NOVPUBChapter 746 -50 Causes (1/2) (3500)
Seeing the enemy fleeing, Wu Qiong’s expression fluctuated wildly for a moment. He wanted to give chase, but also knew the wisdom of not pursuing a desperate adversary. If he wasn’t careful, he could fall into a trap himself, especially in his current state of compromised energy, he most likely wouldn’t escape unscathed.
He struggled internally for a moment. By the time he had somewhat made up his mind, the lingering trace of energy had already vanished completely, leaving no sign of the Xiahou Family’s guest elder with the sinister aura. The elderly scholar sighed heavily, feeling defeated, and thus let go of the slight disdain he had held for the warriors of Jianghu.
Ye Zhuhua stood up, his face flushed with shame, and bowed, “This is the fault of your disciple. Had I been able to block that scoundrel’s moves earlier, I might have captured him. But I made the mistake of underestimating him.”
Wu Qiong didn’t want to be overly critical of this junior who had come to aid him, and he shook his head, “How can you be blamed? That man is a warrior well versed in the treacherous and tricky ways of Jianghu, with deep and cunning schemes. You are still young; how much could you possibly see through?”
He paused and then mockingly said to himself, “It’s laughable that I’ve read so many Sage’s Books, thinking that even if I didn’t reach an extraordinary and holy realm, I would still have gained something. But when it actually came to the crunch, I wasn’t even as decisive as a rough Jianghu brawler.”
“Ridiculous, ridiculous…”
Ye Zhuhua remained silent, not daring to speak.
Wu Qiong sighed to himself and then turned to Xue Qinshuang and Sikou Tingfeng, bowing slightly with an embarrassed expression, “I am grateful for both of your righteous assistance. Yet, it is regrettable that we fell short of success and let that old man escape.”
Sikou Tingfeng stepped aside and said indifferently, “The elderly man must be Xu Shihua from Hedong, known for his intricate and deep thoughts. He has survived numerous dangers, yet he is not willing to focus on Martial Arts.”
Xue Qinshuang simply said that there was no need for the senior to feel this way.
Wu Qiong’s face showed increasing shame.
From behind them came a burly voice. It was Situ Che’s disciple Fei Poyue, who had been traveling. Although he had injured his shoulder earlier in the skirmish, the hot weather had led him to tear off a sleeve to keep the wound dry, revealing his muscular arm.
Now, with one hand holding a sword and the other tightly grasping a member of the Xiahou Family’s Hidden Guard whom Ye Zhuhua had struck down with a sword scabbard, he approached the group and said, “Old Wu, this man is still here. He tried to flee but was discovered by me. How should we deal with him? Should we interrogate him, or…”
His voice trailed off as his eyes suddenly filled with murderous intent.
The Hidden Guard was just being dragged along by him.
Originally, this Hidden Guard, with the Martial Arts he painstakingly cultivated, could only hold his own against Tian Zhide, the eldest and most steady of the three Situ brothers, using spear techniques to maintain a stalemate. The others were not his match at all.
But perhaps because the Hidden Guard had been fighting earlier in a fight among Seventh Rank warriors, and later had a crucial acupoint on his back struck by Ye Zhuhua with a sword scabbard during his escape, he was now being dragged along without resistance.
Ordinarily, after such a heavy blow to an acupoint on the back, one would be lying on the ground unable to move for several hours. The fact that he could walk at all was quite extraordinary, showing that the reputation of the Xiahou Family’s Hidden Guard was well-deserved.
Wu Qiong, dispirited, waved his hand, “The Hidden Guards of the Xiahou Family have always only followed orders, unlike the Imperial Shadow Guards who take drugs to silence themselves; they are not privy to many matters. Even if he were questioned by the harshest interrogators in the city, they would not be able to extract any useful clues.”
Situ Che’s face showed a fierce desire to kill. Although his brothers had not died at the hands of the Xiahou Family, since the Mysterious Sword Sect had covertly come into contact with them with ill intent, the resentment they felt was naturally placed on the Xiahou Family’s head. He grinned and said, “Then I will take this man and deal with him…”
The masked Hidden Guard, who had been silent the whole time while watching Jiang Lan come forward, suddenly spoke up at that moment. According to Wu Qiong, the Xiahou Hidden Guards were not like the Hidden Guards of the Great Qin Imperial Family who needed to swallow drugs to silence themselves, yet his voice was rough and emotionless, “You must not kill me.”
