Above Destiny

Chapter 597 Suffering for Ancestors

After all the sweat and effort, all that's left are tears.

Late at night, in the dormitory of Cannon Fodder Six and the others, snoring filled the air, creating a noisy scene.
Tang Qian, who usually falls asleep as fast as a log the moment his head hits the pillow, is now wide awake, tossing and turning.

Hard to understand.

I'm so angry!
Unable to bear it any longer, he pulled out the ancestral tablets from the sacrificial offering and demanded, "Fourth Grand Uncle, what are you thinking?!"

"What I think isn't important; what's important is what you're thinking."

The fourth great-uncle calmly retorted, "Do you want to live like this forever?"

"..."

Tang Qian remained silent, not out of shame, but out of bewilderment.

I can't understand it, I don't get it, I can't comprehend it.

——Are you fucking kidding me?
Make me laugh?
Then you win!

"Damn it!" Tang Qian retorted angrily, "What's wrong with my whole life? Does spending my whole life repairing bridges and roads and doing good deeds mean I have a bright future?"

Is this my fault?!
This damn legacy—every generation, when they're killing, burning, and fighting to the death, they only care about their own pleasure, leaving no room for their descendants. They live haphazardly and die violently, and that's fine. But then, when it comes to me, it's like how I live my life suddenly becomes incredibly important!

Doesn't something seem off?

"Why, Fourth Uncle!"

Tang Qian questioned, "Isn't that enough? What's wrong with just getting by? There's nothing wrong with living a muddled life, is there?"

"really."

The fourth great-uncle nodded approvingly, then asked, "But is it good for them?"

"..."

Tang Qian fell silent again, speechless. He turned over angrily, not wanting to speak anymore: "Give me some time, just give me some time."

The burnt offering ceremony is performed to dispel the evil spirits.

But it cannot be resolved.

This kind of two-way resonance, where you agree and I agree, is fine, but it's not a cheap phone call after all. You're happy when you call, but you want to hang up after I answer. What do you take me for?

Fourth Uncle is still online.

Without anger or resentment.

But, sigh.

"Lord Tianlu once said something that was absolutely right—the dead shouldn't point fingers at the living. What inheritance and bloodline are all nonsense. They're no big deal. Once they're gone, they're gone."

Fourth Uncle said slowly, "The way of the great group is that victory brings life and defeat brings death. When a person dies, no matter how much they say, they are just a clown. Only the living are the winners."

"Then what are you even talking about?"

Tang Qian rolled his eyes: "Stop babbling. I'm packing my buckets and running away tomorrow. What do I care? I'm done playing!"

"It's up to you."

Fourth Uncle said calmly, "I've been rambling on so much just because I can't stand your indecisive way of doing things. I thought you'd finally learn something after wasting some time, but you're such a disgrace. I can't push you, you can't understand what I'm saying, you can't listen to anything I say, and I can't persuade you."

What can I do? Just let it be, whatever.

There's one thing I must tell you, as an 'elder' for now—”

He said, "At least give yourself a chance, A-Qian, be a real man for once, let others go and let yourself go too."

You have to make a decision eventually.

Tang Qian closed his eyes, ignoring everything. After a long while, he opened his eyes and sighed helplessly, "...What if I can't break free?"

"Then just bear with it."

Fourth Uncle sneered: "He brought it on himself, that's fine, he deserved it."

The burnt offering ceremony is performed to dispel the evil spirits.

The priest rejected your call and wants to block you.

Tang Qian couldn't even call back to yell at him.

He could only toss and turn more and more in his sleep.

I closed my eyes, then opened them again.

After a long while, he turned over and looked out the window at the empty night.

He silently uttered a curse.

Having been saddled with this lousy inheritance, I'm doomed for life!

The next day, Old Tang, who had originally planned to run away with his bucket, gritted his teeth and, during a break from patrol, once again deserted to the place Ji Jue had mentioned.

Then, on a muddy beach, a speedboat that had been waiting for a long time took them on a journey through the waves, winding their way to a dilapidated warehouse.

Ji Jue, who had been waiting for a long time, was holding the Pan Ying sword in his hand and practicing it intermittently. When he arrived, he threw the sword over.

"Fuck——"

Tang Qian beamed, his face instantly glowing with sweetness, as he stroked the three sacrificial emblems on the bag and exclaimed, "The boss is so generous! The boss is in good health!"

"I'll lend it to you, but you have to pay it back after you finish your work. Of course, if you want to sign a long-term contract, I'm open to considering it."

Tang Qian ignored him completely, as if he hadn't heard anything, and didn't respond at all.

So Ji Jue pretended he hadn't said anything, glanced at his butt, and then pointed behind him: "Alright, that's about it."

He said, "Install them all."

Dead silence, a long, dead silence. Tang Qian raised his head and looked at the mountain of containers.

In a state of utter speechlessness, I couldn't help but burst out laughing.

"You, surnamed Ji—"

First of all, while the traditional burnt offering is convenient, it can't hold just anything.

