When she received the exact answer, Murong Yunshu's eyes instantly warmed up, and she cried with a smile.
God was indeed merciful, not letting her wait for so long in vain.
"Here." Li Wunai handed over a handkerchief.
Murong Yunshu took the handkerchief and dried the tears at the corners of her eyes, and only after a moment did she return to her usual calm, collected appearance and said, "As far as you know, who is the most likely person he will strike at soon?"
"Me." Li Wunai pointed at himself and said bitterly.
Murong Yunshu raised an eyebrow, "I'm serious."
"I'm also serious." Li Wunai said, "I told you that he did come that night. Even if he didn't kill me, he would at least ruin the lower half of my body."
After hearing what he said, Murong Yunshu pondered for a long time. Suddenly, as if something had occurred to her, she raised her eyes and asked, "Why the lower half of your body?"
"Uh." Li Wunai was incredibly embarrassed and explained in a very subtle way, "The lower half of the body is more important to men."
"Is that so?" Murong Yunshu looked at him curiously and said, "I thought that for monks, it would make no difference if the lower half of the body was ruined or not."
"......" Li Wunai's face was full of black lines, and the corners of his mouth twitched for a long time before he squeezed out a sentence from between his teeth, "Some things, even if you don't use them, won't work if you don't have them." After saying that, he added, "Monks are no exception. Not using it......is not the same as being able to live without it."
Murong Yunshu went silent for a few seconds after hearing his explanation, then asked with a strange expression, "Do monks nowadays not use their legs when they walk?"
Use their legs when they walk......legs...... Li Wunai was in a mess at that time. "You mean legs?"
Murong Yunshu: "What else do you think?"
"I thought......" Halfway through his sentence, Li Wunai immediately shut up. At the same time, the corners of his mouth twitched, and he immediately changed the topic of their conversation. "Since you concluded that Chu Changge was in your vicinity, then no matter who his next target was, as long as something happened to you, he will appear. So the first order of business is to create a bit of chaos and put you in danger."
Murong Yunshu shook her head, "That way, even if you lure him here, he'll still have to go. It won't help matters."
"Then what do you want to do?" Li Wuyou asked.
Murong Yunshu did not answer his question directly but pondered for a moment before saying, "It's enough to know that he's still alive now. I've waited for three years, and I don't care about this moment. For now, I just want to know what happened to him three years ago and why he became like this in the past two years. Instinct tells me that he is involved in something like......a great conspiracy."
"A great conspiracy?" Li Wunai frowned, "Now that the world is at peace, and there are two wily foxes, Nie Qing and Hua Yeli, in the Imperial Court, aiding with affairs of the state, what big conspiracy can there be?"
Murong Yunshu was silent.
Li Wunai added, "Besides, if there were any conspiracy, they would be able to sniff it out first. They both have the character of conspirators."
Murong Yunshu still didn't say anything, and only after a long while did she say, "They won't be able to smell it because this conspiracy is too far away from them."
"This conspiracy too far away from them?" Li Wunai looked puzzled, "From the tone of your voice, it seems like you know something."
Murong Yunshu raised her eyes and asked in return, "Don't you find it strange that Hua Tiancheng suddenly appeared in Shuzhong?"
"What's so strange about it? You suddenly opened Jiugua House, and it becomes like waves, pushed by a breeze that just springs up. It's normal for him to hear about it."
Murong Yunshu asked again, "How many people know about what happened last night?"
"What happened last night? About Chu Changge's visit?" Seeing Murong Yunshu nod, Li Wunai thought for a moment and said, "It should only be you and me."
"I haven't mentioned this to anyone." Murong Yunshu said.
"Neither have I." As soon as the words left his mouth, Li Wunai suddenly realised and exclaimed, "How could Hua Tiansheng know that Chu Changge had come to see you last night?!"
"That's what I wanted to know." Murong Yunshu said, "Unless he was also hiding outside of my room last night, there is only one explanation."
"What is it?" Li Wunai asked.
Murong Yunshu: "He knows Chu Changge's situation better than we do."
At those words, Li Wunai nodded as if he had some understanding and said, "I'll keep an eye on him." After saying that, he quickly turned around. Please read this chapter at xinshou blogspot com.
