The Performer

What the hell?

Outside Zhong'an Bank, Chen Wu's mind was a complete mess. He still hadn't recovered from the conversation he'd just had.

They were going to assassinate themselves? Did these high-society types really know how to have fun?

In short, three days from now, at the same time and place, Chen Wu was to assassinate Qiao Weisheng once more, in full view of the public. Only this time, Qiao Weisheng himself was paying him to do it.

Chen Wu had wanted to get to the bottom of things, but on the one hand, his master-assassin persona made it awkward to ask too many questions, and on the other, Qiao Weisheng had been vague, clearly unwilling to reveal much. Wanting to get away as quickly as possible, Chen Wu had no choice but to muddle through and accept the commission.

Mulling over their conversation, Chen Wu wandered without realizing it all the way to the Yellow River. The cold wind off the water blew against him, and his overloaded pig brain finally cleared a little. Only then did he notice an iron bridge stretching across the river before him.

He had walked all the way to the famous Yellow River Iron Bridge in Jincheng Prefecture. Chen Wu had only been in this world for three days, but he'd already heard plenty about the bridge.

They said that a retired naval admiral from Jincheng Prefecture had found the old pontoon bridge over the Yellow River unfit for use. To benefit his hometown, he'd joined forces with wealthy local merchants and put up 320,000 silver dollars to build a new one.

The admiral had served in the navy and was fond of new technology. He boldly adopted a steel-bridge construction method no one anywhere in the world had tried before, using steel and cement pilings—materials never previously used to build bridges.

They experimented as they built, so construction dragged on for seven years, with the price climbing again and again. It was only completed three months ago.

Once finished, the bridge became famous throughout the land, hailed as the finest bridge over the Yellow River.

To Chen Wu, it looked as odd as that double-decker carriage. It reminded him a little of Waibaidu Bridge in Shanghai, which he'd seen before crossing over. A steel framework rested atop several bridge piers.

But unlike Waibaidu Bridge, that old film and television darling, this bridge's framework wasn't made of arches. It was flat, as if someone had taken a sword and sliced off the upper half of each arch.

Stranger still, at either end of the iron bridge stood a wooden-and-stone structure resembling a paifang with three bays. The large central opening was slightly taller and wider than the steel framework above the bridge, clearly designed to match it, so pedestrians could pass through the archway and onto the bridge.

At the moment, several rings of onlookers crowded around the archway, with more on the outside than the inside. Chen Wu could just make out constables keeping order within the crowd. Some sort of event seemed to be underway.

"Brother, do you know what celebration is happening here? Why are there so many people?" Chen Wu surveyed the crowd, chose an onlooker who looked scholarly and approachable, and asked.

The man pushed up the glasses on his nose, as if the heavy metal frames were uncomfortable.

"You don't know? The plaque bearing His Majesty's own calligraphy is being hung above the archway today. The local gentry invited some folk performers to entertain the people and display His Majesty's virtue." After speaking, he cupped his hands toward the Capital City.

What a model of loyalty to the Great Shun Empire!

Chen Wu suppressed the urge to scoff and looked up. There was the so-called plaque written by His Majesty's own hand, bearing three large characters: Longevity Bridge.

Before Chen Wu could pass judgment on the old emperor's calligraphy, firecrackers crackled in the middle of the crowd. Gongs and drums followed, and everyone began shouting at once.

Chen Wu rose onto his toes to peer inside.

In the clearing at the center, a troupe in brightly colored costumes and painted masks performed with swords and spears, danced with a land boat, and staged a lion dance. The place was roaring with excitement. A male clown dressed as a woman wandered through the crowd, mugging for laughs and asking for tips along the way.

The suona, gongs, drums, shouts, and laughter rang out without pause, a noisy slice of everyday life. Chen Wu was so absorbed that he watched with relish.

But amid that sea of sound, an extraordinarily faint sanxian melody suddenly emerged, thread by thread, wailing without end.

"Bravo—!" The lion dancers pulled off several difficult moves, prompting a thunderous cheer from the crowd. The sound swelled sharply.

Yet the faint sanxian melody wasn't drowned out. Its cheerful harmonics grew clearer during a variation, as if the instrument were being played right beside Chen Wu's ear. The surrounding noise became nothing more than accompaniment.

Something was wrong!

Chen Wu realized there was a problem. The folk performance had only gongs and drums—there was no sanxian accompaniment at all!

The true qi in his dantian reacted at once. As his energy stirred in response, inspiration struck him, and he looked straight through the crowd surrounding the archway toward the middle of the iron bridge.

An old man wearing small, round, black sunglasses was looking at Chen Wu with a smile.

The man wore a wide-brimmed hat and sat on the railing beside the bridge, leaning against one of its iron pillars. A sanxian rested on his right thigh. His left hand lightly held the neck, three fingers pressing the strings, while his right hand plucked them with a few dried blades of grass.

In the old man's hands, those ordinary dried blades of grass had become as hard as metal. They struck the strings with a ringing twang, and his playing flowed smoothly through every note.

The sanxian's tune gradually grew louder. Just as it reached a fierce crescendo, the old man suddenly stopped. His rich, unadorned voice followed.

"Ah—"

As he drew out that long note, the old man's hands began moving again. The sanxian shifted to a new tune, its slightly desolate accompaniment rising once more. Alongside the old man's rich singing, a local folk song slowly unfolded in Chen Wu's ears.

