The two of them turned around and saw Murong Lian, his white robes fluttering in the wind, holding his long-stemmed smoking pipe as he lazily emerged from the shadows.
Besides the heroic memorials, the summit of Battle Soul Mountain also had eight jade statues, each more than ten men tall. They depicted the seven monarchs who had ruled since the founding of Chonghua, as well as the greatest Imperial Preceptor in its history.
Murong Lian had been hiding behind one of the statues just now. No one had noticed his presence.
Mo Xi rose to his feet and looked down at him from above, his expression cold.
“Lord Wangshu, are you really this bored?”
“This prince came to pay respects to my late father. Afterward, I wanted to overlook the beautiful scenery of the mortal world and contemplate how fleeting life is, like a dream. So I stood here looking at the mountains, the waters, and the drifting clouds.”
Murong Lian narrowed his eyes, took a puff from his pipe, and slowly exhaled the smoke.
“Otherwise, Lord Xihe, do you think I wanted to listen to such a ridiculous conversation? ‘I want to atone for my sins.’ Heh. What a joke.”
His pristine silk shoes stepped onto the blue-jade pathway as he walked straight toward them. With malicious intent, Murong Lian looked Gu Mang up and down.
“Baby, do you know what kind of person you used to be?”
Gu Mang’s composure was almost infuriating.
“I know. I was a traitor.”
Murong Lian blew out a smoke ring, his expression displeased as he sneered.
“Oh, so you do know. I thought you had been living such a comfortable life at the Xihe Residence that you had almost forgotten your identity and status.”
Mo Xi silently took one long-legged step forward, positioning himself between Murong Lian and Gu Mang.
“Murong Lian, you’re sticking your nose into matters that are none of your business.”
Murong Lian laughed sarcastically.
“The dog I raised—I can’t even say a few words to him now?”
“He is one of my subordinates now.”
Mo Xi’s tone was hostile, and the thin layer of false composure on Murong Lian’s face immediately fell away.
“You don’t need to emphasize it. I can already see that you really do treat him like a person.”
“The heroes are buried beneath Battle Soul Mountain. Only citizens of Chonghua may kneel and pay their respects.”
Murong Lian suddenly moved closer to Mo Xi. His eyes flashed sharply as he gritted his teeth.
“What’s the matter, Lord Xihe? Do you still consider Gu Mang your brother? With your inability to distinguish friend from foe, why don’t we just roll out a red carpet next and set off firecrackers while scattering flowers, then bring the Liao Kingdom’s ruler into Chonghua’s Heroic Mausoleum for a sightseeing tour?”
Before Mo Xi could respond to his aggressive words, Gu Mang spoke.
“I came to apologize.”
Murong Lian looked as though he had heard the biggest joke in the world.
“Apologize?”
Gu Mang thought he had not explained himself clearly enough and said, “I came to apologize, to them—”
He turned and glanced at the towering memorial tablets.
“I came to atone before them.”
This time, Murong Lian laughed aloud.
“Ha!”
The tassels hanging from his smoking pipe swayed slightly with his laughter.
Murong Lian laughed louder and louder.
“Hahaha—haha. Atone? Atone?”
His fox-like eyes suddenly fixed on Gu Mang.
The smile had not yet disappeared from his face, but ferocity had already emerged in his eyes. The mixture made his pale face look especially sinister.
“How are you going to atone? How do you intend to atone?”
“Don’t make me laugh to death, Gu Mang. Do you think bending your knees, kneeling before Mo Xi’s father’s grave, kowtowing a couple of times, and burning a little paper money counts as atonement? The countless souls of Chonghua who died in battle will not tolerate you treating them like this!”
“Murong Lian!” Mo Xi shouted angrily.
“What? You’re not going to let anyone talk to him now? You’re not even going to let me criticize him a little?”
Murong Lian suddenly turned his head.
“Little Fireball, you and I both lost our fathers when we were children. How is my Wangshu Residence inferior to yours that you get to order me around like this?! Your father and mine are both lying on this mountain! You don’t mind him coming in, but I mind! Is that not allowed?!”
As he spoke, he raised his hand and viciously pointed at Gu Mang from across the air.
“Look at him! What does that carefree appearance of his count as atonement?!”
Gu Mang suddenly stepped forward several paces, passing Mo Xi and walking directly in front of Murong Lian.
“I never said this was atonement. I’m not clever, but I know this is far from enough.”
Murong Lian shouted angrily, “Bullshit! You’re not stupid. You’re too clever! You pretended to be obedient and resigned at Luomei Villa, and now that you’re in our Marshal Mo’s hands, you’ve started pretending to regret your actions again. You come here and burn a couple sheets of spirit money to win sympathy!”
