陽光的夏天

She laughed and ducked aside, raising a hand to stop him. “Look, a sketch, from a thousand years ago.”

“Who’s the artist?” Muyun Sheng’s eyes lit up, and reached out a hand to take it, but knowing that she would turn and run, started chasing after her. He played blind man’s buff with the girls every day, and his footwork was certainly incomparably agile, and it wasn’t long before he’d caught Lan Yu’er.

He only tickled her a little before she collapsed to the floor, laughing. Muyun Sheng snatched the sketch from her and unfurled it to take a look, his brows creasing slightly.

“It’s another forgery. The seal was copied very well, but the inscription gives it away––look at this stroke. How could that be authentic? And the colour of the maid’s clothing…”

“Ah?” Lan Yu’er pouted. “Another forgery? I thought for sure you’d be happy this time. If your eyes weren’t so sharp, wouldn’t you be happier by far?”

“Haha, but finding forgeries is one of my joys, especially the ones that the palace artists offer up like treasures. I love seeing how pale they get.”

“Why do you always bully those old bogeys?” Lan Yu’er pulled at his sleeve with a vexed smile and a roll of her eyes. “I…”

“What other horrible ideas do you have?”

“I know a place where there are many paintings, don’t you want to take a look with me?”

“Let’s go, then.”

Lan Yu’er was all smiles as she pulled him out the door. She took a few extra turns on purpose so that the other girls could see her walking with Muyun Sheng. They circled round and round and finally came to a remote place secluded from the back gardens. Past the door, they could see before them an almost abandoned little pavilion.

“It’s locked…”

“I have keys!” Lan Yu’er smiled, bouncing on her toes, a tinkling sound coming from her hands. “I stole a bunch the other day from old steward Han and I took them to a locksmith and I started trying them one by one, and then I found this place.” They pushed open the doors and stepped through, where they were met with a suffocating staleness.

“So it’s a warehouse.” Muyun Sheng waved his hand around to try and circulate some air.

“Yes, and there are so many interesting things inside.”

“Yup, there’s...mice! Spiders!” Muyun Sheng pointed indiscriminately.

Lan Yu’er wailed, grabbing onto Muyun Sheng, too afraid to even open her eyes. How had she managed by herself before?

“It’s fine, don’t worry, you’ve scared them all away.” Muyun Sheng smiled, patting her head.

But Lan Yu’er still gripped him tightly, and the two began to search among the junk for treasure.

“Huh? Costumes?”

“There’s a lot of porcelain over here.”

“Oh, a box of handheld furnaces.”

“I’m going upstairs to look around; have been been up there yet?”

Lan Yu’er nodded, and then shook her head.

Muyun Sheng walked up the staircase. The smell of decay was even heavier upstairs, but it was still pretty clean, as if someone had just tidied. He had just started rummaging through everything, when Lan Yu’er suddenly tugged on his sleeve. He turned to look at her. Her face was tinged red, and her eyes glittered.

“There’s a lot of paintings over there.” She led Muyun Sheng past a few large cabinets over to a window. A table stood before the window, and atop the table there were a few painted scrolls.

Muyun Sheng slid a few scrolls closer to himself and unfurled them. They were all copies, and some were even studies made by some former maids or servants or companions. He took a scroll from another pile and opened it. Behind him, Lan Yu’er shrieked.

It was a erotic picture.

Muyun Sheng evidently found it quite diverting, for he flipped through them all. Lan Yu’er was sweating profusely, clutching tightly at Muyun Sheng’s sleeve and sneaking blushing looks past his shoulder.

Muyun Sheng wrinkled his brow, and finally opened his mouth to say, “So these kinds of drawings do exist...but they’re not very good. The people aren’t proportional, and the brushstrokes are too smooth, and the composition lacks focus.”

“Is...is that so? So you were...analysing the art?” Lan Yu’er looked up at him.

“Of course. If I wanted to, I could do so much better than this...what’s happened? Are you sick? Your face is so red, and you’re sweating so much.”

“You mustn’t tell anyone I took you to come see this. If you do, my father will kill me.”

“Oh, Lan Yu’er.” Something occurred to Muyun Sheng. “Why don’t I draw you one?”

“Not in a million years!”

Seeing that he was raising his hands to scare her, Lan Yu’er made like a bunny and scampered away. They used the paintings as projectiles, roughhousing up and down the dirty old pavilion, raising a thick screen of dust.

Muyun Sheng froze.

