Beyond the Timescape

Chapter 39: A Melody of Lingering Affection for the Mortal World

“Kid, how about we call it here?” The camp master broke the brief silence. “You’ve already saved Captain Lei, and this man is dead. There’s no need for us to fight to the bitter end.”

“Besides, I am an Elder of the Vajra Sect. Killing me means declaring war on the entire sect. Our Patriarch is a Foundation Establishment powerhouse!”

Xu Qing said nothing. He suddenly coughed up a mouthful of dark blood. Staggering slightly, he raised his right hand as if to wipe his mouth.

In that moment of perceived weakness, a vicious glint flashed through the camp master’s eyes.

The man who had just pleaded for peace exploded forward with a deafening boom. Golden light erupted from his flesh with unprecedented intensity, turning him into a living golden statue.

“Vajra Third Method!”

Suffused with blinding golden light, the camp master radiated a terrifying, suffocating killing intent.

Yet, Xu Qing’s expression remained entirely impassive. His stagger vanished instantly—a flawless ruse. The hand he had raised to wipe his blood continued upward, lifting high above his head. His bloodshot eyes fluttered shut.

In the darkness of his mind, he saw the ruined temple. He saw the deity-like statue descending from the altar, raising a peerless, breathtaking blade that seemed to harbor the very essence of the Great Dao.

He had simulated this strike countless times in his mind. He had never dared to use it.

Now, the time had come.

A brilliant purple light erupted from his core, engulfing his body and wreathing his raised hand.

Unlike the divine gold of the statue, Xu Qing’s imitation burned with the violent violet of the Purple Crystal.

As the camp master closed the distance with a feral roar, Xu Qing’s right hand drifted downward.

The motion seemed casual, utterly ordinary, and deceptively simple. Yet, within that simplicity lay an indescribable, transcendent rhythm.

The purple light instantly converged upon his descending hand. In the space above his head, the massive, blurry silhouette of a blade materialized.

It was a heavenly executioner’s blade, vast and overwhelming!

The violet radiance surged, swallowing the fading sunlight, obliterating the camp master’s golden aura, consuming everything in its path. Guided by Xu Qing’s hand, the phantom blade abruptly cleaved downward!

Thunder tore through the sky. The earth beneath the camp shattered with a deafening roar. A gale of piercing light exploded outward like a tidal wave, forcing the spectating scavengers to stumble backward.

The camp master’s blinding charge ground to a halt. He stood frozen, barely ten feet away from Xu Qing.

The Elder stared blankly at the youth. Slowly, he lowered his head to look at the ground.

A perfectly straight fissure had been carved into the earth beneath his feet—a trench stretching over seventy feet long, extending far into the distance behind him.

“That blade…” the camp master murmured.

A thin red line appeared on his forehead. In the blink of an eye, the line split down his nose, tore through his chin, bisected his chest, and terminated at his Dantian. A geyser of blood erupted as his body neatly split into two halves, collapsing wetly onto the dirt.

Dead silence claimed the camp, broken only by the ragged, disbelieving breaths of the onlookers.

The dying sun cast its bloody glow over the ruined street, illuminating the youth’s solitary face. Crimson droplets slid down his fingers, falling into the pooling gore at his feet and sending out tiny, macabre ripples.

His reflection in the blood was distorted, yet the absolute desolation and freezing apathy in his eyes pierced through.

Xu Qing silently sheathed his blood-soaked dagger and the pitch-black iron spike, then retrieved the now-faded talisman. He turned and walked toward Cross and Luan Ya, who stood among the crowd.

Cross and Luan Ya watched him approach with reverence in their eyes. They watched him silently take the unconscious, dying Captain Lei onto his back and walk away without a word. They lowered their heads and followed him into the distance.

In the sunset, Xu Qing’s shadow stretched long, covering the bloodstained ground and exuding an ineffable sorrow.

The scavengers around them couldn’t help but watch his retreating figure, gazing at the blood and corpses strewn across the long street.

Behind Xu Qing, the blood seemed to form a shocking, continuous trail.

Some remembered the blood trail Xu Qing had left in the arena during the camp initiation trial, when he dragged the giant-horned python.

Two scenes, two blood trails, seemed to overlap in that moment.

“Kid!” someone shouted first, and soon all the scavengers gathered there joined in.

“Kid!!”

“Kid!!!”

The voices grew louder and louder, coming from the old, the young, the strong, and women with feathers in their hair.

One by one, their eyes slowly filled with fanaticism, their roars echoing to the heavens.

This was… the scavengers’ unique salute!

…

At dusk, at the camp entrance.

Xu Qing, carrying Captain Lei on his back, stopped and looked back at Cross and Luan Ya.

They looked back at him, their eyes filled with reverence and complexity, clearly having guessed something.

“Are you leaving?” Cross asked softly.

“I’m going to send Captain Lei on his final journey, and then… I’ll leave,” Xu Qing nodded.

Cross and Luan Ya fell silent.

A sense of parting welled up in Xu Qing’s heart. He looked at them deeply, then let his gaze pass over them to the camp where he had lived for nearly half a year.

“Take care,” Luan Ya said, gazing at Xu Qing. She stepped forward to tidy his disheveled hair, unbothered by the blood on him, and gave him a gentle hug.

“What about you?” Xu Qing didn’t reject Luan Ya’s hug and asked softly.

“We’re leaving this place too. Don’t worry, Cross and I have hands and feet, and our strength is decent. We can go to any camp,” Luan Ya said with a smile.

Cross still didn’t speak, but stepped forward and hugged Xu Qing tightly.

