98 The Truth (VIII)
◎Dream◎
"Junior Sister, why did you speak up for that devil just now? You saw how he framed me and dissected my golden core," Qu Lingfei sighed, regretting not having taken this opportunity to put an end to that devil. "He's right. If we let him go today, we'll just have to wait for him to die."
"There's no point in saying this now," Qiu Yan said, feeling quite annoyed. "I don't think he intended to kill you. Otherwise, even a deity wouldn't be able to save you."
"Never mind. I won't argue with you." Qu Lingfei waved his hand and pulled a shining fragment from his sleeve. "Thankfully, I successfully retrieved the treasure from that devil. I'll hand it over to Master now. He'll definitely have a solution."
Qiuyan stared at the glowing black jade, hesitating whether to speak, but someone next to her spoke first: "If you two are determined to desert, then I will go and save my sister myself."
Qu Lingfei was very displeased when he heard this: "City Lord Qi, what you said is really harsh. What do you mean by us two are deserters? It was clearly your junior sister who just…"
He stopped talking before he could finish his words.
No matter what, they were partners who had lived and died together, and what's more, Atang had saved his life, so he could never say anything to slander her.
"Wait," he said, reaching out to stop the person from leaving. "You're no match for that demon. Why don't you come with me and my junior sister to the Immortal Realm? Then the elders of the Immortal Sect will join forces to fight him, and we'll definitely be able to capture him alive."
"You're the only one who would believe what those idiots in the Immortal Realm say," Qi He sneered. Without giving him a chance to refute, he turned and left, leaving only one sentence: "Before you question me, you might as well find out what your good master has done to maintain peace in the Three Realms!"
"You..." Qu Lingfei's face suddenly changed. He rushed forward and tried to grab the other person's sleeve. "You can scold me, but what does it have to do with my master?"
Qi He didn't even turn his head, raised his hand impatiently, and knocked the person who rushed up to the ground.
“Senior Brother!”
Qiu Yan hurried forward to help him up. After Qi He walked away, she whispered, "Brother, you shouldn't have been so impulsive just now. Besides, even if our combined cultivation levels are lower than his."
"Junior sister, did I...did I do something wrong?"
Her eyes softened and she sighed helplessly: "I'm not blaming you, but next time..."
"No, that's not what I'm talking about," he held his head in his hands, his eyes filled with pain. "Just now...just now I actually doubted Master. I shouldn't have done that. I shouldn't have doubted Master. Master has lived an upright life, always thinking of the people. How could he do something to harm others?"
Unexpectedly, he reacted so violently. Qiu Yan was speechless for a moment, staring at him silently.
She was also unwilling to doubt her master, but everything seemed to challenge her ideas - even if what her master said that day was true, Atang was kidnapped and so many of his fellow disciples died at the hands of the enemy, but he was still able to stay in the fairyland for many days without being alarmed, and did not think about killing the devil to save people and avenge his disciples.
There was another thing that she never dared to think about in detail. Every time she thought about it, her scalp would go numb and it seemed as if all the blood in her body had frozen.
"Brother, there's something you might have noticed," she paused, organizing her words under his bewildered gaze. "Master always treated you well. He gave you the best swords. Even when we went down the mountain together to exorcise the evil spirit, he gave you the life-saving treasure. If you hadn't told me, I would never have known about this. But when your golden core was cut open and you lay dying on the bed, he didn't even try to save you. Now, even though you haven't recovered for some time, he lets you go to the demon world alone to take risks..."
"Stop talking!" Qu Lingfei interrupted her. The cold moonlight spread across the road ahead, but he felt a little lost. "Are you saying that Master accepted me as his disciple and treated me well because of the golden elixir in my body?"
She was silent for a while, then looked behind him and said, "Master is here, just go ask him yourself."
He was startled and quickly turned around to look, only to find that there was nothing behind him. Then his palm suddenly felt empty and the black jade was snatched away by someone.
"Junior sister, you..."
Before he could finish his words, he suddenly felt his whole body stiffen and he couldn't say the rest.
Qiu Yan raised her hand and pointed at his acupoint, then deftly put the black jade away where he couldn't see it. "Brother, I'm sorry, but I can't trust anyone right now, so I'll keep this thing for the time being."
Qu Lingfei looked up at her, but was speechless.
Thinking it was about time, she untied his tube, and he immediately half-knelt on the ground and started coughing violently.
She bent down slightly and looked into his eyes: "Brother, you won't betray me when we meet Master later, right?"
“…”
He was speechless for a long while, then could only nod in cooperation.
*
The candlelight in the room went out, the light reflected in the pupils disappeared, and the surroundings immediately fell into darkness. Li Jintang was stunned and reached out to grope: "What are you doing? Didn't we agree not to hide anything from me..."
"I won't lie to you." In the darkness, he took her hand and gently kissed it. "Close your eyes and count ten in your mind. You will see the answer."
Li Jintang didn't understand what he was doing, but he still did as he was told. When he counted to the tenth number, he heard a crisp sound beside his ears, and then the surroundings seemed to start to brighten.
"Are you okay? I need to open my eyes."
"Um."
