Chapter 750: Marquis Pingxi, Please Ascend the Mountain!

The Lilong Spear had danced for a long time.

It had remained at a disadvantage against Longyuan from beginning to end, but its opponent was the Sword Saint of the age. Simply enduring this long was already enough for Wei You to take pride in.

Swordsmen had stood at the head of the hundred schools of the jianghu because years and history had proven their strength.

That did not mean the order could never change.

It was no rigid law.

In the end, everything still depended on the person.

The Prince of Jingnan, for example, had been able to overturn it.

Unfortunately, Wei You was not Tian Wujing.

And more unfortunately still... the true momentum of the situation stood on the Sword Saint's side.

The Sword Saint was already stronger than him.

And now he could even suppress him by an entire Grade.

From the beginning, this assassination had been a gamble.

Its only chance lay in surprise.

Once events were forcibly dragged back onto their proper track... everything that followed became inevitable.

After opening Second Grade... the Sword Saint's first sword went straight for Wei You.

Old Yu had spent the past few years living with wife, children, and a warm bed.

His temperament had softened greatly.

But today... his rage had genuinely been stirred beyond endurance.

He could not tolerate it.

Would not tolerate it.

Buzz!

Terrifying pressure descended.

Wei You did not panic.

Did not grow angry.

Instead... he smiled.

At this point, the greater momentum was already lost.

There was nothing left to agonize over.

Besides, anyone who had walked this far along the martial path could not possibly lack a heart that yearned toward martial attainment.

So when that sword came... he only admired it.

And experienced it... with genuine enjoyment.

BANG!

The Lilong Spear blocked the sword.

The strike was fast.

Powerful.

But Wei You still blocked it.

Then... he began vomiting blood.

The skin across his body split open.

Blood seeped from wound after wound.

The Sword Saint's gaze darkened slightly.

"You should have thrown away the spear."

A weapon, in the end, existed to be wielded by a person.

The smartest choice just now would have been to use the spear to receive Longyuan's overwhelming sword qi... then discard it immediately.

Instead, Wei You had clung stubbornly to the shaft and taken the full force of that sword through his own body.

Years ago, before the Sword Saint could open Second Grade, when he fought Tian Wujing, even Tian Wujing had thrown Kunwu aside when it needed to be thrown.

Some injuries had to be accepted.

But any injury that could be avoided... had to be avoided.

That was how a fight became worthwhile.

Wei You was strong.

Compared with Tian Wujing of those years?

Naturally, he fell short.

Yet he still refused to discard his spear.

He already looked wretched on the outside.

Inside... the damage was unquestionably worse.

His blood and qi had begun scattering.

Meridians throughout his body were tearing apart.

Taking that single sword in the stupidest possible way had already reduced him to something more than half crippled.

Facing the Sword Saint's confusion...

Wei You forced himself to lift the long spear again.

He settled into another fighting stance and smiled.

"If the spear leaves my hand, it means I've lost. If the spear remains in my hand, it means I haven't lost yet. Getting defeated by the Sword Saint in one sword would sound far too embarrassing when people tell the story. At the very least... I ought to scrape one more sword out of you."

By the time the Sword Saint opened Second Grade, Wei You, already ground down through the long fight, understood he had no chance left.

Since that was the case... he might as well seek a satisfying death.

No.

An even more satisfying one.

The Sword Saint shook his head.

"If this were years ago, perhaps I would admire you."

Wei You asked:

"And now?"

The Sword Saint shook his head again.

"It's meaningless."

Once...

Yu Huaping himself had been a man of the jianghu.

Among the so-called Four Great Swordsmen, Li Liangshen served in the army, the Swordsmith belonged among the nobility, and Baili Jian's younger sister had long ago entered the Silver-Armored Guard.

Only Yu Huaping... had been purely a man of the jianghu.

But today... he no longer wanted to applaud this kind of jianghu spirit.

As far as fighting itself went, ever since his battle against Tian Wujing, he had stopped agreeing with Wei You's kind of choice.

As for conduct... perhaps you felt satisfied.

