Murong Wanqing once thought that the most painful thing in the world was nothing more than the black blood her mother vomited when she was poisoned, or the blood-stained shirt passed down from her brother's "death in battle".
It wasn't until the bandits dragged her into the ruined temple and the hemp rope cut into her wrist bones that she actually saw Sheng Huaijin laughing and throwing the candy man to her amidst the harsh laughter and tearing sounds of the bandits; that year during the Lantern Festival, he took off the highest lantern for her; at the bow of the painting boat, when he smiled and stuffed the jade pendant into her palm, she felt the warm touch of his fingertips. "It turns out that the most painful thing is the memory rolling on the blade."
Shen Hanzhou, Master of the Medicine King Valley, cut off Wanqing's hand and foot tendons and sealed her emotions and desires with golden needles. When the tendons and veins were replaced, she was in pain, but she suddenly laughed out loud, blood foam staining her teeth: "Does Master Shen know that before the phoenix reaches nirvana, it will always have its feathers plucked out?"
In the bone-changing pool, ice water at minus 30 degrees was wrapped in the "Nine Yin Xuan Gong" mental method and poured into the Dantian. The black hair gradually faded to silver, and the eyelashes were covered with ice crystals. Only the fire of hatred in her eyes burned more and more fiercely - she counted the carvings on the bottom of the pool. The word "Sheng" was dug out with her fingernails, and it was deeply visible...
When Sheng Huaijin's chisel penetrated the fifth cold winter, the words "waiting for your return" on the bluestone finally oozed blood. He always comes here at three o'clock in the morning, with frost and snow falling on his shoulders without brushing them off, as if he has become a monument to this barren mountain. The sparks from the chisel striking the bluestone illuminated the new scar on his brow bone—the result of his solo trip to Yaowang Valley last month. "Wanqing, look at this snow, it looks like the pear blossoms on the day you were born." The white mist he exhaled blurred the handwriting, and his fingertips touched the word "Qing" for the last time. There was half a blood-stained fingernail embedded there - it was what she left behind when she changed her bones.
