My father originally chose this place to build a house, but my grandfather disagreed. From the perspective of Feng Shui, this kind of place is more suitable for building a Yin dwelling rather than a Yang dwelling. In Grandfathers words, with protective barriers on both sides and a mountain at the back, it is a good place to accumulate wealth and prosperity in terms of Feng Shui. However, unfortunately, there is another mountain opposite this one, which is much higher than this chair, and the terrain is extremely steep and rugged, shrouded in clouds and mist all year round.

  Grandfather said, this mountain is higher than the other one. From our houses gate looking out, its not a flat plain at all. On the contrary, you have to raise your head to see the mountain, and that mountain is steep, it will press down on our house. Unless our family can produce an aura more powerful than the dragon vein of the mountain opposite, otherwise this side can only be a yin dwelling, not a yang dwelling.

  His father naturally didnt care about him. In his opinion, the sun shone brightly here, the land was flat, and after building a house, he could still spare two acres to grow grain. The mountains on both sides surrounded it, forming a secluded courtyard, which was quiet and peaceful.

  Grandfather couldnt win against Father, so he had to bring the compass to help with the feng shui. Father wouldnt pay attention to him and just focused on his own project. Grandfather said, "The main door of our house is aligned with a wordless place."

  It is said that Grandfather took Father to see his compass at the time, and Father thought these mysterious things were meaningless. At that time, he was young and vigorous, and with a casual hand, he knocked Grandfathers compass to the ground, which was missing a corner. This incident directly led to their father-son relationship being completely broken.

  The compass is a tool for Taoist feng shui, and can be said to be the rice bowl of Taoists. Each master will only pass on the most important robes and secrets to their favorite and capable disciples before they die.

  My family has been Taoist for generations, and theres nothing valuable in our small sect, except this compass which has been passed down from the first generation of ancestors.

  The master passes on the teachings to the disciple, entrusting his lifelong efforts and hopes, commonly referred to in the Jianghu community as passing on the rice bowl, hoping to continue the legacy and make it flourish.

  If a Taoist apprentice, whether its a famous master or a new apprentice, doesnt have the robe and alms bowl passed down from their master, they usually dont possess the key technical secrets of the lineage, and typically arent qualified for orthodox transmission. In the old Xia family, the previous few generations were still quite prosperous, everyone was eyeing that Luo Pan, whoever got that Luo Pan could become the master of the Xia family, otherwise even if you had excellent skills, you wouldnt get recognized, just like the token of the sect leader mentioned earlier.

  Those who have not paid homage to the mountain gate and are self-taught Taoists, in our Taoist jargon, are called "Piao Xue", that is, half-road-out masters or self-study bookroom masters.

  This master who has not gone through the proper apprenticeship can simply examine some Yang house Feng Shui or Yin tomb Feng Shui. However, when it comes to doing Feng Shui, one must be careful because examining Feng Shui and doing Feng Shui are completely different things. The methods for examining Feng Shui can be diverse, such as Bagua, Qimen, Xinyi method, even witchcraft, etc., while doing Feng Shui requires solid and complete Feng Shui techniques, which usually only come from inheritance, in order to obtain the skills and secrets of controlling human destiny and turning the fortunes of heaven and earth.

  Especially in the yin and yang Feng Shui, one must be careful not to casually replace others in making tombs, lest they harm their own fortune and that of others. The misfortune brought by the Feng Shui of a yin house can be severe, causing destruction of clans or injury and death, all within a hundred days.

  Grandfather was trusted by people not only because of his skills, but also because of his orthodox identity as a Jianghu master for generations. The compass was unlike any other I saw later on.

  It is well known that a compass consists of three parts: the heaven pool, inner disc and outer disc.

  What is called the sky pool refers to the compass, on the bottom surface of the circular box of the compass there is a top needle with a sharp head in the center, and the bottom surface of the magnetic needle has a concave hole in the center. The magnetic needle is placed on the top needle. The direction pointed by the arrowhead end of the compass is south, and the other end points to the north.

  The bottom surface of the Tianchi has a red line drawn on it, called the sea bottom line. On both sides of the north end, there are two red dots. When in use, the north-pointing end of the magnetic needle should coincide with the sea bottom line.

  The inner disc is the rotatable circular plate adjacent to the outer surface of the compass. The surface of the inner disc has many concentric circles, each circle is called a layer. Each layer is divided into different equal parts, some layers have more grid cells and some have fewer, with the fewest being divided into eight cells, and the most having three hundred eighty-four cells. Each cell has different characters printed on it.

  There are many types of compasses, with some having more layers and others fewer. The most have fifty-two layers, while the fewest have only five layers.

  Each school of Feng Shui lists the main content of this school on the Luopan, and various contents are printed on different circles of the inner plate. It can be said that this thing is a concentrated version of the essence of an entire schools classics.

  Most of the inner layers of the compass are densely filled with circles, usually indicating that the more circles a compass has, the more powerful it is, and the deeper the foundation of the school behind it. Some people have spent their entire lives trying to decipher only half of the compasss secrets, while others are remnants left by ancient predecessors.

