Lord of the Desert

Chapter 471 Persistence
Three days later, September 24th.

The rain is cold and the night is deep and wet.

Geng Chi sat in the main hall of his home, drinking half of a jar of old wine. The scimitar hanging on the wall had not been sharpened for a long time, and the back of the blade was already rusty.

His wife and children had already fallen asleep in the backyard.

The crescent moon was bone-white, and its sharp point hooked into the flesh of the sky, emitting a faint, cold light like a grayish cloud.

Geng Chi drank another bowl of wine, rubbed his dry eyes, and stared straight at the "Dahua Law" behind the clan tablet.

Suddenly there was the sound of wind in the darkness.

He glanced in the direction of the sound and saw the old leaves rustling on the big camphor tree outside the courtyard wall. A pale person grew out from among the leaves and slid along the wall into the yard.

There was no sound in the drizzle.

The figure was tall and thin, and his steps were erratic, as if he was gliding on the ground. He looked left and right before crossing the threshold and entering the house.

Geng Chi didn't even pick up the knife.

"who are you?"

He asked lazily, pushing the second bench next to the table to the ground and sliding it in front of the visitor.

"I am the mountain demon, you can call me the trickster."

The man sat down politely on the bench, a rotten stench emanating from his body.

He was wearing a white costume and a pompom on his hat. In the middle of his face was a tofu-shaped block drawn with white powder, probably like the scarf in a drama, but it was not drawn neatly.

"I am the chief constable and can only take care of human affairs. If you are a demon, why are you looking for me?"

Geng Chi asked with a deep smile and poured himself a glass of wine - as the top detective in the county, how could he not know about the innate evil guest who was ranked 49th on the evil list.

"You are about to be enlightened. I come to congratulate you."

The prankster replied.

"What did I realize?"

Geng Chi held the wine bowl, raised his drooping head slightly, and stared into the other person's left eye.

"I realized that the heavens and the earth are empty, that the laws of the country and the rules of the family are just rotten grass and clay tiles, and that morality and human ethics are all bullshit."

The prankster raised his hands exaggeratedly, as if holding up a great and invisible nothingness.

"You see through these fake things, so you have to understand!"

"Understood?"

Geng Chi gulped down half a bowl of wine, soaking his beard.

"I only know that I have been confused, incompetent and untrustworthy all my life, and that my life has no value or meaning."

Hearing this, the prankster's mouth curled up, but his eyebrows were frozen and motionless, and his fingers moved unconsciously, as if he was scratching his flesh with his nails.

"You also have a cataract on your left eye. Humph, those people during this period were you, right?"

Geng Chi sneered.

"It's me. It's all me. How can it not be me?"

The prankster admitted it frankly.

"As soon as the prankster finds you, everything and everyone in your life will become mine..."

He opened his eyes wide and chuckled. His left eye, covered with a cataract, looked like a pale spider egg that was about to hatch.

"You just said that life is meaningless."

The Trickster looked at the knife hanging on the wall.

"Why not just die?"

Upon hearing this, Geng Chi finally showed some fear.

"Why are you nervous?"

The prankster looked puzzled at this, as if it was a stiff imitation.

"What's wrong with death? It's just going back to the time before you were born. Living is busy with meaningless things, complicated and troublesome. Wouldn't it be easier to go back to the time before you were born?"

he said seductively.

"No, I am a little confused, but I don't want to die yet."

Geng Chi pushed away the half-empty wine jar and turned his face away.

"How can I be free if I don't die? Captain Geng, you are so smart and capable, how come you can't figure it out?"

The prankster tried to persuade again.

"You think death is a relief, why don't you die yourself?"

Geng Chi asked back with a sneer.

"I've died! I've died many times."

The prankster replied eagerly, his voice urgent, as if he was about to give evidence in court.

"I've jumped off cliffs, sank into the ocean, and once slit my own neck..."

He pulled open his collar, revealing a shallow scar on his neck.

An even stronger stench spread throughout the hall, forcing Geng Chi to cover his nose.

"I am probably dying, but I have tried to die several times but failed, so I won't force it anymore."

"Whatever you say, I still have a wife and children, and I don't want to die yet."

