When they came out of the underground city, it was getting late. After declining Wang Shuai's dinner invitation, Xu Qingmu and others returned to the inn.
As soon as he entered the door, Xu Qingmu told him that he was going to retreat and there was no need to wait for him for dinner.
Then, he eagerly entered the Baijing Secret Cave and found Lin Zhenbei in the main hall.
Sure enough, Lin Zhenbei, who had been sleeping all this time, was sitting cross-legged in the hall with Zhaoshuang in hand. When he saw Xu Qingmu, there was a smile on his lips:
"Long time no see, Sanxia'er."
Xu Qingmu felt so strange. He stood at the threshold and could no longer take another step. Looking at the person in front of him, Xu Qingmu burst into tears. He finally reached the point where he was sad. So what if he sheds tears again?
Xu Qingmu's lips were wet, afraid that this foot would crush the sight of her eyes.
"Why, you don't want to see me, then let me go?" Lin Zhenbei stood up, looked at Xu Qingmu and joked: "I thought you would rush over, hug me and cry, but alas, it seems so
I'm just being sentimental..."
Lift your feet and quickly go to the north of Lin Zhen.
He hugged the young man in front of him, his tears seemed to be broken, and he couldn't stop them no matter what.
"Okay, okay, don't be too sensational."
After a while, the two brothers sat across from each other and talked about something. Xu Qingmu was very curious, why did Lin Zhenbei, who was missing a lot, suddenly wake up?
Lin Zhenbei pointed at Xu Qingmu's chest: "I guessed right, that locust leaf on Zhenhu Mountain has completely turned yellow, right?"
Xu Qingmu took it out, and it turned out just as Lin Zhenbei said.
"Zhenhu Mountain, the luck accumulated over hundreds of years is all on this sword." Lin Zhenbei took Zhaoshuang, and there was a breath flowing on the light yellow sword, which was dense and majestic. He wrinkled his nose, Lin
Zhenbei spoke again:
"After all my calculations, I never thought that this Zhaoshuang on Zhenhu Mountain is where the real essence of Zhenhu Mountain lies..."
Lin Zhenbei said something that Xu Qingmu couldn't understand, but the young man didn't ask, and Lin Zhenbei didn't explain.
"Old beggar, he's dead..." Xu Qingmu was a little depressed. The eldest child, who had watched the two of them grow up, finally took the first step.
Lin Zhenbei was also a little sad, but he still spoke:
"Xu Qingmu, it was the old beggar who killed me. Do you believe it?"
To Lin Zhenbei's expectation, Fa Xiao, who had already wielded a sword and learned boxing, seemed to know what he was doing, and his expression did not fluctuate much.
"I know."
After a long while, Xu Qingmu spoke again: "I'm sorry."
Lin Zhenbei patted Xu Qingmu's shoulder and recalled: "I really want to bet again. Is that milk sweet or salty?"
"Do you hate the old beggar?"
Lin Zhenbei's force seemed to be stronger: "I hate you, including you."
Xu Qingmu raised his head and looked at Lin Zhenbei, who had unabated hatred in his eyes. The young man could feel the anger and resentment from the bottom of his heart in front of him, but before Xu Qingmu could speak again, the slap on his shoulder became very gentle.
"After the old beggar took away my literary fortune, I learned a lot of things that I didn't want to believe. Xu Qingmu, do you still remember the Widow Wang at the head of the village? The person who didn't agree with me approaching her daughter was far more serious than we thought.
Amazing. When I went to steal melons that day, Widow Wang told me that my literary fortune had been taken away."
Xu Qingmu was startled, thinking of the widow with such a big heart. He always thought that she was just an ordinary person.
As if he had guessed what the young man was thinking, Lin Zhenbei said:
"Far from it, Funiu Town is not as simple as you think. After twelve years of raising dragons, the town is full of atmosphere, all because of you."
Xu Qingmu was surprised again.
"The Widow Wang at the head of the village, Lin Xue from Lin Mansion, the big yellow dog you picked up, the big yellow ox under you, the old beggar's broken brick kiln... none of them are ordinary things. It's just that you don't know it.
.”
As if he remembered a lot of things, Lin Zhenbei rubbed his head lightly and shook it a little.
"And these are all for you. Do you think I should hate you?"
Xu Qingmu was extremely shocked. He had never known about these things. He had guessed a thing or two about the involvement of the old beggar in Lin Zhenbei's death. From the first time he met the young Taoist priest Cao Dan, Xu Qingmu felt that this was the case.
There is something fishy going on, but I just didn’t think about it deeply.
Lin Zhenbei looked at Xu Qingmu again:
"And my death was just to arouse your desire to hold a sword. Don't you think it's sad?"
The son of the county magistrate suddenly laughed at himself, his voice a little sad: "But when I learned the news, my first reaction was whether you had taken the sword. Hey, Xu Qingmu, it seems you didn't let me die in vain.
Well."
Xu Qingmu didn't say a word, he just looked at Lin Zhenbei with mist rising in his eyes.
Lin Zhenbei spoke again: "So I hate you. I hate the eldest child for deliberately treating me as an abandoned son. I hate the third child for taking away my literary fortune. I hate the person who holds the throne behind the scenes. Why did you choose Funiu Town, where our Lin family is located?"
Be the place to raise dragons!"
Feeling Lin Zhenbei's bone-chilling chill, Xu Qingmu felt weak all over.
He owed Lin Zhenbei and the entire Funiu Town.
Suddenly, Lin Zhenbei raised his head: "Do you have any wine?"
Xu Qingmu turned his hands and took out the apricot blossom wine that had been stored for a long time. The day Lin Zhenbei left Funiu Town for Zhenhu Mountain, the two of them made an agreement that when they meet again, they must drink till they are drunk. So.
