It was dark and late, Gu Mang and Mo Xi walked side by side in the dilapidated Chonghua palace.
What Murong Chen had done in recent years had been spitting out among the people. It was like a dressing robe being turned over, and revealing lice underneath it. It was so ugly that you can't look closely at it. The emperor had fallen into chaos and darkness because of his madness. Today's palace was full of broken bricks, stones, wood, and tiles.
When they were walking along the main path, Mo Xi asked, "After the soul box was broken, who fused your two spirits back? Murong Lian?"
Gu Mang shook his head and said, "Su Yurou. Jiang Fuli's wife."
"It was her..."
"Well. But she has been very worried these days, probably because the whereabouts of Pharmacist Jiang is still unknown."
"It's reasonable that he should come back to Chonghua no matter how much he travels around."
"Yes, but not really," Gu Mang sighed. "Otherwise, the miasma in the city can be controlled more thoroughly. Now it can only be supported by Su Yurou alone, but her medical skills are not as good as Jiang Fuli."
Mo Xi thought for a moment and said, "Mengze once said that there was a hermit in Lin'an who practiced medicine and even mastered the art of rebirth. I don't know if he can -"
Gu Mang interrupted him. "It's too late."
His words seemed to have no passion for Murong Mengze's medical hermit, and Mo Xi could see that his lack of enthusiasm was not only because the blood demon beast was coming, but also because he was not interested in the legend described by Mengze. He didn't even doubt that even if time was right, Gu Mang would not ask Mengze the whereabouts of this hermit.
"Do you think what Mengze said is not reliable?"
Gu Mang stopped for a moment and then said with a smile, "I didn't say that."
Seeing that Mo Xi also wanted to ask more, he suddenly raised a finger in front of the Jinluan temple ruins. "By the way, look at that." Then he pulled Mo Xi and ran over.
It turned out to be the golden beast smoke stove in the hall. It was the one that Murong Lian gave to Murong Chen in order to flatter him.
Lying among the ruins, the small gold stove was still sparing no effort to shout, "You are on the top of the sky with great prosperity! You are the king of the world!"
Gu Mang sighed. Finally, he said, "Murong Chen is still asking for too much."
Mo Xi said, "I don't know who can be emperor of Chonghua after Liaoguo's defeat."
"Lian Di can't do it. He just said that he was in poor health and had been ruined.
After all everything is done, he wants to go to Linyi to cultivate himself… However, this kind of thing is not urgent. Each person has his own life and each country has its own fortune. When the ship reaches the bridge, it will be straight. There is no need to worry about it."
Gu Mang said this, paused for a moment, then said with a smile, "But you just said we'll defeat Liaoguo - do you believe that we can win?"
Mo Xi raised his calm and gentle eyes. "With you, we can win anything."
A light flashed in Gu Mang's eyes. He immediately raised his hand and knocked on his chest. "Ha ha, thank you for trusting me. Yes, I think I can win. As for understanding the blood demon beast, none of you is better than me, so if you fight tomorrow, you must listen to me. This time, I am the commander!"
Mo Xi looked at his complacent appearance and couldn't help but poke his forehead.
"... You will always be my coach."
Gu Mang smiled. A somewhat proud and somewhat shy appearance.
"But in a word," Gu mang said after a while, "I've always thought, Su Yurou… She seems a little strange…"
"What did you say?"
"Li Qingqian, the sword demon that time, said that it was the Guoshi of Liaoguo who was crazy because of the marriage of Su Yurou, a peerless beauty. He found more than 100 women who were similar to Su Yurou and sacrificed all of them to the mountain. What else did Liaoguo say at that time… What's so amazing about Su Yurou? He can have as many people as he wants. "
Mo Xi nodded his head and said, "It's true. Miss Hongshao, Li Qingqian's best friend, was also killed for this."
"Well." Gu Mang touched his chin. "But Mo Xi, have you ever thought about the problem?"
"What?"
"Do you think, ah, if an ordinary woman's former date hit the door of her own country, what mentality would she have?"
Mo Xi pondered, "She might try to send a letter to the other party…"
"What else?"
"No matter how bad she was, she would be restless, and not know how to face the man."
"You're right about it all," Gu Mang said, "but Madam Su is not like this at all.
She doesn't seem to care what the Guoshi of Liaoguo is doing at the moment. She doesn't care at all. She has been sending people to inquire about the whereabouts of Pharmacist Jiang."
"Maybe it's because she and Liaoguo's Guoshi are a thing of the past. Now, she is Jiang Fuli's wife, so she naturally cares about Jiang Fuli's safety."
Gu Mang stretched out a finger and shook it. "That's not correct."
He spoke with a smile and pinched his cheek. "You are a man whose moral bottom line is too high. You always measure people's hearts by human relations. Yes, Su Yurou is Jiang Fuli's wife, which is not wrong. I don't think she would betray Jiang Fuli. This is human relations. However, if Su Yurou had such a deep entanglement with another man as Li Qingqian believed, no matter whether she is a wife or a mother, when she meets this man again and has to fight against him, she can't ignore him in her heart."
"..."
"But Su Yurou doesn't care," Gu Mang said. "As far as I can see these days, she has only two emotions towards the Guoshi: one is fear, the second is disgust."
Gu Mang shook his head. "This is not a good attitude in the face of an old friend."
