Chapter 13 Listening to the Wind, I Know This is the legendary Wind Control Technique!
"Help--"
"master--"
"lady--"
"ah--"
"Help! Someone come here!"
"Run! Run!"
"Help!"
"Father...Father..."
"mother……"
Countless people fled in panic within the courtyard, their screams and wails creating a chaotic scene.
Someone rushed out of the gate, but tripped over the knee-high threshold and fell hard on the stone slab, bruising his face. He didn't care about the pain or the time to get up and stand up. In a panic, he scrambled forward and fell. Just as his forehead was about to hit the pillar, the man in blue who had just arrived caught his forehead.
The hand was very cold. It held him steady and then withdrew instantly. The servant didn't even have time to react before he saw the man step into the Shen family's gate.
The servants in the courtyard stumbled and rushed past Zhou Yaren as if fleeing for their lives, stirring up a stench.
Several shriveled corpses lay scattered on the ground, their flesh and blood drained away, leaving only skeletons and thin skin spread out on the ground, covered by clothes.
Amidst the chaos and noise, Zhou Yaren heard a rustling sound, hidden among human bodies, devouring blood and flesh.
He caught the faint rustling sound and turned a few steps quickly. A few feet away, an old woman suddenly knelt down, her bloodshot eyes wide open. She reached out to Zhou Yaren as if she wanted to call for help, but when she opened her mouth, she couldn't make a sound; only gurgling sounds came from her throat.
Lu Bing followed closely behind and arrived at the scene. He looked at the scene inside the Shen residence in disbelief. The two constables were shocked: "Boss!"
At a glance, they could tell how these people had died.
Zhou Yaren walked step by step toward the kneeling old woman and reached out her hand to her.
Lu Bing's pupils constricted, and his heart nearly jumped out of his throat. The blind man couldn't see, but Lu Bing could see clearly. The woman's mouth was wide open, and her bloodshot eyes, which were about to pop out of their sockets, withered away the moment Zhou Yaren approached.
Lu Bing watched helplessly as the blind man walked towards danger without being able to see anything. He shouted urgently and rushed towards the man without regard for his own safety: "Don't go near her! It's dangerous!"
"No..." Zhou Yaren didn't even have time to stop him before the person behind him pounced on him. He had to distract himself and raise his left hand to slap Lu Bing across the chest, sending him flying.
Lu Bing stared wide-eyed in disbelief, never expecting that his reckless act would result in a palm strike, and a dull pain shot through his chest.
But he had no time to argue, because in the next instant Zhou Yaren grabbed the woman's hand and lifted it up with lightning speed. The movement was nimble yet carried a fierce and domineering force, and the old woman's clothes and skin were suddenly peeled off her skeleton.
The clothes and human skin were ripped off, revealing a white skeleton stained with blood, crawling with bright red worms that were gnawing at the remaining flesh on the bones.
Lu Bing, who was sent flying, landed on two constables. Witnessing this scene, they were deeply shocked and greatly stimulated. The two constables' hands trembled, and they failed to catch Lu Bing, instead being knocked to the ground by him.
Without turning her head, Zhou Yaren suddenly flipped the bamboo tube in her hand, her tone stern: "If you know it's dangerous, take everyone and get out of here. Don't cause trouble."
Lu Bing stared at the pile of dry, firewood-like skeletons on the ground, frozen in place as if he had gone deaf.
After the wriggling worms devoured the flesh, they swelled several times their original size, each one a translucent, blood-red cylinder, about the thickness of a little finger. Wherever they went, the flesh was completely gnawed away, leaving only a stark white skeleton.
After peeling off the human skin, the red worms were exposed to the public eye.
"Awooo... What... what is that..." the constable yelled, kicking his legs backward.
Blackie crawled to the side, trembling with fear, and cried out, "Bug...bug..."
Seeing the disgusting worms devour a living person and crawl from the skeleton toward Zhou Yaren, Lu Bing turned pale with fright: "Yaren..."
With a flick of his wide sleeves, Zhou Yaren gathered a stench of wind. The flute in his hand passed through the wind and rang out melodiously. The wind direction suddenly reversed, flowing and converging towards the center of the courtyard, breaking away from the blood-red insects surging towards Zhou Yaren.
Master Fang arrived at the Shen family at this moment. As soon as he entered the door, he was hit by a hurricane. The leaves and curtains rustled, and dust flew everywhere. He stared blankly at the man in blue holding a flute in the courtyard for a while. As the man raised his hand, he controlled the direction of the wind.
"Wind manipulation technique." Master Fang stared in disbelief. "Is he blind?"
Lu Bing frowned in displeasure: "So what if I can't see?!"
Master Fang slammed one hand onto the palm of the other, making a loud "smack," and said, a little too excitedly, "That's right, you can't see it!"
Lu Bing's face immediately darkened: "How can you be so shameful?!"
It's not that I can't stand to see others doing well. Actually, when we met at the Ghost Office earlier, Master Fang noticed that the man in blue had unfocused eyes, but he didn't think much of it. It turns out that the man really is blind and can even ride the wind. Doesn't that make sense?
Master Fang was extremely excited: "He...he...he's a blind man, he can hear the wind?!"
Lu Bing turned around upon hearing the voice, somewhat surprised: "You actually knew?"
He knew, of course, that there was only one person in the entire world who could ride the wind: "Is he really that blind man from Chang'an? He can tell by listening to the wind?"
