Chapter 243: Morning in the Small Courtyard

As soon as He Jin got back to his temporary lodging near the Treasure Market, he saw Hou Yang, the one with the sickly white head, come over and ask in confusion, "What took you so long? Did you find anything?"

How long was I unconscious? He Jin had not yet heard the latest night watch, so he could not tell the time.

He could only put on a gloomy face and say, "I had just slipped into that wine shop’s back courtyard when I was knocked out. I only woke up at the alley mouth by the street a quarter of an hour ago."

Hou Yang froze, nearly unable to hold back his laughter.

He Jin, oh He Jin, you have your day after all!

What did you say about me earlier?

Hou Yang calmed himself so as not to look too smug.

"See? The owner of that courtyard has unfathomable strength."

"It wasn’t the young man who knocked me out. It was the wine shop’s female shopkeeper. Sh-she did it in one move and I passed out. I only caught a glimpse of the skirt she wore and never saw her face." He Jin felt lingering fear as well.

"One move?" Hou Yang blurted in astonishment.

The young man sweeping the floor at least took three moves to scare me off...

Is He Jin deliberately exaggerating to cover up his mistake?

Was it not a failure of fighting but truly too large a gap in realm?

He Jin slowly drew a breath and described what he had experienced and felt, finishing with, "At that moment, the wine shop’s shopkeeper was like the ruler of the heaven and earth in that courtyard. The broom devoured all changes."

"A Supreme Master?" Hou Yang asked, startled and uncertain.

Without personal experience, He Jin could not have recreated such a scene.

"Possible." He Jin did not dare state it outright.

Though he was a seasoned jianghu hand, he had seen fewer than a tenth of the martial arts under heaven, and could not be certain whether what the shopkeeper displayed was the effect of an art.

Hou Yang whispered in disbelief, "A tiny wine shop like that has a Supreme Master, and also a master at least at the perfected Dharma Realm?"

Even if the Flame Capital is full of hidden dragons and crouching tigers, there’s no reason for both dragon and tiger to nest in one tiny wine shop...

Just then, the subordinates they had sent out to gather information returned with more detailed information on the Cheap Wine Shop.

Hou Yang took it and read it, his eyes nearly popping out.

"That young man is Ding Songyan of the Brightnight Sect, and he’s only at the perfected Great Proliferation Realm?"

Who are they trying to fool?

Even the Sage-Severing Way wouldn’t dare lie like that!

"Luo Mingyin, Twelfth Madam Luo, unknown origins, no physical anomalies, has run a wine shop on Tiger Tail Alley for over a year and often curses at her customers... That really does have a bit of a hidden master’s air..." He Jin accepted the information well.

He glanced at Hou Yang and chuckled.

"That Brightnight Sect disciple is clearly Luo Mingyin’s kept pretty boy.

"Did you really test his martial arts? Those moves he made with the broom may well have been secretly guided by Luo Mingyin with a secret art, and he just did as told."

Hou Yang was silent for a moment, then said, "That’s possible."

His judgment wavered.

He Jin then sighed. "That Ding Songyan is plain-looking, yet managed to cling onto a Supreme Master’s high branch.

"Er, could it be that he has extraordinary talent and real skill?"

Hou Yang nodded.

"It seems the crux of this matter is that Twelfth Madam Luo. What do we do next?"

He Jin mused for a moment.

"Luo Mingyin’s attitude is clear. She doesn’t want to be our enemy, and she doesn’t want to be embarrassed by letting us barge into her home.

"For now, we’ll first search the nearby streets and alleys and send people to watch the Cheap Wine Shop, to see whether anyone suspicious goes in and out and whether Wu Zheng appears. At the same time, we’ll report this upward and await His Highness’s decision. Best if we can find out Twelfth Madam Luo’s origins, find someone acquainted with her to mediate, and ask someone trusted by both sides to take a walk through that courtyard."

......

The back courtyard of the Cheap Wine Shop.

