Tzu-yang

  Don't ask, before only heard those old men leaning against the wall talk about monsters and demons, at that time it was just a listen, not taking it seriously, didn't expect that there are actually monsters in the world, and they're sitting right in front of you. Hei San's long tail is thick and straight, with black fur on top, no different from the wild wolves outside the temple before, must be a black wolf turned into a monster, no wonder it scolded those two wild wolves for eating humans and ruining their reputation before entering the temple.

  "Bookworm, are you cold?" asked the drunken man with a blurry gaze.

  "It's okay, it's okay." Don't ask about the chattering teeth, living with wolf spirits in a desolate temple would make anyone shiver.

  "I'll go find some firewood." Hei San threw the firewood that was being used as a pillow into the fire pit, stood up and walked out, his tail dragging behind him, undoubtedly a wolf's tail.

  Hei San left, and Mo asked in a low voice as he walked out of the broken temple, turning to flee north. Although Hei San's words and deeds were only fierce and not evil, no one knew when it would go wild, and traveling with wolves was no different from seeking death.

  When escaping, don't ask how fast you can run, just run as fast as you can. You'd even wish to grow two more legs and run four or five miles in one breath. Then, from the direction of the broken temple came Hei San's shouting voice. Hei San didn't know his name, he was shouting "Bookworm".

  No one asked, and nature wouldn't respond. He didn't even dare to look back, only fleeing for his life until he saw the village and slightly caught his breath. It was already approaching midnight, and there was only one light in the village. Mo Wen moved closer and found it was a blacksmith's shop. A bare-chested blacksmith was forging tools. Mo Wen walked up and stood with his arms around him. The blacksmith turned his head to look at him, saw that he was shabbily dressed, and knew he was someone in trouble who had come to warm himself, so he didn't drive him away.

  "Hey big brother, can I help you pump the bellows?" Mo Wen didn't feel embarrassed about taking advantage of the heat, wanting to do something for the blacksmith.

  The blacksmith nodded and hurriedly walked to the side of the bellows to push and pull it.

  Blacksmith concentrated on forging iron, Mo Xun didn't dare to disturb him. After a while, the blacksmith finished his work and splashed fire. Mo Xun saw that he had nothing else to do, so he took out silver and asked the blacksmith to make a dagger for him. The blacksmith nodded in agreement and used the remaining iron water to forge a dagger for him, reminding Mo Xun not to talk nonsense, as the imperial court did not allow civilian blacksmiths to forge weapons at that time.

  At the fifth watch, Mo asked the blacksmith to leave with the dagger and the ten copper coins. He found another house with a light on and sat down outside. It was a tofu shop, and the owner was inside grinding soybeans to make tofu.

  Since yesterday morning until now, Mo Wen hasn't eaten anything. The aroma of soy milk wafting from the house made his stomach growl with hunger. Mo Wen had never thought that he would sink to such a state, but he didn't knock on the door to buy soy milk, nor did he eat the buns in his arms. Old Wu won't be back for a long time, and now he only has ten copper coins and three buns left, so he must save them.

  It's not easy to get through the night, don't ask how I feel, my head is in a daze, my whole body is icy cold. Under the exhaustion, all I want to do is find a warm place to take shelter from the wind and rest, but there are no abandoned houses around the village, nor any hay to keep warm.

  He didn't even know how he had managed to drag himself until noon, at noon he turned south and headed back, with nowhere to go, he could only return to the broken temple, that wolf spirit's black three must have left.

  Along the way, they picked up a lot of hay. When picking up the hay, Mo asked himself secretly, if Hei San hadn't left yet, he would use the excuse of going out to pick up firewood and get lost on the way.

  Returning to the vicinity of the broken temple, Mo Xun did not immediately enter, but instead observed from a distance for a moment, confirming that Hei San was no longer in the temple before walking back. Outside the temple stood two withered dead trees, presumably dragged back by Hei San last night.

  After entering the broken temple, Mo asked to be frightened, a dead raccoon dog was abandoned in the middle of the broken temple, one of the raccoon dog's hind legs was missing, and there were bloodstains everywhere in the temple where the raccoon dog had struggled before its death.

