No ano em que nasci, cem demônios desfilaram

My name is Chen July, and I was born in a remote mountain village in the northeast.

It is said that on the day I was born, someone saw two yellow-furred foxes standing upright like humans at the entrance of our courtyard, bowing repeatedly toward the house, their behavior eerily unsettling.

People in the village are deeply superstitious, and my grandfather was no exception. He was a feng shui master, extremely concerned with the mysteries of fate. When he heard someone claim to have seen the two foxes kneeling outside our home, his expression grew darker and more troubled. When others asked him about it, he said nothing, merely puffing on his old pipe in silence.

On the second day after my birth, something strange happened in the village. All the chickens and ducks, once prized by the villagers, vanished overnight, leaving everyone deeply uneasy. To make matters worse, someone who went up the mountain to gather herbs died under mysterious circumstances.

These coincidences led the villagers to believe something sinister was at work, and most of them blamed my birth for bringing disaster upon the village. They tried many times to send me away. If not for my grandfather’s considerable influence and respect in the community, I doubt I would have been allowed to stay.

Yet my presence brought poverty to my family. To appease the villagers, my grandfather distributed all the money he had saved to them. It was only thanks to this sacrifice that I remained in the village.

But peace proved fleeting. Soon after, another strange event occurred. W