"Already, is it time to leave?"

She stood in the courtyard, crying silently, asking silently again and again with the shape of her mouth.

Her eyes were closed, still in her dreams.

But there was so much sadness hidden in her slender body, so big that it seemed to fill the whole world.

In the night sky, which she could not see, two figures that were so dim that only fluorescent were left landed beside her, and a figure hugged her tightly.

"Poor child, this world is too cruel for you. ”

As if feeling that hug, Bai Qiaoqiao leaned into that familiar embrace, still crying, and she asked softly.

"Already, is it time to leave?"

The two figures were silent, speechless.

The night is over.

Jojo woke up from her dream in bed, and she stared out the window at the quiet dawn, for a long time, for a long time.

She got up and opened the door and walked out into the courtyard, where the home was still familiar.

"Girl, hurry up and go to the school after eating. ”

Uncle was still smoking a cigarette stick at the door as usual, and when he heard her out of the room, he turned around and pointed to the steaming white porridge on the table.

Bai Qiaoqiao stood at the door, and she looked deeply at the middle-aged man at the door, who was thin and often silent.

"Good. She replied softly, as she had done many mornings over the past sixteen years.

She finished breakfast as usual, said goodbye to the familiar middle-aged couple as usual, took her book bag as usual, and embarked on the familiar road.

The familiar road, in fact, is not only the road to the school, there is a road, maybe not as many times as the school, but it is also deeply engraved in her heart.

Close, close.

This is the Qingxi who met him for the first time, and it is also the Qingxi who spent many quiet afternoons with him.

Jojo stopped and looked at the beautiful stream that was still flowing smoothly not far away.

When I first saw him, I was actually very scared in my heart, he was staring at the magical boy walking by again and again in the window, like his friend in another world.

But one day, this magical boy broke the barriers of the world, landed beside him at once, and stretched out his hand to her like a dream.

It's like a dream, because it's too beautiful, so I'm always afraid of waking up from a dream, I'm afraid of a dream.

Jojo continued on the familiar path and ascended the mountain.

That must be the hill he carried on his back.

Over there, they had rested together under a tree.

Over there, the boy had told him about his fear of snakes, and it was around that time that they met the terrible white tiger.

As Jojo walked down that road, the images of the distant years in her mind suddenly came flooding back, even she didn't know it, and those images remained deep in her heart.

There were more and more thorns on the road, and Jojo's march became more and more difficult, and she put down the book bag on her shoulders and trudged through the mountains.

The sharp grass cut through her palms, leaving criss-crossing scars on her soft and slender palms, and her knees were broken by the hard rocks, leaving fine pieces of red blood on the rocks

Her steps had stopped, but she had not changed the direction she had been moving forward.

By the time they had fallen into the rushing stream six years earlier, Jojo's white dress was covered in dust and had been cut in multiple places. White cheeks with dust and deep tiredness.

But she made it this anyway. She didn't remember how to walk this road because she was in a coma on the way here six years ago, but then Minke took her back again.

Compared to the green stream in the town, the water is fierce and unpredictable, and even in the rainy winter, the water still seems turbulent.

Jojo stared at the stream in front of him, his eyes weak and stubborn.

.......

After Ye Mingke Tianming woke up, he kept holding a wooden sword that was light compared to a firewood knife, gesturing at a huge mountain rock moved from the yard, practicing the trick taught by Uncle Jian.

But every time he swung the wooden sword as if he had found a feeling, the wooden sword that slashed at the rocks broke without accident.

It's easy to remake a wooden sword, but for Ye Mingke, who has already completed the goal of a thousand pieces of wood, it is very simple to re-chop a wooden sword.

In the process of meditating, pondering, comparing and drawing the sword again and again, a morning passed quickly.

Ye Mingke went to the bamboo hut to call his uncle after making lunch, and found that his uncle was striking iron, and the things he created this time were very strange, not swords, nor firewood knives or other iron tools that the townspeople would use.

"Uncle, what are you going to hit? What is this?" Ye Mingke said curiously as he stared at the strange thing in the flames.

"A sword case that can be used to hide swords. ”

Uncle stopped the hammer in his hand and turned his head to look at Ye Mingke, his eyelids drooping slightly.

"I originally wanted to give you a sword, but I thought about it for many, many years, but I still couldn't hit your sword. ”

"I've always wanted to have a real sword, super handsome!"

Ye Mingke's eyes lit up when he heard the sword, but he soon noticed that his uncle's slightly drooping eyelids hid a loneliness that he didn't understand very well, so he hurriedly turned to smile instead.

