Chapter 293: Plans for What Comes Next

Ding Songyan nodded honestly.

"She did."

Twelfth Madam Luo gave an exclamatory sound.

"Then there’s no need to tell me."

"I thought you’d press me, Twelfth Madam." Ding Songyan breathed a sigh of relief.

Twelfth Madam Luo reached out, picked up the black and white pieces from the Go board, and put them into a container.

"Why listen to something you know is an insult? Isn’t that just asking to get upset?"

While slowly tidying up the Go pieces, she looked at Ding Songyan and asked, "What do you think Demoness Ji’s real purpose was today?"

Ding Songyan considered for a moment and said, "Looking at the bright side, she’s showing goodwill, deepening our bond, strengthening our ties, and saving it for later use.

"On the downside, by deepening my bond with my senior sister, she gets a better hold on me, without provoking me too much right now. At the same time, it was a show of force and a warning. Our Brightnight Sect’s Celestial Guardian Sword Formation can drive back a Supreme Master, but the disciples can’t stay holed up in the mountains their whole lives. And she’s skilled in numerology, deduction, and tracking. Never mind Great Proliferation Realm martial artists, even a Dharma Realm Grandmaster would probably have a hard time escaping her clutches if she found one and honed in on them. Besides, the Sage-Severing Way has more than one Heaven-Man.

"Later, when she really needs me to do something critical, I’ll naturally remember all this. She kept bringing up severing worldly ties earlier, over and over, to leave a deep impression on me and build up fear."

Twelfth Madam Luo nodded slightly.

"At least you’re clear-headed and haven’t been fooled by that demoness’s mix of truth and falsehoods, as well as actions."

The shopkeeper paused, her eyes fixed on Ding Songyan’s.

"What do you plan to do from here? Not just about Demoness Ji."

Ding Songyan looked at the board, now gradually clearing, and said in a rather low voice,

"First, make myself more useful, so that whoever is playing the game won’t bear to destroy me, and look forward to the day I really come in handy.

"At the same time, I have to show my attitude: if pushed too far, I’ll go down in a blaze of mutual destruction. At worst, I’ll go to the underworld to rebuild the Brightnight Sect and be a ghost couple with Senior Sister. That way, whoever is playing will hesitate to take extreme action.

"That goes for Demoness Ji, and also for Tan Guanchan, Jiang Weichen, and whoever is hiding in the dark."

Hearing Ding Songyan’s firm, unwavering words, Twelfth Madam Luo’s eyes grew hazy for two breaths, as if she had remembered something from the past.

After a silent moment, she sighed with a hint of a smile.

"You really are stubborn to the bone, and ruthless enough, too. Once you’ve made up your mind about a person or a cause, you don’t give up easily."

"Put badly, that’s called obsession," Ding Songyan said with a self-mocking smile, and continued. "The most important thing is still to improve myself as fast as I can. Once I become a Heaven-Man, I’ll have a bit more room to maneuver.

"After all, the righteous Heaven-Men aren’t exactly plentiful either. The Martial Prohibition Bureau needs Supreme Masters, the court needs Supreme Masters, the army needs Supreme Masters, the Flame Capital needs them even more, and so do the major sects. They can’t very well send Heaven-Men to rotate as guards for the Brightnight Sect, can they?"

Twelfth Madam Luo replied thoughtfully, "It’s not impossible."

"Hm?" Ding Songyan’s eyes lit up.

Twelfth Madam Luo nodded slightly.

"If everyone talks it over, we can still spare a Heaven-Man to guard the Brightnight Sect, rotating every six months.

"But I don’t get the final say on that. You’ll have to show your value first."

Value that’s useful for bypassing or breaking the heaven-earth severance? In that case, quite a few veterans on the righteous side really would be tempted... Ding Songyan thought hard for a moment, then said, "Having eaten the Chaos remains probably isn’t enough by itself. If the court finds the Celestial Thearch’s palace, there could be more Chaos remains.

"And sharing it at the same time, with each side bearing yin or yang, is just Demoness Ji’s word for now. I’m relying on the attitudes of Tan Guanchan and Jiang Weichen, which have no hard evidence, to verify it. Others won’t believe it, neither can they.

"I need to find another way to show it, or find the Celestial Thearch’s palace and destroy all the remaining Chaos remains..."

Showing value enough to tempt Supreme Masters and Sages was no easy matter.

"No need to rush. As Tan Guanchan, Jiang Weichen, and the others’ schemes progressively come to light, people will gradually believe you. And until their schemes are fully revealed, you and the Brightnight Sect won’t face any major storm," Twelfth Madam Luo comforted him. "What you need to do is become a Heaven-Man before they make their move. Mm, the road to Heaven-Man is fraught with danger. You can’t ’feed’ your way to a Supreme Master. You’ll certainly have to go through layers of hurdles, even life-or-death risks."

She glanced at Ding Songyan, sighed, and added, "When the time comes, we’ll see. If there are real signs of danger and you haven’t become a Heaven-Man yet, I’ll go run an inn for a while in that Alpine Lake Town you and Miss Zheng mentioned."

Wh... Ding Songyan couldn’t say a word for a moment.

He felt like a small, paltry thing hiding in a fur robe, dazzled and unable to open his eyes against Twelfth Madam’s blinding brilliance.

Twelfth Madam Luo scoffed.

"Don’t give me any flowery words of gratitude, and don’t say anything that makes me want to slap you."

Ding Songyan swallowed back the words that had reached his throat.

He smiled and said, "I just had one line in my head:

"Twelfth Madam Luo, leader of the righteous path."

"Pui." Twelfth Madam Luo spat. "Don’t flatter me. I haven’t even found my own path to the Spirit Platform yet."

