This red is the same scorching color as the red on my Tianxuan Army flag, so hot that it makes my fingertips numb and my heart burn.
Suddenly, I remembered the martial arts training exercise three months ago.
That day was Tianxuan's "Zhenwu Festival". One hundred thousand iron cavalrymen were lined up in square formations, stretching from one end of the training ground to the other. Their armor reflected the light, like a silver sea.
I stood at the front, with dozens of military flags unfurled behind me. The vermilion and gold-inlaid dragon patterns fluttered in the wind, like a burning sea of fire, making even the air feel hot.
Qin Qianluo stood beside me, still in her armor, holding a riding whip in her hand, the tip of which dangled on the ground, covered in dust.
But she stared at those military flags and stood motionless for a full half hour.
The wind lifted the hem of her robe, making it flutter, and the red of the flag shimmered in her eyes.
Her fingertips unconsciously twirled the lotus embroidery on her cuff, and she didn't even hear me call her "Qianluo" three times.
I laughed at her then, patting her on the shoulder: "They're just old flags, why do you look at them for so long every time?"
She came to her senses, the redness in her eyes still lingering, as if veiled by a layer of mist. She simply shook her head, her voice as soft as the wind: "So alike, so very alike."
It turns out that she wasn't looking at the flag at that time; she was thinking about home.
It wasn't the magnificent, ornately decorated Prime Minister's residence in Tianxuan Capital, where dragons were carved on the eaves and crabapple trees filled the courtyard with pink and white blossoms every spring.
The gilded plaque bearing the inscription "Jinrui Zhaowang" (meaning "Auspicious King Jinrui"), not bestowed by the emperor, hangs in the center of the main hall, its gleaming surface shimmering in the sunlight.
It wasn't just the praise from the entire court; the accolades of "pillar of the nation" were enough to move anyone's heart.
It was the homeland she always longed for in her dreams, the land that haunted her dreams of her past life.
It's the country she only mentioned once, a country with "the Yangtze River rushing for thousands of miles, waves crashing against the Red Cliffs; the Great Wall winding through the mountains, its battlements covered in frost."
It was a country that, in her memory, had been ravaged by war and trampled by iron hooves, yet had never bent its spine.
The two words "homeland" are ingrained in her very bones and engraved deep in her soul; they are her roots.
This flag is her root. It is the thought she has been trying to hold onto, even through the cycle of life and death.
A feeling that was hard to describe, a mix of sour and bitter emotions, welled up inside me, making my chest feel tight and my eyes even feel hot.
I raised my hand to my chest, gazing at the red flag unfurling in the wind, and suddenly a thought came to mind: I wanted to go and see the place she had repeatedly longed for in her heart.
I want to stand on the banks of the Yangtze River she mentioned, watching the river flow eastward and the setting sun turn the sails gold, just as she described, "spreading out a golden sea, even the waves are gold."
I want to touch the Great Wall bricks of her dreams, feel the patterns worn smooth by time, and listen to the wind passing through the battlements, wondering if it carries the fluttering sound of that tattered flag from her memory.
I wanted to see what kind of land, rivers, and people could have nurtured such a woman.
For the sake of their country and home, they were willing to be crushed to become a shield protecting the people.
For the sake of the land before my eyes, I would walk through mountains of corpses and seas of blood with a knife in my hand, even if it meant bearing eternal infamy and being misunderstood by the world, I would never turn back.
The wind picked up again, stronger than before. The red hue was stretched straight by the wind, its rustling sound piercing through the morning mist and reaching my ears.
It was as if it were responding to the thoughts surging in my heart, or as if it were a distant summons, calling upon a dream hidden deep in time, a dream about "returning home" and "protection".
As I gazed at that flag, at that red that never fades in the wind, I suddenly understood.
What she anchored here was never a flag of deterrence.
It was her longing for her homeland, her unwavering commitment to the concepts of "homeland" and "country," and the most fervent and sincere faith that she guarded throughout her life.
That faith, like this flag, is as red as fire and will never be extinguished.
I really want to go and see that country.
Look at the Yangtze River that she so longs for; is it really as she depicted it on the table after getting drunk, dipping her brush in wine?
The waves crashing against the shore can make your chest tremble, and even your heartbeat rises and falls with the sound of the waves, as if resonating with the river.
When the sun sets and melts the water, the river surface becomes a sea of fire, even the wooden oars of the returning sails are dyed reddish-copper, the ripples are like flowing fragments of gold, and even the clouds in the distant sky are reflected in a crimson hue.
Look again at the Great Wall she repeatedly painted on rice paper. Doesn't it really meander like a giant dragon, with arrow marks from thousands of years ago still remaining on the blue bricks?
As the wind passes through the battlements, it carries the echoes of history, spreading out like a golden screen among the mountains.
It protects the myriad lights of homes within the walls, where smoke curls from chimneys, and the laughter of children in the alleyways, as well as the aroma of food wafting from the stoves.
Even though Qianluo has already been reincarnated and her soul has returned to the new earth, her name has become a blurry ink mark in the history books.
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