101. Doubts
The heavenly punishment soon dissipated, and the gloomy energy that had just covered the sky was completely cleared away. Even the mountain walls were charred black, the grass and trees all turned to ashes, and the ground was covered with burnt rubble.
Qing Ling didn't walk too far. After the thunderclouds dispersed, he went back to take a look at Shang Changheng's tomb. The tomb was devastated by the thunder. The coffin and bones were gone. Only a bronze human figure was left lying in the scorched earth tomb - so what was buried here were Shang Changheng's legs.
Head, torso, arms, legs, four graves have collected Shang Changheng's remains.
On the way back, Qingling kept wondering, what was in the fifth tomb?
Empty tomb?
"Qingling." Shang Changheng's voice suddenly came out of Huanlong Perry. Although he was still calm, one could also hear the weakness that he tried hard to control. "After leaving the mountain, you drive north. There is a small town ten miles away. Rest there for a while."
"Okay." Qing Ling still held the jade pendant in one hand. He had not had time to treat the burns on his face and body, nor had he had time to change his clothes.
Zhu Lezhi and Miao Yuan, who had withstood the thunderbolt, were not much better off. The three of them looked at each other and decided that each of them would drive for a while. Qingling would be with them for the last part of the journey. He was no longer the young man who was ignorant of the world and knew nothing at the foot of Zhanlong Mountain. When he first set out on the road, he couldn't even pull the reins.
There is indeed a small town ten miles away from the mountains, and it also has the bamboo stair fields unique to Ningzhou, but it is much larger than the villages separated by mountains in the mountains. Perhaps because of the continuous drizzle, the street market is not very lively, with only a few small stalls selling wild vegetables with umbrellas.
This town is also very small, and usually not many people come here. There is only one deserted inn where you can stay overnight.
Qingling was wearing a cloak, but it couldn't hide the burns and dishevelled look on his face, so when he asked for a room, the guy behind the counter hesitated for a long time, and finally handed over the key tremblingly under the gaze of Qingling's dark eyes.
Qing Ling paid them to boil three more buckets of hot water. The two people who had accompanied him all the way should also wash themselves properly. Soon after Qing Ling finished bathing and asked the waiter to move the tub out, there was another knock on the door. Miao Yuan's voice came from outside: "You didn't bring the medicine. I left it at your door."
When Qingling pushed open the door, there was only a small porcelain bottle on the ground.
He held the porcelain bottle in his hand and was stunned for a moment - he didn't expect that these two people would lend a helping hand at that time.
The mighty power of heavenly punishment was far beyond human power to contend with, not to mention Shang Changheng, a thousand-year-old evil spirit. The thunder did hurt a mortal like him, so at that time... standing on the standpoint of the Yinxing disciples who could barely maintain order between the Yin and Yang worlds, letting them both die together in the heavenly punishment was the safest way.
But they chose to withstand the thunder and pave a way out for him and Shang Changheng.
The moment Qingling closed the door and turned around, he ran into a cold embrace, and before he could react, the medicine bottle in his hand was taken away.
"I'll help you." Shang Changheng said softly, "The injury is on the back of the shoulder, you can't touch it."
His face was so pale.
Qingling thought that he looked even weaker than before, and even his body was not as solid as before. His voice was light and floating, like a wisp of mountain wind that could not be grasped.
He also took on a bolt of lightning in the heavenly punishment. Although there was no visible injury on the evil spirit's body, Qingling knew that Shang Changheng was not feeling well at the moment.
"Okay." He agreed softly, took off his shirt and sat on the small bed in the bamboo house, which was spacious enough for one person but could accommodate two people.
Shang Changheng carefully applied the colorless ointment on his wounds. There were no large, connected burns on Qingling's body, but there were quite a few scattered burns on his chest, back, legs, neck and face. For injuries like this, applying ointment alone would not be enough. He should... take some more medicine.
When the medicine was applied, the thin and frail Qingling trembled with pain but remained silent.
Shang Changheng remained silent, but his eyes were heavy and dark, filled with helpless sadness and heartache - from the moment Qingling ran towards him without hesitation, Shang Changheng knew how inseparable his existence was to Qingling.
His wife came to rescue him in the midst of thunder and lightning.
For a moment, Shang Changheng didn’t know whether he should regret it or not. He tied Qingling to his side like this. What would happen next? What path should Qingling take from now on?
When the ointment was half dry, Shang Changheng helped Qingling put on his undershirt, then reached out and gently stroked his bloodless face.
There was no conversation between them, only the sound of the drizzle. Qingling had more injuries on his back, so he lay on his side, pressing down on his uninjured arm, and asked first, "Changheng."
Shang Changheng thought of the countless things he might say next, such as "Who is that female ghost?" and "What's going on with these five graves?" But in the end, Qingling only asked softly, "Are you seriously injured?"
——After being hit directly by the heavenly thunder, Shang Changheng was actually very weak. He was in pain all over. The pain of having his soul burned was no joke. Fortunately, he had suffered a lot under the tomb for the past thousand years and could still pretend to be unmoved. But after Qingling asked this question, Shang Changheng didn't know how to answer for a moment.
Qing Ling asked again: "Do you need me?"
Shang Changheng understood what he meant immediately. In fact, the word "需" should be removed from this sentence, but Qingling was shy and timid, so he said it in an obscure and serious manner.
