Chapter 10: A Handful of Yellow Earth, Beauty and White Bones

Leaving through the west gate of Maple Forest City, if one followed the official road for about seven or eight li, then turned left onto a small path, it would take less than half an incense stick’s time to see the Green Willow River, its banks encircled by drooping willows.

At this moment, the evening wind brushed against the face, and the bright moon was reflected in the rippling water, shimmering in silver waves.

When Jiang Wang emerged from the small path, he saw Ling He’s thin back standing by the river like a silent tree.

“Hey, let me see, let me see.”

Zhao Rucheng darted in front of him and craned his neck.

“You definitely hid here to cry, didn’t you?”

Ling He looked somewhat helpless.

“Why did you come?”

“Your voice is a little hoarse. You definitely cried!”

At that moment, a rough voice came from the grass by the river.

“Zhao, sometimes you really deserve a beating, you know that?”

“Brother Tiger, you’re here too?”

Zhao Rucheng shrank his neck. This brute Du Yehu really would start fighting at the slightest disagreement, and he would not care about Zhao Rucheng’s handsome face either.

“I was drinking here to begin with.”

Du Yehu spoke irritably, the smell of alcohol drifting in the evening wind.

“Who would’ve thought he’d carry that fellow here too? Bad luck.”

“Exactly! Why bury him at all?”

Zhao Rucheng continued, “A heartless, ungrateful thing like that should have been thrown straight into the river, let him drift downstream and feed the fish and shrimp.”

Jiang Wang glanced in the direction Du Yehu had come from.

“He’s buried there?”

“Third Brother.”

Considering Jiang Wang’s feelings, Ling He explained, “I haven’t forgotten Pengju’s evil, but I still remember his good. My family wasn’t well-off, and I often couldn’t eat my fill. Pengju would always use the excuse of asking me to guide his martial arts to drag me along and keep me from leaving, delaying until it was time to eat. He deserved to die for his crimes, but I couldn’t watch his corpse lie exposed in the wilderness… Of course, you were also good to me. That year when we were wiping out Green Ox Stockade, in order to save me, you…”

“What’s the point of saying all that?”

Jiang Wang interrupted him.

“When my father was alive, he told me that adults are different from children. The first thing adults must learn is to seek common ground while preserving differences. The kind of thing where ‘I won’t play with him, so you can’t play with him either’ is for children. You, Fang Pengju, and I—we each settle our own matters. I won’t affect your deep loyalty toward him, and you won’t affect the fact that my ties with him are severed.”

“That is the truth,” Ling He said.

He looked around at the Green Willow River beneath the night.

“There is always a feeling that it was only yesterday. This place has not changed much, but all of us are already different.”

“There is nothing that does not change. The only unchanging thing in this world is that everything is forever changing.”

After Zhao Rucheng said this meaningfully, he shamelessly leaned close to Ling He again.

“Burying someone shouldn’t take until this late. Did the two of you hold each other and cry?”

The moment his words fell, he sprang up from the ground, neatly dodging Du Yehu’s flying hairy leg.

“Tsk, tsk, tsk. Flying into shameful rage…”

He had only spoken half his taunt when he hurriedly cupped his hands and bowed.

“I was wrong, I was wrong, Brother Tiger.”

Du Yehu had already rolled up his sleeves and chased after him.

“You’re not wrong. I’m just about to hold you and cry.”

Looking at the two of them fooling around, Ling He said leisurely, “But I believe there are always some things that will not be changed.”

“I agree with half of what you said,” Jiang Wang replied.

The “sparring” between Du Yehu and Zhao Rucheng somehow turned into a chaotic four-man brawl. Fists and feet flew, and each person tried to trip the others. By the end, everyone was panting, then they all burst into loud laughter, and then held each other and cried.

If anyone had passed by near the Green Willow River that night, perhaps another ghost story about water ghosts would have spread.

In the end, the four brothers left the Green Willow River side by side, leaving this place that recorded their youth and friendship.

No one spoke again.

Only Zhao Rucheng turned back at the end and muttered:

“When you get to the other side, don’t hurt your friends anymore. You dead ghost.”

…

Moonlight flowed across the rippling Green Willow River and also poured down through the ruined roof of Return-to-Truth Temple.

Perhaps because of the moonlight, the faces of the two people speaking inside the ruined temple both appeared extremely pale.

