Flying Rainbow Swordsman

The Heavenly Prison never saw daylight year-round; only oil lamps burned in the corridors.

Dim and gloomy, it was impossible to tell day from night.

When prisoners first entered, they still scratched marks into the walls to keep track of time. But after enduring too long, or filling every inch of the walls, they no longer had the spirit to count the days.

After all, far too few people ever walked out of the Heavenly Prison alive!

Zhou Yi remembered the prisoner meditating here. His surname was Su, and his family was said to have once produced a great literary master in Jiangnan.

He had written poems that defied the current ruler, drawing an investigation from the Brocade Guard. Somehow, they had uncovered evidence that he had tortured his servants to death, and he had been imprisoned in the Heavenly Prison according to the law.

His family sent money, so he could have an extra spoonful of thin gruel with every meal!

Perhaps if the current ruler died and the new emperor ascended the throne with a general amnesty, this man would be released.

"No wonder he's in such good spirits!"

After Zhou Yi finished handing out the thin gruel, he walked out along the row of cells.

Voices drifted closer from afar.

At first they were a low murmur, then they turned into loud shouts of all sizes. From the sound of it, they were gambling.

The Fengyang Kingdom had stood for three hundred years. It possessed every common ailment a dynasty could have: the emperor demanding birthday tribute, corrupt officialdom, and lax military preparedness.

The Heavenly Prison's rules had long ceased to be as strict as they were in the Grand Ancestor's day. Otherwise, a sickly fellow like Zhou Yi would never have been recruited.

There were supposedly over a thousand prison guards on the rolls. Most collected empty salaries without ever showing their faces, while the few Xiaoweis who came on duty spent every day drinking and gambling for amusement.

Comparing the patterns recorded in history with Fengyang Kingdom's current state, Zhou Yi felt there was a high chance the dynasty was about to change hands.

"Little Yi, done delivering the food? Come play a few rounds!" Zhang Zhou, the dispatcher, called out, snapping Zhou Yi from his reflections.

Zhang Zhou kept blowing into his palms, as though that could make the dots on his tiles larger.

Zhang Zhou was a Heavenly Prison dispatcher, an unranked petty official and Zhou Yi's direct superior. He had been on good terms with Zhou Yi's late father.

Zhou Yi shook his head. First, he was cautious by nature and disliked gambling. Second, he had no money.

The previous owner of this body had spent every last coin in the household on medicine and tonics, trying to nurse his body back to health. It had all been useless, and in the end, a soul from Blue Star had taken over the shell.

He stood behind Zhang Zhou and watched for a while. The game resembled pai gow, and Niu Xiaowei was sitting as the banker.

Boring. Pointless!

Zhou Yi settled his mind and considered how he might cultivate in the future.

Even with the Longevity Dao Fruit, he could not give up seeking immortality. What if one day he encountered demonic cultivators abducting people, or immortals fighting and wiping out an entire city?

In the face of natural disasters and man-made calamities, caution alone could not save him.

Longevity was the Dao Fruit; cultivation was the art of protecting the Dao!

"The previous owner's memories contain no method of cultivation. He had never even heard of immortals. All he knew was that martial arts were divided into inner qi and body tempering. I'll need to visit a martial arts school to learn the details."

Cultivation was for longevity. Zhou Yi had already obtained the Dao Fruit, so he would not put the cart before the horse and wander the world seeking immortality through dangerous adventures.

Therefore, for now, he could only choose martial arts!

"Should I first make a huge sum of money and improve my life? I can't produce soap or cement, but I could make saltpeter ice or greenhouse gardens..."

"Or I could plagiarize some poems and songs. Once I have fame, money will follow..."

"If that still doesn't work..."

"Forget it for now. I have a courtyard in Shenjing, and the Heavenly Prison provides meals. I shouldn't stir up extra trouble over a little money."

Zhou Yi did not trust the business environment of ancient times. In a society ruled purely by officials, anyone with a large sum of silver but no foundation or patron was nothing more than a pig waiting for the slaughter.

Just then.

A clerk came in from outside and whispered something into Niu Xiaowei's ear.

Xiaowei was an official post in the Heavenly Prison, a Subordinate Ninth Rank. Each Xiaowei commanded ten dispatchers, and every dispatcher managed ten prison guards.

By law, Niu Su could command a hundred men. But there were now too many people drawing empty salaries in the Heavenly Prison; he had only twenty or thirty guards under him, and they were often unable to show up in full.

"Brothers, work's here."

Niu Su tossed his bone tiles onto the table and said, "Lord Lei ordered that the thief brought in a few days ago must be interrogated and made to confess today, lest it delay his execution."

Lord Lei's name was Lei Hu. He served as the prison warden. Excluding the Imperial Guards stationed outside, he could be considered the highest-ranking official within the Heavenly Prison.

