Chapter 14

A cool breath brushed against the hollow of her neck, and a man’s slightly husky voice sounded right at her ear. “What a delicious scent.”
Pinned tightly against him, Shen Qing was suddenly engulfed by a danger so tangible it felt like a physical weight, a suffocating pressure that sent every hair on her body standing on end.
Her heart hammered in her chest, as if it might jump straight out of her throat.
She very much wanted to shove him away, but that bone-deep oppression felt like an invisible hand wrapped around her courage, squeezing until she could not move at all. She could only stand there stiffly, body trembling in his hold.
This oppressive aura seemed innate to him. Shen Qing couldn’t make sense of it, but her instincts screamed that this was no creature to provoke lightly.
She forced her body’s fear down and drove her mind to work, searching for a way out.
The hand locked around her waist slowly slid upward. He caught her soft, slender wrist and lifted it to his lips, sighing again. “So fragrant… It has been a long time since I smelled such delicious blood.”
Suppressing the tremor in her body, Shen Qing slowly turned her head. She saw a white-haired man with handsome features, drunk on the scent of her palm like a wine-lover savoring rare spirits.
On her palm was the wound left by Li Daoxuan’s sword earlier. The cut had not yet scabbed; fresh blood was still welling up from it.
She strongly suspected the Twin-Wings Rebirth Array had altered her fate and her blood, making her a magnet for evil spirits and demons.
And sure enough, here was another one.
The white-haired man had green eyes, oddly unsettling. When Shen Qing turned toward him, his gaze shifted from her palm to her face, those green pupils contracting and dilating rhythmically, like a heartbeat.
Now she understood why his eyes looked so strange, because they were very much like Qiuren’s. Quite clearly, they were snake eyes.
As if to confirm her guess, the man’s lips curled, and a long forked tongue shot out of his mouth like a snake’s, only to flick back in an instant.
She tried to jerk her hand back reflexively, but his grip, which felt so light, hid terrifying strength. Her wrist could not move at all.
Shen Qing’s voice shook. “Who are you?”
She somewhat regretted not leaving with Li Daoxuan.
The man brushed aside the hair hanging over his chest and answered mildly, “This one has no name. You may call me Wuming.” (Nameless)
Only then did he seem to realize his overstep. He slowly released her. “Forgive me. I lost my composure. It seems your blood has a fatal allure to me.”
As soon as Wuming let go, Shen Qing retreated from him as if he were plague-stricken. She had no wish to talk further. Having finally pushed past that crushing aura, she turned to leave, only to discover some invisible barrier had appeared in front of her.
She immediately spun back around. “What do you intend to do?”
Wuming’s eyes curved, an eerie smile spreading across his face.
“May I drink the lady’s blood?”
This creature was intent on putting on the manners of a gentleman, yet somehow managed to twist them into something grotesque.
Shen Qing eyed him warily and clasped her hands behind her back. “And if I refuse?”
Wuming’s brows drooped, troubled. “Then I will simply have to force the matter.”
As he spoke, the air grew heavy and damp. Misty rain seemed to rise from the ground, beading on the grass and weighing it low. Dew-soaked blades bent under the weight.
Even the hem of Shen Qing’s skirt darkened, the fabric blooming with damp.
Her face went white. “Don’t come any closer.”
Wuming only smiled gently. “There’s no need to be afraid. I won’t kill you. You are quite beautiful, very much to my taste.” His tone turned coaxing. “Will you be my companion, and share the pleasures of heaven and earth with me?”
Companion, my foot. More like a long-term, portable blood bag.
Shen Qing suddenly flung a bead at him, but he caught it easily. He even gave it a fond little shake. “A mere warding bead like this can’t hurt me.”
It was the first time she’d seen a face that handsome manage to embody sleaze so perfectly.
At the same time, she was deeply alarmed. For him to toy with a warding bead so casually, when a hit on an ordinary evil spirits would punch straight through them, what on earth was he?
Her heart sank. She quickly pulled a stack of yellow talismans from her pouch and threw them at him. Wuming caught those just as easily.
When her hands were finally empty, he smiled, a little helpless. “Anything else? If not, I’m afraid it’s my turn.”
A sharp light flashed in Shen Qing’s eyes. “I already have someone I care about. How could I possibly become someone else’s companion?”
At that, Wuming narrowed his eyes, giving her a slow once-over from head to toe. “Indeed, you do carry someone else’s scent,” he said. “That makes it easy. I’ll just kill him.”
