The woman indeed seemed unable to see her.
After watching her depart straightaway despite her dissuasive words, her gaze not shifting even a fraction as she brushed past, Yan Zhu finally confirmed this rather absurd notion.
She pinched her flesh; there was a distinct tactile sensation.
She stooped to pick up a pebble and could weigh it in her palm.
It was solid, and she had not transformed into some sort of wandering ghost or phantom.
Yan Zhu let out a sigh of relief. Though she did not yet know why the woman could not see her, it was enough to ascertain that she was still a “human” for the time being.
She turned around to look at the frail girl standing to one side.
Amber eyes.
Yan Zhu only knew one person in this world who had them, and that was Song Qing, who had entered the secret realm alongside her.
Naturally, she identified the child’s identity.
At the same time, many speculations arose in her heart, though she was still unable to verify any of them at present.
Yan Zhu stepped toward the girl and slowly bent her knees to crouch down.
The two of them were now extremely close; either one could easily pull the other into an embrace with just a stretch of an arm.
She gazed at the frail girl before her, her eyelashes trembling with reluctance when she noticed the numerous red swellings and scars caused by hurled stones on her exposed skin.
Yan Zhu felt a pang of heartache.
“Song Qing… Are you alright?”
Long after her words fell, she received no response. Instead, the hand she had extended to brush away the dust from the other’s body was caught by a small hand midway.
A somewhat high-pitched childish voice rang out shortly after.
“Who are you?” the girl asked like this.
“Yan Zhu…”
The situation had become tricky. It seemed the other party had already forgotten her.
Yan Zhu frowned, yet still harbored some baseless hope in her heart. She probed tentatively, “Do you not remember me?”
The other responded by shaking her head.
“Have we met before?”
Yan Zhu was momentarily stunned. Looking at Song Qing, who possessed only the appearance of a young child, she acutely perceived that the other party might genuinely be in her childhood stage of mentality at this moment.
“We knew each other before, but you might have forgotten now.”
“It’s fine. You’ll remember after some time passes.”
Yan Zhu finally withdrew the wrist held by the small hand, gently using her fingertips to part the messy bangs on the child’s forehead in front of her, helping her dust off the dirt and tidy her clothes.
The first-aid knowledge she had learned previously came in handy, though troubled by the inability to find herbs, she could only use the available conditions at hand to simply treat the wounds.
Children were indeed easier to coax.
Before half a day had passed, Yan Zhu noticed that Song Qing’s attitude toward her had grown much closer, even occasionally and unconsciously displaying a posture of reliance.
The two stayed out in the wilderness for a long time. The original sun slowly sank from the center down behind the mountain, and wisps of cooking smoke drifted from the village.
The shouts of adults rang out, mostly calling their children’s milk-names, summoning them home to eat lunch.
Song Wenqing’s stomach growled a few times, yet received no heed from its owner.
Yan Zhu saw that she did not want to go back, and connecting this with previous events, she could make a rough guess, an orphan raised on food from a hundred families, ostracized and bullied by her peers.
Presumably, living under someone else’s roof all these years involved no shortage of watching people’s expressions to get by, while the unfair treatments she had endured must have been routine occurrences.
For some reason, Yan Zhu suddenly thought of the female protagonist of her own creation.
She had not given too much explanation about Song Wenqing’s life before entering the sect, but being similarly an orphan, growing up in a small village, and living under someone else’s roof… perhaps the situation would not turn out well at all.
Song Wenqing’s background was just a few sparse strokes supplemented after the plot developed to a certain extent. Rather than saying Yan Zhu arranged it intentionally, it was more like the self-improvement of the story’s internal logic.
Yet thinking of this possibility, Yan Zhu still felt a sense of guilt.
At the beginning, they were clearly just a few lines of text casually tapped out, so how did they become hardships genuinely experienced by a real person?
How many hot tears had six-year-old Song Wenqing swallowed behind her back, and how long had she walked carrying the baggage she should never have borne… before she was able to grow into the appearance of a sixteen-year-old genius maiden.
Fortunately, before she came, she had not detonated the hidden mine. If it developed according to the original text’s trend, the protagonist of her creation would forever stand in the light, admired by all.
That would be the best.
Thinking this, the sorrow between Yan Zhu’s brows dissipated slightly.
Song Wenqing squinted, trying to make out the appearance of the person beside her. For some reason, upon waking up today, her vision seemed veiled by a layer of gauze, making the entire world hazy and indistinct, allowing her to see only the general outlines of things.
She had not told anyone about this matter; those children already ostracized, mocked, and ridiculed her because of these eyes. If they discovered she could not see things clearly, they would surely be as happy as if they had won a triumphant battle.
Would she be unable to see clearly from now on?
Song Wenqing reached out to gently touch her eyes, calmly pondering the possibility that had just popped into her mind.
She disliked these eyes, amber-colored, completely unlike the pure black pupils of everyone else around her.
Thus she was ostracized, isolated, and bullied.
She heard the casual chats of farmers resting from weeding; they called her “little monster.”
That group of children also shouted this when they pushed her to the ground, and occasionally they creatively shouted a few new titles, “barbarian,” “demon,” “little wild seed without father or mother”…
The farming women rarely said such things; they seemed universally more respectful of certain natural things, afraid of committing verbal taboos. Yet Song Wenqing had truly become the unspoken “inauspicious” entity tacitly acknowledged in each other’s glances.