"Be careful. The current Hua Tiansheng is unfathomable." Murong Yunshu said indifferently.
Li Wunai shuddered at her words and looked back at her in surprise for a few seconds, then he laughed and said, "Relax. You can count on me. No matter how unfathomable Hua Tiansheng is, he can't resist my twenty years of deep practice."
Murong Yunshu: "That's the best."
Murong Yunshu's expression remained indifferent. Li Wunai, however, could see a few different things from her look, which rarely appeared on her face——humanity.
Time was indeed incredibly powerful. A heart as cold and hard as stone also gradually becomes soft. This change was, probably, the flowering of love in time.
*
Murong Yunshu had guessed correctly that Chu Changge was near her. So close that he was only a wall away.
She was painting again.
Yun sat on the fork of a tall parasol tree in the courtyard, gazing silently at the woman in the next yard, who was unfamiliar but also familiar to him.
With the canvas facing away from him, he could not see what was on it. But it was clear from her focused eyes that she was painting something incredibly precious.
What was it?
He was suddenly curious.
Yun sifted through her features, trying to search for a similar face from the memories of an unknown number of eras accumulated in the past, but in the end, he came up empty.
This result did not surprise him. He had never remembered much about his past. Every day when he woke up, he didn't even know what he had eaten or done yesterday, as if every time he opened his eyes, it was his first day in this world. The end of his memory was a blank. He wouldn't even know why he was living in this world if it weren't for South, East, North and West telling him what he should do each day.
But since meeting that woman, he began to have memories. Her eyes, seemingly cloudy but carrying a thousand words, were burned deep into his heart, deep in his memory. But that was all. He remembered her eyes but did not know when or where he had seen them, let alone what connection he had with her.
Another man appeared in the courtyard, a gorgeous man, again with little recollection. He stood behind her, staring at the painting and talking about something with her.
Yun frowned. His heart clogged up. It was the first time since he'd woken up this morning that he'd experienced mental swings other than confusion.
Suddenly, a voice rang out from below, "Not happy?"
Yun dropped his eyes to see that it was the four men, South, East, North and West.
"Unhappy is good. Unhappy means your heart is still moving."
Yun withdrew his eyes indifferently and looked at the two people talking happily in the next courtyard for a moment more, then suddenly his feet moved, and he made a move to flash over there.
"No!" The four men from South, East, North and West made their moves in unison and flew to block his way. "You can't go and disturb her now."
"I remember her." Yun said coldly.
"I know." East Guardian said, "But just remembering her is not enough."
Yun was silent for a long time and fluttered to the ground with a wave of exasperation. He asked in a deep voice, "Say, who is she?"
South, East, North and West landed behind him, lined up in a row, with all of them silent.
"You do know who she is." Yun's clenched his hands into fists, not because of their silence, but his incompetence. Why? Why was it that he just couldn't remember anything no matter how hard he tried to think?
Each of the five men had their own thoughts, and they were relatively speechless.
After a long time, East Guardian let out a long sigh and broke the silence, "In fact, you asked us this question yesterday, the day before yesterday and the day before that......every day since you met her. We also answered you truthfully. The reason why we didn't answer today is that we just hope you can think of it for yourself."
Yesterday, the day before yesterday, the day before that...... Yun was confused. When was yesterday? And when was the day before yesterday?
As far as he could remember, the woman in the next courtyard had been painting. Was that yesterday? Or......the day before yesterday?
Suddenly, a sharp pain spread throughout his brain, and his head seemed to want to explode.
"Leader!" South, East, North and West exclaimed together to support the crumbling Yun.
*
At the same time, the brush in Murong Yunshu's hand shook. "Did you hear that?"
"Hear what?" Feng Cheng asked.
Murong Yunshu: "Someone is shouting 'Leader'."
At these words, Feng Cheng stared and listened carefully for a moment, then slowly shook his head. "I didn't hear anything."
"Impossible." Murong Yunshu put down her brush and took a few steps around the courtyard, looking around and trying to find the source of the sound, but found nothing. [+]
"Maybe it's your illusion." Feng Cheng said.
