Kyushu · Endless Nagato

Chapter 3
Yu Zetai waited until the rivers were far away before starting to climb up.Unexpectedly, the rock he used to climb down was already loose, unable to bear his weight, and collapsed with a bang.Yu Zetai's body suddenly lost his balance and rolled down the slope like a rubber ball.His head hit a hard object, whether it was a rock or something else, and he passed out.

After waking up, the rain had stopped and the sky had already become pitch black.Yu Zetai touched himself up and down—although he was bruised all over from the fall, he was still alive at last.He looked around and felt that with his current physical strength, it was impossible to climb up the same path, so he could only continue to look for life.Like a wounded beast, he staggered forward on mud, gravel and weeds, full of fear of the unknown ahead.

I don't know how long he walked, but he still didn't see a little bit of fire in his vision. He seemed to have broken into a completely uninhabited wilderness.There is nothing here but rain, cold and hunger.Finally, he couldn't walk anymore, leaning against a big tree and panting heavily.Suddenly, he heard a burst of footsteps coming from ahead, uniform, neither fast nor slow.The footsteps were approaching him.

His first reaction was ecstasy, but then he thought: What if this is another group of rivers?Although he had thought more than once that "it might be better to let Heluo kill him", but when the possible danger was approaching, the instinct to survive still prompted him to struggle.With the last of his strength, he climbed up the tree and looked down through the gaps in the branches and leaves.

There was almost no light at night in the barren mountain, and the group of people who came had no torches, and they were always walking in the darkness where they couldn't see their fingers.Yu Zetai is used to robbing at night, but he has trained his eyesight very well. He can tell at a glance that these people are human beings like him, there are about twenty or thirty people.But he still didn't dare to go down hastily, walking in the deep mountains without lighting a torch in the middle of the night, I'm afraid it wouldn't be a good thing.Yu Zetai knows the rules of the Tao very well, and he should pretend not to see what he shouldn't see, otherwise he will be killed if he is not careful.

But this group of people stopped right in front of him, making him so nervous that he covered his mouth and nose with his hands, lest the sound of breathing be heard.They seemed to have selected a relatively soft land in front of the big tree, and began to dig the soil.Yu Zetai was confused.No matter how soft the rain-soaked mud is, it will still be a very difficult job to dig it with your hands. Could it be that a group of warriors practicing hard skills such as iron palms are practicing here?
He was thinking wildly, watching this group of sudden strangers use their flesh and blood as a shovel intently.On such a desolate rainy night, in such a Jedi, these inexplicable people are like ghosts and ghosts, making people shudder.Yu Zetai forgot the pain and hunger on his body for a moment, and stared at them engrossed.

Although this group of people didn't have any tools at hand, they worked tirelessly one by one, let alone pain, and slowly dug a big hole.The rain did not show any signs of weakening, but it was getting bigger and bigger. A bolt of lightning pierced the sky, instantly illuminating everything on the ground like daylight. With the help of the light of the lightning, Yu Zetai finally saw clearly the clothes of the group of people.He froze.

This group of people are all wearing thin coarse clothes, and only straw sandals with exposed toes on their feet.What's more, they all had belts made of coarse linen around their waists.Such a belt is usually a symbol, representing an ancient sect with a long history.

Nagato Church.

These weird people who appeared in the barren hills in the middle of the night turned out to be a group of Nagato monks.

Some common sense he knew about the Nagato Order quickly flashed in Yu Zetai's mind.This is a religious organization that has been passed down for thousands of years, and its believers are called Nagato monks or Nagato monks.They hide their clothes and grass shoes, usually stay away from the downtown, and cultivate themselves through hard life and meditation, in order to seek the true meaning and meaning of life.They have a wealth of knowledge and master various superb skills, but they never use these knowledge and skills to make money, but generously teach them to those who need them.

Thinking of this, Yu Zetai breathed a sigh of relief.Among the ancient sects or organizations in Kyushu, no matter Tianqi or Chenyue, they will bring bloody associations, but Nagato will not.They are gentle and indifferent to the world. They have no threat to the state power or ordinary people's livelihood. On the contrary, they can benefit the poor people at the bottom.They have never suffered any form of killing or attack in history, which also shows their good reputation.Meeting such a group of people is not unlucky, but lucky, because the head monks all have a compassionate heart to help others, and they can definitely provide themselves with wound medicine and water for free.