Geng Chi's body sank slightly, and his muscles were tense like a wild beast.

"You said everyone would become you, but they are never you!"

"Not necessarily."

The prankster replied in a vague tone and threw something.

"What do you mean?"

Geng Chi's face was as cold as frost. He took the thing and found it was a stack of letters.

"These are the letters your wife hid in the compartment of the jewelry box under the bed. They are all from her old lover."

The prankster rolled his eyes and laughed.

"I've been your neighbor for three months, and I noticed early on that your son doesn't look like you."

Geng Chi turned a deaf ear to the letter, took it and quickly read it. As expected, it was written by his wife, with sweet words in it. He was so angry that his hands were shaking.

"How is it? Is life completely meaningless?"

The trickster shook his head.

He rolled up his sleeves and untied the tight bandages on his forearm, revealing a half-foot long rotten wound with a mixture of jade-colored granulation tissue and black and yellow pus trembling like a seesaw battle line.

The strong stench spread like an invisible wave.

Geng Chi felt nauseous and wanted to vomit, but he didn't know whether it was because of the stench or because of everything he had to go through in his life.

The prankster hung the bandage on the beam and tied a knot.

"Captain Geng, can I give you a ride?"

he asked kindly.

On the other side, Geng Chi just held the letter and retched. There was no response, and he no longer had the faith to resist.

"wise."

The prankster came closer, chattering, showing his white teeth.

"The affairs of the world are like morning dew, not worthy of the slightest glory; it is better to be free, it is better to be free!"

At this moment, a strange voice came from outside the door.

"Captain Geng, the letter in your hand is old and yellowed. It is obviously from many years ago. It can only be regarded as a commemoration of the past. As for your son, I just went to see him and he looks quite like you."

After hearing this, Geng Chi immediately squeezed out some strength from his dry body, stood up suddenly and stepped back a few steps.

"Who are you?"

The prankster stopped and looked at the tall figure standing in the moonlight in the main hall.

"Take your people."

Hong Fan, dressed in a purple silk robe with auspicious cloud patterns, strode into the house and looked at the prankster in his true appearance in costume - he had a square face, sword-like eyebrows, and a regular appearance. Except for a patch of white makeup in the middle of his face, he didn't look evil at all.

"Purple Ribbon Cavalry?"

The prankster stepped back, surprised but not horrified.

Or rather, he had long lost the ability to be frightened.

Rustling sounds came into his ears from all directions of the house.

The prankster's right eye flickered and he saw the sand moving across the threshold and through the window panes like living things, wrapping around the beams and pillars like dragons and snakes, little by little isolating the rainy night outside.

A small handful of gravel flew over and blocked Tiqi's nostrils.

With such a huge amount of sand, it is obvious that the other party had already arrived at the scene and made arrangements.

"You are Chixing Hongfan."

The prankster frowned and spat out the victim's name, as if he were faced with a difficult problem.

He had always felt that he was a spider weaving a web, but now he fell into someone else's web.

Geng Chi, who had taken the scimitar from the wall and retreated to the corner of the room, opened his eyes wide and had hope of survival.

"Your family is in the northwest of Liangzhou, but you crossed the nine provinces to come to the southeast of Zhanzhou to fight me. Why bother? Why bother?"

The prankster sighed and got into boxing stance. The muscles beneath his costume twitched and contracted like eels, and his joints made slight popping sounds.

Geng Chi in the corner of the house has a low level of cultivation, and there are two mortals in the back house who don't know martial arts. Overly violent moves such as high temperature and explosion are not safe enough.

The Prankster was a pure melee fighter, and Hong Fan didn't think he needed to use his full strength to deal with him.

"Desolate Sand Realm, please."

He put his hands behind his back, and with a thought, he sent out dozens of sand spikes to strangle him from all sides. The prankster reacted instantly.

His flexibility was amazing, and every time he struck, his limbs seemed to be strangely stretched. Although he was not holding a weapon, he could easily deliver sharp air explosions like the crack of a whip.

The gravel in the closed room exploded into dust, but before it dispersed, more sharp sand blades were cutting back and forth.