Blind musicians were blind court musicians who all shared a common trait—they were hearing but blind.
Because the blind musicians are blind, their hearing is exceptionally sharp, and their perception of musical scales surpasses that of ordinary people. In addition to performing songs and dances for sacrificial rites, they also oversee the production and adjustment of musical instruments, using their hearing to precisely revise the scales of these instruments.
Among them, Zhou Yaren was the most special. He had exceptional hearing and an extremely refined ability to distinguish sounds. He could hear the sounds of the eight winds, explore the mysteries of the wind, and judge good and bad fortune. This earned him high praise from the emperor, who bestowed upon him the title "Knowing by Listening to the Wind," and his fame spread far and wide.
Some even say that listening to the wind allows one to communicate with the divine, observe the seasons by listening to the rhythms, discern purity from impurity, know the timing of the day, and grasp the way of heaven. For this reason, some admirers call him an ancient sage.
Because Cai Yong mentioned in "Commentary on the Monthly Ordinances": "The ancient sages understood yin and yang, distinguished the sounds of the wind, and discerned the clear from the turbid."
Lu Bing used to be on good terms with Zhou Yaren and thought that apart from his exceptionally good hearing, he was a pretty normal person. He was definitely capable and a talented person, but he was certainly not as mysterious as the rumors suggested. He didn't act unfathomable or pretend to be a ghost or a madman. So he thought that most of those people were suspected of being sycophants.
But now it seems that it wasn't others bragging, but rather that Zhou Yaren never showed off her skills in front of him at all. In the past, they only sparred with each other in terms of fist and foot techniques, and she never revealed her true moves.
As Lu Bing was lost in thought, he was pulled away by Master Fang, who yanked him aside to avoid the oncoming man.
"Ahhhhhh..."
"Help me!!!"
"Insects..."
Screams erupted as countless red bloodworms crawled out from among the mummified corpses lying on the ground, spreading rapidly in all directions. One of them climbed onto the ankle of one of the servants, attaching itself to the flesh and wriggling as it buried itself deep within the blood and flesh.
In his desperation, he reached out to pull, but the bloodworms were stretched and became long, icy, slippery, and sticky, clinging tightly to his flesh and impossible to pull out.
The servant screamed for help, but the disgusting worm had already burrowed in more than halfway. Suddenly, an invisible wind blade struck, slicing the worm that had burrowed into his flesh in two. One half fell to the ground and wriggled, while the other half continued to burrow in. Then, another invisible wind blade followed, cleanly removing the blood worm.
The servant belatedly realized what was happening and let out a scream.
The two constables were equally loud, jumping around frantically to stomp on the blood-red insects crawling at their feet. Their voices were hoarse from shouting, and their legs were almost numb from stomping. In the nick of time, several leaves slashed down like sharp knives, instantly killing more than half of them.
With a flick of her long sleeves, Zhou Yaren conjured a tornado that swept away all the insects that had been broken in two, leaving only several pools of gushing blood.
Everyone was terrified, having narrowly escaped death, but Master Fang was filled with excitement: "The Wind Control Technique! This is the legendary Wind Control Technique! The ancient and supreme Wind Control Technique!"
Fortunately, no one was paying attention to him at the moment. Master Fang stared intently at Zhou Yaren's figure, watching his every move, every breath, as if he were summoning wind and energy. His body was filled with energy, his clothes were fluttering, and even a single strand of hair seemed to be moving with the wind.
Zhou Yaren stepped on the wind, her figure swiftly crossing the courtyard, the gusts of wind sweeping over several gnawed corpses.
Master Fang quickly pulled Lu Bing aside, clearing the space for him: "Step back, step back."
Lu Bing shook off his hand: "What are you doing?!"
Master Fang was very good at judging the situation: "Step aside, don't get in the way!"
A gust of wind swept past Lu Bing's face, the force of which felt like a slap across the face—silent, but somewhat painful.
Lu Bing almost raised his hand to touch his face, but out of the corner of his eye he caught a glimpse of a disheveled figure, vaguely familiar. Lu Bing turned his head and saw that the person was disheveled, wearing a blood-stained undergarment, stumbling and falling to the ground, unable to get up again, only able to crawl inch by inch towards a withered skeleton in the courtyard, whimpering in his throat, vaguely calling out: "...Father...Mother...Father...Mother..."
The voice was extremely hoarse, as if a trachea had been cut open.
To Lu Bing's utter astonishment, as the man crawled on the ground, his exposed arms were covered in a dense mass of pustules, each with a small but noticeable opening. This immediately reminded Lu Bing of the person who had bumped into him on the street the previous night. He assumed the man was suffering from a serious illness, which explained the numerous pustules, and sent him to Baohe Hall to see Doctor He for treatment.
The man suddenly appeared at the Shen residence and crawled slowly toward one of the skeletons. Several bloodworms crawled out of the skeleton, quickly wriggled toward the man, climbed onto his arm, and burrowed into the abscesses through the open holes.
Lu Bing felt a chill run down his spine.
Kuroko almost stammered, "They...drilled...drilled inside..."
The man remained unmoved, as if these were part of his own body, the pustules resembling nests already formed.
Zhou Yaren gripped the flute, his aura gradually dissipating. He smelled the familiar fishy scent in the wind and asked in a deep voice, "Is it the blood leech that's been kept inside your body?"
A note from the author:
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