Chapter 292: Returning Home

Behind the crack, a lump of slow-throbbing black fetal flesh appeared.

The thing had no facial features, only rows of mouths densely sprouting on its surface.

Each mouth chanted the same sentence:

"When many wishes form a god."

The voice moved from distant to near, from the depths beneath the stone shrine to the beams above, and then into everyone’s ears.

Toward Xiaoman Stockade, the red cords that had just slackened suddenly pulled taut again.

Villagers screamed, some dropped to their knees, others rushed to their doorways trying to relight the extinguished offering lamps.

Zhao Shun stood outside the stone gate, shouting through the wind and snow:

"Daoist Lu! Someone’s trying to relight the lamps!"

"Stop them, don't hurt anyone!"

"They're being pulled by the black lines, you can’t stop them!"

"Then let them see the black lines!"

Lu Yuan pressed the blade against the main line that led into the mountain’s belly, his left thumb holding down his middle finger while his index and middle fingers extended together, palm facing down, forming the "Manifest Line Hand Seal."

"Lines do not show to the eye, they show to the heart."

"If the heart does not acknowledge, the line has no proof."

"Borrow a name to become a line, borrow fear to become a rope."

"Reveal your true shape today!"

As the incantation fell, Lu Yuan slammed his hand onto the ground.

A white light shot along the stone bricks out through the gate, cutting across the snow and streaking straight for Xiaoman Stockade.

Every red cord in the village surfaced at once.

They were not cords, but slender black snakes; each snake head was nailed into a villager’s wrist, their tails burrowed into each household’s offering table, doorways, and ancestral graves.

When the villagers saw this, they retreated in terror.

The woman holding a child lowered her head to look at the black snake on her wrist and, frightened, loosened her grip.

The black snake did not fall; instead it crawled up her arm.

"Don't be afraid!" Zhao Shun shouted from the village entrance, "Daoist Lu said if you recognize it, it can no longer pretend to be a life-saving cord!"

"Put the child down, press your palms together, and recite your name!"

The woman trembled all over.

"I... my name is Ji Guilan."

The black snake paused.

The black line on her body loosened by an inch.

"Say it again!"

"My name is Li Guilan! My husband is Zhao Shun! My child is Zhao Xiaobao!"

She shouted out each name, and the black line began to peel away from her wrist.

The surrounding villagers followed suit and began to recite their own names.

At first only three or five people did so, then the entire street rose in overlapping voices.

"My name is Chen Gui!"

"My name is Liu Ximei!"

"My name is Zhou Dacheng!"

"My name is Zhao Xiaobao!"

The fetal flesh in the black stone contracted violently, and the wind around the stone shrine sharpened to a high keening.

"Shut up!"

"Your names belong to the mountain!"

"Your lives and deaths belong to the lamp!"

A shadow burst from the black stone's fissure, forming a pitch-black long arm that lunged straight for Asheng.

Song Qinghe held the bronze lamp across her chest, forming the "Soul-Protection Seal."

Her right index and middle fingers pressed together, thumb touching the first joint of the ring finger; her left palm supported the lamp’s base.

"The lamp lights the human soul, the flame guards the original heart."

"The soul does not leave its orifice, thoughts do not leave the body."

"If an evil hand comes, it must pass this fire first."

"Quell!"

A ring of blue flame flew out from the bronze lamp, centering around Asheng as protection.

The black arm hit the blue flame and immediately recoiled several inches.

Asheng's complexion grew even more haggard.

"It's not trying to grab me."

"It's after the Life character on my chest."

Lu Yuan looked at the character on Asheng’s chest.

The bluish "Life" character was slowly bulging outward, as if a hand beneath the skin were trying to tear it away.

"Is the Life character yours?"

"Now it is."

"Then guard it yourself."

Asheng bit his lip and sat cross-legged.

Lu Yuan placed a copper coin before his knees, face up.

"Copper marks the boundary, earth is the root."

"If you cannot hold it, stare at this coin."

"Before it hits the ground, do not let the Life character leave your body."

Asheng nodded, pressed his palms together, and reformed the hand seals Lu Yuan had shown him earlier.

"My life belongs to me."

"My body belongs to me."

