Chapter 541: Du Tingxiu (7)

"This university teacher lived in the mountain village for five years, and in those five years, he traversed every ridge of Kongsang Mountain. Oh, he wasn't patrolling the mountains the whole time; when he had free time, he even fathered a son. By the time his son was three, that catastrophe brought about by humanity itself was nearing its end, and the university teacher was finally able to leave the village and return to the city. His marriage with Liu Xiaofen ended right there; the university teacher returned to the city alone, and as for his wife, she was naturally abandoned by him. He didn't even take his own son with him; perhaps he wanted to make a clean break from this humiliating life. In any case, a few years after he returned to the city, he remarried and had more children, and he actually lived quite a happy and satisfying life. Ah, of course, that is another human story, and I don't care to talk about it much," Han Yi said.

Luo Qi listened, feeling a bit distressed, and muttered in a low voice, "Pitiful."

"Humans have always been fickle and faithless; it's no surprise they would do such a thing. How did they put it in their own words? Right, human nature is essentially like that," Han Yi said indifferently, then turned to continue, "The university teacher later became successful in his career. His academic ability was top-tier, and over a dozen years later, he became a very prestigious professor in human society, with students everywhere, and he made many acquaintances among the elite. By a stroke of luck, he met a wealthy merchant who collected West Asian antiques and later became good friends with him; this person's name was Kong Junxi. Right in this friend's home, the professor inadvertently saw a West Asian gold pot with a string of inscriptions carved on it. With his professional eye as a scholar, he determined at a glance that this string of symbols must be of the same origin as the text he had seen in the mountain village years ago. The professor was overjoyed and asked Kong Junxi about the origin of the goldware and where he could find a proper historian to discuss the matter."

As Han Yi spoke, he gave Luo Qi a meaningful look.

Luo Qi understood what he meant, "The merchant is a Mage?"

Han Yi nodded, "He is a Mage."

"Kong Junxi." Luo Qi murmured the name, "I don't know this person, is he..."

"He is nothing," Han Yi said wearily. "He served as a Second-level Executive Mage, but spent most of his time not working at Qionglin; he was a very peripheral, ordinary Mage. He had an interest in antiques and art, and had a bit of business in both the human world and the Magic World; his biggest business was selling Afghan carpets. However, although he wasn't a remarkable figure, he was a key figure. At the time, he learned of this old story from his friend and also thought it was very strange. He gave a vague answer to the professor's questions and promised to help him contact a historian he knew. Once he received the copy of the incantation from the professor, he immediately wrote a letter and sent it, along with the copy, to Du Tingxiu, who was at Qionglin at the time. He didn't even know Du Tingxiu before that; he chose to write to Du Tingxiu simply because Du Tingxiu was the most prestigious and most admired Great Mage at the time."

"This letter caught Du Tingxiu's attention," Luo Qi said, then suddenly furrowed his brows and corrected himself, "No, it was the matter itself that caught Du Tingxiu's attention. But the Du Clan are not Mind Mages; if it were me, I would definitely have brought at least one Mind Mage along. Since he was a close friend of Pei Shu, they should have gone together. Even if Pei Shu might have been too busy to get away for some reason, it wouldn't have been difficult for Du Tingxiu to assign a trusted Mind Mage."

Han Yi looked at him meaningfully, "What have you discovered?"

"Isn't it obvious? Qionglin couldn't possibly be stupid enough to leave any traces on Kongsang Mountain that could be discovered by humans, so it's impossible for Liu Xiaofen to have seen these incantations with her eyes. The only possibility for this matter is that the incantations were born inside her brain. In human terms, she was possessed by a demon. You and I both know that this can only be related to Mind Magic. Du Tingxiu must have thought of this too, which is why he took the matter seriously," Luo Qi said.

What he didn't say was that he had witnessed the Yajian guarding the Seal Land with his own eyes that night—ancient, incomplete, and extremely eerie. If there was still a Seal Land on Kongsang Mountain, there would also be such a guard dog.

But these two situations were not exactly the same. The Old Mage of the Guan Family was guarding an empty tomb, and that guard dog only counterattacked after Luo Qi intentionally probed it. Yet the ghost on Kongsang Mountain had actually taken the initiative to contact a human, and a village woman at that, who could never possibly threaten the seal. Why on earth was that? Liu Xiaofen's madness was likely related to Magic Contact. The human brain is equally precise and delicate; if fragments of Yajian are crudely implanted, the result could be permanent damage to the brain.

"That's all I know about what happened back then," Han Yi said. "I only know that Du Tingxiu subsequently left Qionglin and went to Kongsang Mountain in Ganzhou alone, returning only three months later. When he reappeared, it was the time he broke with Pei Shu. As for why he didn't bring Pei Shu, it might be because he already had thoughts of rebelling against Qionglin at the time; he couldn't go with Pei Shu, nor could he risk using Qionglin's power."

Luo Qi silently thought that the truth might be the opposite; perhaps Pei Shu had done something that caught Du Tingxiu's attention, and he had gone to Kongsang Mountain in Ganzhou alone so as not to alert Pei Shu. Thinking that one day Du Zhengyi might also track him down silently, Luo Qi couldn't help but feel a bit distracted.

Han Yi continued, "To get close to the truth of that year, one can only follow in Du Tingxiu's footsteps, so I also went to Liu Xiaofen's village. She had long since died, but her descendants had little opportunity to leave that place and have always lived in that village; finding their home wasn't a difficult task."

Luo Qi came back to his senses and suddenly realized, "The events of that year are repeating themselves?"

Han Yi nodded. He didn't have as much energy as Luo Qi, and no matter how strange things were, it was hard to spark any particular expression on his bitter, deep-seated face. He described a bizarre event in a dry tone, "Liu Xiaofen's granddaughter is also constantly writing this incantation."

"Strange," Luo Qi said, "It's like lightning striking the same tree twice."

"The little girl in the photo is Liu Xiaofen's granddaughter, and the incantation on the paper in your hand is what the child wrote."

"Has she gone mad too?" Luo Qi swiped the phone screen, looking at the little girl's photo again, "She's still so young."

"You're actually caring about a human?" Han Yi looked at him and said, "You're quite sentimental."

Luo Qi ignored his sarcasm; this person probably only knew how to speak with barbs.

(End of chapter)