A Heart of Compassion

With one step forward, all the sheep beside him vanished, leaving Yu Ziqing standing alone on the path.

To the right, everything remained the same, but the withered trees on the left were no longer quite so withered.

A woman poked her head out from a tree hollow behind a dead tree, reluctance flickering in her eyes. After hesitating for a long moment, she called out to Yu Ziqing.

"Come this way. That way is dangerous."

But this time, her appearance was different—sunken cheeks, haggard face, skin stretched thin over bone, hair like dry straw, clad in a filthy, thin robe with a makeshift cloak of grass and bark draped over her shoulders.

Before Yu Ziqing could answer, another woman, equally filthy and gaunt, emerged from the spot where he stood, her voice tinged with surprise.

"There really is someone."

The moment the words fell, several men charged out from the slope not far away.

Their bodies were hunched, yet they moved with startling speed, eyes bloodshot, mouths hanging open unconsciously to reveal sharp fangs.

They laughed as they sprinted toward the woman on the slope.

Her expression shifted slightly as she realized she had been tricked. She turned and fled from behind the withered tree, and in doing so, revealed the swaddled bundle in her arms.

Seeing this, the men burst into even louder laughter, wild and frenzied, drool spilling from their lips.

"There's a little brat too, hahaha!"

The woman's face was filled with nothing but despair and terror. She clutched the bundle tighter, spun around, and bolted for her life. When she reached the edge of the slope, she seemed to remember there was a hidden cliff there. She looked back, and the thick, suffocating despair in her gaze pierced straight into Yu Ziqing's eyes.

He knew this was only an illusion—or rather, an illusion of what had once happened.

He stood still, catching sight of a white feather arrow that appeared from nowhere, suddenly piercing through her chest. She stumbled and fell to the ground, gritting her teeth, her face twisted in the deepest despair. With her last strength, she hurled the bundle in her arms into the bottomless abyss behind her.

Then she collapsed completely and fell still.

The woman's form shifted from solid to faint, slowly dissipating. But within a few breaths, her figure materialized again on the slope, solid once more.

She poked half her head out from another withered tree, hesitant and reluctant, and called out again.

"Come this way. That way is dangerous."

And the other woman, the one who had served as bait, also reappeared, calling out with feigned surprise.

"There really is someone."

It was indeed a replay, but it kept looping, never moving on to the next scene.

Yu Ziqing understood that if he couldn't deal with this woman—whether she was a ghostly being or something else—he would never get out.

Unfortunately, he had too little information now. He looked down at the short sword. It was completely still.

As far as he had explored, his ability only worked when he knew some essential information about his opponent. Once triggered, it would grant him the power to kill them.

To be precise, this only applied to the enemies he had faced so far. He had no idea about stronger ones.

But if he knew nothing at all, he was just an ordinary man who couldn't get enough to eat and was starving to death.

And right now, he didn't even know her name.

Yu Ziqing tried hard to recall the scattered bits of information he had overheard earlier. He pulled out the cookbook and flipped through the messy, fragmented notes he had jotted down to keep from forgetting.

Unfortunately, there was nothing. Those thugs had never mentioned anything strange about this place.

The most likely explanation was that when they had come last time, none of this existed.

The right side was the most eerie. The layers of fallen leaves, shifting like quicksand, looked like the gaping maws of starving beasts.

As for the woman on the left, he had more or less figured her out now.

She was most likely a ghostly being trapped by a deep obsession. From what he could see, she didn't actively try to harm people. She was just so consumed by resentment and fixation that she had sunk into an abyss of despair, unable to pull herself out.

She was bound here by her own will, forced to relive her most despairing moment over and over again. A classic case.

And that line, "That way is dangerous," wasn't a lure at all.

It was pure compassion.

The thing she regretted most was probably those very words.

Seeing a lone, helpless woman about to step into the locust tree forest on the right, she had been moved by pity and warned her. Who would have thought it would cost her everything?

Now that Yu Ziqing was trapped here, she hadn't done anything to him. For now, the only real dangers were dying of thirst, hunger, or cold.

By the third replay, Yu Ziqing couldn't take it anymore.

"Miss, what's your surname? Would you mind telling me your name?"

"If I'm going to set up a grave marker for you, I need to carve a name, don't I?"

"Sister, trapping me here does you no good. We have no past grudges or recent grievances. And besides, I've never eaten my own kind. Ever since I came to this frozen hellhole, I've even given up my beloved lamb!"

She said nothing, didn't even acknowledge him. She just sank deeper into the abyss of despair, over and over again.

Yu Ziqing was starting to despair too.

To be honest, he had never imagined that a ghostly being, instead of baring its claws and trying to harm him, would simply ignore him entirely—and that would be even more despairing.

"Big sister, what's the point of messing with me? What good does it do you to stay here, unable to break free? If your resentment really won't fade, go after the people who wronged you.

Even if you can't leave, just let me go. If I ever run into your enemies, I'll do a good deed and cut them down for you. That's still better than keeping me trapped here."

Even if we take it a step further—you're afraid that once I get out, I'll turn on you. But there's still a chance I'll remember this favor. Gambling on it wouldn't hurt you, would it?

What if?

What if I'm actually a good person, what if I happen to run into your enemy, and what if I take pity on you, avenge you, chop off their heads, and bring them to you?"

At this point, Yu Ziqing paused slightly, almost not believing himself anymore...

But within an hour, Yu Ziqing was shivering all over from the cold. He felt inside his robe and found only a few strips of beef jerky tucked against his skin—his last-ditch survival resource.

