"Xia Manor"
This luxurious and imposing residence had once belonged to Chu Shiqing.
After Chu Shiqing died, all the property under his name was confiscated by the authorities.
So Xia Qi'an bought this residence.
During this period, the Jinling Wei Dao Si had acquired the businesses of Scented Soap and refined salt, and its personnel had also received a significant improvement in treatment.
This had invisibly raised Xia Qi'an's standing in the Jinling Wei Dao Si by quite a bit.
Xia Qi'an had been cultivating peacefully at home for some time.
Eventually, he found himself unbearably bored, so he went to Liu Qing to take on a mission, treating it as an excuse to go out and clear his head.
As it happened, the mission location was Xia Qi'an's hometown, Lishan County.
Several months had passed since Lishan County had suffered the flood.
Most of the refugees who had previously scattered across the region had already returned home to recuperate and rebuild their lives.
And Xia Qi'an took advantage of this mission.
He could return to Xia Family Village to pay respects to his grandfather, the old blacksmith surnamed Xia, and also pay respects to Xiao Cao's parents.
After the flood, almost everyone in Xia Family Village had died, and only a scant few had survived.
"There probably won't be anyone living here anymore, will there?"
Looking at the collapsed houses all around him, Xia Qi'an saw weeds growing thick among the crumbling walls and broken ruins.
The dried mud and silt left behind after the floodwaters receded stirred a thousand thoughts in Xia Qi'an's mind.
He had no particular attachment to this place. The only person he still worried about was that kind old blacksmith.
Not far outside the village.
On a small hillock, grave mounds of all sizes lay scattered about.
There was not even a gravestone atop any of them.
Xia Qi'an came before the old man's grave.
He silently arranged the offerings and fine wine, planted three incense sticks, and kowtowed several times.
Then he parted a patch of weeds and sat down beside the grave mound.
Blacksmith Xia had been mute from birth. He was also dull and honest, and as a result, he had never managed to marry in his entire life.
Fortunately, there was still one person in this world who remembered him.
In Xia Qi'an's memories, his grandfather had been a plain, unassuming old man who could only communicate with others by gesturing with his hands.
After living together for a long time.
Xia Qi'an had quickly come to understand what his gestures meant, so their everyday communication had never been much of a problem.
He remembered one time when Blacksmith Xia had taken Xia Qi'an to the county town for the market fair.
That day, the sun had blazed fiercely, while the incessant chirping of cicadas filled his ears.
Five-year-old Xia Qi'an had sat inside a basket, a large straw hat covering his head, while his grandfather carried him on a shoulder pole.
The other end of the pole held iron farming tools that they were taking to the city to sell.
"It was so hot that day...!" Xia Qi'an murmured softly, as though he were speaking to his grandfather.
At that moment, fragments of his time with his grandfather kept surfacing in Xia Qi'an's mind.
Those everyday trifles had been as bland as a bowl of plain water.
Most of the scenes from back then were blurred beyond recognition.
Yet before he knew it, Xia Qi'an's face was already covered in tears.
After paying respects to Old Master Xia and Xiao Cao's parents.
Xia Qi'an decided to take the ashes of Old Master Xia and Xiao Cao's parents back to Jinling.
This place was far too desolate, and it lay right beside the Cang River. If another flood swept through in the future, they might not even be able to find a place to pay their respects.
Afterward, Xia Qi'an rode to Lishan County's seat and found several craftsmen who specialized in relocating graves.
After the earth-moving ritual was completed, the craftsmen began digging the remains out of the grave mounds and burning them over fires on the spot.
Then they placed the ashes into separate porcelain jars.
Xia Qi'an put away the jars of ashes and called the leader of the grave-moving workers over before asking, "Have you heard any rumors lately of the dead turning into zombies and causing trouble within Lishan County?"
Seeing Xia Qi'an dressed in an official uniform, the grave-moving man naturally did not dare to slight him. "Replying to you, my lord! It is indeed true... We..."
Upon hearing this, Xia Qi'an tossed them ten taels of silver, settling their wages for relocating the graves.
Then he asked, "Tell me the specifics!"
