Literary Master: Starting with Refusing to Be a Child Star

Chapter 6 I fear I am not a beautiful jade

Saturday.

The sun was very strong.

It's rare for a middle-aged woman to be away from home for a day. She was held up by her own mother, who insisted that she couldn't leave until she had helped her mother harvest ten acres of peanuts.

Why insist on manual labor? Using machines would cost so much more money, and the elderly aren't stupid.

Anyway, the purpose of raising a daughter is to use her.

The middle-aged woman's brother simply disappeared into the shadows.

This way of working today could kill someone.

Same world, same mother. Knowing that middle-aged women suffer, Luo Jinnian was even happier than if she had eaten a delicious pancake herself.

"I fear I am not a beautiful jade, so I deliberately avoid the effort of polishing myself; yet I still hold a sliver of hope that I might become a beautiful jade, so I cannot live a mediocre life among the rubble..."

Luo Jinnian muttered to himself as he swept the floor.

For a time in my past life, short videos made by turning this passage from "The Mountain Moon Chronicle" into text and adding some sad background music were quite popular.

"The Moon Over the Mountain" is Atsushi Nakajima's representative work. Because it is so in line with the "mono no aware" culture of Japanese society, it basically made the author a "national author" with just one article.

This book, along with another famous book on the Internet, "No Longer Human," and Motojiro Kajii's "Lemon," is known as one of the "Three Books of Mono no Awareness" in Japan.

Since transmigrating, Luo Jinnian's memories have been greatly enhanced. He can now recite the entire "Mountain Moon Chronicle," which he only read three times in his previous life.

"The food is all in the pot; you can just heat it up and eat when you're hungry."

"Study hard at home, and be careful with those electrical appliances. I'm going to the company now."

If you're going to be that responsible, no one will tell Luo Jinnian.

The stepfather gave his daughter some instructions at the door, then hurriedly rode his electric scooter to the company to work overtime.

The little girl nodded belatedly, the heavy bag on her back making her feel top-heavy; it was full of things she needed for her art class.

Upon entering the house, one sees the boy humming a tune, happily doing chores.

"Has your sister finished her art lessons?"

"Um."

Chu Qingning was tongue-tied and didn't know how to reply, so she rinsed the mop and followed behind her younger brother. He swept one area, and she mopped it.

Two people working together greatly improves efficiency.

Luo Jinnian lay exhausted on the sofa. His body was too weak; he had no strength left to do even a little work.

Actually, no one asked him to clean the house, but it's a matter of attitude towards life. Even though he had no feelings for the house, Luo Jinnian still did his best to tidy it up.

The older sister also sat down and took out two chocolate-covered liqueurs from her bag, which she had traded with the children in the art class for her other snacks.

There are two pieces in total, one for myself and the other for my younger brother.

"It contains alcohol, which can make you drunk, so eat it slowly."

Fearing her younger brother might get drunk, Chu Qingning gave him some instructions.

Actually, it was the girl's first time trying this snack. Her friend's exact words were: "This thing releases alcohol as soon as you bite into it, but it's sweet, but it's still alcohol."

"What if my sister and I eat slowly and still get drunk?"

Luo Jinnian chuckled, recalling how he was also afraid of getting drunk when he first ate liqueur-filled chocolates.

The girl bit her lower lip, glanced at the novel dessert in her hand that she couldn't bear to part with, and said with difficulty:

"We'll just lie in bed and sleep. We'll be covered with blankets."

According to Luo Jinnian's understanding, what the girl meant was that the two of them went to sleep when they were drunk and even covered their drunken faces with the blanket.

You can know a person's face but not their heart. Who would have thought that this woman with thick eyebrows and big eyes was such a clever idea person?

The two people sitting on the sofa silently enjoyed their liqueur-filled chocolates without saying a word.

After finishing their meal, the two went about their own business.

Luo Jinnian was still copying "Summer, Fireworks, My Corpse".

I was taking notes, mainly to record my understanding of the original text.

The girl took out a drawing sheet and closed her eyes in deep thought.

Once I had a clear idea, I picked up a pencil and, without hesitation, began sketching the liqueur-filled chocolates I had just eaten, relying solely on my memory.

Sunlight streamed brightly through the balcony, and the two of them went about their business in a warm and cozy atmosphere.

Luo Jinnian didn't have the energy to modify other people's successful works; apart from necessary patches, he copied them word for word without making any changes.

If you really want to make changes, start by writing your own work.

