After leaving Luming City, the three of them walked for seven days.
More precisely, two people and a donkey walked for seven days. Wu Wei walked, Chen Yu walked too, and Tangbao carried the book chest and luggage—but it walked more slowly than either of them. Every time they passed a fruit tree, it had to stop and sniff it. Whenever it saw a butterfly by the roadside, it had to tilt its head and stare for ages, as if it weren't a donkey hurrying along the road but some old grandpa out for a spring outing.
"Can you walk a little faster?" Chen Yu asked, looking back at it.
Tangbao snorted through its nose. The meaning was perfectly clear: What's the rush?
Wu Wei didn't mind. "It's a donkey. This is just how fast they go."
"No," Chen Yu said. "It's doing it on purpose. Yesterday, when the wild dogs chased it, it ran faster than I did."
Tangbao turned its head away and pretended not to hear.
On the seventh day, they crossed a stretch of farmland and reached the foot of a mountain.
The mountain wasn't especially high, but it was steep. The path was so narrow that only one person could pass at a time, with dense shrubs and weeds on either side. Wu Wei said the mountain was called Qingping Mountain. Once they crossed it, they'd reach the main road, and from there, heading northeast along the road, it would take about another month and a half to reach Tianfu Sect.
"A month and a half," Chen Yu repeated. "Walking."
"Mm-hmm."
"No carriages?"
"There are. Can you afford one?"
Chen Yu touched the banknotes in his robe and fell silent. The five hundred taels Master Nie had given him sounded like a lot, but Wu Wei had told him that in the Northern Region, a decent meal cost two taels of silver, one night at an inn cost three, and a decent magical artifact started at fifty taels and went up from there. Five hundred taels, even spent carefully, would last only half a year.
"Walking is good," Chen Yu said. "It's exercise."
Tangbao snorted loudly behind them, its tone dripping with mockery.
By the time they reached the mountainside, the weather had changed.
First came the wind, carrying the damp, earthy stink of wet soil. Then the clouds pressed down, hanging so low it was as if someone had spread a gray quilt across the sky. Wu Wei looked up and frowned.
"Heavy rain's coming."
The moment he finished speaking, the first raindrop came crashing down.
This wasn't a soft drizzle. Raindrops the size of beans pelted them from head to toe, smacking against the leaves and turning the mountain path into a stream in an instant.
The three of them and the donkey huddled miserably beneath a big tree, but even the tree couldn't block rain like this. Water leaked through the gaps in the leaves, and before the time it took to finish half a cup of tea, they were soaked through.
"There's a Mountain God Temple up ahead!"
The voice came from farther down the mountain path. A hunter in a straw rain cape, a bow and arrows slung over his shoulder, was running downhill. He stopped as he passed them and pointed toward the area above the mountainside.
"Keep going up for another quarter of an hour. There's a Mountain God Temple near the summit. You can shelter from the rain there!"
The hunter ran off as soon as he finished speaking, his rain cape making him look like a drenched, enormous bird.
Chen Yu looked at Wu Wei. Wu Wei looked at Chen Yu. The two of them looked at Tangbao at the same time.
Tangbao had already started walking uphill.
"...At least no one has to urge it along," Chen Yu said.
"It doesn't want to get rained on," Wu Wei replied.
The Mountain God Temple was larger than they'd expected.
There were three main halls and two side rooms. Though badly in need of repair, the roofs were still mostly intact and, at the very least, didn't leak. A mountain god statue stood enshrined in the main hall. It was carved from stone, and the features on its face had been weathered into a blur. Yet there was even half a stick of incense still burning on the altar, which meant people still came to worship here from time to time.
There was already someone inside the hall.
A young man sat beside the altar, with a jug of wine and several small dishes of food laid out in front of him. He was tidying his clothes while facing a bronze mirror. He wore a moon-white robe, the fabric not especially fine but starched and pressed until it held its shape. His hair was tied up without a single strand out of place, and even his sideburns had been trimmed.
Hearing their footsteps, he raised his head and revealed a face that was, indeed, quite handsome.
