Chapter 14
Chapter Thirteen
As the New Year passed and a new atmosphere emerged, Meng Yingying stared outside, feeling a little empty inside. This was her first time spending the New Year away from home. Strangely, she didn't seem to feel particularly sad, except for missing her grandmother a little.
Her only remaining attachment to the world was probably her grandmother.
My thoughts drifted back to my childhood, to the muddy road where my grandmother, hunched over, carried a little girl step by step back to the small house. The little girl was pale, with thin cheeks, and was so thin that she was just skin and bones.
The little girl gritted her teeth and said, "Grandma, I don't want to live anymore."
Grandma's mouth was full of bitterness. She lifted her up a little and said softly, "Little girl, look at the sunset."
The little girl obediently looked up at the sunset. A vast expanse of rosy light painted the entire sky, like a blend of countless vibrant colors in a riot of orange-red. The little girl glanced at it, her eyes filled with the reflected light, then looked down and saw the white hair at her grandmother's temples, glistening with sweat.
"My dear, Grandma will take you to see a doctor, Grandma will take you to see a doctor, Grandma will take you to see a doctor." The repeated phrase masked a sob.
The little girl hugged her neck and said, "Grandma, I'm a burden. I don't want you to suffer." She buried her head in the back of her grandmother's neck.
Grandma held her up tightly: "Baby is my precious baby. Grandma will take you home and hide you away so no one will find out, okay?"
The little girl burst into tears, sobbing, and said in a choked voice, "Okay...okay."
With another blink, tears welled up in her eyes, and she wiped them away.
Looking outside, he said, "I must...go home."
"Senior Meng! Senior Meng!" Kong Fusheng's hurried voice came from outside the door. Meng Yingying went over and opened the door. Kong Fusheng and Zhou Xiuqi were standing together.
Kong Fusheng, hands on his hips, tilted his head slightly and said, "I thought you were fast asleep."
Meng Yingying's emotions were disrupted. She said, "Even if you fall into a deep sleep, I won't fall into a deep sleep." Then she pushed them away. The group went downstairs to eat and sat down at the table. Suddenly, a smiling and polite voice came from behind them.
"Brothers, do you suggest having another person?"
Meng Yingying turned her head and met the person's gaze. The boy had a high ponytail and looked about sixteen or seventeen years old, with a youthful spirit in his eyes.
Kong Fusheng looked at him strangely: "Uh...do we know each other?"
Zhou Xiuqi remained silent, observed him for a few moments, and then looked away: "Okay."
Meng Yingying was instantly shocked. How could someone who was usually so wary allow a sudden person to join them? She turned to look at the child and examined him carefully. He didn't look like Zhou Xiuqi at all.
The boy tilted his head and looked at Zhou Xiuqi: "Why are you blindfolded?"
Zhou Xiuqi: "My eyes can't stand strong light."
The boy chuckled mischievously, "Is it that you can't bear to see them, or that you dare not see them?"
Zhou Xiuqi turned to the side and saw his face clearly through the thin veil: "I don't know you."
The boy tilted his head and smiled, replying, "Of course I don't know him."
Meng Yingying slowly turned her gaze in one direction to a young man in red. He was dressed in red, with slightly upturned eyes, and his eyes held a smile when he looked at people.
The more Meng Yingying looked at this person, the more familiar he seemed, especially resembling someone else.
The man in red suddenly turned around, met her gaze, glanced at her for a few moments, and then walked over. Meng Yingying remained outwardly calm, but inwardly she was panicking. She was the one who spoke first, asserting her authority: "Do I know you?"
Man in red: "Hmm."
Meng Yingying felt awkward for a moment: "What's your name?"
The man in red: "Don't you know?"
Meng Yingying felt awkward for the second time. She looked him up and down and gritted her teeth, saying, "Do I really know you?"
The man in red said, "Of course you know me, that's why you're with me. Otherwise, with so many people here, why would I be sharing a table with you?"
Meng Yingying nodded, speechless.
After that, no matter where they went, the boy in red followed them, preventing them from having a chance to do what they wanted. It was already late at night when Meng Yingying looked at the boy silently and said, "We have something very important to do next, and it's very dangerous."