Just then, when he was turning, someone was staring at him. He could even feel her gaze. But when he turned around, of course no one was there. He was just about to turn back around when, she suddenly appeared.

Lan Yu’er saw Muyun Sheng standing by the wall, his face deathly pale, as he had been stunned to silence. She walked up to him and asked, “What’s the matter with you?”

Muyun Sheng didn’t respond, only lurched forward until he reached the wall.

There, beneath the table, a painting had fallen open.

The painting was of a woman, standing amidst the wind and the snow, grounded by a vast river and remote mountains. She looked as if she had been gazing into some uncertain distance, walking an unknown road, but had suddenly heard someone call out to her and, startling around, was looking at her caller with a mixture of grief and joy in her eyes. It was in that finishing touch of the pupils where a thousand different sensations met and mingled.

Shaken, Muyun Sheng could do little but stand there, stare blankly, and mutter, “This painting…”

In the course of his youth, little Sheng’er did not learn how to use a bow and did not understand military strategy. All he did every day was doodle, but even in such conditions, his talent could scarcely be concealed within the limited confines of the palace.

Perhaps it was because he had always lived in his own world, but little Sheng’er was stubborn and unrestrained. He didn’t read the classics, didn’t learn the rites; he only ever liked playing around with the girls.

This sixth prince was perhaps the palace girls’ least-feared person, because he had never once used his status as a prince to command or berate anyone. He had grown up fooling around with these girls who lived in the palace, playing until they were all but wild, tumbling about in a mess of arms and legs, never separating themselves into servant and master. His Qinfeng Hall  was the only one amidst a sea of stern and solemn courts that never bothered with rules. So even though everyone in the palace said that the sixth prince was an unbridled child with not a chance in the world of becoming emperor, the girls were intimate with him, because in any case he was never going to be king, there was even less of a need to maintain their reserve.

Most of the girls in Hua’ai Palace were on close terms with him. It was unclear where it begun, but there began to be many pairs of clear, vivacious eyes that longed for him to grow up, so that they could care the way they wanted to care and as much as they wanted to care for him, although at that time they still believed that children were things that the Lord of the Skies placed into stomachs in the dead of night.

Muyun Sheng was happy to play with the girls every day rather than learning to shoot a bow or ride a horse or read the annals of history. But the only things that could entice him away from the girls and into solitary, quiet concentration were his picture scrolls. This sixth prince knew nothing of governance, but he could draw beautifully, a skill that must have come from the heavens, for such talent weaved through every warp and weft of his work that it put the work of even the masters to shame.

As an adolescent, the technical work of his realist portraiture was on par with those of famous masters. The little palace maids and the daughters of dukes and lords who had come to be study companions in the palace could all boast of owning a portrait he had painted of themselves. When he drew, there was always a gaggle of girls sneaking a look from outside, envious of the subject of that day’s portrait. And it was only when he was painting them that he was able to quiet down and devote himself to the task. He didn’t draw flowers or birds, didn’t draw pine or bamboo, only drew beautiful girls, and the girls he drew all seemed to be drifting immortals, each one a masterpiece.

Countless eyes took note of that carefree little Sheng’er, and many voices whispered, “The child is brilliant, but it’s a pity he lingers in a world of tender things, in an imaginary empire; I fear he never was cut from kingly cloth.”

Fengxi raised his head to check at the time. The moon was hanging in the centre of the sky.

“Zhong Li, take this message,” Fengxi commanded placidly.

“Yes, Young Master ,” Zhong Li replied with a bow, and then he walked from the pavilion, and soon, with a wave of an arm, he had gone. Halfway up the sky there was a flash of light, but it was soon extinguished.

Not long after, four points of light flashed against the sky. They were all flickers that dimmed quickly, but anyone who was paying close attention could see them clearly.

Fengxi waited until these four points of light dimmed, raised his teacup, uncovered the cap, and lowered his head to breathe in the fragrance of the tea. He took a shallow sip, and the nodded and said, “There is a proper amount of tea leaves, and the brewing time was just right. The fragrance is light and clean, its flavour is bitter, but the aftertaste is sweet, it’s neither too heavy nor too tart. This is what you call good tea.”

“Young Master, Miss Fengxi is still on the mountain,” Zhong Yuan said suddenly.

“Based on that woman’s abilities, she’ll make it down the mountain just fine.” Fengxi didn’t seem to care. He extended the hand holding the teacup, and Zhong Yuan immediately took it from him.

