Chapter 273 Jinjiang
Zheng Shumu's back bent deeply.
Years of hard work have given him a strong and tall body with the strength of an adult male. The painful torture that has never stopped over the years has tempered him, like steel tempered in fire, making him hard and tenacious.
It was these hands that had been stained with the blood of hundreds of villagers and had experienced the warmth and coldness of flesh and blood.
It was also these hands that picked up the carving knife and, cut by cut, poured their hatred into each wooden puppet. Then they watched coldly as those enemies whom they hated in their childhood but were powerless to do anything about, wailed in pain day and night in the ghost show.
But now, these hands only hugged the little girl's thin shoulders.
But he was trembling as if he was holding the whole world in his hands, fearing that this treasure he was protecting would be hurt by others.
But……
But Mr. Yan was right. How long would this sin last? He had been trapped in hatred for too long. Did Tiantian have to endure everything he had experienced?
Obviously... obviously the mother originally named her Tiantian because she wanted this little sister to have a worry-free life, but why did it turn out to be the opposite of what she wanted?
Zheng Shumu was in so much pain that he could hardly breathe.
Xie Jiaojiao was stunned in Zheng Shumu's arms for a moment. Her mind was in a mess. She had never thought that there would be a day when her brother, who had always obeyed her in everything, would actually refute her words.
"Tiantian, brother has killed enough and is tired of killing. Isn't the torture of those villagers also reflected back on us?"
Zheng Shumu's eyes were blurred, like ice flowers spreading on glass, and even his voice was unreal and erratic: "Those guarding hell... have never been living people, but evil ghosts..."
Mr. Chengyun once said that the southwest is where the old Fengdu is located, where ghosts live. There are constant wailing sounds all year round, and ghost officials patrol to guard against the evil ghosts.
If the villagers were evil spirits, then what was he, who sent them to hell with his own hands and watched them suffer torture?
If Mr. Yan and the stranger were him back then, then how is he different from a ghost now?
Hasn't he become the person he once hated the most?
Zheng Shumu never thought that things would turn out like this until Yan Shixun questioned him harshly. He suddenly realized that he seemed to have built a prison on his own, and both he and his sister were trapped there by his own hands.
This is not revenge.
The future he expected still hasn't come.
"Tiantian, brother has made mistakes too many times, but this time, this time..."
Zheng Shumu choked up, he lowered his head, and held his sister's tender face with trembling hands. Tears fell, hit his sister's cheek, and then slowly slid down.
"Brother, I want to do the right thing for once."
"Just like Mr. Chengyun or Mr. Yan..."
He had no Tao of his own, nor was he a Taoist practitioner. But he had seen the moment when the greatest Taoist practitioner in the world sacrificed his life for his Tao, and the moment when the world was moved and recognized by him.
Once in hell, he looked up and saw the pure white crane shadow. He realized how deeply he had fallen. He wanted to chase but could not escape from the swamp of ghosts.
But he also wanted to see clouds and mist in the sky and earth.
And now, he once again saw the glimmer of hope that he had once missed.
——The exorcist sneaked into hell and stretched out his hand to him among the ghosts.
But this time, Zheng Shumu didn't want to miss it again, and then regret it day and night for the next five to ten years.
"After Master Chengyun died, I swore that I would never harm another life, never leave the village, and stay with you until I die."
Zheng Shumu's hoarse voice was filled with fatigue and tenderness. He even raised his hand to tuck the hair scattered on his sister's cheeks behind her ears.
The smile on his lips was the relief and liberation of a dying man who had given up the whole world.
"Sister, I can't let you go, so... go with me."
"Before everything gets too bad to be salvaged, put an end to it all. Then I'll be your brother in the next life."
"When that time comes, let me make up for all the mistakes I've made in my life and be a good brother. I promise that I won't let anyone have the chance to hurt you again."
Zheng Shumu's voice became increasingly low and finally faint as ash, which was blown away by the wind.
When Xie Jiaojiao heard what Zheng Shumu said, she had a bad feeling in her heart.
She wanted to break free from Zheng Shumu's arms, but Zheng Shumu's arms were like a solid wall and could not be shaken no matter how she struggled.
"Zheng Shumu!"
Xie Jiaojiao was furious: "Are you going to betray me now? Why? Why? Aren't you my brother? Didn't you swear on our mother's remains to protect me? You are a coward who doesn't keep his word! A liar!"
Every sharp cry of the girl pierced Zheng Shumu's heart.
But he still didn't let go, just silently shed tears, letting Xie Jiaojiao struggle in his arms, punching and kicking.
