Life: A Black and White Film (一生一世，黑白影画)

Chapter 12.3 - This Avici Hell (3)

The bonfire gave off a crackling sound. The wind blew a glowing ember toward them and nearly singed her hair, but he blocked it with the back of his hand. Several claps of thunder pounded the air. Wen Han lifted her head. The moon could still be seen. There should not be rain, then. Besides, the wind was also blowing so strong.

However, these rumbles of thunder successfully managed to startle awake the peafowls in the straw shed. In the middle of this night, some blue peafowl leisurely strolled out, pausing every couple of steps. They were several peahens surrounding one peacock. From a distance, they haughtily surveyed these human folk.

With her arms encircling her knees, Wen Han watched these peafowl that were raised even more carefully and meticulously than the little masters of this manor estate. They were, after all, the national bird of India. As she gazed at those blue-hued feathers below these blue peafowls' necks that were illuminated by the blazing flames, she all of a sudden remembered how, that day, he had crouched down and teased that peacock. It seemed he was very familiar with this particular creature.

"Were you ever in India before?" This was a harmless topic, she thought.

"I have been to many places," he said in an even tone. "The Ajanta Caves, Hawa Mahal, the Golden Temple in Amritsar, Amber Fort, Sri Meenakshi Temple... and also the deserts, beaches, and rocky deserts here. Many places." This was Cheng Muyun's first time telling her about his past experiences.

Even if they were only a series of place names, they were still like pictures of a black and white film unfolding, one by one, in front of her eyes.

His fingers stroked over her hair that was tied up. Applying only a slight force, he undid it, allowing her long, black tresses to spill down. "I also raised peafowls for half a year."

No wonder... he knew so well how to bully peafowls.<>Please read this from hui3r[dot]wordpress[dot]com

That was ten years ago.<>This is an UNAUTHORIZED copy, taken from hui3r[dot]wordpress[dot]com

The Cheng Muyun back then and the one now were two completely different people. Or perhaps it should be said, the "he" that Wen Han saw in Nepal who enticed and seduced her was a pared down incarnation of the Cheng Muyun of ten years ago. He had grown up living his life in gray areas. In his adolescent days, he had committed too many evils, and to allow his heart to feel less uncomfortable, he began observing the precepts from age fifteen. Then later, because of an old monk's questioning that cut to his very soul, he had at last suddenly and wholly awakened from his ways.

Afterwards, he had turned himself in, purely as a form of self-punishment.

It was in prison that he had met Fu Yiming.<>Please read this at hui3r[dot]wordpress[dot]com instead

Fu Yiming at that time was acting undercover and was squatting in a jail cell to investigate a case.

In that darkest of prisons in Moscow, Cheng Muyun had looked on as Fu Yiming fraternized with an imprisoned drug lord, being "brothers" with him, and found out about a shocking smuggling line established along a very long stretch of border. And when Fu Yiming's true identity was detected and he was nearly killed as a silencing measure, it was Cheng Muyun who had rescued him.

"Interested?" At the time, the injured Fu Yiming had helped Cheng Muyun get an early release from prison. "I need someone to help me continue investigating this. I can't. I need to keep away to avoid suspicion and conflict of interest. My older sister is involved in this."

When Fu Yiming made this request, he had already clearly known that Cheng Muyun's pre-prison identity, background, and connections could help him complete this assignment.