“If she can’t make it out...then she isn’t worthy of being the Bai Fengxi who can claim to be equal to me!”  Fengxi raised his head to look up at the sparsely lit sky. A few stars were strangely and suddenly bright.

On the north face of Mount Xuan, a few torches were glimmering.

Valiants from every walk of life, after a day and half a night of searching the mountain, were now both hungry and tired, each and every one drenched in soggy clothing, their faces tired.

“Damn it, where the fuck is this Yan Yingzhou really hiding?” someone cursed angrily.

“That’s right. We’ve been searching all day without anything to eat or drink, it’s all that damn Yan Yingzhou’s fault!” someone parroted.

“And that Bai Fengxi! If it weren’t for her, we would have gotten the Xuanzun Seal long ago!” someone said resentfully.

“Exactly! That stinking shrew, who told her to stick her nose in other people’s business? If she lands in my hands someday, I’ll cut her up into eighteen segments. Only then will my hate be eased!” someone said, gnashing their teeth.

“He-daxia, the way I see it, why don’t we go down the mountain for now? It’s already dark, and it seems like we won’t find anything. Wouldn’t it be better to raise our spirits and tomorrow, bring enough rations?” some people asked.

“That sounds reasonable,” someone else said. “Once we leave, we can get people to stand guard at the mouth of the mountain, so that as soon as Yan Yingzhou leaves, we will naturally catch him.”

The person being called He-daxia was He Xun of the Tianxun Protection Service, which had many branches throughout the Eastern Realm. They were extremely powerful, and he himself was a martial expert who had without really vying for the position, taken over as the leader of this group.

Seeing the look on everyone’s faces, all heavy with unbearable weariness, and longing himself for a hot meal and warm blankets, He Xun nodded his head in agreement and said, “We could do that. We’ll go down the mountain for tonight, and come back tomorrow. I doubt that Yan Yingzhou could escape.”

So it was that the group of people started walking down the mountain.

Going down the mountain is always easier and faster than climbing up it, and this group of people was made up of people who practiced martial arts. They were agile and nimble, and coupled with the allure of fine wine and good food at the foot of the mountain, it quickened their pace so that they reached the base of the mountain quickly. Before them, they could already see distant lights; they had almost returned to civilisation.

But the more the walked, the more they realised they could not keep walking. Back and forth and back and forth––they could only walk in circles, and the distant lanterns remained just as distant, though they seemed so close at hand.

“What devilry is this? Why are we walking in circles?” someone blurted.

“It can’t be ghosts, can it?” someone shouted in terror.

As soon as this was said, everyone seemed to feel as if the night was colder and darker, almost as if there were countless shadows rushing towards them. A gust of wind blew out the torchest, plunging them into total darkness.

“Shit! Ghosts!” someone hollered.

“Heavens, there are ghosts! Help, help!”

“Don’t touch me, go away!”

“Help! Help…”

“Get away! You ghosts, I’ll cut you to pieces!”

“Oh, a ghost has killed someone!”

In a moment, these people who normally claimed themselves to be heroes fled one by one like rats, hacking in terror at the shadows of ghosts.

In the darkness, only the sparse light of the hanging moon and stars were watching as the heroes turned on each other, the pungent red of blood coloured the dirt underfoot as the wreckage of limbs began to pile up. At last, the screams of fright and anger subsided, and the northern base of Mount Xuan returned to silence.

A mile off, there were a few lamps which were casting a dim light into the darkness, almost as if they were waiting for a traveller to return in the night.

---

Fengxi woke in a burst of pain. Opening her eyes, she discovered she was in a cave, lit weakly by the light of a torch.

Lowering her head, she found that her left hand had been sliced open, and Yan Yingzhou’s left hand was wrapped tightly around her own, and he was currently using his internal energies to draw the poison out. The blood that dripped onto the ground was purple.

“Don’t!” Fengxi cried, but she discovered her voice was thinner than that of a cat’s. She wanted to stop him, but could not budge. What manner of poison was this, to be so powerful?

At last, Yan Yingzhou stopped trying to draw the poison out. He took from her lapels a Buddha’s Heart Pill and crushed it into fine powder, scattering it across the cut on her hand. Then he tore a strip of cloth from his sleeve and bandaged her wound with it.

As he was doing this, Fengxi borrowed the soft light of the torch to see clearly his and and hers. The poison in her own hand had dissipated considerably, yet his entire left arm had become tinged in a purple colour. Suddenly, fear enveloped her.

