Shame on you

The wind on the top of the mountain suddenly became sluggish, and even the trembling of the pine needles slowed down by half a beat.

"Gao..."

It was the first time she called out the name she had heard from Zhihuan.

"But what Zhihuan did was wrong, and your resentment... shouldn't be directed at innocent people."

She raised her eyes, her gaze passed over the ancient god's silver-white hair, and fell on the scattered villages in the valley.

She saw the old farmer wearing a coarse cloth shorts on the ridge of the field. His skin was dark brown from the sun, and the calluses on his hands were so thick that they could scratch the wheat awns.

He bent down to straighten the wind-blown wheat stalks, his movements slow but steady. With each stalk, he gently pressed the soil at its base, as if comforting a delicate child. When the sun blazed, he untied a coarse cloth from his waist to wipe his sweat. The sweat fell on the cracked ridges of the field and disappeared in an instant. But when he looked up at the smoke rising from his own roof, he smiled.

It was a smile of satisfaction, not because he remembered someone's kindness, but simply because the wheat in the field was growing well and there was hot food on the stove at home.

Yunxiu suddenly remembered what his master had occasionally mentioned ten thousand years ago. He said that the villagers who had initially escaped the disaster would hold freshly ripe wild fruits and bottles of clear spring water, and climb to the top of the mountain along the unpaved bluestone road. Even if they fell and got covered in mud, they would still place the freshest offerings in front of the statue.

Those people must remember the golden figure when the lava flowed over their ankles, and the barrier that supported the sky and the earth when the huge waves smashed their doors. They will tell these stories to their children and grandchildren, guarding this memory like a treasure.

But time will dilute.

She watched a woman walking down a dirt road not far away, carrying a bamboo basket toward a field. Inside the basket, in a cotton-wrapped clay pot, were freshly steamed corn buns. Reaching the edge of the field, she called out to the old farmer, her voice carried on the wind, carrying a homely warmth.

As the old farmer straightened up and took the pot, the woman reached out to help him straighten his wind-twisted collar, her fingertips running through his gray hair at the temples, her gesture natural and intimate. The child poked his head out from behind the woman, clutching a freshly picked small blue flower. He skipped over to the old farmer and placed the flower on his straw hat, his two missing front teeth visible in a smile.

Yunxiu's heart trembled slightly.

They had to worry about whether the wheat in the fields would be eaten by insects, whether there was enough oil in the oil tank at home, how to coax their sick children to drink bitter medicine, and how to mend their worn clothes - these trivial, specific worries, like the grass on the ridges of the fields, grew densely throughout their days.

The memories of the first generation will be like stories told by the elderly, passed down from generation to generation. As they are passed down, the details of "God warding off disasters" will fade and become "immortals blessing the mountains". Later, even "immortals" may become a vague idea, and only the solidity of "farming well will give you enough to eat" will remain.

This is not ungrateful.

Yunxiu gently grasped the hem of her clothes, and rubbed her fingertips across the bird feather pattern embroidered on the fabric - that was embroidered by Senior Sister Yingtang for her last winter. Senior Sister said that wearing it like this would feel like carrying the warmth of the mountains.

She thought, if she were a villager on the ridge, she'd probably feel the same way. She'd remember her ancestors' words, "There's a powerful force in the mountains protecting us," but she wouldn't constantly repeat, "God saved us ten thousand years ago." There was porridge to cook, shoes to mend, and the present more pressing than the distant past.

Just like herself, she remembered the details of her senior brother teaching her sword skills, and the taste of the mountain flower cake made by her senior sister, but she could not remember the specific appearance of her master when she first saw him after she transformed. It was not that she was ungrateful, but time would leave the deepest emotions in the heart, but make the specific memories slowly blurred.

The same goes for the villagers. They may have forgotten the name of the "ancient gods" and the specific disaster that happened ten thousand years ago, but the way they live their lives seriously, isn't that the best response to being "protected"?