“Gu Mang, do you think the Chonghua heroes who died in battle are especially easy to buy off? Do you think a couple of ghost banknotes can erase your mistakes and wipe away everything from the past? Do you think the descendants of Chonghua’s heroes are as easy to deal with as your Lord Xihe?”
Gu Mang looked straight at him.
“I don’t.”
“Then you filthy bastard shouldn’t have come in here today!”
As Murong Lian spoke, he suddenly hooked the back of Gu Mang’s neck with his pipe.
The pipe was extremely hot.
It burned Gu Mang so badly that he shuddered violently.
But Gu Mang did not pull away.
It was like a declaration of some kind of determination.
He silently stared at Murong Lian’s face with his clear blue eyes.
The remaining ashes of Life Is but a Dream inside the pipe’s filter fell along the wide collar of his robe, and the sparks burned through his skin.
He did not dodge.
But Mo Xi could no longer stand by and watch.
Whether it was because of Gu Mang or because of the solemnity of the Heroic Mausoleum, he did not want to watch Murong Lian continue this farce.
He grabbed Murong Lian’s arm and moved the pipe away from the back of Gu Mang’s neck.
The place where the pipe had pressed had already been burned open, exposing bright red flesh.
Murong Lian still was not satisfied.
He shouted furiously, “Mo Xi, get your fucking hand off me!”
“Murong Lian, are you planning to run wild on Battle Soul Mountain?!”
“You brought a traitor here to disgust the heroic spirits of every generation of Chonghua! And you have the nerve to talk about me?!”
“He came to atone!”
“Fuck your atonement! Has he apologized to anyone else?! Has he knelt before anyone else?! What crime is he atoning for?! He’s just trying to please you so he can live comfortably! I think he’s already achieved his goal! What are you planning to do next? Are you going to go before the Monarch and ask for credit on his behalf? Do you even know what his intentions are?!”
Amid their blazing fury, pushing and shoving was unavoidable.
Though, more accurately, Murong Lian was the one attacking Mo Xi, while Mo Xi had been enduring it all along and refusing to fight inside the cemetery of Battle Soul Mountain.
Gu Mang saw Murong Lian repeatedly poking and shoving Mo Xi and wanted to intervene.
But Murong Lian suddenly turned around and slapped him across the face.
“Smack!”
The red-lotus curse mark on Gu Mang’s neck suddenly lit up, but he restrained it and did not let it erupt.
He had understood their conversation.
He knew that no one should fight here.
Much less spill blood.
Murong Lian’s slap still did not satisfy him.
That face, in his eyes, was indescribably complicated and disgusting.
So he viciously kicked Gu Mang in the chest.
Gu Mang could not dodge in time.
He was kicked onto the ground, tumbling down the long blue-jade steps and coughing up a mouthful of blood.
“Gu Mang!!”
Gu Mang harshly wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth and looked up at Murong Lian.
Primal ferocity gathered in his eyes, but he still forcibly suppressed it.
He took a breath, lowered his lashes, and pushed away Mo Xi’s hand when he tried to help him up.
Then, astonishingly, he used his sleeve to carefully wipe the bloodstains from the ground.
Murong Lian narrowed his eyes, the anger still lingering as his fingertips trembled slightly.
“What are you doing?”
“This place shouldn’t be… dirtied.”
After Gu Mang finished speaking, he raised his face again.
“I said I want to atone for my sins. I meant it.”
“…”
“And when I said I would never betray you again, I meant that too.”
Murong Lian: “…”
“I wasn’t lying.”
Gu Mang’s lips, still stained with blood, moved slightly.
“Everything I said while kneeling here today is true.”
Those clear blue eyes were too clean, too transparent.
Murong Lian could not help taking a step backward.
Beneath his sleeve, his hand rubbed the sapphire-blue ring on his thumb.
The trembling in his bones became increasingly difficult to suppress.
Perhaps wanting to force down the emotion rising in his heart, Murong Lian was silent for a moment.
Then he suddenly gritted his teeth.
“Fine.”
“You want to atone? You want to kowtow? You want to start over from the beginning, right?”
Gu Mang answered firmly, “Yes.”
Murong Lian raised his head and drew a breath.
When he looked at Gu Mang again, his eyes held an extraordinarily complicated emotion.
The fingers hidden beneath his sleeve almost pressed the sapphire ring into the flesh of his palm.
“The cemetery has tens of thousands of graves. Whether they are old or new, whether they died because of you or not, you will kneel before every single one.”
“For every grave, repeat this: ‘Traitor Gu Mang, even ten thousand deaths cannot redeem my bloodstained crimes.’”
“Only after you have knelt before every grave on this mountain will you barely qualify to say one sentence.”
Murong Lian bent down, his smoke-laced cheek drawing close to Gu Mang’s ear.
