Chapter 11

Li He was unaware of the wound on his shoulder, nor of the blood on the ground. Only the wind blew through him, and he no longer had the strength to stand. Jiang Er also melted into the silence, waiting for Li He to recover. He remained kneeling there, his head raised only to drop again. He had only come to draw water from the well a few times, and he didn't recognize the dead person by the well. He just... just something. He could only force himself not to think about it anymore, exhaling a breath of air and leaving behind a long sigh.

The blood clot in his throat seemed to have lingered. He picked up the loosened branch, his voice hoarse and unable to utter a word. He wanted to tell Jiang Er to follow him. Li He glanced back at Jiang Er, opening his mouth several times but failing to produce the desired sound. So he tactfully returned to his usual silence, even if it was far from his usual. He walked along the village road, where there would no longer be scattered smoke rising from cooking fires, nor the crowing of cocks at dawn.

He felt his memory was a bit hazy. How long had he been gone? It felt as if he had just left yesterday, yet it also felt like ages had passed. Corpses lay everywhere along the village roads and at doorways, occasionally one or two belonging to the Hu people. Their scimitars were stained with a thick layer of blood, and they had their eyes closed. But most of the villagers kept their eyes open, staring straight up at the sky, until the birds pecked away the flesh on their faces.

Li He walked on, unconcerned about whether Jiang Er caught up or not. He took step after step, the cold wind piercing his flesh. The sun's temperature grew colder, its rays stinging his eyes, drying the unshed tears. He suddenly walked extremely fast, finding strength from nowhere, following the path he remembered, to find the old man's home.

He found the old man, lying beneath a straw mat, blood pouring from his chest, flowing out over the eaves. The mat was blown to shreds by the wind, and the youngest child lay there, his mat stained red by blood, then black. Li He stared blankly at the old friends he had just said goodbye to; they were, after all, his old friends.

He could still remember how, on mornings like this, the old man would always wake first at the rooster's crow, dragging his cramped legs and beginning to cough violently. Then he would go to build a fire and boil some vegetable soup. The youngest would sleep a little longer, only to start clamoring in the fields when the warm air drifted into the house. The birds hadn't yet arrived, and the cold winter wind had carried away the lingering smell of blood.

Li He thought, they just kept the same look as they did in life, as if they were not dead. He clenched his fists again, closed his eyes and thought that they were indeed dead. The old man would no longer drag his legs to the well with the youngest in the evening to fetch water, nor would he carry a basket to the shop in the city to sell dried herbs in the morning like this. The youngest would no longer get up early in the morning to go into the mountains to pick herbs for the old man, nor would he gently pat the old man on the back when he coughed. They no longer had to worry about the grain tax for the coming year, nor did they have to worry about food and clothing during the coldest days of the year.

He squeezed out a hoarse voice, "Brother Jiang, please find some firewood. Let's start a fire." Then he bent over and began to cough, trying to cough out the blood stuck in his throat and chest. Or maybe it wasn't there at all. It was just a pent-up anger that was stuck in his heart, unable to be relieved.

Li He found the hoe that the youngest used to collect herbs from the thatched cottage and dug up the hard sand. He repeated this action with the strength that came out of nowhere and began to dig shallow pits in the ground. He was still silent as usual, as if a long time had passed. He once advised the old man that the winter in Longxi was too cold, and if there was a chance, he could take the youngest to the south to have a look.

It mattered, they died just like that. The coagulated blood spread out before him, and he could barely hold the hoe, so he knelt on the ground and dug at the gravel and gravel in the pit with his hands.

Only if the pit was deep enough would wild animals not dig up the body and eat the rotting flesh. He suddenly thought of the bottomless sand pit in his dream. Such a pit would be perfect, big enough for the old man and the youngest child to live in, enjoying a long, peaceful sleep underground. Even as the gravel scratched his palms and drew blood, he continued digging.

Jiang Er gathered a bundle of dry grass and found a flint to light a fire. He accepted Li He's silence, believing nothing should disturb him. He reasoned that the neighbor who had given Li He herbs was now lying on the ground. He understood what Li He did. The weak flames flickered, and the warm winter sun lost its warmth. Black smoke rose from the haystack, and he closed his eyes, no longer observing the others' grief. He had witnessed this kind of grief too many times over the years, and it only grew fresher with time, making him feel more and more connected to himself.