Twelfth Madam Luo raised her right hand and tapped her left shoulder lightly, murmuring in some confusion, "Why does my shoulder suddenly feel heavier?"

She senses she’s shouldering the blame out of nowhere? The senses of a Heaven-Man? It doesn’t really count as shouldering blame. This matter was Twelfth Madam’s own doing to begin with. I only guided He Jin’s thoughts in the dream and shed my own load... Ding Songyan touched his ear and feigned puzzlement.

"My ear feels a little hot. Who’s badmouthing me behind my back?"

Surely someone is cursing me as a pretty boy!

Curse away!

Twelfth Madam Luo gave Ding Songyan a suspicious look.

"Did you do something bad behind my back?"

Ding Songyan’s mind turned, and he said earnestly, "When I interrogated He Jin, I led him to believe that everything here was directed by you, Twelfth Madam, and that my own strength is low. Even frightening off that Grandmaster named Hou Yang earlier was the result of your secret guidance."

Twelfth Madam Luo showed a look of understanding and said, amused, "You’re quite scheming, but at least you’re honest."

My specialty is showing sincerity. Senior Sister taught me! Ding Songyan was about to reply when he suddenly heard a painful groan from the east wing.

He and Twelfth Madam Luo walked into the east wing and saw Wu Zheng with his eyes tightly shut, his face somewhat twisted, restless though clearly asleep.

"This is how damage to the soul is. The Life-Sustaining Pill isn’t very effective against that kind of injury." Twelfth Madam Luo went back to the main building and took a few grayish incense sticks and a small green censer from a curio cabinet.

She placed the censer at the head of the bed in the east wing and lit the incense with a wave of her sleeve.

A wisp of cyan smoke rose slowly, its fragrance mild, light and calming.

Twelfth Madam Luo flicked a finger lightly, and the blue smoke, mixed with true qi, drifted toward Wu Zheng’s face and entered his nostrils.

Wu Zheng’s fierce, twisted expression eased bit by bit.

Within less than the time to finish a cup of tea, he was sleeping quite peacefully.

Twelfth Madam Luo stopped driving the smoke with sword qi and let it rise on its own and drift through the east wing, letting the fragrance gradually accumulate.

"Go rest. Watch for any change in his condition." Twelfth Madam Luo raised a hand to cover her mouth and gave a small yawn.

After each washed up, one sat down on the felt mat in the main building and the other returned to the west wing.

Ding Songyan did not rush to sleep. He recalled the Five Elements Escape Art he had seen in the dream.

He had forcibly memorized it with the Celestial Heart Art, as he had the Essentials of Heaven’s Decrees.

Combining He Jin’s physical anomalies with the art’s characteristics, Ding Songyan was now certain which divine beast the Five Elements Escape Art came from: Jiao!

According to the Secret Classic of Mountains and Seas: "There is a beast, shaped like a dog with leopard spots and horns like an ox, called Jiao. The result of consuming it? Grants divine travel into the earth, the aid of plants and trees, and great harvests for the land."

"Divine travel into the earth" and "the aid of plants and trees"... It’s called the Five Elements Escape Art, but it focuses on earth and wood. The other three escapes only assist the first two, aren’t impressive, and can’t even be used alone... After recalling the Five Elements Escape Art, Ding Songyan shifted to a cross-legged posture and began trying to cultivate it.

This was an extremely useful art, worth spending lifespan to master quickly.

After an unknown length of time, yellow-black patterns appeared on Ding Songyan’s face, and two bony ox horns grew from his head.

He had mastered the Five Elements Escape Art, consuming a full six years of lifespan.

Since Twelfth Madam was in the next room, he did not try earth escape on the spot and only made a rough assessment.

For every four hundred meters escaped, or ten breaths spent underground, one must stop the escape art and return to the surface for a breath, or else gradually turn into earth and stone, or interfere with the escape art and be crushed by the earth into meat paste and bloody water...

The perfected Dharma Realm Five Elements Escape Art still has many limitations...

In total I’ve used thirty-seven years of lifespan...

