The Old Man Danced Beneath the Trees

Earlier, while Chen Ping'an had dozed in the Patriarch Hall, everyone outside had waited quietly for their Mountain Lord to appear.

For Dao Cultivators, rest and sound sleep were matters of the utmost importance. Life held only waking and sleeping: one great awakening upon arrival, one long sleep upon departure.

Cui Dongshan tucked his hands into his sleeves, glanced at Jiang Shangzhen's frost-white temples, and smiled. "The sun and moon grind ants beneath them; the old man dances beneath the trees."

Jiang Shangzhen had been saying how much he envied Sword Immortal Mi's freedom from burdens, while Mi Yu was sincerely admiring Chief Zhou's iron shoulders for bearing duty and justice.

Hearing Cui Dongshan's reflection, Jiang Shangzhen smiled. "Well said. Sleep off wine at a roadside inn, raise a lamp to study your sword, and ask a gentleman whether any injustice troubles him."

Mi Yu was rather lost. He suffered from having read too few books, but for no particular reason, he wanted to play the gallant traveler and roam the world below the mountain, riding a horse in white robes so he could meet a few lively, lovely swordswomen.

Cui Dongshan turned to complaining that Cao Qinglang had taken first place in three consecutive examinations in the Paradise, only to become a newly minted Second Scholar in the Great Li examinations and receive a mere Subordinate Sixth Rank appointment as a Hanlin Compiler. It had left him too embarrassed to boast to his grandmaster during this trip to the Forest of Merit on the Central Divine Continent. Old Man Dong of the Temple of Literature and Zhou Mi, the former Headmaster of Fish Fowl Academy, were two rotten chess players who had given Cao's Imperial Examination Arts essays less than glowing reviews. What could his grandmaster, who had only