Deep Waters, Something Fishy

The middle-aged monk seemed somewhat hesitant.

He said softly, "Senior Brother, you're putting me in a difficult position. Even if you say so, Master doesn't seem to have spoken on the matter."

The old monk said, "Don't you know perfectly well why Master hasn't spoken? He simply doesn't want to state his position too soon. Surely you know how highly Master regards Senior Di Ting?"

The middle-aged monk froze slightly, then finally gritted his teeth. "Fine. You're all playing the good guys, so I can't play the villain to the end. He can go in, but only he can enter. As they say, the Dharma is not passed to six ears. This concerns the whereabouts of Senior Di Ting's divine blood. I hope Senior Brother won't blame me."

The old monk remained calm. "Why would I blame you? We're merely performing our respective duties."

Then he said to me, "Go on. Remember what you promised me, or don't even think about leaving again."

Of course, I wasn't intimidated by a couple of words from them.

I walked into the cave.

The cave was brightly lit, with burning torches mounted all along its walls.

At the very back of the cave, someone was tied to a naturally formed stone pillar. She had her head lowered, so I couldn't see her face.

Could she be Xu Qiuyan?

At that moment, I noticed another problem: there wasn't a single other person in the cave.

In my mind, a place like this should have been heavily guarded. Yet right then, the cave contained only me and the woman tied to the stone pillar whose face I couldn't see.

I slowly walked toward her.

It looked like she had suffered quite a bit of torture.

That middle-aged monk must have been interrogating her, trying to