The sky had gone completely dark, but the little courtyard where Shrek had settled was dazzlingly bright.
It wasn't just one or two lamps. Every single light had been switched on.
Bei Bei stood in the middle of the courtyard, head tilted back as he watched several golden figures circling overhead.
They were patrols from the Angel Legion, changing shifts every half hour. Since dusk, six patrols had already come and gone, and they hadn't stopped for even a moment. The warriors had golden hair and pale skin, and the wings on their backs gleamed with a cold, hard light beneath the moon. They were like blades suspended above their heads—not falling, just hanging there in plain sight, pressing down on them so heavily that nobody dared breathe too loudly.
He'd been standing there for nearly four hours. His neck was stiff with soreness, and his legs had gone numb, but he didn't want to move. He couldn't be bothered, either. Going inside and sitting would just mean suffering through the night; lying down would make sleep even less likely. He might as well stand here, where he could at least watch the sky, the angels' wings shifting back and forth, and this square of night, hemmed in on every side.
Xu Sanshi leaned against a veranda pillar with his eyes closed, tapping his fingers against his knee in no particular rhythm. One tap, two, three—on and on without pause.
How could he sleep? There were more than twenty people in the courtyard, and not one of them had closed their eyes since they'd been driven back that afternoon.
Some paced back and forth, some sat staring blankly in their chairs, some tossed and turned, and one even lay on the ground counting the cracks between the paving stones. Yet