Wen Han unconsciously took half a step forward.
He pulled up the hood of his hiking jacket, slipped it on, and, with his face partially concealed, ambled toward her. "Don't be anxious. I will come find you tonight." Then, he brushed past her.
Nepal's scent of incense drifted in through the seam of the door.
Meng Liangchuan hopped over the threshold, nearly bumping into a female traveller who wanted to step outside. With a shrug of his shoulders, he gave an apologetic smile, then tossed a bag of flatbread to Cheng Muyun. "Eat it while it's hot."
In only a short period of time, the four of them—she, Cheng Muyun, Meng Liangchuan, and that female traveller whom she did not know—had all passed by the doorway, as if they were all the most ordinary of backpackers with no connection whatsoever between them.
The two men headed directly up the staircase to the second floor.
Before the outline of their figures disappeared from view, Wang Wenhao caught a glimpse in his peripheral vision of Meng Liangchuan's backside. Meng Liangchuan was also looking at him and quickly flipped a middle finger at him before springing up to the second floor. Acting as if nothing had happened, Wang Wenhao lowered his head and continued writing out his passport information. But his left hand, which was on the counter, was clenched tightly in a fist.
The second floor was a very simple hallway.
Cheng Muyun walked to the very end, pulled out a copper-coloured key from his pocket, and opened the lock.
"Just now when I was buying the bread, I kept having a feeling that I've missed something." Biting down on a flatbread, Meng Liangchuan followed him into the room, pulled over a folding chair, and sat down.
"Oh? What have you missed?" he offhandedly asked in reply.
Meng Liangchuan's brows twisted together, his index finger tapping against his temple. "I haven't sorted it out in my mind yet."
From Kathmandu, when they intentionally moved Wang Wenhao's rafting trip one day ahead of schedule to throw a wrench in Wang Wenhao's plans, and then followed him and spied out when the goods would be exchanged...
To when they had seized the opportunity, on the same night the poachers attacked, to switch out Wang Wenhao's goods and then leave behind a message seemingly from another criminal entity, stating that Wang Wenhao should personally come to Lumbini to "buy back" his own things...
To now—<>This is an UNAUTHORIZED copy, taken from hui3r[dot]wordpress[dot]com
"Why did we need to come to Lumbini?" Meng Liangchuan at last threw out his first question.
"Because Buddha is here. I am here on a pilgrimage."
"......" Dropping his head, Meng Liangchuan simply carried on eating his flatbread.
"This place here is a holy place to all Buddhists of the entire world. Every day, there are large numbers of travellers who arrive here from all different places. The security here is extremely tight. Even beneath that large tree on the park grounds of Lumbini Garden, there are armed soldiers standing guard. No one dares to rashly engage in any armed confrontation here that will shed blood. It is just like how no one would dare cause trouble in the holy city of Mecca or Jerusalem. Whether it is a bystander or your own heart, neither will allow such a thing to happen." When Cheng Muyun finished saying this, he also reflected for a moment on his own words. "This reason sounds unimpeachable, doesn't it?"
At least, here in this place, her safety factor would be the highest.
Meng Liangchuan gave up on pressing for answers.
YOU ARE READING
Life: A Black and White Film (一生一世，黑白影画)
General FictionWen Han has arrived in Nepal on vacation and, as a Buddhist believer, also a pilgrimage. But very shortly after entering the borders, she runs in again into someone she had had one encounter with six months ago, hundreds of miles away on the far-off...
