[Onmyoji] Bo Qing

This evening, three people gathered together.

The location is in front of Zichen Hall, under the cherry tree.

Seimei showed up a little later.He is at ease in a white safari, with a strapped magnum in his left hand.Although the right hand is holding a lamp, it seems that the lamp has not been lit all the way.Full black leather ankle boots.

Boya was already standing under the cherry tree.He was dressed for battle: formal court attire, a crown with a tassel on his head.A long knife hangs on the left waist, a bow is held in the right hand, and arrows are carried behind him.

"Hey." Qingming greeted, and Boya responded, "Yes." A man dressed as a mage stood beside Boya.

It was a small man with a lute strapped to his back.

"This is Master Chanmaru." Boya introduced Master to Qingming.The pipa secret songs "Flowing Spring" and "Woodpecker" that Boya had heard before were played by this blind old mage.

Chanmaru slightly bowed his knees and saluted. "Is it Lord Seimei?"

"I am Abe Seimei from Yinyang Liao." Seimei spoke respectfully and behaved steadily.

"I've heard all about you, Master Chanwan, from Boya." His words were much more elegant than when he was with Boya.

"I also heard from Lord Boya about Lord Qingming." The little mage bowed in greeting.His neck looked thin and thin, like the neck of a crane.

"I told Master Chanmaru about hearing the sound of the pipa in the middle of the night, and he also said that he must listen to it." Boya explained to Qingming.

Qingming looked at Boya carefully, and asked him, "Do you go out dressed like this every night?"

"Where is it? Tonight is because there are guests present. If I were alone, I wouldn't be so solemn." Boya laughed.

At this time, there was a wonderful sound of pipa not far away.

Snapped!Qingming clapped her hands lightly.

At this time, from the opposite side of the darkness, a woman's figure quietly appeared.It was a beautiful woman in layered dresses—the so-called twelve singles.Dragging her Huayi, she walked into the light of the lantern in Boya's hand.

The woman stood in front of Qingming in a soft wisteria-colored dress, with her white and petite eyes lowered.

"Ask this honey bug to take us away." The woman took Qingming's lamp with her white hand.

The lights flicked on.

"Honey bugs?" Boya was puzzled.He took a closer look, wasn't it the beautiful woman who led him into Qingming's house earlier today?

The name Honey Bug, for some reason, gave Boya a creepy feeling.

"Is it a shikigami?" Boya asked, Seimei smiled, and whispered, "It's a curse." Boya looked at Qingming.

"What an incredible person." Boya said and sighed.

Seimei continued: "Actually, Mr. Boya, you have seen her body before she became my shikigami."

Boya looked at Mi Chong strangely, then at Qingming, not understanding.

"Do you still remember the first time we met?" Qingming reminded Boya.

Boya opened his eyes wide and suddenly realized: "Is that the butterfly? She is still alive? So she didn't kill it!"

"Senseless killing is not advisable." This was Seimei's answer. "I brought her back and made her my shikigami. Besides, she was a butterfly brought back by Monk Kukai when he came back from Tang Chang'an in ancient times, so I didn't dare to kill her cruelly."

"I see." Boya felt from the bottom of his heart that Qingming was really a good person.

"It's just right now, let her lead the way for us." This was Qingming's long-awaited plan.Humans and shikigami are different after all, even an onmyoji is the same, because no matter how psychic an onmyoji is, he is still a human being.

But shikigami are different, because they are not human beings, they can help humans avoid things they don’t want to encounter, or help humans go where they want to go, because apart from humans, no matter whether it is an animal or a plant, they all have their intuition , this intuition can help them resist natural enemies and escape natural disasters.

As an onmyoji, Qingming is not afraid of ghosts, but he has a clear purpose for this trip, so he naturally doesn't want to waste extra effort.

Boya didn't understand this, he just looked at Qingming who handed the lamp to the woman, and then at the lamp in his hand.Chanwan didn't bring a lamp, and among the three, only Boya carried a lamp.

"Am I the only one who needs a light?"

"I'm blind, so day and night are the same." Chanmaru said softly.

The honey bug turned its body in the wisteria-colored clothes, and walked quietly in the misty drizzle, and the sound of the pipa resounded in the night.

"Let's go." Seimei said.

Qingming carried the bottle and walked in the misty night and the cool night air.

From time to time, he brought the bottle to his lips and took a few sips of wine, seeming to enjoy such a night, and the faint sound of the pipa.

"Do you drink too?" Qingming asked Boya.

"No." Boya refused at first, but after Seimei teased him about whether he was "afraid of being drunk and the arrow would miss the target", he also started drinking.

