Nightfall

Translator: Larbre Studio Editor: Larbre Studio

Sangsang was still calm, arrogant, and indifferent as she used to be when they were on Peach Mountain or touring around the human world. It seemed she was not sensational at all. But actually she was pretty restless because she knew what the Abbey Dean was planning.

Her relation with Taoism was fairly complicated. She was their god, and the guardian they chose for the human world. Since they had decided to destroy her, it meant that the human world would abandon her too.

She was weakening and no longer unkillable. For the first time she realized the misery and vulnerability of life, and started feeling afraid and worried, which all turned into sadness now. Therefore she was shedding tears emotionlessly.

Fortunately, although it was still dark in the night, there was at least a lamp that brought them some light. Likewise, although the human world meant nothing but darkness to her now, he was an exception.

He was the only one she trusted. It was because he was her man. She made him lots of tea and spend countless years with him. They went through life and death again and again until they could no longer be parted.

Sangsang leaned on his arms with her eyes closed. She seemed tired, but the indifferent look was already replaced by relief. Ever since the day she failed to return to the Divine Kingdom, she had for the first time found a moment of peace.

Ning Que cuddled her from behind and said, “Let’s go back to Chang’an. No one can hurt you. Don’t forget you are Haotian. You treated me so cruel previously. How could you become so intimidated now?”

Sangsang did not respond to his proposal of going back to Chang’an. Instead she said, “I’m no longer almighty. Therefore I have to be cautious. As for you… I’m not punishing you for such disrespectful behavior. You should be grateful.”

Upon hearing these words, Ning Que caressed her from the neck to the breasts and said, “You are my wife. We could play courtesy in front of others. But right now we are on the bed.”

Sangsang suddenly opened her eyes. Some anger flashed in her starry bright eyes, but disappeared immediately. If she was becoming a real human being, his behavior was indeed nothing inappropriate.

But she could not help frowning when the hand on her breast became hotter and more restless. She could never get used to this, yet had no idea how she should react.

They had been caressing a lot throughout her memories in the human world. When they were still very young, when they were in the Buddha’s chessboard, they had intimate relations for countless times. But she still found it weird. She was considering whether she should keep pretending indifferent or dispel the world she created and throw him into the Snow Sea to sober himself.

Somehow she did nothing. In order to get rid of the discomfort and irritation in her divine heart, she picked a serious topic.

“The Abbey Dean wants to kill me,” she said emotionlessly.

As she wished, Ning Que’s hand paused on her chest upon hearing the words. A moment later, he said from behind her ears,

“You’re sure?”

“I know everyone’s past, and future.”

“In a closed world, as long as you know all the preconditions and rules, and could make flawless calculations, you will get the precise results. I get it.”

She knew that was the way of talking in the world where Ning Que came from. She had gotten used to it after so many years. Therefore instead of questioning she simply repeated, “So the Abbey Dean wants to kill me.”

It was a typical Haotian’s logic, or manifestation. The Bright Volume of The Tomes of Arcane was a demonstration of such manifestation. It was a declaration of her will to the entire human world.

Ning Que said after a pause, “My Brothers and Sisters and I already vaguely got his plan. But we were not sure. Because we could not understand what he was thinking about.”

Sangsang said nothing but obviously she had prepared well for it.

“I’ve always had a question. Since you know the future, like it is written in the Bright Volume of The Tomes of Arcane, you knew the Headmaster would become the moon, the Buddha would conceal himself in the peak, and the Abbey Dean would seek for alternatives, why did you come to the human world after all? You could not defeat the Headmaster. Instead you weakened and even endangered yourself.” Ning Que cuddled her and asked gently.

Sangsang said, “I cannot tell my own future. The future I saw in the past was too vague to be true. Because there were variables.”

“What variables?”

“Someone like your Headmaster who was above all rules, was the variable.”

“It sounds mighty.”

“You are also a variable.”

“Why”

“Because you are an outsider.”

…

…

They stayed quiet for a while inside the cottage while the snow storm roared outside.

Sangsang was right. Actually when Li Qingshan, the national master of Tang tried to predict the future at the cost of his own longevity many years ago, he already saw Ning Que’s distinctiveness. He was never a part of this world.

He came from another world, hence he was an outsider. Haotian could not predict him. Nor could the Headmaster or the Abbey Dean.

Ning Que kept quiet for a long while. He felt like he was referred to as a kind of messenger coming for some special mission – to bring light or darkness.

