The Burning Chronicles Chapter 5

Seeing this, Grace Qi seemed to hold a ball of fire in her hand, threw away all the pearls, and screamed, "What kind of magic did you use to create this illusion?! Why am I in it... I, I don't believe it, why are you confusing me?!"

The three pearls rolled down to Luke Lu's feet. Luke Lu picked up the pearls expressionlessly and said slowly, "The old lady has indeed forgotten everything..." When he raised his head again, his eyes were cold.

"What do you mean by forgotten? This is totally untrue! In that illusion, I was at least seven years old. How could I not remember things when I was seven years old? I don't even remember knowing a monster named 'Zane'! Tell me, are you an accomplice of that monster?" Grace Qi took a few steps back, already hysterical.

"'Zane' is the name you gave him. What you wrote was 'Yingqi', which means he would hold up the fox fire to illuminate you. You were still young at that time, and your handwriting was messy, so Zane mistook 'qi' for 'zhi'." Luke Lu said this, holding the pearls and approaching Grace Qi, and stuffed the remaining two pearls into her hands without saying anything, "Whether this is an illusion forged by me, the old lady should know it in her heart. What's the benefit of forging this illusion? If you want to take away someone's spirit, just take it by force, why bother with this?"

Luke Lu said this in a strong voice, and his strength was so terrifying that he forced Grace Qi to hold the two pearls again.

Those were Zane's two remaining memories.

When the first one started, Grace Qi only heard noisy shouting and fighting and felt a heart-wrenching pain.

"Master, this is it! It has been coming to my son Qi'er at night for some time now, and it has caused his illness to not get better! Master, you must get rid of it to prevent future troubles!" The voice was that of a middle-aged man, gritting his teeth, as if he was extremely hateful.

Zane saw that his limbs were nailed to the ground by peach wood. The sharp wooden spikes were engraved with complicated spells in chicken blood. From top to bottom, they pierced his four palms, passed through the bones, and were nailed to the ground. He couldn't move, bleeding, and the pain from his limbs gnawed at his mind. He forced himself to raise his head and saw many pairs of feet standing in front of him. Looking through his feet into the distance, he saw Quinn Xiao tied to a pillar with ropes. The little child's face was covered with tears, and he shouted, "Let him go! Daddy, Mom, please let him go, Brother Zane is not a bad person! Please don't hurt him!"

She cried miserably and her face turned blue. She was sick and if she continued shouting like this, it would cost her life.

"Master, look, Qi'er is still bewitched by that evil spirit!" Another woman cried and threw herself on Quinn Xiao's body. She begged the master and covered Quinn Xiao's face, forcing her not to look at Zane anymore. "How could my well-behaved daughter still be obsessed with her evil ways? What should I do..."

Quinn Xiao couldn't move, so she shook her head vigorously and moved forward. The rope had already left blood marks on her neck, but she seemed to feel nothing. She stared at Zane in a pool of blood and cried, "Brother Zane, don't die... Quinn Xiao begs you not to die. Quinn Xiao still wants to see the lanterns you lit. Quinn Xiao said she wanted to be with you forever... Please, Brother Zane, say one word to me, don't die, don't die..."

Zane raised his head with all his strength. He tried to move his nail-pierced claws, and another pool of blood gushed out. "Quinn Xiao..." He was extremely weak and forced a smile towards the girl, even though his true face had been revealed at that time - in order to escape from the Taoist's formation, he had bitten off his teeth, and his nails were broken, leaving several bloody holes.

He is just a monster with weak magical powers, and people don't need much magical powers to beat him badly.

"Don't cry...you'll get sick." He half closed his eyes and muttered a few words from the bottom of his throat.

In the noisy environment, no one could understand what the scarred fox was saying.

"It, it's chanting again!" The frightened middle-aged man saw Zane's mouth opening and closing, and thought it was doing something strange again. Without thinking, he raised his foot and kicked Zane hard on the head!

With a "buzz" sound, Zane only felt the bones in his head cracking, and blood flowed out of his furry ears. He could no longer see anything with his eyes. He only felt as if a huge stone was rolling over him. He could not see or hear clearly...

"Ahhhhhh! Don't touch him!! No one of you is allowed to touch him!!!" Quinn Xiao screamed heartbreakingly in a daze. She kicked her legs frantically and banged her head against the pillar behind her as if in revenge.

"Quinn Xiao... don't cry, don't... cry." He wanted to speak, but he couldn't make a sound anymore. His face was buried in his own blood, warm and smelly.

He vaguely heard the man ask, "Master, what should we do with this evildoer now?"

Another male voice said leisurely, "I will bring this evildoer back. Don't worry, this evildoer will not harm anyone again. You can live your life in peace."

The man hurriedly thanked him, "Master, I don't know how to thank you for your kindness! This money..."

The Taoist priest stopped him, "Well, slaying demons is my duty, and I cannot accept money. You should keep the money and take good care of your little daughter. I'm afraid you still need to take care of her illness."

The man was even more grateful, "The Taoist priest is right, the Taoist priest is right..."

After a while, the man asked in confusion, "Master, since you want to take this evildoer away, but this magic needle is nailed to the ground... it's really difficult to take the evildoer away!" After hesitating for a moment, the man suddenly realized and said, "Look at my stupid head! The limbs are nailed to the ground, so I can just chop them off with a hatchet! Master, you don't mind, right?"

What was the last sound he heard? Was it the sound of a hatchet chopping off his limbs? Or was it Quinn Xiao's final, compromising voice begging for mercy?

The moment the bone was cut, the severe pain stimulated his brain severely, and his whole body felt like it had fallen into hell. He was unable to move or scream.

At the same time, Quinn Xiao cried, "Daddy, Quinn Xiao will be obedient from now on, and Quinn Xiao will never see him again! Let him go, and don't hurt him again... Quinn Xiao has not been bewitched by him, and will never remember him again... Let him go, cut off his hands, he will die, don't die, don't let him die..." At the end of her crying, her voice was as hoarse as a night owl.

At the end of my consciousness, the voices I heard were probably not these... they were the conversation between the Taoist priest and that man.

---"Master, my son Qi'er can't forget this evildoer. What should I do? Is there any way to make Qi'er forget this memory forever?"

Those beautiful memories he had with Quinn Xiao.

The starry night, the candlelight, the laughter, the promise we made to each other not to leave, will all be wiped out at this moment.

The Taoist priest hesitated for a moment, and the last word Zane heard was the one that made him despair: "Okay."

---No need for the world to change, no need for the sea to mutate. Just a small magic formula can make the fragile people of the world forget the memory that they once vowed to engrave in their hearts.

At that moment, Zane thought that he still liked the world.

The parents love their children, the Taoist priest takes it as his responsibility to eliminate demons and defend the way of Taoism, and Quinn Xiao never abandons him until the end... Everyone in the world is kind, right?

It was my own fault. I shouldn't have approached the world as a monster.