This wine has been stored for many years.
Lin Zhenbei reached out to take the wine bottle, but did not drink it. Instead, he slowly poured some on the ground, and then flattened it with his foot. His tone also became much slower:
"But after that, I couldn't hate it any more. It seemed like everything made sense, as if everything was reasonable."
Then he took a sip and seemed to be choking. He coughed twice: "Good wine..."
Throw it to Xu Qingmu, who still pours some on the ground, and then takes a sip.
"It wasn't until later that I no longer hated you. The old beggar worked hard and carefully cultivated you for twelve years. The whole Lin family was buried with you, and Funiu Town's luck was set back three thousand years. Now I feel that it was all worth it." He reached out for the wine.
He drank another sip from the pot and this time, he stopped coughing. Lin Zhenbei exhaled comfortably, his eye circles were a little red, and he repeated again:
“Really, it’s all worth it!”
The two brothers, who had not seen each other for more than five years, just sat in silence with each other without speaking.
Xu Qingmu had been looking forward to this scene for five years.
Until the end, after the two of them drank three kilograms of apricot blossom wine, they both felt a little dizzy. Lin Zhenbei patted Xu Qingmu's shoulder again. Including the last time, they patted Xu Qingmu three times in total.
"Good brother, live well and don't let us die in vain..."
Then he said the same thing as the old beggar:
"Thank you for your hard work."
Xu Qingmu could no longer help but wonder: "Didn't you come back to life?"
Lin Zhenbei looked at Xu Qingmu and said something that made him even more confused: "Originally, it was, but I didn't want it..."
Then he stopped discussing this aspect and just asked Xu Qingmu to accompany him and talk about the beauty of this world.
Xu Qingmu talked about the scenery along the way, the origin of the White Mirror Cave, the horror of Fengdu Ghost Town, the fierceness of the frontier war, and his second sister-Lin Xue.
When talking about Lin Xue, there was something strange on Lin Zhenbei's face, but it soon disappeared. During this period of time, one was listening and the other was speaking, which was very similar to the two brothers squatting there in Funiu Town a few years ago.
The old scalper, who was still alive, was chatting on his back.
Until finally, Lin Zhenbei, whose eyes darkened again, stopped completely.
Tears gradually overflowed from the corners of Xu Qingmu's eyes, but the young man kept talking, talking about the scenery he saw along the way, the wooden sword named "Nianbei", the worthiness of the world, and...
In the end, her voice was so choked that she could no longer make a sound, and Xu Qingmu still whispered in a low voice:
"You said that from now on I would study and you would practice swordsmanship, remember?"
"You said I would help you and go to that temple to have a look, remember?"
"It's all what you said..."
The people listening around him could no longer respond, and turned back into armor puppets, sitting blankly in the hall, accompanied by Zhao Shuang.
The young man sat alone in the empty palace, his lonely shadow reflected in the dusk.
...
By the time he came out of the palace, it was already midnight. That night, Xu Qingmu did not go back to the secret cave to continue practicing. Instead, he climbed to the tall tree outside the inn alone, drinking wine in silence and looking at the moon.
Li Chengru took one step forward, sat across from Xu Qingmu, and reached for the wine bottle. This old man, who had always been a little out of touch, was surprisingly quiet tonight. He just accompanied the young man, drinking and watching the moon, hoping for birth.
But the old man discovered that Xu Qingmu had three extremely strong strands of luck flowing in his body.
As if infected by the mellow aroma of the wine, the old man's mouth smiled. He vaguely remembered that Xu Qingmu once mentioned that there once was a young man named "Lin Zhenbei" who was the same child as Xu Qingmu.
Li Chengru had never seen Lin Zhenbei when he was alive, but he only saw the young man who had become a puppet on the Burial Book Mountain, but was one less soul.
Immediately he spoke: "Go inside the cave. You must be seeing Lin Zhenbei, right?"
The young man nodded.
Li Chengru continued: "Zhenhu Mountain's hundred-year fortune has been stored by Zhaoshuang. After several transfers, the spirit sword found Lin Zhenbei, who had taken the name of Zhenhu Mountain. So today in the underground city, the master of Zhaoshuang Sword was chosen.
The one who chose was not you, but Lin Zhenbei who stayed in the secret cave, right?"
The young man nodded again, and as if he suddenly thought of something, he said to Li Chengru:
"Can Zhenhu Mountain's hundred-year fortune bring Lin Zhenbei back to life?"
Li Chengru looked at the distant moon, as if he was afraid that the young man would be sad, but he still nodded: "That's enough."
Xu Qingmu sat slumped on a branch, tears streaming down her face again.
He thought of Lin Zhenbei's words, "Originally, but I didn't want...", and then he thought of Lin Zhenbei patting him on the shoulder three times.
Understood!
Xu Qingmu burst into tears. He faced the Twelve Realms Sword to repair his bones and restored his body. He faced the king-level ghost in Fengdu City and strangled his neck. He faced Wen Renbo's clone in Mingfeng Village and intercepted him. This young man had never shed a tear, but now, he was crying.
Heartbreaking.
"Didn't you say you hate me? Why..."
Li Chengru also remained silent. He understood where the three auras flowing in Xu Qingmu's body came from.
Lin Zhenbei, a young man he had never met before, gave his luck to Xu Qingmu.
Li Chengru didn't say anything to comfort him, but just looked at the bright moon in the distance, which became a little brighter.
They are just selfish people.
This literary sage, the swordsman who once opened the sky with his sword, remembered the last letter written by a girl named Shangguan Wan to Fang Yunyi:
I sing and dance from the place of hatred, and smile to see you emerge from this mortal world.