Murong Yunshu shook her head with a serious face. "I can tell whether it's an illusion or not."
Feng Cheng hung his head and said nothing. How much perseverance did it take to distinguish between the false and the illusory in this bone-crushing yearning?
Admit it, Feng Cheng, you're not even as good as a woman.
Ten years. It has been ten years since you lost Xie-er. Three years of short sorrow but seven years of lasting and dull pain, yet you still can't get through it.
"What good news did you just say you had?" Murong Yunshu suddenly turned back and asked.
Feng Cheng flinched, withdrew his thousands of thoughts and said, "I have found the Wuhua Valley."
When Murong Yunshu heard his words, she sat down again, picked up the brush and stroked it lightly on the canvas. "Have you met Bai Yifeng?"
The corner of Feng Cheng's mouth twitched as he replied, "Not yet." Then, he was ready to accept her ridicule. It was true. He was afraid of death, so he didn't dare enter the Wuhua Valley.
Unexpectedly, Murong Yunshu did not mock him but only said casually instead, "I want to see him."
Her response took Feng Cheng by surprise, and he was stunned before saying, "Wuhua Valley is not far from here. A fast horse will get you there in ten days."
Murong Yunshu: "I'll give you a month to bring him here."
Feng Cheng was dumbfounded at her words. "What did you say?!"
"I want to see him." Murong Yunshu's voice was still spoken unhurriedly, but it had more than a hint of command.
Feng Cheng frowned. "I can't even enter the Wuhua Valley. How can I bring him out?"
"This is your business. Kill anyone and set it fire, do it as you like."
Feng Cheng was speechless for a long time and said, "He is a close friend of Chu Changge. If you go in person, he will not give you a hard time."
Murong Yunshu: "I have more important things to do now."
Feng Cheng: "What important things? Painting and writing, reciting poetry?"
The pen in Murong Yunshu's hand paused for a moment and answered indifferently, "Pretty much."
"......" Feng Cheng became speechless, as if her words had choked him. After three years of not seeing her, this woman had gotten even weirder!
When she received the exact answer, Murong Yunshu's eyes instantly warmed up, and she cried with a smile.
God was indeed merciful, not letting her wait for so long in vain.
"Here." Li Wunai handed over a handkerchief.
Murong Yunshu took the handkerchief and dried the tears at the corners of her eyes, and only after a moment did she return to her usual calm, collected appearance and said, "As far as you know, who is the most likely person he will strike at soon?"
"Me." Li Wunai pointed at himself and said bitterly.
Murong Yunshu raised an eyebrow, "I'm serious."
"I'm also serious." Li Wunai said, "I told you that he did come that night. Even if he didn't kill me, he would at least ruin the lower half of my body."
After hearing what he said, Murong Yunshu pondered for a long time. Suddenly, as if something had occurred to her, she raised her eyes and asked, "Why the lower half of your body?"
"Uh." Li Wunai was incredibly embarrassed and explained in a very subtle way, "The lower half of the body is more important to men."
"Is that so?" Murong Yunshu looked at him curiously and said, "I thought that for monks, it would make no difference if the lower half of the body was ruined or not."
"......" Li Wunai's face was full of black lines, and the corners of his mouth twitched for a long time before he squeezed out a sentence from between his teeth, "Some things, even if you don't use them, won't work if you don't have them." After saying that, he added, "Monks are no exception. Not using it......is not the same as being able to live without it."
Murong Yunshu went silent for a few seconds after hearing his explanation, then asked with a strange expression, "Do monks nowadays not use their legs when they walk?"
Use their legs when they walk......legs...... Li Wunai was in a mess at that time. "You mean legs?"
Murong Yunshu: "What else do you think?"
"I thought......" Halfway through his sentence, Li Wunai immediately shut up. At the same time, the corners of his mouth twitched, and he immediately changed the topic of their conversation. "Since you concluded that Chu Changge was in your vicinity, then no matter who his next target was, as long as something happened to you, he will appear. So the first order of business is to create a bit of chaos and put you in danger."
Murong Yunshu shook her head, "That way, even if you lure him here, he'll still have to go. It won't help matters."
