The mute wrapped his two thin arms around his knees, his back resting against the trunk of the old locust tree. His head was tilted slightly, his profile facing the small dirt mound.
The moon hung among the branches of the locust tree, casting a long, scrawny shadow of his body.
He squatted there for a long time, just as he had squatted beneath the pillar in the backyard of the Music Registry day after day.
His breathing grew shallower and slower. The knot that had clogged his chest for over a decade quietly dissolved, leaving his eyes hollow and empty, with nothing left.
He suddenly thought that he had never really done anything right in his life.
He was a bastard who mimicked a dog's bark, knelt on the ground to lick bowls, and crawled on all fours.
Later, he was sold to the Music Registry. Hong Xiu had said, “Follow me from now on,” so he followed her.
When she said, “I don't want you anymore,” he stopped following.
It seemed he had never made a single decision for himself in his entire life.
What did he want?
He wanted her to live.
He wanted her to sit under the corridor, her bright red sash draped over her arm, tilting her head to look at him, and saying once more, “Go fetch me a cup of tea.”
She wouldn't necessarily drink the tea once it was brought, but when she took it, she would touch the rim of the cup with her finger to test the temperature. If it was too hot, she would say, “Are you trying to scald me to death?” If it was cold, she would say, “I can't drink cold water.” Only when it was neither too hot nor too cold would she remain silent, taking a sip before putting it aside.
He wanted her to live.
The mute squatted by the grave, his head resting against the tree trunk. His eyes were half-open, and the light in his pupils dimmed inch by inch.
He could not speak human tongue.
But once the knot that had blocked his chest for over a decade dissolved, he suddenly felt light.
A faint, almost imperceptible sweetness lingered on the tip of his tongue, like the taste of that osmanthus cake from many years ago. It had been snow-white, resting on the stone slab outside the woodshed, its edges smudged with a ring of gray dust.
He remembered that when she turned to leave, her bright red skirt brushed over the threshold of the moon gate. A corner of her robe was whipped up by the wind, looking like a flower that had withered but was not yet entirely dead.
“Woof.”
It was a very, very soft sound, like a sigh, dispersing into the night breeze, dissolving under the moonlight.
The mute stopped moving. Curled into a tight ball, he quietly waited to rush toward death with her.
Hong Xiu stood in the void, her round fan hovering three inches above her palm, swaying slowly.
The scene before her was dissolving.
She saw the mute sprawled beside the grave, his forehead pressed against the stone, his shoulders trembling as a white, turbid fluid dripped from his eye sockets.
Then, that scene shattered as well.
Hong Xiu withdrew her gaze and lowered her eyelids. For a brief moment, everything around them fell silent.
The Plague Rat stood slightly behind her, tipping its toes to peek at her face. Its mouth twitched as if it wanted to say something, but it swallowed its words.
Taotie had no such reservations. He spoke in a low, booming voice, “Old hag, are you... alright?”
Hong Xiu sneered, “What could possibly be wrong with me?”
Her voice was flat, so devoid of emotion that not a single ripple could be detected.
Taotie scratched the back of his head. “That mute from just now... he looked pretty—I mean, you two, in the past... at least—”
“At least what?”
Hong Xiu finally turned her head, casting a sidelong glance at him, a faint, mocking smile playing on her lips.
“At least he picked wild berries for me a few times? Or at least he gathered my bones after I died?”
“He was just a dog. Once you get used to keeping one, when it's gone, it's gone.”
She began to wave her round fan again, her posture casual and relaxed.
“Have you ever kept a dog?”
Taotie blanked for a moment. “No, never.”
“Then stop acting all sentimental on my behalf.”
Hong Xiu raised her fan, shielding half of her face and leaving only her alluring peach-blossom eyes exposed.
“A dog is dead when it's dead. I can always raise another.”
“Besides, that dog is still—” She paused, her gaze shifting slightly. “—alive right now.”
The moment the words left her mouth, the faint flicker of emotion in her eyes was suppressed, turning as cold as stagnant water.
For a split second just now, the image of the mute waiting to die beside her grave had indeed flashed through her mind.
She didn't feel anything special. If anything, it was just... quite foolish.
She cultivated the Path of Extreme Emotions; what kind of feelings had she not witnessed?
Joy, anger, sorrow, fear, love, hate, and desire—the seven emotions and six desires were like clay in her hands, to be molded and squashed at her whim.
She could even seal her own emotions in the deepest recesses of her sea of consciousness, pulling them out or putting them away whenever she pleased.
She knew very well that whether it was the mute of the past or the Lou-Metal Dog of the present, they were both relics of a bygone era.
She had never used her true heart when she was alive, and she certainly wouldn't now that she was dead.
Be they old acquaintances or past companions, if they deserved to be killed, she would kill them.
Hong Xiu suppressed the last trace of her lingering emotion back into the depths of her sea of consciousness. She tapped her fingers gently against the surface of her round fan twice, then raised her eyes to look ahead.
The gray mist was churning violently. After the memory dissolved, a dense, overwhelming aura of grief surged back toward them, more than ten times stronger than before.
Shen Liang's entire body stiffened as a muffled groan escaped his throat. Taotie reacted instantly, wrapping his two thick arms around Shen Liang's waist.
“Don't, don't, don't move!”
“I beg of you, I really beg of you, I don't want to go crazy again!!”
Shen Liang gritted his teeth, the veins on his forehead bulging.
Fortunately, he managed to hold his ground. The emotional barrier Hong Xiu had set up earlier was still there, though it tottered precariously under the sudden, intense wave of sorrow.
Chen Zhou's eyes narrowed slightly.
The auspicious cloud above his head—which only he could see—was spinning violently. Its direction finally stabilized completely, pointing straight into the deepest part of the thickest gray mist ahead.
Then, he saw a canine figure amble out from the gray mist.
Its limbs were long and slender, its back slightly arched, and its white fur shimmered with a dim luster under the hazy, gray light.
Its ears were pricked straight up, and its tail dragged along the ground in a defensive posture, yet its steps were slow as it walked toward them, one pace at a time.
His amber pupils stared intently at the bright red figure at the front of the group, without so much as a single blink.
Hong Xiu watched the canine figure approach step by step from the gray mist. She watched it stop about ten zhang away from her, its limbs braced against the ground and its back slightly lowered, looking as if it were ready to spring forward at any moment, yet also ready to turn and flee.
But those eyes kept watching her, never wavering from start to finish.
The corners of Hong Xiu's mouth slowly curled upward, though there was not a trace of warmth in her eyes.
“Oh.”
“So it's you.”
A low whimper escaped Lou-Metal Dog's throat, carrying a strange, inexplicable sense of grievance.
Hong Xiu did not give him any chance to react.
Her figure blurred, her bright red skirt trailing an afterimage in the void as she appeared in front of Lou-Metal Dog in the blink of an eye.
Her bright red fingernails suddenly shot out by three inches as her killing intent surged, thrusting straight toward Lou-Metal Dog's chest.
Lou-Metal Dog did not dodge.
He did not even retreat.
He simply sat there on his haunches, his limbs tucked in and his back straight, raising his head to watch Hong Xiu's palm pierce straight through his chest.
Rate on N.U.
