Chapter 549: Dragon and Tiger Contend

The upheaval in Nanzhou was a major affair. By rights, Niu Youdao should have returned to oversee matters personally, but he did not.

The agreed three-day period passed, yet Yucang did not hurry to demand Xia Lingpei back.

That was because their negotiations had included a condition: Yucang's side wanted to see whether Niu Youdao could make good on his words—whether he could truly drive Tianyu Sect out of Nanzhou and demonstrate absolute influence over the province.

Put plainly, they wanted to see whether Niu Youdao really possessed the strength, and whether he possessed enough strength to cooperate with Xiaoyue Pavilion.

“Yes!” Dugu Jing accepted the order.

Yucang turned and waved a hand, taking Dugu Jing out of the bamboo grove with him. They went to the most elegant and secluded courtyard in Fufang Garden, which had once been Guan Fangyi's private residence and was now occupied by Zhuang Hong and her son.

Master and disciple waited outside the gate until someone inside reported their arrival and permission was given for them to enter.

After they went in and saw Zhuang Hong, Yucang dismissed the surrounding servants before bowing to her. “Your Highness.”

Dugu Jing was not dismissed. He remained and bowed as well.

When Yucang met Zhuang Hong, he generally avoided meeting her alone. Proper appearances had to be maintained.

“National Preceptor.” Zhuang Hong nodded slightly, then asked with barely concealed urgency, “How is the Young Master?”

Yucang answered with perfect propriety. “Your Highness may rest assured. We send someone to see the Young Master every day. He is well and greatly admires Niu Youdao's talent. He has been studying diligently.”

“Studying?” Zhuang Hong gave a faintly self-mocking smile. “Is he truly there to study?”

“He is there to study, and in the future he will remain at Niu Youdao's side to learn from him. I expect he will soon accompany Niu Youdao to Nanzhou in the State of Yan.”

Zhuang Hong was startled and immediately became anxious. “You're sending the Young Master away? Yucang, what are you trying to do?”

Yucang bowed deeply with cupped hands. “Your Highness, please do not be anxious. We truly are sending the Young Master away to study. He is no longer a child and is gradually coming of age. Keeping him like this forever is no solution. Sooner or later, he must go out and see the world. If Your Highness is worried, you may accompany him while he studies.”

“...” Zhuang Hong stared in astonishment.

These people had always restricted her movements. They were willing to let her leave?

She could hardly believe it. “You truly can let me go?”

Yucang's expression immediately became solemn. “Why would Your Highness put it that way? Everything we have done has been for the sake of Your Highness and the Young Master. Talk of whether we ‘let’ you go is far too grave. This subject and the others cannot bear such words.”

Zhuang Hong quickly waved a hand and corrected herself. “National Preceptor misunderstands. I mean, can I truly accompany the Young Master to Nanzhou in Yan? You will not be going with us?”

“The Young Master's teacher has said he wants to give him a freer environment. We will not go and disturb him. I only hope Your Highness will take good care of the Young Master on this journey.”

Joy immediately welled in Zhuang Hong. Maintaining her composure, she nodded. “He is my own son. Naturally, I will take good care of him. National Preceptor need not worry.”

Yucang said, “There is one matter I must still remind Your Highness about. Certain things involve far too much and concern the lives and deaths of too many people. Once outsiders learn of them, many will seek to harm Your Highness and the Young Master. Not a single word of what should not be spoken outside may be leaked.”

“Also, the Young Master is inexperienced in worldly affairs. There are some things it would be better not to let him know for the time being. When the proper time comes, naturally he will be told.”

Zhuang Hong nodded repeatedly. “Even without your reminder, I understand. I would never treat my own life and my son's as a game.”

“Your Highness, take care. This old subject will go make the arrangements.” Yucang and Dugu Jing bowed with cupped hands and withdrew.

Once they had left the secluded courtyard, Dugu Jing could not help asking, “Master truly intends to send her away as well?”

His meaning was obvious. Niu Youdao had never demanded this. Why give the man an extra hostage for nothing?

Yucang sighed. “I don't want to send her away either... Forget it. She doesn't know very much. The important one is the Young Master. When the Young Master is here, she matters. If he is no longer here, whether she remains here or not is unimportant.”

