In a frantic rush, she pulled out the White Cloud Bean. After having Li Jiang hold it, she grabbed his shoulders.
"If you go to a strange place, don't panic. Just think about getting out."
"???"
"Don't be afraid, it's a good place."
"???"
"....Don't you feel anything?"
"???"
"I knew that fellow was lying." She pried Li Jiang's hands open, wanting to take the White Stone out to study it properly, only to see the stone absorbing Li Jiang's blood. The white color gradually turned red, and finally, it became blood-red.
Having never seen such an eerie sight, Li Jiang wanted to throw the stone away, but his little wife was gripping him tightly with both hands, even more agitated than he was. Thus, he could only watch helplessly as his blood was sucked dry by a stone.
"Why hasn't it disappeared?" Qin Wangshu muttered as she picked up the stone, looking at it from all angles, and then tried saying a few words to it, but there was no reaction.
She placed the stone back into Li Jiang's hand and helped him close his grip around it.
The storage bag was real, so this must be real as well.
"You said 'go in'."
"???"
"You said 'go in'."
"? You said 'go in'."
"It's not me saying 'go in,' it's you. You say 'go in'."
After a long, dazed silence, Li Jiang finally understood Qin Wangshu's meaning: "Go in."
"!!!" *Who am I! Where am I! How did I get in here?*
'Li Jiang, can you hear me? Don't be afraid. Observe your surroundings carefully and then come out.'
"!!!" *Who am I! Where am I! How did I get out?*
"How is it? How is it inside? Is there a spiritual spring? Are there immortal herbs? Forget the herbs, can the soil be used for planting...?" Qin Wangshu asked a rapid-fire string of questions, but Li Jiang just stood there like a dazed goose, neither speaking nor blinking.
Licking her lips, Qin Wangshu began to lie.
"This is a treasure of the immortals. When I was a child, I met an old immortal, and this was given to me by him. He said it was a blessed land; you just need to drip blood on it to use it. But I was afraid of the pain, so I never used it."
"Now that the water in the mountain stream is increasing, I think the source shouldn't be far. If there's a pool, there will likely be more animals. If you have this, just go inside if you encounter danger. But you must be careful—people cannot know about this. If people find out, even biological brothers would turn greedy. This is a one-of-a-kind treasure in the world."
The woman before him was not even as tall as his shoulder, yet this overwhelming care reminded him of that single glance in the blacksmith shop over a year ago. Only back then, those eyes were filled with countless grievances and a pitiable fragility.
As their silhouettes overlapped, Li Jiang felt as if something was trying to surge out, only to get stuck in his throat.
This person, who had wanted to kill him at the start, had actually given him such an important treasure. He felt the blood in his entire body rushing backward.
"You... you take it. I'm not afraid of... danger." Compared to himself, he cared more about her.
"You're such a fool. Didn't I just say it requires blood to recognize its master? Once you've dripped blood on it, it will only recognize you." After picking up the small stone and rubbing it a few times, Qin Wangshu took out a silk handkerchief, grabbed a pair of scissors, and snipped the silk. She carefully wove the small stone into a ribbon and hung it around Li Jiang's neck. "Don't you dare lose it. If it's lost, it might be hard to find, or perhaps it'll never be found again."
After securely tying the small stone around Li Jiang's neck, Qin Wangshu grabbed his uninjured hand. "See if you can take me in. I'm truly curious."
He was truly curious, yet he hadn't let it recognize him as its master. As for being afraid of pain—he didn't believe that at all.
The scene shifted. The breath he had drawn swirled in his mouth before bursting into a burst of fragrance.
".....Does this fellow think that if I die, there will be no one to bury me? Giving a space along with a coffin... how thoughtful."
The space was not the kind of blessed land she had imagined. It was oval-shaped, about a hundred square meters in size, surrounded by an eerie red glow. The crystal coffin in the center was even more bizarre. If they hadn't been right by the crystal coffin, and if the lid hadn't been open and empty, she would never have stayed inside for a single second longer.
"Since the coffin was given, why weren't some funerary goods provided?"
Gritting her teeth, she spat out the words one by one. Qin Wangshu raised her foot and kicked toward the crystal platform.
"Ow~" Her toe felt like it was breaking.
"Let me see."
Last time he entered, he hadn't even had time to look around before hearing a sound and leaving. He had been quite frightened when he entered this time as well, but what surprised him even more was his little wife... this feisty temperament... he liked it very much, much more than he had over the past few months.
He took off her shoe and pulled back Qin Wangshu's sock, only to see that her small fingernail was bruised with blood.
"If you want to kick something, just call me. Your feet are so tender."
He breathed out in heartache. If he didn't know that a doctor couldn't do anything for a bruised nail, he would have truly wanted to carry her on his back to find one.
Looking down at the blood vessels under the nail, Qin Wangshu took her sock, which she couldn't distinguish the color of.
"Just looking at it makes me angry. You should just take me out."
People are like this; if they don't have something, they just think about it, but once they have it, they maintain the highest level of vision. Not being a space suitable for farming was disappointing enough, but such a deceptive place with a coffin made her feel more uneasy than disappointed.
"It's a container at least. I'll wash it later and use it to hold water." She didn't dare drink it, but she could at least use it for washing; she was already ready to throw a tantrum.
Thinking of Li Jiang's hand, Qin Wangshu tugged at her skirt, looking for a piece of relatively clean cloth.
"What's going on here?" Mother Li had just realized the fourth child and his wife were missing. She was about to call someone to look for them when she saw them emerging from behind the trees, with the man supporting his limping little wife. Mother Li felt a bit uneasy.
"Mother, do you have any wound salve? Li Jiang's hand is injured."
Qin Wangshu was merely asking, but to her surprise, Mother Li froze for a moment before saying, "My house doesn't have any, but your sister's house does."
"What's happened? How did he get injured? Don't you know it's dangerous on this mountain? How could you be so careless?" As she spoke, Mother Li went to look for the eldest daughter.
The next day, because of her aching toe, Qin Wangshu stayed in without shoes for the entire day.
In the afternoon, the men returned unexpectedly early.
"...The water isn't just flowing; the source is as wide as a bucket. It looks like it won't dry up for a year or two. There are plenty of wild chickens and ducks in the shallow reed marshes, and there are rabbits at the foot of the nearby mountains..."
They had indeed found a spring. Not only was there a spring, but a sizable pool had formed in the mountain stream. The water in the pool between the two mountains was deep and clean, filled with fish, surrounded by reed marshes with chickens and ducks, and there were even wild rabbits by the mountainside.
It was practically paradise. But paradise was not absolutely beautiful. Pan Dalin had not only found traces of roe deer, deer, wild goats, and wild boar herds in the vicinity, but also four large tigers.
Pan Dalin estimated that the tigers were from the same family, though he didn't know where in the mountains between the two peaks they lived.
"Dalin, even though you haven't hunted tigers, you've killed wild boars. A tiger is more or less like a wild boar..."
"Since they're more or less the same, let your children go. Don't worry, if we get one, we definitely won't fight over it. Your four children are all more capable than Dalin. It's just a few tigers; with fists like iron, they'll be finished in a few punches." This Mother Ke—what kind of heart does she have? Tigers, and four of them at that, maybe even more, and she actually dared to suggest it.
(End of Chapter)