Zheng Shumu looked deeply at Yan Shixun across the dense aura of ghosts and rotting corpses in the theater. In his old eyes, there was only a look of fatigue and indifference after pain, and he was so firm that he could not be shaken.
Yan Shixun watched all this quietly without blinking.
When Zheng Shumu looked over, he lowered his head slightly and greeted Zheng Shumu.
"Please leave the rest to me." Yan Shixun's voice was soft, with a sigh.
Facing the ghost baby that even the heaven and earth could not do anything about, Yan Shixun never dared to let down his guard. He knew very well how powerful and terrifying the ghost baby was, so he became even more cautious in his actions. After failing to attack him once, he quickly reconstructed several solutions in his mind and verified their feasibility one by one.
It was at that moment that Yan Shixun noticed the aura belonging to Zheng Shumu.
Therefore, he came up with the idea of persuading Zheng Shumu to help him deal with the ghost baby.
Although Zheng Shumu was a stranger, in fact, he not only inherited the bone-replacing technique passed down by the Zheng family, but also reached the pinnacle of carpentry.
Before Xie Jiaojiao's memory was awakened because of the kidnapping case, it was Zheng Shumu who held on to one side, killed his enemies with his own hands, and sent the people of the Bai surname village to death one by one, single-handedly creating the Baizhi Lake village massacre.
Paper money fluttered all over the lake, and the wailing continued for months.
Zheng Shumu also realized the vitality of life through repeated death and rebirth.
But later, he handed it all over to Xie Jiaojiao, and was greatly shocked by the appearance of Li Chengyun, so he chose to stop from then on.
But speaking of power.
Zheng Shuli has almost the same life trajectory as Xie Jiaojiao... no, his life is even more miserable and sad than Xie Jiaojiao. The power he possesses comes from the same source as Xie Jiaojiao, and is in no way inferior to that of the ghost baby Xie Jiaojiao.
At least Xie Jiaojiao had Xie Lin's wholehearted love for nine years. During the decades when she was missing, Xie Lin was always worried about her. She had someone who truly loved her.
But Zheng Shumu had nothing.
The young boy at that time watched his pregnant mother sink into the lake and then float up again. He was in heart-wrenching pain but no one could comfort him. With scars all over his body and on the verge of death, he escaped from the village. He wandered for more than ten years, experienced all kinds of life, felt all hardships, and had a brush with death several times.
Suffering tempered him.
Zheng Shumu, who was still a young man, planned the death of the entire village after completing his apprenticeship, but no one could share his happiness and pain with him.
When he stood among the corpses on the ground and looked back, there was only the cold mountain wind whistling past, and no one was standing by his side.
Apart from Master Bai, no one else remembered Zheng Shuli and had no idea that such a talented carpenter had ever existed.
He should have been an acclaimed master carpenter, but he was trapped here and couldn't leave.
Pain and anger are the best raw materials for brewing a glass of wine.
Yan Shixun concluded that if Li Chengyun had not passed by Baizhi Lake many years ago and shocked Zheng Shumu with his own actions so much that he decided to stop, Zheng Shumu would have grown to the point where he was able to compete with the ghost baby in the next few years.
Even who gave birth to the new world in the end is still debatable.
Therefore, one of Yan Shixun's plans was to give Zheng Shumu a push on the basis of Li Chengyun.
He was like a cold and rational machine, ruthlessly opening up Zheng Shumu's wounds, making him recall his past painful memories and empathize with everyone in the program crew.
——Zheng Shumu’s weak spot has always been his family.
Yan Shixun's words were like a sharp knife, piercing straight into Zheng Shumu's heart.
Xie Jiaojiao's self-proclaimed instigation failed to shake Yan Shixun. No matter how much she was a ghost baby, a collection of all hatred and ghost energy, she had never seen a wider world after all.
When she was a human, she was protected by Xie Lin's love. When she became a ghost, Zheng Shuli was always by her side. The pain and human world she had seen were not as much as Yan Shixun's.
However, Yan Shixun's counterattack shook Zheng Shumu's confidence.
The moment Yan Shixun lowered his head towards Zheng Shumu, a smile appeared on his lips, and then when he raised his head, the smile melted away like snow.
With Yan Shixun's assurance, Zheng Shumu finally closed his eyes with a smile, as if he had explained the last thing he wanted to do in this life, and then hugged Xie Jiaojiao tightly.
Flames suddenly rose up around him, surrounding the two of them in an instant. The air trembled violently under the high temperature, and was reflected in Xie Jiaojiao's eyes, lighting up her gloomy eyes like a golden red sunset.
On the shadow puppet stage, the candle flame fell over, and the flames instantly spread along the curtain, burning the entire theater.