"Oh, dear," he said, standing up with the enthusiasm of someone welcoming guests into his own home. "You got caught in the rain, didn't you? Come in, come in! I've got wine and food here. It's not much, but if we squeeze together, there's enough for everyone."
As he spoke, he put away the bronze mirror—not into his bundle, but upright beside him within easy reach, as if he might need to check himself again at any moment.
"I'm Sang Sheng," he said, clasping his hands. "Just passing through and taking shelter from the rain as well."
Chen Yu returned the greeting. "Chen Yu. This is Wu Wei, and that's..." He glanced at Tangbao, which was shaking water off itself. "My donkey."
Tangbao shook water all over his face.
Sang Sheng was a natural at making himself at home. Before half a tea's time had passed, he was chatting away with them as if they'd known each other for years. He was a scholar from a nearby town, with a modest amount of family property. He had a wife, and his life was fairly stable.
"My wife and I have always had a wonderful relationship," he said, genuine nostalgia coloring his voice. "On the day we got married, she wore a red wedding dress. I took one look at her and knew my life was complete."
He casually glanced into the mirror.
"But then..." His tone suddenly changed, taking on a bafflement that was difficult to put into words. "About three years ago, one night she went out to draw water and fell, hitting the back of her head. I carried her home and called a doctor. The doctor said it wasn't serious. But after that, she... changed."
"How did she change?" Chen Yu asked.
"She got cold."
"Cold?"
"Just cold." Sang Sheng set down his wine cup. "Her hands used to be warm, and she was warm whenever she leaned against me. But after that, her hands were always chilly, and so was her body. Even in the middle of summer, sitting beside her felt cool and clammy. And..."
He paused, lowering his voice.
"We've been married for five years and still don't have any children. We've seen several doctors, and they all say there's nothing wrong with either of us."
He looked into the mirror again. This time, it didn't seem like vanity. It was more as if he were checking whether he was still the same person he'd always been.
"I thought maybe I was the problem," he said with a bitter smile. "After all, I look like this—"
He paused, then added, "—I mean, I look this good. Heaven has to take a little away from me somewhere else, right?"
Chen Yu: "..."
Wu Wei: "..."
Tangbao stopped shaking itself, and both of its big ears stood straight up.
"And then?" Chen Yu asked in a calm tone, as if they were discussing the weather.
Sang Sheng's eyes lit up. Clearly, this was the question he'd been waiting for.
"And then," he said, lifting his wine cup and taking a sip before letting out a long sigh. The posture of the sigh was very deliberate: his chin tilted slightly upward, his profile angled toward the candlelight, as if he were performing in a play. "About a year ago, I met a young woman while gathering herbs in the mountains."
"Her surname was Qin, and her name was Lianxiang. At the time, I was washing my face by a stream—"
"Washing your face?" Wu Wei cut in.
"Yes, washing my face," Sang Sheng said matter-of-factly. "You can't let yourself go just because you're traveling. I was in the middle of washing up when she stood on the rock across from me and watched. I looked up and—oh, that girl was truly beautiful. Of course, compared with me, she was still a little lacking—"
Chen Yu lifted his teacup to hide the corners of his mouth. Tangbao buried its head in the pile of fodder, its shoulders shaking.
Sang Sheng remained oblivious and continued telling his story. How Lianxiang had fallen in love with him at first sight, how she'd come looking for him again and again, and how she'd poured out her feelings to him beneath the moon. He told the story with vivid detail, leaving nothing out—especially the parts where Lianxiang praised his looks. He repeated those at least three times.
"So your problem is..." Chen Yu prompted.
"My problem is," Sang Sheng said miserably, "that I'm a man of deep feeling and loyalty. I don't want to betray my wife. But Lianxiang... she truly loves me. What do you think I should do?"
When he finished, he looked into the mirror again.
Chen Yu glanced at Tangbao. Tangbao glanced back at Chen Yu.
The look they shared, between one man and one donkey, conveyed exactly the same message: This gossip is delicious.
Wu Wei quietly asked Chen Yu, "Did he just look in the mirror again?"
"The seventh time," Chen Yu said. "I've been counting."