She hesitantly opened her eyes, and the dazzling sunlight made her feel uncomfortable for a moment. She instinctively raised her hands to cover her eyes, and then she realized that it was a bit strange - it was clearly dark just now, how could the sunlight come in?
She heard a few bird calls, put down her hands, looked around in confusion, and was surprised to find that she was beside a stream and there was a mountain that stretched as far as the eye could see.
Huh? Wasn't she just...
Still...
Where is she?
Li Jintang looked down at the river and thought for a long time without coming up with an answer, until another figure was reflected on the river. She ran over and hugged him as if she had grabbed a life-saving straw, as if only in this way could she find a little sense of security.
"Xie An," she raised her head, her eyes confused, "Where is this? Why are we suddenly here?"
Xie Changyan smiled and tucked a strand of her hair, which had been blown by the wind, behind her ear. "Look back."
"Tang'er——"
She was startled, and as soon as she turned around, she was hugged in someone's arms.
The wind seemed to have stopped all around.
"...Sister?"
The girl let go of her and reached out to gently pinch her cheek. "Why did it take you so long to go down the mountain to collect herbs? My father and mother are so worried about us, don't you know?"
Upon hearing this, Li Jintang looked behind him and saw two other people holding hands and walking slowly towards them along the stream.
It was like a bunch of fireworks suddenly exploded in her heart. She ran forward and hugged the woman, burying her head in her shoulder, "Mother, I missed you so much."
Fairy Yunsu patted her back to comfort her and said with a smile, "You, it's only been less than a day since you came down the mountain, and you miss your mother so much? What will you do when you get married in the future?"
"Then I won't marry and will stay with you all my life," Li Jintang said. Suddenly, she realized something was wrong and looked up at her blankly. "Mother, I was only gone for less than a day?"
Before A-niang could reply, Immortal Master Mingxin walked right past them, smiled, and bowed, saying, "Thank you so much, sir, for taking the trouble to bring my daughter back. What should I address you as?"
Li Jintang turned his head, his eyes passing through the layers of leaves. The moment his eyes met those of the young man in white, the corners of his lips curled up slightly, and ripples seemed to appear in his eyes like spring water.
She didn't know if it was an illusion, but at that moment it seemed as if all time had stopped. She raised her head and saw that her mother's smile was frozen on her lips, and the river water at her feet had stopped flowing.
"Xie An, what's going on?"
She was confused, everything was so strange. It was like she had lost a part of her memory, and now she felt that this feeling was somewhat familiar, but she couldn't put her finger on why.
"Why did my sister and mother say that I went to collect herbs? I clearly didn't," Li Jintang pulled him, his tone filled with anxiety, "Hurry up and tell them that we went..."
“I went…”
She paused, her eyes changing from certainty to confusion: "Where did we go?"
"You didn't go anywhere," Xie Changyan lowered his eyes and smiled, "You just accidentally got lost, and I brought you back."
"……Really?"
The words echoed on the surface of the river, urging the fish in the river to swim as usual. Li Jintang came back to his senses and saw the young man bowing gracefully to his father and returning the greeting: "It's just a small favor, nothing to mention."
Her elder sister came over and took her hand, and her parents kindly invited her "savior" to their home. It should have been an extremely heartwarming scene, but at this moment she always felt that something was wrong.
She must have forgotten someone or something, but did it matter?
Just as he was daydreaming, he suddenly felt a lightness on his back. Li Jintang turned around and saw that the young man had naturally taken off the burden he was carrying and was holding it in one hand.
He smiled and said, "Of course I will do it."
Li Jintang stared at him for a long time, then reached out and pinched his waist hard.
This time, without holding back at all, Xie Changyan suppressed his smile, his eyes filled with confusion: "What's wrong?"
She looked at the three people walking in front of her, then suddenly stood on tiptoe and leaned close to his ear, whispering, "I want to see if you're real."
A cold wind blew into the room through the cracks, and the flames on the table flickered unsteadily, like bent grass. In the dim candlelight, he leaned over and carefully lifted the girl from his arms, gently pulling the blanket over her.
The person standing beside the bed had a complicated expression: "Master, is this really necessary?"
"I have no other choice."
Xie Changyan lowered his eyes and stared at her sleeping face, his two hands clasped together under the quilt - she would probably never wake up again, of course, this was what he wanted to see.
"Anything else?"
"Master, I dare to think this is inappropriate," Nangong Xiu said, his brow furrowed as he bowed. "You are still seriously injured. Creating such a huge dream would easily cause a significant loss of spiritual power, which would be difficult to recover. Forgive my frankness, but Miss Li will find out everything sooner or later. Why bother hiding it?"
"She doesn't need to know."
As if afraid of waking up from a beautiful dream, he stood up and walked outside the house, bent over and coughed up a mouthful of blood.
"metropolitan……"
"It's okay," Xie Changyan raised his hand to wipe the blood from his lips and looked back at the girl in the house. "She wants to go home so much and see her family, but reality is too cruel. I'm afraid she won't be able to accept it."
Then let him bear it all, and she just needs to sleep forever in the "beautiful dream" created by him, neither feeling pain nor... forgetting him.
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