"My path does not lead back to the well."

The black arm lunged again.

Song Qinghe met it with the lamp.

Fire and black mist collided, and the entire root shrine trembled.

Her wrist buzzed from the shock, but she did not step back.

"Lu Yuan, the lines won't snap!" Lin Zhaoxuan shouted.

He, Wang Cheng'an, and Xu Erxiao still held the main line to Xiaoman Stockade.

That line had sunk into the stone platform as if grown out of the rock itself.

Wang Cheng'an’s abacus frame had been bent out of shape by the strain.

"It's not just a line!"

"Names fill it inside!"

"There are too many names, you can't just cut it." Lu Yuan said.

Lin Zhaoxuan looked up.

"Then how do we sever it?"

Lu Yuan glanced at the eyes on the black stone, then suddenly turned toward Mister Meng.

Mister Meng had just carried his father's remains out through the stone gate and, turning back, saw Lu Yuan standing before him.

"What was the ritual your father left to guard the altar?" Lu Yuan asked.

Mister Meng's face drained of color.

"I cannot say."

"If you won't say, then tonight it won't be only these people who die."

"The altar-guarding method is not a formula."

"It is a name."

"Whose name?"

Mister Meng looked toward the mass of black fetal flesh.

"The first offering master."

"Speak."

"He said his surname was Meng."

"The full name."

Mister Meng closed his eyes.

"Meng Shoushan."

"Shoushan?" Wang Cheng'an frowned, "That name sounds like someone who guards a mountain."

"He wasn't called that originally," Mister Meng said, "He had his own name."

"But after entering the root shrine, the black stone told him to abandon his old name, and then he could guard the mountain for the whole stockade."

"He handed over his original name and took 'Shoushan' in exchange."

Lu Yuan asked:

"What was his original name?"

Mister Meng's lips trembled.

"Meng... Wenbing."

The fetal flesh in the black stone gave a muffled sound.

All the mouths closed at once.

Lu Yuan understood.

"It fears not the cutting of lines."

"It fears returning the true name of the first offering master."

"As long as Meng Wenbing's name is restored to its place, the subsequent offering masters will no longer be continuations of 'Shoushan', but layers of false names strapped on."

Mister Meng shook his head.

"The name has already been devoured."

"Once swallowed, can it still be spit back out?"

Lu Yuan walked to the black stone and embedded his broken blade at the stone platform's edge.

"Mister Meng, stand behind me."

"For what?"

"Call to your father."

"He cannot hear."

"Call three times."

Mister Meng gripped his hands tight and slowly took his place.

Lu Yuan pressed his left thumb to the base of his index finger, then held his right fingers horizontally before his brow, forming the "Name-Summoning Seal."

"Heaven has names, earth has names."

"Mountains, rivers, plants, all return to their names."

"The departed do not become gates, old names do not become locks."

"Use blood as lead, use voice as proof."

"Meng Wenbing, return your name!"

Mister Meng opened his mouth; his voice was hoarse.

"Father, I am Meng Jun."

The black stone did not react.

Lu Yuan said, "Not call yourself."

Mister Meng closed his eyes.

"Meng Wenbing!"

The ground of the stone shrine trembled violently.

An eye on the black stone's surface split open, revealing an ancient human face within.

That face was coated in black mud, lips parting and closing but producing no sound.

Mister Meng stepped forward.

"Father, I'm here to take you home."

The human face in the black stone raised a hand and pointed at Mister Meng's chest.

There a black "Meng" character slowly rotated.

Lu Yuan grabbed Mister Meng's shoulder.

"Shout again."

Mister Meng, eyes reddened, shouted at the top of his lungs:

"Meng Wenbing!"

This time, the whole mountain heard.

The villagers in Xiaoman Stockade stopped reciting names.

In the Birch Forest, the red cloths on the withered trees all fell to the ground at once.

Inside the mountain's main cave, the remaining lamp flames snuffed out one by one.

From the black stone's fissure a burst of black smoke erupted.

Three characters floated within the smoke:

"Meng Shoushan."

Lu Yuan raised his knife and lightly tapped the stone platform with the blade's back.

"That name is not his."

"Return it to the black stone."

