Always by your side

Ch 33. Land of Dragons

Warning

This chapter is one of the darkest of this tale. 

Trigger warning to depictions of violence and body horror.

Wei Ying POV

Present

I am trying to process what he is saying, so I repeat his words, "What do you mean by saving him?"

Song Lan replies, "I cannot feel him anymore in my left pocket. There is just a small scrap of him. I have failed."

Lan Zhan and I look at each other. He obliges and kneels to the man while gently looking inside his clothes. 

As we have feared, there is a spirit-trapping bag inside. 

Song Lan repeats, "I failed, and now he is gone forever."

My husband knows me well. Before I could start to use empathy, we had already joined hands. Acting as my supervisor, we will reduce the time of this interrogation.

I relive everything as I enter the illusion created by Song Lan's memories.

A man in black next to a man in white hands Song Lan a bag. They walk together for a short time and part ways.

Song Lan heads northeast. Mountain after mountain, cleaning the land from walking corpses and monsters. He kept this direction until he arrived at an almost never-ending valley full of fields and farmers. Yet, conflicts come and go there. First, there are raiders and bandits. Second, although this land is fertile, rain is always scarce. Then, during a bad summer, the farmer who hired him to work in the fields died from heat exhaustion. So, after helping his widow and children to relocate, he left.

It has been 20 years since he was in Yunmeng for the last time as an average cultivator. Some things have changed. The tales of the Yiling Patriarch's good deeds have spread wide, yet people still feared him. 

When the Yiling Patriarch and his husband entered Lotus' Cove, they couldn't see the man in black robes quietly observing them from a boat. They entered, not as the rogue cultivators that saved his pursuers in Burial Mounds. Instead, they returned as part of Lan's clan delegation for a cultivator's conference.

Song Lan didn't stay and quietly followed the river and the mountains heading south, even farther than Meishan's Yu clan, since that land was still rich in energy. Finally, he arrived at a land where it was said that three dragons lived, mingled, and even fell in love with humans. While heading towards the lonely mountains, the rain cleaned his soul. The lush forests and the misty mountains moved his heart. The place was beautiful. It was as if the white peaks seemed to try to reach heaven.

A few temples were on the road towards the mountains, yet he didn't stay. Instead, he found a cave at the top of a peak and sealed himself from the world to pray for the souls in the pouch. Then, before closing his eyes, he thought, "If one day I can find one of the celestial creatures that inhabit this land, I might be able to ask them to grant my wish."

Yet, his meditation was interrupted by the noise outside after some time. He decided to investigate all the commotion and saw a young man pursued by several individuals. His eyes couldn't believe what he saw. He jumped from his cave, and the young lad rushed to him. 

Song Lan scared the pursuers away, and they left. The young man explained that his emperor had cast him out after refusing to burn a village that defended a rebel. He was one of their own; he captured the guy and left the peasants to go, yet the emperor saw it as a betrayal and branded him a traitor. He would have to find a new identity and purpose if he survived. They said goodbye. Song Lan had mixed feelings when he realized this man didn't remember him or his previous life. Maybe some things can change. Good. Entering the wheel of reincarnation is a blessing, after all.