I’ve eaten three kinds of longevity pills, gaining fifty years, so thirteen years remain to spend, and I haven’t yet used the lifespan boost that the realm itself brings...

Ding Songyan rubbed his aching, swollen, hollow head and lay down.

He had planned to use holding to the primordial unity to calm his state and fall into deep sleep, but after smelling the incense drifting from the east wing and the warm fragrance already in the main building, his spirit quickly settled and he fell deeply asleep.

When he opened his eyes the next morning, he actually felt refreshed.

After relieving the pressure in his lower abdomen at the latrine near the wine shop, Ding Songyan drew Frostshade and began his morning practice in the cold wind.

He unfolded each move slowly, sometimes stopping to think, sometimes switching to techniques of the Faith-Slaying Sword.

"Heaven and earth hold the Way, and all things respond..." Twelfth Madam Luo had risen at some point and sat behind the stone table.

She had changed into a dark red short jacket and a three-color cloth skirt, still wearing a loose, tilted bun with a single silver hairpin free of pearls or jade. She said casually, "The Faith-Slaying Sword can spoil another’s moves and subsequent variations by accumulating evil deeds and resonating with the Evil of Heaven and Earth, using it to affect the flow of qi produced by the target’s moves. Besides, the Myriad Evils Qi has its own peculiarities. You have neither of these two. Only by working from the essence, taking the substance and discarding the form, might you merge the Faith-Slaying Sword into your own swordplay."

Myriad Evils Qi was the true qi produced by cultivating the Accumulated Evil Divine Art.

Ding Songyan pondered Twelfth Madam’s words for a while, then deconstructed them and tried again.

In the east wing, Wu Zheng, who had slept peacefully for most of the night, woke up.

His headache had eased somewhat, but his wounds still hampered movement. He struggled to the window and looked outside through the thin oiled paper.

He saw his two benefactors: one practicing his swordplay over there, his moves fragmented and strange, the other sitting behind the stone table, one hand propping her cheek, watching quietly and speaking only occasionally.

Wu Zheng, who had been somewhat anxious, was infected by this warm, peaceful scene, and his worries gradually eased.

A night without incident. It seems Twelfth Madam was right that that group won’t find this place anytime soon.

If I didn’t already know both benefactors are Grandmasters, they’d look like a couple living a quiet life...

Just then, Twelfth Madam Luo stood and said to Ding Songyan, "I’ll go make something to eat."

She swung her arms slightly and walked unhurriedly toward the wine shop’s kitchen, in quite a good mood.

The shopkeeper put last night’s leftover meat broth and rice into a pot together, boiled it until scalding, then ladled it into a large basin and carried it to the stone table in the back courtyard.

Ding Songyan had already put away Frostshade, and cooperatively took three empty bowls and three pairs of chopsticks from the kitchen.

Twelfth Madam Luo went back to the kitchen once more and brought a dish of her own pickled vegetables, saying to Ding Songyan, "Eat first, then take some to Wu Zheng."

Ding Songyan first served a bowl of meat broth rice to Twelfth Madam, then the injured man’s bowl, which he set aside to cool, and only then his own.

While fanning the hot rice, he asked Twelfth Madam Luo, "Do we need to get a prescription for some medicine to help Wu Zheng’s soul?"

"No, my calming incense is enough. If you go buy medicine, wouldn’t you be telling He Jin’s group that Wu Zheng is hiding here?" Twelfth Madam Luo blew small breaths onto her meat broth rice.

Ding Songyan hummed, then said, "After I finish helping Wu Zheng, I have to go back to the estate to guard the corner gate. Be careful no one slips in."

"Mm." Twelfth Madam Luo answered instinctively, then raised her head and said, amused, "You look down on me, don’t you? Do you even need to say this?"

Watching this scene from the east wing, Wu Zheng inexplicably thought of his own family.

Before the disaster, they too had eaten breakfast like this, chatting casually about trivial things, plain and ordinary...

And now, only he was left.

Uncontrollable grief suddenly welled up in Wu Zheng.

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