Mister Meng extended his right hand and pressed his palm to his chest.

"Meng Shoushan is not my father."

"Meng Wenbing is."

As he finished speaking, he tore open his chest clothes with force.

The "Meng" character branded on his skin peeled away along with a layer of black scorched flesh.

The black scorch fell and turned into a small wooden tablet.

On its front were the characters "Shoushan"; the back faintly showed "Wenbing."

Lu Yuan picked the tablet up with his knife tip and placed it against the black stone's fissure.

"Old names return to their owners."

"False names abdicate."

"Return!"

The black stone began to tremble.

The countless mouths in the fetal flesh reopened and emitted a pitiful wail.

"You have no qualification!"

"Meng Shoushan voluntarily offered his name!"

"He agreed to guard the mountain!"

"He agreed to hand over his descendants to me!"

Lu Yuan looked up.

"A one-time voluntary act cannot become an inherited bondage."

"A dead man's vow cannot sign for the living."

"A father offering the mountain does not equal a son offering his life."

He formed the "Sever Contract Seal" with both hands.

Left palm facing up, right index and middle fingers extended together, tips pressing into the left palm's hollow, then slowly dragged outward.

"Contracts are written on paper, vows arise from the heart."

"No paper, no proof. No heart, no contract."

"Whoever uses an ancestor's name as a pledge to bind descendants—"

"From this point, prior contracts stop here, future contracts are not accepted."

"Sever!"

The two characters "Shoushan" on the tablet split down the middle.

The black stone gave a low, thunderous roar.

All red cords leading to Xiaoman Stockade instantly relaxed, and the black scorches on the villagers' wrists fell away.

The second line to the Birch Forest burned itself up.

But the third line to the mountain's main cave tightened violently, dragging the entire black stone toward the earth.

Lin Zhaoxuan shouted:

"The root shrine is collapsing!"

Stone bricks sank piece by piece.

Countless black roots probed out of the stone fissures, winding around the platform and the stone gate.

Xu Erxiao sliced through a black root with his sword.

"If we don't move, it'll bury us here!"

"One more root!"

Lu Yuan looked at the third main line.

That line led to the main cave and had seven blood characters floating on its surface:

"Name, Wish, Life, Death, Home, Shadow, Offering."

The "Life" character had already faded, the "Name" character was cracking, but the "Wish" character still shone.

Asheng suddenly opened his eyes.

"The wishes are in Xiaoman Stockade."

"What?"

"Not the villagers' spoken wishes, but the wishes trapped inside the lamps."

"After the second lamp went out, it gathered everyone's unfinished words."

"Those wishes didn't return to their hearts."

"They were hidden in the lamp wicks."

Lu Yuan looked at the bronze lamp in Song Qinghe's hands.

The flame swayed without wind.

In the lamp's core, many faint, tiny voices could barely be heard:

"I want my child not to be sick."

"I want grain for my family."

"I want the dead to come back."

"I want the snow to stop."

"I want the road to be open."

These were honest human wishes.

The Malevolent Deity might not be able to force a person to offer to it, but it could collect the wishes people had not voiced and reshape them into offerings.

Lu Yuan reached out.

"Give the lamp to me."

Song Qinghe hesitated before handing it over.

"If the lamp goes out, those wishes will scatter."

"Scatter back into their hearts."

"They will be afraid again."

"Fear is human, not the Malevolent Deity."

Song Qinghe gave him the lamp.

Lu Yuan took the bronze lamp, protecting the bowl with his right hand, and formed the "Return-Wish Seal" with his left.

"Wishes arise from the heart and must return to the original heart."

"People ask for food and clothing, not to bow to black stone."

"People ask for safety, not to give up their lives."

"People ask for family, not allow ghosts to substitute."

"Wishes are not incense, hearts are not lamps."

"Return!"

He turned the lamp upside down.

There was no oil inside the bronze lamp, only strands of black smoke.

The smoke touched the ground and transformed into countless tiny flickers of light that flew through the stone gate’s cracks into the open mountain.

In Xiaoman Stockade, villagers suddenly stopped in their tracks.

Someone saw a small white light appear under their eaves.

Someone heard words long unsaid quietly reawaken in their hearts.

