The Northern Song Dynasty returned south, seeking the truth of the Dao.

After leaving the cemetery, it was already early morning. They headed south along the official road. As they traveled south, Lin Qingyan did not look back north, even though that small mountain village was her home.

But now that place has become a dead zone. At this moment, Lin Qingyan has bid farewell to the past; she only wants to leave this painful place. Wang Zhenhuan understands her thoughts.

So, along the way, he kept chatting with her, hoping she could forget the sorrow of leaving her hometown. Binzhou is located on the coast of the Bohai Sea, which, according to later geographical locations, should be in the Shandong province.

Continuing south from Binzhou lies Zizhou. Wang Zhen had previously observed Jurchen scouts advancing south from the riverbank and had made this deduction then. Judging from their hurried manner, the war in the south must be intense.

In other words, the Jurchens should have already captured Zhengding by this time, and even the neighboring Cizhou may have fallen. Therefore, when they moved south, they wanted to avoid these places where fighting was taking place as much as possible.

The two walked until noon, when they came to a fork in the road. Lin Qingyan looked at the two paths, one large and one small, and turned to ask, "Brother, which way should we go?"

Wang Zhenhuan stood at the intersection, first taking a few steps to the left, closing his eyes and smelling the air. Then, doing the same, he went to the right, smelled the air, and then pointed to the left and said...

"Let's take this path."

Lin Qingyan looked at the overgrown path on the left, barely wide enough for two people to pass, and asked with some confusion, "Brother, have you been here before? Which way does this path on the left lead?"

Wang Huanzhen took her hand, shook his head, and said, "I don't know either. This is my first time traveling this route. But I feel that the chances of encountering Jurchens on this route are much lower."

"Why do you say that? This road is overgrown with weeds, and it doesn't look like many people use it. If it leads us into some ravine, that would be troublesome," Lin Qingyan muttered softly.

"Hey, you've got quite the imagination. If we really end up in the mountains, we'll build a house and settle down. Then the man will farm and the woman will weave, and who cares if there's a raging flood outside? Wouldn't it be great if we were a pair of celestial beings?"

Hearing the girl's words, Wang Zhenhuan couldn't help but laugh and tease her. Actually, he hadn't chosen randomly; he had gone down the small path on the left. The wind there was noticeably stronger than on the right.

This suggests that the path on the left most likely leads to the sea. In this day and age, apart from fishermen living by the sea, very few people would go in that direction.

This perfectly matched the overgrown environment along the path. As mentioned before, they were currently in Binzhou, not far from the Bohai Sea. They just needed to follow the coastline southward.

The possibility that they had avoided the Jin people was still quite high. The two walked and looked around, filled with curiosity about everything along the way. In fact, neither of them had any experience traveling far from home.

Lin Qingyan goes without saying; she's been a homebody since childhood. If she hadn't met Wang Zhenhuan, she might have spent her whole life confined to the palace. And Wang Zhenhuan has only been in this world for less than a month.

He knew absolutely nothing about the scenery of this era. In his previous life, he had always traveled on smooth, wide roads, so he had no experience whatsoever. The two of them walked and stopped, until dusk.

It had been several days into autumn, and as dusk approached, the sky began to darken. The two were now in a desolate wilderness, with no village or shop in sight, and could only proceed in the dark.

The pace at night was incomparable to that during the day; the two of them walked for several hours and had only covered a mere ten miles. Wang Zhenhuan looked at the weariness on Lin Qingyan's face and felt a pang of pity.

But the area was overgrown with thorns and weeds, and there was nowhere to rest. So he grabbed Lin Qingyan and said to her, "Come on, let me carry you."

"No need, I can manage. Let's go, this is a desolate wilderness, there's not even a place to stay." Lin Qingyan shook her head, unwilling to let Wang Zhenhuan carry her.

"Nonsense, your feet are swollen, aren't they? I clearly saw you limping just now. Come on, you're not heavy. Judging from this, we're probably still walking quite a distance."

Wang Zhen didn't care about any of that. He squatted down and carried Lin Qingyan on his back. He had clearly seen the girl stomping her feet. She was a young lady who had never traveled far from home; she had never walked such a long distance before.

Lin Qingyan nestled against Wang Zhenhuan's back, feeling a sense of security. Wang Zhenhuan was right; her feet were indeed swollen, and her left foot even had blisters, but she had been stubbornly holding back and hadn't said a word.

Unexpectedly, Wang Zhenhuan noticed this, and the feeling of being quietly cared for gave her a special sense of security. All care stems from genuine concern.

All indifference is a sign of apathy. When someone truly likes you, they will naturally care about you. Wang Huanzhen's behavior at this moment precisely demonstrates his care for Lin Qingyan.

The two of them walked quietly along the path. The occasional chirping of insects could be heard, and a cool evening breeze blew by, lifting a few strands of Lin Qingyan's hair and brushing against Wang Huanzhen's cheek.

The soft touch on his back felt incredibly real. "If only this scene could last forever," Wang Huan thought to himself. Unfortunately, just around the corner, a dilapidated temple appeared ahead.

"Brother, there's a temple!! We have a place to stay!!" Lin Qingyan, sitting high up behind him, could see far. She spotted the dilapidated temple in the distance and excitedly patted Wang Zhenhuan's shoulder, pointing at it as she spoke.

Although he was slightly disappointed, he was still very happy to have a dilapidated temple to stay in in this desolate wilderness. He took three steps at a time and carried Lin Qingyan to the front of the temple.

He stood in front of the temple, looked it over carefully, then knocked on the door and called out loudly, "Is anyone home? It's getting late, and my sister and I have come to ask for the night's lodging. We hope the owner won't be offended!"

There was no one to answer from inside the temple, otherwise it wouldn't be in such a dilapidated state. His hand had just touched the door, but before he could even apply force, the door collapsed inwards with a thud, raising a cloud of dust.

"Pfft—cough cough—Brother, this temple looks like no one's been here in ages. There's a three-foot layer of dust on it!" Lin Qingyan said, patting off the dust.

"Hmm, this looks like a Dragon King Temple. Maybe this used to be a village where people prayed for good weather and a good harvest. It looks like it's been abandoned for a long time. Let's go in," Wang Zhenhuan said, looking the place up and down.

The two walked through the overgrown courtyard and arrived at the entrance of the main hall, just about to push the door open and go in.

Suddenly, a series of piercing footsteps sounded outside the courtyard!