Chapter 231: A Mountain Suspended, A River Submerged (45)
Although Jing Xiaobao was crying so hard he was nearly hyperventilating, he still obediently got to work the moment Yan Shixun carried him over.
“Yan Yan is a big meanie.”
Jing Xiaobao pouted his rosy lips. “Kids my age are supposed to be at amusement parks right now. Yan Yan is totally exploiting child labor and bullying the weak!”
Yan Shixun glanced over at him with a faint smile. “Need I remind you that you’re almost a hundred years old now, son of Mr. Lin Ting—Jing Xiaobao?”
Jing Xiaobao: “…………”
The child, acting as if nothing had happened, plucked a ghost from mid-air, wiped his tear- and snot-covered face, and casually tossed the ghost back. Then he reached up to pull his falling suspender strap back into place and trotted over to the coffin with little “tap tap tap” footsteps.
“Didn’t you say we were working? Yan Yan, why are you still standing there? Don’t slack off, come on!”
He sounded so self-righteous, as if he hadn’t just been trying to weasel out of it a second ago.
Yan Shixun chuckled lightly without exposing him, shook his head, and followed along. “Alright.”
Only after seeing the tension ease between Yan Shixun and Jing Xiaobao did the hunched-over Yin officials slowly emerge from the shadows and step forward to help.
No—more accurately, they practically fought to get to work. They started guiding the souls from the coffins, chaining the dazed spirits, and leading them toward the underworld to face judgment or reincarnation.
—After all, how could they let their direct superior personally handle the work?
And the other one? He was even more untouchable—someone who could fight even their boss.
Before leaving, the Yin officials even respectfully bowed to both Yan Shixun and Jing Xiaobao, then silently retreated into the darkness, vanishing from sight.
These Yin officials, who usually gave exorcists the cold shoulder and acted all high and mighty—even when asked for help in the mortal realm—were now behaving so meekly it was almost adorable.
Even Yan Shixun couldn’t help but glance at them a few more times and curiously asked, “Is it because there’s been no King of Hell for the past hundred years, and now that there’s a new one, they feel uneasy?”
Jing Xiaobao was still hiccuping adorably from his crying fit and wasn’t exactly friendly to anyone except Yan Shixun.
Between hiccups, he managed to turn his head and give the Yin officials a frosty glance.
One of the Yin officials was so startled he nearly fell to his knees. After realizing what happened, he hastily picked up the pace, desperate to finish the job and return to the underworld before Jing Xiaobao could become displeased with them.
Thanks to this, the hundreds of coffins lining the mountain path were opened in record time, and the trapped souls inside were all taken away by the Yin officials.
What lifted Yan Shixun’s mood a little was that, apart from the official in charge, there wasn’t a single soul from the program crew or the rescue team to be found here.
Though the result made him want to laugh and sigh at the same time. He shook his head helplessly and thought—maybe the official had caught a streak of bad luck from Xiao Bing. How had he ended up being the only one so seriously injured? What on earth had happened?
Seeing that all the souls, once destined to become sacrificial offerings for the Winter Solstice ritual, had been properly handed over to the underworld, Yan Shixun finally felt at ease and started walking toward the cliff.
Back when Ritual Master tried to devour Nan Tian, there had been one person who played a critical role.
The older sister of that pair of siblings.
If she hadn’t shut the already-open coffin lid at the last second and bought Yan Shixun a few precious seconds, Nan Tian would’ve ended up like a pried-open clam, swallowed whole by Ritual Master.
Had that happened, Ritual Master would have absorbed the power that Grandma Nan once destroyed, advanced the Winter Solstice ritual ahead of time—and then it truly would have been game over, irreversible fate.
But because of what the sister did, she was struck down the cliff by the furious Ritual Master.
Yan Shixun had no idea what had become of her. Even though the bottomless cliff was high enough to smash someone to pieces, even if all he could find was her corpse… he still wanted to take her away, out of the Nanming Mountains, and give her a proper burial.
Back in Longevity Village, even though their meeting had been brief, her heart had wavered when he said he wanted to take her little sister out of Nanming Mountain. That alone showed both sisters disliked the mountain and the village—they longed for the outside world.
So Yan Shixun wanted to make that wish come true for them.
Just as he turned and took a long stride forward, one of the ghosts, who had been aimlessly following the Yin officials, suddenly saw his back.
That cloudy gaze slowly sharpened with clarity.
Then, with hesitant joy, the spirit called out, “Mr. Yan?”
Yan Shixun paused in his steps.
When he turned around, he saw a face that looked vaguely familiar.
