"Did she get together with him because he looks so much like me?" Xiao Shu asked me, still standing rooted to the spot after shouldering her pack, staring blankly at the stones on the ground, the question lingering in the air.

At first hearing those words, I was completely bewildered. Unlike English, the Chinese pronouns for 'she,' 'he,' and 'it' sound identical. If the words were written on paper, I would have grasped the meaning instantly. But hearing them spoken, those indistinguishable tā, tā, tā sent me reeling, taking me a good while to decipher the exact intent. He was likely still tangled up in the issue of 'the groom isn't me,' unable to shake off the heartache from that scene amidst the forest revelry.

To bring this poor soul, so deeply entrenched in his obsession, back to reason as quickly as possible, I had to rack my brains for a way to guide him. "My elder sister works at the newspaper office; she often shares insights from her work when she gets home. I remember her most frequent saying was that behind every piece of news, there's its own story, and without understanding those stories, you can never know the truth. Therefore, journalists are skilled at digging into the hidden narratives behind the headlines. By the same token, passing any judgment on her based merely on conjecture, before knowing the truth of the story, seems rather biased and unfair to the person involved."

"Mmm, good brother," Xiao Shu nodded, reaching over to loop an arm through mine, and we started walking east, shoulder to shoulder. However, our pace now was much slower and heavier than when we arrived.

Following the map's directions, we skirted the cliff hanging over the Sea of the Departed Souls, reaching the base of the mountain near dusk. Only as we drew closer to the sea wall of the Sea of the Departed Souls did the anxious knot in my stomach begin to loosen. Since it was getting late, I wondered if the Spider Horde would appear tonight; without the sea's protection, our situation would be perilous.

The sunset over the Sea of the Departed Souls was the most brilliant and moving sight I had ever witnessed. Perhaps because the sky itself already held a pinkish hue, the dying rays of the sun brushed over it, transforming the entire horizon into something resembling an oil painting, mesmerizing us into a daze. If I could build a house here, even a simple shack, I would settle down for a long, long time.

"Are we camping on the embankment again tonight, or should we stay in the woods?" Xiao Shu asked, glancing at the deepening twilight, a thread of worry in her tone. She had barely spoken during the journey; this was her first sentence since we resumed our trek. It sounded reasonably rational, which eased my apprehension about him slightly.

"Let's stick to yesterday's plan; we need to guard against the spiders. Based on past experience, the creatures living near the Sea of the Departed Souls are not to be trifled with. They can provoke you, but you absolutely cannot provoke them. If you fight back and cause them harm, they are certain to seek retribution," I remarked with a touch of dark humor.

"Hahaha," Xiao Shu threw her head back in a loud laugh, regaining her former spirit. "If we can't afford to provoke them, can't we just avoid them? We'll hide in the Sea of the Departed Souls and see what they can do to us then." Her expression suggested she had already forgotten the recent unpleasantness.

"What if piranhas show up to nip at our heels? This morning, someone moved faster than a rabbit, zipping out of the lake onto the shore—I thought I was looking at a reincarnated Superman!" I countered.

"If Superman were reincarnated, we wouldn't have to walk nearly this far. I'd just carry you on my back, and we'd shoot over this mountain like a rocket. It wouldn't take two hours to find Monkey," she declared, and we both burst into laughter. Our spirits soared, matching the incomparable brilliance of the evening glow.