But if Marquis Pingxi had truly died here today, the hundreds of thousands of common people in eastern Jin who had only enjoyed one year of peace would immediately lose it.

Chaos would begin again.

The Three Jin lands would once more be ravaged by war.

And beneath this Wang River... how many corpses belonged merely to Martial Artists and soldier-brutes?

How many more belonged to the countless two-legged sheep who had been eaten clean by war?

Back then, Tian Wujing had told the Sword Saint that he looked down on the jianghu.

That the jianghu could never step onto the true stage of the world.

The Sword Saint did not want to say those words aloud today.

Because... deep down... he genuinely felt the same.

"I've disappointed you," Wei You said. "But at least I can say I died where I ought to die."

"No. You're wrong."

"Wrong?"

"Dying here does not count as dying where you ought."

The Sword Saint raised one finger again.

Longyuan began gathering strength.

The second sword was coming.

"There were too many places where your death might truly have meant something. When the Savages invaded, you could have gone to assassinate the Savage King. When the Chu people treated Jin people as two-legged sheep, you could have gone to assassinate the Chu Pillar of State. Even when Yan breached Litian City and exterminated the Wenren Clan, you could have gone to assassinate Tian Wujing. With so many places worth dying, you chose none of them. And now, today, you tell me this is dying where you ought? I don't want to lecture you. But over these past few years, I've picked up some bad habits too. My mouth has become rather sharp. You call this the grand, free spirit of men and women of the jianghu. Perhaps it is. But to me... you simply had a few children, found life unbearably dull, and wanted to find something exciting to do."

"I..."

The Sword Saint shook his head for the third time, cutting him off.

"Enough. No more talking. Die."

Longyuan's second sword descended.

Wei You instinctively tried to block.

But his body had already been damaged so badly that he could no longer bring out the true strength of the Lilong Spear.

The spear remained in his hand.

The sword... passed straight through his chest.

Longyuan killed without carrying blood.

It spun once in the air... then flew back to the Sword Saint's side.

Before dying, Wei You planted the butt of his spear against the ice, forcing his body to remain upright.

The Sword Saint looked at him.

"Holding yourself up after death?"

Wei You's eyes had already lost focus.

But his hands still gripped the spear.

The Sword Saint's fingertip moved again.

Longyuan flew out once more.

This time, however... it carried no killing intent.

The sword merely tapped the shaft of the spear.

The spear fell.

And the man fell with it.

"Someone who practices the sword... cannot cultivate magnanimity."

"NOOOOOOOOO!"

The woman ran toward them like a madwoman.

She had witnessed her husband's death.

A scream tore from her throat.

Elsewhere, Marquis Zheng surfaced from the Wang River and wiped the water from his face.

Then... he laughed.

Father and son were laughing together.

The Demon Child naturally saw the woman's agony.

He laughed because of that.

Marquis Zheng, meanwhile, had seen the Sword Saint's petty final third sword.

That little display of narrow-mindedness delighted him enormously.

The Sword Saint turned sideways.

First, he looked toward Kong Shanyang, who was kneeling on the ice, already raving incoherently.

He did not send a sword at him.

Because the man was already insane.

Then... the Sword Saint stepped backward.

He happened to block the path of the woman charging toward her dead husband.

At this point, her mind had completely collapsed.

Facing the Sword Saint's attack... she barely defended herself.

BANG!

She was knocked to the ground.

The blood and qi she had stimulated earlier... began dissipating too.

At that moment...

Zheng Fan called out:

"Spare her."

Longyuan stopped.

Another fraction of a moment... and it would have pierced the woman's body.

The Sword Saint turned toward Zheng Fan.

"You want to pull the weeds out by the roots?"

The woman on the ground suddenly began struggling.

But the sword sheath pressed her down, preventing her from rising.

She was already nearly crippled.

But she still had three children.

Outsiders loved spreading rumors that Great Yan's Marquis Pingxi had a taste for other men's wives.

But the Sword Saint, who lived so close beside him that the two households might as well tear down the wall and share one courtyard, knew perfectly well that Marquis Pingxi only liked beautiful ones.

Under jianghu custom, vengeance meant cutting weeds and pulling roots.