Li Guilan, holding her child, wept:

"I only pray for his safety, I ask nothing of the mountain god."

Zhao Shun stood by the well:

"I only pray my family live, I will not take someone else's life."

An old man held an extinguished offering lamp:

"I miss my son, but I don't want him to stay in the well."

Voices rose one after another like a tide returning to the riverbed.

The "Wish" character in the root shrine began to dim.

Lu Yuan held the lamp with both hands and finally chanted:

"Many wishes return to the many; evil wishes return to evil."

"People do not live for gods, gods do not live for people's wishes."

"Return, wishes!"

Boom!

The third main line to the mountain belly finally snapped.

The black stone tipped backward and crashed onto the platform.

Outside the stone shrine, the torchbearers bent down one by one, their many lamps falling, blue flames turning to snowwater.

The black fetal flesh rolled out of the fissure and, before hitting the ground, was seized by seven beams of white light.

Those seven white lights were the North Dipper Lock Gate Formation Lu Yuan had set earlier.

The voices within the black stone grew low and distant:

"You cut off three feeding grounds."

"But there are more outside the pass."

"The righteous well at Ma Family Gully is still open."

"In the Guan Di temple to the north, offerings have not ceased."

"As long as someone rings the bell, I can return."

Lu Yuan stepped before the black stone, raising his blade toward the fetal mass.

"Are you afraid of dying?"

"I do not die."

"Then why do you always hide in wells, carts, lamps, and spirit tablets?"

The black stone was silent.

Lu Yuan spoke each word:

"Because you have no form of your own."

"No name of your own."

"No wish of your own."

"You only stitch people's fear together to dress up as a god."

"Today I will not cut your stone."

"I will cut your name."

He placed Gu Chuan’s wooden tablet, Meng Wenbing’s old name tablet, and a yellow paper labeled "Many Wishes" side by side on the platform.

With his left hand he formed the "Name-Stabilizing Seal" and his right hand laid the broken blade across the three objects.

"Gu Chuan returns to the earth."

"Meng Wenbing returns to the earth."

"Many wishes return to the many."

"The mountain god's name is not in the black stone."

"The Malevolent Deity's form is not in the altar."

"Whoever borrows many names to become a god—"

"Today we peel away their names!"

"Peel!"

The seven eyes on the black stone opened at once.

They made no sound.

The entire root shrine suddenly became quiet.

The black qi on the three items peeled away inch by inch.

A sigh came from inside Gu Chuan’s tablet, turning into white light.

Meng Wenbing's old name tablet cracked in two, revealing a thread of warm yellow light.

All the ink on the "Many Wishes" yellow paper vanished at the same moment.

The black fetal flesh began to collapse.

The countless mouths that covered it closed one by one until only a fist-sized black stone remained.

Three blurred characters surfaced on the stone's face:

"Nameless Thing."

Lu Yuan raised his blade to strike, but the ground beneath his feet suddenly shook.

A deeper fissure opened behind the stone shrine.

There was no black water, no human face in it.

Only an ancient iron bell hung in the void below.

Red cords were wound around the bell's body, and the bell's surface was engraved with the names of the various stockades beyond the pass.

At the bottom in glaring characters were three words:

"Ma Family Gully."

The iron bell suddenly swung on its own.

Dong—

The sound passed through the mountain belly toward the north.

In an instant, the black scorches on every villager's wrist in Xiaoman Stockade all shrank.

At the far end of the snowy plain, a line of harsh red light flared up.

It was not a single lamp.

It was countless lamps along the ridge lighting one after another.

Mister Meng stood at the stone gate, his face ashen.

"It sent the last root to Ma Family Gully."

Lu Yuan sheathed his blade and looked north.

"Not the last root."

"A new gate."

Asheng moved to his side.

"There’s something under the righteous well."

"Did you see it?"

"Red cords, and wooden tablets."

"What did they say?"

Asheng was silent for a long time.

"They wrote your name."

Wind and snow suddenly poured back through the stone gate.

On the ground the black stone quivered like a heart not yet fully dead.

Lu Yuan put it into the ink-line box, pressed the lid with three copper coins, then drew a "Seal" character on the box with cinnabar.

"Take this stone away for now."