“You!” Shen Qing burst into curses. “You ugly evil spirits, do you never look in a mirror to see that face of yours? The one I love is unmatched in beauty, with no equal under heaven. Even his strength is beyond the reach of the likes of you. You’re not worthy to breathe his air. Kill him? Keep dreaming!”
With that, she flicked her hand, sending the blood from her palm flying onto Wuming.
Golden light flared. The talismans in Wuming’s hand tore free, whirling upward to form a net of light that dropped over his head.
Wuming simply drew one fingertip lightly through the air. The net immediately split apart, collapsing back into separate talismans. Stripped of their power, they burned to ash in midair and scattered.
“A futile struggle,” Wuming sighed.
Shen Qing’s eyes shone unnaturally bright in the dim forest. She tilted her head. “Is that so?”
The next moment,
Bang!
The warding bead he’d been holding detonated, exploding into a cloud of white dust. The easy smile vanished from Wuming’s face.
A sharp, pungent tang spread through the air, the unmistakable scent of realgar.
Warding beads, naturally, warded off all manner of evil. To refine one, realgar was indispensable.
And now it was earning its keep.
But what realgar there was in the bead would disperse quickly. Shen Qing didn’t pause; she slapped several more immobilizing talismans onto him.
Once she saw that Wuming truly couldn’t move for the moment, she frowned prettily and scolded, “You bullied me just now. Wait right here. I’m going to fetch my beloved to beat you up!”
With that, she gathered her skirt and immediately sprinted in the direction of Li Daoxuan.
Wuming could only watch her retreating back, his face frozen, his demonic power quietly surging around him.
The farther Shen Qing ran, the heavier her skirts felt. Even the air grew wetter, as if she were slogging through a swampy forest.
She knew this change came from that snake evil spirits and was chilled to the bone. What kind of creature is this, to warp the climate of the human realm itself?
The gale behind her drew closer. Realizing how near the evil spirits was, she didn’t dare slow even a step, tearing through the forest at full speed.
As she darted past a stand of dead, twisted trees, a familiar splash of crimson flashed in her vision.
Shen Qing seized upon that streak of scarlet like a drought-stricken field greeting rain. As she drew closer, she shouted, “Li Daoxuan!”
The figure turned. The high-tied end of his hair swept up behind him in a graceful arc. He had no warning at all before the girl crashed straight into his arms.
Shen Qing threw her arms around his lean waist and tilted her face up from his chest.
Loose, fine curls clung to her forehead and cheeks. After all her frantic running, her cheeks were flushed bright red. Her apricot eyes shone brilliantly, as if they’d just scooped up every lost ray of spring in the forest.
Like a kitten, she whined up at him, “Li Daoxuan, someone bullied me-” Her last note stretched out soft and long, that delicate voice like spring water, clear enough to drown a man.
Blindsided by the sudden nearness of such spring warmth, Li Daoxuan blinked despite himself. Then, in the next instant, his thoughts cleared.
They’d only met twice, but he knew exactly what sort of person she was: a head full of schemes, motives never clean, deliberately flashing the Glass Heart before his eyes. And now she was pulling this act, what on earth was she after?
He pried her hands from his waist. “Lady Shen, you, ” He hadn’t yet gotten the “overstep” out when Shen Qing clapped a hand over his mouth.
“Someone’s about to bully you too! Go beat him up!”
As if to confirm her words, almost before she finished speaking, a surge of dense evil spirits wrapped in a screaming gale, slashed straight toward Li Daoxuan’s face.
Li Daoxuan drew his sword in a blur, slicing the demonic energy apart with a single stroke.
The scattered demonic energy crystallized in the air, freezing into a dazzling spray of frost.
Wuming arrived a heartbeat later, white-clad and silver-haired. His expression, already dark, went several degrees colder when he saw Li Daoxuan’s face, so dark it made Li Daoxuan’s own hair color seem pale by comparison.
Especially when he caught sight of Shen Qing, who had tucked herself obediently behind Li Daoxuan like a frightened little bird.
The eighteen-year-old youth stood at the height of his growth spurt; Shen Qing’s head barely reached the tip of his nose.
Li Daoxuan was, without doubt, blessed with a face so finely cut and elegant it left no room for criticism.