While offerings are acceptable for Tang Qian as a 'family,' as long as they are limited to his own possessions, it's like borrowing a hoe or shovel from a relative—borrowing is casual, and storing them is fine. However, if the offerings are external items that don't belong to him, they will become a burden.

After all, your ancestors can't carry everything for you, and you can't just put anything in the ancestral hall.

One must be strong to forge iron.

Tang Qian, on the other hand, is the kind of person who is... well, particularly hard.

It's at least half full, there's still plenty left!

Then, he absolutely refused to put any more on himself.

If you keep pretending, even if you don't get crushed to death, your ancestors will beat you to death.

And so it was a brief encounter.

Inside the warehouse, the bearded man with the thick beard limped away, clutching his backside.

Towards a hopeful future.
.
Something's wrong——

Beneath the broken white pagoda, a short-haired monk, barefoot and ascetic, holds a rusty, broken iron bowl to catch the rainwater that slowly falls from the pagoda.

Little by little, it meandered down into my throat.

The monk's lips were dry and his body was emaciated, like that of a beggar.

Just like the monks who can be seen everywhere in Tacheng, they do not accumulate private property, do not have children, and vow to follow the legendary Tzu Chi King, enduring the trials of the world with everything they have.

They could not drink water that came from the heavens, nor eat fruit that came from the earth. They could not rely on others or any other things. They used their own strength to move white boulders from the wilderness outside the city, carefully polished them into bricks, and piled them up into a tower.

The ascetic practice will end when the white pagoda is completed.

Only then can the offerings and donations from believers be accepted.

Throughout history, countless monks have lived in Tacheng. White pagodas, some intact and some incomplete, stand around the city, which is why it is known as the City of a Thousand Pagodas.

Now, the withered monk's movements once again faltered slightly.

That uneasy feeling is back again.

The wolf pack's blood oath has begun to waver, once again, and once more, and yet again...

It was as if the members were facing a life-or-death crisis.

Kelbassu, that guy, has been exposed?

Impossible. A guy like him, all bluster and no substance, would rather hide in the Empire's base 24/7 and never show his face.

Why is the bond of blood ties faltering?
about to die?
No, no matter how dying someone is, they should die in three or four days, but this connection is getting weaker and weaker as time goes on.

This is a sign that the restrictions have been lifted...

That guy, is he trying to jump ship?
They secretly and quietly tampered with the blood alliance that bound their souls, thinking they were being discreet. But they never imagined that the blood alliance's bondage was so deep that it penetrated to the very marrow and soul, and that even the slightest disturbance would not escape the Wolf Lord's eyes.

Regardless, this anomaly gradually alerted the monks, or rather, the Sheikhs, and their murderous intent began to rise—indeed, this double agent who repeatedly jumped between the heretical cult and the wolf's den was ultimately not one of them.

We can't keep them any longer.

The silent monk picked up his iron bowl and walked along the street, treading through dust and mud, but in the end, he only wandered between the wilderness and the settlement.

He gazed at the distant military base, but did not approach it.

A hint of suspicion and barely suppressed vigilance surfaced in those cloudy eyes.

Even when the goal was within reach, they did not rush into anything.

Suppressing the murderous intent within him, he stopped abruptly, then sat down in the mud and began to scrub the irregular white stone in his hand.

Just like the wandering monks that can be seen everywhere in the wilderness.

My heart gradually calmed down.

And in this extreme tranquility, one finally sensed... at this very moment, amidst the chaotic and mixed atmosphere of the Imperial military base, a trace of malice.

A hint of malice pointed towards himself.

Sheikh paused slightly, instantly becoming alert—a trap aimed at him?

Without a second thought, he picked up the cleaned white stone, hoisted it onto his shoulder, turned around, and left.

Above the sky, a dazzling ray of firelight greeted us.

In an instant, it swept over his head and went on to a more distant place...

【? 】

What the hell?

Sheikh paused, instinctively turned around, and then saw... a burst of flames suddenly rising from the military base!
Three seconds later, a deafening roar filled the entire wilderness, sweeping towards Tacheng like a surging tide.

--boom!!!!!

4:11 PM.

Three minutes after Lao Tang excused himself from work to go to the restroom under the pretext of a recurring hemorrhoids, a red marker suddenly appeared on the large screen of the heavily guarded command post in the very center of the military base.

Radar warning!

The lieutenant at the control panel froze for a moment, his eyes widening, before slamming down the alarm button and shouting, "Unidentified flying object is approaching—60 kilometers away—it's accelerating!"

In an instant, the tranquil command center erupted into chaos. One after another, the interceptor missile launchers were activated. With personnel rushing around and monitoring, the lock-on was quickly completed.

The missile completed its turn and the launch pad was unlocked. The colonel on duty stared wide-eyed, his finger hovering over the launch button, unable to make a decision.

It's hard to determine whether this constitutes an overreaction...

"Is there any movement from the Federation?!"

"Everything is normal, nothing."

"What about the city center?"

"normal!"

"Clear the area around the base—" Before the colonel could finish speaking, he heard the radar observer's excited report: "Target confirmed, not a missile, repeat, not a missile... it's an unmarked, assembled drone!"

(End of this chapter)