I swear that in that moment I wanted to forget everything and concentrate on responding to Xiao Ning. He was kissing me, never mind why. I should enjoy it while I could.
However, there was a mosquito constantly buzzing by my ear. I searched for the source of the sound, reached out my hand, and slapped Xiao Ning on the face.
Xiao Ning covered the part of his face that I had hit and looked at me, eyes full of shock and heartbreak.
I spread out my hand and showed it to him. "Look at this mosquito. My whole hand is covered in blood. How much of your blood did it suck?"
Xiao Ning"s gaze moved numbly from my face to my hand. He saw the blood-stained body of the mosquito.
I touched Xiao Ning"s bitten face, my heart aching. Xiao Ning"s skin was so white. Tomorrow there would be an ugly b.u.mp on his face.
"I"ll go to the drugstore to buy some ointment in a while," I said. "There"s a kind of ointment that works well. I attract a lot of mosquitoes, so I use it often."
Just then, a steady stream of mosquitoes came to attack me. I had been dealing with mosquitoes for over twenty years and was rich in experience. I didn"t need to be able to see to know where they would attack. I slapped a few times, and several dead mosquitoes appeared under my palm.
Looking at the blood on my palm, I shook my head and sighed. "I still got bitten. There are too many mosquitoes. I"m outnumbered."
I performed a visual inspection. There were two or three mosquitoes that had died unsatisfied lying in my palm, full of my blood.
Xiao Ning said nothing. Looking grave, he turned his face towards the apartment"s entrance. "Duan Youlian is out."
A figure in a raincoat walked slowly out of the building. She looked up at the window of the room where her mother lived. Then she stopped looking back, stood in front of the trees where we were hiding and said, "Let"s go."
I dusted the mosquitoes" bodies off my hands and came out of the woods. I looked at the time; it had only been ten minutes. "So fast?"
I"d thought that after so many years of not seeing her mother, she would have stayed longer.
"Life and death are two separate worlds. Ten minutes is already a violation." Xiao Ning crawled out and tore the talisman off Duan Youlian. "Have you figured things out?"
Duan Youlian said, "I have. It"s enough to see her once."
It was already 4:20. Time was pressing. We quickly left the estate and got on the school bus.
On the school bus, Teacher Liu manifested. He patted his chest and said, "I really was scared to death just now. I was afraid that Teacher Shen would hit the mosquitoes with the notebook. Some of those mosquitoes had sucked Teacher Shen"s blood. If they got on my skin... the consequences don"t bear thinking about!"
It seemed that Teacher Liu hadn"t gotten past the time I"d used the notebook to crush bugs. I felt helpless. In my university dorm, it had been perfectly normal to use books and notebooks to crush bugs.
"You"re also afraid of blood sucked by mosquitoes?" I asked, changing the subject.
"Naturally. Mosquitoes and other creatures like that will choose people with strong blood. The blood they ingest is the essence of the human body. It"s very powerful," said Teacher Liu, scared after the fact.
I asked Duan Youlian, "Are you afraid?"
"Just now, when you came out of the trees, it was fortunate that you dusted the mosquitoes off your hand first. Otherwise, since I was suppressed by the talisman, if I"d touched your pure Yang blood, I"m afraid my soul and body would have been shaken. I may not have been able to reincarnate." Duan Youlian"s face was also full of fear.
"So where"s the future in being a ghost?" I said excitedly. "You can"t even stand up to a mosquito. Xiao Duan, have you resolved what you need in order to reincarnate?"
Xiao Ning had the right to speak on this matter. "Her resentful energy has dissipated. We can take her back to the Maoshan Sect to perform a transcendence ritual, and she"ll be able to leave her body."
Actually, this was something that had been worrying me. Xiao Duan had been missing for eight years. If her corpse suddenly appeared after eight years, not having rotted, even if Xiao Duan"s mother didn"t investigate, the police couldn"t let it alone. It would be a homicide case.
"If you take her back to the Maoshan Sect, will the police misunderstand?" I asked with concern.
