Chapter 53 Osmanthus Wine He should have come back with Lu Bing.
Lu Bing had accumulated a lot of good relationships. After the incident, people kept coming and going from the Lu family home, which alarmed all the officials and constables in the yamen. Even the county magistrate came in person.
Once the news leaked out, it alarmed half of Beiqu City. One murder after another occurred, and now even the head constable Lu in the yamen had his whole family caught up in it. It was inevitable that everyone was in a state of panic.
The single stone stirred up a thousand ripples. The manager of Baohetang and Doctor He, each carrying two large boxes of medicinal herbs, pushed through the crowd and eagerly grabbed the yamen runners blocking the courtyard gate from letting them in: "I'm a doctor, I'm a doctor, let me in to take a look at the old lady..."
Hei Zi's eyes and nose were red. The moment he turned around and saw Doctor He, his lips trembled. He knew he would cry if he opened his mouth, so he choked and couldn't make a sound. He tried his best to hold back his tears and could only wave his hand weakly at Doctor He, as if to say that it was okay.
Indeed, it's not necessary. The coroner is already examining the bodies of the old man and the old woman.
No matter how skilled He Lang's medicine is, he cannot bring the dead back to life.
Hei Zi waved his hand, as if silently shooing them away, meaning: "Go back, everyone, disperse."
The manager of Baohetang refused to give up and grabbed Hei Zi's swaying wrist: "Where is Young Master Lu? Such a big thing happened at home, where is Young Master Lu?"
Lu Bing disappeared without a trace.
Besides the two large pools of blood beneath Old Man Lu and Grandmother Lu, there were several other bloodstains on the kitchen floor. The traces indicated that a fierce fight must have taken place in the kitchen. A long trail of blood stretched from the kitchen floor to the eaves, suggesting that someone had dragged another person covered in blood out of the kitchen.
Lu Bing's blood-stained amulet happened to be on the spot. It was something his grandmother had prayed for at a temple in Chang'an, and Lu Bing always carried it with him.
Outside the eaves, the heavy rain had washed away all traces of the blood-soaked figure, leaving them with no way of knowing where it had been dragged.
The constables and coroners paced around the crime scene, but couldn't find any clues about who had come or gone outside.
Later, Aunt Wang next door confirmed that Lu Bing was at home at noon, and she even came over to deliver two pieces of tofu.
So, was the person covered in blood and dragged out Lu Bing?
Based on this reasoning, the boss is likely in grave danger.
Hei Zi dared not think any further, for any wrong thought would be like the death of him. So he finally couldn't hold back any longer and, under the questioning of the manager of Baohetang, turned his back and covered his eyes with his hands.
Before long, the cultivators from Taihang Road arrived. Some went straight to the scene of the murder, while others looked around. Li Liuyun stepped into the main hall and saw Tingfengzhi lying on the soft couch with his eyes closed, not knowing whether he was asleep or awake.
Bai Yuan stood by the bed, holding a silver needle, and bent down to pierce Zhou Yaren's flesh one after another.
"What are you doing?" Li Liuyun stepped forward, still worried. "Tingfengzhi."
The person on the bed did not react.
Bai Yuan calmly inserted the silver needle into Zhou Yaren's temple, his tone completely flat: "He's deaf, he can't hear."
Li Liuyun then noticed that blood was seeping from Ting Fengzhi's ear canal: "What happened to him?"
Bai Yuan picked up a crumpled cotton ball and gently and carefully wiped Zhou Yaren's bleeding ear canal. In short: "You're courting death."
The cotton ball was quickly stained red with blood. Bai Yuan threw it away, picked up another cotton ball to wipe the other ear canal, and then added, "To find someone."
Being in the Lu family courtyard, Li Liuyun didn't need to dig deeper. Just by sweeping over the blood-soaked cotton balls on the ground, he knew who Tingfeng was looking for at such a high price.
Li Liuyun stepped forward to feel Ting Fengzhi's pulse.