"The stars sweep over the mountain pass—

Ah, Lü Dongbin flirts with the peony—

The immortals in the heavens watch the mortal world~~~

The peach-blossom case hastens the prefect to his death~~~"

To Chen Wu, the song rang out as clearly as a great bell. But the people hurrying across the bridge didn't react at all. They didn't even glance at the old man, heading straight for the folk performance beneath the archway by the bridge.

It was as though the song didn't exist, and the old man didn't exist either.

Chen Wu's scalp prickled. He understood now: the old man had clearly used a skill like voice transmission. Perhaps Chen Wu was the only one who could hear the song.

Damn it, were martial arts experts as common as cabbages?

He hadn't checked the almanac before leaving the house. Why did he keep running into experts everywhere he went?

Chen Wu was truly at a loss, but he couldn't pretend he hadn't heard.

Though he couldn't see the old man's eyes behind the sunglasses, Chen Wu had a gut feeling the man was staring straight at him, just as Guo Xuchu had earlier.

I'm tired. Just destroy the world already!

If it's a blessing, it isn't a disaster; if it's a disaster, you can't avoid it. Chen Wu steadied himself, pushed through the crowd, and walked toward the old man. The expert had only used voice transmission and hadn't made a move, so there was room to talk.

"Old sir, you called this young fellow over. What did you want to tell me?"

Chen Wu had planned to loudly rebuke the old man for interrupting his folk performance, but then he thought better of it. He should respect his elders, be courteous, and mind his manners. It definitely wasn't because he'd lost his nerve!

The old man didn't answer. He kept plucking the sanxian and sang again:

"High upon the mountain, a clear spring flows, flowing on for thousands of years.

Everyone drinks from the spring; some are foolish, some are wise."

As he sang the final word, "wise," the sanxian fell silent too. The dried grass he had used to pluck the strings crumbled into pieces and scattered to the ground.

Chen Wu's heart tightened. He immediately clasped his fists and bowed, his manner even more respectful. "Greetings, Patrol Commissioner!"

So the old man's song was a secret signal used by the Golden Wind and Drizzle Tower across Jincheng Prefecture and even all of Gan Province. It identified him as a Patrol Commissioner of the Golden Wind and Drizzle Tower.

Every Patrol Commissioner knew the martial arts and information of the Golden Wind and Drizzle Tower assassins in a particular region. Combined with their unique Sound Transmission Soul-Searching Technique, they could reportedly sense the location of every assassin under their command in real time.

If not for this miraculous skill, Chen Wu would have run away on the very first day he'd crossed over.

So the voice transmission from earlier might have been the Sound Transmission Soul-Searching Technique. What a marvel. Looks like it had been right not to run away without thinking.

"Just call me Old Jin. We believe in Leaderless Dragons; there's no need for all these empty courtesies," the old man said, waving a hand.

"Some people in this world are foolish, and some are wise. The clever wise ones use all kinds of rules and laws, and things like the government, to keep the foolish under their thumb, abuse them, and profit from it. If you join our Golden Wind and Drizzle Tower, you must oppose every government and every rule."

"We assassinate high officials and wealthy magnates not for money, but to shake the chains that bind the foolish, and bring about a state of Leaderless Dragons. Only when you fully understand this will your mastery of our sect's mental cultivation method reach its peak."

"The Patrol Commissioner speaks the truth." Chen Wu appeared perfectly docile on the outside, but inside, a huge wave crashed over him.

He had thought the Golden Wind and Drizzle Tower was just an ordinary assassin organization. He hadn't expected it to be an anarchist organization.

"Gunshots came from the direction of West Gate just now. Was that you? I heard you were going to kill Qiao Weisheng today."

Truly an expert! He could hear gunshots from several streets away.

"This young fellow was there, but it wasn't this young fellow who acted..."

Chen Wu recounted what had just happened, concealing only the fact that he'd accepted Qiao Weisheng's commission.

"...That's what happened. Qiao Weisheng and Guo Xuchu couldn't find anything wrong with me, so they let me go."

When you made up a story, it was best to make nine parts true and one part false.

"Guo Xuchu... Ha ha ha, you've got some luck, kid!" The old man sounded a little gleeful at his misfortune. "This one's going to be difficult! Not only is Guo Xuchu holding the fort, but other forces have gotten involved too. Even I'd have a headache dealing with it."

Chen Wu felt a little more at ease. It seemed the old man hadn't suspected his story was false. He seized the opening and followed up: "Then... could the Patrol Commissioner show me some leniency with this mission?"

"Rules are rules. If you fail a mission, there has to be a punishment." Before Chen Wu could plead any further, Old Jin put away the sanxian, turned, and left. "You've got three days!"

Watching Old Jin's retreating figure, Chen Wu had a sudden flash of inspiration. The Patrol Commissioner before him was an excellent tool.

"Wait! Wait!" When Old Jin was about to disappear into the distance, Chen Wu finally made up his mind and called out to him.

"What is it?" Old Jin didn't stop. He continued along the iron bridge toward the north bank of the Yellow River.

"This young fellow would like to ask the Patrol Commissioner to make a move!"

Old Jin kept walking. "Clean up your own mess."

"Ten thousand silver dollars!"

Old Jin slowed, but still didn't stop. "Guo Xuchu, the Star-Pulling Sword, is a renowned expert of the Sea-Pacifying Palace..."

So it took more money, huh? Chen Wu gritted his teeth inwardly!

"Twenty thousand—no, thirty thousand silver dollars! This young fellow is willing to pay thirty thousand for the Patrol Commissioner to make one move!"

Chen Wu's heart bled. The money had barely warmed his hands, and he was already about to throw it away again.

Old Jin finally stopped and turned around.