If you took revenge... you wiped out the entire family.

As the saying went, fists feared youth.

Martial Artists declined in blood and qi as they aged.

If you left descendants alive, who could guarantee they would not return years later to seek revenge?

And people of the court... were usually even more ruthless.

"Heh. Looking down on me, are you? Both their parents are gone. How are three little cubs supposed to survive? Fine. I'm kindhearted. Once we find the three children, I'll adopt them. When they're a little older, they can become my personal guards. Consider it accumulating virtue."

You husband and wife wanted to kill me?

Fine.

Then I'll have your children grow up to guard me.

If anyone else had said those words, the Sword Saint might not have believed them.

But Zheng Fan?

He genuinely thought Marquis Zheng would do exactly that.

First, because it was simply too damned humiliating toward the dead parents.

Second...

Marquis Pingxi Residence had always been remarkably indiscriminate in whom it accepted.

Forget the Sword Maid for the moment, with her vengeance for her murdered master.

Even Chief Steward Xiao Yibo carried a blood feud over his father's death.

The Residence really did take people without caring whether they came hot, cold, raw, or cooked.

"Besides, they claim this was just jianghu impulse and they suddenly decided to come kill me. They say it, so I'm supposed to believe it? At the very least, the whole thing needs to be investigated properly. If someone was secretly directing or pushing matters from behind... I'll peel a layer of skin off whoever it was!"

Once those words were out...

Marquis Zheng began sharply sucking air through his teeth.

Being soaked in freezing river water for so long was only a minor problem.

The real torture came from the joints in his arms and legs.

They ached so badly it was almost unbearable.

And then there were the tears at both corners of his mouth.

Every time he spoke, the wounds pulled painfully.

Thinking about that...

Marquis Zheng immediately grew angry again.

Fine.

Dislocating joints during a fight, he could understand.

But did you really have to grin like an idiot until you split your own father's mouth open?

Then Zheng Fan pointed toward a red stone lying some distance away on the ice.

He said to the Sword Saint:

"Trouble you."

The Sword Saint reached out.

The red stone flew toward him.

Then he flicked it to Marquis Zheng's side.

"Come on, son. Go back into your nest and rest. If you stay inside Dad, Dad's body can't warm up."

Being possessed by a ghost naturally made a man shiver.

Fortunately, Marquis Zheng was now a Fifth Grade Martial Artist.

Only that kind of physique could withstand his son messing around inside him.

In the past, every time the Demon Child possessed him...

Marquis Zheng would end up collapsed in bed for a long time afterward.

But then... the damaged incense burner that had been abandoned in a crack in the ice suddenly began glowing.

The appearance of that light corresponded with two things.

Zheng Fan sensed something in his heart.

And the Demon Child released a piercing shriek.

"What happened?"

The Sword Saint instantly seized the shifting qi.

He did not understand the rules used by Qi Refiners, but his first reaction was still direct.

One sword slashed out.

The glowing incense burner shattered into pieces.

But it was already too late.

Marquis Zheng began breathing heavily.

His eyes stared forward.

Only... the gaze looked strangely unfocused.

No.

Not unfocused.

It looked as though he were staring at something incredibly far away.

"Too late... already too late..."

Kong Shanyang, completely mad by now, suddenly raised both hands.

He murmured:

"Enter this gate... cultivate this Dao... behold such sights... and cherish your life..."

"You did this?"

Very quickly, the Sword Saint understood.

It had nothing to do with Kong Shanyang.

The man was completely insane.

Whoever had done this... was not here.

Kong Shanyang lifted both hands and shouted:

"Master... Master..."

...

State of Qian.

Back Mountain.

Ten days earlier, Master Xundao had returned from the southwest.

The Emperor of Qian personally led the hundred officials out of the palace to welcome him.

The southwestern rebellion... had been pacified.

Only a tiny number of people in Qian knew that Li Xundao was the orphaned son of the Tattooed-Face Chancellor.

Master Cang had taken him into Back Mountain and raised him there.

He had inherited Master Cang's tradition.

As fighting along Qian's Three Frontiers grew increasingly strained, the main strength of the Western Army had begun being transferred toward those frontiers five years earlier.

