Night Rain on a Desolate Mountain

Clop, clop, clop.

Hoofbeats sounded along the imperial highway.

A swarthy face emerged from the grass, its features gaunt and sunken, its neck long and thin.

Moments later, a bay horse came galloping into view, carrying a young man in a brocade robe.

Neigh!

Zhou Yi drew back the reins, and the horse stopped in an instant. Anyone with a discerning eye would have praised his horsemanship.

"Old sir, how far is it to the Pear Blossom Relay Station?"

The swarthy-faced man slowly stood up. He wore layer upon layer of ragged clothing, all stained grass green. His voice was thin and shrill, as though squeezed out through his slender neck.

"The Pear Blossom Relay Station? It's long gone."

"When did it disappear? What happened?"

Zhou Yi frowned slightly, though he was not surprised. The previous stop, the Bamboo Grove Relay Station, had already become wilderness.

"Three or four years ago. Heard it was a tiger eating people or something. I'm not from these parts either."

The swarthy-faced man looked at the bulging bundle on the horse's back and pleaded, "Have you got any grain or salt? I can trade you some fruit."

"No need."

Zhou Yi took out a small bag of flatbread, tossed it onto the ground, and shook the reins, continuing along the highway.

The bundle on the horse's back was merely for appearances. He had given away nearly everything in it to the refugees along the road.

A short while later.

The highway rounded a bend and entered a deserted village.

Trees already overran the village, and its ruined walls were stained moss green. As he rode past, he occasionally spotted bones left by gnawing beasts beside the road or at the foot of a wall.

"This is what Great Qian truly looks like. The prosperity and comfortable lives of Luo Capital are merely an exception."

Zhou Yi had long since seen such scenes in fragments of demons' memories, and had encountered plenty on his journey as well. Yet every time he witnessed them himself, he still could not help sighing.

This was Jing Prefecture, one of Great Qian's three northern border prefectures.

To the east lay Jingchang Province, where the White Lotus Path was stirring up unrest. Fiends of the Demonic Dao often wandered across the border, wreaking havoc.

The Liangshan Mountains divided Great Qian's sixteen prefectures into north and south. The north held six: Luo, Jing, Wei, Tai, Feiyun, and Jingchang.

Zhou Yi had traveled north from Luo Capital. The farther he went from the Capital, the more deserted the land became.

Within Luo Prefecture, relay stations could still be found every hundred li. Once he entered Jing Prefecture, he could only change horses every two or three hundred li. Inspections, by contrast, grew increasingly strict. Fortunately, his Demon-Slaying Bureau token proved useful, and no soldier dared trouble him or extort money.

Hengyang was in Guning Commandery of Jing Prefecture, close to Guning Commandery City. He expected to cross Coiled Snake Mountain ahead that night, then arrive in another three to five days.

The deserted village was small, and the bay horse soon passed through it.

Caw, caw, caw-

A string of grating cries rang out.

Rows of crows perched on a smooth, barkless dead tree at the village entrance, forming black lines that made the branches resemble the pitch-black claws of a demon.

Caw, caw, caw-

When the crows saw the bay horse approaching, rather than flying away, they cried out even more eagerly.

Zhou Yi narrowed his eyes slightly. He could clearly see the crows' crimson pupils, flickering like tiny red lights in broad daylight.

Using the Qi-Reading Technique, he saw dense, gray-black clouds of sinister, baleful energy coiling around the crows.

Crows liked carrion, but only those that regularly devoured human corpses and were transforming into demons would develop such unnatural red eyes.

As Zhou Yi rode past the dead tree, the agitated crows shrieked. Three or four hundred took wing like a dark cloud and swooped at him together, their beaks snapping.

"Courting death!"

A streak of sword light soared into the air and darted through the flock.

Black feathers fluttered, and blood sprayed everywhere. In an instant, the ground was stained black and red, strewn with crow corpses.

The bay horse breathed steadily. Having seen enough to take it all in stride, it galloped calmly toward Coiled Snake Mountain.

With Jing Prefecture's relay stations abandoned, Zhou Yi had gone more than ten days without changing horses. To keep the bay horse from dying of exhaustion, he could only sustain its strength with his magical power.

Sometimes Zhou Yi wondered whether the man was riding the horse or the horse was riding the man.

The deserted village fell utterly silent again.

After a long while, a swarthy face emerged from behind a broken wall.

Looking toward the dead tree at the village entrance, the man found its branches bare and a great swath of entrails and mangled remains scattered beneath it.

