Chapter 209
Chapter 209
Damp books had been stacked like building blocks. Qin Ying crouched with her knees hugged to her chest in a triangular space screened off by the bookshelves.
The cold water seeping in had left even her toes numb and stiff.
She traced the infinity symbol three times on her knee, and black mist began to churn before her eyes.
As she watched the specks of light, some bright and some dim, emerge within the mist, Qin Ying found that, for once, she did not mind the prayers coming from them.
She opened her mind and let the jumble of faint voices fill her ears.
A young child sobbed, “Supreme Deity, I was so hungry yesterday that I stole half of your sorghum porridge. Please don’t punish me.”
Then came an old man’s rambling plea. “The clay steamer over our stove has been empty for more than a month. My new daughter-in-law boils cudrania leaves to stave off hunger, and my grandson’s belly is swollen like a drum. I beg the Revered Deity to grant us half a measure of salted fermented beans and a cup of Slippery Medicine.”
…
These scattered prayers from Yunwu County and the Sand People tribes finally gave Qin Ying some sense that she had returned to the mortal world.
Cradling the warm, fluffy Thunderbird in both hands, she looked toward the brightest speck in the black mist.
“Han Lie.”
…
Han Lie lay on his back in a cave dwelling of the Kuxi Tribe, a fire blazing in the hearth beside him.
The Kuxi Tribe’s migration had to be completed urgently. As the intermediary between the Kuxi Tribe and the Fengshan Elite Cavalry, Han Lie had been run off his feet for the past few days.
That night, he lay in the cave dwelling where Qin Ying’s Soul-Container Puppet lived and stared up at the ocher ceiling.
The Supreme Deity should be feeling a little better by now, shouldn’t she?
He rolled over and tucked one bent arm beneath his head, his gaze settling on the Box in the corner of the cave.
Thinking about Qin Ying left him unable to sleep, so he simply got up and moved the Box beside the hearth fueled with Sand Lizard dung.
He opened the Box. Firelight danced across the rolls of fine cloth and brocade inside, as well as the needles, thread, and spring shears.
Han Lie picked up a needle and threaded it with a doubled strand.
Driven by the stubborn hope that the Supreme Deity would have beautiful clothes to wear the next time she descended into the Box, he sat beside the hearth and began sewing.
His hands might have been large, but his long fingers handled the needle with surprising skill. The fine-cloth Undergarment was almost finished, and its stitches were neat and even.
He thought back to the Supreme Deity’s world and the marvelous object called a television, where little figures wore embroidered clothes. He had tried to imitate them by embroidering a Mickey Mouse head on the collar.
But after finishing it, he tilted his head and studied it for a while. Deciding it looked ugly, he took the shears and removed it.
He was still holding the shears when the Wooden Bead against his chest suddenly grew hot.
Han Lie quickly put down the garment, rose to his feet, and looked around.
Sure enough, Qin Ying’s voice came to him a moment later.
“Han Lie.”
Han Lie froze, then frowned slightly. “Supreme Deity, I’m here.”
After a moment of hesitation, he remembered Qin Ying saying that she liked people who were direct and straightforward, so he asked, “Are you all right?”
She had only spoken his name, but something about the Supreme Deity’s voice did not sound right to him.
Sitting atop the damp pile of books with her knees hugged to her chest, Qin Ying said, “I have a few things to ask you.”
The black mist, dotted with the lights of faith, hung like fine gauze over the study. It made the room, already leaking from every direction, seem darker, colder, and damper still.
Qin Ying asked, “Do you know of a creature shaped like a civet, with white fur and a long tail? It should live year-round deep within the veins of mountains.”
After considering it carefully, she added, “It should be associated with a hallucinogenic Black Stone. Anyone who touches this Black Stone will fall into an illusion, while a corpse can become a wandering Living Corpse.”
Qin Ying deliberately avoided using a name like Yellow Springs Eye Stone. If the two worlds used different names, it might interfere with Han Lie’s judgment.
“This creature is also called the Mountain Lord, and it may be known as the River God as well.”
Qin Ying described in detail the bizarre Long-Necked Shadows she had encountered along the way, along with the features of the Human-Faced Flesh Mass.
Frowning, she continued, “This creature may even be able to create a prison where time stands still, trapping people from two different points in spacetime.”
At that, Qin Ying paused, trying to work out how to explain the concept of spacetime to Han Lie.
As it turned out, she had underestimated him. Han Lie frowned in thought for a moment before answering, “I remember hearing about something like that.”
“In the Northern Wastes, there is a beast called Xi Nang. It dwells within Ao Mountain and makes its home in burrows underground.”