Afterward... signs of rebellion gradually emerged in the southwest.

Years ago, it had been the Tattooed-Face Chancellor who led Zhong Wendao, Zhong Wenmian, and other famous generals of Great Qian in pacifying the southwest and establishing the Western Army.

Now... the southwest had rebelled again.

And his son... had been the one to pacify it.

Meanwhile, after the Yan army had once marched all the way to the gates of Shangjing, the Emperor of Qian seized the opportunity to take power into his own hands and purged a number of old senior ministers whose achievements had grown enough to threaten the throne.

Among them... was Chancellor Han, the man who had engineered the Tattooed-Face Chancellor's death in prison.

After being beaten hard enough, Qian finally understood one principle:

If your military affairs were weak... if your armaments decayed... then your state truly could cease being a state.

Yan barbarians were one thing.

For the last hundred years, Qian people had long understood that Yan barbarians were difficult to provoke.

But now... even those Chu slaves dared come bully them at their own doors.

And so... from the Qian court down to ordinary people... everyone longed for another Tattooed-Face Chancellor to appear.

The Emperor was preparing to issue a decree ordering Li Xundao into the Bureau of Military Affairs.

In Shangjing... that was no longer any secret.

Li Xundao had not refused.

He had descended the mountain precisely because he intended to enter government service.

He merely requested a month's leave from the Emperor so he could return to Back Mountain and recuperate.

The fighting in the southeast had already ended in a peace agreement with Chu.

There was no urgent war there for the moment.

And so...

Li Xundao now wore a white gauze robe and sat beside a small pond, brewing tea.

Seated opposite him was Great Qian's foremost literary figure...

Master Yao.

Yao Zizhan.

Master Yao was an interesting man.

Everyone beneath Heaven wanted to befriend him.

And the reason everyone wanted to befriend him... was that Master Yao only befriended important people.

Years earlier, the head of the Helian Clan had been his intimate friend.

The head of the Wenren Clan had been his confidant.

Even the Regent of Great Chu loved Master Yao's poetry.

In recent years, Master Yao had eaten at the same table as Great Yan's Prince of Jingnan.

He had even taught school for a time in Shengle City when Marquis Zheng lived there, helping children with their earliest lessons.

When it came to befriending heroes beneath Heaven...

Master Yao ranked himself second.

No one dared rank first.

Now Li Xundao's prestige was at its height.

Before long, he would enter the Bureau of Military Affairs and become one of the great military-political figures of the Qian court.

So Master Yao appearing here to drink tea with him was not strange at all.

People always said that knowing how to warm a cold stove was true skill.

But being able to warm every stove that was already blazing hot... was actually far more difficult.

Yao Zizhan... was a master of hot stoves.

Cold stoves?

Heh.

Who had that much spare time?

If you possessed the skill to warm hot stoves, why bother digging around in obscure corners hoping one cold stove might someday catch fire?

After Master Yao stepped down as Grand Commander of the Three Frontiers, that stretch of frontier service carried him directly into the central government.

People now called him Chancellor Yao.

"How has Master Yao been living lately?" Li Xundao asked.

"You already know what kind of person I am. Poetry and prose? No problem. On that front I've always had confidence. But everything else... military affairs, government affairs... aiyo, I'm already this old. I truly can't bear being buried beneath documents anymore. Besides, His Majesty finally seized the opportunity created when the Yan army marched south years ago. He cleared the court in one stroke and gathered full authority into his own hands. Why would His Majesty push me into the central government without knowing exactly what sort of man I am? As for me, I know how to behave. Whatever His Majesty says, I agree. His Majesty is wise. I'm muddleheaded. That arrangement is actually rather good. At least business gets done faster. My reputation has been full for years already. At my age I still have to occasionally spend the night in pleasure quarters just to dirty my own name a little. So I really don't need to imitate those old Chancellors of the past, deliberately clash with His Majesty over every chicken-feather triviality merely to preserve some scholar-official dignity. Nor do I need to wait for His Majesty to take another consort or build some little garden so I can point at his nose, curse him for wasting the people's wealth, and earn myself a reputation for uprightness."