The swarthy-faced man swallowed and slowly crept toward the dead tree. Sure enough, every red-eyed crow was dead.

"There's meat to eat now, but what am I supposed to do afterward?"

The swarthy-faced man had discovered by chance that, so long as he stayed away from the dead tree, the crows would not fly over to hurt him.

Thanks to that secret, he had collected enough belongings left by passing travelers to barely stay alive.

Now that all the crows were dead, the swarthy-faced man would not be able to survive either.

Zhou Yi rode on and entered Coiled Snake Mountain.

The forest was deep and thick with foliage. Ancient trees towered skyward, blotting out the sun, and the light grew ever dimmer.

Weeds had completely swallowed the rugged mountain road. Only the thinner patches of trees hinted at where the highway had once run.

Zhou Yi had thought he could cross Coiled Snake Mountain that night and enjoy level plains and easy roads afterward. But Heaven refused to oblige.

Rumble-

Dark clouds swiftly gathered overhead, and muffled thunder rolled between them.

The mountain rain came swiftly. In mere moments, broad daylight gave way to a torrential downpour.

Magical power flowed out of Zhou Yi's body, forming a great umbrella without shape or substance that kept the rain out.

He rode another few li along the mountain road.

Lightning flashed, illuminating the curtain of rain and revealing the faint outline of a temple nestled in the mountains.

Zhou Yi rode over to shelter from the rain. Only when he drew close did he see that it was a mountain god's temple, utterly dilapidated, with drafts blowing through every gap and all the white plaster scraped from its walls.

Amid the mountain wind and driving rain, its walls looked ready to collapse.

Zhou Yi tethered his horse outside and pushed open the temple doors. Seven or eight people were already warming themselves by a fire within. From their clothing, they appeared to be traveling merchants.

The merchants' leader kept one hand at his waist. Seeing that Zhou Yi was young and alone, he lowered his head and went back to gnawing his flatbread.

Half of the mountain god's statue had broken off and fallen to the floor, where the merchants were using it as a bench.

Zhou Yi cleared a patch of floor and sat quietly on his bundle, waiting for the mountain rain to pass.

The leader gave Zhou Yi a puzzled look. His clothes were soaked, yet he made no fire; he had stopped to rest from his journey, yet ate nothing. The leader quietly nudged a companion with his foot.

His companion immediately understood and shifted around to sit facing Zhou Yi.

Rumble-

Thunder kept booming, and the rain fell harder and harder.

The merchants dried their clothes and boiled water. The mood grew less oppressive, and they began talking and laughing.

Times were hard, but they could not spend their lives weeping.

Most of their talk was household gossip and dirty jokes: whose wife was taking a lover, whose son was not really his, or who had such remarkable stamina that even the women behind half-open doors refused to let him visit anymore.

"Heard what's happening in Guning?"

One man's words caught Zhou Yi's attention.

"Who hasn't? Ghost trouble. What's so unusual about that?"

"But it can't keep being haunted forever. It's been over a year without a moment's peace. I don't even dare go there to trade."

Someone could not resist complaining, "They catch them, then more trouble comes. More trouble comes, then they catch them again. Everyone's on edge. Can't the officials do something to prevent it beforehand?"

"Ahem, ahem! You dim-witted fool, what nonsense are you spouting?"

The leader kicked the man and stole a glance at Zhou Yi. "If there aren't any ghosts yet, what are they supposed to catch? Keep talking that damned nonsense and you'll have a son without an **!"

The man seemed to realize he had said the wrong thing and hurriedly changed the subject.

Creak.

The temple doors were pushed open again.

A scholar wearing a Confucian headcloth entered. He was stout and covered in mud, as though he had rolled through a muddy hollow.

The book chest clutched to his chest had long since been soaked through by the rain, and water dripped fitfully from it.

Delighted to see the firelight, the scholar wiped the rain from his face and carefully set his book chest on the offering table.

"My name is Du Si, from Hengyang. I intend to travel to the Capital and broaden my horizons. The mountain rain made the road slippery, and I carelessly lost my bundle."

Despite his bedraggled state, Du Si still cupped his hands politely. "Good sir, might I borrow your fire to dry my clothes?"

The leader looked the scholar over, touched the protective talisman inside his robe, and nodded slightly.

Seeing this, the other merchants took some burning wood from their fire to kindle another, and even helped the scholar add a handful of dry firewood.

The people of Great Qian still held scholars in somewhat higher regard.

A newbie author, working hard~0~