Chapter 155 Gao Tianhao
Xing Chun returned to check on Mei Liangyu and Zhong Lishan's condition. He breathed a sigh of relief, but then turned to look at the flames above the mountain wall and began to worry.
How exactly do we destroy this monstrous thing?
If this fire weren't so unquenchable and weren't devouring the five elements, he would have taken the person out long ago.
After Xing Chun and the others had almost fully recovered their Five Elements Qi, they walked across the frozen dark river toward the flames on the other side, failing to notice Mei Liangyu's slightly trembling fingertips.
Mei Liangyu's consciousness was half-chaotic and half-awake. He was gradually able to sense the temperature and sounds around him, but he was still unable to wake up.
Occasionally, you could hear Xing Chun sighing and talking to himself.
Xing Chun felt very lonely. Although his two good brothers were both lying down, he still habitually talked to them and shared his guesses.
The words Mei Liangyu heard most often were:
When are you two going to wake up?
"When will we be able to get out of this godforsaken place?"
"Let's eat baked buns after we go out."
Xing Chun was in a good mood. He spent most of his time studying the terrain and the flames, and would only come back after the five elements were exhausted. The three of them sat in a row against the wall of the passageway.
Even in the midst of the chaos, Mei Liangyu could hear the voices of many people. They were indistinct, distant, and hard to distinguish; some sounded like the ravings of a madman, while others seemed to appear in his memory.
He also heard Yu Sui's voice.
It was that "senior brother" he often heard.
Just as Mei Liangyu was trying to listen carefully to Yu Sui's voice, a flood of even more varied and complex sounds came rushing in.
His consciousness felt as if it were enveloped by boundless seawater, being pushed and rolled by the waves. One moment he would be swept high into the air by the waves, surfacing to breathe, and the next he would be slammed back into the sea by giant waves. The feeling of falling and the pressure of the seawater made him panic.
As he was once again swept out of the water by the waves, Mei Liangyu saw a small boat floating on the tranquil water. On both sides were mountains and forests, and there were seven or eight boats sailing on the wide river. The one he saw was the last one in the group.
A boy of about twelve or thirteen years old sat at the stern of the boat. He was half-squatting, and the golden hem of his robe, embroidered with auspicious clouds, hung down to the ground. The sunlight shone on the jade pendant with a fierce tiger tied to his waist, causing it to reflect a gentle and lustrous light. The rippling water reflected the boy's flamboyant and handsome eyebrows and eyes. Although his face still had some childishness, his dark eyes were full of laziness and arrogance.
The boy gently pulled the fishing rod upwards, pulling the enormous creature out of the water with a splash. The gray-clad old man, his hands bound, emerged from the water, gasping for breath in a disheveled state.
The old man in gray only showed his upper body up to his chest, while his lower body was still submerged in water. His five elements were sealed and he was injured. After breathing, he shook his head, and the boy squatting at the stern of the boat raised his hand to shield himself from the water droplets he flung out.
Gao Tianhao faced the boat, his face covered in water, but he laughed at the boy on the boat and said in a hoarse voice, "Why is it that you, a child, are the one guarding me now?"
The boy said listlessly, "Because you can't even beat a child now."
Gao Tianhao laughed and said, "If you can unlock the Five Elements mechanism within my body, even your mother won't be a match for me."
He deliberately provoked the young man, but the boy didn't fall for it. He simply rested his chin on one hand, his dark, bright eyes half-closed as he sized up the old man in the water, and slowly said, "My mother told me that you are from the Ghost Dao family, a master of the thirteenth realm. You must know quite a lot of celestial secrets, right?"
Gao Tianhao said, "You want to learn the Nine Schools of Ghostly Dao from me?"
Seeing his arrogant and smug expression, the young man stared intently at Gao Tianhao and asked, "Does your Ghost Dao Clan have a secret technique that can help people recover memories lost due to damage to their soul?"
"The kind of celestial technique you mentioned is called 'Soul bestowal.' The Ghost Daoists abandon the physical body and cultivate the soul. Whether you want to harm someone's soul or heal it, you can't go wrong by coming to our Ghost Daoists." Gao Tianhao coughed twice, struggling to free himself from the ropes binding his hands, and looked at him. "Why are you asking?"
The young man frowned slightly, seemingly deep in thought, and looked somewhat impatient and fierce: "As a native of Taiyuan, you trespassed into the territory of the Yan Kingdom's imperial guards and were caught by the Protector-General. You were then sent to Suizhou on charges of being a spy from another country, to be handed over to the Crown Prince for interrogation."
