musicians of old

Chapter 879 Night Walk (Part 1): Rumors
From the dried-up lakebed to the damp woodland, the things growing around me under the moonlight seemed to grow even taller.

The branches of rubber and palm trees are so dense they block out the sun, as thick as the fur on the back of a hunting dog.

Fanning's clothes were unkempt, with the hem fluttering, and his hair and beard, which hadn't been trimmed for days, had grown long, making him look almost like a vagrant.

"The night is so gentle, and the Moon Queen is ascending her throne, surrounded by stars that guard her."

"But it is not very bright here, except for a sliver of skylight, and the lush green shadows and mossy winding paths carried by a gentle breeze."

He walked through the night, carrying his "Illidan" guitar, his face showing a look of reminiscence and remembrance.

Perhaps we've reached the deep Orthos rainforest, or perhaps it's just an ordinary woodland, but it's the same path we've walked before.

"I can't tell what kind of flower is at my feet, or what fragrant blossom hangs on the branch. In this warm, dim light, what fragrance should I bestow upon these fruit trees, the thickets, and the grass?"

"These white trifoliate orange blossoms and field roses, these easily withered violets amidst the green leaves, and these darlings of mid-May, these musk roses adorned with dew. They are the havens for the buzzing mosquitoes on summer nights."

The light from the "Midday Moon" hanging high overhead changed slightly, continuously emitting a hazy white mist.

The scars on the tree trunk and branches were scratched into layers of dark black or silver-gray, which then gradually rippled into layers of colorful light and shadow.

"I listened in the darkness, and so many times I almost fell in love with the silence of death."

Fan Ning's eyes seemed to transcend time and space as she recited the hymn.

Among the figures following him, one stood out more clearly.

The little girl excitedly pointed to a blue flower that made a pleasant bell sound. Her snow-white hair stood out in the multicolored light and shadow, and her pale face flushed slightly with excitement.

“Teacher, listen! It’s ‘Bell Orchid’! Legend has it that it can take away bad dreams!” Luna’s voice was clear and bright, filled with childlike excitement.

"Ha, really?" Fan Ning chuckled twice, turning his head to the side.

Luna skipped and hopped along with him for a while, then stopped, squatted down, closed her eyes, and listened to a plant amidst the sounds of birdsong and insect chirps: "The sounds here, teacher, they're alive! They're breathing, they're growing!"

"Huh? Teacher, what's this place?" The little girl suddenly stood up, startled. "Are we still in the Orthodox Rainforest? The St. Agnes Hospital? No, we're here..."

"Teacher, is that really you?! Where's my sister?!"

"Is this all a dream, or did you devise a way to bring me into reality?"

Luna started running, trying to keep up with Fanning ahead.

She pressed on from behind, panting.

“Now, nothing has changed.” Fan Ning’s voice drifted from ahead.

Waves of water began to surge through the soil.

At first, I thought I had stepped into a stream, but later I realized that the water level of the entire forest was rising.

Fan Ning closed her eyes, her long hair flowing even further away.

got windy.

The illusory river rippled in layers, and his figure seemed to be standing on the deck of a ship, gently swaying and bobbing with the waves.

"In the four-part harmony writing of art songs, the imagery of the lyrics is crucial." A sharply dressed Fan Ning paced the podium, pointing to the blackboard amidst countless stares. "Understanding the imagery and metaphors of the lyrics is related to our creative intentions. Please look at this example—"

"Thirty thousand acres of jade-like fields reflect the sky, where I drift in my small boat. The bright moon shines, and the Milky Way reflects its image; both are crystal clear."

On the stained blackboard, Fanning wrote a masterpiece from a previous life, containing a wonderful and expansive artistic conception, in a few words of Old Hoffmann.

"Professor Fan Ning, may I ask which poet wrote this?"

A blurry figure in the audience couldn't help but ask a question.

"Yes, which poet? Absolutely amazing!"

"I've never heard this poem before."

“It’s just a case study discussion. Everyone should focus on literature itself and the combination of literature and music.” Fan Ning shook his head and smiled, then put down his pen and began writing, first arranging a half-diminished seventh chord on the last line of the first stanza.