"You sound rather like Great Yan's Chancellor Zhao Jiulang."

After Yao Zizhan entered the senior ranks of government, people in court and among the public quickly began joking that he was a "paper Chancellor."

Meanwhile, Zhao Jiulang's constant meek obedience before the Emperor of Yan had earned him the nickname "clay-sculpted Chancellor."

"Hahaha. I accept the blessing. If I can help transform Great Qian until it possesses the vitality of Yan... I'd feel perfectly content."

"He's dead," Li Xundao said.

"Ah... I know."

"Master Yao. Tea."

"Good. Tea."

The two began drinking.

After a while...

Master Yao set down his cup.

He looked at Li Xundao.

Then asked:

"Do you truly no longer hate him?"

The question struck directly at the heart.

Li Xundao's father had served state and people.

Had been one of the state's wings.

And in the end... he died in prison.

Now... his son was about to enter the Bureau of Military Affairs too.

Could he truly feel no hatred?

People liked saying thunder and rain alike were grace from the sovereign.

But a man was still a man.

And a son... was still a son.

Could cultivation on Back Mountain truly erase human ethics and human feeling?

Li Xundao looked at Master Yao.

He was about to answer... when his gaze suddenly shifted toward the white lotus growing in the center of the pond.

Then... he closed his eyes.

Yao Zizhan looked at the white lotus.

Then at Li Xundao.

Silently... he lifted his cup and continued drinking tea.

After a while, Li Xundao still had his eyes closed.

But he raised one hand.

"I see someone."

Yao Zizhan asked:

"Oh? Who?"

"If I say it, Master Yao may not believe me. Judging by the direction, it should be somewhere in eastern Jin. And I can hear wave after wave shouting, 'Victory to the Marquis.'"

Eastern Jin.

A Marquis...

Yao Zizhan immediately said:

"Yan's Marquis Pingxi?"

"I imagine so."

Thanks to Yan's stinginess with noble titles granted outside the imperial clan... the guess was remarkably easy.

"Why can you see him?"

Master Yao understood almost nothing about the methods of Qi Refiners.

He only knew they were mysterious beyond explanation.

Most of the time they looked useless.

Occasionally... they seemed to possess... well... perhaps the tiniest sliver of usefulness.

"I don't know either. But I truly can see him. We Qi Refiners speak of entering this gate and beholding its sights. To outsiders, either we look like transcendent immortals floating above the dust... or, like Master Yao, they think we are frauds playing tricks with ghosts and gods."

"Heh-heh. How could I? How could I?"

Yao Zizhan smiled awkwardly.

"But I truly can see him. Within the gate are contained ten thousand phenomena. If the world inside the gate were compared to night... then right now... he is like an enormous bonfire burning in the darkness. A strange phenomenon falling from Heaven. A star crashing to earth. Something like that."

"Oh?"

Yao Zizhan became interested.

Li Xundao was not deceiving him.

He truly could see Marquis Zheng.

Qi Refiners were famous for observing celestial phenomena and seeking traces of qi.

At this very moment...

Marquis Zheng was borrowing the Demon Child's power beneath the Wang River, stirring the resentment left by hundreds of thousands of dead soldiers and driving it against the restriction created jointly by Kong Shanyang and the many Jin Qi Refiners in Yingdu.

To Qi Refiners... that sort of disturbance was comparable to an earthquake in the eyes of ordinary people.

Falling stars.

Natural disasters.

Qi Refiners could sense events like those.

Right now...

Marquis Zheng was exactly that "bright."

Zheng Fan himself had no idea any of this would happen.

He could barely be called a Qi Refiner at all.

He understood none of the internal rules.

Much less what his actions meant.

The Demon Child did not care.

His entire mind was occupied with how to make the woman who had hurt him suffer.

Nothing else mattered.

And so... the enormous disturbance father and son created on the Wang River could be sensed by almost every highly cultivated person of the mystic paths throughout the eastern lands.

That was what Li Xundao meant by a bonfire blazing in the night.

The last white lotus Master Cang had left behind after entering Yanjing and severing the dragon vein had been carried back by Baili Jian.

