Lu Liangsheng's eyes swept across the seven embarrassed people, and then fell on the smiling face of the woman in the green dress. He then smiled and nodded slightly at her.
It turned out to be Min Yuerou. This place was still hundreds of miles away from Chang'an. It was surprising that a girl like her had to run so far. Lu Liangsheng thought about it and suddenly felt that he was meddling in other people's business. He put down his book and bowed to the campfire.
"Everyone, it's raining heavily outside, come over and warm yourself by the fire."
"Thank you, brother." The young man, who was called Brother Chengwen by his companions, bowed, sat down by the fire, opened his bun, and warmed his wet hair.
When the man who had been shouting before saw him sit down, he asked the other two young men to come in as well and squeeze in together, probably wanting to make some space for the three women at the entrance of the shed to warm themselves by the fire.
"Old man, move towards the donkey."
The man gently kicked Wang Banxia, who was sitting cross-legged nearby, with the tip of his shoe. After the other party turned around, he turned back and sneered at his companion.
"Hey, look, it's a blind man. Hey, brother over there, is this blind man traveling with you?"
"Brother Qi De, stop talking and sit down by the fire."
Cheng Wen, who had invited three women to sit down opposite him, frowned and bowed apologetically towards Lu Liangsheng who was leaning against the tree.
"I hope you don't mind. I, Brother Qi De, speak like this. I'm actually not a bad person."
Over there, Lu Liangsheng didn't mind. He took his eyes off Min Yuerou and waved his hand with a smile: "It's okay. I just happened to come to this straw hut accidentally. You don't have to be surprised. But the blind old man over there is my companion. I hope that Brother Qi De will not bully the old and weak."
The round-faced, slightly plump young man put his hands on his hips, withdrew his feet awkwardly, snorted, and turned his face away.
"How did I bully anyone? You are just lying with your eyes open."
He took a step back, waved his sleeves to push aside the male companion in the middle, and sat on the left side of Min Yuerou, causing the woman to move towards the female companion on the other side. The small straw hut was suddenly packed with seven people plus Lu Liangsheng, Wang Banxia, and an old donkey.
The seven people were talking over there, Min Yuerou occasionally joined in with a few words, and from time to time her eyes glanced at the scholar opposite who was talking to the blind old man.
The flickering firelight shone on her face. She propped up her chin, looking a little dazed.
'She is getting more mature and good-looking. Isn't that old man the blind fortune teller in Lujia Village? Why did he come out with Master Lu? It looks like he is coming to Chang'an... I just wonder if he will stay at my house.'
"Sister Yuerou, what do you think?"
"ah?"
The female companion who was walking with her turned around and asked her while joking, but Min Yuerou was lost in thought and didn't hear anything. Only when she was asked did she come back to her senses and made up a random sentence: "Yeah, it should be like this..." to get by.
The man named Liu Qide was standing close by, so he could naturally see some clues. He followed Min Yuerou's gaze and looked at the scholar opposite. Although he did not admire this woman, they came out together after all, so how could he casually flirt with a down-and-out scholar!
“Ahem!”
He suddenly coughed twice, interrupted, and raised his chin towards Lu Liangsheng: "Brother! Are you going to Chang'an?"
"Maybe he will pass by." Lu Liangsheng smiled and threw a piece of dry firewood into the fire.
"Just passing by, I thought you were going to take the imperial examination." Liu Qide looked at the book on the knees of the scholar who was joking.
"What book are you reading, brother? Could you let us know?"
Lu Liangsheng became excited, picked up the book on his knees and showed it to everyone, saying with a smile:
"'Supreme Virtue' is a very ordinary book. It says that people should understand etiquette and be polite, and should not do anything that would benefit a mean person."
He spoke calmly, but the man opened his mouth slightly and his face turned red. Min Yuerou beside him pursed her lips and chuckled, then quickly calmed down.
"Well, Master Lu is not someone you can easily mess with."
Of course, Lu Liangsheng didn't like to argue with others. He turned sideways, took a blank scroll from the bookshelf, casually wrote with blue ink, and murmured softly.
"In fact, I don't like reading. I am better at painting. Look, a scholar met on the road in a desolate forest in a heavy rain... Have you ever seen a ghost?"
The light tone was suggestive. Except for Min Yuerou, the remaining four men and two women were stunned for a moment. They subconsciously looked at the dripping rain curtain outside the straw hut. The forest outside was swaying wildly in the strong wind. Occasionally, they seemed to hear a few wolf howls, which was quite creepy.
The six people couldn't help but shiver. They turned around and saw the flickering firelight reflecting the scholar with a smile on his face. In their sight, it always seemed eerie.
The writing stopped on the paper. When Lu Liangsheng raised his head, the cold wind was howling, making the bonfire flicker. The six people screamed "Ah!" and immediately huddled together and pressed towards the door.
"Give me back my head... Come!"
Everyone, including Min Yuerou, heard tinkling sounds in their ears as if there were bells ringing outside. Liu Qide instinctively turned sideways, poked his head out of the straw hut to take a look outside, his face instantly turned pale, and his whole body was shaking like a sieve. He raised his arm tremblingly and pointed to the muddy road in the rain.
"Well...well...there is..."
