The next day, everything Zhu Yuanzhang had asked for was delivered to Taicheng.
The dark-skinned shop assistant personally escorted the shipment.
"Given the difference in our status, I can only bring you this far."
"No need to see me off."
Zhu Yuanzhang clasped his hands in salute.
"Thank you, Master."
As they parted, Huzi blinked and slipped a cloth pouch into Zhu Yuanzhang's sleeve.
Then he jumped onto the cart and vanished in a flash.
Zhu Yuanzhang took out the pouch. Inside was a silver ingot.
He found it a little funny.
But he was also somewhat touched.
Since coming to this world, this was the first time he had felt such pure kindness.
As usual, after the guards at Taicheng checked Zhu Yuanzhang's identification token, they let him in.
It was still the miniature nine-story Pagoda beneath which the Zen Courtyard reeked of blood.
This time, he did not run into the black-robed man surrounded by armored soldiers who had emerged from the Pagoda.
Pushing open the red-lacquered nanmu gate, Zhu Yuanzhang led his donkey into the Zen Courtyard.
But before he could announce his name, he caught a pungent whiff of blood.
It drifted from the three adjoining meditation rooms before him.
Although it was midday, with the sun at its fiercest,
rows upon rows of candles burned inside all three rooms.
The shadows of the monks seated on cushions in the centers of the rooms stretched across the walls.
Huge and twisted.
Zhu Yuanzhang narrowed his eyes.
He tied up the donkey in the courtyard.
Then he unloaded the goods.
He made a point of making quite a bit of noise.
Yet the three monks inside the rooms seemed not to hear a thing.
The black figures behind the windows did not move at all, nor did they so much as reveal a breath.
They were like three dried corpses that had been dead for days.
By the time Zhu Yuanzhang had finished all this at a leisurely pace, half an hour had passed.
"Your disciple Minghe pays his respects to the three martial uncles."
Standing in the courtyard, Zhu Yuanzhang addressed the people inside.
"Come in, Minghe."
An aged voice drifted out from the central room.
The figure inside remained motionless. The voice seemed to appear from nowhere.
"You've mastered the Three Divine Incantations. Did Fahui send you here?"
"That's right."
Zhu Yuanzhang replied calmly. But remembering Fahui's warning, he planted his feet and showed no sign of entering.
"Don't be wary. Junior Brother Fahui and I have never gotten along."
Seeing that Zhu Yuanzhang still hadn't opened the door, the voice sounded again from inside.
"I'm sure he said some bad things about me before you parted."
"But now that you've mastered the Three Divine Incantations, you're the last hope of preserving Tongtai Temple's inheritance."
"How could I possibly harm you?"
The stench of blood filling the meditation room grew stronger as the monk in the central room spoke.
Zhu Yuanzhang still did not move.
He glanced from the corner of his eye toward the other two rooms.
"The little monk isn't so foolish after all."
A voice came from the room on the left, sounding much younger than the aged voice from the central room.
"Had you stepped even half a foot into Senior Brother Fajue's room, you'd have become blood food for him to cling to Xiao Liang's dragon vein and eke out his miserable existence!"
"What do you mean, Martial Uncle?"
Zhu Yuanzhang bowed deeply toward the room on the left and asked.
He paid no further attention to the murmuring figure in the central room.
It seemed he had completely accepted the monk's words.
"Did Fahui tell you where the Qinhuai River came from?"
"Faming..."
The monk in the central room let out a long sigh, tinged with irritation.
"Must you always oppose me?"
A great deal of blood spread through the room, with fragments of black clothing floating in it.
Zhu Yuanzhang recognized them at once. They were made of the same material as the clothes worn by the black-robed man he had seen earlier, the one surrounded by armored soldiers.
Behind him, the courtyard gate slammed shut.
His escape route was cut off.
"Dingguang Demon-Subduing..."
Zhu Yuanzhang clenched his fists and murmured.
Flames rose at his feet, forming a circle of fire around him.
"Interesting. You're cultivating both the Mountain-Shrinking Fist and the Dingguang Demon-Subduing True Technique, two mutually incompatible arts. It seems Fahui intends to have you—"
The monk in the room on the left sounded somewhat surprised.
But he cut off halfway through.
"Still, your Dingguang Demon-Subduing True Fire is only at the first level. It's not nearly strong enough. Even if you burned through your entire lifespan, you probably couldn't hold my senior brother off for long."
The monk in the room on the left sounded increasingly regretful.
The scarlet, icy blood had already breached the true fire and risen past Zhu Yuanzhang's ankles.
Countless things like waterweeds, or hair, writhed in the surging blood and clutched his legs, trying to drag him toward the meditation room.
"Please enlighten me, Martial Uncle."
Strands of white hair sprouted from the back of Zhu Yuanzhang's head.
This was a sign that the Dingguang Demon-Subduing True Fire was consuming his true essence.
As Zhu Yuanzhang struggled against Fajue's pull from the central room, he bowed toward Faming from afar.
After their brief exchange, he had felt the blood tide's overwhelming pressure, like a landslide sweeping toward him.
He knew he was no match for Fajue.
So he asked in an unhurried tone, taking advantage of this last chance.
"Why does Martial Uncle Fajue want to kill me? And what do you mean by clinging to dragon energy?"
"It's quite simple. Xiao Yan covets the Buddhist fortune accumulated over a thousand years by Tongtai Temple, while Tongtai Temple covets the royal qi of Jinling that Xiao Yan has withheld."
"That's why Xiao Yan offered himself to Tongtai Temple, and why Xiao Tong died an innocent death at such a young age."
"So that's what happened..."
Hearing Faming's words, Zhu Yuanzhang sank into thought.
Then the bloody strands at his feet suddenly yanked hard.
The door to the central room flew open, revealing a rotten corpse sitting on a cushion.
As if sensing Zhu Yuanzhang's arrival,
the corpse opened its eyes, and countless white worms promptly tumbled down.
A delighted smile spread across the grim white bones, barely covered in flesh.
[You died]
"Is there some legend about the Qinhuai River and dragon energy?"
As before, Zhu Yuanzhang waited until the next day, when they were staying at an inn.
But before setting out, he looked at the surging Qinhuai River outside the window and asked Huzi, who was carrying hot water.
Huzi set down the wooden basin.
Leaning against the doorframe, the sturdy, dark-skinned young man thought it over carefully before answering with certainty.
"There is, actually."
"Do you know what this place was called before Jiankang became known as Jinling?"
Zhu Yuanzhang shook his head.
"I don't."
"It was called Moling. They say it was renamed by some alchemists who visited during the Qin dynasty. But even before it was called Moling, the people of Chu had already named this place Jinling."
Huzi spoke confidently.
"King Wei of Chu climbed Lion Mountain and observed the dragon energy of the Qinhuai. So he buried a vast amount of gold along both banks of the river to suppress the local fortune. That's how Jinling got its name... But in all these thousands of years, no one has ever dug gold up from Jinling."
Huzi shrugged and joked.
"If that story's true, maybe the gold King Wei of Chu buried during the Warring States period is still beneath Jinling today. Whoever digs it up would make a fortune."
He spoke without thinking, but Zhu Yuanzhang listened with interest.
He silently committed the "rumor" to memory.
"As for Moling, that came much later."
"You might not know this, sir."
Huzi went to the window and pointed toward the Qinhuai River's rushing waters as they flowed into the Yangtze.
"Before the Qin dynasty, the Qinhuai River didn't flow into the sea through the Yangtze..."
Before you continue