It now grew in the center of this pond.

With that lotus here... combined with Li Xundao's own cultivation... seeing "Marquis Zheng" was not strange.

He could see the scene more clearly than most others.

"What is he doing?" Yao Zizhan asked tentatively.

Li Xundao shook his head.

"That I cannot know, Master Yao. Or perhaps... I could invite him up the mountain and ask him?"

"Hm?"

Yao Zizhan froze.

"You can invite him here?"

"At this moment, he is inside the gate. And he is extremely conspicuous. Easy to find."

Yao Zizhan unconsciously licked his lips.

"You truly can invite him here?"

Li Xundao kept his eyes closed.

He pointed toward the white lotus at the center of the pond.

"If I am willing to let Master's final white lotus wither away and offer up this entire body of Qi Refiner cultivation... that should be enough to invite him here."

"Heh... heh..."

Master Yao found the idea difficult to comprehend.

He could only offer a polite and awkward smile.

"Master Yao doesn't believe me?"

"It's not that I don't believe you. But if this is truly possible, doesn't that mean one could take an enemy general's head from within three armies? Curse another state's sovereign to death from a thousand li away?"

The Master said nothing of strange powers, disorder, spirits, or gods.

Master Yao was a scholar who read the Classics.

Li Xundao's words were basically asking him to believe that stabbing needles into a paper effigy could genuinely curse an enemy ruler to death.

If that were true... wonderful!

Qian had the largest population of the Four Great States.

Could not win on the battlefield?

No problem.

Everyone could simply make paper dolls together and curse the enemy ruler to death.

Then anyone thinking of attacking Qian in the future could prepare to be cursed to death first.

Wouldn't Great Qian become invincible overnight?

True peace beneath Heaven.

Li Xundao laughed and shook his head.

"Master Yao, I swear upon my father's name that I have not deceived you."

The smile disappeared from Yao Zizhan's face.

Then... wild delight surged across it.

A moment earlier, the idea had sounded absurd.

Now... he immediately discovered how wonderfully fragrant it was.

"Truly?"

"Truly. He is inside the gate at this very moment. Extremely bright. And he has not prepared any concealment or obstruction at all. I do not know why he has exposed himself like this... but right now, I truly can attempt to invite him here. The price is one white lotus... and all of my cultivation."

To make an analogy... right now, Marquis Zheng and his son were like two naked men sprinting through the night while carrying a blazing torch... completely unaware of it.

All around them in the darkness... countless other Qi Refiners were watching.

Only a tiny number possessed the ability to reach out and grab them.

And even those who could... would pay a terrifying price.

Almost an exchange of one life for one life.

Possibly even more.

Li Xundao... could do it.

The price was that he would become an ordinary man from this day onward.

And Master Cang's final remaining legacy... would be exhausted.

Naturally, no one could normally receive treatment like this.

First...

Qi Refiners capable of creating such a massive disturbance and lighting a torch this bright were already vanishingly rare.

Second... someone capable of doing that yet still exposing himself without any concealment or protection at all... was rarer still.

A freak among freaks.

So there was no such thing as Qi Refiners casually taking generals' heads from within an army of ten thousand.

If Marquis Zheng had known about this risk beforehand... with his usual caution... how could he possibly have allowed himself to run wild so openly?

Yao Zizhan hesitated.

"Should we request an imperial decree?"

Shouldn't they at least ask the Emperor of Qian?

"There's no time," Li Xundao answered.

This opportunity truly would vanish if they missed it.

"His Majesty once said that if he had known the Yan envoy who entered the palace years ago would someday grow into what he is now... back then, His Majesty would have..."

"Would have what?"

"Would have forcibly kept him in Shangjing and married an Imperial Princess to him!"

Years ago, when Zheng Fan had still been only a garrison officer, Li Fusheng had sent him into Shangjing while the city was surrounded by the Yan army.

There, Zheng Fan had met the Emperor of Qian... and even mocked him for understanding nothing of war.

Now...

Zheng Fan was Great Yan's Marquis Pingxi.

Across Great Yan's foreign wars these past years... which one had he not participated in?