He is a rare and powerful medicine. Whether you eat him with his skin and bones peeled off, or swallow him with his soul and spirit, it is a great tonic for evil spirits - of course, the same goes for being intimate with him.
Qing Ling himself knew that the heavenly thunder had suppressed Shang Changheng too harshly, so he wanted to use himself as medicine for Shang Changheng to help him recover as soon as possible. However, he himself was now covered in wounds.
"I need you." Shang Changheng sat aside, reached out and gently touched Qingling's cheek, and said with a smile: "I have always needed you, Qingling. Not long ago... you rushed into the thunder to rescue me. No one has ever-"
He paused here, unable to continue, and just smiled, "Take a good rest."
No one would ever save him from desperate situations.
Shang Changheng thought in his heart.
Qing Ling grabbed his hand, which was so cold that it didn't even have a trace of human warmth. But in fact, Shang Changheng could usually control himself to be as cool as jade.
"Chang Heng..." Qing Ling suddenly choked up for a moment, then quickly calmed down. He pursed his lips and whispered, "Let's go back."
"Go back?" Shang Changheng looked at him.
"Go back, go back to Lincang." Qing Ling grabbed his hand with a little more force, "No matter how much time we have left, let's be together... maybe, maybe you can stay with me until we grow old. Let's not go anywhere, okay?"
Qingling, who had always wanted to see the mountains and rivers, seemed to be tired after the long journey in the wind and snow, like a tired bird wanting to return to its nest.
But his partner remained silent.
In the long silence, the answer was obvious. Qing Ling propped himself up and sat up, moving closer to Shang Changheng little by little until he kissed his cold lips.
At first, there was only Qingling's gentle kiss. At some point, Shang Changheng lifted up the uninjured half of his face and kissed him back more forcefully and passionately, as if he wanted to hold the injured Qingling in his arms and merge his soul into him.
After the kiss, Qingling was panting so hard that even the corners of his eyes turned red.
"Qingling, it's not over yet." Shang Changheng whispered, "I've seen the evil spirit guarding the tomb in Rongzhangling."
Qing Ling didn't know why he suddenly brought this up, but he sensed that the other party's tone was slightly heavy, so he asked, "Who is she?"
Shang Changheng said in a deep voice: "It was... the meat and food that the Dongyi people had taken away. After we rescued them, they followed the army for more than three months."
"Follow the army?" Qingling was slightly stunned.
"Yes." Shang Changheng carefully avoided Qingling's injured shoulder and waist, and gently asked him to lie on his shoulder face to face, and said softly: "The relatives of the soldiers sometimes follow the army. She... was the only one who was rescued from the Dongyi camp and was alive. At that time, she was already pregnant. She got pregnant when she was imprisoned by the Dongyi. The doctor accompanying the army said that she was four months pregnant. She was weak. If she was forced to abort... I'm afraid there would be two deaths. So she had to be sent to be taken care of by the relatives accompanying the army. I heard Hou Su mention her. Her name is Lan Ying'er."
Four months, but when she died, she must have been about to give birth.
Qing Ling hesitated and asked, "Then do you know how she died?"
"I don't know." Shang Changheng shook his head. "It's really inconvenient to leave a pregnant woman in the army, even if there are relatives to take care of her. What's more, the army is rushing to attack. She can't bear it. Once, Qing Jie came to the front again and said that he wanted to send the soldiers with intact bodies back home, so he asked him to take Lan Ying'er back to Lucheng."
Qing Ling couldn't believe it: "…Send them back to their hometown? At that time? What about Lan Ying'er? She didn't look like she died in childbirth."
After asking, Qing Ling was suddenly stunned, and recalled the thousand-year-old evil spirit suppressed at the foot of Zhanlong Mountain, the evil corpses in Huangshan Ridge and Cangjun Mountain, Zuo Baichuan who had been buried but was still dug out and taken away, and those... soldiers who kept their bodies intact. Zuo Baichuan, Wei Qingxia and Hou Su had all become evil corpses and were still sealed under the tomb!
What is Qing Jie going to do with these corpses after taking them back?
He wants to refine the corpse!
But there is no need for that. Qingling doesn’t understand. What next after refining the corpse? Instead of using it to fight against the Dongyi people on the battlefield, why was it placed in Shang Changheng's tomb to watch over him? Or maybe they had wanted to sacrifice Shang Changheng a long time ago, and out of a little guilt, they wanted him and his good brothers who fought alongside him to be together forever. Everyone was buried neatly in the tomb, except Shang Changheng, who was divided into four parts.
This doesn't make sense.
Qingjie he——
"He has other purposes." Shang Changheng slowly expressed Qing Ling's suspicions that he could not express. "Qing Jie never showed his true colors in his early years. He only did his duties as the Grand Master. But later... Shang Changjun trusted him very much. In fact, at that time, I even suspected that if Qing Jie raised his arms and shouted that human sacrifice was the right way, then the people of Da Zhou would also become human sacrifices of the noble families."
"But he didn't."
"Even..." Shang Changheng gently stroked Qingling's head and continued, "He has denounced the Dongyi people for being ignorant and stupid more than once."
Qing Jie was an expert who could predict the fate of a country back then, so it was understandable that he looked down on the Dongyi people's sacrificial rituals, which were useless.
But what he did was not necessarily aboveboard.
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