Chapter 14 The Show Must Go On

Zhou Ze got into Lao Zhang's car. Lao Zhang specifically turned his head to look at the boss, whose arms had recovered.

His lips twitched.

He said,

"That's really amazing."

"When horns grow on your head, you'll find it even more amazing."

"............" Lao Zhang.

"Let's go. You found the place, right?"

With a name, a photo, and a profession, finding the person's home address wasn't difficult.

"Found it. Shall we go to his house first?"

"Mm."

The car started. Outside, tiny snowflakes began to fall, bringing a moment of crystalline beauty.

"Boss, do you usually watch lion dances?"

Lao Zhang asked while driving.

"Lao Zhang, do you usually watch plays?"

"No."

"Same here."

Zhou Ze took out two cigarettes, lit one for himself, and offered the other to Lao Zhang.

Lao Zhang shook his head and said, "You get fined for smoking while driving in Tongcheng now."

"You can't die anyway."

"............" Lao Zhang.

Seeing Lao Zhang's insistence on principle, Zhou Ze let him be. He opened the car window and smoked, saying at the same time,

"My biggest impression of lion dances comes from the *Once Upon a Time in China* series, *The Lion King*. I remember when I was a kid, the small TV in the orphanage often played that movie."

"Haha, that's a very old film. I like watching it too, especially the last line, 'We won the competition, but lost the whole world.'"

"It seems like lion dance activities are more common in Guangdong, Hong Kong, and Macau. Anyway, I haven't seen a lion dance performance in Tongcheng since I left the orphanage."

Tongcheng does have a local opera called Child's Play, but now only a few elderly locals listen to it. Its current role is to be mentioned when promoting Tongcheng to the outside world.

"This can be considered a relatively down-to-earth folk culture," Lao Zhang said with emotion.

"Yeah, it's one of the more down-to-earth ones."

In recent years, the country has been vigorously promoting traditional cultural industries, so that whatever it is, even if it is fabricated, must create a name for itself. And those many highbrow traditional arts, cannot even be popular among young people domestically, yet the country hopes to use them to carry out cultural output to the outside world...

"We're here."

Lao Zhang stopped the car at the gate.

This wasn't really the city center; it was in the suburbs. A detached villa, it looked quite impressive.

At least, it didn't give off the image of a miserable folk artist who couldn't afford to eat.

Two white lanterns hung on the iron gate, probably electric to prevent fires, not candles.

Lao Zhang walked up and rang the doorbell.

Soon,

a middle-aged man in a black suit came out. He looked at Zhou Ze and Lao Zhang with some suspicion, but didn't ask anything, and opened the door directly, inviting them in.

Lao Zhang's prepared speech was useless.

The middle-aged man led the way. They quickly passed through the courtyard to the back. The backyard was also large. Nowadays, many houses in the countryside are new buildings paired with old bungalows next to them, which is convenient for raising dogs, growing flowers, and doing things. The living conditions are really much more comfortable than those small apartments in the city.

In front of the house, there were three lions placed, not real lions, but lion dance props, red, white, and yellow.

Inside was a mourning hall.

Outside, many tables were set up, and many people were sitting there drinking tea and chatting quietly.

The atmosphere was a bit like a martial arts gang meeting in secret.

Zhou Ze saw the portrait of Lu Yaozu placed in the center of the bungalow's main room. The old man's expression was serious, like a grandmaster.

It was also quite interesting. It seemed that the body hadn't been cremated yet, and should be lying in state here. But he had just sent the person's soul to hell. Whether this lying in state continued or not, it really didn't matter anymore.

Zhou Ze wanted to go and offer incense, just to show some respect, but when he was about to move forward, he found that everyone's eyes were on him. The middle-aged man who had led Zhou Ze and Lao Zhang in, whose face resembled Lu Yaozu's by five or six parts, reached out and stopped Zhou Ze.

Then he pointed to the three lions placed on the side, and said,

"You two, according to the rules, give us a performance first, show us your skills."

What?

They wanted them to do a lion dance?

Zhou Ze turned his head and looked at Lao Zhang standing behind him.

Lao Zhang actually took a deep breath, and took the initiative to walk to the lion, selected a white lion, and picked it up, returning to Zhou Ze's side.

Unusually proactive,

just as proactive as when he comes to freeload meals!

"Boss, let's do it. We can do it."

"Am I here to accompany you in doing acrobatics?"

Zhou Ze asked back.

He had no interest in that. What he liked to do was lie there and not move, not lift a lion and sweat like rain.

"To find clues, bear with it, Boss. Think of the kids at those temple fairs."

Lao Zhang lowered his voice.

"Heh, I'm not their dad."

Lao Zhang smiled ingratiatingly and handed the lion's head to Zhou Ze.

"Heh..."

Zhou Ze was a little speechless, but he still took the lion's head.

Putting on the lion's head, Zhou Ze lowered his voice and said, "Here's the question. Can you even do it?"

"No, I can't."

Lao Zhang's answer was very honest.

At this time,

the middle-aged man walked to the side. There was a camera there, facing this direction. At the same time, he pressed the play button on the sound system. The background music started!