The sound of the pipa was melodious and sad, and Chanmaru was walking silently while listening to the sound of the pipa ecstatically.

"It's the first time I've heard this tune, it's such a sad tune." Chanmaru whispered.

"The chest is so stuffy!" Boya said, arching her shoulders.

"It should be a melody from a foreign country." Seimei said while putting the bottle to his mouth.

The trees under the night are very peaceful, and the fragrance of green leaves dissolves in the night.

A group of people arrived at Luocheng Gate.The beautiful sound of the qin really came from above the Luocheng Gate.

The three of them listened silently for a while.

The tune changes from time to time.

When playing one of the pieces, Chanmaru murmured to himself in a low voice: "I have some impression of this piece..."

"What?!" Boya looked at Chanwan.

"One day before his death, the late Shikibu Qinggong played an unknown piece of music, I think it is this piece of music." Chanmaru took off the pipa from his shoulder and held it in his arms.Qiang Qiang——Cicada Ball played the pipa along with the melody coming from Luocheng Gate.

Qiang Qiang—the melodies of the two pipas began to intertwine.

There was a slight hesitation at the beginning of Chanwan's pipa sound.However, perhaps Chanmaru's pipa sound reached the other party's ears, and the pipa sound from Luocheng Gate repeated that piece of music in the same way.Repeated several times, the sound of Chanwan's pipa no longer hesitated, and after several rounds of back and forth, it was almost integrated with the sound of pipa from the city gate.

Brilliant music.The sound of the two pipas blended harmoniously, echoing in the night.It was a tremblingly beautiful pipa sound.

Chanmaru closed her blind eyes as if fascinated, and played a series of sounds on the pipa, as if she was chasing something rising in her heart.Joy was evident on his face.

"I'm so happy, Qingming..." Boya murmured with tears in his eyes.That's his heartfelt emotion as a music fanatic: "As a mortal, I can hear such pipa fairy music..."

Qiang Qiang—the sound of the pipa rises into the dark sky.

Someone has spoken.A low, beastly voice.At first, the sound was low and mixed with the sound of the pipa, and gradually became louder.

The voice came from Luocheng Gate.It turned out that the pipa player on the Luocheng Gate was crying while playing.

I don't know when, the two lutes are still, only the voice is crying.

As if chasing the aftertaste of the lute left in the atmosphere, Chanmaru raised his blind eyes to the sky, with a blissful expression on his face.

Voices began to be mixed with the crying.is a foreign language.

"This is not the language of Tang Dynasty." After listening to it for a while, Qingming suddenly said: "It is the language of Tianzhu..."

"Can you understand?" Boya asked.

"A little bit." Qingming added, because he knew quite a few monks.

"What are you talking about?" Qingming listened carefully again, and said to Boya: "It's saying 'how miserable'. It also said 'I'm so happy'. It seems to be calling a certain woman's name again..."

"What's the woman's name?"

"Say it's Sydney."

"Sydney?"

"Siniya, it could also be Silia." Qingming looked up at Luocheng Gate nonchalantly.The place where the light can reach is extremely limited, and the place a little higher is already pitch black.

Going up to the second floor of the city gate, Seimei greeted him softly.He spoke a foreign language.

The crying stopped abruptly.

"What did you say?" "I said: 'You play the pipa really well.'" After a while, a low voice came from above.

"You play my country's music and speak my country's language, who are you?" Although slightly accented, it is unmistakably Japanese.

"We are the ruling people serving the court." Boya replied.

"What's your name?" the voice asked again.

"Yuan Boya." Boya said.

"Yuan Boya, you were the one who came here last night, right?" the voice asked.

"Exactly." Boya replied.

"I'm Chanmaru." Chanmaru said.

"Cicada...were you playing the pipa just now?" When the voice asked, Chanwan plucked the strings and replaced the answer with a clang.

"I'm Zhengcheng." When Qingming said this, Boya looked at him in confusion: ...Why didn't you use your real name?Boya's puzzled expression expressed such a meaning.

Qingming looked up at Luocheng Gate nonchalantly.

"There is one more..." The voice hesitated to speak.

"...doesn't seem like a human?" The voice seemed to be muttering to himself.

"That's right." Sunny said.

"Is it an elf?" the voice asked in a low voice.

Seimei nodded.

It seems that the upstairs is overlooking the city gate.

"May I ask your honorable name?" Qingming asked.

"Han Duotai——" The voice of the answer was very low.

"Is it a foreign name?" "Yes. I was born in a place you call Tianzhu." "Shouldn't I be from this world?" "Yes." Mrs. Hando replied.