A six-year-old child could not speak of grand principles or dissect the essence of things layer by layer. Song Wenqing could only vaguely perceive that the vast majority of the misfortunes she suffered seemed to stem from her “difference” from others.
Her thin, small body lacked the strength to support her in escaping, and a mind still half-ignorant of adult rules could not provide any effective measures to improve her plight. Trapped like a caged bird in a small, remote village, she suffered all forms of violence from everyone.
It was malicious harm inflicted by humans upon more special members of their own kind.
The kindness Song Wenqing received could be counted on one hand. The old grandmother who died last winter was the person who had treated her best in the past. She would not call her “little monster,” and her aged voice would utter another title, “little pitiful one.” Afterward, a palm covered with the traces of time would rest upon her head.
It was warm.
As warm as the person beside her.
“Yan Zhu…”
She parted her lips, tracing this pleasant-sounding name with the tip of her tongue.
Yan Zhu was different after all.
Song Wenqing’s young mind could not yet find words to describe it, so she could only temporarily bury the thought deep in her heart.
Later on, when everything was over, the eighteen-year-old Song Wenqing’s consciousness returned to articulate that word on behalf of her “past” self.
Gentleness.
A gentleness that made one want to shed tears.
Yet the present Song Wenqing merely swung her short legs, her short fingers nervously hooking onto the garment of the person beside her.
She was very afraid that she would walk away.
Song Wenqing still remembered that the name Yan Zhu had called out at the beginning was “Song Qing,” but she was not Song Qing. The wooden plaque hanging around her neck since birth was engraved with only three characters, Song Wenqing.
Therefore, her name was Song Wenqing.
Moreover, she did not know her either; she had always lived in this tiny village.
Song Wenqing thought that perhaps Yan Zhu had recognized the wrong person.
Perhaps very soon she would discover that the filthy little girl before her was not the person she was looking for; she would surely be disappointed, then leave to look for that Song Qing.
Her fingers could not help but exert force, gripping the soft fingertips she was holding even tighter, as if this could make the other’s footsteps pause for a moment.
“Will you leave?”
Yan Zhu was momentarily stunned, looking up at the little child gazing at her. Though she did not understand why she suddenly asked this, she still replied, “Not for now.”
She did not even know where she was right now, so naturally she could not leave.
Moreover, Yan Zhu vaguely felt that the key to breaking the situation should lie with Song Qing, who had transformed into a child right before her.
Was it to help her remember, or to help her make up for some regret?
Not for now…
Song Wenqing chewed on these four words, understanding the subtext hidden behind them, that one day, she would leave.
“Then will you… take me away?”
She summoned her courage to ask, her empty small hand gripping the corner of her clothes tightly out of nervousness.
A filthy child, a little monster different from everyone around, a troublesome and burdensome drag…
This person was too good; the unprecedented experience of kindness made Song Wenqing dare to ask a question she would not otherwise dare harbor hope for.
That person seemed to have no hesitation, giving her the answer in the very next moment with a resolute tone.
“I will. I will take you away,” she said.
Song Wenqing raised her head, seeing the pale yellow outline sketched for her by the setting sun. Her heart beat wildly, and the indescribable joy caused her mind to stall for two seconds.
“Are you an immortal?”
Farmers often prayed for rain from the heavens during droughts, farming women often knelt before divine statues praying for sons, and the dying elderly also yearned for immortals to descend and protect them… Immortals in the mortal context seemed both compassionate and omnipotent.
Song Wenqing felt that Yan Zhu was an immortal.
Soft fingertips gently slid across her cheek, tucking a stray lock of flying hair behind her ear. A fresh, sweet fragrance rushed toward her along with a somewhat muffled laugh.
“I am not. I am merely a mortal.”
Song Wenqing was in a daze for a moment, feeling as though someone had once said to her as well, “I am merely a mortal.”
However, she did not believe such words right now; she could not yet think of any title more suitable for Yan Zhu than “immortal.”
“It looks like it’s getting dark. Let’s head back first; staying here is not very safe…”
“Where is your home?”
Yan Zhu took the small hand of the child beside her, walking along the direction where the others had left earlier.
“Over there.”
By the time they reached the edge of the village, twilight had already enshrouded the entire settlement. There were no longer any farmers’ figures in the fields, but every household was exhaling the aroma of food and lighting lamps.
Yan Zhu looked toward the direction pointed by the finger, spotting a dilapidated thatched cottage that appeared exceptionally small against the backdrop of the surrounding houses.
She frowned, unable to resist rubbing Song Wenqing’s head beside her.
The closer they got, the more she discovered the harshness of the living environment.
The dilapidated hut before her looked as though it had already witnessed the entire process of a person transforming from an infant into a white-haired elder, and finally to the end of life. Whether judging from the eaves missing a piece here and there or the huge spiderwebs in the corners of the roof, its age was already not young.
There were only two rooms: a bedroom and an open-air kitchen outside.
The bedroom was empty, featuring nothing else besides a red wooden table, a small stool, and a narrow wooden bed close to the wall that could be used for lying down.
Compared to how to leave this place, how to first survive in this harsh environment seemed to have become an even more pressing puzzle.