  When Mo Xun saw the wolf, he immediately regretted it. This wolf was obviously left to him by Hei San. Hei San's previous scolding of the wild wolves and some of his actions showed that although he was not human, he did not harm people at will. If he traveled with him, he would not be eaten, and Hei San was a man of his word, so he could accompany him to find Lin Ruocheng everywhere in Ye City. Unfortunately, Mo Xun was timid and missed the great opportunity. Thinking of this, Mo Xun stomped his feet repeatedly, regretting it endlessly.

  But Hei San had already left, and even if he regretted it, there was nothing that could be done about it. After a long sigh, Mo Wu used his dagger to cut off some branches and reinforce the window again, and wove together a fence to block the main gate. He wasn't a noble or aristocrat, but he knew how to do ordinary chores; of course, the woven fence was quite crude.

  No one had ever cleaned the sewer before, but Mo Xiang's adaptability was strong. He skinned and disembowelled the raccoon dog, hung it in the temple, then washed the miscellaneous items. When night was about to fall, he went to the village north again, exchanging his last ten copper coins for half a catty of salted pork. When he returned to the broken temple panting, he saw that things hadn't been stolen, and only then did he put his mind at ease. He had never taken food so seriously before, but now he had no choice but to take it seriously, because without food, he would starve to death.

  At night, it snowed again. Mo asked to make a fire and cook in the temple. The broken water tank was his stove. Inside the temple was warm. Mo asked held deer meat in his hand and secretly shed tears. When he was suffering, he rarely thought of his family because he felt that death was not necessarily an escape. But at this time, in a warm environment, eating delicious deer meat, he found that life still had a beautiful side, but this beauty his family could no longer feel.

  After several days, Mo Wu stayed in the broken temple to rest. After Hei San left, those two wild wolves did not appear again, and he could sleep soundly at night. It was very cold in winter, and food was not easy to spoil. Most of the deer was salted by him, and only a small part was eaten. Every time he ate, he would think of Lao Wu, but he didn't know if Lao Wu was safe on his way or had anything to eat.

  It was unexpected that Lao Wu rushed back on the tenth night, wind-blown and dusty.

  "Old man, where did this come from?" Lao Wu looked at the deer meat hanging on the east side of the temple in astonishment after entering.

  "Has the kind-hearted person left something for us? Are you back in Xiyang County?" Mo asked, taking over the bundle on Lao Wu's body and sizing him up from head to toe.

  "Here." Old Five took out a small cloth package from his bosom and handed it over to Mo Wen.

  "How is it so fast?" Mo Wen took over the bundle and asked in puzzlement.

  "I didn't rest much on the way here, are these all ours?" Lao Wu's attention was still focused on those pieces of meat that had not yet been thoroughly dried.

  "Yes, I've been keeping it for you." Mo Wen nodded and said.

  Lao Wu heard the news and excitedly ran over to pick up a piece of venison to cook. Venison was the best meat at that time, favored by aristocratic families, extremely expensive, and ordinary people rarely saw it.

  "What's with these silver pieces?" Mo asked, opening the cloth package handed over by Old Five, and found that inside, apart from the gold ingot, there were no less than twenty taels of fragmented silver.

  "I rummaged through the corpse's body, those clothes and shoes were found by me in the county town, they are clean." Old Five added firewood to the bonfire.

  "Your leg strength is quite impressive." Mo Xiong put away the silver coins and walked over to help by the fire.

  "If I were on flat ground, I could catch up with a rabbit." Lao Wu began to boast.

  Mo Wenxun smiled and nodded, but in fact, Lao Wu couldn't catch up with the rabbit. However, his leg strength was indeed far beyond that of ordinary people.

  Lao Wu soon fell asleep, still clutching the unfinished piece of meat in his hand. Mo didn't ask him to put it down, instead he took the meat away from Lao Wu, wiped his hands clean and then stood guard by the fire pit, adding more wood to keep Lao Wu warm. In this chaotic world, the two were both master and servant, brothers, and also dependent on each other for survival.

  Lao Wu slept until noon the next day, and the young man quickly recovered his spirits after eating and sleeping well. The two of them packed up the remaining venison and left the broken temple to head towards Ye City.

