Chapter 10: A Handful of Yellow Earth, A Beauty's White Bones

Exit the west gate of Fenglin City, follow the official road for about seven or eight li, then turn left onto a small path. In less than half a stick of incense, you will see the Green Willow River, its banks draped in weeping willows.

At this moment, the evening breeze brushed against their faces, and the bright moon was reflected in the rippling water, shimmering with light.

When Jiang Wang emerged from the path, he saw Ling He’s thin back, standing by the river like a silent tree.

"Hey, let me see, let me see." Zhao Rucheng darted in front of him, craning his neck and saying, "You were definitely hiding here crying, weren't you?"

Ling He looked somewhat helpless. "Why are you all here?"

"Your voice is a bit hoarse. You definitely cried!"

Just then, a rough voice emerged from the grass by the riverbank. "Zhao, do you know that sometimes you really deserve a beating?"

"Brother Hu, you're here too?" Zhao Rucheng shrank his neck. Du Yehu was a brute who would truly start a fight at the slightest disagreement, and he wouldn't care about ruining Zhao's handsome face.

"I was already here drinking," Du Yehu said sullenly, the smell of alcohol drifting in the evening breeze. "I didn't expect him to carry that guy over here too. Bad luck."

"Exactly! Why even bury him?" Zhao Rucheng added. "A heartless, ungrateful wretch like that should just be thrown into the river to drift downstream and feed the fish and shrimp."

Jiang Wang glanced in the direction Du Yehu had emerged from. "Is he buried right there?"

"Third brother," Ling He said, mindful of Jiang Wang's feelings. "I haven't forgotten Pengju's wickedness, but I also remember his kindness. My family background was poor, and I was often hungry. Pengju would always make excuses to have me teach him martial arts, holding me back until it was time to eat. He deserved to die for his crimes, but I couldn't just watch him rot in the wilderness... Of course, you have been very good to me too. That year when we suppressed the Green Ox Stronghold, you saved me..."

"Why say all this?" Jiang Wang interrupted him. "My father told me when he was alive that adults are different from children. The first thing an adult must learn is to seek common ground while reserving differences. The kind of 'I won't play with him, so you can't play with him either' mentality is for children. Your relationship with Fang Pengju and your relationship with me are separate matters. I won't interfere with your deep feelings for him, and you won't interfere with my decision to sever all ties with him."

"That is the truth," Ling He said.

He looked left and right at the Green Willow River under the night sky. "I always have the illusion that it was only yesterday. Not much has changed here, but we are all different now."

"Nothing is immutable; the only constant in this world is that everything is always changing," Zhao Rucheng said meaningfully, before shamelessly leaning in toward Ling He. "It shouldn't take this long to bury someone. Did you two hug and cry together?"

No sooner had the words left his mouth than he leaped into the air, nimbly dodging a hairy leg flying from Du Yehu.

"Tsk tsk tsk, flying into a rage from shame..." He had only just begun his provocation when he hurriedly bowed. "My mistake, my mistake, Brother Hu."

Du Yehu was already rubbing his hands and chasing after him. "You aren't mistaken; I was just about to have a good cry with you."

Watching the two bickering, Ling He said softly, "But I believe there are some things that will never change."

"I agree with half of what you said," Jiang Wang replied.

The "sparring" between Du Yehu and Zhao Rucheng somehow turned into a four-way brawl. Fists and kicks flew, and everyone tripped each other up. By the end, they were all panting, laughing out loud together, and then hugging and crying.

If anyone had passed by the Green Willow River that night, they would likely have started rumors about water ghosts or something similar.

The four brothers finally left the Green Willow River side by side, leaving behind the place that recorded their youth and friendship.

No one spoke again.

Only Zhao Rucheng looked back one last time and muttered

"When you get to the other side, don't harm any more friends. You dead ghost."

...

Moonlight flowed through the shimmering Green Willow River and poured down onto the dilapidated roof of the Zhenzhen Temple.

Perhaps because of the moonlight, the faces of the two people speaking in the ruined temple appeared deathly pale.

