Chapter 1: He Crawled Back
The putrefactive odor of dead bodies made one sick with nausea. The flies and maggots were all over the pit. At the bottom of the pit, there was a man, sitting on a pile of rotting corpses, covered in blood and with strangely bent legs. He was completely incapable of moving.
The nails of his hands were broken, and the blood mixed with the mud from the wall of the pit, making them more like the hands of a fiend.
His long hair was soiled and knotted, and his forehead was covered by the fringe of his brow. But these could not hide the sad and painful eyes, which were brighter than any star in the sky. These bright eyes burned with the flames of anguish and despair, and the blood gushed from them.
“Ha-ha-ha”
“Look at his eyes. Ouch, I’m scared!”
“But you are such a rubbish who are doomed to die, and dare to look at me with such eyes. Bah!”
Above the pit came the harsh mockery and the indifferent laughter of those inhuman people with twisted nature liked a devil.
The person under the pit stared at them as if he were going to carve their faces in his mind and turn to ghost to seek revenge.
He grinned and looked at the people above the pit.
“What are you laughing at?”
“That look is disgusting. Kill him!”
That smile stopped the laughter of the men, and they began to look frightened, to hide their fear in anger, and to lift up the stones and smash them down.
When the stones were down, the loud thud had come. It sounded like a watermelon had been broken, echoing dully in the deep hole. This thud tore into those peoples’ ears, and chilled them out in a cold sweat.
The flies at the bottom of the pit whirled suddenly and swarmed to the corpse, whose voice had died, and whose head had been broken. However, his eyes were still wide open with a creepy grin at the corner of his mouth.
“Shit! Tough luck! Let’s get the hell out of here and report on our finished mission.”
“Pooh, pooh! I’ll have to let my woman prepare bath water for me to wash away the bad luck. ”
“Ha ha ha…. ”
The evil spirits circling over the pit went away, but the sun did not shine into the bottom of the pit, and the darkness grew cold.
If there were ghosts in the world, the man at the bottom of the pit would be the most terrible and demanding ghost, that, no doubt, would haunt all his enemies.
Then a dark-green jade pendant suddenly slipped out from the clothes of the corpse. It had absorbed the blood of its master and turned bloody red as if a revenge-storm had been brewing to claim lives.
***
“Grandpa! Second uncle!”
“Don’t die!”
“We don’t collude with bandits! This has nothing to do with our Ling family!”
“I’m Ling Zhang, upright and righteous. I’m not such one of those villains!”
“Your demons are just trying to take over my Ling family’s property. You set us up and mutilated and killed dozens of my family, and I’ll crawl back to take revenge!”
“Ah, ah, ah… My leg! My leg!”
“Ridiculous! What marshal fiancé! Don’t you know how influential the Imperial Yuwen family is! You even want to combine with this great family by marriage!”
“See? This is the divorce paper from Yuwen family. Take a good look at yourself. Who do you think you are? You really think your family can rely on Yuwen family to turn the tide? In your dreams!”
“No, I didn’t overrate myself. That’s what the Yuwen’s promised Grandpa. I don’t want… I didn’t, I didn’t, I didn’t do it. They wronged me… I don’t want to die, I don’t want to die, I want revenge, I want revenge!” Murmurs full of anguish and despair came from Ling Zhang’s mouth, and finally the cry of despair woke him from his nightmare.
Suddenly sitting up straight, Ling Zhang was perspiring. Then he stared blankly at everything around him, which looked both familiar and strange to him.
This was a pavilion. There was a fence. Beside the pavilion was a pathway that meandered towards the corner door on the wall, and the corner door was open…
“Where am I?”
He remembered that it was the beginning of his nightmare.
Getting through that corner door, he would be framed with filthy crimes that could never be washed clean; from then on, his life was in a state of agony and despair.
But he was dead, wasn’t he? He dreamt when he was dead?
The headache was splitting. Ling Zhang was very confused, and could not tell whether this was the dream or the reality. He held the tabletop of the stone table and staggered to stand up.
Catching sight of what he was wearing, he was shocked as if he was struck by lightning. The clothes on him was that he had on that day!
It was so real! How could this happen?
And his legs. He stomped his feet. His legs were in perfect condition.
Taking a deep breath to stabilize the mess in his mind, he gave his legs a good thump.
“Whew, that hurts.”
“This pain is too real, not a dream!”
Outside the pavilion, the cold wind suddenly blew in. It made him shiver. Ling Zhang stood up hard. He was alive. He was alive now!
He was shaking all over, and he checked himself from top to bottom. He looked at his unscarred hands, he pinched his own bones, felt his waist and face, and began to tremble. It was real. He was back! Back to when he was 17 years old!
After confirming this fact, Ling Zhang forced himself to calm down.
If all were true, then Ling family was fine now. He was still the young master of noble birth in Tan Yang, not the one with filth that couldn’t be washed clean. He and Yuwen family’s engagement had not been known. Grandpa was still alive, uncle was still alive, and the rest of Ling family are still alive!
This was the wish he had prayed for so many times that God had really made it possible for him?
After about 10 minutes, the cold wind calmed him down completely. Slowly he turned to the corner door, his excited eyes gradually cooling down as the corner of his mouth revealed a silent and cold grin. He lifted his feet and walked through the door.
Author’s Gossip:
Ling Zhang: Oh yeah. I crawled back! Villains, aren’t you surprised? Isn’t it exciting?
Yuwen Tong:
Poor Marshal doesn’t know anything yet.
Spoiler alert! Spoiler alert! The marshal doesn’t know anything about breaking off the engagement. He’s merely a scapegoat. The marshal is a good man who loves his wife.