Ding Songyan smiled and went along with it.

"What I mean is, Twelfth Madam, your character and virtue are enough to make you the leader of the righteous path."

Twelfth Madam Luo stopped talking. She reached for a cup, only to find no tea had been brewed.

Ding Songyan jumped up, found the teapot, circulated the "Red Summer" wing, and poured Twelfth Madam a cup of water that was just the right warmth.

With no time to brew tea, this would have to do.

Twelfth Madam Luo didn’t stand on ceremony. She drank two sips of water and said, "If it really comes to that, and I haven’t yet had the chance to study the ’Command of the Five Destructions’ and the Ways of the Military School and the Legalists, you’ll collect them for me."

"I’ll give it my all," Ding Songyan agreed without hesitation.

He poured himself a cup of water too, moistened his mouth and throat, and then changed the subject.

"Besides what I just said, I also need to take advantage of Tan Guanchan, Jiang Weichen, and the others each having their own agendas to gain more benefits, and to ruin their plans within the limits of what they’ll tolerate, so they can’t get ready so quickly. The consort selection turmoil this time, for example.

"Phew, it’s like dancing on three eggs. One small mistake and I’m finished, but I have no choice but to dance."

What he meant was carefully maneuvering among Jiang Weichen, Tan Guanchan, and the other forces, trying to maintain a balance, surviving in the gaps while also dragging out the players’ plans by pulling in one faction to fight another and flip-flopping back and forth, to buy himself more time to grow.

Just as the Demon Sovereign and the others might be waiting for him to become a Heaven-Man, he had to prepare thoroughly, get the Unified Way Sword to lesser mastery and aim for rapid progress in a short time once he became a Heaven-Man, exceeding his enemies’ expectations. If, like Twelfth Madam, he could reach the peak of the Heaven-Man Realm in a few years, or have combat power equal to the peak, then this game of Go would come alive.

"What a weird metaphor," Twelfth Madam Luo muttered.

She could understand what Ding Songyan meant, and couldn’t help imagining whether she could dance on three eggs herself.

Actually, she could.

Twelfth Madam Luo thought for a moment and cautioned, "Be careful. That you’re useful to them is only a guess for now."

"Understood." Ding Songyan casually brought up something more practical. "Since Tan Guanchan very likely knows my secret and knows I can see through Demon Seeds, the key to his plan for the consort selection isn’t Demon Seeds.

"He surely built his plans around Demon Seeds before, but after the Zhen household affair he must have changed them. He’s pretending to keep pushing forward, partly to ’temper’ me while hiding a warning and show of force, and partly to make us focus on finding Demon Seeds and overlook everything else."

Twelfth Madam Luo listened carefully, then said thoughtfully,

"After the Orchid Grace Examination ends, before the New Year, you and your Master Granduncle should be able to see all the candidates for this consort selection. Look carefully then, and take the chance to report your worries and suspicions upward."

The shopkeeper was silent for a moment, then added, "You also can’t overlook Hong Jingchu. He’s quite a strategist. In the past, mm, he was the one who came up with ideas.

"This consort selection may be a case of making the real seem fake and the fake seem real."

Among the people who wandered the jianghu together back then, the Jianwu Emperor was the sly strategist? Ding Songyan nodded gravely to show he had committed it to memory.

He looked out at the deep night outside the house, collected his thoughts, and bowed with clasped hands.

"Twelfth Madam, I’d like to ask you what a Heaven-Man is and how to become one."

Twelfth Madam Luo pondered briefly.

"It’s late today. Get some good rest first. Tomorrow morning I’ll take you to a place."

This was agreeing to Ding Songyan’s request.

"Thank you, Twelfth Madam." Ding Songyan stood with a smile.

Twelfth Madam Luo stood too and looked at him.

"In good spirits?"

"It’s still a day, whether it’s good or bad. I don’t know how long it’ll be before their schemes come to fruition. Being constantly depressed and anxious is not only bad for improving my martial arts, it also easily damages my mindset, so I regress instead of advancing," Ding Songyan said with a laugh. "I have some experience with this. The best attitude is to be serious but lively."

Twelfth Madam Luo nodded slightly and laughed.

"You do have quite a few good points to learn from."

After bidding Twelfth Madam farewell, Ding Songyan returned to the Prince’s estate. He first went to the separate courtyard where Wang Zhou lived and met his Master Granduncle in the main room.

Without any rambling, Ding Songyan first used Establishing the Six Directions to seal off eavesdroppers, then went through the main points of today’s attack, some of what Ji Hanyi had said, the possibility that the Demon Sovereign knew his secret, and his discussions with Twelfth Madam Luo.

Wang Zhou’s expression shifted between concealed worry and joy at the sect’s coming new Grandmaster. In the end, all those emotions settled into heaviness.

Finally, Ding Songyan said solemnly, "Master Granduncle, in what happens next in the Flame Capital, I may very likely expose my realm, my strength, and even deeper secrets. The sect needs to prepare early."

Wang Zhou nodded slowly and sighed.

"Songyan, your improvements to the martial arts have been remarkable. In less than two years, I should reach the perfected Dharma Realm, and others have made progress too, especially your Master Uncle Yan. It’s a pity time waits for no one.

"I’ll find an excuse to go back to the sect soon and discuss with the Sect Master and the others how to prepare. Whether by carrier pigeon or any other way of passing messages, I don’t trust any of them."

The Grand Elder of the Brightnight Sect then smiled.

"You needn’t worry. Even those desperate times didn’t destroy the Brightnight Sect, so what is there to fear now?

"Even if all of us are gone, as long as our spark—you—remain, the Brightnight Sect can be lit again and illuminate heaven and earth."

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