His brows arched, slender as distant green hills; beneath his straight, well-defined nose were refined thin lips, the faint upward curve at the corners just enough to soften the sharp, imposing arrogance in his eyes.
At a single glance, he struck straight at the soul, yet carried a streak of danger, a wicked air that clung to him.
With Wuming now standing across from him, even Shen Qing couldn’t tell for a moment who seemed more evil spirits, Wuming, or Li Daoxuan.
In short, neither of them was any good thing.
Shen Qing patted Li Daoxuan on the shoulder and, in a voice just loud enough for those nearby to hear, said quietly, “That fellow called Wuming says he’s heard you’re very powerful and wants to fight you. You two enjoy your duel, I’m going to run first!”
After leaving that instruction with Li Daoxuan, she turned and bolted back in the direction of Springview Terrace, off to find help.
She had fired off Xuanji Pavilion’s signal flare earlier, but only a short while had passed. Even if those disciples strapped windwheels to their feet, they couldn’t possibly arrive this fast. But Young Lord Gu was still here.
If Li Daoxuan couldn’t handle the evil spirits alone, adding Young Lord Gu to the mix would surely raise their odds.
Li Daoxuan wanted to grab Shen Qing, but she ran faster than a rabbit. In the blink of an eye, she was gone without a trace.
Wuming’s attack arrived in the next heartbeat.
Li Daoxuan gave a cold snort. “A mere snake dares provoke this prince?” He swept his sword up and sliced off a lock of Wuming’s silver hair.
Wuming’s gaze sharpened as he watched the fallen strands. He had always treasured that silver hair and this borrowed handsome face; Li Daoxuan’s move had undoubtedly enraged him.
“Little brat,” he said softly, “when I was stirring the mortal realm into chaos, you were probably still in your mother’s arms crying for sweets. You really don’t know what’s good for you.” His five fingers suddenly elongated several inches, nails gleaming with a chilling light as he struck straight for Li Daoxuan’s face.
While Li Daoxuan and Wuming tore at each other, sky and earth turned upside down, Shen Qing all but ran herself into pieces.
By the time she finally made it back to Springview Terrace and pushed the doors open, she was met by a sea of heads all turning toward her in unison.
Seeing so many people still here, Shen Qing almost blacked out on the spot.
Cuizhi was the first to rush over. “Niangzi!”
Shen Qing clamped a hand on the girl’s head, panting hard. “Everyone is to go down the mountain immediately! Now!”
If they left too late, she was afraid they’d all end up as souls under Wuming’s claws.
Cuizhi hurriedly said, “Miss! Madam has been looking everywhere for you, where are you going?”
Shen Qing grabbed her. “Where is Young Lord Gu?”
Cuizhi answered, “He’s in the West Garden right now.”
Shen Qing immediately summoned an attendant. “Go inform the commander of the imperial guards that everyone is to be taken down the mountain at once. There must be no delay!”
The attendant’s voice went shrill. “M-Miss Shen, what, what’s happened now?”
“There is still a great evil spirits behind us,” Shen Qing said. “His Highness Cang is tangling with him as we speak. When His Highness and Young Lord Gu begin subduing the evil spirits, you are to get everyone down the mountain right away. Do not get in the way!”
The attendant’s already bloodless face went from white to mottled blue and purple.
“Dear heavens above!” he yelped, and bolted off to gather people.
Shen Qing, meanwhile, told Cuizhi to make absolutely sure her mother was safely escorted home, then slipped past the crowd and rushed toward the West Garden.
She had barely stepped through the hanging-flower gate when she ran headlong into Gu Yun.
The moment he saw her, his expression changed. “Miss Shen!”
Before Shen Qing could speak, he blurted anxiously, “The sword I lent you earlier, where is it?!”
Seeing her return empty-handed, Gu Yun suddenly wanted to die. He thought she’d somehow lost the sword.
“I ran into His Highness Cang on the way,” Shen Qing said quickly. “He took his sword back.”
Panic drained from Gu Yun’s heart at once, replaced by a kind of amused curiosity. So A-Man had already met Miss Shen and knew she’d had his sword.
That made him even more interested in whatever was going on between the two of them.
Before Shen Qing could notice the increasingly odd look in his eyes, she raised a hand and pointed north, her expression solemn. “His Highness encountered a evil spirits on the way. He’s fighting it right now. I must ask Young Lord Gu to hurry and assist him!”
Gu Yun froze, clearly not expecting another evil spirits. “What kind of evil spirits?”
