Chapter 77 Dreamlike Beauty: Name
Do you really feel like you've lost?
With the iron whip wrapped around her neck, Yueying was forced to tilt her head back and gasp for breath.
Even when captured, there was no trace of humiliation on her face; her eyes remained cold and arrogant, and her hatred was almost tangible.
She sneered, "...So, this was all a trap you set."
Tang Yu remained noncommittal, only saying calmly, "Qimeng, how could she be so easily stripped away?"
The cold wind brought a damp chill to the room, but she calmly suppressed Yueying, seemingly unconcerned about her clothes being soaked in the medicine, and as if she felt no cold at all.
Until a slightly heavy outer garment was draped over her, Tang Yu knew who it was without even turning around.
But she didn't turn around, nor did she say thank you.
At this moment, Yueying laughed in extreme anger, gritting her teeth with resentment, and asked in a deep voice, "How did you know it was me who came?"
"Because... you won't let anyone else do the work of killing me."
Tang Yu spoke casually, yet it made Yueying gasp for breath.
She curled her lips into a smile and continued, "There are only the three of us in the room, and even the guards outside are all your men. Yet, as cautious as you are, you still sent out a large number of men in black just in case. Isn't it to ensure that I die tonight?"
"How can you be content to remain a mere bystander when you have such a brilliant opportunity to kill two birds with one stone?"
Yueying's expression changed slightly, but she still snorted disdainfully to cover up her loss of composure.
"Then when did you discover that the Prefect of Xia Nan was one of my men?" she asked.
Tang Yu suddenly curled her lips, giving Yue Ying a meaningful look with her emerald eyes, "Your people?"
"Back when the Southern Moon Kingdom was destroyed, the remnants of the fallen kingdom were barely clinging to life. How could they possibly infiltrate the Great Xia Kingdom and even build the entire Beauty Ruins in the Central Capital with just a decade or so of planning and effort?"
She seemed to be talking to herself, then turned to look at Wang Shanyue and asked, "Although Yaohua Pavilion has been open in Zhongjing for more than ten years, do you still remember when this Southern Frontier Musician first became famous?"
Wang Shanyue thought about it carefully and replied, "It seems like... just in the next three or four years."
Xiao Fangliang nodded in agreement, "After the complete defeat in the Southern Frontier, for about five or six years, there were almost no people from the Southern Frontier in the Central Capital. Not to mention music halls, how could they dare to accept women from the Southern Frontier whose origins were unknown?"
After listening, Tang Yu looked at Yue Ying again, a smile playing on her lips, but without any warmth: "So, without external help, how could Nan Yue have laid out this grand scheme in just a few years?"
She paused, then continued, "And how could you truly be the master of the Prefect of Xia Nan?"
After a moment of silence, Yueying suddenly sneered and looked up at her.
His tone was calm to the point of numbness, as if he were admitting defeat: "I lost. I accept my fate. Kill me."
"Do you really think you've lost?" Tang Yu asked.
Yueying's face turned pale instantly, but she still managed to control her emotions.
Tang Yu didn't press the matter. Instead, she pulled her outer robe tighter and looked past the eaves at the cold moonlight.
The wind has blown away the clouds, revealing the silvery glow of the night moon.
Unfortunately, the Lantern Festival has passed, and the moon is no longer as full as it used to be.
Water overflows when it is full, and the moon wanes when it is full.
The same applies to all schemes in the world; it always seems difficult to seize the perfect moment. When you feel you have victory in your grasp, defeat is often not far away, and vice versa.
Tang Yu would never believe her words.
Seeing that the other person remained silent for a long time, Yueying's face turned pale with suppressed anger. Finally, she couldn't help but ask sharply, "What exactly do you mean?"
Tang Yu then turned around, but her gaze swept past Yueying and landed on Xie Xingzheng standing to the side.
That face remained calm and composed, its emotions unchanged.
"I'm also very good at lying."
Her eyelashes trembled slightly, as if she were talking to herself: "That day, when Si Huo treated me alone, I asked her to set up this scheme for me. To ensure that the prefect heard about this plan, she took advantage of Xie Xingzheng's conversation with him to break in."
"When they returned, Yueying saw it as a golden opportunity to kill me." Tang Yu paused. "But in the eyes of the person behind the scenes, it was a perfect opportunity to attack Xia Nan."
As soon as he finished speaking, the room fell into a deathly silence, and everyone was stunned for a moment.
Xie Xingzheng unconsciously tightened his grip on his weapon and took a sudden step.
Just now, he almost wanted to rush out immediately and head to the south of the city to defend against the enemy.
