Chapter 253: Someone Is Going After Niu Youdao

At the slightest unusual movement among the trees, Yuan Huo's crossbow twanged. A pheasant hidden behind the trees on a slope beside the road burst out flapping, then dropped to the ground. Several gazes swept over it. The five riders did not slow or pause.

Yuan Gang rode in front to open the way while the other four watched both flanks. Hooves thundered fiercely as they plunged deeper into the mountain forest.

The crossbows in the four men's hands had been designed by Yuan Gang. They could be assembled for use or broken down for carrying, while the components themselves had been forged by Gongsun Tieniu.

At first, Gongsun Tieniu had thought little of the job and handed it to his disciples. Unexpectedly, his disciples could not complete it. More precisely, what they made could not satisfy Yuan Gang's requirements because his standards were too exacting.

Yuan Gang knew perfectly well what kind of men he was training. At times, weapons needed to be easy to carry and conceal. Sometimes, when entering or leaving a place, it was even necessary that no one be able to tell an object was a weapon at all. Otherwise, openly carrying gleaming weapons everywhere might mean being denied entry to certain cities before anything else happened.

So the crossbows he wanted had to be capable of being dismantled at any time for easy transport and concealment. He also required damaged crossbows to be able to exchange parts with one another at any time. That meant the dimensions of corresponding components had to be essentially identical across every weapon. For blacksmiths forging everything by hand, that demand was extraordinarily difficult.

Yuan Gang rejected batch after batch of components. In the end, Gongsun Tieniu had to take the work on personally. Only with his exceptional craftsmanship did the finished parts finally meet Yuan Gang's requirements.

At first, Gongsun Tieniu thought Yuan Gang was deliberately finding fault. His temper flared and he told Yuan Gang to get lost. Yuan Gang eventually had to ask Meng Shanming to intervene before Gongsun Tieniu was persuaded to do the work.

Even then, production could not be fast. No one else could manage it, and everything depended on Gongsun Tieniu alone. The result was easy to imagine.

After more than a year, Gongsun Tieniu had forged components for only a few dozen crossbows. Even now, that was nowhere near enough to equip the two or three hundred men Yuan Gang wanted armed.

Yuan Gang had originally wanted to produce a few guns as well—not the spear-like weapons called guns in this age, but the firearms he had been familiar with using in his previous life.

Yet if even making crossbows to uniform specifications was this difficult, he had even less hope of producing the guns he wanted.

Given how familiar he was with the construction of firearms, combined with Gongsun Tieniu's forging skill, producing a single gun should not have been a problem. Ammunition was another matter entirely. The dimensional tolerances of the projectile demanded far greater precision. If the sizes came out inconsistent and caused the chamber to burst when fired, he might fail to kill anyone else and kill himself instead.

The primer assembly was even more delicate. Yuan Gang had still less confidence in that. If one shot out of every two failed to fire, that could cost a life at the critical moment. Better to carry a kitchen cleaver and save himself the trouble.

He knew perfectly well where the underlying problem lay, but industrial manufacturing was not his field. Master Dao was no expert in industrial manufacturing either. They might know where to begin, but actually solving the problem would require Yuan Gang to spend a very long time studying it. For the moment, he could only abandon ideas that were not yet realistic. As for training the men to ride warhorses, Yuan Gang had once again turned to Meng Shanming for instruction.

He had known how to ride in his previous life, but his skill had been nowhere near the level required to fight and kill from horseback. In technique, he was far inferior to cavalrymen of this age.

He understood very well how important mastering a warhorse was in this world. It did not matter if a man could not drive a car, fly an airplane, or operate a tank here. He absolutely had to be skilled at handling a warhorse. So he went to Meng Shanming for instruction.

A man capable of training the Yingyang and Wulie Guards that had once shaken the realm would naturally have his own methods for training cavalry. The facts proved Yuan Gang right. Meng Shanming helped him tremendously, broadening his horizons and filling in precisely the weaknesses he lacked.

For more than a year, every day had been full for Yuan Gang. This was what he called doing something meaningful.

As for Niu Youdao's habit of shutting himself away alone and sitting cross-legged in meditation for endless stretches, Yuan Gang's way of thinking simply could not get used to it.

The mountain forest stretched for more than ten li. Before long, the five riders burst out of it, relaxed their vigilance, and continued thundering onward beneath the setting sun... At dusk, Niu Youdao's party entered a relay station. They dismounted, and station hands naturally took charge of the horses. Once the group had settled in and washed up, the two sworn brothers sat down together to eat and drink.

"Ah, Little Brother. After eating at your place for several days, then coming back to food like this... is this fit for a human being?" Linghu Qiu set down his wine cup with a miserable expression.

Niu Youdao said, "It's all right. Elder Brother is simply too particular."

Linghu Qiu rolled his eyes. "I'm particular? Between the two of us, who exactly has the extravagant standards when it comes to food and drink? I doubt there's a second person beneath Heaven as particular as you! Why don't you teach Hongxiu and Hongfu those cooking methods?"

Niu Youdao said, "It isn't that I don't want to teach them. Elder Brother saw it yourself at my place. Those kitchens all bear the name of Nanshan Temple. Those are Nanshan Temple's secret arts. They aren't casually passed outside, and outsiders aren't even allowed into the kitchens to watch. If I'm going to have them work for me, I have to respect their rules, don't I?"

After the affair involving a plate of red-braised pork and his bizarre encounter with Shao Pingbo, Niu Youdao had stopped showing off his cooking knowledge while traveling. Besides, he had promised Yuan Fang not to casually pass those methods around anymore.

As for Yuan Gang teaching the boys, Niu Youdao could not control that, and Yuan Fang had even less chance of controlling Yuan Gang. The idea of Yuan Gang listening to Yuan Fang was laughable. Faced with Yuan Gang, all Yuan Fang could do was stand to the side and nurse his grievances.