The fighting power of Chixing is well-known throughout the world, and a stalemate will surely lead to defeat. In addition, Dahua has never said that taking hostages can restrain the court warriors.

The prankster's mind flashed, and he realized that the only way to survive was to break through.

He flicked his fingers and blew up three sand blades. He twisted his body like a snake to dodge, but was forced to take a blow while speeding up. His ribs were cut half an inch deep.

The extremely high internal pressure caused by the warrior's high-speed movement squeezed the crimson blood out like a cicada's wing, and the prankster's lateral abdominal muscles tightened automatically, stopping the bleeding instantly.

The effect of "Shu Yu Fei Quan Dian" is very much like a weakened version of the giant spirit phase.

Unfortunately, Hong Fan is far superior to what it used to be.

As his mind went, a grain of sand left in the wound was detonated by the blazing fire essence within it. It crystallized and sharpened in the high temperature, and then cut and wandered along the anterior branch of the twelfth thoracic nerve...

Hong Fan had used this move when he fought against Gong Zian in Jinhai City, but after a long period of training, its power was no longer comparable.

In Geng Chi's eyes, the prankster who had rushed into the yard like a tiger, blasting through the sand wall, suddenly groaned and fell to the ground.

His right eye was bloodshot, his fingers were trembling, and his costume was soaked by sweat and rain in just a few breaths.

"how?"

Hong Fan stood in the corridor and asked through the rain curtain.

"It hurts. It hurts so much. It feels like magma is flowing in my blood..."

The prankster finished this short sentence in three times.

"Are you convinced? It would be easy for me to kill you right now, but before I came here, the head of the martial arts academy said that it is better to capture you alive than dead."

Hong Fan asked again.

The prankster's facial features were twisted in severe pain, and his eyes were narrowed to hide the cataract.

This expression makes him look more like a living person.

"If you don't resist, I'll stop. How about that?"

Hong Fan eased off slightly.

The prankster didn't reply, but tensed his muscles and was about to stand up, but was immediately interrupted by a surge of pain.

This process was repeated again and again until dozens of seconds later, his costume was soiled by tumbling, and the completely powerless prankster finally collapsed in the mud.

"Do whatever you want. There is no difference."

he whispered.

"Is the pain just now no different?"

Hong Fan asked.

"It's just a noise in the eternal void."

Teasing the guest.

"When you were still He Xiuhuai, you entered the Heart Eater again and again to rescue lost people, and there was no difference, right?"

Hong Fan suddenly laughed.

The prankster with his head down was stunned for a moment, as if he didn't expect others to know this.

"What else? I have been working in vain for nothing."

He shook his head.

"No, of course you have received it. If saving people didn't give you anything in return, you wouldn't keep going back."

The prankster remained silent, recalling the long-faded fragments in his memory, but all he got was a pale and blank feeling like the snow.

Those who are saved will still die;

Those who have not died will still go;

And time and time again, even his own body began to rot. At that time, He Xiuhuai could not find his lost parents, and in the end he gradually forgot why he was looking for his parents...

“I only see that everything is empty.”

He pursed his lips and the words that came out were like a string of bubbles.

"Since everything is false, why have you been busy these past few months concocting such a situation?"

Hong Fan walked out from the porch and stood beside him.

The vast and boundless rainy night gently covered Hegao County, temporarily concealing all the filth between heaven and earth.

"Have some fun."

Instant answer.

"Isn't it fun?"

follow up.

Speechless.

"You're not looking for fun, you're looking for a mirror."

Hong Fan sighed.

"You want to find a persistence that you can't destroy, reflecting the self you lost."

"What are you talking about..."

The prankster clutched the mud beneath him reflexively, looking up with disdainful laughter, and before he had finished laughing, his eyes were blank again.

The rain fell, plowing two clear grooves on his dirty face.

······
Ten days later, it was October 3rd.

In the capital, Dahua is the chief of the military department of the military academy.

The misty green smoke emitted by the seven bronze crane incense burners adds a touch of mystery to the steel Xiezhi in addition to its majesty.