Gao Tianhao still smiled and said, "You seem to care about me quite a bit."
“If you were truly a spy from Taiyuan, my mother would have killed you long ago. She wouldn’t have let you live to reach Suizhou.” The young man spun the fishing line, causing Gao Tianhao to fall back into the water. After a while, he fished him out of the water again and said slowly, “My mother may not kill you, but that doesn’t mean the Protector-General won’t kill you either. When you get to His Highness the Crown Prince, he will have to kill you to frame the Sixth Prince.”
Gao Tianhao coughed softly: "Then I should thank Her Highness the Princess for sparing my life?"
"I think you should thank me." The boy leaned forward, raised an eyebrow as he stared at Gao Tianhao. His crisp, youthful voice, though lacking adult mannerisms and sounding childish, possessed a unique confidence and composure. "Do me a favor, and I'll let you leave safely. Neither the Imperial Guard Commander nor His Highness the Crown Prince will be able to catch you."
"Even my mother can't catch you."
Gao Tianhao didn't underestimate this twelve or thirteen-year-old child in front of him, because of his parents, and because they had witnessed the child's strength before. After listening to his words, he thought for a moment and asked, "What do you want me to do?"
The boy said, "The sixth prince has lost his memory because his soul was injured. Come with me to help him regain his memory."
Gao Tianhao did not immediately agree, but instead asked with a smile, "As far as I know, your mother is neither on the side of the Crown Prince nor the Sixth Prince. Why are you getting involved in the Sixth Prince's amnesia?"
The boy replied, "I'm not taking sides with the Sixth Prince. He looks like a fool; how could he be a match for His Highness the Crown Prince?"
Gao Tianhao: "You praised His Highness the Crown Prince for being smart, so does that mean you're on His Highness's side?"
The boy snorted coldly and did not answer. Instead, he said impatiently, "Are you going or not? If you're not going, I'll have the Protector-General take you to Suizhou. Even the Five Elements Mechanism seal won't be broken there. You'll just have to wait to die."
Gao Tianhao looked up at the fishing line binding his hands. This was no ordinary fishing line; the more he struggled, the tighter it wrapped around his wrists, leaving many bloody marks.
“I don’t do things I’m not sure I can do, and I won’t give up until the very last moment. Now, you have to tell me why you want to help the Sixth Prince regain his memories?” Gao Tianhao asked.
The boy's expression darkened at the question, and he angrily slammed his fishing rod. Gao Tianhao, who had just come out, fell back into the water, splashing water everywhere. He bubbled and gurgled underwater, and was pulled out again after a while.
Gao Tianhao's eyes widened, and he was about to curse when he heard the child say, "My older sister has always had everything she wanted since she was a child. She has always been happy and there has never been anything that could bother her for more than a day. Now that the Sixth Prince has lost his memory, it is rare for me to see her so sad."
"I've also heard about the Sixth Prince's amnesia. He's only eighteen years old, yet he's already a prodigy with the Yin-Yang School's eleventh level of cultivation. If he were given more time, he would be the youngest Saint in the entire Xuan Gu Continent." Gao Tianhao swallowed back the curse words he was about to utter and sighed, "Your Sixth Prince of Yan Kingdom was also a military genius who led troops into battle at the age of sixteen. He not only repelled the rebel army left behind in Shenbei Prefecture by Nan Jing, but also found the seriously injured and wandering Saint of the Farmer School, and rescued Yan Manfeng from the encirclement and attack of several Rakshasa sorcerers, allowing him to return safely to the royal city. The Sixth Prince can be said to be your Yan Kingdom's greatest hope."
"I'm just trying to give you a friendly reminder. In your Yan Kingdom today, the Empress Dowager is in power but she's not very capable; the King of Yan is incompetent and obsessed with beautiful women; powerful families are seizing power and suppressing the poor everywhere; and ministers are fighting each other, so half of Yan Kingdom has been infiltrated by the other five kingdoms."
The boy frowned and said, "Why are you saying all this?"
Gao Tianhao laughed and said, "I'm telling you, don't meddle in things that aren't your business. Even if you're the princess's child, you can't handle it. Maybe other people are just waiting for you to make a mistake so they can use that as an excuse to make things difficult for your parents."
“The Yan Kingdom is not without Ghost Dao masters at the thirteenth realm, yet no one dares to restore the Sixth Prince’s memories. Don’t you know why?” Gao Tianhao sighed with regret. “Even your parents didn’t dare to make a move. How could you still dare to have such an idea?”
"Furthermore, you say the Sixth Prince is stupid, but he's not stupid at all."
