Chu Banyang took a short knife and cut his palm, blood dripped onto the box, red and black intertwined.
Ordinary ashes couldn’t possibly be that heavy.
This must have something to do with a certain talisman.
As the blood flowed, the talismans on the ground became brighter and the temperature dropped. Chu Banyang was focused, his other hand lightly pressing on the box, murmuring sentences – all very strange, very fragmented syllables, not belonging to humans. His clothes fluttered without wind, and his hair floated in the air.
At some point, the air suddenly stagnated.
The temperature dropped below zero, and Chu Banyang suddenly fell silent.
Lu Yingjiu could feel that some existence had descended into this narrow space.
It was bound by the Chu family’s contract and the surrounding talismans, wild and cold.
Among the many gods and ghosts, the Chu family’s Peacock God was also very dominant. Lu Yingjiu thought: this is indeed completely different from other ghosts and gods, it lives up to its reputation.
Chu Banyang slowly uttered syllables, reciting ancient spells.
The air stagnated again for a few seconds.
Then the blood-red patterns on the ground lit up one by one, and besides, the surroundings seemed to be shrouded in a thick black fog. Chu Banyang was less than a meter away from Lu Yingjiu, but Lu Yingjiu could no longer see him clearly.
A few seconds later, a cool breeze rose from the ground.
Accompanied by the sound of rustling, green flames lit up clockwise around them one by one. There were nine in total, surrounding the two of them in the center, burning faintly.
The base of the flame was made of pure gold, and the brilliant metal was adorned with various gems, cat’s eye green, crow black, twilight gray, purple… They were strung together by golden threads, shimmering a dreamlike luster in the firelight.
The ground under Lu Yingjiu’s feet became soft.
It felt like the thick fur of an animal. He looked down and saw that beneath his feet were actually feathers woven with emerald green and gold.
It was exactly the gorgeous color of the feathers on the Peacock God.
Looking around, the layout of the entire room had changed, and the peacock’s gorgeous feathers spread out in all directions. Above the green fire, there were specks of light, flickering brightly and dimly, looking like a cluster of stars at first glance.
In the blink of an eye, they had arrived in a unique space.
Lu Yingjiu thought again: it is indeed the most luxurious ghost god.
Peacocks love beauty and wish to display their feathers at all times, even this ceremony exuded a luxurious atmosphere.
Chu Banyang was used to this scene, walking forward, all the way to the flame at the front.
There was a small altar there, and in the center was a stone tablet – almost identical to the stone tablet under the 20th pavilion when Lu Yingjiu was in the Mt. Gassan Village. Both the Chu family and the Zhang family highly respect and revere the Heavenly Way, and such stone tablets were erected in many places.
On the altar, there was a small wooden bowl, filled with a liquid intertwined with emerald green and gold.
Chu Banyang picked up the bowl, carefully walked back to Lu Yingjiu’s side, and handed it over. “Drink it.”
Lu Yingjiu: “…”
Lu Yingjiu said, “Although I know you have always disliked me, you wouldn’t be so blatant as to poison me…This looks a bit like diluted paint.”
Chu Banyang assured. “Absolutely safe, I used to drink it often when I was a kid.”
“What’s the use of drinking it?” Lu Yingjiu asked.
“You will dream,” Chu Banyang said, “You have a lot of confusion, right? Dreams can answer many doubts.”
——About this, Lu Yingjiu had heard it before.
Each eye spot on the tail feather of the Peacock God was a golden eye, which flashed different lights like a kaleidoscope. If one looked deeply into it, it had the power to bewitch people’s hearts.
In addition to this, it was said that the Peacock God guarded a pool of divine water.
Drinking that divine water that never dries up for a thousand years, one could have prophetic dreams or enlightening dreams.
Generally speaking, the Chu family would not give the divine water to outsiders.
Perhaps because this matter involved Chu You, Chu Banyang brought Lu Yingjiu here.
In that case, Lu Yingjiu no longer hesitated, thanked Chu Banyang, took the wooden bowl and drank it all.