"I'll do it!"

Zhang Zhou's eyes were somewhat bloodshot. Under the swaying lamplight, he looked like an evil ghost.

"My luck's been rotten today. I lost every last coin, so I need to vent my anger on this bastard!"

As he spoke.

More than a dozen men surged toward the torture chamber.

Zhou Yi hesitated for a moment, then followed them.

The thief was in Cell A-12. When they opened the door, they found a man hanging upside down within. His face was streaked with blood, and his features could not be made out.

Zhou Yi followed at the back of the crowd. Perhaps because the previous owner's memories had seen such things often, the miserable sight of the man did not make him nauseated or sick.

Zhang Zhou splashed water over the man to wake him, then did not even question him before swinging his whip down viciously.

Smack! Smack! Smack!

With every crack, another bloody welt appeared on the man's body.

The whip had been soaked in salt water. When it struck his wounds, the man howled in agony.

Only then did Zhou Yi see clearly that every tooth in the man's mouth was gone, and even half his tongue had been cut off. How was he supposed to confess?

Niu Xiaowei sat upright in a grandmaster's chair, leisurely sipping tea while speaking softly with the clerk responsible for recording the proceedings.

The dozen or so men around them watched the man suffer. Some wore expressions of pleasure, some looked on with indifference, and some bet on how many rounds the prisoner could endure.

A long while later.

Zhang Zhou grew tired of whipping him. He picked up a red-hot branding iron and pressed it casually against the man's body.

Sizzle! Sizzle! Sizzle!

A scorched stench filled the room. The man was already barely breathing, with only instinctive groans left.

Niu Xiaowei stopped Zhang Zhou from continuing. "Don't kill him!"

The clerk had already finished writing down the interrogation. He grabbed the man's hand and, without even needing cinnabar ink, pressed a clear bloody handprint onto the confession.

The evidence was as solid as a mountain; the confession was beyond denial!

Zhou Yi asked the prison guard beside him in a low voice, "Uncle Ye, what crime did this man commit? He doesn't look like some official lord."

"This thief is one of those jianghu drifters. His nickname is something like Flying Rainbow Swordsman."

"Half a year ago, Yu Province suffered a drought, and plenty of people starved to death. This fellow led people to storm the grain depots. Not only did he kill more than a dozen grain merchants, he even cut off the county magistrate's head."

Old Ye said, "The Brocade Guard tracked him for nearly half a year before finally catching him. He was directly sentenced to be beheaded!"

An Outlaw of the Green Forest!

That was Zhou Yi's first thought. In ancient droughts, the mild cases left corpses of the starved scattered everywhere; in severe cases, people exchanged children and ate them.

The man had opened the granaries and distributed food, saving who knew how many lives!

Niu Xiaowei took the confession and looked it over, then nodded slightly. "A White Lotus Sect rebel, gathering a mob to cause trouble, murdering officials and plotting rebellion! Make sure he eats properly. He will be executed in a month, so at least keep him alive."

Zhang Zhou said, "Rest assured, sir. Little Yi is steady in his work."

"My lord, should we feed him something better?"

Zhou Yi bowed to accept the order. Looking at the man's wretched condition, tortured until he scarcely resembled a human, he did not seem likely to survive a month on thin gruel alone.

Niu Xiaowei waved his hand. "No need for the trouble. This thief has tempered his five viscera and six bowels. He is a first-rate jianghu expert, not so easily killed."

Sure enough.

When Zhou Yi brought over the food bucket that evening, the man had already regained some of his vigor, his tiger eyes opened wide.

The black-purple burns on his face and the bloody whip marks on his body did not make him appear weak. Instead, they gave him an even fiercer, more baleful air.

Zhou Yi did not dare approach. He scooped up a spoonful of thin gruel and poured it toward the man's mouth, but the other party clenched his jaw shut and struggled. By accident, the gruel went up his nostrils.

"Cough, cough, cough!" The man choked and coughed without stopping.

"Hero, I'm only a humble yamen runner. Please don't make things difficult for me."

"Court... dog... lackey!"

Half his tongue was missing, so the man's words came out slurred and unclear.

Zhou Yi set down the food bucket and went outside to take a look. The cells on either side were empty, and the prison guards had all gone to play tiles.

He returned to the man's side and clasped his hands in salute.

"Hero, you disregarded your own safety to aid the disaster victims. I admire you beyond measure. Now that you are trapped behind bars, you should not abandon yourself. Even if you must mount the execution platform, you should have the strength to curse the court a few more times!"

Upon hearing this, the man fell silent for a long time before slowly opening his mouth.

Zhou Yi helped wipe away the food grains and dirty blood from the man's face, then carefully fed him spoonful by spoonful, so that none would go up his nose again.