  "I've got a dagger, if we meet robbers again, we'll stake our lives." On the road, Mo asked for the dagger and handed it to Lao Wu. This was what he had been thinking about these past few days - if they were robbed of this money again, the two would really have no way out.

  "If we meet bandits again, you run first and I'll hold them off. Wait till you're far away before I come after you." Lao Wu took the dagger and tucked it into his waist.

  "Alright, I'll go first, so as not to hold you back." Mo Wen nodded and spoke up.

  The two of them had a good countermeasure, but it didn't come in handy. They arrived at the outskirts of Ye City without any surprises or dangers. On the south side of Ye City, there were many barracks, but outsiders were strictly forbidden from approaching. The two of them observed from afar for a long time and didn't discover any women inside the barracks, so they left the barracks and continued heading north.

  Arriving at Ye City, he was amazed. The scale of Ye City far exceeded what he had imagined before. The huge city wall enclosed an area hundreds of times larger than Xiyang County. There were as many as four south-facing city gates alone. The streets in the city were several zhang wide, with people coming and going, rubbing shoulders and treading on each other's heels. Everywhere there were buildings, shops, and ancient temples. As the saying goes, "A single spot can reveal the whole leopard." Just from this corner of the city, one could see how vast Ye City was, and how many people lived here. Finding someone in the city was like searching for a needle in a haystack, or finding salt in the snow.

  After entering the city, Mo didn't know what to do and stood still for a long time. In the end, he could only take Lao Wu around to ask about it everywhere, but there were too many people coming in and out of Ye City, and often Hu soldiers would bring in women who had been robbed. The two of them asked around all day, but got nothing.

  The next day, Mo Xun changed his approach and stopped inquiring about Lin Ruocheng. Instead, he asked which route the soldiers had taken to attack Qingping City during the previous period. However, this method also didn't work out. Firstly, outsiders wouldn't possibly know military affairs, and secondly, many people suspected that the two of them were spies sent by Jin State to gather information, so they looked at them with suspicion. Before long, Mo Xun didn't dare ask anymore, fearing that if he continued asking, he might really be caught by the authorities.

  On the third day, Mo Xun inquired and found several small slave markets in the city. He went to take a look but still couldn't find any trace of Lin Ruocheng. Mo Xun was at his wit's end and could only wander around the streets with Lao Wu, lingering outside the official residences, hoping to run into Lin Ruocheng by chance. However, the city of Ye was divided into four cities and eight districts, with a population of no less than several hundred thousand. How easy would it be to run into someone by chance?

  "When human strength is exhausted, heaven's will cannot be violated. Forget it, forget it." Three days later, Mo Wen finally lost heart and gave up.

  "Let's go back to Jin State, this place is full of big noses." Lao Wu saw that Mo Xun had finally loosened up and hastily took advantage of the situation. He never agreed with Mo Xun going north to search for Lin Ruochen, feeling that she wasn't worth it.

  "Go back, go back." Mo Wen didn't ask again, he knew that his decision to search for his wife in the north was 50% due to his nature, 30% out of a sense of duty, and only 20% out of emotional attachment. At this moment, he felt both disappointed and relieved. He was naturally disappointed that he couldn't find Lin Ruoxuan, but since he had tried his best and still got no results, he was also at peace with it.

  Lao Wu was afraid that Mo Xiang would change his mind again, so he didn't dare to stay a moment longer. He pulled him towards the south city gate. However, they hadn't walked far when Mo Xiang stopped and turned around to look at a Taoist priest who was buying grain by the side of the road.

  "Old Master, do you know him?" asked Lao Wu.

  "I don't know." Mo Wen shook his head.

  "What did you see him doing?" Old Five asked again.

  Mo Wen didn't speak immediately, and the Taoist priest reminded him of Mount Wuliang. Thinking of Mount Wuliang also made him think of Hei San, the illiterate wolf spirit. After a brief moment of contemplation, Mo Wen turned to Lao Wu and said, "Let's go to Mount Wuliang."

  "What?! Where are you going? If you become a Taoist priest, the Mo family line will be cut off!" Old Fifth's eyes widened.

  "I'm not here to be a Taoist priest, I've come to repay a personal debt..."

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