The boy scoffed, "The Sixth Prince has the words 'restoring the Yan Kingdom' written all over his face, which is why he's become a thorn in the side of so many people. If he's not stupid, who is?"
Gao Tianhao was taken aback by what he said, and his eyes changed slightly.
The boy stood up, looked down at the person who had fallen into the water, and said, "Since you don't want to, then forget it."
Before Gao Tianhao could finish speaking, the boy stepped on the fishing rod and splashed the man back into the water.
The boy timed it carefully and waited until it was almost time before he fished Gao Tianhao out of the water again.
Gao Tianhao gasped for breath, but hurriedly replied, "I promise you! When are we leaving?"
The boy raised an eyebrow and said leisurely, "Are you in a hurry?"
Gao Tianhao shook the river water off his face, looked up at the person on the boat, and asked him with a questioning look, "But you, do you really dare to cooperate with spies from other countries?"
The boy did not answer.
Mei Liangyu, however, knew.
He dares.
Because his father had said that Gao Tianhao was from Taiyuan, but not a spy for Taiyuan. He entered the forbidden area of Yan Kingdom to find something else.
Something that could affect the situation and even the lives of the six kingdoms.
Gao Tianhao spent half a year with this child.
The sixth prince of Yan's situation is not simply a matter of amnesia.
The sixth prince suffered a mental injury, losing his ability to move and his memory, becoming mentally impaired. The once young hero, the spirited young man, is now a dazed fool with blank eyes, drool dripping from his mouth, who can only smile foolishly at you.
With the help of the boy, Gao Tianhao escaped from the guard captain and came to Yandu. After disguising himself, he followed the boy's instructions through a secret passage to see the sixth prince every day and help him heal his soul.
At that time, Yandu was heavily guarded because of the Sixth Prince's affair. Amidst the power struggles among various factions, people overlooked the child who was only twelve or thirteen years old.
Whether it was the royal family of Yan, the aristocratic families, or the ministers who had been infiltrated by other countries, they all believed that the eldest princess's youngest son was short-tempered, arrogant, and difficult to deal with. He was also not focused on his cultivation, and he would look at a little bit of everything and practice a little bit of everything. They told others that his talent was not compatible with any of the nine schools of thought.
Unlike his elder brother and sister, who were exceptionally talented and achieved remarkable success in both the Yin-Yang School and the Military School.
At that time, the adults had too many and too strong enemies to guard against, so they neglected the children who had not yet grown up. It was precisely because of this that the boy was able to secretly lead people to heal the sixth prince.
Gao Tianhao initially thought he had made a bad deal by agreeing to this.
If he were captured and taken to Suizhou, he could still escape. But once he arrived in Yandu, things would be much more difficult.
After spending more time with the child, Gao Tianhao changed his mind again.
He felt that the child was much more interesting than the rumors suggested.
Although he liked to learn a little bit of every kind of martial arts, it wasn't that he couldn't learn them all. In his spare time, he would tinker with his own mechanical dice. Once, Gao Tianhao opened the door and saw mechanical rabbits, cats, dogs, colorful phoenixes, and magpies all over the floor. He had nowhere to put his feet and could only stand at the door and helplessly call out to the person who was sleeping on the table: "Young Master, wake up, it's your turn to lead the way to the palace to rescue people."
The boy sat up with a frown, his face full of impatience from not having slept well. He flicked his sleeves, tugged at his coat, and after a moment of looking down, his eyes widened as he searched for his shoes on the floor filled with traps.
Gao Tianhao agreed to the child's request not entirely out of fear of death, but because he wanted to see the child's father.
The boy said his father had gone to a very far place and wouldn't be back for a while.
Gao Tianhao said, "Given the current situation in Yan, your mother and siblings are struggling to hold on in the capital. Why did he run away?"
"What do you mean 'ran away'?" the boy asked, looking up in dissatisfaction.
Gao Tianhao said, "If he were in Yan, no one would dare to injure the Sixth Prince like this."
"Those people want to deal with the Sixth Prince, so naturally they have to find a way to get my father away first," the boy sneered. "When my father comes back, they will all be dead."
Gao Tianhao believed this and stayed in Yandu for half a year.
But the boy's father did not return before he left.
After four or five months of private treatment, the Sixth Prince's injuries have improved. During this time, Gao Tianhao returned to the Yandu Palace and narrowly escaped danger several times. However, he was certain that the boy's mother had discovered him but turned a blind eye and occasionally helped cover for him.
In the fifth month, when the Sixth Prince regained his memories, news came from Yandu that Prince Qingyang and the head of the Nangong family had arrived in Yandu.
