Endless yellow sand stretched without limit. Whenever the dead of night fell, with the bright moon hanging overhead, the vast emptiness made this place feel like a silent world!
This was the most desolate stretch of desert in northwestern Xijing—even walking for ten days and ten nights, one would see no oasis, no gobi flatland, no city or trace of human habitation.
The crisp, clear sound of camel bells rang out especially melodiously in this silence, like an endless song that never seemed to end.
Beneath the bright moonlight, atop a tall camel hump lay a man in purple robes with silver hair, seemingly unconscious, not moving at all. Leading the camel was a young girl, quite delicate-looking, small in stature. Her manner of dress made it immediately clear that this girl must be from the northern part of Xiliang, at the border with the Xiongnu—the northern desert region!
This tribe belonged to both Xiliang and the Xiongnu, and once both nations had claimed jurisdiction over it, but now neither paid it much attention, the dispute having been shelved for the time being!
However, this place hadn’t been sealed off by either nation—it maintained contact with both Xiliang and the Xiongnu, with intermarriage occurring between them, and the tribespeople here themselves couldn’t say for certain whether they carried more Xiliang blood or more Xiongnu blood!
The young girl walked along, humming some unnamed little tune along with the rhythm of the camel bells, her melodious, faintly sorrowful bell-song stubbornly transformed into a cheerful tune by her humming!
The camel carried the person on its back, with heavy bundles hanging from both sides. People of the northern desert tribe always traveled in groups when going out—it was unclear what kind of person this young girl was, traveling alone like this!
Judging by the direction she was walking, she should be heading back to the northern desert.
“Cough… hm…”
Suddenly, the person on the camel’s back made a sound. The young girl’s ears were sharp; she immediately stopped in her tracks, gripping the camel bell, tilting her head to listen carefully, and indeed heard the man’s faint cough.
He was awake?
She was startled for a moment, then overjoyed, hurriedly cupping the man’s drooping head in her hands, only to see, to her shock, black bloodstains once again seeping from the corners of his pale lips!
The man was too weak to move at all, and had no strength to speak; he only raised his eyes to glance at her once before slowly closing them again. Though he wasn’t dead, the aura of despair radiating from his entire being was more terrifying than death itself.
He had already given up on living.
“Hey, don’t do this, you!”
The girl panicked, gently tapping the camel’s head, and the camel obediently knelt down. She carefully pulled the man down, laying him flat on the sand, pillowed on a bundle, and hurriedly checked his breath, confirming he hadn’t stopped breathing, before letting out a sigh of relief!
She had come across this man by chance in the desert—at the time he’d been half-buried in the yellow sand, his face not even visible, only his clothing revealing he was from the Central Plains.
She had struggled with all her might against the wind and sand to rescue him, originally intending to capture a Central Plains person to bring back and teach her tribespeople the script of the Central Plains, but she never expected that the moment she saw his face, she truly thought she’d stumbled upon a banished immortal!
In a daze, she genuinely believed her luck was that good—that she’d rescued an immortal fallen from the heavens. He was so beautiful!
She had no idea what was wrong with him; the blood at the corners of his lips kept flowing without stop. She could only bring herself to give him the heart-protecting pill she’d kept hidden for so long, barely managing to preserve his life force.
The heart-protecting pill was a treasure of the northern desert tribe—only a few were produced each year, and even someone with an extremely weak constitution could sustain themselves for a year after taking one. Yet she never expected that after only a month, this fellow would fail again, and now she had no more medicine on hand!
“Hey, I know you’re awake, I know you can hear me! I have no more medicine. If you really want to die, you definitely won’t see tomorrow’s sun!”
Seeing the man remain motionless, the girl couldn’t help but grow anxious, but continued, “Why do you want to die? You’re still so young. Whatever the matter is, why don’t you tell me, and I’ll help you make sense of it?”
……
No matter how the girl asked, no matter how she pleaded, the man showed not the slightest reaction.
The girl grew helpless, looking at his pale, handsome face, the long lashes casting shadows beneath his eyes. She suddenly felt a strong urge to see what his eyes truly looked like—that one glance earlier had been too fleeting, she hadn’t even recovered from it before he’d closed his eyes again!
Thinking this, she bravely leaned closer, her small hand gently resting on his eyes, softly brushing his lashes.
But just then, she noticed something interesting—he clearly resisted her touch, his brow furrowing slightly.
A mischievous glint flashed across the bottom of the girl’s eyes. Her small hand traced along the corner of his eye, gently moving down to his cheek, slowly moving inward, touching his high, straight nose.
Originally, it had just been mischief, meant to force his eyes open, but she never expected that this gentle touch would become unconsciously addictive—this feeling was so wonderfully strange. In the northern desert, there had never been such strict separation between men and women, and she’d touched plenty of men’s faces before, but this time the feeling was completely different.
Before she knew it, she was gently touching his jaw already, yet she couldn’t bring herself to let go no matter what, as if her hand had been placed under a spell, unable to leave this face!
Along his jawline, she gently stroked upward again, a strange sense of wonder coursing through her fingertips. She suddenly felt an impulse—no, she could no longer control her own actions!
She slowly closed her eyes, slowly leaning closer, closer, closer still. His jaw was nearest to her; she wanted to kiss him. According to northern desert custom, when a woman suddenly took a liking to a man and wanted to marry him as her husband, she would leave a mark on his closed eyes—a kiss of branding!
She thought, this man—she would definitely save him, and she would definitely have him too!
But just as she opened her eyes and was about to press her kiss down, she suddenly froze, startled!
She saw… she saw that these tightly closed eyes before her were overflowing with tears—at this very moment, this man’s face was streaming with tears!
Just how much sorrow could there be, that even with eyes tightly shut, tears still flowed?
The girl froze, stunned into blank astonishment, her heart inexplicably wrenching painfully, hurting so much it made her want to cry.
But just at that moment, this tear-streaked man finally moved. He slowly reached out, his large hand cupping her face, and from the side of her cheek, just as she had done to him a moment ago, gently, gently stroked—not her features, but every inch of skin on her face, as if searching for something, yet not quite that either, simply a pure, gentle caress.
His hand was ice cold, yet this gentle touch was warm enough to make one feel comforted, incredibly soothing.
The girl, already stunned, now found it even harder to recover. She unconsciously sank down, letting his hand caress her face with the utmost tenderness.
But just as she was immersed in this thick, inescapable tenderness, the man suddenly withdrew his hand. The girl abruptly snapped back to her senses, opening her eyes to meet his—now open, though she hadn’t noticed when—eyes brimming with tears, in which, more than anything else, was clearly disappointment and self-mockery.
Ziqing, it turns out… it’s not you. How could it possibly be you?