When I fell off my horse, the Valan soldiers around me were laughing at me loudly.

Because I started vomiting on the horse's back, on the top of the horse's neck. The horse's restless hind legs stood up, as if terrified of what I was spitting out. These were all things I had barely eaten in the morning: half a piece of hard bread and a small cut of meat, and a few sips of the Saland's wine made from coconuts and worm eggs. I wouldn't have drunk this wine, it had a strange taste, but the constant thirst made me take a soldier's sac and pour myself a few sips.

I started vomiting since the morning and the soldiers kept saying it was proof that I couldn't drink. When I fell off my horse, they laughed at me for being a drunkard. The voices of these people seemed to come from the sky, I lay on the ground and didn't want to get up, my body was sweaty, I don't know why I suddenly had an inexplicable feeling, I really wanted to lie here, wait for the wind to dry all the sweat on my body, wait for the uncomfortable strength to completely pass and get up again.

The Valan soldiers around me told me to get up and not lie on the ground and play dead. My arms were as weak as sheepskin, and I couldn't support my body. Someone pulled my hair and patted me in the face, "Victor, you fell?" ”

I didn't know who it was, so I just nodded.

At this point, I started vomiting again and started coughing after vomiting. The Valans dodged away, and needless to say, I knew this time was different: I vomited blood. This time, no food was spit out, and those things had already been vomited, only hot gastric juice and blood, and there were still blood stains on the side of his mouth after spitting up.

I was carried under a tree, and a passing soldier left his water for me. Soon after, Giovanni and his eunuch advisor came to my side.

"Little loach," said Giovanni, "I have heard that you slept too hard yesterday with a woman, and you can't ride a horse today." ”

I went to the Salander servants' rooms yesterday and asked them who those who were locked up in the chapel. The servants looked sad and frightened, and begged me not to ask. But when I endangered these people and threw them into the dungeon. A maid pulled me aside. She took off her clothes. I was surprised by the bare breasts, one because of the woman's boldness, and the second because of the black scar on the woman's chest.

"My lord, look at this ugly scar, which is left by the plague," said the woman. "Those people are just as sick as I am. I was locked up there for six days, and when I realized I wasn't dead, I knocked on the door and someone else let me out. When you burned down that house, it had been nine days since the last time it was opened. There can't be anyone alive. They were all sick, very sick. ”

I wanted to say that there were still living people inside, but I couldn't hold back the words.

"What's that?"

Pestilence.

I already knew in my heart that my initial thoughts of self-comfort had almost deceived me, but by this time, I had discovered to my horror that this disease was not something I could hope for, and that it could not be avoided by saying that I was strong and powerful.

She said a strange word in the Salander dialect.

"What do you mean?" I asked her.

"The Great Death." She said in rusty Wikibian words. "Very few people survived. Those who survive will also die some more later, and then '''"

"No one will survive in the end?"

"Yes." She said. "I survived, but I don't know why. My father and six brothers all died, one after the other. My husband and four children are also dead, all my children, each like a flower, the eldest will make naan, and the other three will take them to the market and sell them, all of them are not under ten years old, but they have all left me. The corpses were also burned by you, but I don't blame you, my lord, they are dead, I called them by name when I came out, one after another, but none of them answered'''"

The woman's Wikibian accent was strong, but I understood it.

"What did you do?" I asked her, "What did you eat?" What did you drink? That's why you survived? ”

"I pray." She thought for a moment and replied.

I almost wanted to beat her with a whip, and I felt as if a boatman had coldly sailed away when I was about to drown.

"What else?"

"Nothing, sir," she shook her head helplessly, "do you want me to put my clothes on?" Or take off a little more? ”

I was surprised why she said, "What do you mean?" ”

"My father, brother, and husband feed me, but now that they're dead, I'm going to feed myself," she said in a dry and cold tone, as if to say something completely unrelated to her, "three loaves of bread and a pinch of salt, and you can do whatever you want." She even laughed.

This woman must be a demon, and even the most dissolute Valan woman would not say such a thing. I turned my head and walked away, feeling her looking at me behind me, and I couldn't help but look back and ask her, "Are you thirsty?" ”

"Your Excellency?" Her numb face finally showed a little doubt.

"When you were sick, did you feel thirsty?"

"O Allah," she said in a presumptive elongated tone, as if sensing my fear, "I could have drunk almost the entire oasis at that time." ”

I stumbled back to the barracks, deliberately not wanting to drink water, as if not drinking water would prove that I was not sick. I found a blanket and hid in the corner of the room shivering.

