Chapter 010 Linjiangxian (IV)
With her mother's last words in her heart, Ni Su wanted to dream about her, but was afraid to dream about her. She could no longer sleep in the second half of the night. She simply packed her bag, left a few coins and a note under the candlestick, picked up a lantern, led the horse, and left Madam Jiang's house quietly.
The road was not easy to walk on at night. Ni Su rode slowly on horseback. There was a living soul silently by her side, accompanying her forward in the light night mist.
Swaying on the horse's back, Ni Su's sleepiness that she had lost earlier came back silently for some reason, making her eyelids feel heavy. She forced herself to be alert, shook her head, and couldn't help but glance at him secretly.
He looks very young and walks in a very graceful manner.
"How old were you then?"
Xu Hexue's half-closed eyelashes slightly raised when she suddenly spoke. Understanding what she meant by "then", he held up the solitary lamp and opened his lips: "Nineteen."
Ni Su was surprised, "At nineteen you just..."
The second half of her sentence was drowned in her throat.
"Why?"
Ni Su couldn't imagine that nineteen years old should have been the best age, so why did he die young and wander around in Youdu.
When Xu Hexue heard her ask "why", he also thought about it for a moment, but in the end, he shook his head and answered: "I don't know."
"You don't know how you died?"
"No,"
The light flickered, casting a shadow on Xu Hexue's clothes and shoes. He just stared at them. He heard the sound of waves surging in the river on one side. He looked up and saw the mountains were like ink and the water was sparkling. "I don't know why I have to die."
Ni Su didn't understand, so she thought for a moment and said, "You haven't even lived half of your life yet, you must have a lot of regrets, right?"
"It's been so long, I've forgotten a lot."
Xu Hexue was hiding in the mist, which made her face look even paler. "Now I only remember one thing."
"Is that your old friend in Yunjing?"
Ni Su looked at the cloak on him.
Upon hearing this, Xu Hexue turned his head to meet her gaze, but did not say yes or no.
"Just like we agreed, you will find my brother for me," Ni Su held the reins, stroked the horse's mane when he heard the horse's breathing, and said to him, "I will also help you find your old friend and do my best to make up for your regret."
The distant mountains were covered with white scales. Xu Hexue silently examined the girl on horseback. After a moment, he looked away and said in a calm voice, "I don't need you to help me with anything. Just light a lamp for me."
The candle in the lantern went out, and the sky became increasingly gray. The river section on the right, shaded by green trees, was much quieter. There was a stone bridge across the two banks. An old man leading a cow came slowly from the other end, pushing up his bamboo hat. He squinted his eyes and saw someone riding a horse approaching on the mountain path.
The horse's hooves stepped lightly, and the young woman on the horse's back nodded her head and leaned her body sometimes to the left and sometimes to the right. The old man was watching and saw the horse's butt turn and rush to the ditch with lush grass and trees. The woman who was dozing on the horse's back was caught off guard and her body tilted and she was about to fall off.
The old man opened his mouth but before he could shout, he saw her tilted body seemed to be supported by something.
The old man suspected that he had seen wrongly, so he rubbed his eyelids and saw the woman sitting upright on the horse's back with her eyes wide open in a daze.
“That’s strange…”
The old man muttered to himself, walked down the bridge and went to the path along the river bank to herd the cattle.
Ni Su just realized that his hands were empty. He lowered his eyes and saw the hand holding the reins. Under the pale and thin skin, every inch of bones was beautiful and smooth.
There was someone behind her, but she could not sense his breath. His embrace was just very cold, as cold as snow, as if it would freeze her sleepiness to death.
He suddenly realized something, and distanced himself from her a little, saying, "If you are sleepy, go to sleep."
Ni Su did not look back. She looked at the bag that should have been on her but was now hanging on the horse's neck. She responded softly. The sleepiness that had not yet frozen to death pressed down her eyelids. During this swaying journey, she felt at ease dozing off.
It is the hottest summer now. Even though the sun has set and it has gotten dark, it is still very hot in Qingzhou City. The owner of Songyuan Inn is fiddling with an abacus behind the counter, wiping the sweat from his forehead with a towel from time to time.
Several waiters were busy lighting lanterns in the hall. The shopkeeper saw a shadow projected on the counter. He looked up and saw a dusty girl.
"Young lady, are you staying in the hotel?" The shopkeeper said with a smile on his face.
"Two rooms."
Ni Su put the money on the counter.
Two rooms?
The shopkeeper stretched his neck to look around behind her, but he didn't see anyone else. He asked in confusion, "It seems you are alone."
Ni Su was startled. She almost forgot that others didn't know about Xu Ziling's existence. She said "Ah" but didn't change her words. "I'm waiting for a friend. He will come over later ."
The innkeeper nodded and said, "Don't worry, there are people guarding the inn at night. If your friend knocks on the door, we will welcome him in."
"Thank you very much."
Ni Su responded briefly, then lifted her skirt and followed the waiter upstairs.
After simply asking the waiter for some food, Ni Su put her bag on the bed, turned around and turned off the lights in the room, then lit them again with her own hands. She lit five candles in a row, and sure enough, the figure became clearer and clearer under the lights.