“A Puppet Stone grows in its belly. It hides by day and emerges at night. When it encounters a person, it lures them into the earth’s veins and devours them.”
“Each time a Xi Nang consumes nine hundred and ninety-nine women, it gives birth to something resembling a Flesh Embryo. The sac then ruptures, and it is born anew.”
“It is often worshiped by the Gutless People.”
From Han Lie’s explanation, Qin Ying learned that Ao Mountain was home to a species of long-tailed, civet-like beast known as the Xi Nang.
The Xi Nang dwelled within the earth’s veins deep in the mountains. Whenever it encountered a person, it used the Puppet Stone growing in its belly to create illusions, luring its victim deep into the mountains to be devoured.
For every nine hundred and ninety-nine women it consumed, it gave birth to a placenta-like sac of flesh. Its new body would be born from within that sac.
With each rebirth, it grew a little larger.
As long as it suffered no fatal injuries, it would never age or die.
By devouring humans, it could give birth to itself over and over again.
It was practically an ageless, deathless species. For this reason, the Gutless People of the Northern Wastes worshiped it as a god.
Qin Ying drew a deep breath.
Perhaps the thing in the pool was seeking rebirth. That was why it kept using the Yellow Springs Eye Stone to lure brides there and devour them.
Had the artificial Gutless People in the laboratory been created in an attempt to reenact the days when the Xi Nang was worshiped?
Was this Xi Nang native to this world, or had it originally passed through the door to get here?
Solving one mystery only to uncover countless more was a terrible feeling.
Qin Ying turned to look at the pitch-black doorway.
Forcing herself to suppress the urge to go in and ask, she continued, “Are there any legends about the Xi Nang being able to create other dimensions?”
“Yes,” Han Lie answered as he pulled on his leather armor.
Hearing the rustling on his end, Qin Ying paused. “What are you doing?”
“I’m going to the Fengshan Elite Cavalry.” Han Lie grabbed his saber and pulled open the door to his cave dwelling.
“Uncle Chen told me the story of the Xi Nang when I was a child. I’ll go ask him about it now.”
He no longer cared that it was the middle of the night. All he knew was that the Supreme Deity seemed to be trapped by a Xi Nang.
Compared to the Supreme Deity’s safety, whether Uncle Chen was asleep was hardly important.
He hurried to the Sand Lizard they had brought from the Blackstone Tribe.
The Sand Lizard had curled up to sleep in the sand for the night, and a short new section had already grown from its severed tail. When Han Lie yanked its reins and forcibly woke it, its watery eyes were filled with confusion.
“Good. I’ll take you to eat some fresh grass.”
Han Lie stroked the spines behind the Sand Lizard’s crest.
The Sand Lizard sprang to attention and took off on all four legs.
Now that the wondrous object Di Shang had appeared, the Fengshan Elite Cavalry had no intention of letting it slip through their fingers. They planned to retrieve Di Shang and present it to the Luoyang Treasury.
After moving the giant beast Chongyuan and the main camp fifty li back, Chen Zhao had led a group to establish a separate camp near the Kuxi Tribe.
Han Lie rode his Sand Lizard there at full speed, only to be stopped by patrolling soldiers at the camp gates.
“Han Lie, what are you doing here?”
Ye Sima happened to be in charge of the patrol that night. Seeing Han Lie arrive so late, he assumed that something had happened in the Kuxi Tribe, and his expression immediately changed.
To his surprise, Han Lie merely cupped his fists and said, “I need to speak to Uncle Chen about something.”
One side of Ye Sima’s mustache twitched.
So what if the brat had connections? Calling him “Uncle Chen” as if they were family…
Still, Ye Sima had no reason to offend him for nothing, so he sent someone into the camp to deliver the message.
Before long, Chen Zhao emerged with a coat draped over his shoulders, accompanied by a white Tent-Guard Monkey whose bald pate resembled that of a river imp.
“Ah Lie, what happened?”
Sleep still crusted the corners of Chen Zhao’s eyes after being woken in the middle of the night.
He had assumed there was an emergency and rushed out in a hurry.
Yet when he reached the camp gates, he found Han Lie standing there with a solemn expression, asking, “Uncle Chen, you told me the story of the Xi Nang when I was little. Can you tell it to me again?”
Chen Zhao stood in the cold wind in nothing but a thin underrobe and loosely worn shoes. For one fleeting moment, he wanted to draw his saber and stab this brat to death for coming to hear a bedtime story in the middle of the night.
He took several deep breaths and silently replayed the face and voice of Han Lie’s father in his mind a few times. Only then did he manage to suppress his anger.
“Follow me,” he snapped.