aracness

[aracness]

[aracness]

[aracness]

[aracness]

Shen Jiu stood up suddenly, panting, and wiped the sweat from his forehead nervously. His head felt heavy and everything was spinning. There was also a feeling of warmth covering his whole body. He scanned the room around him with his eyes. He couldn't remember how he had gotten there, and yet everything seemed strangely familiar.

The opaque wooden walls , the bunk bed, with its thin old blankets , the sparse furniture and the thin sheets covering his body, as well as the piles of wood around the room; it all reminded him of something, although he wasn't sure what (...).

It wasn't until he saw the door to that room that he realized where he was, and then he froze, frightened, and let his palms and fingernails cling tightly to the threadbare sheets beneath him.

He stared anxiously at that door that for years had witnessed his pain, and that he had once thought he would never see again, so distant and yet so real.

His eyesight was blurred by tears he could not remember shedding, and a strange warmth throbbed in his chest. Despite that, he could remember the wooden door perfectly.

It was something deeply rooted in his memory, from when he was a child asking for impossible promises to the one who waited for him behind the door.

A sudden dizziness dazed his mind.

He inhaled deeply while observing the details of that gate; the hard carvings in the wood, the numerous locks, which ensured that he did not escape from the room, the 2 cun* thickness of the door, specially made to withstand blows and soundproof against any commotion...

That room, so familiar to him, was none other than the woodshed where he used to stay when he was a child, under the Qiu's roof.

He moistened his lips, puzzled, for he had no idea how he had gotten there, being that he had burned that house with his own hands.

So, he tried to grab one of the blankets from the bed, and.... He was petrified to see his own arm, intact, but more importantly, to recognize that it was the arm of a child.

"This has to be a dream" he thought, and groped his face. She was surprised to feel smooth, clean skin, and as she pinched her lips, she felt them as her own.

Shen jiu felt her shoulders flank as he recognized that sense of vulnerability that had accompanied him all his childhood.

That fear that prompted him to hide behind some woman's skirts, to run away from some bad man....

Nausea climbed from his belly and settled in his throat.

Strangely, he tried to remember some detail that could be useful, anything that could explain his presence in that house. He meditated for a while until he remembered Meng Mo, that demon in cahoots with Luo Bingghe who sometimes used to sneak into his mind to cause him nightmares. Shen jiu knew that it was quite possible that it was all Meng Mo's doing, so he tried to concentrate his Qi. Surprisingly, he could not. That was most strange, for if it was his nightmare, then he must have been able to control it. He gnashed his teeth in hatred and cursed Luo Binghe. His time in the Qiu household was a time he hated deeply but knew he could never forget. He had no regrets for the death of any Qiu and yet his actions weighed on him like a chain that kept him from moving forward.

Shen Jiu called Karma to that bitter feeling that always twisted in his stomach, like an undercooked soup. It was his punishment for taking everything away from sweet Haitang.

Even with all the negative feelings that came with that time, Shen Jiu still felt possessive about his past. He was unwilling to share it with anyone else, partly because of the shame and inferiority complex that arose in himself towards the person who discovered his past. So, if you were to ask him directly, no, Shen Jiu would not talk about it with anyone, much less Luo Bingghe.

That beast had overstepped its bounds by intruding into his mind like that.

He sighed heavily and decided to play along with whoever had put him in that situation. The safest thing to do was to pretend that he hadn't noticed the illusion, act calmly until he found out what they were after, and then try to confront or expel the intruder in his mind. After all, it was his dream. He had the power to control it.

He rose from the bunk and his stomach flipped as he felt the rough ground beneath his untouched legs (Or maybe not so much?).

He quickly became aware of the pain in his calves as he stood up and the burning in his ankles that told him he had probably been shackled until recently.

He recognized that feeling, it was normal for him to be chained by Qiu Jianluo when he was still alive.

The pain in his head was only expanding and a wave of shivers ran through his body.

He slipped quietly into a pile of wood, where he remembered he used to keep his robes, those that the Qiu had "mercifully" granted him, because they could not bear to see his ragged figure.

He groped for the garments and then carefully dressed himself, preparing to go out even as his legs were heavy and his whole body throbbed painfully. She gasped as she felt a wave of heat spreading from her stomach.

He knew that pain; he was entering a Qi bypass. He only hoped he could get out of the woodshed in time.

He staggered to the door, his heart pounding with grief. Then, he took one step, then another, (One more and he would reach the door), and....

He collapsed to the floor. The wood creaked loudly and Shen jiu's body lay limp on the floor, burning with fever and sweat.

His head was spinning and things were distorting around him, forming a swirl of colors and sensations that seduced him into a deep sleep.

Shen Jiu struggled to stay awake despite the growing exhaustion settling into his increasingly weakened body.

The last thing that crossed Shen jiu's mind were the words "Don't let him come." before finally losing consciousness.

He really wished he would never see Qiu Jianluo again.

Even if it was just a dream

(A nightmare)

~-~-~-~

- 1 Cun*: 3.3 CM.

Thank you very much!