Bai Yuan kept her eyes downcast and didn't give Li Liuyun a single glance. She picked up a silver needle on the table, held it over the lit oil lamp, licked the tip of the needle with the flame, and then pierced Zhou Yaren's ear.
Bai Yuan focused intently on rotating the silver needles, carefully controlling the depth of the punctures. It took him almost half an hour, and he dared not be careless in the slightest. Finally, he managed to turn Zhou Yaren into a hedgehog with needles, and the bleeding in his ear canal was slowly stopped.
Bai Yuan breathed a sigh of relief, then glanced at Li Liuyun beside him: "Did you find it? Did I take the opportunity to harm him?"
Li Liuyun withdrew his hand without showing any emotion: "Tingfeng risked his life to save you yesterday, so I don't think you would take the opportunity to harm him."
Bai Yuan gave a cold laugh and straightened up: "I think you are a man who appears calm on the surface, but you are actually more cunning than this blind man."
Li Liuyun did not refute: "Different people have different opinions, but I still thank you for your help, which saved Tingfengzhi from going deaf."
Without hearing, she would no longer be able to hear the rumors. Li Liuyun was in the know, and at that time, Zhou Yaren's fate would surely be tragic.
Desperate, he blinded himself to block out all other possibilities, then willingly became a blind official in prison. He painstakingly carved out this opportunity at the end of his rope; if he had been deaf…
Being deaf and blind makes one useless, without any value whatsoever, leaving Zhou Yaren with only death as an option. But even death cannot end his suffering; he must be exiled to repeat his mistakes in the next life, continuing his endless cycle of cause and effect.
For once, Bai Yuan looked at Zhou Yaren with a hint of pity in his eyes.
He was really willing to go all out to find Lu Bing, even disregarding his own safety. Was it really necessary?
However, Zhou Yaren's actions told her that...
In the days that followed, as soon as his hearing returned, he would immediately use his divine sense to search for any clues about Lu Bing in the slightest movement.
But Lu Bing seemed to have vanished from Bei Qu without a trace, leaving no word whatsoever.
Zhou Yaren was deathly pale, her face even paler than that of Old Master Lu, who was about to be buried in the coffin.
Bai Yuan never tried to stop a stubborn person, only occasionally watching coldly from outside the window, letting him do whatever he wanted until he was exhausted and could no longer hear anything. Only then would he give up and collapse, exhausted and weary.
At times like this, Bai Yuan still couldn't bear to watch. She would put down the wine jar, fall from the roof covered with blue tiles into the room, light the lamp, and intend to give him a few more acupuncture treatments.
Unexpectedly, Zhou Yaren did not completely lose consciousness this time. As soon as Bai Yuan approached, he smelled a rich aroma of wine: "You've been drinking?"
Bai Yuan continued to burn silver needles over a tiny flame, offering no response; even if he did, the deaf would not hear it.
Zhou Yaren said, "The osmanthus wine was made by my grandmother."
Bai Yuan paused in her hand as she burned the needle, because she had indeed dug the jar of wine out of the Lu family's cellar. It smelled incredibly mellow, so she simply took it without asking.
Moreover, since both family members were lying in coffins, she couldn't ask anyone who was responsible.
Zhou Yaren opened her eyes, staring blankly into the void, and began to speak as if to herself: "Back in Chang'an, there was a large osmanthus tree with a canopy in the Lu family's courtyard. Every year when it bloomed, my grandmother would have Lu Bing pick the osmanthus flowers to make wine, soup, or osmanthus cakes, and she would always save some for me."
He said, "The old man's hands always smell sweet, like the fragrance of osmanthus."
Zhou Yaren's eyes slowly moved, finally settling on Bai Yuan's face. He asked, "Is there anything else?"
Bai Yuan put down the silver needles, turned and left the room. Not long after, he brought in a jar of wine and placed it heavily in front of him.
