Bumpy Sleep

After Jian got his ten taels of silver he immediately went to the market and begun to buy several things, met, vegetables, rice and even some nice clothes for his sister. He wanted to by her something more, but he didn't know what to, so he took all of those and with the help of a rickshaw, he and the things he bought were in front of the house. 

"Here you go,for your service."

"Thank you."

Jian paid the rickshaw driver, and even left him a tip as he was in a good mood. Hopefully his older sister wasn't in a bad mood today. He didn't enter the house but went to the back where a brick shed was, their forge. His father had been a blacksmith when he was still alive, and his sister was following in his footsteps as she was now shaping a red hot piece of metal .

*Ting ting ting.. 

The sound of the hammer hitting the red hot iron and then the anvil made for a symphony of sound all around, but the heat and the smoke from the coals wasn't pleasant at all. She noticed Jian arriving at the door of the forge, but didn't raise her head at all as she continued to hammer away at the hit iron. Several minutes passed with only the sound of metal beeing struck, and after she had finished forging a couple of nails, she finally raised her head to acknowledge Jian.

"What do you want? "

"Ahhh, me...nothing. But I have a surprise for you that I think you will like" smugly said Jian making his sister feel strange.

'The idiot has a surprise? What in the nine heavens is going on? Am I in a dream?' she rubbed he aching hand, and it felt pretty real to her. Jian saw the confusion on his sisters face , and couldn't help but cus at the stupidity of the previous Jian. Even his sister doubted him.

"Hey, hey I'm not joking with you at all. Here , take it." Jian handed his sister a red envelope which the later slowly opened, and when she saw the contents, she froze. Inside the red envelope were five taels of silver, a small fortune for common folk. 

"Feng Jian, where did you get these?! Five taels of silver....did you do anything stupid? Tell me that you didn't, because if you did...I swear in the nine heavens....

"Hey hey hey....put the hammer down! I didn't do anything. " Jian hastily explained himself, trying to reason with his sister who was ready to bludgeon him with her forging hammer. " I didn't steal or do anything stupid, I earned that. I even paid my debt to the Red Ginseng before commig here.

And before you ask how, it was selling some medicinal herbs and roots. Happy now?"

She lowered her hammer a little as she heard Jian's explanation, but she still didn't believe him completely. "Fine , suppose you did that , but where did you find the medicinal plants to sell? You don't even know where to find them."

"Ughh, of course I know, you also know about it , so how about you calm down and I'll tell you the full story. Let's head to the house and we'll talk about it."

Seeing the pleading look in Jian's eyes she finally relented, but she didn't let go of her hammer "Fine I'll hear you out...

.........

The simblings were eating dinner , a simple one made of rice, pickled vegetables, and even some meat that was rarely eaten if there wasn't any kind of celebration. Jian's sister Feng Mei was enjoying her meal with gusto, but Jian who was also eating the same things didn't seem to be enjoying it at all. Maybe it was because of his different palate as he had come from 21st century earth, or maybe because he wasn't feeling well , but it was most likely because of the bump on his head that he kept rubbing constantly. 

"Dammit, did you have to hit me so hard?" complained Jian as he didn't stop rubbing. If he stopped he felt like his head was going to explode.

"Hmph, that's nothing compared to what I should do? Why did you do something so stupid as to go the cemetery at night, you know it's dangerous. Not even those monks dare to go there at night, even less if it's a full moon."

"But, I already told you I had some protective sutra's said to me before I went in there. It was fine...

"No, it wasn't! Do you know how stupid you sound? If sutra's were enough to get the job done, then everyone would do it. You were just lucky, stupid lucky."

"Uhhh...." Jian wanted to say that the sutra's really worked, but he would have to reveal his secret, something he didn't want to. So , he swallowed those words and finished his meal. After that he went to bed, but he couldn't sleep as his head hurt. He twisted and turned in his straw bed for quite some time until he couldn't anymore. He willed the smartphone into existence, put the volume to the lowest he could, and ran the recording of one of the mantras. Supposedly this mantra helped in healing, or so the monk said.

"Tayata Om Bekanze Bekanze Maha Bekanze Radza Samudgate Soha

"Tayata Om Bekanze Bekanze Maha Bekanze Radza Samudgate Soha"

He put the phone near his head, tried to sleep, and after a long while he finally managed to go to the land of dreams. Unbeknownst to him, several moats of golden light swirled around him, especially his head.