Shang Xiangyu walked slowly to the corner of the cave by the Great Cauldron, his face devoid of any expression, his eyes showing a kind of fish-like numbness.
In that corner, there were two Great Cauldrons. Shang Xin was completely naked at the moment, sitting downwards, nestled inside one of the cauldrons.
He seemed to be asleep, his expression serene, motionless.
Shang Xiangyu stood by the cauldron, looking at Shang Xin.
Yesterday morning, he had undone Shang Xin’s chains and had taken him to play in the dense forest for a day.
He personally took Shang Xin to catch rabbits, roast rabbits, and he made a swing under a big tree in the forest; Shang Xin sat on the swing, and he pushed him for a long time, pushed him very high...
Shang Xin laughed happily...
Though he was Shang Xin’s brother, this was the first time he had ever played with Shang Xin since they were children.
When they were young at home, every time Shang Xin came to look for him, he would push Shang Xin away in disgust. After it happened many times, Shang Xin became afraid when he saw him and never came to find him again.
The two brothers played in the dense forest for an entire day until dusk fell. Shang Xin, already tired, sat on a platform of blue stone, but he still looked clear-eyed, drooling, smiling as he watched Shang Xiangyu not far away.
Shang Xiangyu squatted in front of Shang Xin, wiped his sweat and drool with his sleeve, stared at him blankly, and said painfully: "Xin’Er, forgive your brother!"
After Shang Xiangyu finished speaking, after a long while, he suddenly smiled wretchedly and gently fed a medicine pill into Shang Xin’s mouth. Shang Xin didn’t know what the pill was, but upon swallowing it, a cool sweetness spread in his mouth, and with the saliva, he swallowed the pill down.
The next moment, his eyes turned black, and he fell into Shang Xiangyu’s arms.
At that moment, in the crimson cave, Shang Xiangyu looked at Shang Xin in the cauldron, Shang Xin’s naked body drenched in sweat, obviously due to the gushing magma causing the cave temperature to be extremely high, leaving him overheated.
At this moment, Shang Xin trembled slightly and suddenly opened his eyes.
Shang Xiangyu’s heart stirred; he had fed Shang Xin a kind of knockout drug, but he had deliberately mixed it with honey, mint, and sesame paste to give Shang Xin a feeling of eating a sugar pill.
However, the honey and sesame paste might have diluted the drug’s potency, and now, with the closed and extremely hot surroundings of the cave, Shang Xin’s whole body was sweating, and being naked seemed to have evaporated the residual effects of the drug.
As soon as Shang Xin woke up, he saw Shang Xiangyu standing by the cauldron. He smiled at Shang Xiangyu and tried to struggle to get up.
But his buttocks were nestled in the cauldron, and his hands and feet were propped by the edge of the cauldron, leaving him unable to muster any strength.
He raised one hand towards Shang Xiangyu, and Shang Xin’s usually slurred tone suddenly became clear. "Brother! Hug!"
Shang Xiangyu froze there, looking at Shang Xin in astonishment, thinking he had heard wrong.
"Brother... hug!" Shang Xin struggled in the cauldron and called out again.
Shang Xiangyu’s body trembled like a sieve, tears cascading down like broken beads.
Shang Xin called out twice, not only Shang Xiangyu heard it, but Pan Yong, Duan Rong, Yin Cong, Chen Hu all heard it; except for Pan Yong, the other three were shocked.
Shang Xiangyu was the brother of the fool!
Shang Xiangyu’s eyes were filled with tears as he forced a smile, picked up Shang Xin, and sat him on the edge of the cauldron.
As Shang Xiangyu cried, he smiled eerily, suddenly noticing that at his right fingertips, white light flickered faintly. It was the dense and violent Heaven and Earth Primordial Qi surging at his fingertips.
Shang Xiangyu’s hand paused slightly, his eyes filled with sorrow, and he suddenly raised his fingertip, gently pointing at a spot on Shang Xin’s chest.
With a "puffing" sound, a mass of blood mixed with shattered flesh sprayed out from Shang Xin’s back, splattering into the cauldron. Shang Xin’s innocent and silly smile froze on his face, staring blankly at Shang Xiangyu.
Shang Xiangyu’s fingertips dispatched the violent Heaven and Earth Primordial Qi, instantly tearing Shang Xin’s heart apart.
Shang Xiangyu’s hand released, watching Shang Xin’s body fall into the cauldron.
At the moment he killed Shang Xin, his chaotic heart suddenly calmed down, even he was surprised by this abrupt change.
Shang Xiangyu’s gaze was cold as he looked at the body in the cauldron, murmuring: "Xin’Er, brother is dead, you can’t live either. It wasn’t me who killed you, but this cruel fate."
"Both myself and my hand are merely pawns beneath this cruel fate." Shang Xiangyu raised his hand, looking at the finger that ended Shang Xin’s life, saying.
At this moment, Shang Xiangyu glanced at the pill furnace not far away. The ring of Water Jade on the belly of the furnace was still glowing inconsistently, sometimes green, sometimes blue.
Shang Xiangyu’s gaze focused. Time waits for no one.
Now, looking back at the body in the cauldron, any brotherly affection in his body had vanished. At this moment, looking at Shang Xin’s body, his gaze was icy, as if he were looking at a mere medicinal ingredient.
Shang Xiangyu suddenly picked up a stone pestle, thicker than a human arm, leaning against the cauldron, and forcefully pounded it into the cauldron, one strike after another.
The body in the cauldron was quickly ground into a bloody pulp.
Shang Xiangyu pulled out the stone pestle, wiped off the blood splatter and flesh bits from his face, picked up a filter cloth from the cauldron beside it, wrapped a large mass of bloody flesh, and started twisting it with force in the other cauldron.
As Shang Xiangyu twisted, gushing blood water squeezed out from the fine meshes of the filter cloth...
After Shang Xiangyu repeated the operation several times, Shang Xin’s body had become a heap of flesh residue, and the other cauldron was now half-filled with blood water, exuding a rich bloody smell...