"The prankster pretended to be fifteen different people, including neighbors, storytellers, vendors, prisoners, prisoners' families, etc. In the end, he even robbed the uniform, documents, and seals of a deputy official of the Zhanzhou Tixing Anchasi. The deputy official and his two attendants were knocked unconscious in the countryside. After waking up, they were only wearing their underwear and temporarily living in a deserted village. It took a lot of effort to prove their identity."

Hong Fan crossed his arms and talked about the tips he had learned from the pranksters along the way. He felt it was absurd but also quite impressed.

"The chief constable in Hegao County is also quite capable. The prankster flipped through all 17 volumes of files in advance, and in a hurry he only found three problematic cases, and then he deliberately put them at the top, pretending to conduct a random inspection..."

Someone passed by outside the palace, and the sound of a bronze bell was heard in the distance.

Before leaving Hegao, Hong Fan had a long conversation with Geng Chi for an hour, but still failed to completely relieve the latter's exhaustion.

Physical injuries are easy to heal, but once a belief is wounded, it may never heal in a lifetime.

"How did you find him in Hegao County?"

Liu Guyan held a wolf hair brush in his hand and took notes at a very fast speed while asking questions.

"We start with the smell, walking the streets and alleys to record all the places with bad odors; then we wait for the prey in each place, using bats to identify the target."

Hong Fan replied.

"bat?"

Liu Guyan only had the power realm cultivation level, so he didn’t understand.

"The sound made by bats is very sharp. Even warriors in the Pure Realm cannot hear it, and it is far beyond the hearing ability of ordinary people, but innate masters can hear it. Without subjective defense, a person will instinctively react to hearing a special sound. I tried it in various places and finally found that a chef making stinky tofu in an alley actually reacted to the ultrasound of bats - that was September 22nd."

Hong Fan answered in detail.

Liu Guyan understood what he said and recorded the key points: "Did you take action immediately?"

"No, the prankster is acting strangely, and I need to know who he has implicated this time."

Hong Fan shook his head.

"Aren't you afraid of losing him? The prankster is very agile and can change his appearance at any time. Wang Zishou escaped from him in the past."

Liu Guyan asked quickly, obviously thinking that he could get another good idea that could be promoted like the one with bats.

"This is easy for me. I just need to throw a few grains of sand and embed them into the folds of his clothes and hair. It won't be difficult to locate him within a hundred meters."

This time, Hong Fan's operation cannot be imitated.

A series of questions and answers quickly outlined the entire case.

Liu Guyan called the clerks and asked them to polish and archive it.

Another burst of bronze bell sound faded away.

"Liu Chenshi, what will happen to this prankster?"

Thinking of He Xiuhuai's past, Hong Fan asked an extra question.

"Just lock him up first and ask him about all the crimes he committed in the past. Generally speaking, catching a wanted criminal on the evil list can solve many cold cases."

Liu Guyan replied.

"As for He Xiuhuai's illness, the headmaster will take a look at it in person when he has time."

"Can the headmaster cure this?"

Hong Fan was stunned.

"It's hard to say. The zombie transformation of Heart Eater cannot be cured, but other aspects may not be the same. After all, the manipulation of vitality by Yimu Qinglang Sutra is incomparable to any other martial arts."

Liu Guyan stood up and stretched.

"If he is cured well, he can make amends for his crime. If he is not cured well, he can be reused. Innate warriors are very valuable. Even if they cannot be educated, they will not be beheaded. At the very least, they can be transported to the northern border and used in a few battles."

PS: (Words added after this paragraph is published are not counted)
I took care of my baby every day during the Chinese New Year, and my skills became more and more proficient. It was not until February 6th when my aunt came over that I realized I had lost six kilograms.

From the time I resumed writing on the 7th to yesterday, the 14th, I wrote a total of 18,000 words, which were written quite hastily.

On the one hand, Nailong distracted his attention to some extent; on the other hand, the operations officer had severe pain in his waist and abdomen, and was shaking with pain at one point. He went to the hospital several times during this period, and it was not until the Lantern Festival that it was confirmed that it was urinary stones (he had never thought about it this way). Fortunately, the lithotripsy was successful the next day.

I don't think most people will be interested in the plot of the prankster, because the style deviates from fantasy and the excitement is not enough, but it is a small attempt anyway.

Then resume the normal plot path.

(End of this chapter)