Chapter 173: Master, Someone's Trying to Drive Us Away

He was at a loss as to what to do with the hot potato he was holding, the tips of his ears flushed red with embarrassment as more and more people looked his way. At that moment, a hand reached out and took the child from his arms, and Chu Wanning turned around with a sigh of relief: "Mo Ran".

"Yeah." Mo Ran shifted the baby into the crook of one arm and held it there, rubbing Chu Wanning's hair with his other free hand.

The way he has to smile is not as handsome as other times, but it somehow makes you feel warm.

"You're all done with the island."

"Well, say yes."

"Linyi I'm afraid this fire won't be out for four or five days, until then we'll have to stay on Feihua Island, there aren't many houses on the island and we have so many people with us."

"I asked the village headman and he said it's all still livable if you squeeze it in."

There's nothing wrong with Mo Ran negotiating such issues, he knows how to communicate with people better than he does, and with his looks and all, he knows he's much more likeable than he is when the girls in the village looked at him when he was helping with the rice harvest.

Chu Wanning pondered silently for a moment, not knowing what to expect, nodded and said, "Thank you for your hard work."

"Don't talk about hard work with me." Mo Ran glanced at the candy in his hand, and smiled as she coaxed the child in her arms, "What about you, why are you crying?"

"I want Mother, I want Daddy."

Mo Ran saw that he was still so young, he was still stumbling, but his parents had died in the fire and would never return. You must be good so that they will be happy to see you."

He held and coaxed the child for a while, but the child gradually settled down, still sobbing, but not crying out anymore.

Mo Ran looks down at the child with tears on his eyelashes, while Chu Wanning stands quietly watching him with his sweets.

The man's face is very beautiful, with hard, crisp lines, which, if placed in ink and seal script, would be the bones of a man with a strong, masculine brush stroke, and a very strong and distinguished calligraphy, easily revealing a handsome face.

His angles are hard, but his eyelashes and eyes are soft, like the spreading of spring leaves.

Chu Wanning is a bit out of his depth.

So when Mo Ran poked his head around and bit into the candy at the end of his finger, Chu Wanning jerked his hand away, his eyes widened in surprise and he asked, "What for?"

The glutinous rice candy was so small, the man's head came close and quickly took it away, naturally his lips would touch the tips of his fingers, even the warm, moist tongue accidentally licked his finger belly, Chu Wanning only felt a tingling all over his body, that swift and small intimate contact, but it was enough to send a tingle up his spine, like a new bud breaking through the seed, pushing through the silent soil, pushing the stifling earth to softness

Mo Ran smiled at him with his candy in his mouth and turned his head to wink at the boy.

With a tilt of his head, he rolled the candy into his mouth, rolling the knot in his throat, then said to the child, "Look, it's not some horrible elixir, it's candy."

Chu Wanning :""

He had just been too distracted to listen to what the little boy and Mo Ran were saying.

Only then did his eyes fall back on the child, who stared timidly, yet earnestly, at Mo Ran for a moment, half whispering in surprise, "Ah, it's really sugar."

"Yeah." Mo Ran smiled and said, "How could this immortal brother be so nice as to take you away to make pills"

Chu Wanning again: ""

With the events of the previous night too many and too frightening to be sleepy, Mo Ran settled the men, women and children he had rescued and, at dawn, walked alone to the shoals of Feihua Island, where the morning shoreline recedes far back to reveal a shoal that is not visible at high tide.

When he was alone, his mind was heavy, and under his eyes, it became a lingering haze.

He took off his shoes and walked slowly along the wet shoreline, his footprints treading on the wet mud and sand, leaving two skewed trails behind him.

In fact, there were many things he couldn't understand about Xu Shuanglin, such as why he didn't like to wear shoes in the cold and always walked around barefoot.

Mo Ran is a man who hides a lot of his past and is always treated badly.

Perhaps that is why he could clearly understand Xu Shuanglin's desire to destroy the Confucianism School, Jiangdong Court, and even the whole Upper Fairy World at all costs.

Being suppressed and ostracised, that's not what hurts the most.

The most painful thing is to be betrayed by someone close to you, the most painful thing is to have done nothing wrong, to have tried with all his heart and soul to become a great master, only to be accused by a thousand people at the "Lingshan Mountain Conference", the most important event in Xianxia, that the magic he had created with all his efforts was stolen from his brother. The only spell he had ever created was one that he had stolen from his brother

To be ridiculed and looked upon with disdain for all eternity.

Mo Ran knew that after this catastrophe, the Xianxia community would face a reshuffle, and for those who had been traumatised, both in face and in body, they would think: Xu Shuanglin is a madman.

