Chapter 195 — Old Ground
The Sword Questions the Heavens · Page 4 of 5
Jin Pingyue pointed toward the cave mouth. "That is the Ancient Cave of Demon Suppression. When I tracked that man in black to this place, I saw with my own eyes the Beast Sovereign reborn from within that cave."
Ming Li nodded slightly, then looked around the cave. Apart from that bottomless dark opening, the cave was surrounded by sheer cliffs and jagged, hideous rock. Some ten-odd zhang above the cave, pressed close against the stone face, hung a thick layer of black cloud, drifting slowly in midair like water-mist. From its dense blackness one needed no asking to know it must be something violently poisonous. At a glance, an ordinary person would find no path anywhere—it was a place of death.
Drawing back his gaze, Ming Li pondered a moment. "Shall we go in?"
Jin Pingyue showed a hint of hesitation. She was silent a good while, but at last nodded. "Well—we've come all this way. How could we shrink back now? Let's go."
Ming Li glanced at her and saw something strange in her expression; her face was somewhat pale, plainly still somewhat wary of that mysterious cave. In truth, was she the only one? Even the little gray monkey on Ming Li's shoulder seemed to have changed its temper, sitting especially quiet.
As though sensing something, Jin Pingyue turned and looked at Ming Li, then suddenly smiled, revealing a row of lovely white teeth. "I'll be fine," she said with a smile. "Let's go."
Ming Li nodded and went first. Jin Pingyue followed behind him as they walked slowly toward the Ancient Cave of Demon Suppression.
The sound of footsteps on the hard, scorched black rock was swiftly drowned in the ceaseless howling of the evil wind. The closer they came to the cave mouth, the fiercer the biting wind grew, and the colder the sinister chill it carried.
By now both had realized that the source of the biting evil wind sweeping the whole mountain was, astonishingly, blowing out from that ancient cave.
The closer they came to the opening, the dimmer the light around them seemed to grow. More and more of the radiance was blotted out by the black cloud above the cave mouth, as though such a place would not permit light to enter.
And the stone statue that stood at the deep cave's mouth, facing into its depths, at last gradually came clear before their eyes.
The stretch of road was not truly long, yet to the two of them it seemed they had walked a very, very long time. When at last they stood at the mouth of the Ancient Cave of Demon Suppression, the sky had gone completely dark; the sunlight that had been warm upon them not long before had vanished entirely above the black cloud.
Ming Li slowly came around to the cave mouth and stood before the stone statue of the woman.
Dim light fell upon her.
The wind and frost of countless ages had slowly carved the first soft, beautiful smoothness into roughness. Amid the shifting years of seas turned to mulberry fields, how many pairs of eyes had gazed thus, faint and quiet, upon your face.
Time flows on like water in a great river, never pausing for even half a moment. The first stirrings of the heart, the first memories, those countless threads once so deeply graven in the heart—in the end, it seems, they must all be forgotten.
Leaving only a shred or two lingering in legend, spoken of carelessly by later generations after long ages have passed.
Your former beauty, your former glory—before time, they scatter like dust in the wind.
The cold wind swept past the collar and struck the body. A gaze fixed through ten thousand years—perhaps, in the end, it cannot compare to a single moment's regret!
A soft hand patted his shoulder gently; the monkey Little Gray's chittering rose at his ear. Ming Li's body gave a slight shudder; he abruptly stepped back, then came to himself—unwittingly, while gazing at this stone statue of the young woman, he had fallen into a trance.