But he also knew that the journey would take nearly two hours, and even if he rushed there now, it would be in vain.
The flames of war may have already been ignited, the city gates may have been breached, and the south may already be a sea of blood and mountains of corpses.
All he can do now is trust Tang Yu.
The two looked at each other, but remained silent.
"So what if you guessed it?" Yueying raised her head with difficulty, looked around, and then sneered sarcastically, "Aren't your friends and family all here?"
"Do you have someone else who is capable of sending a message to stop us?"
Her arrogant demeanor enraged Wang Shanyue, his face turning red with anger. "You!"
But he soon realized that Yueying was right.
All the people Tang Yu could trust were now crammed into this room.
Wang Shanyue suppressed his anger, turned to look at Tang Yu, and asked anxiously, "Who exactly is the mastermind behind this? You must have made arrangements for what happened in the south of the city, right?"
Tang Yu did not answer immediately, but just looked at Yueying quietly.
Those emotionless eyes seemed to give Yueying a glimmer of hope, and she suddenly burst into laughter.
The laughter was grating yet shrill, a sickly mockery: "Don't you all know? She! She is our most precious saintess of Nan Yue, Yue Qimeng!"
The air inside the room instantly froze, and everyone's expressions were not good.
Seeing this, Yueying laughed even more unrestrainedly, her eyes flashing with a mad pleasure.
"She was born a person from the Southern Frontier! Even though she grew up in the Great Xia, she has now merged with Qi Meng and become a Gu! She is no longer Tang Yu; she is now just a monster without emotions!"
Her eyes were filled with utter resentment and madness as she raised her voice: "You foolish people of Great Xia, do you really think she'll stand on your side? Do you think she cares about the life or death of Great Xia?"
"She wouldn't do that, she's just lying to you!"
As Yueying's last words fell.
In an instant, the entire room became so quiet you could hear a pin drop.
All eyes unconsciously fell on Tang Yu.
Tang Yu, however, was completely unaffected, her expression indifferent, and she even nodded slightly.
"you're right."
She calmly accepted the identity of "Yue Qimeng," and also the label of "ruthless."
Upon hearing her words, Yueying truly believed she had guessed correctly and won, and a smile had just appeared on her lips.
Suddenly, Tang Yu leaned down at her and asked curiously, "But... why should I let Nanjiang have his way?"
Yueying's smile froze on her lips, yet she still tried to comfort herself in her heart:
She couldn't possibly guess who was behind it all, nor could she possibly have fully guessed their plans.
Tang Yu straightened up, not immediately explaining anything, but coldly looking at Yue Ying's face, which seemed to be crying but wasn't.
Suddenly, she sighed softly and said with emotion, "How important the Holy Maiden is to Nan Yue."
The voice was soft and calm, yet it made everyone feel suffocated.
"Nan Yue's glory over the years... was all built on the bones of these poor girls. But when have the people of Nan Yue ever treated 'Yue Qimeng' as a human being?"
A faint glint appeared in Tang Yu's eyes, but it was not anger; rather, it was a barely perceptible sorrow.
"What you dream of and yearn to become is nothing more than a container that Nan Yue uses for a limited time and will replace when it expires."
Yueying's face turned deathly pale, and her shoulders began to tremble slightly.
Tang Yu's words were like peeling away her disguise, leaving her with nowhere to hide her sorrowful thoughts.
"Everyone has forgotten that the subjects of those 'Moon Dreams' were originally living, breathing people, born from mothers after ten months of pregnancy, capable of living for better or for worse."
"But because they were born in Nanyue, they have been burdened with a ridiculous mission since birth." She curled her lips into a sarcastic smile.
"I have recalled many times the past that was awakened when I merged with the dream. I found the girls who died in the pool of blood. I neither knew their names nor could I remember their faces."
Tang Yu tilted her head slightly, her voice gentle: "I think you only got the name Yueying after you survived the Blood Pool of Ten Thousand Gu, right?"
Yueying's body trembled even more violently, her lips opening and closing several times, but she couldn't utter a single word.
Tang Yu's voice grew even softer: "Who gave you this name? Did you... ever have a name before?"
She paused, a hint of confusion in her voice, "Me too."
“Aside from the ‘Moon Dream’ you told me about, and the ‘Tang Rain’ my parents gave me, there is no memory of my original name in the depths of my mind.”
The candlelight illuminated Tang Yu's wet, brown hair plastered to her temples, and her cold, eerie green eyes. Everything clearly indicated that she was from the Southern Frontier, yet she had never accepted it.
“It’s not that I’ve forgotten,” she sighed, “but that it was something we never had.”
