He squinted as he leaned against the altar, rubbing the iron box in his arms.

The oil lamp crackled and popped, producing a tiny flame.

The strange, sweet aroma of oil actually made his thoughts clearer.

There were too many problems, and he only had two paths ahead of him.

Either escape this eerie village under the cover of night and avoid all the problems that exist.

Either find a way to deal with it as soon as possible, actively approach this world, find solutions to these problems... and the reason why you became flesh.

With a loud "boom," the rain that had been brewing all afternoon finally came crashing down relentlessly.

In the dilapidated temple where tiles were missing, streams of water poured down, creating small puddles on the ground if not dealt with promptly.

Zhou looked out and saw another curtain of water in the dim night.

A faint, extremely fast beam of light rushed toward the dilapidated temple.

Before long, a tinkling sound pierced through the rain.

"Someone's here?"

Zhou He frowned and stuffed the iron box into the inner pocket of his tattered clothes.

He quickly reversed his grip on the knife to his right hand, and with the help of his teeth and left hand, tied the yellow cloth around his wrist.

Because the statue and the back wall of the temple appear to be one piece, it is impossible to crawl behind it.

Zhou He could only move his body and hide in the shadows on the side of the offering table.

A dark figure pushed a cart and rushed in through the rain, the clattering sound coming from the cart he was pushing.

"Hey, what a heavy rain!"

The figure shouted as it stepped into the temple gate, then suddenly stopped as if it had discovered something.

Zhou He held his breath in the shadows, his fingers slowly relaxing before tightening their grip on the knife handle again.

The figure took two steps backward, then began to mutter, quite loudly:

"The rattle drum, the drum rattles, it makes a jingling sound;

I walk the main road and the alleyways; I am a poor peddler.

They had rouge and face powder, which they sold to young women living in households.

There are cigarettes and dry tobacco, which the old man enjoys eating...

As he chanted, perhaps realizing the rain was indeed too heavy, his voice grew increasingly urgent. He simply mumbled a series of indistinct lines, perfunctorily completing the ritual, and finally shouted a few lines as if he were just making up a rhyme:

"Seeing the Buddha brings me peace of mind. You are a benevolent deity, Buddha. You have lent me a roof over my head; I will offer you this offering of incense oil as a token of my respect!"

After muttering to himself, he pushed the cart into the dilapidated temple, looked around, and then his gaze fell upon the place where Zhou He was hiding:

"My good friend, please don't be offended. We're all fellow travelers on the road of life. How about I stay the night and keep you company?"

Zhou He remained silent, hiding in the shadows, and quickly surveyed the scene using the dim light from the small lamp and the sliver of light filtering through the rain.

The man looked like a peddler who roamed the streets and alleys. His short blue clothes were soaked through by the rain, and his face was long and narrow with his medium-length hair hidden in shadow.

The peddler was not annoyed that Zhou He remained silent.

He clasped his hands in a gesture of respect to the statue, then turned around with a smile and pushed the cart to the wall.

Leaning against the cart, he stretched his legs wide, then took off his coat, wrung it out, and produced a stream of water.

Feeling as comfortable as sitting on your own kang (heated brick bed).

For a time, only the oil lamps inside the temple flickered occasionally, and the thunder outside the window ceased to rumble.

There was an eerie tranquility and harmony.

The peddler wrung out his outer garment, then brazenly took off his inner lining and wrung it out as well. He then took off his trousers, naked, and continued wringing.

Zhou He remained silent, his brows furrowed in a persistent frown.

In this eerie, dilapidated temple, late at night, amidst a downpour, a stranger suddenly appears. Is it a good thing or a bad thing?

I still know too little about this world. If I were to strike up a conversation rashly and get recognized, the consequences would be unimaginable.

Stay hidden for now and act when the opportunity arises.

The peddler wrung out his trousers, draped them over his cart, turned to Zhou He with a grin, and said:

"Hey friend, why don't you close your eyes for a second? I'm about to take off my underwear."

Seeing that Zhou He still did not respond, the peddler reached out, grabbed a handful of maltose from the shelf, counted them, put a few back, and then threw the maltose in his hand into the shadows behind the offering table.

