60: Dream, Qingming Dairi

“Hmm?”

Hearing Bao Jing’s words, Jiang Lan became a little interested.

“The Xiao Nan Village chief really has a problem?”

“Yes, Little Monk and Zhan Jiu barely escaped from Xiao Nan Village with our lives.”

Jiang Lan didn’t ask for details, but instead asked:

“Is the village chief dead?”

“Zhan Jiu said he’s dead.”

Hearing that the village chief was dead, Jiang Lan’s interest waned considerably.

If he were still alive, he might have been able to serve as his resource, adding to his lifespan.

Immediately after, Jiang Lan suddenly glanced at the monk Bao Jing.

“Zhan Jiu said he’s dead? Weren’t you there too?”

Bao Jing was a little embarrassed, his face reddening slightly, “Little Monk must have had a hysterical fit at the time. By the time I came to my senses, I was already back at the office. Everything I just said was told to me by Zhan Jiu.”

Bao Jing himself didn’t know, but Jiang Lan had seen what Bao Jing looked like when he had a hysterical fit.

He had good reason to suspect that the phrase ‘barely escaped’ had undergone some artistic embellishment by Bao Jing.

Jiang Lan stepped forward and lightly patted Bao Jing’s shoulder.

“Want to come over to my place for a bit?”

He was quite interested in this young monk, Bao Jing.

Bao Jing didn’t seem like an ordinary mental patient.

“amitabha.” Bao Jing put his palms together and bowed, “No, Benefactor Jiang, Little Monk has been recovering from injuries for the past few days, and today I should return to the office to check in.”

“Then I’ll head back first.”

Jiang Lan didn’t insist on dragging Bao Jing along.

He was somewhat interested in Bao Jing, it was true, but not that interested.

Moreover, Jiang Lan was tired at this point; getting back to rest was the main priority.

“Benefactor Jiang, take care.”

After bidding farewell to Bao Jing, Jiang Lan returned to his own small courtyard.

Everything in the courtyard was as usual.

Pushing the door open and entering the house, he routinely checked if the room had been disturbed. Only then did Jiang Lan change his clothes and lie down on the bed.

“Hoo…”

He exhaled a mouthful of stale Qi.

Finally, he could rest for a while.

Closing his eyes, Jiang Lan tossed and turned on the wooden bed for quite some time before suddenly remembering something.

At present, both the Altar Lord and Hong Luan were dealt with, but he still had some kind of Soul-Reaping Dao on him.

However, this thought only appeared for an instant before he pushed it to the back of his mind.

According to Hong Luan, the master of the mountain lord who cast the Soul-Reaping Dao on him was, at most, at the fifth Qi Gathering Realm. To threaten him now, it was far from enough.

No matter how powerful the Soul-Reaping Dao was, it was impossible for it to cross a major Realm and kill him by a detour.

Therefore, there was no need to worry.

As for the Green Lantern Altar Lord possessing Chen Heguang and saying those things to him… Jiang Lan guessed that it was probably just to trick him into joining the Green Lantern Sect, which was why he deliberately scared him.

His thoughts wandered for a while. After an unknown amount of time, Jiang Lan finally fell into a dream… Jiang Lan opened his eyes.

What greeted his eyes was a scene like an endless Hell.

Looking around, he stood on a bluestone bridge.

On both sides of the stone bridge was a river.

A river made of blood.

In the river, countless white bones floated, and a strong, foul stench assailed his brain.

Looking forward, there was an endless wilderness, covered with a faint greenish-blue hue.

In the wilderness, tombs stood one after another.

A cold wind blew, chilling him to the bone.

Jiang Lan couldn’t help but shiver, his eyes much clearer.

He immediately realized that he was dreaming.

He had experienced knowing he was in a dream a few times before.

But his previous dreams had never been as real as this one.

So… bizarre.

He looked up.

A full moon hung in the sky.

However, this moon looked quite strange.

Unlike a normal bright and clear moon, the moon above Jiang Lan’s head was purplish-blue, and its light was extremely dim.

Almost subconsciously, a line of text appeared in Jiang Lan’s mind.

“In the thirty-second year of Shenwu, a Blue-Faced Great Demon appeared, swallowing the sun from the sky and replacing it with the azure darkness. This led to a thousand miles of ice, crops failing to grow, and starving corpses littering the roads.”

Was this bluish full moon the ‘azure darkness’ written in historical records?

The bluish full moon in the sky emitted a faint, cold light that shone on Jiang Lan, making him feel a bone-chilling cold.

Just then, in the previously empty sky beside the full moon, a massive blue lotus platform suddenly appeared in Jiang Lan’s line of sight.

Its size was almost comparable to that of the full moon.

Jiang Lan’s eyes widened, filled with shock.

Under his gaze, on the blue lotus platform, a giant figure dressed in blue gradually solidified from an ethereal state.

From its appearance, it seemed to be a person.

And it was a woman.

However, the woman’s face seemed to be shrouded in a mist, no matter how much Jiang Lan strained his eyes to observe, he couldn’t see it clearly.

At this moment, Jiang Lan’s mind was empty, all thoughts vanished, replaced by a sense of tranquility he had never experienced before.

A thought involuntarily popped into Jiang Lan’s mind.

If it could just stay like this forever, it wouldn’t be bad, would it?

Suddenly, the blue-clothed woman on the lotus platform opened her eyes.

Their gazes met.

In an instant, Jiang Lan felt an overwhelming chill sweep over him, almost freezing his Soul.

Although the woman’s face was obscured by mist, the mist in front of her eyes disappeared at this moment.

They were a pair of extremely beautiful almond-shaped eyes.

However, there was not a trace of human emotion in her gaze, like a bottomless abyss.

Jiang Lan wanted to avert his gaze, but found he couldn’t.

Let alone wanting to avert his gaze, even moving his eyelids was a luxury for him.

That bone-chilling cold, which almost froze his Soul, continued relentlessly.

After an unknown amount of time, just as Jiang Lan thought he would be trapped in the dream forever, the woman’s eyes closed again, and the mist rose to cover them.

But Jiang Lan seemed utterly oblivious, his eyes vacant, still staring blankly up at the woman sitting on the lotus platform in the sky.

“Dong—”

“Dry weather—watch out for fire—”

Jiang Lan abruptly opened his eyes.

“Ha… ha…”

His chest heaved wildly, and it took a full fifteen minutes for him to calm down slightly.

Jiang Lan turned over and sat up from the wooden bed.

Why would he suddenly have such a dream?

And who was the woman sitting on the lotus platform in his dream?

Green Lantern Goddess?

What a joke, how could he, a mere Demon Suppression Guard, be so fortunate as to attract the attention of the Green Lantern Goddess?

Jiang Lan had never felt so close to death.

He had a feeling that if it hadn’t been for that gong sound, he might really have been trapped in that dream forever.

He never expected that a life-and-death crisis would actually be resolved by a night watchman?

Before Jiang Lan could think further, a gust of wind seeped through a gap in the window and hit his face.

Jiang Lan’s expression immediately stiffened.

This bone-chilling cold… He turned his head with difficulty and looked out the window.

Outside the window, a bright moon hung high.

Only, this moon was blue.