She thought back: she’d clearly swallowed two of those pills, which were reputed to be an antidote to countless poisons, yet why was the poison still coursing through her body? An awful thought flashed through her mind, and she shivered, though she wasn’t cold.

“What poison is this?” she asked hoarsely.

“Withering creeper,” Yan Yingzhou said, all tranquility.

Withering creeper? That was one of the most toxic poisons known to man! It was said that no antidote could remedy its effects!

“You...you…” Fengxi looked at that calm face, wanting so badly to slap him awake, but she was seized by a sudden heartache. Only after a long moment could she ask, “Are all the generals of the Huang Kingdom as stupid as you are? If they are, then I’m beginning to have my doubts about the veracity of its reputation! How can it hope to rule the world with someone like you in charge?”

“I don’t like owing people. You drew the poison out for me, and now I’m returning the favour. Then we’ll be even. In any case, I’m the reason you were poisoned.” Yang Yingzhou said this wanly.

He lowered his gaze toward the hand in his hand, slender and long, smooth and supple like jade. How enchanting it was! It was such a pair of hands that, waving a skein of white silk, could just as easily take life as they could save it. To be honest, a pair of hands such as these, a person such as she should be sitting, hidden behind a screen, a single orchid clutched in her grasp, lowering her head to softly breathe in its scent, smiling shallowly, brows lightly knit.

“How could there be someone like you? You knew that was a poison without an antidote, but you still drew the poison toward yourself; do you want to die so badly?” Fengxi sighed.

She suddenly thought of something else, something which caused her whole body to go cold, as if she’d been dropped in ice.

There were no more pills! There were only six pills in a bottle, and the last one had been applied to her hand. So he hadn’t even the opportunity to prolong his life.

“If you can hold on for a moment longer, then you must hold on; that way your chances of surviving will be greater.” Yan Yingzhou let go of her hand, raising his head to look at her. “Bai Fengxi oughtn't be so easy to kill!”

“And you? Do you rate your own life so cheaply?” Fengxi watched him closely. Beneath the firelight, his face held not a shred of emotion, but there was a current surging in his eyes.

Suddenly, Yan Yingzhou waved his hand, extinguishing the flame, and then he stood up and walked toward the mouth of the cave, observing. He walked back to Fengxi, moving her quickly toward the back of the cave, hiding her from sight.

“Are those assassins onto us? You…”

Fengxi’s voice broke off; her acupoints had been sealed by Yan Yingzhou.

A coarse palm slid across her cheek; it was a graze so fleeting it felt like a dragonfly flitting across the water, as if he was too afraid to touch her more deeply. He retreated quickly, gripping the hilt at his waist. Abruptly, he turned and walked toward the mouth of the cave.

Don’t go! Don’t go!

Sh was wailing in her heart that to leave was to meet death at the door.

As if he’d heard her scream, Yan Yingzhou paused to look back at her. Standing there, in that moment, he seemed to be undergoing some great battle with himself. Ultimately, he moved in front of her again.

Even in the darkness she could feel the intensity of his red-hot gaze on her. At long last, he lowered his head, whispering by her ear, “I will come back. In our next lives, I’ll come back to find you. In our next lives, I won’t die young. Fengxi, remember me!”

His lips pressed lightly down, at first grazing featherlike across her cheek before more firmly falling upon hers. He bit down, hard. Fengxi only felt a burst of pain on her lips, and then tasted iron on her tongue, mixed with salt. Last of all she saw a pair of bright eyes in the darkness. In those limpid eyes there were ripples of boundless regret.

Tears trickled downward.

“If someday you must finally choose between me and the kingdom, which would you choose?” she had asked the Emperor Ming.

“Why should you speak thus? Isn’t everything perfect the way it is now?” She sighed a heavy sigh, raising her head to gaze through the window at the starlight, not saying anything more.

Disasters entered the world one after another close on the heels of Muyun Sheng’s birth.

From the day the child was born, a wild, relentless snow began to fall that didn’t stop for three months. The plains of the north were buried in it, and the wandering tribes began to migrate southward, which came to a head with an insurrection.

A year later, thunderstorms in the southern province of Yue led to calamity, forcing countless to abandon their homes, losing everything. The evacuees, unable to find food, began looting in the county seat.

Another three years later, an earthquake devastated the shore, which caused a strange island to simply rise from the sea. A tsunami rushed inland to the provincial capital, and the hungry ocean came ashore to swallow people whole. In two coastal counties, thousands of miles of fishing villages turned into desolate shorelines.