Unexpectedly, the divine water had a gorgeous luster, but it tasted like a very ordinary sweet spring. After a few sips, the throat was full of sweetness.
Then Lu Yingjiu’s eyes flickered.
The flames, the feathers under his feet, Chu Banyang… They all disappeared, and there was only a pale white in the whole world.
His whole body was floating, and his mind was also dazed, as if his soul was out of his body.
It took Lu Yingjiu several seconds to realize that the whiteness in front of him was actually a snowstorm.
An overwhelming snowstorm that could almost bury the whole world.
He felt “himself” walking in the snow, the accumulated snow under his feet hindering his steps, there was no light in the world, the only source of light was a lantern in his hand.
The lantern was oddly shaped, hexagonal, with sharp edges like a blade. A fist-sized source of bright yellow light was slowly burning inside, bringing some warmth.
“He” continued to move forward against the snowstorm, his thin clothes rustling in the wind – his clothes were of an ancient style, with wide cuffs and neatly buttoned collars, all in pure white, flawless, blending with the snow.
Occasionally, “he” looked back.
Only then did Lu Yingjiu notice that he was holding someone in his left hand.
It was a pale-faced young man in black, with a new wound on his face, and the bright red blood flowing out was the most gorgeous color in this world.
Lu Yingjiu couldn’t see his face clearly.
The blood was about to flow down to the young man’s chin, but he had no intention of wiping it off, just tightly holding “his” hand, not daring to let go for half a second.
As if as soon as he let go, he would lose the whole world.
They walked side by side in the snowstorm.
There was no road ahead, no goal, and they didn’t know if the storm would end or if the snow would melt.
But they kept going.
…Where am I?
Lu Yingjiu thought vaguely.
His consciousness was still scattered, his thoughts slowed down, and all the images seemed to have a filter, separated by a long time, making him unable to see clearly.
In the haze, there was a feeling of drowning or drunkenness.
His eyes flickered again.
The ground beneath his feet returned to a soft texture, and the peacock feathers appeared again.
Lu Yingjiu still held the wooden bowl in his hand.
It all seemed like an illusion.
As his consciousness cleared, Lu Yingjiu steadied his mind and asked Chu Banyang, “How long has it been?”
“Less than a second.” Chu Banyang said, “No matter how long you experience in your dream, in reality, it’s like you were in a daze.”
He then asked, “So, have your doubts been answered?”
“…No.” Lu Yingjiu returned the bowl to him, rubbing his brow bone, “I don’t even understand what I saw. I seem to have seen… people from ancient times? Anyway, the clothes don’t look modern.”
“Ah.” Chu Banyang said.
“What’s wrong?” Lu Yingjiu saw that his expression was a bit strange.
Chu Banyang paused for a while before saying, “Then you might have seen your past life.”
Lu Yingjiu said, “What about the promised dream of solving confusion? Why are you offering other services?”
Chu Banyang replied, “Dream of solving confusion is just one possibility. Some people’s dreams can solve puzzles, some can predict the future, and a very small number of people can dream of their past lives.” He hesitated for a moment, “But, based on experience, people who dream of their past lives…”
“What about people who dream of their past lives?” Lu Yingjiu asked.
Chu Banyang hesitated for a long time before finally saying, “They usually had a miserable death in their past life.”
Lu Yingjiu: “…”
Lu Yingjiu took a deep breath and said, “Forget it, I don’t care about my past life. I don’t remember it anyway, so no matter how miserable it was, it has nothing to do with me. Give me another drink of the divine water, maybe this time it will solve my confusion.”
“That’s not possible,” Chu Banyang said, “The divine water has side effects. You can only drink it once every three years, otherwise you will have a miserable death in this life.”
Lu Yingjiu: “…”
Lu Yingjiu said, “Your family’s divine water doesn’t sound very divine.”
“Indeed.” Chu Banyang rarely agreed.
There were simply too many people in the Chu family who wanted to profit from the divine water.
