The wooden boat carrying the last group of participants reached shore more than an hour after the sun had begun sinking westward.
Its hull was slightly larger than those of the earlier ferryboats, and the little white flag at its bow gleamed pale gold in the slanting sunlight. A middle-aged boatman stood at the stern with a pole, dressed much like the man who had brought Zhao Feng to the island and of a similar build, though his pole entered the water at a steadier angle.
One man sat on each side of the boat, separated by a distance neither wide nor narrow.
The man on the left wore a pale blue-green robe with no unnecessary decoration, only a narrow cloud pattern embroidered in silver thread along the collar.
His features were handsome and youthful, and he appeared not yet thirty. He had prominent brow bones and a clean, sharply defined jawline. An unadorned wooden hairpin secured his topknot, its head polished into a smooth, gentle curve.
The man on the right wore a dark blue robe, its sleeves half a foot wider than ordinary ones, puffing slightly backward in the wind as the boat moved. He was a little taller than the man on the left, with a lean face and skin paler than anyone around him, as though years spent somewhere dim had naturally given him that complexion.
As the wooden boat approached shore, his gaze slowly swept across the entire island, neither hurried nor lingering, as if placing everyone present into a slowly running sequence of identification before returning his attention to an ordinary field of view.
By the time the boat docked, people on the pier had already recognized them.
Quite a few cupped their fists in greeting from afar.
Before the two men disembarked, Murong