Wu Qiong laughed bitterly in frustration, approached the Hidden Guard and said loudly, “What a thing to say — that we must not kill you! The enmities on Jianghu are clear: he who kills shall be killed. Could it be that only the Xiahou Family is allowed to kill us, and we can’t kill anyone from the Xiahou Family?!”
The Hidden Guard looked up at him, his voice still indifferent and raspy, “At this time, the One-Leaf Pavilion cannot.”
A pointed revelation.
Wu Qiong’s voice halted, his rising anger instantly quelled, and he took a deep breath, trying to keep his voice steady, “Speak your piece. You have ten breaths to give me a reason not to kill you.”
The Hidden Guard didn’t hedge and responded without hesitation, “The One-Leaf Pavilion has just suffered an internal attack; killing me would be pointless and would only deepen the grudge with the Xiahou Family. At this time, the One-Leaf Pavilion is like a dandelion in the rain, unable to withstand any more harsh weather.”
“Moreover, in the current situation, if you kill me, the Xiahou Family’s attack on the One-Leaf Pavilion, though the world is vast, must remain unknown. Each Xiahou Hidden Guard has a purple sandalwood name plaque at the ancestral temple, with the given name inscribed on the front and the birth date engraved on the back. With my life, that would be hard evidence, and it could even make the Xiahou Family apprehensive.”
Wu Qiong scoffed, knowing that this was the best course of action, yet still provocatively said, “If the Xiahou Family acts like this, they should be held accountable by the martial community and brought before the First Estate for judgment. Why would we need you as evidence?”
The Hidden Guard glanced at him, succinctly saying, “The rules and reasoning of Jianghu do not recognize yours.”
That single sentence left Wu Qiong speechless, and after a long while, he waved his sleeve and retorted coldly, “To betray one’s own clan for personal life, pitting fellows of Jianghu against each other; the Xiahou lineage, undeservingly called a noble clan, I am ashamed to be associated with.”
The masked Hidden Guard remained calm, simply saying, “If you truly think so, you can kill me with a single sword stroke. If instead you rely on me, then you are no different from the contemptible ones you describe.”
Wu Qiong’s face turned ashen.
Jiang Lan, who had been watching silently, suddenly spoke up softly,
“Take off your mask.”
The Hidden Guard’s body stiffened slightly, refusing to move.
Wang Anfeng and others didn’t recognize Jiang Lan, but Wu Qiong understood that the girl beside him had a delicate and lively mind. Even her father, who was the Sect Master of One-Leaf Pavilion, often fell short of her ingenuity. She was praised by the scholars of Jiangnan Road as the green lotus in the pond, born with a crystal-clear heart, so she surely wasn’t taking aim without reason.
His expression changed subtly, and then he thought of what the Hidden Guard just said, a sharp comment that would become bone-chillingly biting with another word. The guard had a keen grasp of the situation in Jianghu and spoke bluntly, displaying a hint of mockery and disdain between the lines.
There weren’t many in Jiangnan Road with this kind of temperament and insight.
Wu Qiong’s eyes widened as an absurd thought arose in his mind.
Could it be…
Xiahou Xuan?!
How could that man be so audacious? Or did he have an ulterior motive?!
The old scholar’s heart raced suddenly, and anger began to surge within him.
Before the dust could settle on this thought, he had already violently raised his hand and reached for the Hidden Guard’s mask. The guard seemed to resist, lifting his hand a bit, but failing to stop him as one arm was captured by Situ Che, and his own martial arts appeared to be only around the Seventh Rank, insufficient to stop the attempt.
The mask was forcefully removed, and the action was so aggressive that some of the guard’s black hair became disheveled.
Jiang Lan’s heart skipped a beat for a moment.
But the face underneath was not the one she had thought she had forgotten, the one that refused to leave her heart; it wasn’t even remotely similar.
The facial features were somewhat resolute, but the eyebrows drooped a bit, making the eyes appear somewhat lackluster. If one were to suggest he resembled a drunk who loitered in taverns, it would be apt—yet this did not match with the poised and proud demeanor of a martial artist as exhibited just a moment before. The Hidden Guard looked at the old scholar beside him and said indifferently:
“Young Master said you’re so lost in your books that you mistook me for the Young Master, and indeed your foolishness is unparalleled.”