Chu Banyang’s cousin, who was still in junior high school, wanted to drink the divine water before the exam to predict the final question.
As a result, he didn’t predict the question, but dreamed of a tragic love story from his past life. He cried so much that he couldn’t take the exam. He packed his schoolbag and wanted to run away from home to find his lover from his past life and continue their love story.
In the end, he was beaten by his father and sent back to school. Naturally, this problem was solved.
Then there was his cousin, who drank a bowl of divine water before buying a lottery ticket, hoping to win a big prize.
She didn’t predict the big prize, but her dream solved her doubts.
She felt as if a cloud had been lifted, and a path she had never seen before appeared in front of her.
But she seemed to have awakened too thoroughly.
Because that night, she became a nun.
In short, the number of times the divine water could accurately play its role was very few.
The possibility of changing one’s life with its power was almost zero.
Chu Banyang added, “If the divine water was so effective, why would the Chu family still be in business? Years ago, they could have made a fortune by selling some divine water.”
Lu Yingjiu thought about it and felt that it made sense and was irrefutable.
He said, “Well, since there’s no other way, I’ll just find a way to investigate it myself.”
“That’s the only way.” Chu Banyang nodded, “I didn’t have much hope to begin with, but it’s better to try than not to.”
He returned to the urn, pasted new talisman paper on it, and prepared to leave.
Taking advantage of this time, Lu Yingjiu looked around.
Everywhere he looked, there were gorgeous decorations of precious stones, and the star-like light sources above his head became even brighter.
So bright that they couldn’t be ignored.
He looked closely and saw countless scenes in the light sources.
There were farmers under the scorching sun, buses in the cold rain, students jumping around in schools, and huge windmills towering in the fog…
Each one was incredibly realistic.
Lu Yingjiu asked Chu Banyang, “What are those in the sky?”
“Oh.” While pasting the talisman paper, Chu Banyang answered him, “Those are all dreams of the Peacock God.”
“It dreams?” Lu Yingjiu looked up again, examining closely.
“Yes,” Chu Banyang said, “Not many outsiders know, but the Peacock God is actually always in a deep sleep. Our Chu family just borrowed its power, but we can’t communicate with it.”
He pasted the last talisman paper and said, “It was born from the divine water, without any doubts to be answered, so it always hovers between past lives and predictions, and will never wake up. There are rumors that it has 59 dreams each time it sleeps.”
“Each starlight in the sky is one of its dreams.”
Lu Yingjiu was stunned for a moment.
–59
This number was very familiar.
Where had he seen it before?
His memory went back, and time flipped like a book, taking him back to Wanming Mountain.
On the route of worshiping the mountain, he entered a wooden house where worshippers had rested, and found his childhood photos in Zhang Nianyun’s room.
He took all those photos out.
On the back of one of them was written with a black water pen: [1/59]
Was this a coincidence, or…
Lu Yingjiu quickly stepped forward and asked Chu Banyang, “Why 59? Is there anything special about this number?”
Chu Banyang, seeing his sudden seriousness, answered somewhat puzzledly, “There’s no reason, it should just be a coincidence.”
Lu Yingjiu asked him word by word, “Apart from here, where else has the number ‘59’ appeared?”
“I’m not sure.” Chu Banyang thought for a moment, “I don’t know about other families, but for the Peacock God, there should only be this one. However…” He thought carefully again, “There seems to be a similar rumor in the Zhang family.”
Lu Yingjiu said, “Can you remember the details?”
So Chu Banyang sat down on the soft feathers, touched the urn, and thought carefully.
Even though he was reminiscing, there was still a bit of complacency on his face.
Probably because, for the first time in so many years, he was able to answer Lu Yingjiu’s questions.
After a long time, Chu Banyang finally spoke, “It was when I was very young. At that time, the Zhang family had not yet declined, and the Chu family once planned a large-scale ritual with them.”
He continued, “Before, our two families worshiped the Heavenly Way separately, and this was the first and last time we worshiped together – of course, the decline of the Zhang family afterwards is another story.”