Perhaps only Mo Weiyu, who once also grinded his teeth and killed like a man, could resist the urge to ponder this long, quiet walk along the coastline, alone.

Xu Shuanglin, what kind of person was he? When he was young, did this madman also practice his swordplay in the orange grove with great vigour, only to return after nightfall, tired and satisfied, with a sweet orange plucked from his sleeve, to take to his brother, who was always lazy, to eat?

At that time, he did not know that his brother, despite his lack of success, could make himself invisible in Xianxia with his three-inch tongue.

Did this madman, too, buried himself in a scroll of spells, thinking hard, dipping his pen into ink and writing down a slightly adolescent insight, and then, dissatisfied, biting his pencil, sinking back into deep thought?

At that time, he was not aware that, in fact, no matter how hard he tried, in the end, the result would be a stigmatized body with no hope ever.

Mo Ran closed his eyes, the sea breeze on his face, the sunlight falling on his eyelashes, gilding them.

Xu Shuanglin gave this name to his place of residence, was it just a spontaneous decision?

And in a previous life, Xu Shuanglin was hibernating at the School of Confucianism for the same purpose as in this life, but in that life he died in the midst of a beacon of fire for Ye Wangxi

Ye Wangxi .

This name was also given to her by Xu Shuanglin.

Forgetting something

Did he ever try to forget the years of injustice and unfairness, the hatred and glory of the past, the ugly faces

And the corpse of Luo Fenghua, which Xu Shuanglin went to great lengths to drag out of the infernal hell.

What does he want with this corpse?

In the vision, Xu Shuanglin tells Nan Gongliu that the only way to completely break the curse on the ring is to obtain the spirit core of the cursed person, but the end result suggests that Xu Shuanglin's true purpose was never to help Nan Gongliu break the curse.

Spatial rift, Zhenlong chess game, the art of rebirth

And the hand that sticks out of the crack at the end.

Mo Ran had a vague feeling that something was very wrong somewhere, and his brow furrowed in thought.

Suddenly, his eyes opened unexpectedly.

One thing occurred to him

Back then, at the edge of Jin Chengchi, when old dragon Wangyue died, he had said, "That mysterious man, with the power of Pinching Willow at Jin Chengchi, cultivates two secret arts, one is the art of rebirth, and the other is the Zhenlong game of chess."

At that time it did not mention the "gates of life and death in time and space".

In other words, for Xu Shuanglin, all he cares about are the two spells Rebirth and Zhenlong, which, needless to say, are for convenience and the manipulation of pawns.

What about rebirth?

Who he wants to be reborn

Mo Ran thought about it and decided that there were two answers, one for Rong Yan and one for Luo Fenghua.

Xu Shuanglin's words suggest that Rong Yan was once in love with him, but due to certain circumstances, she eventually broke up with Xu Shuanglin and married his brother instead.

But on further deduction, it does not seem to be her.

If Xu Shuanglin really loved Rong Yan and wanted to bring her back to life by any means possible, why did she kill her only son in her last life?

The more important point is that this guy has been lurking around Nan Gongliu as a "Shuanglin elder" for a long time. If he was trying to bring Rong Yan back to life by using the rebirth technique, why didn't he just stop her from being sacrificed at Jin Chengchi's side in the first place?

Not Rong Yan.

Mo Ran turns his head and looks out at the sea, coloured red by the rising sun, the waves spreading and rising, the tide rising back up as the sun rises in the east at a speed visible to the naked eye, the sky and earth in all their golden splendour.

It is Luo Fenghua.

Mo Ran is almost certain that the person Nan Gongxu is going to resurrect is Luo Fenghua.

Things at the School of Confucianism are far from being as simple as they appear, like the rising and falling of this sea, the broken shells, the dangerously colourful starfish, all covered by the rolling waves beneath the waves at dawn.

The sea was rising fast and the fine gravel was washed by the waves, spreading to the shoals where he strolled.

There was a sudden chill beneath his feet and Mo Ran looked down, the waves had come up and were lapping at the back of his feet.

"Wow."

He moved his well-manicured toes, feeling a little cold, and turned around to walk back to the beach to put on his shoes, only to turn around and see Chu Wanning walking towards him out of the red haze, looking bemused, carrying in one hand the shoes and socks he had casually thrown in the sand and handing them to him.

"Why are your feet bare, it's so cold."

Mo Ran followed him high up the sandy slope and sat down on the shore of a rocky beach, shaking the mud from his feet and putting his shoes back on. He suddenly felt some relief that although he was not destined to receive the kind of love he wanted from Chu Wanning in his life, Chu Wanning was still the best teacher in the world who would care for him and look after him.