Mo Xi saw his serious appearance, and couldn't help but feel helpless. "How do you know this woman's mood?"
"In fact, it has nothing to do with whether it's a man or a woman. It's just human nature," Gu Mang said with a pause. "Well, I'll tell you this. You thought I was treasonous. Before the Dongting water battle, when you knew you would see me after committing treason, what was your mood?"
Mo Xi: "…"
"It wasn't not fear or rejection, is it?"
Naturally.
He could still recall that kind of mood very clearly: that extremely painful anticipation. Waking up from dreaming about Gu Mang's figure like being infiltrated by the tenderness from the past, and also wanting to be covered by the unknown future.
Mo Xi lowered his eyelashes and sighed, "I understand what you mean."
"So there's something wrong with Madam Su."
"Well…"
Gu Mang said, "There are three possible reasons for why she is not right. First, Madam Su has some secrets related to Liaoguo's Guoshi that others don't know. Secondly, Madam Su never gave any response to the Guoshi of Liao. It was all his own groundless imagination that made him so crazy from the beginning."
"And the third?"
"Third," Gu Mang said, "Li Qingqian may have misunderstood Liao Guoshi's actions during those years. His interpretation of the relationship between the two was wrong from the beginning
Mo Xi opened his eyes.
Gu Mang touched his chin and then said, "In fact, I prefer the third possibility. Because when we subdued Li Qingqian, he saw Su Yurou's real face. She said a few secret words to him, and the sword demon Li Qingqian collapsed and disappeared. I think the third is more likely than the first two. It is because Su Yurou destroyed Li Qingqian's original cognition from which his obsession was born. Therefore, as a sword demon, he felt that everything was too ridiculous, so his will broke down and was reduced to ashes. Otherwise, with one face and a few words, how could she defeat his reason?"
Mo Xi thought and nodded. "Yes."
Gu Mang was about to say something more. Suddenly, he heard thunder roar in the distance. He turned his head and looked at it——
"Not good!"
In that high sky, suddenly, a large cloud whirled and gathered in a whirlpool. The center of the whirlpool rolled by, and the black cloud flashed with thunder. A hole seemed to have been torn into the sky. The pale light was like blood over a dome, shining on the military camp where Liao Jun was stationed. In the light that was white enough to light the abyss, countless small black spots floated up from the Liao Jun camp and flew to the crack the dome.
Gu Mang use an eye-focusing technique to zoom in and see exactly what the black spots were. His face was blue and ugly.
"... Damn it, it's a real blood demon beast rebirth ceremony." Gu Mang's lips moved. Staring at those black spots, he whispered, "Those floating in the air are all living sacrifices, butterfly bone beauties captured by Liaoguo!"
Mo Xi was surprised. "What?"
They all knew that the so-called butterfly bone beauties were a tribe with the blood of ancient demons. However, after the war of gods and demons, the demon gate was closed to the world forever. This abandoned race lost its support from the evil spirits, and slowly lost their spiritual cores and spiritual power. They became no different from, even weaker than, ordinary people. The only demon characteristics they kept was that they were suitable to be cultivation furnace cauldrons.
"The blood demon beast is a kind of evil beast refined from the remains of ancient blood demon. It needs a lot of magic blood," Gu Mang said. "When I was in Liaoguo, I carefully read those fragments about the blood demon beast. It is said that the evil beast was made by the spirits of the demon family. If people wanted to make this kind of evil beast, they could only find things related to the demon family to sacrifice. The most useful one is the butterfly bone beauty tribe."
Mo Xi asked, "In other words, the blood demon beast is actually fed with a living person with this special bloodline?"
"Almost," Gu Mang said, "They'd need more than 100,000 butterfly bone beauties to refine a blood demon beast. At the beginning, wasn't Li Qingqian's village slaughtered because the Liao people were searching for them everywhere? They have been plotting for a long time."
As he spoke, his dark blue eyes looked at the scene.
"It seems that Liaoguo wants to fight with us before dawn. It won't last till tomorrow," he said. He tied up the blue and gold silk belt Murong Lian gave him. A few strands of fine bangs hung down and fell on his heroic pendant.
"Go! Go and lead!"
He spoke with a thin smile on his mouth. Mo Xi didn't know if it was just his impression, but under the light of the blood demon beast in the sky, Gu Mang's blue eyes looked moist.
Mo Xi looked at his expression, and suddenly a trace of a fuzzy ominous feeling raised in his heart. He could not help murmuring in a low voice, "— Gu Mang... "
He thought that Gu Mang could not hear this low call. Even if he did, it was meaningless, and perhaps Gu Mang would not respond.
But he was wrong.
Gu Mang turned back. His blue eyes reflected the fire in the distance and gazed at him for a moment. Then, Gu Mang suddenly swept over the shoulder of Mo Xi and hugged him tightly——
That embrace carried a lot of meaning: love, intimacy, comfort, encouragement… There was Gu Mang's bright faith that he used with Mo Xi. This embrace was so natural, as if there had never been years of wandering as a spy.
When Gu Mang released him, his handsome face was shining with a bright light
full of fighting spirit.
"After this fight, I'll invite you to drink with your Gu Mang Gege. I want the best pear blossom white, otherwise I won't be happy."
Mo Xi was really waiting to see his expression. He turned his body and pulled him up. He couldn't help but rush to Dianjiang platform.