“Anyway, I went up the mountain with them, and on the way, I met people of my age from the Zhang family. One of them told me the story of Di Ting.”
The ghost god contracted with the Zhang family was Di Ting.
But the Zhang family was a very mysterious family, rarely interacting with outsiders, and Lu Yingjiu knew very little about them.
Chu Banyang said, “The child told me that Di Ting, who is contracted with them, likes to collect gems. It always needs to put 59 gems in its nest to be satisfied. But gems are easily covered with dust and corroded by yin energy in the ghost world, and finally turn into nothing.”
“Whenever a gem breaks, Di Ting will collect new gems until there are 59 gems in the nest.”
“For that ritual, the Zhang family brought 59 gems.”
“If you really want to trace the origin of ‘59’, it might be in the Zhang family. They are the most fervent worshippers of the HeavenlyWay, far surpassing the Chu family.”
Lu Yingjiu was silent for a while before he spoke, “So, the Zhang family believes that the number ‘59’ is special to the ghost gods, or the Heavenly Way.”
“Yes.” Chu Banyang said.
Lu Yingjiu looked at the above again, where the light was as dazzling as a group of stars, and asked, “So, is there any way to see this dream? Or is there anything special about them?”
“Each dream corresponds to a location in reality.” Chu Banyang said, “If you want to say something special, there’s nothing special.”
“However,” he looked up at a corner of the starry sky, “Speaking of this, there have always been two places where the dream of the Peacock God has collapsed. The Chu family has always been unclear about the reason.”
He pointed to the corner.
There were indeed two very dim lights there.
Compared to other dreams, they were simply too inconspicuous, as if they would extinguish at any moment.
Lu Yingjiu asked, “What two places do they correspond to in reality?”
Chu Banyang mentioned the locations.
One was a village by the sea, and the other was a school.
Lu Yingjiu noted down the two place names, thinking that regardless of whether this had anything to do with him, he would eventually have to look for clues.
Chu Banyang asked, “So, does the number ‘59’ have anything to do with you?”
“Yes.” Lu Yingjiu said, “But I haven’t figured it out yet.”
Chu Banyang immediately looked curious, his face full of “want to know”.
But he just didn’t speak, holding it in stubbornly.
If it were usual, Lu Yingjiu would have teased him a few times.
But today he really wasn’t in the mood, and said, “I’m sorry, I don’t plan to say it out for now. Until things are clear, involving too many people, I feel uneasy from intuition.”
“Oh.” Chu Banyang said, “It’s okay, I’m not interested at all.”
Lu Yingjiu: “…”
Chu Banyang was still as sick as ever, it seemed that the divine water couldn’t cure his tsundere.
Staying here wouldn’t make any more progress.
Chu Banyang made a gesture, and the wind once again lifted their clothes.
Lu Yingjiu’s vision went dark, then bright.
They were back in the basement of the Chu family.
The blood-red patterns on the floor flickered a few times, then dimmed. Chu Banyang bent down, with some difficulty lifted the urn, ready to move it back.
Seeing his struggling appearance, Lu Yingjiu was worried again.
If he dropped this family bucket, it would be like dropping the entire Chu family’s ancestors, old people’s bones were brittle and easy to break, that would be so disrespectful.
As they were going up the stairs, he saw Chu Banyang struggling more and more, so he said, “Let me carry one side, in case you drop grandpa and grandma, it’s too…”
Before he could finish his sentence, he heard a “bang!”
Chu Banyang loosened his grip, and the urn fell straight down!
It was too heavy and knocked a corner off the stairs.
Lu Yingjiu: “…too bad.”
Chu Banyang was quite calm, his face unchanged, he bent down and picked it up again, “It’s okay, I used to drop it all the time when I was a kid. Our family has a lot of urns, they’re not precious, each younger generation has one.”
Lu Yingjiu said, “Why does your family have so much ash? Enough for everyone to have a share.”