When I see him walking around barefoot, I worry about him catching a cold.

" What do you think about the Confucianism School"

"It's not that simple."

"I suppose so." Chu Wanning's brow had barely relaxed since last night, and even now, despite a brief moment of peace and tranquillity, it was still tinged with worry as he watched Mo Ran put on his shoes and socks and return his gaze to the vast ocean.

The rising sun at sea level burns a glorious golden red, intertwined with the unquenched fires of Linyi in the distance, making it difficult to distinguish between them.

"It's hard to find out where Xu Shuanglin was pulled by the space rift." Chu Wanning said, "If he doesn't want to be found and disappears, I'm afraid no one will be able to catch him for eight or ten years."

Mo Ran shook his head and said, "He won't be able to hold out for eight or ten years, but when he regains his energy, he should make a move."

"How?"

Mo Ran then told Chu Wanning his guess and added, " Luo Fenghua's corpse, not a real physical body, was a prosthetic limb rebuilt in the Infernal Purgatory, which would soon fester and decay when it left the ghost world and lacked the yin energy to feed it. So I guess a year at the most, even if he is not fully prepared, there will be a new movement."

Chu Wanning did not make a sound.

He is always cautious in what he does or thinks. He would not be as bold as Mo Ran in making assumptions about such uncertainties. But there is no harm in listening to Mo Ran's assumptions.

"What about the hand," Chu Wanning asked, "the hand that picked up Nan Gongxu at the end, what are your guesses?"

"" Mo Ran shook his head, "The First Forbidden Art, I know too little to say, I don't know."

It was not true, and although Mo Ran did not want to lie to Chu Wanning again, there were things that he could not say to him.

He was afraid to say.

Truly, he had had very few peaceful days for as long as he could remember, not more than a year in two lifetimes combined, I'm afraid.

A man who has been displaced for decades suddenly sits him down and gives him a pot of hot tea and a campfire, how can he afford to get up and leave again, how can he afford to shatter this good dream with his own hands?

So all he could say was, I don't know.

He was almost certain that the owner of the hand could not be that simple. Why else would Xu Shuanglin in his previous life not have been so quick to collect the Five Great Spiritual Beings and slaughter them wantonly if someone who had returned from rebirth had not instructed him and compelled him to do so?

What's more, when Jin Chengchi, the white son controlled by Xu Shuanglin, once said to Chu Wanning, "If you think I'm the only one in the world who knows the three forbidden arts, then I'm afraid you won't live long."

Mo Ran felt that Xu Shuanglin must have known that some people who should not have existed in the first place had come into this world. But at the same time he felt that Xu Shuanglin knew that there were those who were reborn, but he did not know that he was also reborn.

Otherwise, why didn't he just reveal his own secret when the Confucianism School was fighting? Then it would all be over, and Mo Weiyu would never be able to turn back.

Xu Shuanglin Why not

Two possibilities.

First, he was not able to do so for some reason.

The second is that he does not yet know his cards.

But in either case, Mo Ran is very passive at the moment. The clues he has are too few, and if the other side is careful not to reveal any more clues, then I'm afraid he can only stand in plain sight and wait for the cold, glowing knife to stab him in the back at any moment.

Mo Ran purses her lips, her thick, deep lashes dropping in a soft flutter.

In his last life, he lived in hatred, selfishness and self-interest, and did all sorts of crazy things. In this life, no matter how it ends, he wants to live each day to the best of his ability, to do his best to make up for those he owes, to do his best to protect his master, Shi Mei and Xue Meng, and to protect the top of death and life.

Do your best to hold on to this moment of warmth that you once sought but could not.

As they were lost in thought, a fisherman came hurrying up and shouted to Mo Ran and the others, "No, two Your Mightiness, something's wrong."

Startled, Mo Ran leapt to his feet with his arms on the ground and asked, "What's wrong?"

"The head of the island went out to sea some days ago and just returned this morning. She heard the village chief talk about what had happened and was very unhappy with his treatment. She's already kicked everyone out, and the people you brought with you are all standing outside."

The fisherman had a good heart and his eyes got a little moist as he spoke.

"It's pathetic, this cold day, not even willing to give a piece of clothing and quilt to the head of the big family and say"

Chu Wanning also stood up, his face sombre: "What else did she say?"

"She also said that these people from Linyi had eaten the food and drank the water from Feihua Island, and that they would have to settle the money with them, and if they didn't pay, they would be arrested and kept on the island as slaves."

Before he could finish his sentence, Chu Wanning was already in a rage, his moon white robes fluttering as he sprinted towards the village of Island Heart.