“If the Young Master is gone and I continue keeping a widowed sister-in-law by my side for years, what will outsiders think? Everyone who has met this sister-in-law of mine knows she is quite beautiful. Avoiding gossip would be impossible.”

“And after going too long without seeing her son, she will inevitably start demanding to see him over and over. Sigh. Better to let her leave with him.”

Dugu Jing nodded thoughtfully.

That was true enough. Her identity was what it was. They could neither beat nor curse her. If she started making a fuss every few days about wanting to see her son, it really would become troublesome.

Better to know when to tighten the reins and when to loosen them.

...

“What happened to my ten flying mounts?”

At Tongfang Garden, Yucang had come to see Zhuang Hong and her son off. Watching several large flying mounts descend into the courtyard, he moved close to Niu Youdao and asked the question in a low voice.

“When people fight and kill, casualties are unavoidable. They're all dead.” Niu Youdao brushed him off without concern. “You don't think these are yours, do you? These are my own. You know perfectly well I had flying mounts in my hands already.”

Naturally, he would never admit he had captured Yucang's ten mounts.

He himself had lost three, after all.

Yucang's teeth practically ached from hearing the answer.

He realized he had only come looking for irritation. True or false, matters had reached this point. Unless he forced Niu Youdao's neck down onto an executioner's block, there was no hope of making the man spit them back out.

In the end, several flying mounts rose into the sky.

Clouds spread vast beneath the heavens, and the immense Qi capital gradually receded below.

“Teacher, where are we going?” Xia Lingpei tentatively asked.

He was sharing a mount with Niu Youdao. Of everyone present, he understood the least. No one intended to tell him the truth.

“Read ten thousand volumes and travel ten thousand li. Why ask so many questions?” Niu Youdao casually brushed him off.

Xia Lingpei inwardly exclaimed in wonder.

A teacher truly was a teacher. Even a casual sentence came out like polished prose, containing principles enough for him to ponder at length.

His face immediately filled once more with admiration and worship.

Guan Fangyi kept hold of his arm as though protecting him.

In reality, she was restraining him.

Until they were certain everything was secure, any agreement about cooperation was just talk. Xia Lingpei's life would remain firmly in their hands.

What surprised Niu Youdao was that he had effectively caught one hostage and gotten another free.

Yucang had actually delivered Zhuang Hong into his hands as well, giving him both mother and son.

He could not quite understand what Yucang meant by it.

Had he not confirmed that Zhuang Hong was not a cultivator, he might not even have dared accept her.

Yucang had originally wanted to send several people along to attend mother and son.

How could Niu Youdao possibly allow that many hidden dangers to remain beside him?

In the end, he agreed only to let one of Yucang's disciples, Guo Xingshan, accompany them.

Refusing even one would have been difficult to justify.

Yucang's side also needed someone who could confirm at any time whether mother and son were safe and serve as an intermediary for contact.

Yucang agreed in part because he judged that the safety of Zhuang Hong and Xia Lingpei should not be a major problem.

Given Yucang's standing, no matter who had a grievance with Niu Youdao, they could simply target Niu Youdao. There was no need to move against Yucang's people and create extra trouble for themselves.

So long as Niu Youdao did not behave recklessly, mother and son should be safe.

They flew between cloud and sky.

Zhuang Hong looked relaxed and delighted, her gaze roaming across the magnificent scenery between Heaven and Earth.

All these years, she had appeared to be treated with honor, but she knew perfectly well that in truth she had always been kept under soft confinement.

She had been widowed before the age of twenty and confined ever since. Now she was only in her thirties.

The finest years of a woman's youth had passed in cold and lonely seclusion.

One could imagine the loneliness in her heart and how deeply she had yearned for the outside world.

Now she had finally been released.

The joy in her heart was beyond description, like a bird flying free from a gilded cage.

Guan Fangyi looked back at the Qi capital receding behind them.

She was leaving the city again, but the emotions in her heart were entirely different from the first time.

Then she looked at Xia Lingpei under her control, and finally at Niu Youdao standing ahead, facing the winds and clouds.