The man happily put away the silver. After thinking for a moment, he said, "There have been rumors like that all over the areas around Lishan County lately. Some people who had only recently died turned into zombies after being buried and came back out to harm people. Several villages have already been slaughtered by zombies..."
Xia Qi'an frowned upon hearing this. "What you just described... did you witness it with your own eyes?"
The man usually engaged in digging graves and robbing tombs as well, and he now replied somewhat guiltily, "Replying to you, my lord... I... I really did see it with my own eyes."
"We make our living dealing with the dead, after all. We truly did see a zombie run into Burial Ridge."
The Burial Ridge the man mentioned was naturally the Burial Ridge Mountains.
Lishan County lay at the foot of the great mountains of the Burial Ridge Mountains.
Xia Qi'an had come to Lishan County this time for two reasons: to relocate the graves, and to investigate why the dead were turning into zombies.
Seeing that he could not extract any useful information from the man.
Xia Qi'an immediately rode away.
Following the intelligence provided by the Snake Guards, Xia Qi'an went to the villages where the zombies had appeared and investigated them one by one.
However, the results of his investigations matched what the grave-moving man had said.
The clues showed that the zombies causing trouble had indeed ultimately run into the Burial Ridge Mountains.
This discovery was far too unusual.
Generally speaking, newly born zombies possessed no intelligence. Like headless flies, they could only run amok and harm people everywhere by instinct, without any order or purpose.
Yet these zombies had all entered the Burial Ridge Mountains in unison.
It was as though they had been guided by some mysterious force.
At the foot of the mountains.
Xia Qi'an swung down from his horse and raised his head to gaze at the towering blue-black mountains before him.
In an instant, the grandeur and mystery of the mountains shook him to the core.
The range coiled there like a gigantic dragon, radiating an aura that inspired awe.
He had seen the mountains of Burial Ridge only from afar before and had never entered them.
But now that he stood at their foot, the feeling was entirely different.
Standing beneath the great mountains, Xia Qi'an felt as tiny as an ant, as though this towering range might swallow him whole at any moment.
The Burial Ridge Mountains stretched on without end, as if they had no terminus.
Some said that the Burial Ridge Mountains were one of You Province's dragon veins, a land steeped in legends.
After the Age of Dharma Decline arrived, however, the feng shui of the Burial Ridge Mountains underwent a drastic transformation, ultimately turning them into a forbidden land where mortals should not venture and demons ran rampant.
He entered the mountains.
Xia Qi'an followed the traces left behind by the zombie as he pressed onward.
For safety's sake, he also left marks along the way.
No one knew how long he had been walking through the mountains.
After tearing through a curtain of vines, a secluded pool suddenly appeared before his eyes.
The area around the pool was filled with thick red maple trees. Their leaves drifted down from time to time, fluttering like dancing butterflies as they fell into the water.
The surface of the pool shimmered with a deep blue light, and merely looking at it seemed enough to make a person lose themselves in drunken bliss.
Stillness, depth, mystery.
That was what Xia Qi'an felt as he stood there.
Xia Qi'an gazed at the deep blue surface of the water and could not help staring blankly.
Perhaps there was something strange about the pool, or perhaps he had truly been captivated by the scenery before him. For a moment, Xia Qi'an actually forgot to move.
However, just then.
He suddenly caught a faint, fishy stench drifting from behind him.
As a martial artist, Xia Qi'an possessed keen senses. His heart immediately gave a heavy thump, and every hair on his body rose involuntarily.
Yet only then did he realize that his body was already beyond his control. He could not move even a finger.
In his desperation, Xia Qi'an bit down hard on the tip of his tongue. The pain jolted his entire body, and only then did he finally regain his senses.
In a flash, he whipped around.
A red snakehead as large as a millstone was lunging at him with its jaws spread wide, about to swallow him whole.
The great serpent's four enormous fangs and the red flesh inside its mouth were clearly visible.
"Splash!"
His heart gave a violent leap.
Although Xia Qi'an was startled by the sudden attack, he did not lose his footing.
His reaction was incredibly swift. Both hands shot out and braced firmly against the great serpent's jaws like iron pincers.
However, the difference in size between him and the great serpent was simply too great. Even with his hands holding its jaws apart.
He was still shoved backward by the great serpent until he fell into the pool.
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