Chapter 23 The Dying Guest: He'd Rather Be a Madman.

Liu Yuhen suddenly opened his eyes, his gaze sharp as a blade. His mouth and nose gasped for air as if a drowning person had suddenly been deprived of it. The ringing in his ears quickly subsided, and his consciousness suddenly returned.

Before his gaze could focus, he hurriedly got up and called Jiaojiao's name.

His panicked expression suddenly froze when he saw the furnishings inside the house; his blood seemed to freeze in that instant, and he felt as if he had fallen into an ice cellar.

This is the guest room of the Great Golden Roc King.

How could that be? He was clearly on that rugged road deep in the mountains.

How did I end up here? Where is Jiaojiao...?

Liu Yuhen's mind went blank, and he completely lost his composure.

He was breathing with difficulty, feeling as if a thousand tiny needles were pricking his lungs. His thoughts were in complete disarray, and he had no time to think about what was happening before his eyes.

The only thing she could recall was Jiao Jiao's sickly flushed face and her burning body temperature gradually cooling down.

Jiaojiao was just an ordinary person with no internal strength and a weak body. Liu Yuhen couldn't imagine what would happen to her if he were gone, alone in the deep mountains.

This idea made his throat feel as if it were being choked by an invisible rope.

Liu Yuhen had never felt fear in his life. A person who was determined to die was naturally fearless. Even ten years ago, the word "fear" was a fantasy to him.

But now...

Like a rotten, hollowed-out tree that finally encounters flowers and grasses willing to twine around and climb.

The decaying wood blossomed, and the withered wood was finally tinged with green again, which became the lifeblood of Liu Yuhen.

He finally met someone who could keep him alive.

It was already so close...

He stumbled and rushed out, afraid that if he was even a step too slow, he would lose the only glimmer of light in the darkness.

Liu Yuhen used his internal force to force the door open. He had barely stepped out of the room when two figures were already standing outside.

It was Xiao Qiuyu and Dugu Fang.

Both of them walked towards Liu Yuhen, but the sound of their footsteps was that of only one person; Dugu Fang's footsteps were as light as a spring breeze and almost inaudible.

Xiao Qiuyu was still holding the Broken Heart Sword in his hand. Hearing the noise in the house, he thought that an uninvited guest had arrived.

Liu Yuhen was the most aloof, eccentric, and indifferent of the three. He couldn't think of any other reason that would make him act rashly in the middle of the night.

Xiao Qiuyu and Dugu Fanghui harbor murderous intent toward the blind man Hua Manlou because Lu Xiaofeng disregards them.

However, Liu Yuhen would never take the initiative to kill, simply because only the living have the will to kill and things they cannot tolerate.

He can't see people at all.

Liu Yuhen only killed those whom Shangguan Feiyan wanted to kill, people who were already on their deathbeds and lifeless, becoming a knife in Shangguan Feiyan's hand.

However, at this moment, Xiao Qiuyu's idea wavered.

There was no sound of anyone breathing inside. At such close range, unless the uninvited guest inside had practiced the art of concealing their breath, it was impossible for them not to notice.

But what struck him as even more odd was Liu Yuhen.

His hair was disheveled, his face was ferocious and terrifying, and his single, cold, scarlet eye seemed to be filled with fear and dread.

Two words that he believed could never appear on Liu Yuhen's name.

Xiao Qiuyu was already considered a close friend of Liu Yuhen, and he had never seen Liu Yuhen like this before.

He even saw unfrozen tears in that deformed, perpetually cold single eye.

Xiao Qiuyu could hardly believe that the person in front of her was the reckless Liu Yuhen.

When Liu Yuhen saw the two of them again, it felt like a lifetime had passed.

The events of those two short days made him feel as if time stretched on endlessly, enough to span the entire first half of his life.

Upon suddenly seeing these two familiar faces, it was like a ship at sea suddenly crashing into a reef, leaving him covered in blood and tearing a corner of his chaotic thoughts apart.

As if grasping at a fleeting hope, he stepped forward and grabbed Xiao Qiuyu's arm, "Where is she! Where did she go!"

His voice was like the mournful cry of a cuckoo, each note filled with blood, carrying a plea and expectation that evoked compassion.

Xiao Qiuyu's perpetually smiling, composed face finally broke free of its facade. He frowned and said, "We didn't see anyone. What's going on...?"

Dugu Fang finally couldn't hold back any longer and asked with a grim expression, "Who exactly broke into your house?"

Could it be that this person's martial arts skills have reached such a transcendent level?

It's impossible to make him and Xiao Qiuyu completely unaware, as if they were in an empty place.

In another room where no lights were on, Lu Xiaofeng listened to the commotion outside and couldn't help but ask Hua Manlou with his eyes.

Hua Manlou sat by the window, gazing at him, and shook his head slightly.

Even with Hua Manlou's hearing, he couldn't tell that someone had broken into the room. Was this person incredibly skilled in lightness skills, or was there simply no such person at all?