People began to say that the sixth prince, Muyun Sheng, was someone who never should have been born.

The sages from the Imperial Polaris Holy Sect were finally able to divine the reason for the troubles: Muyun Sheng’s mother was no real human, but a spirit whose form was congealed from the accumulation of energies heavenly and of the earth.

How much did the Emperor Ming once love her, that for her he was willing to throw aside the sacrament that commoners could not be allowed to be imperial concubines? That he banished many hundreds of ministers from the capital for their opposition? That he fell out with his relatives and his advisors? Decades ago, the crises he’d caused on her behalf had shaken the world.

And yet, everything had already passed. The boundless splendour that had in those days been capable of bringing ruin to kingdoms was now no more than legend. The Emperor had aged, and no longer had the energy to stand off against those traditions that were as unyielding as city walls. People now said that she was a devilish mei, that she would bring devastation to the kingdom, to the world, and when these rumours echoed across the land, the Emperor Ming’s credence with the people began to fall. He issued an edict to detain her within the walls of a high tower, always to be alone.

Sometimes, a very small Muyun Sheng would stand beneath the tower and watch from afar as his mother reclined in the tower above, gazing vacantly into the vibrant clouds so far from her reach, fluttering the fan in her hand every so often. Sometimes, she would smile a small little smile, as if recalling some bygone era. But the era was gone, and her happiness and beauty had departed with it.

When she died, she was only thirty-two.

But when she began to travel this world, she was disenchanted, for she had never thought to consider that most people looked quite ordinary, or even ugly. The farmers and their dark skin, the shopkeepers and their swaying bellies, the vagrants and their drooping faces––the world was shaped by people like these, who, for the slightest bit of food or money, would work until their sweat reeked and overflowed. And the earth was not always home to flower buds and sweet winds, either. Yellow dust was often seen, and so were foul mud and white bone. She began to regret having come to this world, and so thought to find herself a peaceful mountain valley to hide away in.

She had stayed in the mountains for three months before she began to regret that, too. Though there were lakes so clear you could see straight to the bottom, and white deer and yellow oriole, there was a strange feeling that nagged at her. It was a feeling she’d possessed when she’d been no more than a mercurial soul: the thirst to be able to speak to someone, and listen to that person respond. She finally understood herself to be unable to return to her solitary world, for she was a person now, and people grew lonely.

So it was that she once again came to the human world, though she hadn’t imagined herself being lonelier among a crowd of people, because she believed no one to be capable of wholeheartedly listening to her speak. What people saw was her beauty, admiring her like a painting or weighing her like an object to be bought or sold. She began to be afraid, both wanting to be incorporated into the crowd and wanting to keep away from it. She was dithering on a small lane outside the city, not knowing what she ought to do, when a man in a golden saddle astride a fine horse appeared before her.

Muyun Qin was a martial emperor in accordance with the customs of the Muyun clan, which dictated that each emperor ought be able to personally lead armies into battle. Thus, Muyun Qin was adept with bow and horse, which was why he never much worried about assassins when he returned from his inspection tours, urging his horse forward and leaving his troops in the back of his mind. As a prince, he had led the advance against rebel armies and into enemy ranks, battled with ten thousand troops––a few assassins were nothing to him.

Initially, Muyun Qin had already rushed past the girl, but he jerked his horse to a stop, unable to explain even to himself why he’d done it. When he turned to look back at her, he felt suddenly that despite having had all of heaven in his grasp, he had been nothing more than a pitiful fool.

Upon seeing the object that had come tumbling out, the four people simultaneously abandoned Yan Yingzhou and flew towards the object. And Yan Yingzhou himself was shocked into shouting, and followed them shortly after.

Fengxi had just pushed back the six men fighting her when she heard Yan Yingzhou’s cry. Turning, she saw the men rushing towards the object by the wooden box. With a quick wave of her hand, the white silk unfurled to tangle around the object. Another wave, and the white silk jerked back towards her. She opened her left hand to receive the object. On touch, the thing was as cold as ice––this, indeed, was the object of so many people’s desire: the Xuanzun Seal.

Yet when Yan Yingzhou realised that Fengxi had the seal, he could not keep himself from screaming, “Don’t!” His voice was alarmed beyond compare.

