Lingxu, Sword Coffin, Blind Swordsman

Great Xia Domain, Azure Cloud Continent, North Liang City.

A small boy, only six or seven years old, was huddled next to the stone lion at the back door of the Zhao Mansion.

In the freezing snow, the little boy shivered in thin, ill-fitting clothes.

Strangely, his eyes were covered with black cloth.

The black cloth revealed a pair of sword-like eyebrows, a high nose bridge, and thin lips.

His cheeks were gaunt, making his facial features particularly angular.

Creak~

The back door of the Zhao Mansion opened, followed by a dull thud.

Bang!

A stiff corpse was thrown out from the back door.

The small body fell to the ground, creating a shallow pit in the snow.

Zhao Qing, dressed in a thick cotton-padded coat, hesitated, a hint of pity flashing in his eyes.

He threw down four strings of copper coins, putting the rest back into his sleeve.

Clatter!

Upon hearing the sound, the boy quickly got up, shook off the snow, and forced a gentle smile on his frostbitten face.

“Is that you, Brother Qing? Did you just throw out the leftover food from the mansion?”

As he spoke, the boy squatted down, his red hands groping blindly in the snow.

The smile was still on the boy's face, but his hand touched a corpse that was already icy cold!

Li Guanqi's hand froze in mid-air, his lips trembling slightly, his whole body shaking.

After a moment, the boy knelt on the ground, his hands trembling as he reached towards the face of the corpse.

His trembling hand touched the girl's chin, and he recoiled as if he had been shocked!

He felt a long scar, which his uncle had inflicted on his sister two years ago when he was drunk and had lost money.

“Sister…”

A slightly sorrowful murmur escaped from the boy's mouth.

The smile on the boy's face had long disappeared, and two lines of clear tears streamed down his face uncontrollably.

Ignoring the heavy snow falling from the sky, he took off his only ragged linen garment and wrapped it around the girl's body!

His emaciated body was covered in hideous scars, and the bruises on his back had not yet faded.

He reached out his frostbitten hand and gently stroked the girl's hair.

The boy lowered his head and murmured in a hoarse voice: “It's better to be dead than to… suffer while alive.”

Ignoring the biting ice and snow, the boy searched the ground for a long time and only found four strings of copper coins.

Four strings of copper coins!!

A滔天的rage blazed in the boy's heart, as if it would scorch his chest!!

He never thought that even in death, his sister could not retain her last dignity…

Is dead people's money so easy to take?!

A gust of cold wind blew past, and Zhao Qing couldn't help but tighten his cuffs, looking at the boy and saying.

“Your sister had bad luck, take the money and go back, don't freeze to death here.”

The boy tore off the blindfold, revealing a pair of pale white eyes.

He looked up in the direction of the voice, trying his best to suppress the anger in his heart.

His voice trembled slightly as he slowly reached out his right hand and said softly: “For the unjust death of a servant, the master's family must compensate ten strings!”

“This money… is my sister's last dignity, you shouldn't take it!”

Zhao Qing folded his hands in his sleeves, and upon hearing that the other party wanted money, the look of pity on his face immediately disappeared.

He said with a cold face: “Little blind man, take it or leave it! Get lost!”

With that, Zhao Qing turned to close the door.

Li Guanqi, who was only six years old, was thin, but a fierce look appeared on his face!

He quickly stepped onto the steps of the Zhao Mansion, grabbed the man's hand and shouted: “Give me what you should give!”

Zhao Qing frowned when he saw Li Guanqi's frostbitten hand grabbing at him.

A cold light flashed in his eyes, and he grabbed the boy's hair with one hand and threw him down the steps.

Bang!

The thin body was slammed hard into the snow, which was covering a bluestone slab.

Falling on it would result in bruises, let alone a boy who was thrown half a zhang away.

Zhao Qing glanced coldly at the boy lying on the ground and said sinisterly: “Stinky blind man! Take the corpse and get out of here quickly!”

“If it weren't for the fact that I felt sorry for you, I wouldn't have given you even four strings!”

“Tch!”

Just as Zhao Qing turned around to go back, the corner of his clothes was suddenly grabbed by someone behind him.

Zhao Qing turned his head and saw that the boy had somehow come behind him, holding his clothes tightly with both hands.

“Give me the money!!”

“This is my sister's life money!”

Zhao Qing's anger grew, and just as he was about to get angry, he lowered his head and saw those bloodshot, pale white eyes!

Those eyes were clearly blind, but he felt that the other party was staring at him.

A chill rose from the bottom of Zhao Qing's heart, and he turned his head to look at the girl who had been worked to death and starved to death.

Zhao Qing still couldn't bear it, and put the remaining copper coins from his sleeve into the boy's hand.

“Here, take it, what a jinx!”

Li Guanqi let go of his hand and numbly counted the copper coins in his hand.

Bang!

The mansion door closed, and a slightly childish voice came from inside.

“Little Qing~ what are you doing! Hurry up and feed the young master's birds?”

“Young Master Yuanlin, I'm going, I'm going.”

“What were you doing just now?”

“……”

“Isn't it just the death of a maidservant? It's no big deal, hurry up and let that dead blind man get lost!”