One of them was a captivating woman. She wore a bright red dress, and her figure was exquisite, with graceful curves in all the right places. Especially the dazzling glimpse of pale fullness at the slightly open collar—it made it hard for the eyes to look away.

Her face was also a little too pale. Logically, it should have made her seem frail and sickly, yet she somehow gave people an astonishingly gorgeous impression. Perhaps it was because of those overly vivid red lips.

She sat there without the slightest concern on the dusty incense altar, so beautiful and yet so calm.

She lightly rubbed her red lips with her little finger and said, “All the beggar children in this temple are dead. What a bother. What are we supposed to use to request the divine decree?”

Her voice seemed to circle once around the spiderwebs beneath the eaves before arriving where it should, sounding somewhat hollow.

“A cultivator’s life-soul will be enough.”

The speaker stood by the doorway. Unlike the red-dressed woman, he seemed unwilling to let even half a foot touch this dirty ruined temple, and he covered his mouth and nose with a handkerchief embroidered with plum blossoms.

“Oh my, you make it sound so easy.”

The red-dressed woman said, “Even killing a few mortals requires us to sneak around. Kill a cultivator? Are you afraid the Dao Academy of Zhuang Country won’t come knocking?”

“Everyone in this city, one by one, will die sooner or later.”

As the man spoke, he frowned.

“Do we really have to choose this kind of place to talk?”

The red-dressed woman giggled.

“The famous Zuo Guanglie fell right here. The people of Zhuang Country have searched this place inside and out no fewer than ten times. There is nowhere nearby cleaner than this.”

When she mentioned Zuo Guanglie, she even closed her eyes slightly, revealing an intoxicated expression. Even a blush quickly spread across her pale face.

“I feel as if I can still smell his virile aura.”

“Back to business.”

The man calmly interrupted her reverie.

“Wei Quji is not easy to deal with, and now Dong A has appeared as well. We must find the Dao Child as soon as possible. Those Qin and Chu barbarians fought wildly here and disrupted the sacrifice at Return-to-Truth Temple. In my opinion, instead of secretly capturing mortals one after another, we may as well directly sacrifice one cultivator. It would be simpler and cleaner.”

“There is more than one way to seek death. Why must you cling to this one? Wouldn’t drawing a sword and cutting your throat be fine? Or perhaps attracting thunder to devour your body?”

Perhaps unhappy that her thoughts had been interrupted, the red-dressed woman opened her beautiful eyes and also withdrew her smile.

“Before the Dao Child appears in the world, you had best understand what it means to keep a low profile!”

The man also seemed somewhat irritated. Covering his nose, he said, “Miaoyu! Don’t make it sound like attacking Maple Forest Dao Academy wasn’t your idea! Now the entire city is in an uproar. One misstep, and our great undertaking will fail at the last moment!”

“What do you understand? This world is too vast, and there are too many accidents! Who could have imagined that Zuo Guanglie would die just like that? And that he would happen to ruin our sacrificial plan. The white bones at the bottom of the River of Forgetfulness have been silent for too long! There can be no more accidents! In the current Maple Forest City, Dong A is extremely important. We must determine his strength and bottom line! Some sacrifice is inevitable. Besides…”

The red-dressed woman named Miaoyu licked her lips.

“Do you know that the beggars in this ruined temple did not all die? In Maple Forest Dao Academy, I smelled a familiar scent…”

The filthy environment made the man increasingly impatient.

“Does the life or death of a mere beggar deserve my concern?”

This time, Miaoyu merely stretched lazily and carelessly, revealing every bit of her beautiful figure.

“Idiot.”

The man narrowed his eyes, concealing the flash of desire in their depths.

“Do not think that just because you are nominally the Dao Child’s woman, you can be so unrestrained. Over the thousands of years of the sect’s history, there have been countless holy maidens. When the Dao Child appears, whether he wants you or recognizes you remains to be seen.”

“Beauty and white bones, empty and illusory. Can you not see through it?”

“Heh heh heh heh.”

The man turned and walked out of the temple.

“Whether I can see through it or not, what does it matter? This is all there is.”

After a long while, in the quiet and ruined old temple, an alluring murmur softly sounded, spreading out like moonlight.

“How could he not love me? How could he not want me? I have guarded him for so many years, waited for so many years…”

[End of Chapter]