In Spring Splendor House on Yanghua Street, Master Ming suddenly froze at his table. Then he raised an entire pot of strong liquor and poured it down his throat, cursing under his breath, "Worthless fool! Over one woman, you ruined your face-and now you're going to throw away your life too?"
Two streams of cloudy tears slowly trickled down Master Ming's aged face... "Worthless fool. Worthless..."
On the second floor of Spring Splendor House, a thin, middle-aged scholar sat quietly behind a latticed window.
Dressed in plain cloth robes, the scholar wore an indifferent expression. Holding a cup of tea that had long since gone cold, he glanced toward the corridor and recited in a low voice...
"Lament the Ghost Festival; how many memories ride the drifting smoke? Autumn cicadas sing of autumn's end; from dreams I wake, unable to sleep again. Bent old husbands and wives fold paper money; hearts find no peace, loved ones remain incomplete. A sheet turns to ash and curls away; death severs the ties of mortal dust... When a man dies, his soul should scatter. If he isn't dead, he should live properly! Neither living nor dead-that is what troubles the heart most... When it's time to take the road, take it!"
The scholar seemed to be savoring the poem's lingering cadence. On the bed behind him, a fair-skinned, voluptuous courtesan rolled over, glanced at him, snorted, and went back to catching up on her sleep.
The scholar heaved a long sigh and turned to look at the woman's exposed charms, his trembling hand reaching out again...
Bang! Someone suddenly shoved the door open. A tall, heavily made-up woman in her forties stood in the doorway with her hands on her hips, coldly surveying the middle-aged scholar as he prepared to lay his paws on the girl...
"Well, well! Scholar Zhao, composing poetry and flaunting your talents! A restless heart, unable to sleep, is that it? Where the hell did you get those savage potency drugs this time? You tormented our girl for half the night without stopping-who could sleep through that? Who are you pretending to be refined for?"
Scholar Zhao's expression did not change. He waved a hand and was just about to rebuke the madam...
When she slammed a piece of silver onto the floor and stared coldly at him. The instant Scholar Zhao saw that silver, both his legs trembled.
The madam sneered. "You, Zhao! Don't tell me you don't know the quality of the silver you tossed down last night! You thunderstruck bastard, even your whoring money is counterfeit? Aren't you afraid of retribution? Hand over three taels of good silver right now, and we'll let this go. If you can't... I'll skin you alive!"
Scholar Zhao's face twitched several times, but he forced himself to hold his ground. "You madam, how utterly unreasonable! How do you know that was the silver this humble scholar spent?"
"You motherfucking thief! There weren't many patrons last night, and only three paid silver to stay overnight! Constable Ma, you, and Master Ming from the capital... Think you can deny it?"
Scholar Zhao's eyes darted about. He was just about to offer an excuse.
But two brothel thugs with brutal faces surged in behind the madam. Without a word, they pinned him to the floor, punched him several times, and began searching his pockets and bundle.
The head thug frowned, cursed at Scholar Zhao as he wailed on the floor, and handed the madam a dozen or so loose copper coins. "Madam Liu, this penniless pedant only has these few coins left! What should we do with him?"
The madam surnamed Liu flew into a towering rage, her three corpse spirits leaping madly. She rushed over and viciously kicked the freeloading Scholar Zhao in the stomach several times.
"You plague-stricken pauper!" she screamed. "Last night I was already wondering where a penniless wretch like you got the money! You dare cheat and swindle even over brothel fees? Beat him half to death, then drag him to the back courtyard to clean the stables and empty the privies! Either find someone to ransom him for ten taels of silver, or make him do hard labor out back for six months... This plague-stricken bastard..."
The two brothel thugs came over, kicked Scholar Zhao viciously several more times, then dragged him out of the room like a dead dog.
The madam continued shouting after them, "Strip off his clothes and boots and have Lü Bufan take them to the pawnshop! They should still be worth a few dozen copper coins!"
Just as Scholar Zhao sank into despair, a somewhat muffled male voice came from the large room at the end of the corridor. "What's all that racket? You're getting on your grandpa's nerves! Get the hell away..."