Shen Qing thought for a moment. “Human form, silver hair, green pupils, and he flicks his tongue like a snake. He seems to be a snake evil spirits. But wherever he goes, the land turns to water, and he can twist the nearby climate at will.” Her expression grew heavier. “He doesn’t look like any ordinary evil spirits.”
A single surge of demonic power from Wuming had been enough to frost the surrounding trees and grass, making it feel like deep winter.
Right now, the forests of Mount Li were already wet and sodden. At this rate, it wouldn’t be long before the woods turned into a marsh of stagnant water, no firm ground to be found.
Suddenly, a thought flashed through Shen Qing’s mind. She met Gu Yun’s eyes, and shock flared in both their gazes.
Gu Yun’s throat bobbed. “Miss Shen, are you…sure?”
Shen Qing’s eyes went wide; her back had gone cold. “Every word I said is true.”
Gu Yun’s expression darkened at once. “Not good. A-Man is in danger!”
Shen Qing grabbed him before he could turn and run. “Young Lord, if it really is that thing, going alone will put you in danger as well!”
Back then, when it appeared at East Mountain Temple, Xuanji Pavilion and the temple’s elite disciples had thrown everything they had at it, and still only managed to chop off one of its heads, and that was after the beast had already been badly wounded and forced to flee.
Now that it dared show itself again in broad daylight, who knew how much of its strength it had regained.
Gu Yun said anxiously, “But A-Man may not be able to handle it on his own either!”
Shen Qing suddenly remembered something. “Signal flares! Do you have any that can call for Master You Daozi?”
“I do!” Gu Yun immediately fumbled at his chest, but his fingers met nothing. His face went grim. “They’re gone.”
Shen Qing’s heart sank as well.
Gu Yun forced himself calm. “I could swear I had them on me today.” Then he slapped his forehead. “I remember! When I carried the unconscious Miss Zhao back, I must have dropped the pouch in the West Garden. I’ll go fetch it now!”
Shen Qing frowned. “Miss Zhao fainted?”
Gu Yun walked as he spoke. “Yes. I came across her passed out on the road. She was probably frightened. Aside from a slightly unstable pulse, everything else was fine.” There was no evil spirits qi in her body, either.
Doubts churned in Shen Qing’s mind. “Was there anyone else near Miss Zhao?”
“No one. Miss Shen, what do you mean by that?”
Shen Qing only shook her head distractedly.
Logically, Shen Ling and Zhao Ranyan had been sent out of the rift’s illusion at the same time, and Qingnu hadn’t touched either of them. There was no reason for Zhao Ranyan to faint.
That left only one possibility: Zhao Ranyan’s fainting was Shen Ling’s doing.
Shen Qing couldn’t yet guess Shen Ling’s purpose, but since Gu Yun said Zhao Ranyan’s body was otherwise fine, she could at least set that aside for now.
As for how long Li Daoxuan could last, she could only hope he wouldn’t actually die.
The two of them reached the West Garden together and, sure enough, found the pouch with the signal flare by the guest room door.
Gu Yun let out a long breath, picked up the pouch, and took out the flare. He aimed it at the sky.
A golden maple-leaf sigil burst open high above, brilliant light tearing through the oppressive gloom, driving back the yin energy around them. Its dazzling glow poured into their hearts like a calming tonic.
Once the flare was released, Gu Yun gripped his own sword and said, “Miss Zhao is in the inner room. I hope Miss Shen can look after her for a while. I’m going to help A-Man.”
Remembering how Gu Yun had lived so freely and unrestrained in her last life, Shen Qing figured this time would be the same; he shouldn’t come to harm. She didn’t try to stop him, but she didn’t intend to follow, either.
Never mind that Wuming already had a taste for her blood, her presence would only provoke him further. On top of that, Shen Qing knew full well her own skills were half-baked at best; if she went, she’d only drag the two of them down.
Li Daoxuan was her capture target. If he died, the mission would be deemed a failure, and she’d die with him.
She genuinely did not want Li Daoxuan to die.
After Gu Yun left, Shen Qing pushed open the door to Zhao Ranyan’s room. The girl lying on the bed was pale, her brows slightly furrowed, clearly still shaken by earlier events.
Seeing that she was sleeping soundly, Shen Qing chose not to disturb her further. She slipped back outside, quietly laid layer upon layer of protective arrays around the room, and waited for Master You Daozi to arrive.