There's no need to be stuck in the past.

Yunxiu gazed at the village where smoke drifted from cooking fires, and suddenly his heart cleared. It was enough for the first generation to remember; it was enough for time to remember God's sacrifice. There was no need for those who came after him to live under the shackles of "having to remember someone."

They are not the "ungrateful ants" that Zhi Huan mentioned, but living beings who sprout and bloom seriously on this protected land. Their smiles, their sorrows, and their efforts to stay alive are in themselves the best continuation of this protection.

The wind blew again, this time carrying the slight tickle of wheat awns. Yunxiu raised his hand to brush away the hair that fell on his cheek.

The meaning of life is never to remember the past, but to live the present life well.

Those people may have forgotten who blocked the disaster ten thousand years ago, but they live seriously on their own ridges, working from sunrise to sunset, laughing for a good harvest and worrying about their children's illness. They are not ungrateful ants, but their distant memories have been diluted by time.

"If you tell me this to ask for my opinion, then I tell you, I don't agree." Yunxiu said to the ancient god.

"If you want to side with Zhi Huan... or insist on sacrificing the lives of all the people in Yao Xi Mountain to restore your divine power, then you should step over my corpse."

For the first time, ripples appeared in the ancient god's azure-gold pupils.

He looked at Yunxiu as if he was looking at a child who knew nothing about the world, and also as if he was looking at the creatures who had first knelt down to worship him ten thousand years ago.

"don't know……"

He murmured softly, his smile somewhat bleak.

"How could you understand? It's my delusion."

"But... you're simply ungrateful. You really think you can fight me?"

Before he finished speaking, the warm light surrounding the Ancient God suddenly changed its texture. Previously shrouded in the soft warmth of morning mist, it now tightened as if tempered with iron. The sharp blade of light pierced Yunxiu's clothes, leaving her no room for escape. The force was irresistible and unyielding, like snow falling from a mountaintop suddenly collapsing into an avalanche, instantly enveloping her.

Yunxiu only felt a flash before his eyes. It was not the usual dizziness, but a blankness as if all the colors were drained away.

The cypress trees on the mountaintop, the distant village, even the wind against my fingertips, all vanished in an instant. The sound of the wind and birdsong in my ears seemed to be snuffed out by an invisible hand, leaving only dead silence.

The next second, an overwhelming, searing heat suddenly slammed into my senses. It carried the bitter, sulphurous heat that burned through my flesh, mixed with the scorching smell of burning vegetation. It penetrated my nose and throat and into my lungs. I felt like I'd been thrown into the crater of an erupting volcano, and even my breath was tinged with sparks.

The red magma seeped into the bone joints along the lines of the "skin". Every inch of the skin seemed to be tightly clamped by red-hot iron pliers and repeatedly scraped by the gravel in the magma.

She could clearly feel her skin burning and sticky, like wax melting in the sun, ready to flow at the slightest touch. A searing pain surged in her throat, and every breath felt like swallowing a burning coal. Even her saliva became scorching, and as it slid down her esophagus, it burned her chest, causing it to tremble.

Yunxiu subconsciously wanted to struggle and curl up his fingers to protect his heart, but he found that he had no limbs - instead, there was a huge body that was so huge that the end was out of sight.

The divine body glowed with a faint golden glow, as if cast from melted stars, and every inch of it exuded the weight of divinity.

She lowered her head and could only see the edge of the divine body blocking the erupting volcano and the village at the foot of the mountain. The red magma was rolling not far away, and the splashing sparks were hitting the divine body like a rainstorm.

“Zizi—”

The moment the magma collided with the divine body, a subtle "hiss" echoed as the divine essence evaporated. When the golden light and the crimson light collided, the splashes weren't ordinary sparks, but particles of light carrying fragments of the divine essence. When they landed on her palm, they were like countless red-hot needles, piercing deep into the divine essence, causing her to tremble with pain.

