Chapter 809: Lodging Among the Willows, Unable to Sleep Soundly
Willow Lodge was the finest inn in Hanqiu City, bordering the most beautiful lake in the city and surrounded by ancient willows. In spring and summer, it was the most tranquil of places, but in the depths of winter, when the lake ice had not yet melted and the ancient willows were bare of leaves, standing by the window and gazing at the surrounding scenery by starlight inevitably stirred a sense of desolation and bleakness.
Under the night sky, Hanqiu City was profoundly quiet, devoid of any clamorous sounds, even easily evoking thoughts of a graveyard. Wang Po was still in the Tiannan region, having not yet returned to Tianliang Commandery. Yet the Zhu family seemed destined to wither away until they were utterly consumed. Many changes in the world always came so suddenly, catching people off guard.
Nanke's voice roused him from his contemplation. He turned and walked to the bedside, sitting down.
Nanke removed his shoes and socks, setting them aside, then placed his feet into a basin. She lowered her head and earnestly scrubbed them.
The hot water in the basin was at just the right temperature—not scalding, yet not likely to cool too quickly. She must have tested it herself, just like those nights at the Banya Horse Ranch.
During the days when Chen Changsheng was unconscious or unable to move after waking, Nanke had been the one to feed him and wash his body.
He had tried to refuse many times but could never convince her, just like tonight.
"My injuries are almost fully healed now. From now on, let me handle these things myself, alright?"
"No."
Nanke didn't even lift her head.
She remembered nothing now, only that Chen Changsheng was the most important person to her.
So she should serve him well, ensure he lived healthily, and recover as quickly as possible.
Chen Changsheng thought for a moment, then said honestly, "I'm not sure... if I can cure your illness."
"But only you can try, right?"
Nanke raised her head, staring into his eyes.
Because her soul had been shattered, the distance between her eyes had stopped widening, but her gaze still seemed somewhat vacant.
When she focused on something or someone like this, it was actually a bit frightening.
But Chen Changsheng had grown used to it by now.
After washing up, Nanke naturally unrolled her bedding on the floor, but instead of sleeping, she casually took off her upper garment and sat down in front of Chen Changsheng.
During those nights before leaving the Banya Horse Ranch, Chen Changsheng had begun trying to treat her.
Even as a simple-minded girl, Nanke vaguely felt that being naked before a man was improper.
But now she had grown accustomed to it.
Chen Changsheng's fingers brushed over the stone bead, his consciousness entering the garden, and he retrieved the short sword.
Then, from the Hidden Edge, he took out a golden needle.
True essence poured into it, and the tip of the golden needle began to tremble slightly, piercing through Nanke's seemingly delicate yet remarkably tough skin, probing into her meridians.
Over the years, he had cured Luoluo's illness, healed Xuanyuan Po's injuries, and treated Zheshou for a long time. His skill at channeling true essence through the golden needle and observing the finest details had improved greatly since his early days in the capital. Yet he still lacked confidence in curing Nanke's condition.
Because Nanke was not a demon, but a member of the demon race.
Through these nights of treatment, Chen Changsheng had gained a deeper understanding of the demon race's body, and the more he learned, the more incredible it seemed.
On the surface, the demon race's body differed very little from the human race's, especially for royalty like Nanke. But in certain aspects, there were vast differences.
Those differences were mainly concentrated in—the meridians, the dark mansion, the energy apertures, and the sea of consciousness.
The demon race had meridians but no energy apertures, and certainly no dark mansion.
Most importantly, the demon race's sea of consciousness was not an ocean formed by true consciousness like that of humans or the demon race; instead, it resembled a mist of light.
The question was: were those lights within the mist fragments of consciousness, or some kind of objective existence?
Chen Changsheng was very curious about those lights that were both faint and elusive, yet omnipresent and eternal, because he vaguely felt he had seen them somewhere before.
Unfortunately, although Nanke had opened her consciousness as much as possible, Chen Changsheng still couldn't penetrate deep into her sea of consciousness. Unless he wasn't worried that his intrusion might turn her into a true idiot or kill her outright, he had no way to see the true nature of those lights.
...
...
Zhu Ye's remains had been secretly transported back to Hanqiu City, but the burial had never been held. The Zhu family and the Peerless Sect didn't know what to do, because his remains were mangled, as if gnawed by wild beasts. Yet the desolate Hanqiu City was already turning into a graveyard.
Even if the Dao Lord and the Prince of Xiang continued to protect the Zhu family out of their past friendship with Zhu Luo, how could a clan without true experts endure forever in such a treacherous world? Not to mention that the entire continent knew Wang Po would one day return to Hanqiu City to reclaim what he had lost years ago.
The Ten Thousand Willow Garden outside Hanqiu City seemed to have foreseen today's situation years ago, when it burned once, preemptively burning its own spirit money.
Not far from the Ten Thousand Willow Garden lay the Zhu family's ancestral tombs. Only successive Zhu family heads or elders who had made great contributions were worthy of being buried here.
The starlight tonight was excellent, illuminating the graves and tombstones very clearly. If one carefully read the inscriptions on the stones, they could probably understand the entire history of the Zhu family and the Peerless Sect.
Deep within the cluster of graves was a thin, hunched figure, his back bent, vigorously swinging both hands, digging at something incessantly, while muttering continuously under his breath.
Starlight fell on his face, making his crooked eyes, mouth, and nose appear even more terrifying—more frightening than all the tombstones combined.
The saliva spraying from his mouth was unbearably foul, stinking worse than the corpse fluid from all the opened graves.
Yes, this thin, hunched man was digging up graves. His long, slender nails were caked with dirt and rotting flesh. For some reason, they were incredibly sharp, quickly opening a grave. In just half an hour, he had dug up all seventeen major tombs in the Zhu family's ancestral burial ground.
Whether rotten corpses or bleached bones, to that thin, hunched man, they were the finest harvest.
His eyes gleamed, his saliva flowed even more, and he made extremely garbled, hard-to-understand sounds. Only by listening very closely could one grasp the general meaning.
—Your Zhu family is about to be destroyed.
—So give me your resentment and your wandering souls. I will help you kill your enemies.
The hunched, thin man suddenly sat cross-legged, forming a lotus position, his palms facing the stars. He closed his eyes in meditation.
He was clearly using the most orthodox national religion's Daoist techniques. Under the starlight, his expression was solemn, even somewhat sacred.
But his mouth and nose were crooked, his eyes couldn't fully close, making him look extremely ugly.
The most orthodox divine arts of the national religion, the most beautiful starlight, the ugly hunched man.
This stark contrast carried a sense of absurdity and ridiculousness, yet for some reason, it also inspired terror.