And each time... he had played a decisive role.

Busybody commentators had once tried ranking the Four Great Generals of the younger generation.

Now... no one mentioned the ranking anymore.

It had disappeared even faster than the old Four Great Swordsmen list.

Among the others, only Nian Yao, who had just beaten Qian again in the southeast, could still barely remain on the same stage.

The rest... could no longer be mentioned in the same breath as Marquis Pingxi.

For a talent like that... what would marrying him to one Princess have mattered?

But the implication behind the Emperor's words was obvious.

Back then... was back then.

Now... he wanted the man dead.

The enemy's hero... was your own scourge.

Great Yan producing one Tian Wujing had already been enough to terrify Qian.

If Marquis Pingxi truly grew into Tian Wujing's successor... damn it... look at the man's age.

Was Qian supposed to endure another thirty years under his shadow?

"I understand."

Li Xundao had received his answer.

"Are you yourself willing?" Yao Zizhan asked.

"Truthfully, this return to Back Mountain was already meant for me to discard my cultivation. Since I am preparing to enter government service and the Bureau of Military Affairs, how could I go there still carrying the identity of a Qi Refiner? The imperial court is not, in the end, a place for ghosts, gods, and mystic muttering. Great Qian's court cannot provide a proper place for some spirit-medium charlatan."

"Is it worth it?"

"It is. No matter how much this body of Qi Refiner cultivation divines Great Qian's national fortune... it cannot save Great Qian."

"Sigh."

Yao Zizhan let out a long breath.

"Besides, I planned to abandon it anyway. As for Master Cang... years ago, Master willingly sacrificed himself to the Dao by entering Yanjing. I believe he would approve of using this white lotus this way today."

"If you invite him up the mountain... what happens?"

"If he cannot descend again, it is equivalent to losing his mind. Master Yao has written tales of the strange to frighten people into doing good, haven't you? I remember one of your stories. A man committed too much evil and lost part of his soul."

"I made that up."

"The principle is roughly the same. We must act quickly. The opportunity is about to disappear."

Yao Zizhan unconsciously rubbed his hands together.

Then said:

"Truthfully, I and Great Yan's Marquis Pingxi could be called intimate friends. We haven't seen each other for a very long time. I do miss him. So... why don't you try inviting him here? I'll catch up with an old friend."

"Good."

Li Xundao began forming seals with both hands.

His left hand pointed toward the white lotus in the pond.

His right finger touched the center of his brow.

The white lotus began withering at a speed visible to the naked eye.

At the same time... the transcendent presence around Li Xundao rapidly faded.

Yao Zizhan lifted his empty teacup.

Pretended to take a drink.

Then licked his lips.

Today... he had the good fortune to witness a miracle.

For a moment, poetic inspiration rose uncontrollably inside him.

What should he write?

"On Remembering My Friend Marquis Zheng Upon Meeting Him Again"?

Then... the white lotus withered completely.

It dissolved into drifting powder.

Li Xundao seemed to age seven or eight years in a single instant.

But his eyes suddenly opened.

One hand swept outward.

And he shouted:

"Li Xundao of Back Mountain respectfully invites Great Yan's Marquis Pingxi... to ascend the mountain!"

...

On the Wang River... the Sword Saint stared anxiously at Zheng Fan sitting before him.

At this moment... he could wave his hands and shout all he wanted.

Zheng Fan gave no response.

His eyes simply remained open.

If an enemy had been standing here causing trouble, Yu Huaping would already have cut that person apart.

But the problem was... there was no enemy anywhere around them.

That made the Sword Saint increasingly agitated.

Had the man suddenly lost his mind?

Kong Shanyang, who had already been confirmed thoroughly insane, continued calling out:

"Master... Master..."

He was mad.

But he had sensed his master's aura.

The aura of that white lotus.

"Where... is this?"

Zheng Fan suddenly spoke.

"Zheng Fan? Zheng Fan!"

The Sword Saint immediately called him.

There was no response.

...

"This... is Back Mountain."

Within the powder left by the withered white lotus... a human silhouette appeared.

Who else could it be... but Marquis Zheng?

