I cast my line of sight over there, and what I saw were only a cluster of bamboo trees, nothing out of the ordinary.
Old Gong stopped the tune and made a soft 'Ah?' sound, muttering something indistinct in his mouth.
"Shall we go take a look?" Mogan proposed tentatively.
"What's over there?" I did not immediately nod, but asked Lao Gong.
Upon reaching the mountain, we must enter the mountain realm. Here, every breeze and rustle of grass, or any strange places, must be met with utmost vigilance.
We are just two people, and if we add Yang Guijin, he's not in his right mind, so we can only count him as half a person. We cannot afford any losses.
The mystical name Wu Zhongkuan Xuan Chi Jin Xiang Di Ru Shen, wielded by Lao Gong, also held a bit of prowess.
"Oh, nothing much. However, saying there might be something, there might be. The slope of Long Mountain, the Dragon's Nest, it's a good place to put in effort." Lao Gong tilted his head to explain.
Lao Gong's saying was like not saying at all, yet it seemed like he had said something. Yang Guijin, however, swayed forward.
I pondered briefly. Since Lao Gong did not mention any danger, I did not stop him and followed Mogan and Yang Guijin.
Past the bamboo forest, there was another stretch of lush grassland. After walking a bit further, we saw a deep hole.
At the mouth of the cave, there were tall grasses. Inside, it was completely dark and couldn't be seen clearly.
"Treasure hunt?" Mogan mumbled to herself.
"It's not connected." Lao Gong pursed his lips.
Yang Guijin did not cry and laugh again; he just had a crying face, and his hand kept wiping away tears.
"Can we explore the inside, how could it not be connected?" I pondered.
Mogan made a gesture and two dark bramble mice emerged from the shadows beneath her feet, entering the hole.
Soon, the bramble mice came out and returned to Mogan's shadow.
"There's a stone slab blocking it... There are signs of carving, but it hasn't been opened. There's still a lot of blood, it's been too long," Mogan said, her tone slightly grave.
"Blood stains indicate that someone has been injured."
Yang Guijin's reaction suggests that someone had died here in the past, perhaps even someone closely related to him?
Indeed, the lower nine ranks in the Huangsi are likely to know each other well enough to act together.
This place is like a place where my parents used to be. They can be considered as having scouted it out, and this path is blocked.
At this moment, Yang Guijin suddenly stopped crying and stared blankly in front of him, without moving.
"It's better to go back and rest where we were before," I diverted the conversation.
Lao Gong did not say we could enter here, and given that something happened in the past, there was no need for us to stay too close.
As we walked back, Yang Guijin followed us mechanically, as if nothing had happened earlier.
To the road we had previously taken, we found a slightly flat place to rest and ate some food.
Yang Guijin was somewhat troublesome, unable to eat on his own. Mogan and I went to feed him, and he kept turning his head.
Lao Gong simply climbed onto Yang Guijin, roughly chewed and swallowed a large amount of food, and then got off him.
After that, Yang Guijin kept burping and mumbling incoherently, saying he was full...
After resting for about two hours, we continued to climb up the mountain.
However, after walking just a few steps, Mogan's brow furrowed. She immediately made several gestures, and several black shadows emerged from the shadows beneath her.
She stood still in place.
After a few minutes, Mogan nodded at me and walked quickly towards a dense forest on the side.
I brought Yang Guijin along with Mogan.
Soon, behind an old tree, we saw a person.
The person was dressed in tattered clothes, almost reduced to strips of cloth. His body was covered with black, fluffy fur, and a bramble mouse was perched on him, as if gnawing at something.
This was a man, whose cheeks were extremely thin and concave, his eyes were also black.
Judging from the remaining clothes, it should be an old woman who has been dead for some time.
He seemed to have little consciousness, as if the corpse had residual thoughts and slowly turned into a wraith.
Looking at him, Yang Guijin seemed distracted but said nothing.
I was silent for a moment, took out a copy of the ghost-sealing talisman, and sealed it.
Then I had Mogan dig a hole with bramble mice beside him, and bury him there.
I had a complex feeling inside.
After all, this man had once worked with my father. The ghost doesn't know where it went, and the body was exposed to the sun and rain, turning into this state.
If we encounter people like Fan Jie, they would be turned into tools.
If it's a Daoist like Liu Ziheyu, I'm afraid the bones would be lost.
According to the Nine Flow trades, when a person dies, the light should go out, and they should be buried to rest in peace, suppressing the evil spirits by being deeply buried in the earth.
After that, as we climbed the mountain again, I paid close attention to Yang Guijin's every move.
However, he did not show any unusual signs again.
The mountain was so large that we walked for almost until dawn before finally reaching the edge of the summit.
By the time we reached the top, a faint grayish-white dawn broke through the pitch-black night.
But on a quick glance, there's no Taoist pavilion on the peak at all.
The vast top of the mountain is completely empty, the ground is solid yellow clay, and there are no signs of any plants.
Mogan frowned, with confusion in her eyes.
I felt something was off as well.
It's either that Lao Su was lying, or Yang Guijin was speaking nonsense and passing on the wrong message.
At this time, it's impossible for Mogan to use the brush-tailed mouse to see anything, so Lao Gong at least has to wait until noon when he can barely show his head for a moment.
Yang Guijin stood numbly next to us, with no reaction.
"I'll tell Mogan to rest and wait until noon to check," I said.
She wiped the thin sweat from her forehead and nodded.
We found another place and sat down to eat. After climbing all night and a whole day of turmoil, the drowsiness overwhelmed me. Yang Guijin didn't eat anything, but kept saying he was full, even though his hand was still on his stomach. He even fell asleep sitting like that.
After Mogan and I finished eating, we leant against a boulder on the peak and closed our eyes to rest.
Mogan was sleeping, while I used breathing exercises to recover my energy.
Although sleep can help recover one's energy more, in such a place, it's always unsafe to leave without a guard, so temporarily meditating won't do any harm.
Time slowly passed, I don't know how long, until I heard a faint noise and opened my eyes.
Yang Guijin had disappeared without a trace…
In the center of the mountain peak, Yang Guijin was walking unsteadily.
The sunlight was blinding, reflecting off the loess.
Just as I was about to get up, something strange happened…
Yang Guijin suddenly vanished from sight!
The sunlight was too glaring, causing spots to appear in my vision after prolonged exposure. I closed my eyes, shook my head, and opened them again, but still couldn't see Yang Guijin.
My heart sank quite a bit, and I hurried towards that direction!
I quickly reached the spot where Yang Guijin had disappeared.
Looking down at my feet, the ground was solid loess, with no trace of any channel.
This only left me more confused, with an eerie feeling creeping up on me.
In broad daylight, someone disappeared right before my eyes?
This isn't a cat hole in Gao Tian Temple, it's a person who disappeared right in front of my eyes...