It was the backpacker they had encountered outside the mountain area, at the guesthouse district, before the filming crew went into the mountains.
They had stayed at the same guesthouse as the hostess. and just happened to brush past the variety show crew, entering the mountains a bit earlier than them.
But they hadn’t been seen again in Longevity Village.
Yan Shixun froze for a moment, then smiled and nodded. “Didn’t expect to run into you here. I thought you’d be in the lower part of Longevity Village.”
If that had been the case, he might have had a chance to save these backpackers.
But now, they were already dead.
The only thing Yan Shixun could do for them now was to send them to the underworld for reincarnation.
In contrast to the backpacker’s joyful smile upon this reunion, Yan Shixun’s expression held a trace of sorrow.
The backpacker, having gone through life and death and regained his memories, understood what had happened to him.
But in death, he seemed to have found peace.
The backpacker waved at Yan Shixun with a carefree gesture, comforting him instead. “It’s fine. I only had a couple of days left anyway. Whether I died sooner or later, it made no difference.”
“It was because my illness cost too much to treat, and there was no cure. So I gave up on treatment, thinking I’d rather leave the money for my wife and kid. As for me, I just needed a place to wait for the end.”
The backpacker smiled. “Originally, I came to Longevity Village hoping for some luck, but turns out… luck wasn’t really on my side.”
“But it’s alright. I think this isn’t so bad either.”
He sighed with emotion. “At the very least, when I died, I honestly didn’t feel any pain. On the contrary, I felt really happy.”
“Even if it was fake… I still wanted it. Even if it was just for a brief moment.”
As he spoke, the cheerful smile on the backpacker’s face slowly faded, turning blank and sorrowful.
Yan Shixun said nothing. He simply stood silently beside the backpacker.
The man understood everything. After enduring prolonged suffering, he had long ceased to cling to life or fear death. Perhaps all he wanted in his final moments was to leave his last words in the human world before departing for good.
The nearby Yin official dared not rush them. He stood quietly with his hands at his sides, waiting in silence.
After a long while, the backpacker blinked away his tears, nodded to Yan Shixun, and broke into a smile through the wetness.
“Mr. Yan, I’ve watched your show. It’s really good—you’ve saved a lot of people and given hope to many. I’ll be going now. Please keep up the good work in the human world.”
Yan Shixun gave a gentle nod. “There’s a good King of Hell in the underworld. You’ll receive a fair judgment there. If you are free of sin, you’ll be reborn into your next life as a human.”
But the backpacker quickly waved his hands. “No need for that.”
Yan Shixun raised his brows in slight surprise.
It was rare. Most people clung desperately to the idea of reincarnation—he’d hardly met anyone who turned it down.
The backpacker scratched his head and gave an embarrassed grin. “If there really is a next life, I’d like to come back as a panda. Just lie around all day, eat, and soak up the sun.”
“Being human is too hard. I don’t want to be one again.”
He joked, “If panda’s off the table, I’d settle for being a cat or a bear.”
Amusement rose in Yan Shixun’s eyes. He nodded: “Maybe you’ll get that chance.”
Having voiced everything he’d kept bottled up inside, the backpacker looked much lighter—he even walked with a bounce in his step.
He bid farewell to Yan Shixun and, smiling, followed the Yin official toward the afterlife.
Yan Shixun watched them leave, then turned around and descended along the mountain path toward the cliff.
He had originally thought the older sister had fallen into the valley at the very bottom. But to his surprise, after descending a bit and getting a different angle, he spotted her sitting on a large jutting rock beneath the cliff wall.
She sat there in a daze, her expression blank, as if she still hadn’t processed what had just happened.
A flash of joy passed through Yan Shixun’s eyes. He quickly grabbed a stone beside him, his tall figure moving with agility as he leapt through the air, landing steadily on the boulder.
Hearing the sound, the older sister looked up in a daze and saw a face that seemed somewhat familiar.
It was… the man she had met in Longevity Village—the one who had wanted to take her younger sister out of Nanming Mountain.
And also, the one who had killed Ritual Master.
At the thought of Ritual Master, a flicker of hatred and anger crossed her face. But it quickly softened when she recalled the kindness Yan Shixun had shown her younger sister before.
“It’s you, the one from Longevity Village.”
She forced a smile. “I never got the chance to ask your name.”
Yan Shixun chuckled softly and extended his hand to her. “I’m Yan Shixun. Thank you for that fabric you gave me earlier, and for deciding to seal the coffin when you did. You saved Nan Tian’s life.”
“No, I should be the one thanking you.”
Her expression turned serious. “I thought I was going to die for sure. It was your companion who summoned the underworld soldiers to catch me and safely place me here. That’s what saved me from falling to my death off the cliff.”