Linghu Qiu stroked his chin and clicked his tongue. "A pack of monks from a temple with skills like that. Little Brother truly has good fortune!"

Niu Youdao chuckled. "Naturally. Otherwise, why would I have bothered carrying off the whole nest of monks together?"

Linghu Qiu thought about it and had to agree. He could only shake his head enviously. "That's an enormous road to riches!"

Niu Youdao smiled without replying. He did not consider it much of a path to wealth at all because he understood the underlying situation.

There was nothing particularly sophisticated about the techniques, and cooked food could not be preserved for long or transported great distances. To turn it into a business, one would have to open establishments everywhere. The moment the operation expanded, secrecy would become impossible. The methods would inevitably spread sooner or later.

Liquor was different. Once brewed, it could be stored for a long time. So long as the production source remained controlled, it could be distributed outward and still function as a profitable business. Cooking was not realistically suited to that.

If Shang Chaozong one day unified the realm and could control the whole realm, then perhaps the cooking methods could be run as a business. Under present conditions, it was impossible.

As things stood now, many common people could barely feed and clothe themselves. All they asked was a full stomach. Niu Youdao did not think spreading these techniques now would serve any meaningful purpose. It would merely give wealthy households one more luxury to enjoy. And every additional thing created to satisfy the desires of the rich and powerful brought disaster upon ordinary people. Liquor itself was a perfect example.

Ordinary commoners could not afford even a mouthful. It satisfied the appetites of the powerful while consuming enormous quantities of grain. For people struggling merely to eat, that was no good thing. Introducing this method of liquor brewing into an age like this was, in a sense, creating sin.

So for now, some things were better left in his hands, with rarity making them precious. Having something impressive to serve guests and leave them pleased and satisfied was useful enough.

"I hear your master was Dong Guo Haoran of Shangqing Sect?" Linghu Qiu suddenly asked while holding his chopsticks.

Niu Youdao smiled. "I suppose so."

Linghu Qiu said, "What do you mean, 'suppose so'? I once met your master. We crossed paths only once, but I knew him. He was a decent man. Are you looking down on him now?"

Niu Youdao said, "Elder Brother misunderstands. He accepted me as his disciple, but never passed on any arts to me. After I reached Shangqing Sect, internal struggles for power there led to me being placed under house arrest for several years. For years, I wasn't even allowed through the gate. As for cultivation, they threw me a book and told me to teach myself. They made repeated attempts on my life as well and nearly killed me. I can't say I have much affection for Shangqing Sect."

He did not want outsiders believing his ties to Shangqing Sect ran especially deep. With anyone he met, he tried to make the separation clear.

Linghu Qiu looked surprised. "If Dong Guo Haoran accepted you as his disciple, why didn't he pass on his arts? Did some accident happen?"

Niu Youdao shook his head. "Unpleasant matters from the past. Better not to mention them."

Seeing he was unwilling to say more, Linghu Qiu, who had only been probing, did not pursue the question. Their friendship was not yet deep enough to pry too hard into such details, and there would be plenty of time later. There was no need to rush.

He changed the subject. "Once we rest at this station and set out again, we'll be leaving Jinzhou. If you really bring warhorses back, you'll probably have to pass through Jinzhou. Jinzhou may be allied with Shang Chaozong, but if a large number of warhorses passes through, who can guarantee they won't be tempted enough to seize them? Aren't you going to smooth the way while we're here?"

Niu Youdao said, "If we're going to worry about that, there are far too many places along the route that would need smoothing over. Leave that kind of work to Tianyu Sect and the others. If I can put in the effort on the Qi side, that's already enough. The other places aren't mine to worry about, and I couldn't worry about all of them even if I wanted to."

In truth, so long as he could obtain the warhorses, he had never intended to move them overland in the first place. The two commanderies lay against the sea. With such favorable conditions, only a fool would ignore the sea route.

From what Fei Changliu and the others had said, Tianyu Sect had long thought the same way: if they could get the warhorses, they would transport them by sea. The problem was that they had no way to get the horses out of Qi's borders... A bright moon hung high in the night sky. A Goldenwing swooped down and vanished through the window of one room at the relay station.

Hongfu raised a hand and caught it. She removed a secret message from the tube on its leg and passed the message to Hongxiu while she herself went to settle the Goldenwing.

Hongxiu opened the message and decoded its contents. Then she stepped to the lamp, burned the message to ashes, and walked to the couch.

Lowering her voice to Linghu Qiu, who sat cross-legged in meditation, she said, "Sir, people from Xiaoyue Pavilion have their eyes on us."

Linghu Qiu slowly withdrew from his cultivation and opened his eyes. He looked at her in puzzlement. "Xiaoyue Pavilion is watching me?"

Hongxiu said, "More precisely, they're watching Niu Youdao. Someone wants to make a move against him!"

Linghu Qiu frowned. "Whose order?"

"No one's. Someone acted on her own authority. You've dealt with her before—the woman named Su Zhao, the brothel proprietress who took the initiative to befriend you last time."

Linghu Qiu looked suspicious. "Why would she have a grievance with Niu Youdao? That woman is one of Xiaoyue Pavilion's people too?"

"Most likely. Otherwise, how could she mobilize Xiaoyue Pavilion's manpower? She may hold some position within Xiaoyue Pavilion as well, though the message didn't reveal her exact status."

Linghu Qiu gave a cold chuckle. "What sort of game is this? Send word immediately. Have someone stop her!"

Hongxiu shook her head. "That would be difficult. It could make people suspicious of your identity. The higher-ups mean that as long as you don't leave Niu Youdao's side, she won't dare act recklessly. She's already been warned."

[End of Chapter 253]