Chapter 13 Stay close to me, I'll protect you from death...
They were too close, and their relationship didn't seem to be close enough for them to hug each other. So she awkwardly lay in Ming Shu's arms. Ming Shu, feeling unsteady in his embrace from her movements, warned, "Don't move."
He noticed Shi Wenzhe's discomfort and reassured him, "I don't mind."
Shi Wenzhe: "..." "No, that's not what I meant either, oh well... never mind."
He put Shi Wenzhe down. He wondered if it was Shi Wenzhe's imagination, but she felt that since they entered the ancestral hall, the roaring outside had become much quieter, as if the rotting corpses and bones were very far away from them. So the sense of urgency she had felt earlier suddenly disappeared.
Ming Shu looked around the ancestral hall and felt a bit overwhelmed. The facilities in the ancestral hall were old and simple, with nothing sturdy. They were basically all decorations made of mud. Moreover, after so many years of wind and sun exposure, those things were already broken and useless. How could they possibly withstand the surging piles of white bones?
"Sigh." He couldn't help but sigh, somewhat frustrated: "If I had known, I would have repaired it for you when I left. The clay statue... is utterly useless."
Shi Wen pressed her swollen ankle and found that it didn't hurt at all. She thought, "It probably hurt a lot." But that suited her just the way she wanted it. She didn't want to be a useless burden in a time of crisis.
The ancestral hall was indeed old, with many withered grasses and fallen leaves from who-knows-when remaining. She could hear the sound of rummaging around, trying to find a handy tool to use as a weapon, but she only found an unnamed plaque in the corner. Holding the plaque, her throat tightened, and she couldn't bring herself to laugh.
Ming Shu seemed to be hit hard, covering his face and unwilling to face it. He turned around decisively and walked towards the door.
Shi Wenzhe hesitated, then reached out to stop him: "Um... there's no rush... going out to die..." The next second, he saw Ming Shu pull out... uh, pull out? from his sleeve with a clanging sound.
Shi Wenzhe slowly typed a question mark, while Ming Shu pulled out an empty shell.
She was so angry she laughed.
Provoked by the laughter, Ming Shu's fox-like eyes almost spit fire. He spun around in anger, baring his teeth at Shi Wenzhe: "Don't laugh! I'm poor! The longer you know me, the more you'll know that I, Ming Shu, am a penniless pauper!" He scratched his head, his once neatly combed long hair now a mess, making him look like a beggar.
The plaque that had been hailed as a sign of shock was even knocked down.
"I'm so angry! Why doesn't His Majesty give me more pocket money? I don't even have many suitable natal magic weapons! Damn it, damn it, damn it."
If Su Bian heard the harsh words, a flash of green light appeared, and she lashed out at Ming Shu, striking him squarely on the head.
So the two of them started fighting, each wielding a whip.
Shi Wenzhe was amazed and could only whisper a reminder: "Don't submit a formal petition."
"Stop hitting Ruosu."
"Stop fighting, brothers, the enemy is at our doorstep."
A sudden gust of wind blew the door open, making a noisy, hoarse sound, finally bringing the brawl, which had neither started nor ended in sight, to a halt.
Ruosu seemed startled by the accident and couldn't help but rub against Mingshu's shoulder, quietly shrinking down and wrapping herself around his wrist.
Shi Wenzhe, like a startled rabbit, tiptoed to Ming Shu's side and squatted down in an inconspicuous corner.
"Did you hear anything?" she asked softly.
Ming Shu looked left and right, then innocently said, "No."
Shi Wenzhe almost cried: "It's strange precisely because there isn't one."
She and Ming Shu stared at each other, and Ming Shu finally realized what was happening and said dryly, "Yeah, that's right, where are those rotting corpses and bones?" He even tilted his head after saying that, looking quite cute.
Shi Wen was so agitated that he closed his eyes.
“That’s so stupid,” she said.
“You’re right, but being silly isn’t your fault. You don’t need to belittle yourself,” Ming Shu comforted him.
Shi Wenzhe closed her eyes again, took two deep breaths to calm herself down, afraid of being so angry that she would die.
Ming Shu stared blankly, his fox-like eyes wide and round.
"So pure, so incredibly pure," she murmured.
Ming Shu leaned closer to listen: "What did you say?"
Shi Wenzhe laughed and said, "I'd say you're a purebred husky."
Ming Shu: "What is that?"
"A dog."
Ming Shu, whose tail had been stepped on, blinked and mumbled an explanation, "I'm a fox..." But seeing Shi Wenzhe's utterly despondent expression, he could only swallow his unfinished words.
The door was blown by the wind again, hitting the wall and bouncing back up, seemingly about to fall apart, making a faint sound. Ming Shu was facing the statue, and the wind blowing from behind him blew up his long hair. Those few strands of white hair had completely blended into the hair, like fish swimming into the sea, and their shadows could no longer be seen.
But Shi Wenzhe didn't know why, but he saw those white hairs, and under the flickering candlelight and the secret gaze of the statue, he saw the faint white light spreading around Ming Shu.
Ming Shu seemed oblivious; he stood very straight, gazing at the statue of the god from afar, his heart pounding wildly.
She felt that Ming Shu was a deity who had stepped out of that statue, possessing a sacred and inviolable holiness.