  Grandfathers compass is different from the material, it is not common copper or jade, but a whole transparent glass-like thing, the size of a palm. Usually, the smallest compass has at least five layers, while Grandfathers compass only has two layers. The characters on top are also different from ordinary compasses, without those heavenly stems and earthly branches, only the words "life" and "death". It can be rotated freely to the left or right, and every time it reaches a position, you will hear a "click" sound, and one layer and the outer layer form a combination, with only eight possible outcomes.

  It was just this compass that my father accidentally broke off a piece the size of a thumb nail. My grandfather treasured it as his life, and after passing it down through generations to him, he actually damaged it, no wonder he would turn against my father.

  It seems that Father also understood the importance of this compass to Grandfather, knew he was wrong, and finally reluctantly gave Grandfather a way out. In the end, the old man sighed and said: "A thousand jin door, four liu house; no god at the door, no master at home, take care of yourself!"

  Finally, above the central axis of the gate, Father buried a copper coin, and on the door frame, he also drew a black line with an ink gun. That line was the line drawn by Grandfather with a compass, and it pointed to an empty door.

  So, the main gate of my old house is not straight but slanted. Grandpa finally helped Father this time, tilting it 40 degrees to the left, which is a bit too much, as he put it, dont expect anyone to help you, and no one will bother you either.

  Since ancient times, every large gate has had a door god guarding it. Our old house is an exception, as there are no words on the gate, making it an empty gate where gods and ghosts can enter, and demons can come! It all depends on whether the owners eight characters are strong enough, and whether the owners yang energy can calm down this house!

  As for what aftermath this house left behind, it all came out in just a few years.

  At the age of seven, I started going to school. At that time, Hongcun had a school, but Wulipu didnt, so children from there had to walk 7 or 8 miles on mountain roads every morning to come to Hongcun to study. Both villages were very small, with only about thirty students in the whole class. Studying was free at that time. In the morning, we studied Mao Zedongs selected works, and in the afternoon, we learned some arithmetic.

  The desks in the classroom were all made by the village carpenter, two people per desk. The one who shared a desk with me was a child from Wulipu, and when the teacher called attendance, he called him "Zha Wenbin". He was about my height, and according to what I heard from my classmates in Wulipu, he was an adopted child, often bullied by those kids since childhood. And I was notorious for being a troublemaker in Hongcun, having knocked out a classmates loose tooth on the first day of school, so at first, he was a bit afraid of me.

  That morning, as usual, I carried my school bag to go to school. After arriving at the classroom, Cha Wenbin poked my arm and said: "You have something today."

  Im really curious, why did you say I have something going on? What could I possibly have going on?

  He leaned his head and whispered in my ear, "Youll have to ask the teacher for leave and go home later. Somethings happened at your place. I dreamed last night that youd be wearing mourning clothes today."

  At that time, I couldnt understand the word "wear mourning", so I went to ask him what it meant. The two of us whispering to each other caught the teachers attention, and I was sadly called up by the teacher to be criticized: "You two are not paying attention in class, muttering to yourselves, what are you doing?"

  I swore that I was very honest when I was young, so I immediately raised my hand and said: "Teacher, Zha Wenbin said that I have to wear mourning today. What is wearing mourning?"

  The teacher was shocked to hear that these two bear children were discussing such issues in class. As the flowers of the Republic, they should be discussing how to become socialist successors, not researching feudal superstitions all day.

  "Cha Wenbin, stand up for me!"

  "Teacher, I..."

  "Whats wrong with you! Do you know what it means to wear mourning attire! Youre talking nonsense!"

  After hearing the criticism, most of the children in the class burst out laughing, and Zha Wenbins face turned bright red. Probably because the laughter in the class irritated the teacher, making him feel that the discipline of the classroom was being disrupted by this child named Zha Wenbin, so he rushed down from the podium, grabbed him like a chick, pulled him to the edge of the podium and shouted at him: "Tell me, what is mourning attire!"

  He looked at me with a pitiful expression, his eyes welling up with tears, his hands ceaselessly rubbing the hem of his clothes. The teacher, however, grew even angrier in response to his silence, and began shaking Zha Wenbins thin shoulders back and forth, eventually raising his ruler to strike his buttocks. In the classroom, those children who had been watching the commotion were now in an uproar. Finally, Zha Wenbin could not bear it any longer, and said something that shocked all of his classmates: "Teacher, I dreamed that Xiaoyis grandfather would die today, and later his father would come to fetch him, holding a white cloth and telling him to wear mourning clothes..."

  This answer obviously made the teacher furious, his whip swung even more fiercely. Just then, the classroom door was hastily pushed open and everyones attention was drawn to the person who came in.

  "My dad, holding a white cloth in his hand, rushed to the teacher and said: Teacher Zhang, Im Xiaoyis father. His grandfather just passed away, Ive come to take him home..."