Fengxi had begun to make her way to Yan Yingzhou’s side after she caught the seal, but upon seeing his fright, she knew he was scared of having it taken from him, so she placated: “Don’t worry yourself, we haven’t lost anything of yours.”

Seeing her at his side, Yan Yingzhou immediately picked up the cloth that had been wrapped around the seal and held it beneath Fengxi’s hands, saying “Let go, now!”

Noting his care towards the Xuanzun Seal, Fengxi could not help being a little disappointed. She loosened her hand, and the seal fell into the cloth. She said, lightly, “I won’t take your Xuanzun Seal.”

As she spoke, she waved her right hand, and the white silk flew with great force towards the four people who were bounding toward them. They could not dodge it in time, and in due course, they were swept to the ground.

Yet Yan Yingzhou immediately grabbed Fengxi’s left wrist, sealing her acupoint. Only then did he raise his head and urge, “Swallow the pills!”

Fengxi then noticed that her hand had already turned purple, and that the colour was spreading to her arm. Though Yan Yingzhou had already sealed her acupoint, he had only succeded in slowing it down a little. She immediately realised that the seal was covered with deadly poison, and that she had already touched it. At once, she took two Heart of Buddha pills from her lapel and swallowed them one after the other.

But the ten people she’d knocked to the ground had finally caught their breaths, and began to circle in on them.

Yan Yingzhou grabbed her right hand and took off, dragging her behind him as he all but flew away––at that moment, one of them was heavily injured, while the other had been badly poisoned, and they were no longer in any position to fight off the men. And who knew how many more would show up after those ten?

Yan Yingzhou fled with Fengxi in tow, and at first, Fengxi was still able to keep up with him, but gradually, she began to feel like all her strength was slowly being drawn from her, her body became weaker and weaker, her head more and more heavy, while her chest felt like something was blocking it. Even breathing was difficult, and her steps became sluggish.

As for Yan Yingzhou, it could only be said that he had injury on top of injury. His energy was long depleted, he was running on adrenaline alone, and this, coupled with his last burst of desperate running, meant that in only a short while, the last of his strength was gone. One stumble, and they both went down.

“You should save yourself,” Fengxi’s weak voice rang out. Her eyes were already blurring. She was running out of energy with which to even speak, and she couldn’t help mocking herself. In the past, it had been so easy for her to kill, and now it was her turn to be the lamb waiting for the slaughter.

Yan Yingzhou only gave her a look. The look felt as if he was returning some of her soul to her, gave her a little bit of clarity. She blinked a few times and looked at him, and realised that the face before her, though drenched with sweat, was actually an exceptionally handsome one, that the expression on said face was one of attachment and resolution!

He pushed himself to his feet, straining to carry her in his arms, and continued to run forward, but they were advancing so slowly, and they could already hear the footfalls of the soldiers who were giving chase.

“You really are stupid, what’s the use of dying together? It’s always better for even one of us to survive.” Fengxi muttered this angrily at him, but she knew that Yan Yingzhou had already decided that, even if they were to die, he would not abandon her. What kind of man…

Suddenly, she felt Yan Yingzhou’s body stiffen, and then he stopped. Upon raising her head to look, Fengxi realised that there was, in fact, no more road, but a sheer slope down the mountainside, atop which they now stood.

“Fengxi, let’s take a gamble. If we win, we’ll survive together. If we lose, then we’ll die together! Are you willing?” Yan Yingzhou asked her in low tones, though he could not prevent the hands around her from tightening.

“I’m willing,” Fengxi said placidly, and then she smiled a little. “Even if I die, I’ll be taking the General Fierce Wind with me, which is really quite a cost-effective arrangement.”

Yan Yingzhou suddenly lowered his head towards her. He was so close they could feel each other’s breath. Their lips were so close, and Fengxi could not help but to think to herself: was this statue of a man about to kiss her?

But he didn’t.Yan Yingzhou had a pair of eyes that were a deeper black than the night sky, which shown with a brighter light than the winter stars, and they stared unwaveringly at her, something particular hidden in them. Then he sighed, “To die alongside Bai Fengxi, I can say that I’ve died without regret!”

Having said this, he jumped, holding Fengxi tightly. As they tumbled down the mountainside, Fengxi could feel the pain and shock of her body striking the hard ground, but it wasn’t so severe. Yan Yingzhou had embraced her so tightly to him that he was bearing the brunt of the injury, but though it didn’t hurt so much, the pain, conversely, had found a home in her heart.

This was the first time a man had protected her.