As for what they are doing now, it is probably some kind of penance, right?Then leave them alone, Yu Zetai thought.He waited patiently, watching the group of long monks finally dug the big hole in the ground, then walked to the front of the big hole, stood in a row with their backs to the hole, only one person stood in front of the queue facing them, It's like a platoon of soldiers and their commander.During the whole process, he didn't hear a word from the long door monks, as if they were all just dumb.

What are they going to do?Just when this question arose in Yu Zetai's mind again, a scene that horrified him happened.The long-door monk standing in front of the queue raised his arm and punched a companion heavily. Yu Zetai had no doubt that he heard the sound of ribs breaking.The beaten Nagato monk didn't even groan, and fell stiffly backwards into the pit, his body colliding with the bottom of the pit with a heavy blunt sound.The monk who threw his fist did not stop at all, and punched No.2 companion into the deep pit with another punch, followed by the third and fourth...

This pit is a tomb!Yu Zetai desperately suppressed his desire to scream, his whole body trembling like chaff.Have these monks gone crazy?He thought in horror, on such a cold rainy night, digging his own tomb in the depths of Beimang Mountain, and then allowing his companions to beat him to death and bury him in the tomb, even a lunatic would not be able to do such a thing what!
The long door monk who made the shot quickly drove all his companions into the deep pit alive.Then he started filling it with soil until he buried everyone.He did this patiently and meticulously until the ground was completely leveled and no trace could be seen.Then he turned around and walked back steadily along the way he came, as if nothing happened just now.The ground was still flat, there was still no sound of people around, and the footprints on the ground were gradually washed away by the rain.

——It was as if those long-door monks had never been here before, and everything was just a dream, an inexplicable nightmare.

Yu Zetai waited until the head monk was gone before he dared to climb down the tree. His mind was still in a trance, and it was difficult for him to recover from the horrible scene he saw just now.However, the mental trance and physical hunger and exhaustion made his limbs no longer flexible. He had just climbed two steps down when he stepped on the ground and fell down.

When he fell heavily to the ground, he clearly heard the sound of his leg bones breaking, which was almost exactly the same as when the ribs of those long monks were broken.He understood that he probably would never be able to get out of this mountain again.

[-]. The Emperor's Dream

In April of the 17th year of Hongjing, Apocalypse City.

Emperor Hongjing had a dream.In the dream, he returned to the 26th year of Shengde, which was the first year of Hongjing, back to the moment when his father died and he became the throne.In the dream, the father's body actually stopped on the Golden Luan Hall, and sat upright on the dragon chair, as if he was alive.The main hall was bustling like a market in Tianqi City, countless people who couldn't see their faces walked through it, making all kinds of noisy sounds.

Shouldn't the current emperor be me?Why let a dead man sit on it?He looked around in a daze, and no one around him paid attention to him, as if he didn't exist at all.He wanted to get angry, and wanted to summon his courtiers and guards, but found that no matter how much he opened his mouth, he couldn't make a sound.

What's wrong with me?The emperor felt extremely terrified.From this strange vantage point, there was only one face he felt close to, and that was his father, the recently deceased Emperor Shengde.Even though he knew his father was dead, he ran over involuntarily.

The father didn't speak, which was normal, because the father was already a dead man.But what is strange is that the father's eyes are open, and the two eyes are staring at him with dignity.The emperor was afraid of being stared at by his father since he was a child. At this moment, he only felt hairy all over his body, and his legs began to go weak.

Is there anything you want to say to me, father?The emperor wanted to ask this question, but he still couldn't open his mouth. He felt that besides the majesty, there was also a trace of sadness and sorrow hidden in his father's eyes. It seemed that there was some complicated meaning, as if he had something to say to him.

But in the end, my father still didn't say anything.His eyelids closed slowly, and blue smoke slowly rose from the top of his head. In a moment, Emperor Shengde's body began to burn fiercely. The flames ejected from his body were as high as several feet, and in an instant, the entire Taiqing Palace was destroyed. lit.

"Come on! Put out the fire!" The emperor was finally able to make a sound.He shouted with all his strength, but none of the people who came in and out answered him.Instead, they all gathered in the center of the hall and stepped into the flames.Soon, the Taiqing Palace became a sea of ​​flames, and people silently let the fire devour their bodies until they were reduced to ashes.

Emperor Shengde had been burned to the point where only a scorched skeleton remained.But suddenly, the skeleton stood up!The former emperor, who had turned into dry bones, stood up from the fire and walked towards his son step by step.

(End of this chapter)