"It won"t come to that." Ning Tiance smiled confidently. "The Maoshan Sect has some connections. Besides, Duan Youlian has already dealt with the ones who killed her. The police wouldn"t find anything. After she has transcended, we can return the body to her mother, let her cremate and bury it."
I didn"t ask Xiao Duan what she had said to her mother. That was private. Seeing her looking peaceful now, without the soaring resentment she"d displayed before, was enough.
The driver took advantage of the lack of cars in the early morning and not having to worry about being caught by the traffic cameras. He flogged the bus the whole way. First he drove Teacher Liu to the Farther Side Estate. Then he drove Xiao Ning, Xiao Duan and me to the hotel. The whole process took less than half an hour. He still had to find a shady place to park the bus in the last ten minutes.
This was my first time taking a ghost bus going over a 150 kilometers per hour in the city. The driver floored the gas pedal and ran red lights the whole way, brushing past countless cars. I was so scared that I clutched the armrest with one hand and Xiao Ning"s arm with the other, terrified that the two of us would be thrown off the bus.
When we got off the bus, the driver tipped his cap and smiled derisively at me. "My top speed is only eighty? What a joke!"
After throwing us off the bus, he stepped on the gas and sped away. I held Xiao Ning"s hand, my face pale. "That driver is really something. I"m feeling inferior. He actually dares to drive at highway speeds in the city!"
Without turning a hair, Xiao Ning said, "He drives a ghost bus. The ghost and human worlds are separate. He won"t run into other cars. Even if he did run into them, the bus would just pa.s.s through. It would be fine."
Xiao Ning really was amazing. He could even keep his calm at such speeds. Maoshan"s Celestial Masters were remarkable...
"Ugh..." While I was lost in thought, Xiao Ning rushed to the garbage can outside the hotel and threw up.
I said nothing.
In the end I helped the carsick Xiao Ning into the elevator. Back at the room, I helped him sit down on the sofa, poured a cup of warm water and handed it to him. "Rinse your mouth. Ah, why show off if you get carsick? You should keep your eyes closed as much as possible instead, rest and let me rub your temples."
Xiao Ning silently looked at me. There seemed to be a lot of words behind his eyes.
He was always looking at me like that lately. I was used to it.
I went to get a hot towel, sat on the sofa, and had Xiao Ning lie down on my lap. I wiped his face with the hot towel. "Close your eyes, lie quietly for a while. You"ll feel better when you"ve slept."
After I wiped his face, I examined the mosquito bite on Xiao Ning"s face. There was no b.u.mp, but it was a little red.
I concentrated my efforts with the hot towel on that place, trying to promote blood circulation and prevent swelling to preserve Xiao Ning"s handsome appearance.
Xiao Ning wasn"t very obedient. Except for when I was wiping his face, he hadn"t closed his eyes. He was following my every move with his gaze.
When I was focused on taking care of his face, Xiao Ning grabbed my hand and quietly said, "Teacher Shen..."
I was so fl.u.s.tered that I dropped the towel.
Xiao Ning swallowed. His attractive throat rolled gently. I didn"t dare to look at his face, keeping my eyes on his throat. I felt an impulse to bite it.
Although I didn"t meet Xiao Ning"s eyes, my ears were working, quietly waiting for him to speak.
I heard...
Bang! A loud knock came from outside the door. I immediately recovered my intellect and got up to open the door.
Xiao Ning fell off the sofa with a thump. Ah! I"d forgotten he was lying on my lap, and as soon as I stood up he would...
The knocking was loud and urgent. Sect Leader Ning, who had been asleep in the master bedroom, came out holding his back and yawning. "Why aren"t you opening the door?"
Then he went to open the door. I"d thought all along that I"d forgotten about something. Now, what was it?
The door was open. Sect Leader Ning shouted, "What living corpse is so bold, knocking at the door of the Maoshan Sect"s hotel room? Tiance, the exorcism sword! Watch me deal with this evil creature."
Ah, I"d been so devoted to helping the carsick Xiao Ning into the elevator that I"d forgotten Xiao Duan downstairs…