She made a name for herself when she was still young, and since she made her first appearance as Bai Fengxi, no one, with the exception of Hei Fengxi, had been her rival. She’d never needed protecting, and there had never been someone who had thought that Bai Fengxi needed protecting. But now, Yan Yingzhou had stirred up some buried emotion, and her heart leapt without knowing why or how.

“A single seal can draw such a crowd!” Fengxi sighed.

Upon raising her gaze to the heavens, Fengxi discovered that the day had already begun to slant westwards, painting the the sky resplendent with scarlet clouds, and the lushness of Mount Xuan was also stained with a light wash of colour. At this moment, the world was incomparably beautiful, but this was the kind of beauty that sank the stomach and left one with an inexplicable frustration.

“The sunset is beauty beyond compare/I moan only the dusk is near.”

A sleeve billowed in the wind, loose locks swung lightly in the wind, and on Fengxi’s face there was a rare look of sorrow.

“Yan Yingzhou, are you dead or alive?”

For herself, she knew that to evade the groups of people searching mountain would be an easy enough matter, but what of Yan Yingzhou? With such serious injuries, there was no way he could leave the mountain, but with so many people looking for him, where could he possibly hide? How long could he possibly remain hidden?

Fengxi looked towards the sunset one more time, and then turned to ascend the mountain with light, floating steps.

Tower of Intoxicated Immortals, Ruancheng

Since nightfall, the Tower of Intoxicated Immortals was more lively than usual. The famous Hei Fengxi had arrived, and had promised to drink until drunk with the heroes of Bai Kingdom. Thus not only had the revelers of the Han Family feast arrived, but others who hoped to share the honour of Fengxi’s reputation had shown up as well, each hoping to see Master Fengxi’s peerless elegance.

Between the bouts of drinking and toasting, between the platters of sheep and cow, between games and the music, everyone was drunk to the point of ecstasy.  

They drank until the curtain of night dropped upon the world, until everyone grew intoxicated. Some were sprawled across the tables, while others had fallen upon the floor, and not a one remained clear-headed.

“Come! Drink up! Lambs and calves such happiness create, we’ll not stop drinking until we’ve drunk our weight! We haven’t reached three hundred cups of wine yet, everyone get up, start singing!” Bystanders could hear Fengxi’s clear voice raised in loud song, yet there was no response save the snores of those who were deep in a mist of drunken slumber.

“Yi? Why so useless?” Seeing that there was no response, Fengxi dusted himself up and stood in one elegant motion, his handsome face showing no signs of drunkenness, though his eyes were overbright, more limpid than the stars that hung above the night sky.

“Master, a letter for you.” Zhong Li walked into the tower and passed him an envelope.

Fengxi took it from him, and skimming its contents, curled his lips in satisfaction.

With a look around the rooms, Fengxi smiled lightly and said, “Since all these fine heroes are all drunk, I’ll take my leave.”

A rush of cold wind embraced the three as they departed from the Tower of Drunken Immortals, and Hei Fengxi lifted his head to regard the insipid moon and the sparse smattering of stars.  

“Tonight’s night sky doesn’t seem to be as brilliant as yesterday’s,” he remarked casually, and turned to leave, with Zhong Li and Zhong Yuan trailing close behind.

On the southern side of Mount Xuan, Bai Fengxi slipped noiselessly through the trees like a wisp of white smoke, so quick that she was nigh invisible.

Suddenly, she heard a low gasping sound, almost like that of an injured beast, and Fengxi stopped short, and listened closely. But she heard nothing more.

The forest at night was darker than it was during the day, and in the spaces between the trees there sometimes entered the faintest sliver of light, and when the wind brushed past, the leaves rustled, but apart from this, it was an expanse of silent darkness.

Fengxi froze, quietly waiting.

At last, she heard another one of the quiet gasps, and she was headed immediately toward the direction of the sound with the glint off a blade of a sword came piercing straight at her. But she had come prepared, and her white silk wrapped itself around the blade with but a flick of her hand. She smelled fresh blood.

“Yan Yingzhou?” she called quietly. The silk loosened, returned to her sleeve.

“Miss Feng?” a hoarse voice croaked, and the light off the blade disappeared.

Relying on the dim light that seeped into the forest and the augmented sight of a martial artist, Fengxi could see that Yan Yingzhou was half-kneeling on the ground. She rushed over and crouched by his side, but she could see that he was sweating profusely, and his face had turned paper-white, while his lips had turned a dull black.