"Arrogantly facing a myriad of waves,

Hot blood like the red sunlight,

Courage like iron, bones like refined steel,

A chest of a hundred thousand feet, eyes that see ten thousand miles,

I strive to be a good man…………"

The magnificent and classic *A Man Should Stand Tall* rang out.

Zhou Ze and Lao Zhang were still standing still.

Everyone present was an expert, probably from the same trade. To come here to mourn, you have to show your skills first, see if you're any good, before you're qualified to offer incense to the deceased and then sit down and drink tea with your fellow professionals. This should be the old rule in this circle.

"It seems like these two brothers think it's boring to just stand there."

A thin, tall man drinking tea next to him stood up, walked to the side, and tore off a piece of black cloth. That area was actually a row of plum blossom poles, and very high ones at that. They weren't nailed into the ground, but more like a fixed trolley, completely made of iron, easy to carry for performances.

"Lao Zhang, can you jump up there?"

Zhou Ze asked.

"Um..." Lao Zhang.

"Why not just beat these people up and ask them directly?"

In the middle of the night, with a little snow falling, it was more suitable to sit by the bed drinking tea or coffee, not messing around here.

"Boss, I feel like this thing isn't that simple. We have to mix into their circle first. Didn't you say that the xiezhi (mythical unicorn-like creature) is in my body? Let me try it. I think it should work."

It seemed that

not being killed by the car during the day

had given Lao Zhang a lot of confidence.

"I still think it's more practical to beat these people up," Zhou Ze insisted on his own opinion.

"Boss, I…………"

Just then,

"Roar!"

A low roar came,

Zhou Ze's eyes suddenly narrowed,

Lao Zhang, who was holding the lion's tail behind him, was also stunned.

It's hard for those who haven't really heard it to imagine what a lion's roar is like. It's a bit like opening a loudspeaker and adding a square dance sound effect.

But on the scene, other than Zhou Ze and Lao Zhang, no third person heard this sound.

"Boss, is there really a Lion King?"

"God knows what it is."

Zhou Ze's gaze swept the audience.

"Hurry up, be quick."

"Yeah, don't hide your skills, let everyone see your real skills!"

"That's right, that's right, start it up, start it up."

"Are you looking down on us?"

"You idiot, what are you touching!"

Accents from all over the country gathered together. Everyone was getting a little impatient.

In fact, lion dancing is a skill that requires real kung fu. The two Guang provinces, which are the most famous and have the best development, emphasize Southern-style kung fu. Other places also have their own traditional practice methods.

This is different from dancing. On the stage, you can jump around a bit, have some basic skills, and keep up with the rhythm to fool people, but here the lion is so heavy, and you have to go up and down the plum blossom poles, which requires real hard work.

A group of people were urging.

Zhou Ze really wanted that Lion King to come out now,

bite a few people,

and see if they would still yell.

It was just that the Lion King didn't come out. After making that roar, it disappeared without a trace. Zhou Ze could sense that it should still be here, but he couldn't determine its location.

This shouldn't be a ghost. It might not even have a physical form, but be a special existence.

Even,

it might be a kind of...

belief.

Moreover, the nature of the matter had also changed. Before, no matter how the lion dance old man "talked nonsense" in the bookstore, as long as it wasn't confirmed, it could be treated as if nothing had happened.

It's difficult to work diligently and conscientiously, but anyone can figure out how to occupy a position without doing any work.

However,

now,

since he had already sensed the existence of that Lion King,

and had been reminded that it was going to cause trouble at the temple fair the day after tomorrow,

then,

as the constable of Tongcheng,

it was naturally impossible not to care.

Zhou Ze licked his lips, put on the lion's head, and Lao Zhang bent down and lifted up the lion's tail.

"Lao Zhang, just jump with all your strength, believe in your potential."

"Oh, okay."

Lao Zhang immediately responded, and at the same time muttered to himself with some excitement:

"Ever since I watched that movie when I was young, I've been thinking that one day I could do a lion dance myself."

Zhou Ze: "(━┳━_━┳━)"

No wonder…

"Be a good man,

Hot blood, hot heart, hot,

Hotter than the red sunlight..."

When the background music reached its climax,

"Go!"

Zhou Ze gave a low shout,

and released some of his baleful aura.

The whole person jumped,

jumped more than two meters in place, directly onto the plum blossom pole, and stood firmly.

Lao Zhang behind him jumped with all his strength,

his figure flew up directly,

jumping so high and so far that he almost jumped from this end of the plum blossom pole to the other.

Seeing this,

Zhou Ze immediately yanked the lion's head, pulling Lao Zhang;

Lao Zhang was suspended in the air by Zhou Ze for five or six circles, which offset the momentum caused by his excessive force just now;

At the same time, Lao Zhang's feet were still blindly stepping, as if doing an extremely difficult moonwalk.

Finally,

Zhou Ze yanked down again,

the lion's cloth made a crisp sound,

Lao Zhang's figure quickly came down, landing on the plum blossom pole behind Zhou Ze, swaying and barely stabilizing.

"Phew…………"

Lao Zhang breathed a sigh of relief,

too exciting.

The experts present,

were directly stunned,

completely stunned by the amazing action,

their scalps tingling!

After a while,

when Zhou Ze hadn't thought of the next action,

everyone actually stood up together:

"Clap clap clap clap!!!!"