Madam Liu's expression shifted several times at those words. In the end, she laughed coquettishly. "Oh my! We've disturbed Master Ming's sweet dreams. It's all my fault for not attending to things properly. We caught a stinking pauper paying with fake silver to enjoy our girls for free! I lost my temper for a moment. My apologies, Master Ming. I'll take this pauper downstairs right away... Please forgive us!"
"A pauper? A scholar, then?"
"Exactly! There are only a handful of scholars in all of Huqi Town, but this Zhao has spent years drinking, whoring, and gambling, making nothing of himself..."
"Forget it. Put his silver on my tab! Let him go. All this shouting is irritating!"
"Well..." The madam's face twitched, a trace of hesitation and concern flashing through her eyes. Finally, she gritted her teeth and said sweetly, "Since Master Ming has spoken, this pauper can count himself lucky! I'll let the bastard go, but..."
By then, Scholar Zhao had caught his breath. He struggled to his feet, offered a scholar's bow toward the large room, and affected a refined voice. "This humble scholar, Zhao Dazhuang, thanks his benefactor for saving him! A dragon stranded in the shallows, I was born into an ill-fated age. The injustice I have suffered is too bitter to speak of. Mere thanks cannot repay your rescue today. Might my benefactor open the door and grant me an audience? Let me remember your honored face, so that one day..."
Scholar Zhao seemed intent on trying another swindle, but the curtain across the opposite doorway flicked aside, and a coarse ceramic chamber pot suddenly hurtled out!
Scholar Zhao ducked his head. The chamber pot shattered against the wall, splashing foul-smelling urine all over his head and face...
The man inside cursed, "Get the hell away! You disgrace to scholars, just hearing your voice makes me sick! Keep making noise, and I'll have the madam bury you in the cesspit!"
The madam curled her lips and signaled with her eyes for the two thugs to haul the pauper away at once. One thug grabbed Scholar Zhao by the collar and dragged him off amid a flurry of curses.
Madam Liu hesitated as she looked toward the opposite doorway, seemingly wanting to say something.
The head thug beside her leaned close to her ear and whispered, "Madam Liu, Master Ming's horse is still being kept in the stable, fed the finest hay and grain! A fine horse like that is worth at least a hundred taels around here. With that horse as security, we needn't worry about Master Ming falling short just yet. Why not wait a little longer?"
The madam's expression shifted. She nodded and quietly left with the thug.
Little did they know that inside the room, Master Ming was staring darkly at his still-trembling right hand... In his eyes, his right hand had become nothing more than a blurred outline!
"They sent an Immortal Envoy who patrols a district to recite a death-hastening poem? Even if the Heart-Piercing Curse has reduced me to this, a spineless wretch like you has no right to put me in my place!"
Outside the brothel, the down-and-out Scholar Zhao gently straightened the long robe the thug had torn. The wounds on his face eerily vanished in an instant!
Scholar Zhao narrowed his eyes and surveyed the brothel coldly. Then he snorted and walked away.
"The people from Two-World Mountain really are all bent on getting themselves killed! I don't know why the city lord doesn't simply seize him. That would be a great achievement-far easier than painstakingly gathering heavenly materials and earthly treasures for the Immortals, wouldn't it? Could the city lord be casting a long line to catch a big fish? Otherwise, why insist that I beat the grass to startle the snake and warn that old bastard?"
Scholar Zhao muttered to himself as he slowly walked down an alley. Suddenly, he raised his head and stared warily into its depths!
A black-robed figure stood silently there, a pair of icy eyes beneath the hood watching Scholar Zhao with faint disgust...
"My lord!" Scholar Zhao dropped to one knee with a thud and clasped his hands, trembling. "If you need anything, my lord, you need only send instructions by talisman. How could I trouble you to come here in person..."
The black-robed figure snorted in disgust. "How these remnants from Two-World Mountain are dealt with... is that for you to decide? Since when did a mere Immortal Envoy like you need to concern himself with matters on behalf of the Twelve Guardian Cities and the Twelve Immortal Sects?"
"I wouldn't dare! I wouldn't dare..."