Either way, it was too depressing. It sounded nothing like a happy or satisfying ending for his journey of thousands of miles in pursuit of his wife. To carry out a pleasant chat on the night of their reunion, he had to switch the topic again.

“When is the due date?” he stroke on her swollen belly and asked attentively.

Sangsang answered briefly, “No idea.”

He was stunned. He wondered, Don’t you even know when was your last period? But he then realized that his wife was not a human being. It was indeed hard to tell.

It took ten months for an ordinary woman to conceive. If that was also the case for Sangsang, he would definitely have been cuckolded.

He tried to forget about the non-sense and raised another equally serious question. “A boy or a girl?”

“Do you want a boy or a girl?” Sangsang did not turn to him, but her eyes brightened up a bit. Throughout her lonely days in the freezing north, she had been thinking a lot about it. Perhaps she did not realize that she was indeed acting like a real human being now.

“Either is good.” Ning Que gave it a second thought and said, “Well I might be more experienced with raising a girl.”

The experience he referred to was how he raised up Sangsang in the past.

Sangsang knew what he meant. But she answered, “I have no idea.”

Ning Que was a bit annoyed and complained, “How could you know nothing about it?”

An ordinary pregnant woman should know her due date, but could not tell the gender without the help of a doctor. But Sangsang was no ordinary woman, which meant she should know what they could not know.

Shouldn’t Haotian know everything?

“Because I don’t want to know.” Sangsang lowered her voice and pretended to be angry, or piqued.

She was still that plump woman, even more so since she got pregnant. But right now she was lying in his arms and acting like a little girl. And he found it cute.

Ning Que sensed some jealousy in her manner… just like when she ran away from their home in Chang’an many years ago. But this time she was jealous of.. the child.

No matter what she was jealous of, making her jealous was the most exciting accomplishment in his life. So he laughed heartily and cuddled her even tighter, but of course he was careful enough not to press on her belly.

The two of them lay quietly on the bed.

The stone statue lay quietly on the table.

The big black horse and the indigo lion rested quietly at a corner.

After a short while, the dawn came despite the darkness.

Ning Que got up and started packing. He would take her home.

Sangsang looked at him quietly, without echoing his preparation.

When finished packing Ning Que came to her and said, “Don’t you try to play by not giving a response to me. Like it or not, you are coming with me.” Upon those words he held her up right away.

The big black horse dashed toward them attentively and bended for Sangsang to get up. Then it rubbed its nose on her legs to show affection.

Sangsang sat high on the horse. She looked down at Ning Que and said, “Do you think I can’t punish you?”

Ning Que leaped onto the horse, sliding his arms around her waist to hold the reins and whispered in a smile. “I know you can, but you won’t.”

The big black horse lowered his head further as it found the words extremely disgusting.

The indigo lion stared at Sangsang in tears. It wondered how its almighty master ended up like this.

…

…

The couple rode on the big black horse, left the snow fields in the roaring storm and headed to the south. The indigo lion-dog run cheerfully behind them.

Ning Que take the route via the Snow Sea. The snow was at least one meter thick on the frozen sea. Although it was strong and tall, the big black horse walked with great efforts on the sea and wondered why he chose to go this way.

If someone could take a look from high above, he would see that they left a very thin but distinctive trace on the surface of the Snow Sea. It seemed tiny in the vast snow fields, but was never covered by the roaring snow. It was weird and hard to how it was maintained.

Sangsang sat in front of him and looked from the sky to the ground. She stared at the thin track on the Snow Sea that could not be erased by the storm, and said nothing.

Ning Que knew what she sensed and said, “It’s just some preparation.”

All of a sudden a bubble appeared in front of Sangsang. It was a smooth and crystal bubble. The bubble was very thin and seemed vulnerable. It kept shivering in the roaring snow storm but was never blown.

There were two extremely tiny cracks as if the bubble would break in the next moment. The two cracks seemed like the two strokes that made up the Chinese character people. The cracks were tiny. If the thickness of the bubble was one thousandth of a hair, the depth of the cracks was merely one thousandth of the bubble. No ordinary human being could have seen it.

But Ning Que was not ordinary. He saw it and turned solemn. He realized that if the bubble would be broken, the world would be destroyed too.

Sangsang asked, “Are you able to write that talisman now?”

Ning Que said, “No.”

Sangsang kept quiet for a long while, then said, “You should let me know before you can.”

…