458: Blood

Blood

"Faced with this sudden attack, the primitive people were at a loss. Their gods and witchcraft couldn't help. Their valuable relics that had been passed down for generations were exported to the civilized world and disappeared."2

Grandma calmed down. Xiao Yi and I didn't dare to speak. This must be how Grandma was brought to the outside world.

"Tong Hui quietly followed behind these savages. He eventually found the mute girl's tribe in the hinterland. The mute girl was no longer a priestess because she gave birth to a child."

My heart skipped a beat. The child of the Tong family!

"That child was thrown into the river by the tribesmen, while the mute girl was put into a cage and locked in the cave where she and that man spent their days and nights together. That was her punishment. However, she didn't die. She waited for that man to return. She knew he would.

"Tong Hui returned. He found a guide to act as an interpreter. He told her that if she cured the poison in his body, he would not kill her tribesmen. Her tribesmen knelt in front of her. Tong Hui forced her to submit by locking her up like an animal. She refused to help him, and he started to kill her tribespeople.

"The mute woman was indifferent. When every one of her tribe was killed, she laughed. She thanked Tong Hui in sign language for getting rid of these people. They killed her family, threw away her child, and locked her up in the cave. They were no longer her tribesmen. They were her enemy.

"Tong Hui was furious. He demanded her to cure his poison. The mute girl told him to let her out of the cage first. Tong Hui had no choice but to agree. The mute girl knelt before her tribe's corpses. She made a seal with her hands and cut open her arm to fuse her blood with her tribe. She walked to Tong Hui and told him to suck her blood. She said that was the only way to cure the poison. However, Tong Hui was suspicious."

I sighed.

Grandma smiled. "You've guessed the ending? The antidote was indeed the girl's blood, but Tong Hui didn't believe her. He missed his last chance. The mute girl looked at him and smiled weirdly. She wiped her blood on her body and made another seal before jumping into the river.

"Tong Hui wanted to haul her back, but there was nothing he could do. The current was too fast, and the girl was already gone. The translator told Tong Hui that the mute girl had cursed his family for generations before she jumped into the river. Tong Hui was angry, but there was nothing he could do."

Was this karma?

"What happened next?" I asked softly because we hadn't reached the part about the free-spirited grass."

"After that, Tong Hui started to comb the other villages for priestesses. He threatened, enticed, and used all kinds of methods. There was another priestess who fell for his trick. She was willing to develop an antidote for him. That was how he got the free-spirited grass.

"However, free-spirited grass isn't an antidote. It's a different poison. They merely control the other. But as the body ages, the balance between the two poisons will topple over. Eventually, the person will die from either forget-me-not or free-spirited grass."

After telling this story, Grandma's entire body relaxed.

"Does this mean the antidote of forget-me-not is the blood of the poisoner?" I latched on this detail. I was hopeful.

Grandma shook her head.

My heart sank.

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