Li Guanqi stared blankly at the sky, holding the copper coins and sitting on the steps of the Zhao Mansion for a long, long time.

He walked down the steps, carrying the already stiff corpse with difficulty, and turned to leave.

Creak… creak…

That was the sound of Li Guanqi's feet stepping on the snow, a little slow, swaying.

All of this was seen by the old man in the wine shop dozens of zhang away.

The old man was wearing a gray plain robe, with white hair and beard.

He had a high nose bridge, and his lips were slightly thin but did not appear mean. There was no hint of decadence between his eyebrows and eyes, but his eyes were clear.

There were some side dishes and a pot of warm wine on the table.

Looking at the boy groping along the wall, the hand holding the wine glass suddenly stopped in mid-air.

A faint gleam flashed in the old man's eyes as he looked at the boy, and he murmured in a low voice: “I never thought that the embryo I've been looking for for hundreds of years would be a little blind man…”

“Forget it, forget it, this may be God's will.”

Then the old man slowly got up and said in a醇和voice: “Waiter, check out!”

It was the cold winter months, when the north wind was biting.

For the young Li Guanqi, the gusts of cold wind were like sharp knives stabbing at him.

He rested several times on the way, and by the time night fell, the boy had placed the already stiff corpse in front of a medical clinic.

The gray-clothed old man was also thinly dressed, but the snowstorm automatically avoided him as it passed by.

“The person is dead, and the three souls and seven spirits have entered reincarnation, what are you doing at this medical clinic?”

“I'm getting medicine for my mother… not her…”

Before long, the boy had several sets of herbs in his hand, and with great effort, he carried the corpse and continued on his way.

Then he came to a small shop with white silk hanging at the door.

After a while, the boy walked out with a jar in his hand.

A piece of paper was pasted on it.

‘Li Cuiwei.’

He wrapped it in the girl's pink clothes. From beginning to end, there were not many emotions on the boy's face.

On the way, the boy also picked up two buns that were already as hard as bricks at the entrance of a bun shop.

At this time, there was a hint of a smile on the boy's face.

This made the old man, who had been following behind him, very puzzled. Why didn't the boy have any emotional fluctuations when his own sister died?

He just stubbornly insisted on the Zhao Mansion's servant deducting the compensation that should have been paid.

The boy holding the ashes also had no expression, but smiled because he picked up two unwanted buns.

The old man's curiosity was completely aroused and he continued to follow behind the boy.

Suddenly!

The old man in the wind and snow stopped, looked up at the sky.

He said lightly with a calm face: “Tsk, I just demolished a sect some time ago, and the North Liang Kingdom's Protector Mage actually came to my door in person?”

“A small Nascent Soul… it's good to see him, so as to save both parties trouble.”

Shua!

The old man took a step and instantly traveled dozens of miles, appearing in a wild pavilion.

The brocade-robed old man had already warmed wine and brewed tea, seemingly waiting for a long time.

Seeing the old man appear, the North Liang Kingdom's Protector Mage quickly got up and saluted respectfully, saying: “I have seen Senior…”

South of North Liang City, in a dilapidated small courtyard, even the door could not be closed.

The boy stood at the door and hesitated for a long time, and finally took a deep breath and pushed the door open and walked into the house.

Creak~

The dark room didn't even have a lamp lit. The family was destitute, and there were many holes in the window paper, but there was no money to repair it.

A dark shadow on the cold earthen kang moved slightly, and then a weak voice slowly came.

“Guanqi… is that you back?”

The woman's voice was very gentle, but unusually weak.

The woman who got up looked haggard, with sunken cheeks, but her eyes were full of tenderness when she looked at the boy.

The woman looked around in the moonlight and asked softly: “Where's Cuiwei?”

Li Guanqi's body suddenly froze as he rummaged for candles in the drawer. He lit the candle, illuminating the lonely earthen jar next to him.

He turned his head away, not daring to look, and said in a dry voice: “Sister Cuiwei… is dead, the Zhao Mansion compensated ten strings of copper coins.”

“I got all the money back and hid it well to treat mother's illness.”

After speaking, the boy took out the bun that had been slightly melted by his body temperature from his arms and handed it to Song Wanrong.

He groped for the herbs and walked towards the kitchen, saying in a hoarse voice: “I'll go brew medicine for mother.”

Song Wanrong gently pulled Li Guanqi's hand and put the bun in Li Guanqi's hand.

She forced back her tears and said: “Mother… mother is not hungry, you eat it.”

The dry hair covered most of the woman's face, but Li Guanqi heard a few drops of tears falling on the mat.

Just as the two were immersed in grief.

Bang!!

The door was kicked open, and the piercing cold wind suddenly drilled into the house. The boy's body trembled, not knowing whether it was from the cold wind or from fear.

The person who came was Li Guanqi's distant uncle, Li Dashan.

Li Dashan was not tall, wearing a dark blue cotton-padded jacket, with protruding cheeks, triangular eyes, and a hooked nose.

The whole person looked fierce, and before he even entered the door, his sinister voice had already traveled far away.

“Damn it! Where's the money!!”