"Buzz—" The long chime of the bell sounded, and the withered grass and fallen leaves in the ancestral hall seemed to be startled. They spun and leaped up on their own without any wind, swirling and dancing in the air, and then suddenly scattered like a soft skirt.
She was so engrossed in watching that she didn't know how long the fluttering leaves had been entangled with her until her eyes became sore that she had to close them. Only then did Shi Wenzhe reluctantly shift her gaze half a step away. But in that instant when she closed her eyes, everything seemed to recede into the distance. The pale white light disappeared, the entangled withered leaves fell to the ground, and her long, flowing hair fell silently down. The wind blowing in from outside the door made the creaking door open again.
You could hear a pin drop on the ground. Shi Wenzhe opened his eyes, and everything returned to normal, as if everything that had just happened was a dream.
She was breathing heavily, and only now could she hear other noises. The sound of her heartbeat and blood flow assaulted her eardrums. She was somewhat dazed, and her vision was blurred. Even Ming Shu's figure was distorted, as if it was about to disappear.
"Ming Shu!" Shi Wenzhe couldn't help but call out. She was a little scared, afraid that the white-clad Ming Shu was really a ghost and was about to leave her.
Ming Shu did not reply, but Shi Wenzhe called out again and stumbled toward the center of the ancestral hall.
Only when he touched the familiar hem of her clothes and held it in his hand did Shi Wenzhe feel at ease.
With her arm gently lifted, Shi Wenzhe stood up. She stared blankly at Ming Shu, whose expression was somewhat indifferent and whose eyes were vacant. Although it was the same face, she always felt that he was a different person.
“Ming Shu shouldn’t be like this.” Shi Wenzhe thought, “Ming Shu should be a puppy wagging its tail and acting cute, not an empty shell without joy or sorrow.”
She reached out and grabbed back, only to touch the other person's hands, which seemed as cold as ice.
"It's so cold," she thought. "How can a living person have such a temperature?"
The bell rang three times, the hazy white light dissipated like mist, and the wind howled, causing fallen leaves to dance wildly in the ancestral hall. A familiar, terrifying roar came from outside the door; the long-awaited danger had finally arrived.
Shi Wenzhe stiffly turned around, and a white light, seemingly from nowhere, illuminated the courtyard, illuminating the eerie and terrifying corpses and bones.
They were like demons crawling out of hell, greedily scrambling for fresh flesh and blood.
Ming Shu was also awakened from his slumber by the sound of the bell. The cold frost in his eyes finally faded, replaced by a dazzling warmth, and even a blush appeared at the corner of his eye.
“I often hear of broken records,” he murmured.
"Hmm?" Shi Wenzhe turned around upon hearing the voice.
“I had a dream.” He continued to himself, “It wasn’t a good dream, it wasn’t good at all… There were a lot of corpses, and I was standing under a tree, no… no, I was standing on a mountaintop, looking down at the world. Blood flowed like rivers and corpses littered the land. Many people were crying, living beings were crying, and the mountains and rivers were crying too. It seemed…” He touched the corner of his eye, his voice tinged with sadness, and slowly said, “It seemed like I was crying too.”
His expression was fragile, and his gaze towards Shi Wenzhe unconsciously held a hint of hope. Shi Wenzhe's eyelashes trembled. "What do you hope to get from me?" she thought. "I don't think I have anything to give you, but if it's a hug or some comfort, that's fine."
"Do you want me to hug you?" Shi Wenzhe asked softly, though the question was somewhat inappropriate, because behind them was a vengeful ghost that had come to claim their lives.
Ming Shu seemed stunned by these words. He thought for a moment, ignored the increasingly clear roar, nodded solemnly, and then opened his arms.
There was a warm, fluffy scent in her arms. Shi Wenzhe took a deep breath, and she remembered the little white dog back home. When the little white dog got tired from sunbathing, it would run to Shi Wenzhe's arms and ask for a pat. Shi Wenzhe would pet it, comb its fur with her fingers, and mischievously lift it up to watch it panic, watch it look at her pleadingly, watch it whine and whimper. Finally, Shi Wenzhe would mercifully hold it in her arms and gently sniff it. It was that warm, fluffy scent.
It's a leisurely afternoon, a time of peace and tranquility.
Ming Shu hugged him for a while, then Shi Wenzhe patted his arm and asked, "Are you feeling better?"
Whether it was because he realized something was wrong and felt embarrassed, or because he was still feeling heavy-hearted, Ming Shu replied in a muffled voice, "Not yet."
Shi Wenzhe chuckled softly, pulled away from the embrace, and said slowly, "There's nothing we can do about it." She pointed to the twisted and bizarrely shaped rotting corpses and skeletons outside the ancestral hall and said, "The enemy is at the gates."
Ming glanced at Shi Wenzhe absentmindedly, then looked at him incredulously. Finally, he had to accept the cruel reality. His expression was strange, and he said in a low voice, "You should have reminded me sooner."
"I was just worried that you'd be in a bad mood."
"You're about to lose your life, why would you care about your feelings?!"
"Okay, okay, I was wrong. Well, is there any way to save you? I'm a useless person, I can only try my best not to hold you back."
Ming Shu seemed hesitant, keeping his head down and remaining silent. Finally, he shook his head, wrapped Ruosu around Shi Wenzhe's wrist, and whispered to comfort him, "I am compatible with this place, but also incompatible with it. I can't do anything about it, and it can't kill me either. Stay close to me, and I will protect you from death."
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