“You have sincerity. You atone before all spirits.”
After saying this, Murong Lian straightened and glanced at Mo Xi, seemingly certain that Mo Xi would never agree.
He then turned back to Gu Mang.
“But ultimately, you are Lord Xihe’s man now. Whether you do it or not, I have no authority to order you around. It all depends on how much remorse you truly have.”
Gu Mang did not hesitate.
There was not even the slightest pause.
He rose from the ground.
The brilliant sunlight illuminated his swollen cheek and the bloodstain at the corner of his lips.
“I’ll do it.”
I said I was sincere.
As long as there is something I want to do, I will never turn back.
When Murong Lian heard how quickly he agreed, it was impossible to tell whether the expression on his face was more of a sinister smile or more of astonishment.
Perhaps there was even some secret hidden within it that no one but himself could understand.
Murong Lian’s eyes flickered.
In a soft voice, he said, “Don’t regret it. There are tens of thousands of graves. You may not even be able to finish the kowtows in three days and three nights.”
Gu Mang said, “Then four days and four nights. Ten days and ten nights.”
He even turned his head and looked at Mo Xi.
“I want to show you my heart.”
Mo Xi’s fingers had long since clenched into fists, but he had remained silent.
He understood Gu Mang too well.
The moment he saw the light in Gu Mang’s eyes, he already knew that if he stopped Gu Mang from doing this, it would be like preventing a beast from tasting blood.
Gu Mang would never willingly give it up.
Besides, what Murong Lian had said was not entirely wrong.
Even a small evil requires a price to turn back from.
How much more so for Gu Mang, who carried the weight of corpses strewn across the land and blood staining thousands of miles?
Yet Mo Xi still said hoarsely, “Gu Mang, think carefully. Even if you kneel, no one can forgive you. Whether it’s three days and three nights or ten days and ten nights—even if you kneel until you die on this mountain, you will still be a criminal minister in Chonghua. Nothing will change.”
Gu Mang only repeated, “I want to show you my heart.”
Mo Xi’s chest felt as though struck by a massive stone.
After hearing him repeat it twice, he suddenly understood what Gu Mang meant.
Gu Mang had never expected his so-called sins and betrayal to be erased with a stroke.
Gu Mang already knew that his sins and betrayal could never simply disappear.
He only wanted to live differently from the person he had once been.
He only felt that the person he had once been was wrong.
He only… only wanted to…
“If you look at it, and if you’re willing to believe me, can you teach me what I should do? This time, I don’t want to take the wrong road again.”
Mo Xi could not say a single word.
His heart hurt so badly that he almost fell to his knees.
Amid the cold mountain wind, his face was so pale, and his blood felt so cold.
He looked at Gu Mang’s raised head, at that face still completely unaware of what lay ahead.
After a long time, he heard someone speak.
The voice was terribly hoarse.
Only afterward did he realize that the person speaking was himself.
He sighed.
“Gu Mang, don’t be foolish. You have no road left.”
Gu Mang’s eyes widened slightly.
Murong Lian’s expression changed.
“Mo Xi—you can’t—”
But Mo Xi did not listen.
His heart was being cut like a knife, his throat seeming to bleed, yet he still spoke word by word, each one so cold, so ruthless.
“You have no road left.”
“The Monarch has sentenced you to death. The only reason you are still alive is so that you can be kept ready at any time for the Black Demon Trial.”
“Mo Xi!!”
Murong Lian shouted furiously.
“Are you crazy?! You told him about this?!”
“Then what do you want?”
“Let him be filled with hope as he tries to atone, only to tell him on the day he dies that everything he did was useless?”
“…”
Mo Xi turned his gaze back to Gu Mang.
“Since you want to do this, I’ll tell you the truth.”
“Maybe tomorrow. Maybe next year. In the end, you will die.”
“No matter what you do, there will never be an opportunity to start over.”
Gu Mang said nothing.
His widened eyes slowly lowered.
His long lashes drooped, casting faint shadows within those deep, sea-like blue eyes.
Just when Murong Lian and Mo Xi both thought he would give up, he suddenly spoke softly.
“I understand.”
The mountain wind howled, like golden drums resounding, and also like the quiet weeping of departed souls.
“But it doesn’t matter.”
“Because I think that even if I can start over for just one day, even if I can live one day properly, that is still worthwhile.”
His face lifted.
For a moment, he looked just like the fierce young man from before, the one who had found life within death even when surrounded by absolute despair.
Gu Mang said, “I’ll go as far as I can go. If you want me dead tomorrow, then I’ll be a good person for one day.”
“If you want me dead next year, then I’ll be a good person for one year.”
—“This is the last thing I can do.”
This is the last shred of peace I can ask for after wandering and suffering for so many years—the last thing that can let me face my own heart without shame.