Enemy

Gu Shenwei had been this close—just this close—to taking the perfect first step on his path of revenge. He had made every preparation, only to stumble at the last moment and fall from the bright road into a bottomless ditch.

Someone in the courtyard recognized Xue Niang and knew she had been brought by Eighth Young Madam. They pointed her out to each other, then let out perfectly timed snickers, loud enough to be heard but so brief that when Xue Niang turned around, she couldn't find anyone to blame.

A faint flush spread across Xue Niang's waxen face. Without asking a single question, she left He Nu behind and hurried away with Huan Nu, returning to Eighth Young Master's residence.

Gu Shenwei was left in the front courtyard. Xue Niang went to see her young madam, and a little while later, the young madam's furious scolding drifted faintly from the rear courtyard.

Several servants passed by. They were surprised to see Huan Nu, who had left and now returned, and even more alarmed when they heard the young madam's voice. They hurried off without daring to ask what had happened.

About a quarter of an hour later, Xue Niang strode out of the courtyard. As she passed Gu Shenwei, she didn't so much as glance at him, as if he didn't exist.

Gu Shenwei stood alone in the empty courtyard, anxious and bewildered. Now he couldn't get into East Fortress, and he had lost his value as well. How would Xue Niang and the young madam treat him? Hand him straight over to Eighth Young Master? Or leave him to fend for himself and find some killer to take revenge on?

If they chose the former, he would have to find a way to kill Eighth Young Master Shangguan Nu. That was the limit of what he would compromise on in his revenge. Shangguan Nu had personally killed his parents and elder brother; in Gu Shenwei's mind, he was his foremost enemy.

An hour later, Gu Shenwei still hadn't come up with a plan. Xue Niang returned, her expression impossible to read. She stared at the bewildered Huan Nu for a long while, as if weighing something. At last, she said, "Go pack your things. From now on, you'll stay here and work."

This was a little better than the worst possible outcome. Gu Shenwei bowed and agreed, then found his own way back to Kindling Courtyard, his steps heavy as if he carried a thousand-pound burden. But halfway there, he grew optimistic again. He hadn't gotten into East Fortress as he'd hoped, but he would be staying at Eighth Young Master's residence. That meant he'd have a chance to get close to Shangguan Nu—and a chance to take revenge.

When Gu Shenwei practiced martial arts with Xue Niang during the day, he had never seen the master of the residence. Shangguan Nu seemed to leave early and return late, never lingering at home.

Rumors had already spread through Kindling Courtyard, and the place was on the verge of boiling over. When the boys saw Huan Nu return alone, they swarmed around him to ask what had happened.

Gu Shenwei told them the truth, and their expressions changed along with it. But when they heard he would be working at Eighth Young Master's residence from now on, most of them still seemed envious. No matter how hard or tiring the work was, it had to be better than serving the dead at Kindling Courtyard.

One of the five boys was missing. After Gu Shenwei finished telling them his bad news, Lei Nu shared another piece of bad news with him: Xue Niang had taken Qian Nu away, supposedly to recommend him for a place in East Fortress.

Xue Niang and the young madam had made a simple mistake. They were outsiders and knew little about Golden Peng Fortress's assassin system. They assumed that someone good at martial arts would be welcomed. The young madam had also asked her husband for information, which was a poor choice; Shangguan Nu was Unrivaled King's son, entered into the assassin registry at birth, and had never been through a selection process. He knew just as little about such matters.

As a result, Xue Niang had painstakingly trained a promising candidate without ever learning one of the important rules for recruiting apprentices into East Fortress: before entering East Fortress, a candidate could not practice any Internal Force.

It was said that Golden Peng Fortress had its own Internal Force technique, incompatible with every other martial art in the world.

Whatever the reason, the Hehe Jin that Gu Shenwei had practiced so hard had become an obstacle to his entering East Fortress.

Once Xue Niang learned of the mistake, she immediately discussed a solution with the young madam, then summoned a guard assassin to ask about all the rules. She discovered there was still a way to correct it.

As it turned out, East Fortress didn't care what martial arts foundations its assassin apprentices had. It didn't even matter if they knew no moves at all. Once inside East Fortress, they would all start training from scratch anyway.

So Xue Niang came to Kindling Courtyard and chose again from among the five boys. Somehow, Qian Nu had tasted the flavor of a fortune dropped from the sky: he put down his work and turned into an assassin apprentice.

By the time Gu Shenwei returned, the four remaining boys had already learned most of the details. The story of Xue Niang's humiliation at East Fortress had spread throughout the fortress, even reaching remote Kindling Courtyard. Gu Shenwei alone knew nothing about it.

The incident showed just how isolated Eighth Young Madam was in Golden Peng Fortress, and how few people liked her.

Nothing could have been more cruelly ironic. Gu Shenwei could hardly accept it, and the other four boys were furious too. They could accept the clever Yao Nu becoming an assassin, and understand Huan Nu, who knew martial arts, entering East Fortress. But Qian Nu had nothing special about him; he was no different from any of them. That he had stumbled into such good luck felt profoundly unfair.

"He won't last. A month at most, and they'll carry him back," Lei Nu declared confidently. Although assassin apprentices weren't required to have any martial arts foundation, according to custom, knowing a few moves was always an advantage.

There was nothing more to say. When Qian Nu returned in glory, all the boys, Lei Nu included, would go and fawn over him.