Her feelings grew even more complicated.

What did it mean to possess ability?

What did it mean to possess methods?

Only on this journey had she truly seen.

At Myriad Beasts Sect, crisis after crisis had arrived one upon another, yet he had sat steady in the fishing boat no matter how the winds and waves rose.

While she was still stumbling around in confusion, he had already dissolved dangers from every direction into nothing and, with a turn of his hand, borrowed the momentum of the gathering storm to counterattack.

At Myriad Beasts Sect he reached into treacherous waters and pulled out five flying mounts. He bent Dachan Mountain to his purpose, pursued Shao Pingbo to Beizhou, and forced him to flee.

Then he hunted Shao Pingbo all the way to the Qi capital and once again forced him to escape, this time to Jin.

After stumbling upon Yucang's identity and being hunted by Xiaoyue Pavilion, when anyone else would have fled as far as possible, Niu Youdao instead turned back toward the Qi capital and plunged straight into the tiger's den.

With a flip of his hand he made clouds, with another he made rain. He snatched chestnuts from the fire, reversed the situation, caught Xiaoyue Pavilion in his own palm, and withdrew safely.

All the while, without betraying the slightest outward sign, he had turned both Nanzhou and Beizhou upside down.

In the end, one sweep of his sleeve cleared away the storms of north and south, and he returned with his work complete.

Yet Shao Pingbo was no ordinary man either.

He had joined hands with Tianyu Sect to strike. After the move failed, he imprisoned himself to prove his innocence.

When danger arrived, he treated Dachan Mountain as though it were nothing and calmly slipped away.

Trapped in the Qi capital, he used deft methods to dissolve the crisis.

When isolated and weak, he played the states in the palm of his hand, causing their pursuit to come up empty again and again.

Most astonishing of all, although he had arrived in Jin as a homeless dog, he somehow received the honor of having the imperial robe placed over his shoulders.

His fallen situation reversed in an instant.

He gained even stronger backing, finally forcing Niu Youdao's side to hesitate, lower its banners, and stop acting rashly.

The question of who would ultimately bring down the deer remained unresolved.

The two were dragon and tiger locked in contention.

The defeated one had grown stronger rather than weaker. He had not truly fallen behind and had gained the backing of Jin.

The victor returned laden with gains and had also secured the assistance of Xiaoyue Pavilion.

Between victory and defeat, victory contained further victory, while defeat contained gain.

Guan Fangyi understood now. She had seen it with her own eyes.

The two men had gambled everything against one another, yet instead of wearing each other down, each had pushed the other onto a higher stage.

They had already drawn the intense attention of the great powers beneath Heaven.

Having followed all the way and witnessed it personally, Guan Fangyi was truly left in awe.

Faced with these two young men, she repeatedly felt as though she had lived all her years for nothing.

She did not understand everything.

But one thing she did understand.

Take any single affair either of those two had carried on his shoulders and place it on hers, and it would crush her to death with ease.

She truly could not bear that weight.

...

“Mr. Yucang's sworn brother's son?”

At the Provincial Inspector's Residence in Nanzhou, dusk had settled over the garden. As the group strolled together, Lan Ruoting brought news, and Meng Shanming asked in astonishment.

Lan Ruoting nodded. “Yes. There is no mistake. The news has already spread everywhere. Someone personally sought confirmation from Mr. Yucang and verified it.”

The group exchanged looks.

Mr. Yucang's reputation was anything but ordinary, and his students throughout the various states were either wealthy or noble.

Yet Master Dao had somehow become the teacher of Mr. Yucang's nephew.

Meng Shanming shook his head with a rueful smile. “That Master Dao truly leaves a man with nothing to say.”

Just then, a personal guard ran over and reported, “Your Highness, the Princess Consort's mother, Peng Yulan, is outside the residence. She asks to see Marshal Meng.”

Everyone froze.

Shang Chaozong's face darkened. “She still has the face to come here? Does she want to kill me again? Tell her I refuse to see her!”

So many of his brothers had died in that upheaval. Many had even been old retainers who had served his father.

And the killers had come from his wife's family.

What was he supposed to do?

[End of Chapter 549]