Suspense novels that use a first-person perspective are as common as Pikachu on the street.

The first-person perspective of the dead in "Summer, Fireworks, My Corpse" is a clever touch, but not a major innovation.

What's truly terrifying about this book is that when the nine-year-old protagonist, May, recounts the entire story later as "my corpse"—it's as if she no longer sees herself as a person, but rather as an object.

The narrative choice itself is terrifying.

Yayoi's brother, Ken, the "Great Succubus" in the entire story, completed the mental shift from "playmate" to "criminal" within seconds of confirming May's death, without any moral struggle. This is another kind of horror.

Children's evil is the purest form of evil, not because they are bad, but because they do not yet have the concept of 'evil'.

When the author, Otsuichi, wrote about the evil of these children, he used a very sophisticated approach: he only showed it without commenting.

The story continues after "I" die.

The next morning, Ken and Yayoi lifted the cement slab and dragged "my" body to the cedar tree cave. As they passed through the grove, Green Sister suddenly appeared.

Ah Jian stood in front of the corpse and said they were looking for cicada shells.

His legs were shaking, but his voice was not.

Sister Green glanced at the rabbit slippers sticking out of the cloth on the ground, said nothing, and walked over.

After taking a few steps, he turned back and said, "Jian, come to my house for ice cream this afternoon."

After Midori walked away, Yayoi collapsed to the ground, trembling all over: "Did...did she see...?"

"No," Ah Jian said. "Even if I saw it, it wouldn't matter."

This is a rare moment when Ah Jian reveals his nervousness, indicating that he is not completely cold-blooded, but simply better at controlling his expressions than the average person.

This didn't ruin Ah Jian's original "bad kid" persona; on the contrary, it made it even more terrifying upon closer inspection.

May's mother came to A-Jian's house to ask him questions.

Ah Jian came out of the house with a glass of water.

"Auntie, have some water." He handed her the cup, his voice very obedient.

May's mother asked him what her daughter had said that day.

Ah Jian thought for a moment and said, "She said she wanted to go to the river to catch fish."

"Riverside... Riverside..." May's mother stood up and stumbled as she ran outside.

Ah Jian's lies have a three-layered structure.

The first layer is the behavioral layer—he takes the initiative to serve water, establishing a first impression of being "well-behaved and sensible".

The second layer is the language layer—his answer has specific details (riverside, catching fish), and details are the most effective disguise for a lie.

The third layer is the emotional layer—his expression and tone of voice when he said this were no different from usual. He wasn't acting normal; he was just being normal. This is the highest level of lying.

From the very beginning, Ah Jian's characteristics—lack of empathy, calm execution, lack of remorse, and social pretense—each one of them treads on the line of antisocial behavior.

The more Luo Jinnian read, the more she felt that the original text was truly detailed.

The brother and sister dragged May's body to the front of the cedar tree hole.

It was a naturally formed tree hole at the base of a large cedar tree, its entrance covered by ferns. Ah Jian climbed in first to take a look, and came out with mud on his face.

"It's deep inside, there's enough room."

He stuffed May's body into the hole.

May's arm got stuck in the hole, so Ah Jian twisted it hard and heard a "crack" sound.

Yayoi covered her ears and squatted down.

A-Jian turned around, saw Ya-Yo's expression, and smiled.

The smile was very light and faint, as if to say, "It's alright."

Yayoi saw Ken standing in the yard, holding the slipper that May had thrown under the tree.

Yayoi asked him what he was keeping it for.

Ah Jian said, "I'm not going to do anything with it. I'm just keeping it."

The next day, he buried the slippers in the backyard.

In her past life, Luo Jinnian saw a post that she still remembers vividly: "I read the part about A-Jian hiding slippers three times, and each time I discovered a new dagger."

"The first time I read it, I thought Ken kept the slippers as a memento because of guilt. The second time I realized something was wrong—he told Yayoi to throw them away, but he picked them up again, took them out to look at them in the middle of the night, and finally buried them. This wasn't a memento; it was a collection. He made May his own. The body was hidden in the tree hollow, and the slippers were buried in the backyard; both were his."

Ah Jian treated "me" as his private property.

Someone else commented, "There's even more detail. He buried the slipper before dawn, all by himself, with a small hoe. The pit was about two palm-widths deep. After burying it, he stomped on it twice and covered it with fallen leaves. The whole process was exactly the same as burying a corpse. He was practicing."

Yes, that's very well said. From today onwards, these are all the original author Luo Jinnian's own thoughts.