"Then, we try lowering the bass voice by a semitone, perhaps in an open arrangement, leading to a dominant seventh with a half cadence—"

"A serene understanding arises in the heart, its subtle beauty difficult to describe to you." The wind and waves on the deck were slightly larger, clear but not cold.

The water, like the sky, is a deep blue-black, reflecting the countless stars that twinkle in the sky.

There are a few poems that I don't know why they are so unforgettable. Perhaps I talked about them with some people I cared about in some important historical context.

“Dunkel ist das Leben, ist der Tod The embers of life are darkness, the embers of darkness are death.”

"Poetry cannot be translated." A beautiful young woman once nodded in approval before him.

Fan Ning leaned against the ship's railing and wrote in the night, producing works such as "Elegy Song," "Spring Day Drunk and Expressing My Aspirations," and "Imitating the Ancients on a Long Autumn Night."
Having arrived in that time and space of the old industrial world, I had indeed wondered before if it was possible to incorporate elements of Tang and Song poetry into a symphony.

It sounds like a somewhat absurd idea, and it would be very strange to put it on a performance, but since there are no performances now, it doesn't really matter.

It might be somewhat off-topic from "Night Wanderings," and as a standalone piece, I don't know what use it will have, but that doesn't really matter.

"I once exhausted my words in my poetry, begging him to let my last breath dissipate into the void. And now, how magnificent is death, to depart from this world in the dead of night."

"You will still sing, though I no longer listen; your songs are only for the mud and grass. But you, immortal bird, will never die!"

The wind carries away the soul-stirring poems and brings forth illusory and sorrowful ballads.

In a seemingly ambiguous historical fragment, a ferry sails along the route of the Paradogos Islands. A young girl lies on her side in a wicker chair, gazing at the sea. So much time has passed that it is difficult to distinguish between the sea and the sky.

Her body lay on the edge of the curved sky, and suddenly she slipped and fell, her sense of loss, along with her infinitely stagnant cognition, plunging into the vast, boundless, and star-studded black sea below.

"what--"

A cry that startled me awake from a dream.

Someone grabbed her hand and helped her stand still.

This is a steep reef.

On the distant, dilapidated shoreline, there seemed to be many figures walking, but they were quite a distance from where they were standing. The water around them was swift and dark, with layers of illusory scenes swirling and intertwining, and pebbles, broken branches, and debris constantly swirling and being swept into the dangerous and lost void below.

The reef itself is also in danger.

"Teacher!?" Miss Nightingale trembled violently when she saw who had grabbed her.

"Our performance is about my hometown, my sister, and my fellow students."

"What's wrong with me? What is the reason for all of this?"

She felt that countless fragmented years had passed since the dazzling starlight of that famous singer competition and the song "Summer Noon Dream" at the "Flower Festival".

“It’s all emptiness, all chasing the wind.” Fan Ning looked into the distance. “Before, you were a dream; now, you are a song. Both are brought to me by the wind.”

"So dreams are fake, right!"

"Dreams are real, of course."

"Then take me away, teacher, take me away." Two lines of clear tears flowed from the eyes of the usually optimistic girl. "To be your dream forever, that would be so romantic."

She felt she had lost the strength to stand, so she knelt down and hugged Fan Ning, her cheek pressed against his clothes, her shoulders sobbing violently, trying to release all the pent-up gloom and pale sorrow.

“I had heard of you before, but now I see you with my own eyes. The wind blows as it pleases, and I hear its sound and understand your coming and going.”

Fan Ning smiled quietly, reached out and gently stroked her hair, then patted her shoulder.

"Are you confessing your love to me?" The girl's eyes sparkled with ice.

"Of course, your confession was made in the height of summer, when love was a question; my answer was given in the depths of winter, for love is never-ending."

Fan Ning smiled quietly, her enthusiasm and sincerity almost divine.

"I have been searching for you on a pilgrimage, my most wonderful and lovely student, Miss Nightingale."

Fanning's figure disappeared from the reef, along with Ann's.

Another patch of pure, peach-pink starlight drifted up, floating across the rushing, ethereal river, heading towards the shadowy figures of travelers on the bank.