Zhou He instinctively flinched, and two of the three candies fell to the ground, while one landed on his leg.

"My good friend, this candy of mine is no ordinary candy. It comes from Jincheng's Greedy Mouth Shop. I suppose you've tried it before."

The peddler, still wearing that same grinning expression, held his underpants to his waist with both hands and continued:

"I'm using this candy to ask you to come out and talk to me. You have to give me this face."

This sounded a bit strange, and Zhou He wasn't prepared to answer.

He brushed the candy off his leg, stood up, stepped out of the shadows, leaned against the offering table, and said in a cold tone:

"We've only met by chance, what's there to say?"

As soon as he finished speaking, Zhou He gripped the knife in his hand tightly, his pupils shrinking slightly.

wrong!

Didn't I just not want to answer?

What methods did they use to influence my consciousness?

"What? My friend doesn't recognize me?"

The peddler actually bent down and took off his underpants while talking, completely ignoring Zhou He staring at him.

Zhou He hesitated for a moment, then immediately gritted his teeth, trying to suppress the urge to speak, but the words involuntarily flowed from his mouth:

"I don't recognize him."

The peddler seemed somewhat surprised as well, draping his underpants over the handrail of his cart and saying casually:

"I'm a peddler!"

Zhou He paid no attention to his actions, his mind racing.

The other party seems to have some special means that compels me to speak to them.

However, the content of their speech seemed to be their own decision, without any sense of being manipulated or guided.

Is it some kind of hypnotic technique?

Zhou recalled the peddler's actions and words after he entered, and found that there was no guidance that he was used to during hypnosis.

Except for that line—"I'm using this candy to ask you to come out and talk to me; you have to give me that face."

Is it related to sugar?

Zhou He suppressed the turmoil in his mind and repeated the other person's last two words:

"A peddler?"

This is a communication technique that Zhou often uses when dealing with patients who have a strong desire to express themselves but are unable to communicate normally.

By repeating the other person's keywords and asking rhetorical questions, you can break down their problem without revealing your own thoughts, while still keeping them talking.

"A peddler's job is to go from street to street, buying and exchanging goods. He'll exchange a piece of candy for a few words from you. I'm already giving you a high price."

The long-faced peddler said with a smile.

After he said that, Zhou instinctively thought of repeating whether it was a tall piece of candy or not, but suddenly realized that he no longer had the urge to answer the other person.

Upon seeing this, the peddler seemed to remember something, and his nose twitched:

"I forgot that my friend is a meat merchant who has gone out to eat."

Zhou He remained silent, gripping the knife tightly in his hand.

Does the other party know that I'm a sex trader?

The peddler seemed somewhat annoyed, patted his forehead, and said:

"Hey, look at this! I knew my friend had already left, so I probably gave him too low a price—want another piece of candy?"

The feel of the knife gave Zhou He a sense of security. After a brief moment of thought, he took the initiative to refuse:

"I dare not eat your candy again."

Just now, Zhou He realized that he seemed to have fallen into a wrong way of thinking.

Because he was so unfamiliar with this world, he subconsciously adopted a rather conservative, even passive, defensive mode.

But none of the many problems that the peddler had identified before he arrived could be solved by passive defense!

If the other party can expose my identity as a sex worker, then can everyone else in the world also see it?

If that's the case, is rushing out of the village still a good choice?

But staying and trying to integrate into this world while assuming the identity of Young Master Zhou also presents its own problems.

After the rooster crows, Old Han will come to this dilapidated temple.

What I urgently need right now is information, a lot of information about the world.

The peddler in front of him, judging from his strong desire to express himself and his unconventional behavior, which showed no regard for his image, led Zhou He to initially conclude after a brief analysis that he was a good source of information.

As for the other party's strange "hypnosis," is there any potential threat?

Zhou He knew very well that there must be one.

But now we're in a dead end. To break out of this deadlock, taking risks is inevitable; retreating is tantamount to waiting for death.

Therefore, he had to extract some information from the peddler.

Ideally, it should be related to the world and to one's own problems.

So he took the initiative to speak.

The peddler spoke up almost simultaneously:

"I have a business idea that I'd like to start with a friend."