The man in red asked, "Is it dangerous? Will I lose my life? If so, I definitely have to go." He raised an eyebrow slightly, and Meng Yingying thought to herself, "You look so weak." But she didn't say it aloud. She just followed Zhou Xiuqi, not caring that he was in her way, and didn't look back.
At the Li residence, Li Youde, drunk and staggering, lay on the bed, laughing and crying bitterly, "I must have had the worst luck in eight lifetimes to marry such a wife. I should have sold off that useless daughter of mine long ago."
"We have nothing now, and we still have to support that dead woman's child."
Zhao Qiao'er, heavily pregnant, came in just in time to hear this. Her shoulders had been feeling heavy and tired lately. She still had to do housework every day, so she could only endure it. She knew that after giving birth to her son, she would have a better life.
"Dinner's ready," she said slowly, sitting down with her heavy belly.
Li Youde smashed the wine bottle on the ground. Zhao Qiao'er flinched, her eyes dimming. Li Youde got out of bed and left. Zhao Qiao'er seemed used to it and ate her meal alone.
After finishing her meal, Zhao Qiao'er felt nauseous, but she endured the nausea and walked out of the house toward the ancestral hall.
Inside the ancestral hall, a red light shone through, and the woman in the old man's eyes rolled back, making her appear neither human nor ghost.
The door was opened, but the woman did not look up.
"Zhaodi..." The voice was not a woman's voice, but a man's sobbing voice.
The woman looked ahead in a daze.
Zhou Runsheng felt as if a piece of his heart had been ripped out.
"Who are you? I don't know you."
"Zhao Di, I am Zhou Runsheng."
"Zhou Runsheng..." The woman on the platform spoke in a low, hoarse voice, her voice no longer clear as she hadn't drunk water for a long time.
"I don't know him."
"Who are you!"
Zhou Runsheng turned his head, gripping the dagger tightly in his hand: "It's all your fault that Zhao Di was harmed. Today I will make you pay with your life!" He picked up the dagger and stabbed at her. Zhao Qiao'er was terrified, her gaunt face trembling.
"If you hurt me, my son will not let you get away with it!"
Zhou Runsheng's eyes were red, and a red glow enveloped his face, making him look ferocious: "I don't care about your son! You poisonous woman! Prepare to die!"
Suddenly, a shrill scream rang out.
Meng Yingying and the others broke through the house and rushed in, only to see Zhou Runsheng staring blankly at her on the ground, while moving closer to her and making gurgling noises.
Bang! With a loud crash, Zhou Runsheng began spitting out black liquid, writhing on the ground as he shouted, "Quick! Run!"
Zhou Xiuqi stepped inside and remained motionless, not even drawing his sword. Meng Yingying shouted, "Senior brother, come out quickly!"
Suddenly, someone next to her laughed. Meng Yingying turned her head and asked, "What are you laughing at?"
"Zhou Runsheng has been sexually assaulted, can't you tell?" the man in red said.
Zhou Xiuqi removed the thin veil from his eyes, revealing his indifferent features. He asked calmly, "What do you want?" The "Zhou Runsheng" on the ground was half-crying and half-laughing, sometimes crying and sometimes laughing, but he didn't speak, and black water was gushing from his mouth.
“You’ll only kill him by doing this,” Zhou Xiuqi added.
The trembling shoulders on the ground paused, and then, through Zhou Runsheng's voice, asked, "I'm scared, Runsheng-ge, come and keep me company, Runsheng-ge." The scene was eerily quiet. The voice was male, but it was high-pitched and shrill as he cried.
Meng Yingying paused, "This...this is...."
"Zhao Di?" Her eyes widened in astonishment, her hand hovering in the air as she slowly walked up.
Li Zhaodi seemed to hear her own name, and looked up, whispering, "Yingying..."
Li Zhaodi smiled and said, "Yingying, would you like some tofu pudding?" Her voice was strange; it didn't sound like her anymore, nor did it look like her face, but Meng Yingying knew it was her.
Zhou Xiuqi: "If you don't come out of his body within the time it takes for an incense stick to burn, he will die."
Li Zhaodi turned her head: "I want him to be with me. He said he would marry me."
Zhou Xiuqi gripped his sword tightly: "But you are already dead."
