After enough time had passed in which no more sound could be heard, Ji Yuan suddenly lost his strength and leaned against the mountain god’s statue, sweat flowing freely.
He felt like he had expended enough energy to run several rounds of a 5-K cross-country marathon. Now, Ji Yuan barely had the strength to move a finger, gasping for air against the mountain god statue like a wheezing dog.
Zhang Shilin and others were a little overwhelmed. Initially, they were glad to still be alive, but they gradually started to panic.
“Master, are you all right?”
“Water, water, water! Quick, get some water for the master!”
Zhang Shilin and the group of merchants hurried about. One grabbed a towel, another grabbed a bamboo cup. Someone began using clothes to fan Ji Yuan.
“Here’s the water, here’s the water, Master, please drink!”
Zhang Shilin originally wanted to hand the bamboo tube to Ji Yuan, but found that the man was gasping for air and didn’t raise his hand, so he carefully set the bamboo tube against Ji Yuan’s mouth and tilted it.
After several gulps of water, Ji Yuan had drank enough. Zhang Shilin, however, was still too nervous and didn’t take the cup back. Ji Yuan’s mouth was now blocked by a bamboo tube, and his hands and feet were too weak to lift.
‘Come on, are you blind?’
Ji Yuan had no choice but to hold his breath and close his mouth. When Zhang Shilin saw water dribbling out the side, he realized that the master didn’t want to drink anymore, and hurriedly removed the bamboo tube.
Ji Yuan let out a long breath, slowly calming down.
Zhang Shilin and the other merchants1 also breathed a sigh of relief. Suddenly remembering something, Zhang Shilin knelt directly in front of Ji Yuan.
When other merchants saw his actions, they followed suit.
“Master, thank you for saving our lives. I kowtow to you, I kowtow to you!”2
“Thank you, Master for saving us!”
The remaining eight traveling merchants kowtowed loudly. They were not pretending.
The kowtowing made Ji Yuan flustered. It was embarrassing have others bow so low to him at his young age, let alone having it be done by so many people.
“Get up quickly, stop kowtowing, please do not blame me for not being able to save Wang Dong and the others…”
Ji Yuan said from the heart. In his past life, he had seen many incidents where excessive aid caused enmity and grievances.3 Instead of letting the merchants weigh the variables in their hearts, it was better to identify what was going to change at the moment.
Sure enough, the merchants were stunned at his words, glancing at each other, and the atmosphere turned a little awkward.
They might not have the courage to admit it, but that didn’t mean that hadn’t thought of it. In fact, even Zhang Shilin thought that if the master had taken action earlier, Wang Dong and Jin Shunfu might not have died. Thɪs chapter is updatᴇd by novel⦿fire.net
The silence of the merchants proved Ji Yuan’s guess to be true. He wasn’t Huang Laoxie, who went out of his way even to his own detriment.4 He didn’t need to be recognized or remembered for his good deeds, but at the same time he did not want to be misunderstood.
Ji Yuan’s thoughts continued further. What if some of these people kept remembering and eventually became resentful? What if their grudge spread to the families of the deceased? Perhaps they would shift the blame from the tiger onto Ji Yuan himself.
“It’s not that I didn’t want to save those four people earlier. I was simply incapable of doing anything. You heard what the tiger spirit said. How could it be easy to overturn one’s death and change it to life? When the ghost came, I was at a critical moment, and my entire body couldn’t move!”
Anyway, he told one lie, it was easy to tell another, so Ji Yuan just continued to make up nonsense, crafting a story to make it sound more serious.
“In order to save you, I did not hesitate to expend my own skills to break out of the predicament. Unfortunately those four people had already left. I was lucky to be able to save you in this state!”
His words were very convincing, particulary when combined with Ji Yuan’s current appearance. Zhang Shilin and others felt ashamed.
“Hey, be more careful from now on. It’s definitely not normal to meet a handsome scholar or beautiful woman in the middle of the woods.”
Ji Yuan’s sincere words were not only meant to remind the merchants, but also to remind himself.
“Thank you for your advice, thank you for your advice!”
“Master, are you hungry? We still have some food.”
“Please don’t call me Master, just call me Sir…”
Ji Yuan felt that the word “Master” was regarded like a kind of magical weapon. The title the tiger spirit, Lu Shan Jun, had used to refer to him seemed more appropriate.
As for food, although he knew he was weak at the moment, he really had no appetite.
That night, even though the group knew that the danger had passed, no one dared to sleep except Ji Yuan, who really was too tired. He swore that he would just lie down and take a short rest, but within seconds he fell asleep.
At dawn the next day, the merchants, who had been in trembling in fear all night long, could not sit still for a moment longer, and they all got up and prepared to leave.
Zhang Shilin and others took out all of the belongings from the baskets of the other four people, and placed them in their own bags. The empty baskets were then placed under their own backpacks.
“Hey… Xiao Dong is gone, how do I break the news to Uncle Wang…”
“Yes, and Lao Jin has two kids… Now… hey…”
“Liu Quan and Li Gui hadn’t even gotten married yet, they were so young…”
“Let’s help their families out more in the future!”
“Yeah, that’s the only thing we can do…”
The merchants sighed. At the dawn, their fears had eased, and the atmosphere had turned sad.
Zhang Shilin walked around to the back of the the statue of the mountain god. The expert was still soundly sleeping. He was covered with a robe and a raincoat, which Zhang Shilin and the others had placed on him after Ji Yuan fell asleep.
As expected of a master: although no one dared to sleep last night, even holding back from relieving themselves outside, he was fearless enough to sleep soundly.
“Master, er… Mr. Ji, we are leaving. What might your plans be? Sir?”
Ji Yuan was very tired, and only vaguely heard someone calling him.
“Sir, we are leaving. Do you have any requests? Sir…”
“Hey… don’t bother me… so annoying…”
In his sleep, Ji Yuan rubbed an itch on his face with one hand, and waved like he was swatting a fly with the other.
“Shilin, don’t disturb Mr. Ji’s rest!”
“Yeah, Zhang Tou, Sir has been living here for a month! Let’s go down the mountain as soon as possible!”
“Brother Shilin, the gentleman has already said to leave, let’s go!”
Zhang Shilin originally wanted to say goodbye in person, perhaps to request some kind of protective amulet or something, but now he didn’t dare to disturb him any more.
After hesitating for a while, he took out a bag of dry biscuits, steamed buns and a bamboo tube filled with water, and carefully placed them next to the statue of the mountain god.
“Let’s kowtow to Mr. Ji before we leave!”
The group of traveling merchants, along with Zhang Shilin, gathered around the side of the mountain temple, knelt down, and kowtowed twice towards the sleeping Ji Yuan.
“Dong, dong, dong, dong…”
Ji Yuan rolled around and cursed.
“Oh no, Mr. Ji is angry! Hurry up, hurry up!”
“Shh, keep your voice down!”
The traveling merchants hurriedly put their bags on their backs and left the mountain temple, the site of so many recent shocking events. Secretly, they all decided in their hearts that they would never take this road on Niu Kui Mountain ever again.
Three to four hours after sunrise,5 Ji Yuan woke up inside the temple and stretched.
“Hooh… I slept… so well!”
His surroundings seemed a little too quiet. Ji Yuan rubbed his eyes and looked around. Although his vision was very blurry, he could see that it was dawn, but he felt that something was wrong.
Hey! Where are the people? Where has everyone gone?
Dammit!6 Zhang Shilin, may you suffer a thousand blows! This damn guy left me behind!
T/n: We now have a NovelUpdates page!!! Wooo!!!