A bolt of lightning tore down from the sky, bathing the entire Mountain God Temple in stark white light.
A thunderclap followed, rattling every roof tile.
Then the temple doors were pushed open.
A young woman stood in the doorway, dressed in a pale green outfit and holding an oil-paper umbrella. Rainwater ran down the umbrella ribs and gathered in a small puddle at her feet. Her face was very pale—not a sickly pallor, but a smooth, lustrous whiteness like porcelain. Her eyebrows and eyes curved prettily, and the corners of her lips held a faint, almost imperceptible smile.
A very light fragrance clung to her, a sweet scent like dandelions scattering on the spring wind.
"Sang-lang," she said in a voice so soft it could melt a heart, "I was worried you'd get soaked, so I brought you an umbrella."
Sang Sheng's expression changed instantly. His previous animated confidence turned into a complicated look tangled up with pride and guilt.
"Lianxiang," he stammered as he stood. "What are you doing here?"
Lianxiang closed her umbrella and walked into the temple. Her gaze swept over Chen Yu and Wu Wei before finally settling on Sang Sheng, whom she glared at reproachfully.
"You went out without bringing an umbrella. What if you caught a chill?"
As she spoke, she pulled a handkerchief from her sleeve, rose onto her toes, and wiped the corner of Sang Sheng's mouth. The movement was natural and intimate, like she'd done it countless times before. The handkerchief carried the faintest herbal fragrance, and as it brushed his lips, Sang Sheng's complexion visibly grew rosier.
Sang Sheng's ears turned red, but he still put on a brave front. "I'm perfectly fine, you know. You didn't have to make a special trip—"
"I wanted to." Lianxiang cut him off with a smile, her voice gentle but impossible to refuse.
Chen Yu leaned against a pillar with his arms crossed, watching the show with total concentration. At some point, Tangbao had moved over beside him. Its two big eyes were locked on the man and woman without blinking, its ears standing straight up.
Wu Wei sat in a corner, his face as red as a boiled shrimp.
Chen Yu noticed a detail: after Lianxiang wiped Sang Sheng's mouth with the handkerchief, his complexion had clearly improved. Not the kind of improvement that came from receiving attention from a beautiful woman, but a real, unmistakable flush of vitality and blood.
Interesting.
Lianxiang was about to say something when another bolt of lightning tore across the sky.
Another thunderclap.
The temple doors were pushed open again.
This time, another woman stood in the doorway. She was half a head shorter than Lianxiang and wore a plain blue cloth dress, her hair loosely tied into a bun. She was holding an umbrella too—not an oil-paper umbrella, but a sturdy large umbrella with a bamboo frame. Its canopy even had two patches sewn onto it.
Her face lacked Lianxiang's refined beauty, but her features were regular, her eyebrows thick and black, and her gaze sharp as two knives.
The instant she appeared in the doorway, a chill poured in from outside. It wasn't the coolness brought by the rain. It was an icy cold that seeped outward from the cracks between one's bones.
She saw the handkerchief still resting at the corner of Sang Sheng's mouth, and her eyes instantly turned cold.
"Sang Sheng."
Two words. No "lang," no "husband"—just his name.
Sang Sheng's face went white.
"W-wife—"
"I was worried you'd get soaked, so I brought you an umbrella," she said in exactly the same tone Lianxiang had used, though the meaning was completely different. "I didn't expect someone to get here first."
Lianxiang pulled the handkerchief away from Sang Sheng's mouth, but she didn't step back. Instead, she smiled faintly and nodded at Sang Sheng's wife.
"Hello, sis."
"I'm not your sister."
The air froze. And the temperature dropped a little further.
Sang Sheng stood between the two women, looking from one to the other with the expression of a man who'd been cheating with two women at once and just realized both boats were sailing in opposite directions.
Chen Yu reached into his robe and pulled out a sesame cake he'd bought on the road. He broke it in half and handed one piece to Tangbao.
Tangbao took it and chewed with a loud crunch.
Wu Wei stared at them, eyes wide. "You two... are eating?"
"What's the point of watching a show if you don't have something to eat?" Chen Yu took a bite of the cake. "What a waste."