“The injuries have worsened.”

Fengxi sighed quietly, and hurriedly fed him two of the Buddha’s Heart Pills, and then extended a hand to his ribs, where she felt something wet. She didn’t have to look to see that her hand had come away with blackened blood. Her heart shook, and without time to think about much else, she tore the clothes away from his ribs and crushed one of the precious pills over the wound, then poured some of the Purple Mansions Powder over it, and quickly undid her girdle to wind it tightly around him.  

“Take off your clothes; I’ll apply some medicine to the rest of your wounds,” Fengxi instructed.

This time, Yan Yingzhou put up no protest.

“He he…” Fengxi seemed to be reminded of something and suddenly began to chuckle. “I’d thought that you’d run naked from the cave, but who knew that you’d be wearing clothes? Where’d they come from?”

“Stole it off a person I killed,” he said quietly, and then sucked in a sharp breath, for the dried blood had crusted his clothes to his wounds, and though they were peeled carefully away, it was still a pain that was hard to bear.

“Serves you right,” Fengxi scolded, but her hands were extraordinarily gentle, carefully helping him remove his robes so that they wouldn’t jostle the bandages. “Why didn’t you wait for me to come back?”

But Yan Yingzhou didn’t respond, only looked at Fengxi through the darkness with a pair of bright eyes.

“Am I a person who fears implication?” Fengxi asked, sprinkling the powder deftly over his injuries.  

Still he did not speak.

Both of them fell quiet then, as one was fixed on applying medicine, and the other stayed still in appliance.

Only...the first time she had helped him heal his wounds, he was passed out while the she was only occupied with saving his life, and had no real concerns beyond that, never once realising that this was a way for a man and a woman to get to know each other physically.

This time, however, both of them were clear-headed, and in the darkness they were so close to each other, close enough to feel each other’s breath. One could feel the pair of cool hands meandering around his body, and could only feel his heart beginning to pound, while a sense of comfort seemed to overwhelm him. The other was keenly aware of the solid muscles that existed on the powerful body under her hands, and instead of feeling revulsion or fear, she felt instead a warmth infiltrating her heart. And in each of their hearts they could feel the beginning of some small feeling, and they very clearly understood that the other possessed a body so different from their own. Something warm blossomed between the two that made their faces burn with heat, their hearts thump like drums. This feeling was like nothing they’d ever experienced before.

When the medicine was finally applied, one put his clothes on in silence, and the other sat to the side with a stillness she rarely experienced. Neither talked to the other, and both seemed to want to express something, seemed to feel in their hearts the creation of a feeling that was new, that was strange.

Suddenly, they felt a sense of impending crisis, and, without thinking, reached to grab each other by the hand and pull themselves up.

A gleam as bright a snow flashed towards them, and the two swept backwards in unison. Then a length of white silk flew out, and a green spear blade thrust forward, meeting the black-robed men head-on as they descended from the sky.

Unlike the vagrants from earlier, these black-robed men were masters of the highest class. Of the ten who surrounded them, four leapt at Yan Yingzhou, while the remaining six entangled with Fengxi, a Soul-Breaking Sword in each of their hands. Their technique was exquisite, measured in both defense and attack, and it was easy to see that they had been trained in the same sect, for they worked together perfectly.

Against these six people, Fengxi did not seem to need to exert effort, attacking and defending as needed.

But Yan Yingzhou was in no such position. If the black-robed men had been fighting him one on one, they would have been nowhere close to his match, but because of this disparity, the four men attacked him all at once, and Yingzhou was forced to exert great effort. This, added to the strain of his earlier wounds and the injury done to both his physical and mental well-being caused him to be much less focused than usual, and before long there were two more open wounds on his body.

Noticing this, Fengxi furrowed her brows, and could not leap immediately to his defense. But that white silk split through the heavens, at times like a sharpened sword, keen and penetrating, at times like a long whip, merciless and fierce, and at times like a sabre, bent on annihilation. Like rain, the silk fell upon the six she was fighting.

Their offense changed immediately to defense, but Fengxi’s attack did not give them even a minute to breathe. Snakelike, the silk whipped towards the three swordsmen on the left, but the swordsmen reflexively leapt backwards to avoid the attack. In that moment, Fengxi struck towards the three swordsmen on the right. They quickly brandished their weapons in anticipation of her attack, but who knew that when Fengxi struck, the blow hit like lightning, and with three startled cries, their sabres hit the ground.