Chapter 1253: Section 1254: Shepherd City Under the Great Fog
Leaving Zithraide’s antique shop, there was silence all the way to the exit.
Perhaps sensing something on Angel’s mind, Sanders mused for a moment, “Zithraide harbors his own set of standards in his heart. He reveres balance, and while he takes, he also gives. This standard applies not only to his guests but also to those harmed by the transactions, treating them all equally.”
Sanders paused, then suddenly smiled, “Speaking of which, when Zithraide first entered the Wizards’ Realm, he was somewhat like you.”
“However, you are stronger than he was. Even if you dislike something in your heart, you can still face it rationally and objectively. But Zithraide back then was incredibly passionate.”
This was the first time Angel heard Sanders talk about his own past, and he couldn’t help but be a bit curious, “What about afterwards?”
“The lifespan of humans is too short, and human nature is too elusive. The longer you live, the more you understand. Time wore down Zithraide’s passion, even the most naïve can’t withstand the constant battering of the wind and rain.” Sanders didn’t explain what he meant by ‘battering of the wind and rain,’ but after a pause, he continued, “Speaking of which, the Zithraide of today, I feel, hasn’t changed much from before. At least, compared to others in the Wizards’ Realm, he has maintained a pure heart for hundreds of years.”
...
Sanders turned his head back to the lettering on the wall above the door—
“If you’re willing to burn the brilliance of life for a rose, I think, you must be mad.”
Although this sentence came from “Dancer of Sin and Flowerseller,” the author of the book was actually Zithraide himself. He carved these words on his own door, not only to signify his identity, but it also implied that this was Zithraide’s own experience.
He was both recounting and introspecting.
Because he too had once been impulsive, exchanging his life for an insignificant rose.
…
They took off in the gondola.
As before, the gondola was concealed by Sanders’ Illusion Technique, invisible to others.
But even without the illusion, the weather was such that no one would have noticed anyway.
Fog.
And it was a dense fog on an overcast day.
The daylight was gloomy, turning the entire Shepherd City into blue-black hues, teetering on the boundary between visibility and vagueness.
Add to that the fog, which although not thick, still reduced visibility further. Apart from near streetlights and the vicinity of lit buildings where things were clear, elsewhere only faint outlines could be discerned.
Angel piloted the gondola, flying towards the outskirts of Shepherd City.
Throughout the journey, Angel, pondering the transaction with Zithraide, fell into a sort of introspective questioning. Sanders also remained silent, his mind lingering on the series of impacts Angel had brought to him earlier.
For a time, the silence sustained.
It was not until they were nearing the peripheral areas of Shepherd City that Angel snapped out of his reverie—not because he had resolved his thoughts, but because he was drawn to a light on the ground below.
Beneath them was a sloping path flanked by the silhouettes of buildings, unlit by streetlights, but with light escaping from within the buildings, ensuring the slope was not entirely dark.
The sloping path was not on the main thoroughfare of the city, so the city planning had not yet reached it, leaving the ground a mere dirt road. It seemed there had been a light rain the night before, making the path quite muddy.
At this moment, on the muddy slope, a figure holding a lantern was making her way with difficulty.
The figure wore a rain cloak, so at first, Angel didn’t pay much attention, assuming it was just a lonely traveler. Later, Angel noticed her because she slipped and fell due to the slick ground.
She lay there, and due to her movements, her hood fell back, revealing a head full of white hair.
The lantern had fallen nearby, and its dim light happened to shine on her face. Looking down from the sky, Angel immediately saw the illuminated, aged face.
It was an old woman, the very one Angel had seen before in Zithraide’s antique shop!
As Angel watched the person on the ground, the sense of familiarity in his eyes grew stronger. Unbeknownst to him, as he observed, he had brought the gondola to a hover.
This caught Sanders’ attention.
Sanders looked down and saw the white-haired old lady on the ground, who seemed to have fallen and was lying there for a long while without moving. After some time, she struggled slowly to sit up.
She sat in the mud on the sloping path, surrounded by the blue-black backdrop and occasional glimpses of light. The mist drifted around the old woman as she breathed heavily in a low tone.
Sanders asked Angel, “What, do you know her?”
Angel shook his head, “I don’t know. She just seems familiar, but I can’t quite place her.”
Hearing Angel’s response, Sanders looked at the old lady on the ground again, this time with much more scrutiny than before. However, his conclusion was the same as before, “A very ordinary human, if you must pinpoint something special, it’s that there’s a sense of incongruity about her.”
“Incongruity?”
“Her eyes don’t match those of an old person, yet the aura of her twilight years doesn’t seem feigned.”
Sanders’s words immediately reminded Angel of a plot from some novels on the holographic tablet, “Could it be that a young soul has barged into the shell of an old person with white hair?”
Sanders let out a chuckle, “If souls could so easily occupy a body, why do you think there are so many wandering dead souls in the world? There are many restrictions to soul intrusion. How could a soul that has reached such limits choose the body of an ordinary old man that won’t live much longer?”