“After all, it’s a big family.” Chu Banyang continued to walk forward, “Everyone gets a shovel after they die, and the accumulation becomes a lot.”
Lu Yingjiu held his forehead.
“People die when they die.” Chu Banyang said, “The Chu family takes life and death lightly, it’s enough to set up a monument for the ancestors, the rest is empty, there’s no need to be too particular.”
When he went upstairs and said goodbye to Chu Banyang, Chu Banyang asked him again, “Are you planning to go to those two places where the dreams are broken?”
“Yes.” Lu Yingjiu nodded.
Chu Banyang hesitated for a long time, as if he wanted to say something.
But he didn’t speak in the end.
It was getting late, and Lu Yingjiu got in the car and realized it was almost six o’clock.
The distant sun was sinking, casting a golden glow on the mountains and clouds.
Jing Xian sent him a text message asking when he would be back.
Lu Yingjiu hooked the corner of his mouth and replied: [Within 40 minutes]
After that, he started the Land Rover and joined the stream of cars returning home, like a flock of tired birds returning to their nests.
In the past, when he returned home alone, he was very calm, because he knew that besides the greedy cow cat at home, there would be no one else.
But this time it was different.
The way home was filled with anticipation and joy.
After parking the car and going upstairs, Lu Yingjiu just took out his keys at the door, and the door opened directly.
–The sound insulation here was not good, probably Jing Xian heard the sound of the keys.
Afterwards Li Yingjiu felt his feet dangling, as Jing Xian hugged him all the way into the room.
Lu Yingjiu: ?
For a moment, Lu Yingjiu only felt a warm hug.
Jing Xian said in his ear, “You’re back too late!”
“I was delayed on the road for a while.” Lu Yingjiu patted his back and comforted, “Isn’t it still before dinner time? It’s still on time… hey, hey, put me down quickly.”
Jing Xian then put him down, his expression quite complicated, as if he still wanted to continue holding him.
Lu Yingjiu said, “What did you do today?”
He felt a little guilty. If Jing Xian really stayed in the room all day, it would be really boring.
From his observation, although Jing Xian could use electronic devices, and used them quite well, he didn’t touch games at all, and occasionally watched movies.
Jingxian said, “I watched a movie.”
“Mm.” Lu Yingjiu thought, as expected.
Jing Xian added, “Then before you come back, I went for a walk and killed a dozen ghosts by the way.”
Lu Yingjiu: “…?”
“And fed a dozen fierce beasts.”
Lu Yingjiu: “…”
It sounded like Jing Xian had a fulfilling day, so he didn’t need to worry.
But Lu Yingjiu unconsciously relaxed his eyebrows.
The sense of security when returning home always made people feel warm all over and unconsciously curved their eyes.
After all, Jing Xian had been waiting for him.
Lu Yingjiu looked around the room again.
He saw hairball lazily lying in the corner, constantly belching.
He had a bad feeling. “What did you feed it again?”
“Nothing.” Jing Xian didn’t even blink.
It was obviously a lie.
Lu Yingjiu changed his shoes, walked over and sat down, touched hairball’s round belly, and then touched the cow cat that came over.
Two fluffy little animals rubbed against his hand.
After a few seconds, Jing Xian also sat next to him, leaning towards him, and his hands were as restless as ever, hugging his waist.
Lu Yingjiu was helpless, reached out to pull his hand that was about to lift his clothes if not stopped, and laughed, “Jing Xian, you…”
He suddenly froze.
When he touched that strong hand, his vision was once again a pale white.
The overwhelming snowstorm, the dim lantern, the white clothes, the endless road ahead.
The young man in black behind him tightly held his hand, his cheek was injured, with a touch of bright red blood.
Lu Yingjiu still couldn’t see the young man’s face, but he heard his voice.
The young man spoke, asking cautiously, “…Will you die?”
The “him” in the dream did not answer.
So the answer to the young man was only the hysterical screaming of the wind.
It’s getting more and more interesting🤔🤔