Yan Shixun was surprised at first, but then he realized—it had been Ye Li’s doing.
Back then, the situation had been dire. He had only managed a quick glance at the older sister as she was thrown out before refocusing entirely on the battle with Ritual Master.
But Ye Li had caught that glance and instantly understood what Yan Shixun wanted. He had ordered the underworld soldiers to catch the falling sister midair, making sure she wasn’t harmed in the slightest.
Though their bodies were encased in sharp, silver-gleaming heavy armor, the arms of the underworld soldiers held her gently, cradling her softly. Following their general’s command, they placed her safely at the base of a mountainside far from the battlefield, so she wouldn’t be hurt by the flying remains.
These underworld soldiers, ruthless and unstoppable as they fought monsters with their blades under the command of their general, also protected the innocent with unwavering gentleness, never letting harm come to her.
They were the unyielding line between life and death. As long as Fengdu stood, as long as Ye Li sat upon the divine throne, the one hundred thousand underworld soldiers who followed him would continue to carry out their general’s will and uphold the order between life and death.
After hearing what the older sister said about Ye Li, Yan Shixun stood in momentary awe. Then, a sincere smile curled at the corners of his lips, one he couldn’t suppress.
Ye Li—Lord of Fengdu, the last remaining ghost deity in the world.
Yet somehow, they had developed such a deep mutual understanding. Ye Li could even guess what Yan Shixun wanted just from a single glance. And he had carried it out so flawlessly that Yan Shixun had no worries at all.
Yan Shixun gave a small shake of his head. His usually sharp and cold features softened.
However, at the mention of Nan Tian, the older sister lowered her gaze, a look of guilt washing over her. “I didn’t know at first that he was Grandma Nan’s grandson. If I had known, I would’ve risked my life to stop it.”
Now that the danger had passed, she gradually relaxed. Trusting Yan Shixun, she began to share everything she knew.
Yan Shixun had initially believed Nan Tian to be the last surviving member of the Nan Village—but he was wrong.
These two sisters were also orphans from the same village.
Unlike Nan Tian, however, they had grown up in Nanming Mountain from infancy, raised by Ritual Master.
They had been abandoned at a fork in the road as babies because their family didn’t want daughters. Barely clinging to life, they were picked up by Ritual Master—not to be sacrificed like the others, but instead to be allowed to live as ordinary people.
This was Ritual Master’s final flicker of compassion after witnessing the cruel fate of the Nan Village.
But that kindness became a chain of karma that tightly bound the sisters to Nanming Mountain, preventing them from ever leaving.
As they grew older, they occasionally interacted with outsiders who temporarily regained their memories. Through these conversations, the elder sister slowly came to realize that what Ritual Master was doing was wrong.
She wanted to rebel. But… she had a younger sister.
She feared that if she died, her sister would be bullied and suffer. So she kept enduring in despair, struggling just to stay alive.
Still, the older sister was unwilling to give up entirely. So she secretly resisted in her own way.
She and her sister wove fabrics imbued with protective blessings, hiding them among other symbolic cloths to avoid detection by Ritual Master or the villagers of Longevity Village. Then, they secretly sent these fabrics beyond the mountains.
Part of it was to repay the kind hostess who had cared for them all these years. But in her heart, she also harbored a quiet hope that someone out there would receive one of the cloths—and that it might save a life.
For years, though, that hope went unanswered.
Until the production team arrived at Nanming Mountain—and the young master, Song Ci, with his picky eyes, happened to be drawn to one of their colorful handmade fabrics.
But he gave it to the hostess instead.
That fabric saved her life.
The kindness the hostess had once shown them became a life-saving charm in her moment of danger. It protected her from the crazed swing of her husband’s axe and allowed her to survive until the rescue team arrived.
The sister had no idea the hostess had been in danger outside the mountain. But when she thought she was going to die, it was that gentle woman who came to her mind.
She felt regret. According to their agreement, she was supposed to leave the mountain to exchange goods with the hostess after the Winter Solstice dawn ritual.
But this time, she had thought she would fail to keep her word.
She never expected that fate would take such a turn—that what she thought would be her certain death was completely dispelled by the intervention of a ghost deity.
She was still alive.
And—
“Take your sister and leave Nanming Mountain with me.”
Yan Shixun smiled, his voice deep and soft. “You’ve spent long enough here. It’s time for you both to see the outside world.”
He winked at her, then pointed upward. “Let’s go. Your sister is up there, really worried about you.”
The sister froze for a moment, then her face lit up with overwhelming joy.
“Okay!”
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