"The more I order, the longer you will appear in front of others?" Ni Su sat down at the table and poured herself a bowl of tea.
Xu Hexue glanced at the lamp on the table and nodded slightly: "These are enough to support us for some time."
It's not that he can't show his body, but the more incense and candles the necromancer lights for him, the more real his body will become, until he is no different from an ordinary person.
"Then when you go to meet your old friend, I will light up a whole house of lights for you."
Ni Su supported her chin and said to him.
Xu Hexue raised her eyes for a moment, then said, "Actually, you don't need another room."
"You are a gentleman who observes etiquette, and you refuse to share a room with me. I no longer want a room, so where will you stay tonight? Are you going to find a tree outside again?"
Seeing that he didn't speak again, Ni Su put down the tea bowl, "Xu Ziling, you are so humble and polite even as a ghost, how can I not treat you politely just because you are a ghost? All the clues related to my brother are in your hands now, please don't refuse."
She said this just to make Xu Hexue accept her kindness.
He was so polite and virtuous that he must have been an extraordinary person when he was alive. And as a lonely soul living in the world without a roof over his head, wouldn't he be even more lost?
After all, he was once a living person.
"Thank you very much."
After a while, Xu Hexue lowered his eyes.
After a whole day's journey, Ni Su was exhausted. Fortunately, someone in the inn fetched water. She finally took a bath, changed into clean clothes, and fell asleep as soon as she touched the pillow.
On a silent night, the waiter was keeping watch in the hall, trying not to sleep. At one moment, he felt a flash of light from upstairs. His eyelids immediately lifted up and he looked up. He saw a bright candlelight in the room that no one had moved in yet, and it was quiet upstairs without any sound of human voice.
The waiter was bored and recalled that the candles burning in the room were those he had found for the girl. Her friend hadn't arrived yet, so he didn't know why she lit so many candles in the empty room.
Feeling an indescribable weirdness in his heart, the waiter yawned lazily, hoping that the night would pass quickly so that he could go back to sleep.
The lanterns on the upper floor swayed in the wind, and a very thin mist sneaked into the room through the half-open door. In the bright flame of the candle, it turned into the shape of a young man.
Xu Hexue silently looked at the simple furnishings in the room. After a while, he sat down beside the couch and sat there quietly for a while until he frowned slightly.
He rolled up his left sleeve, and the warm yellow light illuminated his pale arm. Under his gaze, the intact skin cracked inch by inch, forming messy knife and sword scars like blood lines.
The bright red blood flowed and dripped down his wrist, and once it touched the ground, it instantly turned into fine dust, floating and dispersing.
Xu Hexue put down his sleeves and touched the soft quilt with his knuckles. Tentatively, he stretched his body and lay down like he had done many years ago when he was still a human being.
The dust in the room flew everywhere and disappeared in a flash.
He closed his eyes.
I heard the sound of pine wind outside the lattice window on the right, the chirping of birds at night, and... knocks on the door.
Xu Hexue opened his eyes in an instant.
He got up from the bed, walked over and opened the door, then saw a sleepy girl standing outside. Her long black hair was loose with a few strands of hair sticking to her cheeks. When she heard the door open, she opened her eyes wide and looked at him.
"What's wrong?"
Xu Hexue spoke.
"I forgot to ask you, do you want to take a shower?" Ni Su suppressed a yawn, but her eyes were misty.
He looked clean despite the dusty journey, he must be very fond of cleanliness.
Xu Hexue was stunned. She didn't expect that she would get up in the middle of a sleep just to ask him this.
"I,"
He chose his words carefully and answered, "No water."
"No water? Then what to use?" Hearing his answer, Ni Su felt less sleepy and she did not hide her curiosity.
In the lobby downstairs, the waiter was fast asleep on the table, snoring loudly.
Ni Su tiptoed downstairs, lifted the curtain and walked into the backyard of the inn.
The round moon was mostly blocked by the eaves, but the silvery moonlight spread across the courtyard. Ni Su saw Xu Hexue standing there. He was not wearing the cloak, and his robe was as clean as snow.
Being stared at by the girl in the corridor, Xu Hexue's cold eyes revealed a somewhat unnatural expression. He moved his two fingers slightly, and Ni Su felt that the moonlight in the courtyard was even more dreamy.
Shining on his body, bits of bright light continuously floated out from his sleeves, very faint, even fainter than his shadow on the ground.
Ni Su really found it difficult to describe what she was seeing.
She almost thought she was in a dream.
Is it okay to just bask in the moonlight?
Ni Su was completely stunned, almost staring blankly at the young man standing in the courtyard. No, it should be said that he was still a teenager, with a clear mind and a handsome appearance.
At this moment, I was in a strange and dazzling world, which felt both alienated and divine.
"You don't look like a ghost at all."
Ni Su walked to his side, stretched out her hand to touch the dust, but she just looked up, not knowing that when her fingers touched a grain of dust, his eyelashes trembled slightly.
The furry ball of light on the ground also shook its tail.
"I think..."
Ni Su looked up at the night sky above the eaves: "Just like the stars."