Wang Cheng'an asked, "Where off to?"

"Back to the stockade first; bury it in the Birch Forest where there are no ancestral graves."

"It's not dead yet?"

"The Nameless Thing is hardest to kill."

"Then what do we do?"

"Let it slowly cool in a place without feeding lines."

Xu Erxiao sheathed his broken sword.

"Brother, how far is Ma Family Gully from here?"

Mister Meng said, "Thirty li if you take the old courier road; you won't make it before dawn."

Lu Yuan glanced at the black footprints in the snow.

"Taking the courier road is too slow."

Lin Zhaoxuan pointed to the wall behind the Daoist hall.

"There's a horse trail behind the wall, used to haul timber. The snow is deep, but it goes straight north."

"That road cannot be used," Mister Meng hurriedly said.

"Why?"

"At the end of the horse trail is a ruined Guan Di temple."

"Behind the temple is the righteous well."

"They don't offer to the mountain there."

"What do they offer?"

Mister Meng looked toward the red light in the north.

"They offer Guan Di's loyalty and righteousness."

"But under the offering table, buried, are the names of people fleeing."

Lu Yuan re-tied red cloths to everyone's wrists.

This time he tied them into dead knots.

"Who says loyalty and righteousness can't be borrowed by evil?"

He looked up at the ridge in the wind and snow.

"Let's go."

They left the root shrine.

Meng Wenbing's remains were carried by Mister Meng; Gu Chuan’s wooden tablet was handed to Zhou Heng.

The three rescued children were carried on Lin Zhaoxuan's and Wang Cheng'an's backs; Xu Erxiao cleared the path behind them.

Song Qinghe carried the remaining bronze lamp; Asheng followed on Lu Yuan's right.

When they stepped out of the old Daoist hall, the stone gate behind them closed by itself.

From the gap came one very soft voice:

"Lu Yuan."

Lu Yuan did not look back.

Asheng, however, heard it.

"What did it say?"

"It called you."

"I know."

"Why didn't you answer?"

Lu Yuan tightened his grip on the broken blade.

"Because my name is my own."

The red light to the north grew ever stronger.

From deep within the snowplain, a bell toll sounded.

Dong.

Another.

Dong.

When the third toll fell, everyone's shadows at their feet turned north at once.

On the old courier road's snowy ground, a wooden tablet had appeared without anyone noticing.

Half buried in the snow, the characters were bright red:

"Lu Yuan, Life Sacrifice."

Lu Yuan walked over and pried the tablet up with the knife tip.

On the back was another line:

"Ma Family Gully righteous well, waiting for you to return home."

After reading, Lu Yuan slid the tablet into his sleeve.

"It wants me to go."

Song Qinghe asked, "To lead the way?"

"Also a provocation."

"Then do we still go?"

Lu Yuan looked at the red growing on the horizon.

"It borrows the Guan Di temple’s name and buries the refugees’ bones."

"It borrows loyalty as a lock, borrows homeland as a home."

"If we don't go, Ma Family Gully will become another Xiaoman Stockade."

Xu Erxiao looked up.

"Then let's go."

Wang Cheng'an patted his abacus frame.

"The accounts aren't settled yet."

Lin Zhaoxuan tightened the ink-line.

"The road isn't sealed yet."

Zhou Heng hoisted a child onto his back.

"People inside the pass can no longer allow it to bury in wells."

Mister Meng cradled his father's remains and whispered, "I'll take you there."

Lu Yuan looked at him.

"Not to take us."

"But to go settle your own account."

Mister Meng nodded.

"I will go alone."

They marched north along the old courier road.

The wind and snow gradually swallowed their figures.

Behind them, Xiaoman Stockade's offering lamps did not shine again.

But further toward Ma Family Gully, an old bell—unstruck by any hand—tolled nine times in succession.

When the ninth toll fell, a hand reached out of the righteous well.

A red cord was wrapped around its wrist.

At the cord's end hung a wooden tablet.

On the tablet, besides the three characters "Lu Yuan," another line of small new characters had been freshly carved:

"Name, Wish, Life, Death, Home, Shadow, Offering."

After the seven characters, the final stroke slowly descended.

"Returning home."