"The girl used as material doesn't need a name. And 'Moon Dream' is just an ordinary code name after the success."
These words were like an icicle piercing Yueying's heart.
"Shut up!" she screamed, her voice broken, as she covered her face.
Tears slipped through her fingers, and Yueying felt utterly lost.
Tang Yu is right, she doesn't have a real name.
After the Battle of Nanyue, she was taken in by Elder Mu and insisted on getting the name "Yue Qimeng".
But Elder Mu disagreed, and the other Nan Yue people would disagree even less.
So she gave herself a name – Yueying.
Taken from the edge of the Blood Pool of Ten Thousand Gu, from the ever-blooming, vibrant blood hibiscus.
She thought to herself that she was never any worse than Yue Qimeng.
Tang Yu released the chains binding her, and Yue Ying collapsed to the ground, limp like an empty shell, trembling all over.
But at this moment, she neither fought back nor had any thought of running away.
Tang Yu watched quietly and continued, "Do those 'Moon Dreams' really want to be deprived of their emotions and freedom? In fact, they were never subservient to the Yue Clan, nor were they willing to sacrifice themselves for the Southern Moon. They just didn't know that they had the right to see this world."
"You said 'Moon Dream' has no feelings..."
Her tone was as cold and ruthless as the snow in the depths of winter, “But compared to ‘Moon Dream,’ it is you people who do not treat people as human beings and are cruel and heartless that I find more pathetic.”
At this moment, whether she is Tang Yu or Yue Qimeng, their thoughts are subtly aligned, yet coincidentally the same.
"Therefore, I cannot understand why you chose Nan Yue. Just as you may not understand why I, as 'Yue Qimeng', chose Da Xia."
A cold night wind swept in, causing the oil lamp's sparks to crackle faintly, which was particularly noticeable in the silence of the room.
Yueying shook her head again, like a small beast that was driven to the brink of despair but still clung on desperately.
She couldn't admit defeat, and she absolutely refused to believe that Tang Yu would win.
Why? On what grounds?
She always wins, she always survives.
What surged in her chest was not hatred, but an almost obsessive resentment.
Yueying gritted her teeth: She must be bluffing her!
Therefore, she would never give Tang Yu even the slightest chance, and she would not say anything.
But Tang Yu seemed to hear the struggle in her heart, and sighed softly: "Whether you know the truth or not is no longer important. But I should make you accept your defeat wholeheartedly."
Her gaze was calm as she slowly spoke: "Originally, if the Tang family hadn't arrived in time... we might not have escaped your pursuit in Nan Yue. And do you know who sent the message to the Tang Clan?"
Tang Yu paused, but did not wait for Yue Ying's reply. Instead, she calmly uttered a name: "Yan Keli".
Yueying looked up, her eyes filled with confusion and bewilderment.
Because she had never heard of that name before.
They had no idea who this person was.
Tang Yu was not surprised by Yueying's expression at this moment.
She sighed, "Look, you don't remember her name at all. Because back then, you never treated her like a human being."
Yueying's face turned pale.
Tang Yu continued unhurriedly, "You might still remember that girl from the Southern Frontier who survived the beasts with me back in the Lower Ruins."
"When you kidnapped me, Xiao Fangliang and the others did not know that Xie Xingzheng would come. So in order to save me, they had to go to the Tang Clan to ask for help. At the same time, Xiao Fangliang vaguely sensed that there seemed to be spies from the Southern Frontier all around."
Tang Yu looked at Yue Ying, her face expressionless. "Therefore, he deliberately avoided all people related to the Xia Nan government and specifically sent Wang Shanyue to entrust this matter to this inconspicuous girl from the Southern Frontier, who was even quite ostracized in Xia Nan. And it was she who, in order to save me, carried a secret letter and traveled day and night to the Tang Clan, crossing mountains and rivers."
“What’s even more ridiculous,” Tang Yu said with a sarcastic smirk, “is that the very girl you tricked into coming to the Lower City and using as a tool for your amusement in animal fighting. Tonight, when you tried to kill me and Xie Xingzheng, she took all the truth and rushed to the South Gate.”
Yueying's lips trembled, wanting to say "impossible," but her throat felt as if it were being choked by an invisible hand, and she couldn't make a sound.
Yan Keli...
Someone who should have been toyed with to death and discarded like trash was actually the reason for her failure?
absurd.
Tang Yu's gaze was as cold as ice and snow, like a knife piercing her heart.
"You, like those people from Nanyue, have never looked at those girls properly, nor have you ever regarded them as human beings."
Her voice was soft and cold:
"Therefore, you and King Xia Nan did not lose unjustly at all."
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