Chapter 9: The Secret That Cannot Be Hidden at the Bedside

No sooner said than done.

Song Cheng's Soul had left his body to wander about, seeing many sights in the dark of night, though in reality, he had only been night-wandering for the time it takes to burn half a stick of incense.

On the bed, the Young Mistress of the house twisted her delicate body in her sleep; seemingly failing to touch her own man, she subconsciously groped around to both sides.

After her small toes brushed against Song Cheng's calf, the Young Mistress turned over as if sleepwalking and leaned in from behind.

Even though there was a full half-bed's distance behind her, she still stubbornly and instinctively wanted to squeeze toward Song Cheng's side.

As it turned out, upon leaning in, the Young Mistress only felt like she had pressed against a large block of ice, so she opened her eyes from her dream, reached out in her daze to touch Song Cheng's body, and was completely frozen awake by this.

She opened her eyes abruptly, fully realizing that her man's body had gone cold.

Tong Jia was terrified and hurriedly went to feel his pulse and check his breathing.

"I'm alive."

Song Cheng said.

The Young Mistress of the house asked anxiously: "What is going on with you?

You were lying here just fine. Did you go out or something? No, that's not right, if you were going out, how could I not know?"

Song Cheng said: "If I told you I could perform Soul-leaving, would you believe me, my wife?"

The Young Mistress of the house was petite, yet like a warm little stove; she flipped over onto the youth, crawled into his embrace, and said: "Hold me to warm up."

Song Cheng held her tight, as if holding a beam of sunlight.

The Young Mistress of the house was shivering and grimacing from the cold, yet she didn't utter a word about it, only wrapping herself tightly around the youth and pressing her hands against his cold spots to warm him, saying: "Stop having such dreams. We know each other better than anyone; a few days ago you said you could see Ghosts and I believed you, but today you say you can perform Soul-leaving—will you never stop? Have you been possessed by evil, or have you caught some hysteria?"

Song Cheng thought for a moment and decided not to hide it from Tong Jia.

Things like transmigration, panels, and immortality were things he certainly wasn't prepared to talk about; firstly, this was his greatest secret, and secondly, Tong Jia wouldn't be able to accept it. But night-wandering and seeing Ghosts were nothing to hide.

In this chaotic world, he and the Young Mistress of the house relied on each other for survival.

The Young Mistress was also affectionate and loyal to him.

"Constantly growing stronger oneself while treating the person sleeping beside you like a fool, not letting her know even the slightest bit about oneself, and then silently watching her play the clown"—this was something he could not do.

Thus, Song Cheng said: "Once my body warms up, let's test it."

Tong Jia asked amusedly: "Test what?"

Song Cheng said: "You take a piece of paper, write some words on it, and then quietly place it outside the room. I will perform Soul-leaving to see what words you wrote, then return and tell you."

Soul-leaving for the duration of a few breaths, as long as it wasn't in extremely harsh weather, was still quite easy for Song Cheng.

Tong Jia said: "Alright! If you guess wrong, then from now on you are not allowed to let your imagination run wild, and you are not allowed to say you can see Ghosts or perform Soul-leaving. Just live our lives properly!"

Song Cheng said: "It's a deal."

Tong Jia sighed speechlessly.

Her body was warm, hot everywhere, and now that she had shared quite a bit of her temperature with Song Cheng, combined with Song Cheng's own precise control over his night-wandering time, after a while, Song Cheng's body began to have some warmth.

The Young Mistress of the house felt it too, so regardless of the darkness, she flipped off Song Cheng's body, rustled out from under the quilt, and when she reached the edge of the bed, her small feet lightly kicked Song Cheng's thigh, and she said fiercely: "I was sleeping perfectly well, but you woke me up, and now I can't fall back asleep! If we're going to test it, let's do it now!"

Song Cheng said: "Fine."

The Young Mistress of the house quickly wrapped herself in her coat, took paper and brush, ran outside, and with two quick strokes, drew a big turtle, then wrote two characters on the turtle shell: "Song Cheng".

After finishing this, she picked up a small stone, pressed the drawing into the mud, then quickly returned, sat by the bed, lightly tapped Song Cheng, and said: "Hey, it's written.

I'll give you a hint: I wrote a line of a poem, the one you know.

But that poem has eight stanzas; guess which one I wrote."

Song Cheng searched his memory.

In his predecessor's memories, after being taken in by Huichun Hall, he had once learned some basic characters and recognized a few simple numbers.

He couldn't write, but he had learned alongside Tong Jia from the old doctor so that he wouldn't make mistakes when filling prescriptions.

The only exception was that once, the old doctor treated a scholar, and the scholar, as a gesture of gratitude, gifted him a poem he had written.

He and Tong Jia had learned it along the way.

Song Cheng sensed his physical state.

Body warm, ready for Soul-leaving.