Lu Xiaofeng already felt that everything here was unusual, and now he was even more suspicious.

However, upon hearing Xiao Qiuyu and Dugu Fang's replies and seeing their expressions upon first seeing him, Liu Yuhen felt as if a bucket of cold water had been suddenly poured over an iron sword being forged in a raging fire. With a hiss, a cacophony of sounds arose in his mind.

He swallowed hard, suppressing the bitter taste rising in his throat, and heard himself ask, trying to remain calm, "When did I get back?"

His voice was extremely hoarse, like a venomous snake whose throat had been pecked out.

Xiao Qiuyu frowned even more, and asked in confusion, "Didn't the three of us come back together?"

A hint of disbelief flashed in Liu Yuhen's dark eyes. He shook his head, his voice cracking, and his breathing unsteady as he said, "I... I wasn't gone for two days."

"You haven't seen me for two days, haven't you... haven't you!"

Xiao Qiuyu looked at the seemingly crazed Liu Yuhen with a strange gaze, and slowly said, "Yesterday, we came back together. Before nightfall, before Brother Dugu and I went to kill that blind man, we met you. Brother Liu, what's wrong with you?"

Liu Yuhen couldn't answer his question at all. He was breathing heavily, and his world was spinning around in the face of this answer, ultimately turning upside down completely.

He clearly met Jiaojiao in that deep green mountain.

Two days, it's been two days already...

He's lying to me.

He remembered Jiao Jiao's eyes, eyebrows, posture, tone of voice, and every single detail clearly.

He also clearly remembers every detail of everything that happened in the mountains.

This is real, not an illusion.

Jiaojiao is still waiting for him to take her down the mountain to get treatment in the deep mountains; he cannot stay here.

She'll die... She'll die.

Nothing could stop him now. He trembled with panic and ran out like a madman, muttering to himself, "Yu Qingshan... Yu Qingshan..."

Dugu Fang sensed that something was wrong with him, so he reached out to stop him, frowning as he said, "Liu Yuhen, are you crazy? Wake up."

Liu Yuhen's heart was filled only with that secluded forest and the girl on the mountain path whose tears soaked his clothes.

He was about to shake off the person blocking his way, but as soon as he raised his hand, his gaze involuntarily fell on the person's sleeve.

His eyes trembled, and he seemed to have lost all his strength in an instant.

The garment was still his unchanging black robe, but clearly back in the Boiling Spring, he had already draped it over Jiao Jiao's shoulders.

What made him even more unable to control himself was that the cuffs of the garment were supposed to be torn.

Because at the very beginning of their encounter, he had already cut a strip of cloth from the cuff with an iron hook. That strip of cloth should have been haphazardly wrapped around Jiao Jiao's hand, not reappearing intact on his sleeve.

He suddenly felt that everything in the world was so absurd.

Liu Yuhen raised his right wrist, which contained the iron ball, and carefully examined the cuff.

His legs went weak for a moment, and his heart went blank.

It was as if a thick fog had rolled in, and he was completely oblivious to everything within it.

He staggered into the room of Hua Manlou like a drunkard, his steps unsteady.

Completely ignoring the need to knock, he completely forgot Lu Xiaofeng's remark that only wild dogs would jump through the window without thinking.

He rushed in recklessly, more frantic than a wild dog, and asked in a trembling voice in the direction of Hua Manlou and Lu Xiaofeng, "What day of the month is it today?"

However, the answer he received disappointed him once again.

In an instant, it felt as if someone had ruthlessly thrown into a cold and eerie cellar like a spoiled dog.

He stood there, waiting for someone to tear him to pieces.

Why...?

The tinnitus echoed loudly, seemingly trying to drive him mad, and his disheveled hair and ferocious expression made him look almost like a real madman.

So, was that reflection that briefly appeared in the summer night just a fleeting dream? Or perhaps it was something he imagined while he was asleep, poisoned by some kind of intoxicating fragrance?

His blood rushed to his head, and suddenly a large mouthful of blood gushed out.

But he was completely oblivious; only piercing pain and sorrow remained in that single, terrifying eye.

Everyone was telling him that there were no deep mountains, no Jiaojiao, no encounters from those two days; it was all a dream he had because he longed to be loved too much.

He had finally encountered a bright, shining moon in his cold and hopeless life, but now he was being told that it was all just a dream.

When a certain hope is dashed, it feels like your heart has been hollowed out.

Dream?

Liu Yuhen lowered his head in resentment.

He was willing to admit that he was a pathetic wretch and could lose everything, but he just didn't want to lose that little girl with two small moles at the corners of her eyes who would affectionately depend on him.

He abruptly turned and left, leaving all the past behind.

What a grand dream.

They're all fake.

Liu Yuhen's figure disappeared into the dark night, disappearing into the hazy moonlight.

No one knows what's wrong with this man who's almost killed himself, where he's going, or what he's going to do.

But no one could stop him; no one could stop a dying man desperately seeking a lifeline.

Only Liu Yuhen knew that he would rather be a madman.

A note from the author:

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