Chapter 67: Tenderness—Part Five
Translated by K of Exiled Rebels Scanlations
The wife spoke again, “Let’s just hope that he knows who did him wrong. If he wants to seek revenge, then seek revenge on those cultivators. Please don’t come harm us normal people.”
Her husband, “Who could possibly guarantee that? When he killed over three thousand people in Qishan, I was very young, but I can still remember that back then, not only the immortals who cultivated, even normal people were scared of him. He’s a bloodlusting demon who has no heart.”
Wei WuXian’s grin gradually faded.
He had been quite interested when listening to the couple talk about their daily lives. However, all of a sudden, he felt that his head was as heavy as a thousand pounds. He couldn’t raise it to see the expression on Lan WangJi’s face. What the couple chatted about next, he couldn’t hear any of it.
Suddenly, a chilling roar came from outside of the farm. The family in the yard had been having dinner, talking and laughing. When they heard the unhuman roar, they were so startled that even one of the bowls smashed onto the ground. The child began to cry. The young man snatched a hoe from the side, “Don’t worry! Don’t worry!”
Not only were they surprised, even Wei WuXian and Lan WangJi flinched. Lan WangJi was about to get up when Wei WuXian thought of something and grabbed the clothing in front of his chest, “Don’t move!”
Lan WangJi’s eyes widened slightly. The roar had definitely come from some dark, cruel creature. If the owner of the farm went to deal with it alone, he’d most likely not come back alive. In spite of this, Wei WuXian repeated, “Don’t move.”
A scream came from the yard, along with more of those unhuman roars coming closer and closer. It had already entered the door. Lan WangJi couldn’t stay still any longer. Bichen unsheathed at the speed of lightning. Yet, the family of three had already fled, running as they screamed. The stack of straw had been messed up by Bichen. Amid the straws raining down on them, something entirely black stood in the middle of the yard.
Its hair was tangled and it was still flashing its fangs. The disordered points that seemed to grow out of its body made it look both terrifying and somewhat funny. Lan WangJi had never seen such a monster before. He paused in surprise, while Wei WuXian had spoken already, “Wen Ning, you haven’t opened up your throat in too many years. Your shouts are really getting worse and worse.”
Human speech came out of the mouth of the dark monster, “Young Master… I’m a fierce corpse after all. All fierce corpses sound like this… when they shout.”
Wei WuXian patted his shoulder, “Such strong energy.”
Wen Ning glanced at Lan WangJi. Probably having recalled that the GusuLan Sect’s people disliked those who didn’t dress neatly, he smoothed his hair a couple of times, sheepish-looking. As Wei WuXian saw how many branches stuck out of his hair, he almost couldn’t bear it as he plucked one out, “Why did you suddenly jump out? And you’re like this. Were you robbed? What’s that on your face?”
Wen Ning, “The dust and dirt on the ground… After I watched you two go inside and didn’t come out for a long time…”
Wei WuXian, “You’ve always been following behind us?”
Wen Ning nodded. Wei WuXian understood. Wen Ning didn’t dare meet with anyone except for him. And so, after they went down the Cloud Recesses, he secretly followed behind them. When he saw that nothing happened for a long time after they went inside the farm, he went to listen in and heard that the couple was talking about him. He felt awkward and wanted to scare them away so that Wei WuXian and Lan WangJi could come out. Probably feeling that how he had looked wasn’t daunting enough, he stuck a bunch of strange things to his face and his body.
Wei WuXian was laughing so hard that he was close to death. With a look of embarrassment on his face, Wen Ning rubbed the mud away as Wei WuXian suddenly found that his hands were covered in blood, “What happened?”
Wen Ning, “Oh, nothing…”
Lan WangJi, “The scent of blood.”
Wei WuXian just realized that there really was the scent of blood coming from Wen Ning. His heart skipped a beat. As Wen Ning saw, he immediately waved his hands, “Not blood! No, no, it is blood, but it’s not the blood of live humans.”
Wei WuXian, “Not the blood of live humans? Have you fought with anything?”
Wen Ning had led them for a while until they arrived at a patch of woods. In the woods, there were twenty or thirty new graves, along with a half-finished pit on the side and a pile of corpses beside the pit. He’d call it a pile and not a single corpse because the corpses were already quite broken. Wei WuXian went up to examine it. The fingers of some of the severed arms were still twitching. The jaws of some of the heads were still opening and closing, creating the hair-rising sound of teeth rubbing against one another. The corpses had transformed already.
Wei WuXian, “You’ve broken them into quite a lot of pieces.”
Wen Ning, “If I didn’t, they’d keep on biting people. They couldn’t be stopped at all. All along the way there are corpses like these.”
Wei WuXian, “All along the way? Have you always been in front of us to get rid of these things?”
Wen Ning nodded in embarrassment. His ability to recognize those of his own was greater than that of humans, and he could recognize them from farther away as well. If this was the case, then that’d explain why nothing had happened during their journey. Wei WuXian had found this strange as well. Didn’t people say that a bunch of fierce corpses were travelling toward Yiling? Why didn’t they see a single one of them? So Wen Ning had cleared the obstacles before them.
Wei WuXian, “When did you begin to follow us?”
Lan WangJi, “Koi Tower.”
Wei WuXian looked at Wen Ning as Lan WangJi continued, “The day of the fight with the cultivators, he helped.”
Wei WuXian sighed, “Didn’t I tell you to hide somewhere and not worry about anything right now?”
Wen Ning forced a smile, “But, Young Master… where could I hide?”
Before, he had somewhere to return to, people he could follow, but now, in this world, apart from Wei WuXian, everyone was unfamiliar to him.
After a while of silence, Wei WuXian stood up and patted at the dust at the lower hem of his clothes, “Bury them.”
Wen Ning quickly nodded. He continued to dig the pit that had only been half finished. Lan WangJi pulled Bichen out. Its sword energy swept out. Dirt splashed everywhere, and a crevice was opened in the ground.
Wei WuXian, “HanGuang-Jun, you’re digging the grave too?”
Lan WangJi turned around. Just as he was about to speak, he saw Wen Ning standing behind him. Forcing up his frozen lips, he squeezed a smile, “… Young Master Lan, do you want any help? I’m finished with my side.”
Lan WangJi looked behind him. There were rows of black pits, the piles of dirt beside them tall and neat. Wen Ning maintained his ‘smile’ as he added, “I do this kind of thing a lot. I’m experienced. And fast.”
On the topic of who it was that often made him ‘do this kind of thing’, no explanation was needed.