The Tianqing Temple in the capital.
Tang Lizhi and Fu Zhumei walked side by side, the former holding the "Golden Thread Song," while the latter gripped a monk's firewood knife. The two emerged from the underground corridor and wandered through the temple for a while.
The tea garden of Tianqing Temple bore a striking resemblance to the Wandering Eyebrow Garden, with many bedrooms that likely housed quite a few people on ordinary days. Yet today, the place was unusually empty. Along the way, Tang Lizhi and Fu Zhumei subdued three "Ghost Peonies," tearing off their masks to reveal faces that were completely different—one even bore the branded mark of a convicted criminal, suggesting he might have once been a notorious bandit.
Yet none of them admitted to having any past identity, remembering only their mission to restore their nation and seek vengeance, clinging to some unknown grudge of national and familial hatred. These nameless figures possessed considerable martial prowess; subduing them would not have been easy without Tang Lizhi and Fu Zhumei working together. However, they had returned to Tianqing Temple to recuperate—wounds all sustained during the battle against the Central Plains Sword Assembly at the Wandering Eyebrow Garden on Soul Prayer Mountain.
Within the House of Wind and Moon, the Ghost Peonies moved like phantoms.
Seemingly immortal.
The root of it all lay here.
After a fierce battle in Tianqing Temple, Tang Lizhi never had the chance to use his "Fragrant Orchid Smile." This place was undoubtedly a stronghold, yet the number of guards was shockingly few—far too few for a den of madmen who had entrenched themselves here for years.
There should have been many more people here. Where had the increasingly deranged "Qingshan" gone? Where were the other Ghost Peonies? How had the "Late Emperor," personally chosen by Chun Hui, vanished in mere moments? And where was the other puppet—Prince Ji, Chai Xijin?
Tang Lizhi leaned on Fu Zhumei’s shoulder, barely able to stand. The weight nearly sent them both tumbling to the ground. Had they pressed their advantage earlier, killing another Xie Yaohuang would have been effortless. But now, their momentum spent, Fu Zhumei felt dizzy and weak, while Tang Lizhi’s hand on his shoulder was as cold as ice.
A'Li had long reached his limit.
His injuries were no pretense.
No matter why Xie Yaohuang had suddenly disappeared, it was nothing short of divine mercy. Fu Zhumei forced himself to stay steady, his thoughts muddled: A'Li is determined to fight to the death... He believed A'Li could kill that half-madman, but more than that, he wished A'Li would spare himself.
Tang Lizhi—peerless in martial arts, nobility incarnate, dazzling in wealth and status.
He was so beautiful, so eloquent, so alluring, and so terrifying.
Everyone praised him. Everyone feared him.
No one wanted... He already had everything. Why did he push himself so hard, to the point of being battered and bloodied, barely clinging to life, still scheming to fight a villain to the death?
What was it all for?
Just to earn everyone’s gratitude, to hear them proclaim that Young Master Tang was omnipotent?
That was far too reckless.
Fu Zhumei numbly supported the ice-cold Tang Lizhi. Too reckless. A'Li was like someone repaying a debt—before he had gained anything, he had already given everything away.
A carriage departed the capital, driven by one Ghost Peony, while another sat inside.
The driver wore a black robe adorned with red flowers, a striking sight even from a distance. The Xie Yaohuang inside, however, wore neither black robes nor red flowers, nor did he don a mask. Sitting cross-legged, he held a silver needle, carefully inserting it into his own scalp.
He was performing acupuncture on himself.A-Shui sat in a corner of the carriage, with Feng-Feng curled up in her lap, staring curiously at the strange man poking needles into his own head.
Xie Yaohuang, though known as the "Ghost Peony," rarely left Tianqing Temple. He was intimately familiar with the life of Emperor Gong, believing himself to be the emperor’s lingering spirit. Yet he often suffered from headaches, and after scouring three volumes of The Book of Transmigration , he found no mention of how to treat the splitting pain of a "soul-shifted body." Earlier, provoked by Tang Lizhi, his blood surged with fury, and Chun Hui had urged him to take his medicine. Sensing his own instability, he had hastily departed.
But even after leaving the prison, his headache persisted, as if something foreign were trying to burst from his skull. The usual remedies proved useless. After smashing a few objects in his room, a sudden thought struck him—he turned and went to the secret chamber to seize A-Shui, ordering her to lead him to Ning Buyi .
That mysterious fragment, discarded alongside The Book of Transmigration , might hold the secret to curing the afflictions of a soul-shifted body. The more he dwelled on it, the more his excitement grew, and for the moment, the half-dead Tang Lizhi and Fu Zhumei were forgotten.
The world claimed that Young Master Tang was omnipotent.
But what difference was there between the boneless beauty whose neck he squeezed and the so-called omnipotent Young Master Tang?
In the end, all things in this world ought to grovel at his feet, to be spent at his whim, to raise their necks like drowning swans, pleading pitifully for life.
A-Shui sat silently beside him.
"Where did you throw the fragment?" Xie Yaohuang pulled the long needle from his head, its tip stained with blood that dripped onto the carriage floor.
A-Shui answered calmly, "In the valley behind Yujing Mountain, outside the city."
"Yujing Mountain?" Xie Yaohuang studied her composed expression, and some of his own agitation seemed to settle. "Why did you go to Yujing Mountain?"
"Back then, a friend of mine lived behind Yujing Mountain." A-Shui closed her eyes briefly before opening them again. "His turtle liked to eat paper. Sometimes I’d bring scraps to feed it."
Xie Yaohuang, his mind steeped in thoughts of vengeance and national ruin, was momentarily baffled by such an absurd tale. He frowned, replaying her words twice. "Eat paper?"
"But that fragment wasn’t fed to the turtle," A-Shui said softly. "By the time I returned, my friend was already gone."
OpenNovel