After the village guardian died, the village hadn’t known peace for three years. The elderly kept getting sick one after another, and even the chickens and ducks they raised began to die without any apparent reason. The strangest part was that the stone bridge behind the village collapsed, crushing and injuring two villagers who were heading to the market. And that bridge was exactly the one the guardian had helped repair when he was young.

Not long afterward, a wandering teenage boy suddenly arrived in the village—about fifteen or sixteen years old. His eyes were dull and unfocused; all he would do was “heh-heh” laugh. Once he walked into the village, he sat down and refused to leave. The old branch secretary at the village entrance watched the boy for a long time, then let out a sigh: “The heavens have sent someone to guard the village again—our village guardian’s been picked up and continued.”

From then on, the boy stayed and became the new village guardian. The villagers treated him extremely well. If anyone made something delicious, they would bring him a bowl. And the village gradually regained the peace it used to have—people and livestock were safe, as if the disasters of the past three years had never happened.