Gu Shenwei went to see the new courtyard steward and said he had come back to collect his things. That caused a little trouble: servants couldn't be assigned to another courtyard just because Xue Niang said so, especially when Kindling Courtyard had fewer and fewer servants and it would be difficult to find someone to replace him.

But the problem was soon resolved. Xue Niang was thorough; she had already completed the formalities and officially claimed Huan Nu in Eighth Young Master's name.

That afternoon, Gu Shenwei moved into a small stone hut with his bedding roll. It stood beside the rear courtyard of Eighth Young Master's residence. His roommate was Old Zhang, a coachman in his fifties, and the two of them were responsible for looking after the stables.

All the male servants in Golden Peng Fortress were called "someone Nu," and Old Zhang was no exception. But everyone called him "Old Zhang." Amid all the cries of "Nu," that most ordinary name was remarkably distinctive.

Old Zhang was a model servant: unfailingly loyal and diligent at his work. Every day, he returned to the hut and fell straight asleep, never gossiping. In the several days since Gu Shenwei had moved in, they had exchanged fewer than ten words.

Gu Shenwei knew horses well, though before, someone else had looked after them for him. He had only cared whether his own pony ate well and whether its coat gleamed. Now he was feeding his enemy's horses.

He tried not to think about his old life, afraid he might lose control of his emotions and reveal his secret. Danger lurked everywhere here; he had to be cautious with every step. Han Shiqi was dead, but no one could guarantee that Eighth Young Master's subordinates didn't include someone else who knew the young master of the Gu Family.

And then there was Qian Nu, who had already entered East Fortress. He was beyond Huan Nu's reach now. Could he accidentally let slip what had happened with the White Silk?

Xue Niang was another potential threat. Gu Shenwei understood why she had kept him at the residence: she wanted to keep an eye on him. After all, she and the young madam had already revealed far too much in front of Huan Nu.

That said, Xue Niang rarely appeared. Apart from the routine morning greetings, he hardly saw her at all.

Old Zhang was a household servant of Golden Peng Fortress and didn't need to prove his loyalty to the young madam. Gu Shenwei suspected this was why he never chatted with him. They belonged to different sides, each serving their own master.

Gu Shenwei had long noticed the conflicts among the masters of Golden Peng Fortress, and had heard plenty about them too. But he couldn't exploit them. His status was too low, his strength too meager. Even if a mountain had a crack, he couldn't pry it open.

The only thing he could do was train hard.

The fact that he practiced Internal Force was no longer a secret. Everyone assumed Xue Niang had taught him, so there was no need to hide it. Every day, after tending Eighth Young Master's dozen or so powerful horses, he would find somewhere to train. He practiced Hehe Jin, Tiger Subduing Fist, and Iron Mountain Saber Technique at least once each.

Old Zhang watched coldly, neither opposing nor supporting him. He held on to just one "privilege": at dawn, he led the horses to the front gate of the front courtyard to wait for his master, then went back to the front courtyard at dusk to bring them in again.

Gu Shenwei had no chance of meeting Shangguan Nu, but he learned plenty about his habits.

Eighth Young Master's schedule never changed. He left early and returned late, come rain or shine. Every five to ten days, he took extra horses out with him. They returned three to five days later, looking completely different—filthy and thin, and sometimes one of them was missing.

Only then would a hint of feeling show through Old Zhang's usual indifference. No matter how late the horses came back, he would wake Huan Nu and make him help bathe and feed them. He took each exhausted horse in his arms in turn, murmuring to them like a loving mother waiting for her child to come home.

Gu Shenwei realized he was trapped halfway once again, unable to move forward and with no room to retreat. He spent his days with an old man who loved horses more than people, while his enemy carried on as usual on the other side of a wall, living his life and killing people.

Fourteen-year-old Gu Shenwei had developed a patience he had never possessed before. He knew he had to wait, could only wait, must wait—because Divine Will was with him.

Two months after he became a stable hand, a thin layer of snow had settled over Golden Peng Fortress when Gu Shenwei finally got his chance.

That afternoon, he was practicing Iron Mountain Saber Technique with a wooden stick. Xue Niang had taught it to him. To hide his identity, he had to forget the Gu Clan Saber Technique, which he was better at, but his practice was going poorly.

Iron Mountain Saber Technique was a style that placed great emphasis on practical combat. Its eighteen forms were simple to learn, but the combinations were endlessly varied. Gu Shenwei had no opponent, like an archer without a target; no matter how hard he practiced, he couldn't get the knack of it.

And he kept slipping in a move or two from his family's saber technique without meaning to. He knew that style too well; he couldn't forget it even if he tried.

Gu Shenwei was so engrossed in his practice that only after a long while did he suddenly notice someone watching him from a dozen or so paces away. The person seemed to have been standing by the wall for quite some time. He hadn't gone out of his way to hide himself, yet somehow attracted no attention at all. That was the kind of quality a top assassin should possess.

Gu Shenwei froze. He had always hoped to get close to his enemy, but he hadn't expected his enemy to approach him first.

The visitor was Shangguan Nu.

Hatred and fury were like a ball of tinder-dry willow fluff. They flared up and burned away in an instant, leaving behind nothing but a heap of hard seeds of fear.

Had Eighth Young Master finally discovered who he really was? Gu Shenwei felt his legs trembling. This wasn't the meeting he had envisioned. He wasn't ready.

Shangguan Nu stared at the boy before him, who looked somewhat gloomy and whose gaze was tangled with conflicting emotions. Something stirred faintly in his heart, and his remaining left hand instinctively closed around the hilt of his saber.