Wu Qiong’s face turned ashen.
“You!”
Jiang Lan came out of her daze; ripples in her mind’s pond of lotuses instantly calmed, and she let out a self-deprecating, light laugh:
“It seems I was dreaming, thinking you might be him.”
Having his mask removed, the unremarkable Hidden Guard replied woodenly, “I have been serving by the Young Master’s side since childhood. For twenty years, I have never been far from his side. It’s only natural that I picked up a few of the Young Master’s ways of speaking and mannerisms. I’m truly at fault for allowing you to mistake me for him.”
“I should be dead for this oversight.”
No sooner had he spoken than a dagger slid into his hand, and he moved to stab his own face with it. The action was fierce, but the old scholar grabbed the guard’s arm in a flash, annoyed by his temperament and yet shocked that he still had weapons concealed on him.
He thought again that if even such a mere personal Hidden Guard had such vision and decisiveness, was skilled in martial arts, and lacked nothing, then One-Leaf Pavilion seemed much inferior by comparison—other than Jiang Lan, they only had the young Ye Zhuhua to be proud of.
At the age of eighty, having seen all manner of storms in his life, he understood the reasons for this quite well, but he could only laugh at himself and felt a touch of weariness rise within him.
With a flick of his wrist, he broke the fine black iron dagger and sighed wearily, “Let’s just leave it at that. The recent fight has already disturbed the neighbors. Let’s rest at the inn for now. For the damaged property, we’ll compensate the shopkeeper at full price.”
Situ Che and the others tied up the Hidden Guard thoroughly and threw him into a room for a thorough search, making sure he had no more weapons on him. They found several handle-less flying daggers, three silver needles, a spring-loaded hand crossbow, a soft sword that extended to two feet and seven inches, and two short daggers within the soles of his shoes—all clattering to the floor.
The Hidden Guard remained indifferent, but this display made his fellow disciples both shocked and angry. Had it not been for the guard causing Jiang Lan to misunderstand and then drawing a dagger on himself, they would never have searched him so meticulously.
The chilling scene that might have unfolded made them shiver violently in the stifling heat, following which their anger grew, and they took him to a corner and vented through punches and kicks.
Wang Anfeng was preoccupied with his own matters and wanted to find Xue Qinshuang, but he discovered that the girl had already returned to her room early in the day. Standing in front of her door hesitantly for a long time, he still didn’t knock on the wooden door.
The elderly Confucian scholar Wu Qiong entered the room with Ye Zhuhua, forcing himself to be spirited. He brewed a pot of tea, poured a cup for the young disciple, blew off the steam, took a sip, and with a self-mocking sigh said:
“I’m getting old; my energy simply can’t compare to you young folks anymore. Without some distractions, I struggle to stay spirited.”
Ye Zhuhua replied in a soft voice:
“Uncle-Master, how can you say that?”
Wu Qiong shook his head and said, “Let’s not talk about that. Has the shopkeeper given any compensation?” 𝖓𝔬𝖛𝔭𝔲𝖇.𝔠𝔬𝖒
Ye Zhuhua nodded. Although he looked like a simple young scholar, he had an unflappable demeanor, as if he could face any situation calmly, and said:
“The shop was disrupted by martial artists’ fighting today, and the guests were inevitably frightened. I took the liberty of giving a little extra compensation.”
The white-haired scholar chewed on tea leaves in his mouth and nodded in agreement:
“Since we’ve caused others to worry, the compensation is certainly due.”
Chewing tea leaves was a habit he had developed in his youth; back then, his family was poor, and he used tea to stay awake and study. Even after the tea had no flavor left, he would chew on the leaves to stimulate himself until the last hint of bitterness faded. Coming back to reality with a hint of apology on his face, he called his young disciple by his courtesy name, saying:
“Right, Zhiyuan, what brings you here so suddenly?”
Ye Zhuhua stood up and bowed respectfully, speaking slowly:
“I must inform Uncle-Master.”
“Master has returned from his travels, ascended the 1,300 steps with sword in hand. The encirclement of One-Leaf Pavilion has been broken, and I was sent in haste. There’s no longer a need for Jiang Lan to travel to Zixiao Mountain Villa and seek shelter.”
The old man’s teacup fell to the ground with a crack.
PS: Today’s first update is presented… 3,500 words.