Amid the stammering voice, the remaining five people widened their eyes. A charcoal red warhorse was walking slowly like a floating stream, carrying a warrior in a green robe and golden armor, holding a Qinglong Yanyue in his hand. However, there were nothing on his shoulders, and he was headless, and slowly coming towards them in the heavy rain.
"Heads up...Heads up..."
The next moment, the horse's hooves stopped, the sound of the bronze bells stopped, and the headless general turned sideways on the horse's back, and the sound suddenly rose, like the ringing of a huge bell.
"You guys, give me back my head—"
"ah!!"
The four men and two women screamed in fear and rushed out of the straw hut, running quickly to the horses and carriage. The coachman who was sitting inside to avoid the rain looked at the two women in confusion, who ignored their usual virtuous appearance and climbed into the carriage in a panic, urging him to drive away.
Even four young men who had always been quite powerful in the capital jumped on their horses and rode away. After four horses and one carriage ran madly across a muddy road for a while, a woman in the carriage suddenly discovered that one person was missing, so she lifted the curtain and shouted to the four people riding horses outside.
"Sister Yuerou is missing!"
Outside, the four men stopped their horses and looked back in the direction they were fleeing, feeling quite anxious.
"Min Yuerou is the daughter of the Minister of Personnel. It's not good for us to leave her like this, right?"
"But there's a headless ghost and a ghost scholar over there, what should we do?"
"How about we go back together and take a look?" "Yes, if anything happens to Min Yuerou, Minister Min might report it to His Majesty, and the adults at home might beat us to death."
After hesitating and discussing for a while, the four of them asked the coachman to take the other two women away first, and then drove the horses back there. In the heavy rain, the straw hut was still there, but the headless ghost was nowhere to be seen.
"Yue Rou!"
The four men shouted from a distance, but seeing no response, they moved closer cautiously. They saw that the donkey, the old man, and the scholar were long gone from the straw hut, leaving only an extinguished bonfire with smoke rising from it.
Cheng Wen was sharp-eyed and walked over quickly to take out the half-burned scroll from the campfire. He saw that the half of the portrait that remained on it was the headless ghost he had seen before.
"That scholar is not a ghost. He is probably a Taoist master. Brother Qi De, you are in trouble. It is possible that Yue Rou was kidnapped by that man."
The other two young masters wiped the rain off their faces, stomped on the water on the ground, and looked at Liu Qide with reproach.
"It's all your fault. I told you not to talk nonsense, but now you've offended the master and implicated us as well. How are we going to report to Minister Min now?!"
"I... I..."
Liu Qide was also a little at a loss. After all, if someone else encountered such a thing, it would be difficult to accept it. He looked around the straw hut, shrank his neck, and muttered to himself.
"Can you blame me for this? How would I know he is an expert? If I knew, I would have said those things. You guys shouldn't have been too close to each other. You guys are still good brothers."
Cheng Wen glared at him fiercely.
"Stop talking. Go back and tell Minister Min the truth first."
The four of them went back, mounted their horses and left. On the other side of the woods parallel to them, raindrops fell on the branches and leaves in the dense forest, and only occasionally a few drops fell on the thick fallen leaves.
Amid the rustling sound of footsteps, the ghost scholar mentioned by several people was now leading the old donkey, taking Wang Banxia and Min Yuerou, whose fingers were intertwined with each other, as if walking in the woods.
The woman intertwined her fingers behind her back and kicked the fallen leaves at her feet as she walked. She remembered the spell she had just performed and found herself in the woods in the blink of an eye. She was amazed and could not help but turn around and face the scholar pulling the donkey, walking backwards while talking.
"Mr. Lu, what you just cast was a spell? What's its name?"
"A small spell in the world of the universe."
Lu Liangsheng explained, but he was curious about why she came here. The distance from here to Chang'an was not as simple as a picnic.
The woman walking backwards did not hide it and a smile appeared on her lips.
"There was a war in the north, my father was very busy, and I was bored staying at home alone, so I took the opportunity to sneak out. Actually, I was going for a picnic, but they heard from people that there was a Lanruo Temple in Shangyong, and the murals of Buddha and goddesses inside were very strange. If you look at them for a long time, it seems that your soul can be sucked in. So they followed out of curiosity."
Lanruo Temple
When Lu Liangsheng heard the reason, he laughed. The murals of Buddha and goddesses around the inner courtyard wall were all painted by him. They must have some magical power left over from when he was struck by the calamity.
It is impossible to suck a person's soul in, but some people have seen it and spread rumors and exaggerated it.
The two talked for a while, and after walking for a while, the rain gradually subsided. When they walked out of the forest, Lu Liangsheng looked at the sky. The dark clouds were about to disperse. He looked at the woman beside him and said:
"It just so happens that I'm going to pass by Chang'an, so I'll take you back. There's nothing good to see over there. There are no ghosts, but there are a lot of wolves."
"oh."
Min Yuerou lowered her head, fiddled with her sleeves, then suddenly raised her head and asked a question.
"Mr. Lu, a cultivator, can you get married?"
Wang Banxia, who was walking behind, tripped over a stone and fell to the ground. He quickly got up, patted the fallen leaves, waved his hand and stepped back: "Master, you guys chat..."
He quickly covered his ears and hid behind a tree.