"Then what do you want to do?" Li Wuyou asked.
Murong Yunshu did not answer his question directly but pondered for a moment before saying, "It's enough to know that he's still alive now. I've waited for three years, and I don't care about this moment. For now, I just want to know what happened to him three years ago and why he became like this in the past two years. Instinct tells me that he is involved in something like......a great conspiracy."
"A great conspiracy?" Li Wunai frowned, "Now that the world is at peace, and there are two wily foxes, Nie Qing and Hua Yeli, in the Imperial Court, aiding with affairs of the state, what big conspiracy can there be?"
Murong Yunshu was silent.
Li Wunai added, "Besides, if there were any conspiracy, they would be able to sniff it out first. They both have the character of conspirators."
Murong Yunshu still didn't say anything, and only after a long while did she say, "They won't be able to smell it because this conspiracy is too far away from them."
"This conspiracy too far away from them?" Li Wunai looked puzzled, "From the tone of your voice, it seems like you know something."
Murong Yunshu raised her eyes and asked in return, "Don't you find it strange that Hua Tiancheng suddenly appeared in Shuzhong?"
"What's so strange about it? You suddenly opened Jiugua House, and it becomes like waves, pushed by a breeze that just springs up. It's normal for him to hear about it."
Murong Yunshu asked again, "How many people know about what happened last night?"
"What happened last night? About Chu Changge's visit?" Seeing Murong Yunshu nod, Li Wunai thought for a moment and said, "It should only be you and me."
"I haven't mentioned this to anyone." Murong Yunshu said.
"Neither have I." As soon as the words left his mouth, Li Wunai suddenly realised and exclaimed, "How could Hua Tiansheng know that Chu Changge had come to see you last night?!"
"That's what I wanted to know." Murong Yunshu said, "Unless he was also hiding outside of my room last night, there is only one explanation."
"What is it?" Li Wunai asked.
Murong Yunshu: "He knows Chu Changge's situation better than we do."
At those words, Li Wunai nodded as if he had some understanding and said, "I'll keep an eye on him." After saying that, he quickly turned around. Please read this chapter at xinshou blogspot com.
"Be careful. The current Hua Tiansheng is unfathomable." Murong Yunshu said indifferently.
Li Wunai shuddered at her words and looked back at her in surprise for a few seconds, then he laughed and said, "Relax. You can count on me. No matter how unfathomable Hua Tiansheng is, he can't resist my twenty years of deep practice."
Murong Yunshu: "That's the best."
Murong Yunshu's expression remained indifferent. Li Wunai, however, could see a few different things from her look, which rarely appeared on her face——humanity.
Time was indeed incredibly powerful. A heart as cold and hard as stone also gradually becomes soft. This change was, probably, the flowering of love in time.
*
Murong Yunshu had guessed correctly that Chu Changge was near her. So close that he was only a wall away.
She was painting again.
Yun sat on the fork of a tall parasol tree in the courtyard, gazing silently at the woman in the next yard, who was unfamiliar but also familiar to him.
With the canvas facing away from him, he could not see what was on it. But it was clear from her focused eyes that she was painting something incredibly precious.
What was it?
He was suddenly curious.
Yun sifted through her features, trying to search for a similar face from the memories of an unknown number of eras accumulated in the past, but in the end, he came up empty.
This result did not surprise him. He had never remembered much about his past. Every day when he woke up, he didn't even know what he had eaten or done yesterday, as if every time he opened his eyes, it was his first day in this world. The end of his memory was a blank. He wouldn't even know why he was living in this world if it weren't for South, East, North and West telling him what he should do each day.
But since meeting that woman, he began to have memories. Her eyes, seemingly cloudy but carrying a thousand words, were burned deep into his heart, deep in his memory. But that was all. He remembered her eyes but did not know when or where he had seen them, let alone what connection he had with her.
Another man appeared in the courtyard, a gorgeous man, again with little recollection. He stood behind her, staring at the painting and talking about something with her.
Yun frowned. His heart clogged up. It was the first time since he'd woken up this morning that he'd experienced mental swings other than confusion.