Zhou Yaren groped her way to sit up, lifted the lid of the wine jar, and the rich aroma of the wine wafted out, almost making her drunk.
He didn't use a teacup, but instead held the jar and drank several large mouthfuls, as if drinking from a knife. The liquor was spicy and cut his throat, slicing into his stomach as if it would draw blood and seal his throat. It also ignited a raging fire in his lungs, burning his internal organs.
This feeling is quite unpleasant.
In truth, Zhou Yaren rarely drank alcohol, almost never, but Lu Bing enjoyed it and often entertained his friends with wine and meat. Back in Chang'an, Lu Bing did indeed have a group of drinking buddies, and he would always show off the jar of osmanthus wine brewed by his grandmother.
Therefore, the following year, my grandmother collected osmanthus flowers from the courtyards of the neighbors to make wine for him.
So he said, "This is wine that my grandmother brewed for Lu Bing."
Zhou Yaren knew that the old man couldn't let go of this grandson the most. When he burned incense and prayed to Buddha, he never asked for great wealth and honor, but only for peace and safety. He even asked for a peace charm for Zhou Yaren, exactly the same as the one that Lu Bing always carried.
Zhou Yaren gulped down several mouthfuls of wine. If he couldn't find Lu Bing, how could the old man rest in peace if he knew?
After the incident, Zhou Yaren did inquire with the people in the government office whether Lu Bing or his uncle and grandmother had any grudges with anyone in Bei Qu, which might have led to their deaths.
Hei Zi said, "In our line of work, it's inevitable to make enemies. There are plenty of people who are dissatisfied with the trial and hold grudges, but nothing has happened in all this time. As for the old man and the grandmother, they have never made enemies with anyone."
"They haven't caused trouble for so long, yet they chose this moment to retaliate?" Li Liuyun said. "It's possible, but unlikely."
“Let’s not talk about the distant past,” Zhou Yaren said in a hoarse voice. “The case that Lu Bing is handling now is the most life-threatening one. There have been a series of murders in Bei Qu, including the Shen Yuanwen family, all of whom were drained of their flesh by the Gu worms and blood leeches. And I suspect that the Gu master is Chen Ying, who has also gone into hiding at this time, and the people in the yamen can’t find her.”
“Yes, the boss told us to go find Chen Ying, but she was no longer at the inn. The boss even took us to the Shen family's mourning hall, but we couldn't find her. Unexpectedly, the boss bumped into her by chance, and was stabbed by one of the men wearing an iron mask next to her.” “That was terrible,” Hei Zi said. “So the boss gathered us brothers together overnight to search for Chen Ying, searching house to house.”
Zhou Yaren's voice was low and hoarse: "Perhaps this is what pushed people to the edge. Chen Ying had nowhere to hide, so she went straight to the Lu family and took Lu Bing as her target..."
Hei Zi froze, almost dropping the knife in his hand.
Moreover, Zhou Yaren couldn't find Lu Bing no matter what; either he was dead, or he wasn't in Beiqu City anymore.
Chen Ying and the group of cloaked thugs also disappeared without a trace. Zhou Yaren found it hard not to suspect that the Lu family's misfortune had nothing to do with them.
As Zhou Yaren pondered this, she drank heartily, and the jar of osmanthus wine was soon emptied.
He should have come back with Lu Bing.
If he had come back with Lu Bing back then, perhaps everything could have been avoided.
Why didn't he come back with Lu Bing? Zhou Yaren was plunged into unprecedented self-blame and resentment.
Bai Yuan leaned against the table, unable to speak to a deaf, blind, and depressed man. Only after Zhou Yaren had knocked herself down did she calmly approach him and heat a silver needle over the oil lamp flame to insert it into the acupoint beside his ear.
Perhaps due to the effects of the alcohol, a few traces of color returned to Zhou Yaren's pale face, which had previously looked like she was terminally ill, and her lips became rosy, giving her a semblance of life before death. She no longer looked like she was about to die.
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