"Actually, I can use any sword. But the sword box is actually pretty cool! Thank you, uncle. ”

"This sword case can help you find your own sword. Remember, you have to find your own sword, and no matter what others think your sword should be, only you can decide what your sword is. ”

"Well, uncle, I remember. Ye Mingke, who felt the solemnity in his uncle's tone, nodded seriously.

"It will take a while for the sword box to be ready, and I will give it to you later. Let's eat. ”

Uncle Jian shook his wheelchair and drove out of the door, froze at the door again, and turned back to Ye Mingke.

"If one day you go out of town and come across the method of cultivation, remember, you must not learn a technique called the Six Paths. Even if everyone else is learning. ”

"Why?" Ye Mingke asked puzzled.

"Because...... It has a pair of eyes on its back. Uncle Jian suddenly looked up at the still gloomy sky outside the door, and said another strange word.

"Eyes, what does this mean?" Ye Mingke tilted his head slightly and thought, Uncle has been saying more and more strange words recently.

And uncle, it seems to have become a lot gentler.

The two were having lunch in the courtyard, and halfway through the meal, Tao Yao called Ming Ke's name outside the door.

Ye Mingke took the meal to the door and saw Tao Yao's face with a slightly anxious look.

"Qiaoqiao didn't come to school this morning, I don't know if I'm sick?"

"That silly girl, it can't be that night with a cold, right?"

Ye Mingke frowned slightly.

"I'll ...... later"

He wanted to directly say that he would go to Qiao Qiao's house to see her after eating, but halfway through speaking, he remembered his tense cultivation arrangements after lunch, as well as the words he had promised his uncle yesterday that he would cultivate diligently, and his uncle's recent attitude towards his own cultivation.

He hesitated a little, after all, nothing should happen to Jojo.

"You go to Qiaoqiao's house to see her first, I'll see if I can find time to go over this afternoon. You remember to tell me about Jojo as soon as possible. ”

"Uh-huh. Tao Yao nodded and left first.

Ye Mingke sat at the door, letting go of the palm he was clenching at some point, feeling his heartbeat a little unnaturally faster, and his heart was beating uneasily.

But there's no reason for this, it's just that I care too much about that girl.

He hesitated for a while, and after eating, he still chose to walk to the sacred mountain behind the bamboo hut first.

Not long after he left, Tao Yao, who was full of urgency, took hurried steps, stepped through the tranquility of the streets of the town, and rushed to the door of Ye Mingke's courtyard.

"Jojo is missing!"

He braced his knees with his hands, gasping violently, muttering a repetition in his mouth.

......

Outside the town, in the forbidden sacred mountain.

Five years don't seem to have changed the dilapidated temple that stands silently in the dense mountain forest.

The moss on the walls was still green, the huge incense burner that had been dumped was still in place, and even the dust that floated and sank in the sky cast by the hole in the temple roof also drew a similar trajectory.

In the long years, it has lived a quiet life that has not changed for thousands of years.

But the people of the world, in the same five years, have gone through complicated world events, and have inadvertently changed their appearance.

After going through hardships, tiredness, dust, and even fear of life and death, Jojo finally stepped into this temple again.

This place hides the most terrifying memories and deepest nightmares of her life, because it also hides her warmest and most peaceful times.

The warm light of the fire in the rain, and the beautiful mist of the water boiling above the fire, the best day of her life, the most beautiful joy.

Jojo walked past the overturned incense burner, stepped over the overgrown weeds, and walked into the back of the temple, where the idol was enshrined.

She looked up.

The light of heaven poured from the roof of the temple, shining on the statue of the god sitting high in the temple and the girl looking humbly.

The heavenly light shone on the girl's face, reflecting the sadness, fear, weakness and strength of that beautiful cheek.

And the statue of the god shrouded in the heavenly light still had a cynical face that did not look like a god, but the eyes that looked at the girl were compassionate.

"Brother Mountain God. ”

Bai Qiaoqiao folded his palms and looked up at the idol reverently, his hazy eyes filled with hope.

"Brother Mountain God, Jojo doesn't know which ones were nightmares and which ones were real that night, but Jojo believes in your existence. ”

"That time it was Brother Mountain God who saved Qiao Qiao and Ming Ke. ”

"Jojo wants to ask Brother God to save us again! Jojo is willing to do anything about it. ”

Jojo's bright eyes looked up at the statue like a drowning man trying to grasp the last hand in front of him.

But the idol still looked at her silently, his eyes compassionate.

The empty temple was silent, and the drifting dust rose and fell silently in the skylight, as if it was struggling in the impermanent world.

The gods were silent.