Suddenly, a voice rang out from below, "Not happy?"
Yun dropped his eyes to see that it was the four men, South, East, North and West.
"Unhappy is good. Unhappy means your heart is still moving."
Yun withdrew his eyes indifferently and looked at the two people talking happily in the next courtyard for a moment more, then suddenly his feet moved, and he made a move to flash over there.
"No!" The four men from South, East, North and West made their moves in unison and flew to block his way. "You can't go and disturb her now."
"I remember her." Yun said coldly.
"I know." East Guardian said, "But just remembering her is not enough."
Yun was silent for a long time and fluttered to the ground with a wave of exasperation. He asked in a deep voice, "Say, who is she?"
South, East, North and West landed behind him, lined up in a row, with all of them silent.
"You do know who she is." Yun's clenched his hands into fists, not because of their silence, but his incompetence. Why? Why was it that he just couldn't remember anything no matter how hard he tried to think?
Each of the five men had their own thoughts, and they were relatively speechless.
After a long time, East Guardian let out a long sigh and broke the silence, "In fact, you asked us this question yesterday, the day before yesterday and the day before that......every day since you met her. We also answered you truthfully. The reason why we didn't answer today is that we just hope you can think of it for yourself."
Yesterday, the day before yesterday, the day before that...... Yun was confused. When was yesterday? And when was the day before yesterday?
As far as he could remember, the woman in the next courtyard had been painting. Was that yesterday? Or......the day before yesterday?
Suddenly, a sharp pain spread throughout his brain, and his head seemed to want to explode.
"Leader!" South, East, North and West exclaimed together to support the crumbling Yun.
*
At the same time, the brush in Murong Yunshu's hand shook. "Did you hear that?"
"Hear what?" Feng Cheng asked.
Murong Yunshu: "Someone is shouting 'Leader'."
At these words, Feng Cheng stared and listened carefully for a moment, then slowly shook his head. "I didn't hear anything."
"Impossible." Murong Yunshu put down her brush and took a few steps around the courtyard, looking around and trying to find the source of the sound, but found nothing. [+]
"Maybe it's your illusion." Feng Cheng said.
Murong Yunshu shook her head with a serious face. "I can tell whether it's an illusion or not."
Feng Cheng hung his head and said nothing. How much perseverance did it take to distinguish between the false and the illusory in this bone-crushing yearning?
Admit it, Feng Cheng, you're not even as good as a woman.
Ten years. It has been ten years since you lost Xie-er. Three years of short sorrow but seven years of lasting and dull pain, yet you still can't get through it.
"What good news did you just say you had?" Murong Yunshu suddenly turned back and asked.
Feng Cheng flinched, withdrew his thousands of thoughts and said, "I have found the Wuhua Valley."
When Murong Yunshu heard his words, she sat down again, picked up the brush and stroked it lightly on the canvas. "Have you met Bai Yifeng?"
The corner of Feng Cheng's mouth twitched as he replied, "Not yet." Then, he was ready to accept her ridicule. It was true. He was afraid of death, so he didn't dare enter the Wuhua Valley.
Unexpectedly, Murong Yunshu did not mock him but only said casually instead, "I want to see him."
Her response took Feng Cheng by surprise, and he was stunned before saying, "Wuhua Valley is not far from here. A fast horse will get you there in ten days."
Murong Yunshu: "I'll give you a month to bring him here."
Feng Cheng was dumbfounded at her words. "What did you say?!"
"I want to see him." Murong Yunshu's voice was still spoken unhurriedly, but it had more than a hint of command.
Feng Cheng frowned. "I can't even enter the Wuhua Valley. How can I bring him out?"
"This is your business. Kill anyone and set it fire, do it as you like."
Feng Cheng was speechless for a long time and said, "He is a close friend of Chu Changge. If you go in person, he will not give you a hard time."
Murong Yunshu: "I have more important things to do now."
Feng Cheng: "What important things? Painting and writing, reciting poetry?"
The pen in Murong Yunshu's hand paused for a moment and answered indifferently, "Pretty much."
"......" Feng Cheng became speechless, as if her words had choked him. After three years of not seeing her, this woman had gotten even weirder!