She could clearly see that the surface of the divine body was melting at a speed visible to the naked eye, and golden light flowed down along the edge like melted glass in the sun. Every drop of falling light brought with it a tearing pain - the pain did not come from the skin, but from the core of the divine essence. It was like someone was peeling off her soul bit by bit, and it was the beginning of the collapse of the divine body.

Before the burning pain could subside, the deep blue sea water, wrapped in broken wood, ship masts, and even bamboo baskets dropped by villagers when they fled, slammed into the other side of the divine body like a huge wall of water.

The chill instantly penetrated the golden barrier. It was not the coolness of mountain stream water, but ice that could freeze bones. It drilled into the divine body through the cracks and merged with the heat of magma in the chest cavity.

The two extreme pains twisted into one in the bone marrow, as if countless knives were cutting the divine essence at the same time, forming a torture more cruel than any single pain.

“Crack—”

A clear crisp sound came from the ribs of the divine body, which was the sound of being broken by huge waves.

Fine golden light leaked out from the cracks, like broken stars, falling down along the divine body. Every time a star fell, Yunxiu felt a little empty in his heart.

She could "see" that the crack was slowly widening, and the sea water was pouring in through the crack, freezing her divine essence so much that it was shrinking, while the magma on the other side was still constantly crashing into it, and the golden barrier was becoming thinner and thinner, like an eggshell that would break at any time.

The ground beneath my feet suddenly shook violently, and black mist poured out from the cracks in the ground.

The feet of the divine body were firmly trapped in the cracks, and the gravel on the ground was like sand and gravel rubbed against a knife edge, repeatedly scraping the divine essence. Every vibration made the "bones" numb, and even standing took all the strength.

Yunxiu wanted to lift her hands to support the cracked earth, to push back the rubble that was falling into the cracks. She could see villagers at the foot of the mountain, carrying their children, running to higher ground, and could hear their cries; those were the lives she wanted to protect.

The villagers at the foot of the mountain were already in chaos. Some of them were hiding behind the divine body with their crying children in their arms, some were hiding in the shadow of the divine body with their elderly parents, and some were holding tightly to the only food bag in their home.

They regarded the divine body, shimmering with golden light, as their only refuge, clinging to its edge, not daring to breathe loudly, as if by staying a little closer they could escape the lava and the surging waves. One young woman even lifted her child above her head, holding it close to the divine body's golden light, as if hoping to use this ray of light to ward off disaster. The child's cries, mingled with the adults' prayers, carried by the fluctuations of divine energy and penetrated Yunxiu's perception.

The divine body struggled to support the overwhelming weight. Lava continued to crash against the body's front, crimson streams flowing down along the golden light, burning the divine essence and causing it to tremble. Large areas of melted material appeared on the body's surface, and the golden light dimmed like a candle in the wind.

But even so, the divine body still had to spare some strength to disperse its divine power - Yunxiu could clearly feel that wisps of fine golden light seeped out from the fingertips, shoulders and neck, and even the cracks in the divine body. Some of them floated towards the erupting crater, turning into a thin ice mist, trying to slow down the speed of the magma splashing; some of them drilled into the cracks in the ground beneath their feet, like a dense spider web, tightly entangling those ever-expanding cracks, and even forcing some of the black mist back into the ground.

Every time a ray of divine power was released, the golden light of the divine body would fade a little, and the supporting force would also weaken a little.

Yunxiu could "taste" the feeling of divine energy being lost. It was like an ice cube was stuffed in his throat, making it cold and astringent, and even his breathing became sluggish.

The divine body began to tremble uncontrollably, not because of the cold, but because of exhaustion - he had to use his huge body to block the impact of the three disasters, and at the same time he had to use his divine power to suppress the spread of the disasters. The two kinds of consumption were like two blunt knives, repeatedly cutting the already shaky divine essence.

This wasn't something Yunxiu could control. Her control over divine power wasn't anywhere near this level.

This was Gao's will. On the verge of collapse, his first reaction was still "protection."