The day after receiving the news, the farmer sage Yan Manfeng entered the palace and stayed by the sixth prince's side without leaving him for a moment.
It seems that everyone believes that the head of the Nangong family came for the sake of the sixth prince.
Gao Tianhao said to the boy, "Although Yan Manfeng is still recovering from his injuries, he has set an example by taking the lead. Other sorcerers in Yan Kingdom will follow suit, so there is no need to worry for the time being."
The boy frowned and said, "Why did he have to come at the exact moment when the Sixth Prince's injuries were almost healed? Isn't that too much of a coincidence?"
Gao Tianhao said, "Nangong Ming is a man of unfathomable cunning and scheming. The Nangong family has made great contributions to the state of Yan. He must have come here with some purpose."
He was originally a recluse who didn't care about the conflicts between the six kingdoms and only focused on the secrets of the strange fire, but during the time he spent with the boy, he transformed from a recluse into a strategist.
Gao Tianhao comforted him, "With Yan Manfeng here, as long as the other party isn't a Saint, there won't be any major problems."
The boy sitting opposite him, propping his head up with one hand and observing the chessboard with his eyes down, looked up at Gao Tianhao after hearing this and said in a low voice, "Yan Manfeng is afraid of him."
Yan Manfeng's life was smooth sailing for the first half of his life, but after meeting Nangong Ming, his life became nothing but "losing".
It wasn't just once or twice, it happened every single time.
Yan Manfeng is cautious and strong, but the more cautious and hesitant a person is, the more he becomes after experiencing several failures and realizing the strength of his opponents. He is always thinking about the strength of his opponents and finds it difficult to find his mistakes and a way to break through.
Nangong Ming would always strike again just as the other party was building up confidence, telling them that they had guessed wrong again, that they had failed again, and that they could do nothing with him.
Yan Manfeng moved so quickly because he was afraid.
Looking back, Gao Tianhao realized that the boy wasn't wrong.
There are few people in the world who are not afraid of someone like Nangong Ming.
“If the Breath of Earth were still with him, he wouldn’t be so afraid of Nangong Ming,” Gao Tianhao sighed. “I heard that Nangong Ming’s daughter is a skilled practitioner of magic. So many people from Yan State went to try to reclaim the Breath of Earth, how come they all failed?”
“The more people go, the happier Nangong Ming will be.” The boy frowned and collected all the chess pieces from the board.
Gao Tianhao looked at him again and said, "At your age, you can think of these things. You must not let others know, or you will become the next Sixth Prince."
The boy didn't answer; he seemed to be deep in thought about something else.
For many in the Yan Kingdom, the head of the Qingyang Nangong family was indeed a nightmare.
When he arrived in Yandu and entered the palace, he only saw the sixth prince once from afar before discovering that someone was secretly treating the sixth prince.
In Yandu, Nangong Ming was practically half a king of Yan.
The night before Nangong Ming ordered a search of the capital, the boy sent Gao Tianhao out of Yandu.
Gao Tianhao was stunned for a moment when he was suddenly told to leave. The person he was waiting for had not returned yet, but he also knew that he could not wait any longer. Otherwise, he would be dragged into the trouble of the conflict between the six kingdoms and would surely die.
That night, the stars were shining brightly, and the countryside was lush and green. The boy pointed out the way to the secret passage and said, "Go ahead, I'll take care of the rest myself."
Gao Tianhao said, "Your father still hasn't come back."
The boy, however, said nonchalantly, "He will come back."
"When he comes back, I will tell him and arrange for him to meet with you."
Gao Tianhao asked in surprise, "You know?"
"You always ask about my father, it's hard not to know." The young man waved his hand and turned to leave first. "The entrance to this magic array will disappear in a quarter of an hour, so hurry up. We'll meet again someday."
Gao Tianhao shouted, "Aren't you going to leave me some travel money?!"
The boy replied without turning his head, "My mom cut off my allowance, and I'm short of money. You'd better find a way to earn it yourself!"
Gao Tianhao was so angry he wanted to knock down all the stars watching the show. He stood in front of the magic array entrance for a long time, but when the magic array was about to disappear, he turned around and left.
Gao Tianhao only regretted this one thing in his life.
He regretted leaving Yandu that night.
When Gao Tianhao saw the boy again in Taiyi after many years, he couldn't help but stop and stare blankly for a moment.
He thought that if he hadn't left that night and had stayed in Yandu instead, many things would have been different.
[Author's Note]
Thank you so much for your support! I will continue to work hard!
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