Just then, Heaven and earth changed.
The wind stilled; the clouds fell silent. In an instant, all sound vanished.
Moisture in the air thickened further, mist blooming outward until it seemed on the verge of soaking the entire West Garden.
That familiar pressure spread up from the soles of her feet to the tip of her heart. Shen Qing thought she could hear a faint chuckle from afar, or perhaps it was only her imagination.
Wuming had come.
But where was Li Daoxuan? Where was Gu Yun?
Shen Qing’s heart sank.
Thinking of Zhao Ranyan unconscious inside, Shen Qing immediately hitched up her skirts and ran toward the main courtyard.
Wuming’s target was her. She had veiled Zhao Ranyan’s presence with her formations; as long as Wuming chased her, Zhao Ranyan would naturally be safe.
The humidity in the air climbed higher and higher until Shen Qing felt as if every breath was nothing but water filling her lungs.
Breathing that clammy, saturated air, she kept feeling as though snakes were crawling over her skin, clammy and cold, making her shudder with sticky revulsion.
Inevitably, she thought of Jiangnan Road, where her senior brother had once taken her as a child.
The scenery there had been like a painting wrought with the most delicate brushwork. Waterways everywhere, the land a web of rivers and canals; clear currents flowed past, mirroring blue skies, white clouds, and drooping willows.
Crossing arched bridges, one could hear bright-faced youths, boys and girls both, chatting and laughing in soft, lilting accents, every glance and gesture steeped in watery grace.
Yet the plum-rain season there had been anything but pleasant, much like now.
The air had been thick with damp, as if the very air could be wrung for water, leaving one vaguely suffocated. The sky, overcast and sunless, weighed heavy on the spirit. The whole world seemed wrapped in moisture, vision blurred at the edges.
Even one’s mood would follow that weather, stuffy and irritable, sliding toward gloom.
Shen Qing pressed her lips together and scanned her surroundings. Wuming still had not shown himself. At this moment, he was clearly in a fury, less hotly urgent and more in the mindset of a hunter toying with its prey.
As she pushed open a door, a paper effigy with a lolling tongue suddenly lunged at her.
Shen Qing twisted aside, dodging the paper man’s attack.
The figure was shaped like a man, sideburns reaching his brows, hair knotted high, the whites of his eyes shrouded in black mist. Two round spots of red bloomed on his cheeks, like the painted face of an actor on stage.
Noticing the blood-red dot at the center of its brow, Shen Qing instantly understood: this was a paper spirit that had been given life.
Such things were immune to blades and spears, impervious to brute force. The only way to subdue one, was fire.
But where was she supposed to find a fire striker right now?
Shen Qing knew Wuming meant to toy with her first, wear away her sharp edges with fear, then slowly savor his prey.
She refused to play along. She was the daughter of a grand general, the direct disciple of Xuanji Pavilion’s chief. Her skin and flesh might have been pampered soft by her parents, but she had still drawn a sword and slain evil spirits before. How could she be frightened senseless by a mere evil thing like this?
If there’s no opening, you make one.
If there is no fire, then she would find a way to make fire.
Shen Qing bent back, retreating in a deep arch to avoid the paper spirit’s razor claws. While it turned stiffly to pursue, she whipped out a dagger she’d somehow tucked into her sleeve without anyone noticing, then slashed it across the paper spirit’s iron-hard abdomen.
Watching from the shadows, Wuming’s lips curled with mocking amusement.
She knew the paper spirit didn’t fear blades, and she still attacked with a dagger? Like a mantis trying to stop a carriage. Utterly overestimating herself.
Yet in the next instant, the smile vanished from Wuming’s face and appeared on Shen Qing’s instead.
Putting all her strength into the strike, Shen Qing dragged the dagger edge across its abdomen. Sparks flew from the enchanted iron, and just as the sparks burst forth, she flicked the corner of a yellow talisman she’d already prepared right into them.
The fire talisman met flame and erupted, blooming in her hand into a dragon of fire that coiled and lashed, surging straight toward the paper spirit.
At the touch of fire, the paper spirit shrieked in a piercing wail and, in the space of a breath, crumbled to ash.
After finishing off the paper spirit, Shen Qing wiped away the fine sheen of sweat beading on her forehead. Irritated as she was, she couldn’t be bothered to worry about provoking Wuming further. She jabbed a middle finger up toward the sky and snorted, “Idiot.”