Li Zhaodi paused slightly, puzzled: "Am I already dead?"
Zhou Xiuqi gripped the sword hilt but hesitated to draw it. Meng Yingying saw this and called Li Zhaodi's name: "Zhaodi, does it hurt?"
Li Zhaodi burst into tears: "Yingying, I'm in pain."
Meng Yingying choked back tears, her fingers trembling as she gripped her Taoist robe: "Then do you hate him?"
Li Zhaodi retorted, "How could I hate Runsheng? Runsheng is the person I love. How could I hate him?" After she finished speaking, she fell silent. Meng Yingying remembered when she told her her name, she smiled and said, "It sounds like a nice name."
She was an extremely kind woman, yet she ended up like this. What about her? If nothing had changed, would she also have ended up in a state of being neither alive nor dead?
Zhou Runsheng collapsed to the ground, his body going limp. On the ground lay a dark, tangled creature, its limbs intertwined, presenting a bizarre sight.
She lay on the ground, breathing weakly: "She has trapped me in this place. If I go out, I will be burned alive."
"I'm neither human nor ghost, but I don't want to hurt you, Runsheng. I'm sorry," she said softly.
Meng Yingying stopped in her tracks. Someone whispered in her ear, "Afraid? Isn't she your old friend? Are you afraid of your own friend?" Meng Yingying turned around abruptly, but there was no one behind her.
Meng Yingying took a deep breath, overcame her fear, squatted down and brushed aside her hair. Blood was everywhere on the ground. She looked up and said, "Yingying, I'm sorry."
Meng Yingying: "You did nothing wrong."
Li Zhaodi lowered her head again, unwilling to let her see her face: "I was wrong, I shouldn't have, I shouldn't have had such a terrible thought." A tear of blood slid down and dripped into the pool of blood. Meng Yingying took out a handkerchief and wiped her face clean, then asked: "I also wanted to kill someone."
Li Zhaodi raised her head and looked at her, her eyes blank with narrow pupils.
"I want to kill all the people who made you like this." Meng Yingying stroked her face, tenderly wiping away the dirt. "Am I a bad person?"
Li Zhaodi shook her head repeatedly: "Of course not."
Meng Yingying bent down, knelt on the ground, and held Li Zhaodi's head in her arms, whispering, "Then you're not either." Li Zhaodi cried loudly in her arms, as if she had been wronged and had finally found a backer.
Zhou Xiuqi frowned and then slowly relaxed his brows: "Li Zhaodi, you should enter the cycle of reincarnation as soon as possible."
Li Zhaodi stopped crying: "Okay."
Zhou Xiuqi took out a mirror from her Qiankun pouch: "Turning and turning a thousand times, rebirth is like a dream, the mysteries of heaven and earth, ferry my soul, guide my departed spirit." The mirror light shone on her body.
Li Zhaodi looked at Zhou Runsheng, who was unconscious to the side, and memories of the two of them resurfaced in her mind.
"My name is Zhou Runsheng, which means 'to nourish things silently.' May I ask your name, young lady?"
"My surname is Li, and my given name is Zhaodi."
“Zhaodi? The sun and moon shine brightly, and the sun shines outside the village. It means bright and splendid. I write it for you to see.”
Zhao Di's original intention was to have a son. She knew very well that because she was a girl, her mother had never loved her. But when she met Zhou Runsheng, he said that Zhao meant brightness.
Zhaodi represents a mother's hopes for her son, while Zhaodi represents her own brilliance.
Under the willow tree, their vows were still fresh in their minds. Everything was genuine. If it were the next life, Zhou Runsheng, would you be my wife and my husband?
May she live a bright and radiant life in her next life.
Li Zhaodi nodded slightly to Zhou Xiuqi. Zhou Xiuqi drew his sword, cut off a strand of her hair, picked it up and placed it on the mirror, chanting: "Yin and Yang in chaos, countless reincarnations, a thousand miles of grudges and wronged souls laughing, a single point in the Yellow Springs, please go!"
She bit her tongue, smeared the blood on her hair, and the hair caught fire. Li Zhaodi's whole body began to burn, but she felt no pain. She looked at Meng Yingying and said, "Yingying, thank you."
Meng Yingying looked at her, slowly being burned by the flames.
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