One of them was a captivating woman. She wore a bright red dress, her figure exquisite and curvaceous. The slight opening at her collar revealed a dazzling patch of white, making it impossible for one to look away.

Her face was perhaps too pale, which by rights should have made her look frail and sickly, yet she gave off a sensation of stunning, vivid beauty. Perhaps it was because of her overly vibrant red lips?

She sat on the dust-covered altar without a care, so beautiful yet so composed.

She used her pinky finger to gently stroke her red lips and said, "The beggars in this temple are all dead; it truly is vexing. What shall we use to invite the divine decree?"

Her voice seemed to circle the cobwebs in the eaves before reaching its destination, sounding somewhat hollow.

"The soul of a cultivator will suffice."

The man speaking stood at the doorway. Unlike the woman in red, he seemed unwilling to let even half a foot touch the filthy, ruined temple, and he covered his nose and mouth with a handkerchief embroidered with plum blossoms.

"Oh my, that sounds easy," the woman in red said. "We have to be sneaky just to kill a few mortals. Kill a cultivator? Are you not afraid the Zhuang State Daoist Academy will come knocking?"

"Every single person in this city will die sooner or later," the man said, frowning. "Must we choose to speak in a place like this?"

The woman in red giggled. "The world-renowned Zuo Guanglie fell right here. The people of Zhuang State have turned this place over more than ten times, inside and out. There is no place cleaner than this nearby."

Speaking of Zuo Guanglie, she closed her eyes slightly, revealing a look of intoxication, and a flush quickly rose to her pale face. "I think I can still smell his robust scent~"

"Back to business," the man interrupted her reverie calmly. "Wei Quji is not someone to be trifled with, and now Dong A has arrived. We must find the Daoist Child as soon as possible. Those Qin and Chu barbarians are fighting here, disrupting the sacrifice at Zhenzhen Temple. If you ask me, rather than sneaking around to catch mortals one by one, it would be simpler and more efficient to just sacrifice a cultivator."

"There isn't only one way to court death; why must you be so rigid? Wouldn't drawing a sword to slit a throat be better? Or drawing down lightning to consume the body?"

Perhaps annoyed by the interruption of her reverie, the woman in red opened her beautiful eyes and withdrew her smile. "Before the Daoist Child manifests, you had best know what it means to keep a low profile!"

The man seemed somewhat irritated, covering his nose as he said, "Miaoyu! It’s as if attacking the Fenglin Daoist Academy wasn't your idea! Now that the whole city is in an uproar, if things go wrong, our grand plan will fall apart at the last moment!"

"What do you know? The world is too big, and there are too many accidents! Who could have guessed that Zuo Guanglie would just die like that? And it just happened to ruin our sacrificial plan. Beneath the River of Oblivion, the white bones have been silent for too long! There can be no more accidents! In the current Fenglin City, Dong A is crucial; we must determine his strength and his bottom line! A certain amount of sacrifice is unavoidable. Furthermore..."

The woman in red, named Miaoyu, licked her lips. "Do you know that the beggars in this ruined temple are not all dead? I smelled a familiar scent in the Fenglin City Daoist Academy..."

The filthy environment made the man increasingly impatient. "Is the life or death of a mere beggar worth my concern?"

This time, Miaoyu just stretched lazily, her beautiful figure fully displayed. "Fool."

The man narrowed his eyes, masking the flash of desire in their depths. "Do not think that just because you are nominally the Daoist Child's woman, you can be so presumptuous. There have been many Saintesses in the sect over the thousands of years. When the Daoist Child manifests, whether he wants you or acknowledges you remains to be seen."

"Beautiful faces and white bones, empty and illusory. Can you not see through it?"

"Heh heh heh heh." The man turned and walked out of the temple. "Whether I can see through it or not, what does it matter? It is what it is."

After a long while, in the quiet and ruined old temple, a seductive murmur sounded softly, rippling out like the moonlight.

"How could he not love me? How could he not want me? I have guarded for so many years, waited for so many years..."

(End of chapter)