Xu Qing took a deep breath, waved to them, turned, and strode out of the camp gate, heading farther and farther toward the Forbidden Zone.

Behind him, under the sunset, Cross and Luan Ya stood silently, watching him go until Xu Qing’s figure disappeared at the horizon. Luan Ya murmured.

“Cross, will we see him again in the future? It’s a pity we still don’t know his name.”

“We will… The name isn’t important,” Cross said softly, taking Luan Ya’s hand.

Xu Qing left, departing the camp and heading into the Forbidden Zone.

He carried Captain Lei on his back, walking silently forward, just as he had when Captain Lei was gravely injured and he carried him, just as when they parted and he carried him—the same road, the same person.

But he could feel Captain Lei growing lighter, his life force dwindling, an unstoppable aura of death spreading.

Xu Qing’s heart grew heavier with sorrow.

He stepped into the jungle, walked through the Forbidden Zone, and headed steadily in one direction. Time passed slowly, the sunset faded, and night fell.

Perhaps sensing the bloodlust and lingering killing intent on Xu Qing, no strange beasts appeared before him on this journey, allowing him to walk on in sorrow.

After about an hour, a weak, hoarse voice came from behind him.

“Kid, I just had a dream.”

Captain Lei woke up, his expression dazed and fading, murmuring softly.

He didn’t ask why he was here, didn’t ask why Xu Qing had appeared, and didn’t speak of his own experiences.

“I dreamed of Taohong, and I dreamed of you too.”

Xu Qing’s eyes reddened, his sorrow deepening. He quickened his pace but tried to keep it steady, getting closer and closer to his destination.

“In the dream, you were still so obedient, always first in the schoolhouse.”

Captain Lei wanted to smile, but these few words seemed to drain most of his strength. His voice gradually weakened, and before falling unconscious again, he whispered softly.

“What a wonderful dream.”

“Kid, I can’t hold on much longer.”

Xu Qing lowered his head, racing forward at full speed. Along the way, he tried to use his Purple Crystal to help Captain Lei, but it was useless—it couldn’t retain his life force.

Finally, after half an hour, he reached the place where they had once heard the song—the same area, the same large tree.

Here, Xu Qing gently set Captain Lei down, propping him against the tree. His eyes red, nose stinging, he looked at the wrinkled, dying old man before him.

“Captain Lei,” Xu Qing said softly.

The old man leaned against the tree and slowly opened his eyes.

His gaze was cloudy, staring blankly at the world before him. After a long while, he seemed to recognize where he was and gradually smiled, a faint light appearing in his eyes.

“Kid, do you have any wine?”

Xu Qing nodded silently, took a flask of wine from his leather bag, and placed it at the old man’s lips, letting him take a big sip.

That sip of wine made the light in the old man’s eyes grow brighter, like the final glow of a candle.

As if seeing Xu Qing’s reddened eyes clearly now, he smiled.

“Why are you crying?”

Captain Lei seemed to regain some strength. With Xu Qing’s support, he struggled to sit up a bit more.

Slumped heavily against the gnarled trunk, the old man tried to lift his trembling hand to pat Xu Qing’s head, but his remaining strength bled away. Just as his arm began to drop in defeat, Xu Qing caught his calloused hand and gently, firmly, guided it to rest upon his own head.

A frail, contented smile cracked the old man’s face.

“Truth be told… I consider myself a lucky man,” he rasped, his voice barely a whisper against the wind. “At least in this final hour, I have a companion by my side. I have strong wine to warm my throat, and I know someone will dig a grave for my bones.”

He let out a shallow, rattling breath. “In this sprawling world… out of the teeming masses, how many die alone in wretched desolation? Left to rot as nameless meat in the silent wilderness?”

“Death itself isn’t terrifying. What truly chills the blood… is staring into the abyss without a single familiar face looking back at you…”

As the words faded, the last flickering embers of life in Captain Lei’s eyes began to dim, swallowed by the encroaching dark. Suddenly, his jaw worked, forcing out a final, labored breath.

“Kid… let me have one last sip.”

Xu Qing’s heart filled with sorrow. He picked up the wine flask and gently placed it at Captain Lei’s lips. As the wine spilled out, Captain Lei looked past him, his expression dazed, murmuring softly.

“Taohong, have you come to take me away…”

The wine spilled onto the old man’s clothes and into the soil. He didn’t drink it. The light in his eyes, along with the flame of his life, went out.

Xu Qing trembled, lowering his head. The sorrow in his heart could no longer be controlled, spreading throughout his body.

He gripped the wine flask tightly, so hard that it deformed in his hand, but he didn’t notice.

After a long while, Xu Qing bit his lip, silently set the flask aside, and looked up at the old man who would never wake again.

Uncontrollably, his mind flashed back to the ruined city, to the figure who had suddenly turned back to look at him from afar.

“Kid, are you willing to leave this place with me?”

Tears, drop by drop, slid from the corners of Xu Qing’s eyes.

They washed away the bloodstains on his face, leaving two clear trails that fell onto his clothes.

Having grown up in the slums, he had long forgotten how to cry.

But today, he couldn’t hold back. He gazed at the old man’s body until the sky began to lighten again. Silently, he buried the old man and the wine flask under the tree.

Scavengers don’t need tombstones, because no one comes to mourn them.

But the old man had a tombstone.

Before the tombstone, Xu Qing stared blankly.

After a very long time, he took a piece of cloth from his leather bag and pulled out the only piece of candy inside.

Silently, he placed it in his mouth, leaned against the tree, and closed his eyes.

The candy was very sweet.

Someone had once told Xu Qing that eating it when you’re sad makes you feel a little better.