“Moreover, this person’s body and soul are harmonized, without any contradictions.”
Angel thoughtfully seemed to realize something, “I actually saw her in the antique shop before. Could she be a guest of Lord Zithraide? Is her current condition the result of trading her youth and lifespan?”
Sanders pondered for a moment, “It’s possible. However, even if we were simulating her youth, I have never seen her.”
The old granny on the ground finally stood up. It seemed her foot was injured, as she could only lean on the railing beside the path to move forward slowly. As her figure slowly receded into the distance, Sanders said to Angel, “It’s time to leave.”
Angel nodded his head. Regardless of whether he recognized the old granny or not, what he could confirm was that even if he felt a sense of familiarity, it wasn’t strong enough for him to recognize her identity at a glance. It seemed that the old granny was probably no acquaintance at all—just a familiar stranger, and furthermore, a common person… There was no need to continue thinking about it.
With this thought, Angel took one last look at her staggering back and piloted the gondola towards the distant dark blue sky.
…
Anada looked up at the blue-black sky shrouded in thick fog.
For some reason, she had felt all along as if someone in the sky was watching her. However, after a long look, she couldn’t find any clues.
Could she have been mistaken about the feeling?
At this moment, a chubby little boy whose features were squeezed together by his chubby cheeks popped his head out of a window from the top floor of a four-story building by the road.
The chubby boy, probably thirteen or fourteen, spotted Anada, and his eyes lit up before he quickly concocted some mischief. He took a deep breath in through his cheeks and spat a thick wad of phlegm in a parabolic arc toward where Anada was standing.
But the mischievous child’s aim was poor, and the phlegm landed five or six meters away from Anada.
Anada glared venomously at the chubby boy for a moment, wanting to scold him, but her body was no longer strong enough to shout. She could only mutter in a low voice, “Damn brat, if it were a few days ago, I would have gone up there to tear your limbs off!”
That said, how could the weakened Anada compare to the chubby boy now?
All she could do was spit in contempt and, hunching over, trudge away. Behind her, she could still hear the boy’s laughter.
After the prank by the mischievous child, Anada did not pursue the previous sensation of being watched any longer. Perhaps that feeling was merely from nearby residents sneering at her after seeing her fall.
Carrying a gloomy mood, Anada left the uphill road. Here distance from her rented home was still a few hundred meters away. In the past, it would probably have taken her only a few minutes to get home, but now, those few hundred meters seemed as long as the past ten miles, incredibly lengthy.
Anada slowly shuffled forward, feeling a stiffness in her muscles and joints that was very uncomfortable. Plus, with her foot sprained earlier, walking became even more difficult.
Having made it more than two hundred meters, Anada could not go any further and had to sit down on the flowerbed by the roadside to rest.
While Anada rested, suddenly a melodious singing of hymns reached her ears.
Curious, she turned her head and saw that the singing came from the theater behind her.
She was familiar with this theater; during the day, it was a children’s choir and at night an adult choir. Before she aged, she had attended a performance. However, as a low-ranking Diya, she really couldn’t enjoy such sappy music. She’d much rather go to the Enchanted Theater for a pleasant adult stage drama than listen to these cheesy, melodramatic love hymns.
Now, the voices from the theater were exactly the kind of lovey-dovey tunes she used to dislike.
But maybe because she had to listen, or because she had just had discomforting experiences, Anada oddly found herself not as repulsed by the singing.
Even, she got lost in the music.
The choir’s love hymns told the story of a dashing nobleman and his true love, a tale filled with adversity. Tragically, just as the lovers finally came together, the nobleman passed away from a disease caused by his youthful indiscretions, leaving behind the girl who had been faithful all her life.
The story was clichéd, but the hymn was beautiful.
“How many loved your moments of glad grace, And loved your beauty with love false or true; But one man loved the pilgrim soul in you, And loved the sorrows of your changing face.”
“And bending down beside the glowing bars, Murmur, a little sadly, how Love fled And paced upon the mountains overhead, And hid his face amid a crowd of stars.”
“Yet the years have etched their lines upon your face.”
“Even though aged, even though wrinkled, even though everyone has left you, I am still waiting behind the mountains, beyond the starlit sky, in the folds of your memory, as eager as the day we first met, waiting for your perusal.”
Perhaps Anada had never experienced this kind of love, but the stark contrast wrought by the passage of time had deeply imprinted herself in her mind. Not long ago, she was a young girl with stunning beauty, but now… her face was full of wrinkles, and she seemed as old as if about to enter a coffin.
“Would anyone care about me now?” Anada mumbled to herself, unable to help but conjure the image of a young boy in her mind: her childhood sweetheart, Hebdon.
“The song is right,” she thought. “Love eventually fades, youth also withers.” Anada took a deep breath, “As long as I can start on this path, everything is worth it.”
With that thought, Anada stood up again. Home was only two hundred meters away.
As long as she got home, she could take the potion she had exchanged with Zithraide. Even if she had lost her youth, even if she had agreed to Zithraide’s demonic terms, as long as she succeeded, she was willing to pay everything!