He closed his eyes, visualized the Nine-Layered Treasure Pagoda, and his Soul flew out of his body at high speed, rushing toward the door like a gust of wind.

After squeezing through the crack in the door, he saw the drawing paper pressed down by the small stone outside. He didn't linger and returned immediately.

The trip took no more than a few breaths.

Tong Jia had originally been terrified to see Song Cheng stop breathing and sat there, but in an instant, his breath returned, which made her even more shocked and uncertain.

Song Cheng smiled and said: "You didn't write a poem, but drew a turtle, and wrote the two characters 'Tong Jia' on the turtle shell."

He didn't know many characters, but he could at least recognize his own name.

Tong Jia subconsciously spat "Pah," but after spitting, she looked at him in utter shock, her beautiful single-lidded eyes wide and round, as if she couldn't believe it at all and couldn't accept this reality.

Soul-leaving?

It was like seeing a Ghost! After her shock, her first reaction was to jump off the bed to grab a clothes mallet, then she quickly turned around and said: "You really have been possessed by evil!"

Song Cheng sighed, recalled that poem, and recited: "Cold colors in the lonely village at dusk, sad winds heard across the wild fields. The stream is deep, struggling to bear the snow; the mountains are frozen, the clouds do not flow. Gulls and herons fly, hard to distinguish; looking at the sandy islet, nothing is clear. A few plum trees by the wild bridge, all are white and fluttering."

Immediately after, he began to bring up things only he and Tong Jia knew.

After finishing, he said: "That day when I was unconscious, perhaps I had an epiphany and suddenly mastered this ability."

Tong Jia asked a few more questions, finally threw aside the clothes mallet, ran back onto the bed, and said: "Then that means you can see what I look like?"

Song Cheng said: "More beautiful than a celestial being!"

Tong Jia giggled, then muttered incessantly: "I never expected my man to have this ability."

Song Cheng then leaned in and told her everything about "the eldest of the three Ding brothers threatening Yun E with a knife," as well as his guess about "the second of the three Ding brothers coming to investigate" that day.

Tong Jia was stunned and said: "No way. Those three brothers are still children; the youngest is only fourteen, and the two older ones are only just fifteen."

Song Cheng said: "I can tell, Ding Siyu has practiced martial arts, and he has a good knife."

Tong Jia fell into complete silence, and suddenly, a wave of lingering fear washed over her.

If Song Cheng had truly been unable to get out of bed that day, would Ding Siyu have broken into her room in the middle of the night, held a knife to her throat, and humiliated her? "Let's go, call everyone to go and watch together!" Tong Jia was furious.

Song Cheng pulled on her and sighed softly.

In a village of the old, the weak, the sick, and the disabled where most strength was "0~0," that brute Ding Siyu, as long as he was ruthless enough, could potentially scare everyone into not daring to meddle in other people's business.

What's more, Ding Siyu was the nephew of the village head and was "red-rooted and sprout-straight" in Tanghe Village; compared to Yun E and outsiders like him, Ding Siyu was one of their own.

Although he was angry, he did not know what to do about this situation at the moment.

The Young Mistress thought for a long while, sighed heavily, and asked, "Then what do you suggest we do?"

Song Cheng said, "Isn't there a blacksmith shop in the village? Although the blacksmith was taken away for military service, the tools are still there; we will go buy some tomorrow."

The Young Mistress said, "They are all scrap metal, and many are even rusted."

Song Cheng said, "I know how to pick."

The Young Mistress lay on his chest, resting her chin in her hands as she looked at him, her beautiful eyes sparkling as if she were meeting him for the first time, and after a long while, she said, "Song Cheng truly doesn't have this ability."

Song Cheng was stunned, feeling as if he had been exposed.

The Young Mistress continued, "I have heard of cases where lonely Souls and wild Ghosts possess bodies; you wouldn't have possessed him after Song Cheng died, would you?"

Song Cheng said, "Nonsense!"

The Young Mistress said, "There it is, there it is, there it is; Song Cheng wouldn't say things like that, right?"

After saying this, she sighed softly again and said, "But you know everything about me and Song Cheng. And, if you really did possess him when Song Cheng fainted."

"Then the one who slept with me is you."

Song Cheng gave a bitter smile and said, "Young Mistress, is there a possibility that a lonely Soul or wild Ghost tried to possess me, but ended up being absorbed by me instead? And then I absorbed his memories, which led to these changes."

Tong Jia blinked her eyes, her heart in turmoil.

Song Cheng began to speak cheesy romantic lines.

Slowly, under the quilt, the young couple began to make love once more.

Secrets cannot be hidden at the head of the bed; how could someone who lives with you day and night be so easily deceived? But regardless, the two were already in the same boat, relying on each other for survival.

After a bout of passion, Tong Jia had more or less accepted it.

Besides, her own man was clearly an upgraded version of Song Cheng, which was also quite good.

(End of this chapter)