When several of the Valan soldiers heard that I had gone to the house of 'those women' in Salander, they came to me with great interest and asked me why I had suddenly opened my mind. At that time I was in the same cold sweat as now, and the Valan soldiers thought that I had just experienced a career and was very frightened, so they all went to find the woman themselves and left me alone.

But now, even the most frivolous Valan soldier has to start thinking about the current situation.

Under the watchful eyes of several Valan soldiers, the eunuch unbuttoned my collar and lifted my sweaty sackcloth.

He stared at my chest and covered my clothes.

"Do you want water?" His eyes shone like a mouse.

"Yes." But we all know that he asked something else, "What's wrong?" ”

He said the same words as the woman. "You can look at your chest."

He reached out to help, but I opened it, and I laboriously lifted the blouse that I hadn't taken off for days, and saw some purple sores.

"What's going on?"

I looked up and asked him.

The soldiers passing by turned their heads one after another. Whisper. Varan soldiers laughing and laughing. The noisy and noisy Varan soldiers, who always laughed at me, just looked at me from afar, did not speak, and walked past me.

"You touch your armpits." When he realized that I didn't understand the word 'armpit,' he pointed to his armpit and said, "Touch it." ”

I felt the lump.

"That's enough." I said in frustration, feeling an irrepressible anger welling up, "I'm sick!" Don't ask anymore, I'm not a monkey! ”

He said presumptuously, "You will envy the monkey for the next few days, and the monkey will not get sick." ”

Giovanni did not speak. He pinched his chin and looked at the purple sores on my chest. He asked the man to talk to him.

They talked for several minutes, Giovanni kept asking questions, and the advisor kept answering.

When Giovanni returned, I plucked up my last hope, as if waiting in a dark well for a rope to save my life, "Prince! ”

"You can't follow us." Giovanni left me in the dark and covered the manhole, "I'll find you a farmhouse." Pay them to take care of you. ”

"Nope." I burst into tears and wondered how much water I had drunk. But it was as difficult as it was to shed tears, as if there was not a drop of water left in my body, "Don't leave me behind, I can still ride a horse." The Kugit were also sick, and they rode their horses well. Don't leave me behind. ”

Are you going to be kicked out of the way again?

"Please, Giovanni. I'm just sick and I'm going to get better, and yesterday I saw a woman and she's getting better. She told me a secret recipe that would cure me'''"

"If she had a secret recipe," said the eunuch, "she would become the richest woman in the world, and kings and sultans would kiss her toes, and handsome princes would swear to serve her." But there's no secret recipe, kid. ”

"Get out!" I said to this eunuch, "Who are you?" Are you a Valan? Why did you let people throw me away! ”

"Victor, Victor," Giovanni took a step back and said to me, "it's good for all of us. The Valans will no longer leave their warriors behind, but you will not be able to ride a horse anymore. Rest assured, the farmers around here are under my care, and you will stay with them until you recover. ”

Until recovery, or until death.

"Don't drive me away."

All of a sudden, all the things that came to me from waking up on the river to the present, being left behind, being sent as a hostage, being used to being used to all kinds of things, but this time it suddenly felt like I had been abandoned for the first time. Actually, I know why, this time is different from all previous abandonments: this one is abandoned, and you will almost certainly die.

"That's it." Giovanni said.

Resentment welled up from the bottom of my heart like a spring.

"One more thing for you, Vido," said Giovanni, "four Kugit died yesterday, and one of them was the merchant of ointment. I don't know if you're popular or what, he left all the ointment to you before he died. I folded them into gold coins and sewed them into this cloak. If you still use it, it's enough for you to find us with a horse,"

He threw me a cloak and turned away from me.

The Valan soldiers left me on the side of the road, and I heard the cavalry coming, the horses neighing, and the spearmen's spears like moving forests.

Then, all these things disappeared, and all sounds became the evening wind.

A couple of peasants arrived late, led by a Valan soldier, who carried me to the ox cart.

"Victor," his eyes were a little reluctant, "then, goodbye." ”

The ox cart carried me off the road.

The Varan soldier stood at the intersection and sang goodbye to me.

“

The wind blows in my chest, and a spring flows from my mouth;

It was raining in my hut, and my bed was covered with moss;

There was fire burning in my eyes, and my tongue was spitting out the trees;

My hearth is full of embers, and the blade of my sword is covered with blood scabs;

``````”

This is the song that leads the Heroic Spirit to the temple.