Yao Zizhan stared wide-eyed.

If he had not known whose son Li Xundao was... if Li Xundao had not just returned to court after pacifying the southwestern native-chieftain rebellion... he would have assumed someone was performing illusions before him and pretending to summon ghosts.

But right now... he believed.

This was real!

"Back Mountain?"

The shadow formed from white-lotus dust sounded confused.

"Yes. Qian's Back Mountain. Marquis... right now... you are on the mountain."

Li Xundao released a long breath.

He had succeeded.

He had "invited" Great Yan's Marquis Pingxi... up Back Mountain.

Before long... the real Marquis Pingxi would either fall into unconsciousness... or descend into idiocy.

Naturally... nothing like this could ever be written into official history.

But that did not matter.

Yan's new sovereign had only just ascended the throne.

Destroy another one of his arms now... and that State of Yan, enormous in appearance but hollow in breath... would find it difficult not to encounter serious problems.

Difficult to resolve the troubles it was about to face.

At that moment...

Marquis Zheng felt extraordinarily light.

He could only make out two figures in front of him.

One wore white.

One wore black.

One was middle-aged.

One was very old.

He could not see their faces clearly.

Their voices reached him only dimly.

So... he did not recognize Yao Zizhan.

At the same time...

Marquis Zheng's own consciousness felt muddled.

Truly thinking was extremely difficult.

He could only say by instinct:

"I... shouldn't be on a mountain right now."

Li Xundao smiled.

"But Marquis... you are on the mountain right now."

"Then I... should go down the mountain."

"Heh-heh-heh."

Li Xundao laughed.

He pointed toward the mountain path ahead.

"Marquis... do you recognize which road leads down?"

"The road... down the mountain... how do I walk it..."

Zheng Fan began thinking.

His mind was thick and muddled.

He could only think through instinct.

Then... at that very moment... the smile on Li Xundao's face froze.

Yao Zizhan pointed toward the pond with confusion.

"Why... has another person appeared? And why does he look... somewhat familiar?"

Yes.

Within the dust created by the withered lotus... another silhouette had suddenly appeared.

And at that moment... inside Zheng Fan's mind... he was still thinking about one thing.

How did the road down the mountain go?

He remembered that before entering Yanjing, he had gone to Litian City.

He had gone to Marquis Jingnan Residence.

He remembered Tian Wujing taking him to pay respects to Du Juan.

He remembered Mount Tianhu.

He remembered the summit of Mount Tianhu... and the extraordinarily comfortable afternoon nap he had taken there.

He remembered waking... and seeing that man's back still standing in the same place.

Because that man had been there... he had been able to sleep peacefully.

He remembered waking from that nap... and that man taking him down the mountain.

He remembered the words that man had once spoken to him.

He had asked:

"What is something mysterious beyond mystery?"

And the man had answered:

"So-called mystery beyond mystery... if you believe in it, it exists. If you don't... then it isn't worth a fart."

He had also said:

"Heaven and Earth are vast. Since you now sit in the position of Great Yan's Marquis Pingxi, sooner or later you will inevitably encounter things like these. Perhaps fortune-telling. Perhaps heavenly secrets. Perhaps prophecy. In short, all of it will look mysterious beyond mystery. If you believe, it exists. If you don't, it doesn't. Many people know how to say those words. Very few can truly live by them. You are walking down this mountain behind this Prince's shadow. So remember these words from this Prince: Do not believe in fate. You must believe... that no one in this world can calculate another person's destiny."

"If that day ever truly comes... when you feel you cannot hold on anymore... think back to today. Think about this mountain road."

...

"PFFT!"

Li Xundao vomited a great mouthful of blood.

It splattered across the tea set in front of him... and sprayed Yao Zizhan all over.

Yao Zizhan was completely stunned.

Then...

Li Xundao stared in horror at the second silhouette that had appeared beside the pond.

His face filled with disbelief.

"How is that possible? How is that possible? This... how can this possibly be..."

The second phantom... walked in front of Zheng Fan.

Then spoke.

"Little Brother. Big Brother will take you down the mountain."

[End of Chapter 750]