Li He clutched his aching chest, picked up his hoe again, and began digging. By sunset, the shapeless pit had widened and deepened slightly. He plunged his machete into the ground, propped himself up, and, standing up, he embraced the frozen corpse and placed it in the newly dug pit.

He saw the old man and the youngest child lying together, and he didn't move the straw mat covering the youngest child. Li He just watched, kneeling beside the pit, scooping up handfuls of the excavated soil with his palms and sprinkling them on them. The blood on their bodies was covered by the sand, as if they were just asleep, and would wake up again in the morning at dawn. Their faces were covered by the sand, and Li He felt that he had been away for too long, so long that he had forgotten their faces, their voices, and their appearance, even though they were right in front of him. They were covered by the sand, and Li He pulled out his machete and pressed it on the sand that was above the ground, compacting it so that it would not be dug out by wild animals.

He could only pile the nearby stones together to serve as a tombstone for them. Li He knelt, or rather, collapsed to the ground, forehead touching the sand, eyes closed to soothe the pain that prevented him from crying. He was completely drained of energy, no strength to tell himself to move forward, no strength to process the pain that ripped through his body. He was in no position to ask why. No one would ever give him a proper answer. Everyone dies, at every moment, in the blazing desert, in the desolate and uninhabited Longxi.

He could no longer hear anything, his ears ringing with a pain in his brain. He couldn't hear the gurgling creek, nor could he hear the voices of his old friends. The old man and the youngest child, like his mother, father, sister, and brother, had lost their voices and faces in his mind. They would only come back to life one day in a dream, to show him the way home. But where could he go back to?

Li He awoke with this question, stumbling to retrieve the dried herbs the old man had left in the house. They were piled like weeds in a corner, so the barbarians wouldn't take them. He found a pot and set it over the fire, boiling the drinkable portion. He knew nothing about pharmacology, so he could only boil the herbs the old man had thrown in, like weeds.

"Little brother..." Jiang Er uttered the words "my condolences," silently. He placed the blackened vegetable soup in front of Li He, not thinking of Li He's hands stained with blood and gravel, not thinking of those silent eyes, not thinking of what had happened here. He remained silent, neither asking nor answering, waiting for Li He to recover. He knew that Li He had to recover.

Li He lifted the heavy bowl with his hands and poured the bitter, hot broth down his throat. The heat threatened to scald his entire body, his hollow flesh fuzzing with the flowing bitterness and heat. The hunger in his stomach, the ruptured wound in his shoulder, and the stinging in his hands wouldn't wake him. Li He was used to this pain, but he stared blankly at the ground. The village had become empty. Perhaps, many years from now, when someone returned, they would find only exposed bones covered in sand and gravel.

He laughed at his own thoughts. He knew full well that he had only had a chance to return here after a defeat. He also knew full well that those who left the village would simply remain on the battlefield in another form. They might not even be left with a complete body. Their swords would be taken from them, their armor stripped from them. Fire would blacken their flesh, rain would drown them. Birds would eat the edible carrion, and wild beasts would drag away their bones and gnaw on them.

They would never be buried together, and no one would bury them. Li He acknowledged this. He hadn't had the chance to bury the man who died on the battlefield, nor did he have the energy to bury the others in the village who died at the hands of the barbarians. He emptied his bowl of soup, holding it, and forced himself to accept the dead silence.

The clouds seemed to have avoided the moon tonight, and even the moonlight, generously shining across the village, filled Li He's view with a full moon. Jiang Er lay on the ground and fell asleep. They had been walking for a long time, their strength exhausted. Li He kept his eyes open, the lump in his chest growing larger and larger. He couldn't understand this night, this full moon.

Why can't we be reunited on a full moon like this? Why does this full moon only appear on nights like this? Li He buried his head in his arms and laughed silently with a hoarse voice.

He mocked himself for not being able to see through all this, yet he couldn't help but accept all this he didn't want to. He was truly powerless. He tried to convince himself with hatred, but who should he hate? The barbarians who had massacred the people? How could he guarantee that the barbarians who died under their swords weren't villagers like him? He tried to convince himself with regret, but the old man and the youngest child weren't old friends. They were just casual acquaintances, spending a month together. He repaid their debt with himself, a debt that fulfilled their demands. He tried to convince himself with the future, but he couldn't see the path back home clearly, and it was hard to see himself embarking on that path.

How should he convince himself?

[1] A handful of soil, but the more familiar sentence should be Luo Binwang’s: A handful of soil is not yet dry, where is the six-foot lonely man?