The rotten corpse and the wooden puppet turned around and tried to escape, but they could not outrun the speed of the fire spread and were engulfed by the flames in an instant.
Xie Jiaojiao looked at the flames around her in horror, trembling and crying hysterically.
She controls all the wooden puppets. In the feedback of cause and effect, she controls life and is also controlled by life.
The locust tree helped her trap all the ghosts here, but it also gave her the weakness of wood attributes, so that her soul was firmly bound to the tree. The invisible ghost baby thus became tangible and had a weakness that could be attacked.
She was afraid of the fire that came from Zheng Shumu.
That fire once burned in the souls of all the villagers with the surname Bai and was even projected into the shadow play, leaving traces of burns on Zheng Shumu's home and the houses in the village. It was a testimony to Zheng Shumu's oath to the heaven and earth and Li Chengyun not to step out of Baizhi Lake.
Zheng Shumu always had the opportunity to suppress his sister, but he was reluctant.
But now, the brother finally made up his mind and responded to the oath he made to Li Chengyun many years ago.
The flames quickly engulfed the theater, illuminating the originally dim space with golden red, and the rolling heat waves dispelled the eerie chill.
Xie Jiaojiao's sharp scream came from the sea of fire.
“Zheng Shuli! Zheng Shuli!!! I hate you, I will never forgive you!!!”
"Brother, brother, save me...save Jiaojiao, don't..."
Xie Jiaojiao is crying.
The little puppet in her arms fell to the ground, covered in blood. It lay on its back, looking at the sky illuminated by flames, and its blank eyes suddenly blinked.
Immediately, tears of blood flowed from the puppet's eyes.
It tried to stretch out its arms towards Xie Jiaojiao, wanting to protect her behind it and comfort her so that she wouldn't be afraid. But it was made into a puppet, so it couldn't even do such a small thing.
The puppet could only watch all this happen.
Finally, when the flames burned its body, it looked up at Xie Jiaojiao with deep attachment.
Then, he dropped his arms weakly.
Completely engulfed in flames.
"younger sister……"
The firelight illuminated Yan Shixun's handsome face. He squinted his eyes slightly, and the flickering light stung his eye sockets, causing them to feel sore. A thin mist surged up, and his eyes were as bright as the setting sun falling on the water, creating shattered golden waves.
Ye Li, who had been guarding behind Yan Shixun, also slowly walked forward, came to Yan Shixun's side, and stood shoulder to shoulder with him.
Ye Li looked indifferently at the ghosts and gods who wanted to hurt Yan Shixun. He screamed and struggled in the flames, but his heart was not stirred at all.
Even if Xie Jiaojiao didn't die at the hands of Zheng Shumu, he would not let her go.
Even if he exhausted all the soldiers and ghosts in Fengdu, he would make sure that the new ghost who spoke so arrogantly would die here for this arrogance and would not give her any chance to hurt Yan Shixun.
It would be better to say that Zheng Shumu's timely recognition of the situation saved Xie Jiaojiao, allowing her to die without too much pain.
Zheng Shumu endured the flames with his body, enduring every inch of the burning pain, but he never made a sound. When he died, he still had a relieved smile in his eyes.
Both his sins and his parents' hatred ended here and never continued.
Zheng Shumu couldn't bear the burden of pursuing Li Chengyun and feeling guilty about his sister. In his struggle, he had no choice but to sacrifice himself.
At the very least, at the last moment of his life, he finally found peace of mind.
He looked at Xie Lin who was burned to ashes, sighed lightly, and completely lost consciousness in the flames, falling into endless and peaceful darkness.
Xie Jiaojiao's cries gradually faded away, and were finally drowned out by the crackling of the flames.
The figure in the sea of fire fell down with a loud bang, turning into ashes on the ground.
At the same time, all the rotten corpses and wooden puppets in the theater were also burned to ashes.
Whether it is the puppets that imprison the souls of the villagers, or the puppets prepared for the program crew that have not yet been replaced.
The entire theater in the lake, which carried the tragedy and pain of Xie Jiaojiao's life, collapsed in flames. Whether it was the ghost show that had been passed down for thousands of years, or the guilty souls trapped in it, they were all buried in the sea of fire and taken away by Zheng Shumu's death.
Ye Li lowered his eyes slightly.
He looked at Yan Shixun's hand hanging at his side, slowly stretched out his hand, and gently wrapped Yan Shixun's hand with his bony palm.
The slightly cool touch brought Yan Shixun back to his senses. He withdrew his gaze from the flames and glanced sideways at Ye Li beside him.
Then, he laughed softly.
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