"Hey, big sister, just let me go. Take a gamble that I'm telling the truth—you won't lose anything either.

If you drag this out any longer, you might never get your revenge. That's the absolute truth."

Kind words were useless. The other party still ignored him, just replaying the scene over and over. Yu Ziqing fell silent too, losing any desire to persuade her to release him.

He only felt that he was freezing to death like a dead dog, and this place was filled with despair.

A despair that couldn't hold even a shred of compassion.

This wasn't right. It shouldn't be.

Shouldn't...

Yu Ziqing's mind stirred. He forced himself to calm down, and when the next replay began, he quietly immersed himself, quietly empathized.

Especially at the moment when the woman threw the swaddled baby off the cliff—that feeling of despair was like seawater pressing in from all directions in the deep ocean, suffocating him.

Re-experiencing, rethinking, Yu Ziqing had a sudden realization. It seemed he had been wrong from the start.

From the very beginning, he had assumed the ghost was malicious. From the very beginning, he had thought this female ghost was trying to trap him.

If that premise itself was wrong, then everything that followed might be wrong too.

This female ghost might not have intentionally trapped him here, nor meant him harm. From a normal person's perspective, consider a very normal psychological issue.

No one would want to tear open their most despairing wound over and over for others to see—and be forced to watch at that.

Since she didn't want to harm anyone, even ignoring the people who came, she couldn't possibly be one of those rare, twisted psychopaths, right? She didn't seem like it.

So, if she wasn't trying to trap him, and from the start she was just warning him that the woods on the right were dangerous and this path was safe...

Then...

Yu Ziqing shivered, tucking his hands in, pacing in place to keep his body moving, trying not to freeze to death, while continuing to think.

Since the female ghost wasn't trying to harm him, the problem had to be this very place.

Glancing up at the cliff at the end of the slope, Yu Ziqing suddenly had a guess.

This place was like an abyss—an abyss of despair. Whoever stepped into it would fall in and be trapped, including the female ghost herself. She was trapped in the abyss of despair she had unwittingly created.

With that thought, when the next replay began, Yu Ziqing pulled a small cloth pouch half the size of his palm from his robe. He opened it, reluctantly took out a strip of beef jerky no longer than his pinky, rushed shivering to the female ghost's side, and shoved it into her hand.

The woman was startled. She looked down at the beef jerky in her hand, dazed.

"Take it. Eat something. You'll get through this."

At the same time, the surrounding environment began to change—not centered on the female ghost, but on Yu Ziqing.

There was surprise in her eyes, and something complicated. The next moment, ripples like water spread outward from Yu Ziqing.

Yu Ziqing felt a slight loss of weight. In the blink of an eye, everything returned to normal. He stood on the slope, the female ghost was gone, and the flock of sheep below the slope had reappeared.

The suffocating despair that had weighed on his chest vanished as well.

Yu Ziqing's expression was complicated. He sighed inwardly—just as he had guessed. That endlessly replaying illusion was an abyss of despair, a godforsaken place that couldn't tolerate even a shred of compassion.

He had only shown a tiny bit of compassion—whether genuine or not—before being crushed by despair, and it had spat him out.

Old Yang stood beside Yu Ziqing, nudging him with his head, pulling the distracted man back.

"Old sir, I'm fine. Let's go."

After taking two steps, Yu Ziqing stopped. He paused for two breaths, then decisively turned back, pulled out his short sword, walked to the withered tree, and carved a few crooked characters into it.

Tomb of Cece, erected by Ziqing.

After a moment's thought, Yu Ziqing added another line beside it.

Tomb of Cece's Child, erected by Ziqing.

"I don't know your name. I can barely even speak, let alone carve a stone tablet. I'll give you a nickname and use this dead tree as a marker. The thought counts—don't mind it."

"See? That 'what if' I mentioned just happened."

"And don't blame yourself. Your child definitely doesn't blame you. Really."

If he didn't do something, Yu Ziqing felt his heart wouldn't settle. This wretched place couldn't tolerate even a hint of compassion—whether real or fake—yet it used that same compassion to torment her. If she had truly turned dark, she probably would have escaped long ago.

What kind of cursed place was this?

Ghosts don't harm people. It's people who harm people.

Yu Ziqing turned and left. Old Yang craned his neck to look at the carvings, his expression strange, then shook his head as if he couldn't bear to look, following along.

Yu Ziqing was a bit exasperated.

"The Register Script you taught me doesn't have that character at all. I used one with a similar meaning—what's wrong with that?"

"Besides, it's not my fault it looks ugly—I'm cold and hungry, and my hands are shaking."

Old Yang shook his head, signaling that wasn't what he meant, then nodded toward Yu Ziqing's chest.

"You're saying I'm stingy? That I gave you the smallest strip? What do you know—this is my lifeline, my very life depends on these beef jerky strips..."

Seeing that Yu Ziqing still didn't seem to understand, Old Yang stopped gesturing and just grinned, listening to Yu Ziqing's flustered explanations.

When Yu Ziqing and the remaining flock of sheep had gradually faded away, disappearing down the path.

From the tree hollow behind the withered tree, the woman drifted out, one hand gently touching the newly carved words, the other clutching the small strip of beef jerky Yu Ziqing had left behind. She stood there, silent, for a very, very long time.

A moment later, when the abyss descended once more, the woman gripped the beef jerky tightly in one hand and was dragged back into the depths.

This time, something seemed a little different.