The old woman was surprised to hear this. She looked at him unbelievingly
only to find that, with white hair and ruddy complexion, the old man had a
bearing out of the ordinary. She went on to persuade him to take flight. But he
only smiled without reply. Thereupon the grandmother could not help but leave
her home and flee to the mountains.
Around midnight the monster Year rushed into the villages. He found the
atmosphere was quite different from that of the previous year. The house of the
grandmother in the east end of the village was brilliantly illuminated, with
bright red paper
stuck on the doors. Greatly shocked, the monster gave a strange loud cry.
The monster Year stared angrily at the house for a moment. And then howling
furiously, he made a pounce on it. As he approached the door, there came all of
a sudden the exploding sounds of bang-bong. Trembling all over, the monster
dared not make a step forward.
It turned out that the red color; flame and exploding were what Year feared
the most. And when the door of the grandmother's house was thrown open and an
old man in a red robe burst out laughing in the courtyard, the monster Year was
scared out of his wits and fled helter-skelter.
The next day was the 1st of the first lunar month. When people came back from
their hideouts and found everything safe and sound, they were quite surprised.
The old woman suddenly realized what had happened and told the villagers about
the old beggar's promise.
The villagers swarmed into the grandmother's house, only
to find that the doors were struck with red paper
, the ember of a pile of bamboo were still
giving out exploding sound of bang-bong in the courtyard, and a few candles were
still glowing in the room...
