Everyone felt somewhat dazed.
They looked up at the bright, clear sky. Some remembered that it had been evening when they received their "fated encounter," and asked almost instinctively,
"What time is it now?"
"How long has it been?"
Jiang She did not answer.
He turned his head and said gently, "Sorry for the trouble, Mountain God. Could you have someone bring us some food?"
At the mention of food, for some reason everyone suddenly felt hollow inside. Their bellies seemed to press against their spines, and sour saliva welled in their stomachs. A wave of hunger suddenly swept over them.
They could have swallowed twenty steamed buns in one sitting.
At this moment, they did not know.
The local county magistrate had already been fretting for seven days.
"These people went to the Lu Family to celebrate a birthday, and they still haven't been seen today?"
"Reporting to Your Honor, Master Bai and the others haven't returned. People from the Bai and Wang Families have come looking again."
The head constable cupped his hands as he reported, "Your humble servants also went to the Lu Family to investigate. We couldn't find the courtyard they described at all. We went three times and never saw it. In this humble servant's view, the Lu Family doesn't have such a courtyard. They're all imagining things!"
"Oh?"
The magistrate of Xiangyang County was named Cheng Zhi, courtesy name Yuanze. He pinched the bridge of his nose.
"Ridiculous! One person imagining things is possible, but could all those servants, the Lu Family's young mistress, and their eldest daughter be imagining things too?"
he asked.
"What does the Lu Family say?"
The head constable's brow furrowed tightly. "The Lu Family is the strange part. They say Lu the Eldest went off with an immortal master to worship the gods and seek the Dao. They also say these nineteen people may have gone along to study the Dao."
At the mention of the Lu Family, the constable was full of complaints. He had been running around tirelessly for days and couldn't help grumbling.
"Your Honor, no matter how we question them, that's all they say. What kind of answer is that?"
Magistrate Cheng naturally didn't believe Lu the Eldest had truly gone to seek immortality. He thought it was utterly absurd. Only the people of Tianfu Village would believe such things. He kept pinching the bridge of his nose, trying to soothe the worry and anger churning inside him.
As he pondered, he came up with one possibility.
"Could these people have encountered bandits on their way to the birthday celebration?"
The head constable kept his hands cupped. "Why would bandits rob the Lu Family? If they were after money, they would have gone to another wealthy household. Everyone in the county knows the Lu Family has little left."
As he spoke,
the head constable lowered his voice.
"Yesterday, I also heard that the county commandant sent people to question the nearby stockades. They've been behaving themselves these past few days, and no one heard of anyone entering their stockades."
"It's spring plowing now. Those fellows are probably out turning the fields."
The head constable spoke very quietly and cautiously.
Their county commandant had a somewhat questionable background. It was said that he had come from the outlaw world in his youth. He hadn't passed the jinshi or mingjing examinations, nor had he received the post through hereditary privilege. In short, that was how he had become an official.
Now, it seemed he had turned over a new leaf.
His family had even hired a tutor to teach him. These days, people revered the Dao, and the county commandant often went to Taoist temples to offer incense, chat with the priests, and study Taoist scriptures.
He had quite a penchant for the Dao.
The magistrate nodded.
This was a difficult matter to handle. Today was the seventh day, and he still had no idea where the nineteen people had gone. If only the servants and Lu the Eldest were missing, it would have been easier.
But among the guests were several wealthy local gentry, some of whom were related by marriage. One of them was also a great poet. Meng Haoran was said to have many dealings with their Xiang Prefecture Governor, and the two maintained a close private friendship.
That made things difficult.
Just as he sat there fretting, unsure how to deal with his great-aunt at home or his superiors,
hurried footsteps came from outside.
"Your Honor! There's news—"
Cheng Zhi abruptly raised his head.
The servants carried away the soup bowls and cups, while platters of food streamed in one after another. These people had no idea how long they had gone without a meal. They ate like starving ghosts, devouring everything in sight.
They emptied eight jars of wine alone.
Even the elderly Grand Matriarch, leaning on her cane, shuffled over to the table. She ate three steamed buns in a row, then had quite a bit of meat and fruit before finally coming to her senses.
By the time the magistrate arrived with his men,
this was what greeted them.
The table was covered with plates, most of the dishes eaten clean, with only a little soup and scraps left behind. Some people had simply sat on the ground, and their cups, plates, and bowls were all empty. If there hadn't been so few people in the courtyard, and their clothes looked familiar, the magistrate might have thought a hundred strapping men had descended on the Lu Family.
They were all surprised to see the magistrate hurrying over.
"Your Honor?"
"Why has the magistrate come?"
Someone tried to get up and pay his respects. He had just pushed himself up against the wall and cupped his hands when the attendants and constables behind the magistrate of Xiangyang County burst into a hubbub of voices.
"They've actually come back!"
"Did anyone see when they returned? Qian San, your big brother was keeping watch at the Lu residence. Did he see when these people came back?"
"Wonderful!"
"We can finally give the Wang Family an answer. My mother works needlework for the Wang Family. They've been worried sick these past few days and haven't even had the heart to buy embroidery."
"It's been seven days. What have these nineteen people been doing all this time?"
"Could they have been carried off by one of the nearby stockades?"
The voices tangled together, chattering like a pot coming to a boil.
The dozen or so people in the courtyard listened in a daze to the attendants and constables.
Wang Anlan was the Wang Family member they were talking about. He was the Wang Family's second son. On this trip to the Lu Family's birthday celebration, he had witnessed the "immortal master" breathe out flames, met the lord of Lumen Mountain, and even seen a true immortal.
He had spent forty years in a dream, yet awoken with not a wrinkle in his clothes.
He listened, stunned.
"Seven—seven days...?"
Magistrate Cheng's cousin was Wang Anlan's wife, and Wang Er was his cousin by marriage. The two had always been close.
"Wang Er, where have you all been during these days you were missing?"
Wang Anlan came to his senses as if waking from a dream.
He opened his mouth, then after a long pause said, "We... had a dream."
Cheng Zhi furrowed his brow, not quite understanding what Wang Anlan meant.
"What?"
As if his soul were still wandering in the dream, Wang Anlan began to recount what had happened there, somewhat dazedly—leaving out the part where someone had hacked him to death with a knife.
"Is this true?"
The more Cheng Zhi listened, the more horrified he became.
At first, he had thought his cousin-in-law was pulling his leg, or perhaps had gone off carousing and was afraid to tell his family. But then the others began chiming in from the side, adding their own details.
Their accounts corroborated one another, each detail fitting together without a single flaw.
It was as if...
there truly were an Ancient Locust Kingdom in the world.
"Forty years in a dream, while only seven days passed in the world."
"Is this an immortal's power?"
the magistrate murmured to himself.
Wang Anlan's memories of what had happened were as vivid as if it had all truly occurred. After finishing his account of those forty years, he basked in the morning light, felt the cool breeze of late morning, listened to the people around him chatter, and ate his fill in the human world. At last, he began to regain a sense of reality.
When he thought more carefully about what he had experienced in the dream, it seemed a little distant.
Faint and indistinct, it truly felt like a dream.
As he spoke, Wang Anlan mentioned that Lu Pei had gone in search of an immortal's fate and encountered a false immortal master trying to deceive them, but fortunately, they had received their "fated encounter" from an expert they met along the way.
Magistrate Cheng was listening intently.
Then Wang Er suddenly jolted.
"Right, that immortal—"
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