Chapter 185: Cloud Mountain (Part 7)

Qianyin and Elder Xian snapped back to their senses and immediately stepped forward to grab An Feng's body. However, this alone was not enough for An Feng to pull the person up. Qianyin had no choice but to rush in front of An Feng, grabbing Mohan's waist with all her might and finally pulling her up with every ounce of strength she had.

Liu Fei's body was extremely heavy. Being pulled up, it landed on the ground like a cold stone, producing a heavy, muffled thud that carried a freezing chill, striking straight into the hearts of everyone present.

Only then did Qianyin and Elder Xian notice the surrounding scene: the steep, sheer cliffs and two lifeless bodies with closed eyes and lingering smiles. Qianyin touched Xiao Qi's face in disbelief, standing frozen in place. Dead—Xiao Qi and Liu Fei were dead.

Mohan's tears refused to be held back any longer. Just as she had managed to stop crying, seeing them made her heart ache anew and filled her with overwhelming guilt. All of this was her fault; she should not have been so willful. She desperately reached up to wipe away the tears on her face, wishing to erase the evidence of her grief, but no matter how much she wiped, they would not stop.

An Feng felt his heart break for her. He stepped forward, pulled Mohan into his embrace, gently patted her back, and consoled, "It's going to be alright. It's not your fault, you don't need to blame yourself like this."

Mohan struggled frantically, crying out in a panic, "No, it is my fault! If I hadn't insisted on coming out to rescue those so-called victims, they wouldn't have died."

Elder Xian paid no attention to who was right or wrong. He stepped forward first to examine the bodies, confirming that the gunshot wound to the head had been the fatal blow. He sighed inwardly; after all, their Mohan family owed these two young souls a debt. To die at such a young age—their parents must be heartbroken.

Qianyin pressed her lips together and remained completely silent. She did not know what to say. From the standpoint of a friend, she should comfort Mohan first, but as an outsider, she ought to condemn her.

No one spoke again, leaving Mohan to wash away her sins with her own tears. Mohan's original intention had been pure; as a police officer, she was duty-bound to rescue those around her. Her only mistake had been a failure of judgment, which had cost the lives of two loyal subordinates.

Time ticked away drop by drop. The surrounding temperature continued to drop, and the passing wind blew with a biting chill. Realizing they could no longer remain silent like this, someone had to speak up, otherwise the wolves would soon emerge.

"How do you plan to bury their remains? Are you going to bury them right here?" Qianyin asked in a low voice. Now was not the time to assign blame or argue over right and wrong; there were still too many matters waiting for them to handle, and they could only deal with them one step at a time.

"No, I'm taking them home," Mohan said with certainty. The determination in her eyes left no room for the other three to question her. She stepped forward, hoisted Xiao Qi's corpse directly onto her back, and began walking step by step along the path they had taken to get here.

An Feng and the others immediately furrowed their brows. Why was Mohan acting up and making a scene again? Although the bodies were important, bringing them back would cause a mountain of trouble. Leaving aside how they would explain things to the police chief upon returning to the precinct, simply transporting the bodies back was a problem in itself—a full two days' journey. Even though the weather here was freezing, the bodies would still undergo a certain degree of decomposition.

"Mohan, stop acting rashly and hold on for a moment. Let's do one thing first before carrying the bodies back, alright?" Elder Xian watched Mohan as she struggled forward step by step, calling out to her with helpless resignation. This group of young people were all stubborn to a fault; once they set their minds on something, nothing could make them change it.

After carrying the corpse for a few steps, Mohan started to gasp for breath; she was already utterly exhausted. Without proper rest, there was simply no way she could transport the body all the way back, a fact she knew all too well. Yet she refused to admit defeat and could not bear to abandon these precious remains to the wilderness.

Hearing that they would help her think of a way, Mohan gently lowered Xiao Qi's remains and sat quietly in a daze beside her. Looking at that face that still bore a trace of a smile, the pain in her heart felt as though it had been pricked by needles and then washed over with brine.

Elder Xian glanced at An Feng, who immediately understood and hoisted Liu Fei's body onto his own back. Placing it beside Xiao Qi's, he looked quietly at Mohan, feeling a deep ache in his chest yet having no idea how to comfort her.

Elder Xian surveyed the surrounding medicinal herbs. He remembered a miraculous medical formula from the past. As long as he could find that specific herb and apply its juice to a person's nostrils, it could preserve the body from decay for a full decade.

Without carrying the reference illustrations with him, he had to rely entirely on his own sense of smell to search. Without telling the others what he was looking for, he walked alone with his head bowed and waist bent, sniffing at the herbs everywhere. After smelling several varieties—even catching a peculiar, nauseating scent of blood that made him want to vomit—he forced the nausea down and continued his search.

Qianyin walked a few steps, wanting to follow and help with the search, but she simply could not bear this oppressive atmosphere. If she stayed here any longer, she felt she would be crushed to death by the heavy, suffocating grief radiating from Mohan. She understood the feeling of losing someone important, but she could not fathom what it felt like to have your friends die for you.

Mohan kept her head down, gently stroking Xiao Qi's face, wishing so much that she would open her eyes once more. She longed for that mischievous girl to come back; even though Xiao Qi could be annoying at times, having her alive and breathing beat anything else in the world.

Her mind drifted back to the first time she had met Xiao Qi. Back then, Xiao Qi had been so irritating, wearing that confident smile on her face. Yet as they gradually grew closer through subsequent encounters, blow after blow had slowly worn away that confident smile.

The more Mohan thought about it, the less she could control the tears streaming down her face, dripping steadily downward. Flashes of memory also crossed her mind—times when Liu Fei had brought her cake. Liu Fei had been an exceptional subordinate. In the next lifetime, she hoped he would never meet a captain like her, nor ever come close to her, so that Liu Fei could live a life of happiness.

Elder Xian had walked quite a distance. Shivering all over from the piercing cold, with his hands rubbed raw and bleeding, he finally found the three medicinal herbs he needed. Pulling out a small piece of cloth, he placed all the herbs together, picked up a small stone, and pounded relentlessly at the surface. Soon, a rich mixture of medicinal juice and pulp was extracted.

Having finished all this, Elder Xian felt as joyful as a child and dashed back at a run. Clutching the herbs, he quickly approached Xiao Qi and Liu Fei. Without a word, he glanced at Mohan, then carefully applied the medicinal juice to the tips of Xiao Qi and Liu Fei's noses.

The scent of this medicine was intensely fishy and bitter; just inhaling the aroma gave one a sense of a bitterness so profound it was almost impossible to swallow. Mohan and the others pinched their noses tightly, waving their hands to fan away the surrounding air in sheer misery. The smell was suffocating and sickening.

Elder Xian glared at them, smeared the remaining juice onto the backs of Liu Fei and Xiao Qi's hands until all of it was used up, tossed the small piece of cloth onto the ground, stood up carefully, and patted his sore lower back.

Knowing that leaving tonight was out of the question and that they would have to spend another night in the cave, Mohan looked at Elder Xian with lingering confusion. As she lifted Xiao Qi's body back onto her own shoulders, she asked, "What is the purpose of doing this, Elder Xian?"

"These herbs can preserve their bodies from decay, for at least ten years," Elder Xian replied as he took the lead, speaking with an air of profound mystery. The bottomless abyss of the pharmaceutical world was not something ordinary people could casually step into, and even he had yet to fathom its deepest depths.