"What is your identity?" "I am a wandering musician. I was originally the son of a king of a small country. Because the country was destroyed in a war, he left for another country. I loved music more than martial arts since I was a child. I knew musical instruments at the age of ten. At last What I'm good at is playing the banjo..." There was infinite nostalgia in his voice.

"I just wandered around the world with a yueqin in my arms, and arrived in Datang, where I spent the longest period of time in one place during my lifetime. When I came to your country, it was more than 150 years ago. I took the empty sea The monk's boat came to your country..."

"I died in 120 years ago. I used to make lutes and other musical instruments near Fahua Temple in Pingcheng Jing. One night a thief came, and I was beheaded by the thief and died..."

"Then why are you like this again?"

"I originally wanted to see my hometown again in my lifetime. Maybe it's the sadness of leaving my homeland for a long time and dying in a foreign country, which makes me die with regret."

"That's true." Qingming nodded in agreement, and asked again: "However, Mrs. Han Duo..."

"Please speak," the voice replied.

"Why did you steal that Profound Elephant?" "Actually, I made this Profound Elephant when I was in Tang Dynasty." His voice was low and calm.

Seimei let out a long sigh. "I see."

"It must be a wonderful fate. Mr. Zhengcheng..." said the voice.He used the false name Seimei reported just now.

However, Seimei did not answer.

"Mr. Zhengcheng..." The voice spoke again.

Boya looked at Qingming.With a smile on her red lips, Qingming looked up at the dim city gate.

Suddenly, Boya remembered something.

"That mysterious elephant may have belonged to you in the past, but it is ours now. Can you give it back to us?" Boya stared upwards and said.

"It's not a big problem to return it, but..." The voice was very small.After being silent for a while, he said, "However, can you agree to one of my requests?"

"what's up?"

"I am ashamed to say that when I sneaked into the palace, I fell in love with a female official." "There is such a thing?" "I married a wife when I was 16 years old, and this female official looks exactly like my wife... I sneaked into the palace every night because of the female official. That's how I saw the mysterious elephant. Of course, I could use the power of ghosts and gods to take the female official as my own, but I couldn't bear it. So I settled for the next best thing and took Walking on the mysterious image, remembering the past and my wife Sydney, playing the pipa to soothe my soul."

"Then..." "Please tell the woman this secret, and invite her to come here once. Only one night is enough. Please give me a one-night relationship. If my wish is fulfilled, she can return to the palace the next morning. Then leave here quietly..." After finishing speaking, the voice sounded like weeping.

"Understood." It was Boya who answered.

"I'll go back and report the matter to the Holy Majesty. If the Holy Majesty allows it, I will bring that girl here at the same time tomorrow night..."

"I am very grateful." "What are the characteristics of that woman?" "It is a female official with a fair complexion and a mole on her forehead. Her name is Yucao." .If the Holy Majesty is not allowed, then the arrow will be shot in black..." "Your Majesty, thank you." The voice replied.

"That's right. You..." The one who suddenly spoke to the city gate was Qingming who had been silent just now.

"Can you play the pipa just now for us again?" "Play the pipa?" "Yes." "I wish I could. I should have played it downstairs, but because of my unbearable appearance, I played it upstairs. " said the voice.The clanging pipa sounded.

The sound of the pipa is endless, as if there are countless spider threads in the atmosphere, which is better than the previous performance and more mesmerizing.

Honey Bug, who had been standing by the side, bent down slightly, put the lamp on the ground, and stood up lightly.In the night where the breeze was rippling, the honey bug raised her white arms lightly and danced lightly.

She danced to the melody of the pipa.

"Oh!" Boya couldn't help exclaiming.

The dance and the sound of the piano are over.

Voices came from above.

"What a wonderful dance! Please stop here tonight. Just in case, let me show my strength." "Just in case?" "So that you won't do stupid things tomorrow." The voice just said Falling, a green light swept over from the second floor of Luocheng Gate and shone on the honey worm.

The moment the honey bug was covered by the light, a distressed expression appeared on his face, and his lips parted.Just as he was about to show his teeth, the figures of light and honey bugs disappeared.

The lamp on the ground reflected a floating thing, which slowly fell to the ground.

Qingming stepped forward to pick it up and saw that the honey bug had turned back into a butterfly, not sure if it was dead or alive.

"Please everyone." There was such a sentence on the top of the head, and there was no sound.

After that, only silky mist and rain floated in the silent night sky.

Qingming pinched the wisteria flower with the white fingers of his right hand, and pressed it gently on his red lips.

A serene smile formed on his lips.

The author has something to say: there are a lot of original texts, accounting for [-]%.