"Little sister!"
He Simu heard Chen Ying's call amidst the noise, and she slowly turned her head to look over. Chen Ying was still wearing his armor, and his body was covered in blood. He saw a bit of despair in He Simu's trembling eyes, and he wanted to say something helplessly, but because of the presence of others, he could only stop talking.
He Simu closed her eyes. It seemed like only a moment. When she opened her eyes again, the fragile emotion disappeared. All the emotions were sunk in her eyes, like the sky and the sea with no visible boundary in the dark night.
She slowly stood up, turned around, and walked out of the room without speaking to Chen Ying. Chen Ying hurriedly turned around and chased after him. He Simu stopped in a quiet corner, and Chen Ying also stopped.
"What happened to Duan Xu?"
He Simu's tone was a little unstable. His fists were clenched tightly.
Chen Ying clenched her fingers and briefly told He Simu what they had experienced in the past few days. After listening, He Simu softly repeated: "Trapped for three days?"
Chen Ying nodded in confusion and said, "Yes..."
"Is he mute? He didn't even call me for three days!" He Simu punched the rockery bonsai next to him, and the rockery immediately turned into dust.
She turned her head, and Chen Ying saw her dark eyes filled with ghostly spirit. She lowered her head and rubbed her forehead, whispering, "How is he?"
"The arrow wound was only an inch away from the heart of the third brother, but the doctor we invited is the most famous doctor in Qizhou. The doctor said that he might be able to treat the wound, but... but..." Chen Ying's eyes were red, and he gritted his teeth and said, "But, the arrow is poisonous... The doctor said that if there is no antidote by tomorrow, the third brother will... be poisoned into the bone marrow, and there is no medicine to cure it."
tomorrow.
In other words, if she hadn't come to see Duan Xu today out of excitement, the next thing she would see would be Duan Xu's corpse.
He Simu looked towards the busy and noisy place, and after a moment of silence, he asked, "Who hurt him?"
"I don't know who the Danish troops were, but they let them slip away."
"Got it." He Simu said briefly and neatly: "Take good care of him. I will bring the antidote back tomorrow."
After saying this, she disappeared into the darkness, turning into a puff of green smoke.
When Lu Da returned to his room to rest, there was a strange noise on the door and window. As soon as he turned around, he was strangled by something and lifted up. He struggled hard and saw a woman in the middle of the room. The woman was tall and pale, wearing a red and white three-layer gown with a curved hem. A gorgeous silver hairpin was swaying in her hair. She looked up at him coldly with a pair of completely dark eyes.
"I asked around, and the poison on the arrow that hit Duan Xu was prepared by you." He Simu stretched out his hand and said simply, "Give me the antidote."
"His Highness the Ghost King actually came in person... He really is very clear about public and private affairs..." Lu Da smiled gently. His face turned red and purple due to suffocation, but he still said calmly: "I also heard that... His Highness the Ghost King always exchanges one thing for another when he acts in the human world."
He Simu took two steps towards him and asked, "What do you want?"
Lu Da raised his finger and pointed at the jade pendant on He Simu's waist that was emitting a faint blue light.
"Ghost King Lamp."
He Simu's pupils suddenly contracted. Lu Da was put on the ground and began to cough violently. The ghostly aura filled the room, indicating the wrath of the Ghost King. He Simu sneered and said, "Perhaps, you know an evil ghost named Yan Ke?"
Lu Da put down his hand that was touching his chest. He looked at He Simu and said nothing.
He Simu mocked, "I never thought that the high priest of Danzhi, who believed in Cangshen, would actually turn to the evil spirits like his father whom he despised."
Lu Da's face was a little pale, not sure if it was because He Simu had just grabbed his throat, or because of some other reason. He said calmly: "I know what I did is apostasy, as long as Danzhi can be safe, I can bear all the punishments. Duan Xu borrowed your unparalleled power, he must die, or you lose your power."
He Simu turned his head and looked at Lu Da, seeming to find it absurd: "Do you think Duan Xu was able to win until now because of my help?"
If he was as good at asking for help as Luda said, she wouldn't be standing here.
Lu Da simply said, "Your Highness the Ghost King, I made the poison, and I am the only one in the world who knows the antidote. You can do anything, even if you kidnap the emperor, I will just commit suicide immediately. Without the Ghost King Lantern, I will not give you the antidote. Although I cannot defeat you, you cannot dissect my brain."
The handsome and noble priest in white robe looked at the Ghost King. The candlelight in the room flickered restlessly, reflecting He Simu's pale face and the deep emotions in his eyes. Lu Da clenched the corner of his clothes nervously.
After a moment, He Simu smiled faintly and said, "Luda, you don't understand the battlefield at all, so you shouldn't be involved in it. Of course, you are not suitable to be a priest. You want to use a unified faith to maintain this country that is falling apart under alien rule. This wish itself is childish and ridiculous."
She approached Luda and poked his chest with her cold fingers, the chill penetrating deep into his heart.
"Lu Da, you are destined to be out of place and accomplish nothing in your life. And I..." She smiled softly and said, "Although Duan Xu and I have some feelings for each other, how could I give you the Ghost King Lamp for him? You are too naive."
Luda's eyes flickered, but he still insisted, "You only have one day. If there is no antidote tomorrow, he will die."
"Everyone will die. What difference does it make whether it's today or tomorrow?" He Simu looked at him with contempt.
The moon was at its zenith, and the noise in Qizhou City gradually died down. Chen Ying stayed by Duan Xu's bedside, holding his hand, and anxiously wiped the fine beads of sweat from his head. The doctor had just treated Duan Xu's wound and re-bandaged it. At this time, Duan Xu's face was pale, and he didn't know what he dreamed about. His eyeballs moved rapidly under his eyelids, and his anxiety gradually reached its peak. He spoke in a very soft voice.
Chen Ying leaned over and heard Duan Xu calling out in a weak voice - Simu... He Simu...
Shen Ying thought that his mother also called out his name like this before she died.
He tried to hold back, but in the end he couldn't hold back his tears. He kept praying in his heart, praying that his loved ones would not leave him again. He would never be lazy in practicing martial arts again, and when danger came next time, he would protect his third brother well.
Duan Xu's faint voice spread into the wind, passed through countless mountains and rivers, and fell into He Simu's ears.
"He's calling me."
He Simu had already left Danzhi. She was in Yuzhou City. In the darkness, only the Ghost King Lamp on her waist emitted a faint blue light. She said softly, "You finally know how to call me now."
This is the top of Xusheng Mountain, perhaps the best place in the entire Yuzhou City. On one side, you can see the white houses in Yuzhou City covered with snow, and on the other side, you can see the smoke of the human world with thousands of lights. It is half human and half ghostland. She buried her parents together in a tomb, buried here.
She squatted down and leaned against the tombstone, just like she leaned against their shoulders when they were alive. Outside, she was the ghost king that everyone looked up to and everyone feared, but here she was just someone's daughter.
"It's been a long time since I last visited you. I'm going to avenge you soon, Dad. Look at you, you are such a worrying person, you've been schemed against. You even need your daughter to help you clean up the mess."
He Simu stroked the words on the tombstone. The names she had written carefully three hundred years ago were now a little blurry. Three hundred years didn't seem like a very long time. It was as if she had slept in a daze and suddenly woke up. Three hundred years had already passed.
"I really don't understand why Yan Ke wants to be the Ghost King so much. I have watched him over the years, trying to find some reason from him that would interest me in the position of Ghost King, but I can't find any."
"What is the Ghost King? On the throne, there is only sacrifice."
None of the evil spirits fighting for the throne understood.
He Simu looked up at the night sky, tapping her fingers on her bent knees. She said nonchalantly, "Isn't it just a sacrifice? What if we lose Duan Xu? He is just an ordinary part of all the sacrifices."
Perhaps it was just because this person was too lively and passionate that she felt sad. She had never associated the word death with him before. She briefly forgot that he was a human being, and that he would turn gray and become a dry bone.
Since we are mortals, what is the difference between dying tomorrow and dying after living for dozens of years? They are just a matter of a snap of the fingers.
"Life and death go back and forth, there will be many people like him in this world in the future. But I may have to wait a few hundred years before I meet the next person who can make a curse. But even if it's just a few hundred years, I can still afford to wait."
He Simu leaned against the tombstone, gently stroking the Ghost King Lamp on his waist, and said with a chuckle: "It seems that he is just an ordinary person."
There was a long silence, and the bleak north wind blew in the dark night, rustling the trees. The silk thread was entangled between the sky and the earth, blowing He Simu's long hair and clothes, and the hair brushed her eyes and lips.
"It's getting cold." He Simu said in a low voice.
—Your hands are so cold, but they will be warm if I hold them.
“He was always warm.”
"He also said that he wanted to build a colorful palace in Yuzhou City. It was so fancy and I never thought he would like this kind of thing."
"I haven't learned to ride a horse yet. I fell off the horse last time. He said he would teach me later. I said I didn't want to learn because I didn't want to ride a horse. Actually, I felt a little embarrassed because I seemed to be very clumsy when I was a mortal."
He Simu started laughing as he spoke, and then fell silent again. His heart felt like magma seeping out through the cracks in the ground, burning grass and wood everywhere.
She slowly placed her forehead against the hard stone tablet and whispered, "Dad, Mom, I seem to have become very strange recently. Was I so afraid of being alone before?"
"Mom, I actually went to look for your reincarnation. It was a very cute and beautiful little girl. I watched her walk away and didn't talk to her in the end. She will have a new life, lover and children. She is not my mother, and she is not you. I have erected a tombstone for you here, but you no longer exist in this world. I will never find you. No one can hear what I say now. This is what parting is all about."
"It's the same with Duan Xu. Duan Xu is dead. There will never be another Duan Xu in this world."
He Simu stood in front of her parents' tombstone. When the morning light first appeared, she poured the fine wine she brought on the tombstone and said softly, "I drank this wine when I had a sense of taste. It's a fine wine."
"I can win without the Ghost King Lamp. But if I do this, you will probably be very disappointed in me." After a pause, He Simu said, "Maybe I am not suitable to be the Ghost King at all."
Then she slowly leaned over and hugged the tombstone tightly, muttering in a low voice: "I don't want to be the ghost king either."
—One day, you will be like your father, maintaining the balance between ghosts and humans to protect this world.
The memory was too old, and she could hardly remember the voice and appearance of her mother when she said this. He Simu smiled softly, and when she stood up, she was still the moody and powerful ghost king in the ghost world.
"Okay, I'll do it well."