"Shut up! Since Guangling Commandery did reasonably well with its ore and spirit herb tribute last year, I won't take issue with a useless fool like you. Watch that Master Ming, the one afflicted by the Immortals' Heart-Piercing Curse, and drive him out of Guangling Commandery as soon as possible! The rest is none of your concern... Do you understand?"
"Yes! Yes! I will do everything in my power to serve you loyally, my lord, and work for the Immortal Sects! With me here, nothing will go wrong in Guangling Commandery... My lord, I recently acquired a piece of excellent spirit jade. I had intended to present it to you when I entered the Guardian City next month to deliver the tribute..."
Scholar Zhao furtively raised his head, only to discover that the terrifying lord of the Guardian City had already vanished! He breathed a sigh of relief, wiped the cold sweat from his brow, rose, and swiftly disappeared into the alley.
The black-robed city lord appeared atop a dilapidated stone tower some distance from the brothel. Beneath the hood, those eyes coldly watched the building, which seemed to exude the murky air of the mortal world...
"Master Ming... You remain in Huqi Town and refuse to leave. I suppose you, too, have heard that the immortal is descending and Liu Xian'er is emerging from seclusion?"
"You want to persuade the Village Head not to go to the capital to die... But if Wei Wuchen decides to do something, can you stop him?"
That night, the courtesan attending Master Ming as he drank suddenly noticed that his eyes had turned cloudy and dim! They looked exactly like the clouded eyes of someone whose heart had been overwhelmed by raging distress...
Meanwhile, inside a low brick house in Huqi Town, Immortal Envoy Scholar Zhao slowly stepped outside as though facing a formidable enemy, watching warily the white-haired man who had suddenly appeared in his courtyard.
White-clad, white-haired, and thin, the figure with that uncanny aura sat quietly on a stone stool in the courtyard with his back to him.
"Are you the Immortal Envoy of Guangling Commandery?"
"What if I am?" Scholar Zhao now bared his full might, the dense aura of a Fourth Realm cultivator swirling around him! A gleam of sword light flickered in and out of his right sleeve, his aura locking onto the uncanny man in white before him.
"I have nothing to say to you. Master Ming's whereabouts must never become known to the Immortal Sects beyond the Guardian City, so you, the Immortal Envoy of Guangling Commandery, cannot be allowed to live."
"What the hell are you, spouting such arrogant nonsense? You dare threaten an immortal envoy of the Guardian City..."
Before he could finish, the man in white gently released a slightly yellowed willow leaf from between his fingers. A fleeting glimmer flashed across the leaf before it drifted softly to the ground...
The man in white silently rose and turned to leave without looking back. After three steps, he abruptly vanished into thin air, leaving only the dumbstruck Scholar Zhao behind!
A thin line of blood silently appeared on Scholar Zhao's forehead, and a crimson drop slowly trickled down. The light in his eyes had already gone out, and his Fourth Realm cultivator's aura crumbled away...
His soul and spirit were utterly annihilated! Before dying, Scholar Zhao had not even managed to activate the communication talisman hidden at his waist...
In the brothel, the girl attending Master Ming sent word to the madam: Master Ming seemed to have run out of money!
Madam Liu Jinyue hurried upstairs to check on him. Then, while Master Ming lay drunk and unconscious on the floor, she turned his bag of gold and silver inside out!
There was not a single copper coin left... Only a simple set of Travel Permit and Official Credentials, with no official rank or scholarly honors, nor any token or proof of belonging to a great clan.
Still unwilling to give up, Liu Jinyue helped Master Ming up and asked whether he had any wealthy friends or relatives he could turn to...
In the end, the drunken, agonized Master Ming merely waved a hand and mumbled... "A man whose family is ruined seeks only a swift death!"
His words struck Madam Liu Jinyue like five thunderbolts crashing down upon her. She dropped Master Ming and went to calculate how much silver she had lost on the old bastard over the past few days!
Even counting that fine horse, she was still out seventeen or eighteen taels of silver. Liu Jinyue was so furious that smoke seemed to pour from all seven openings of her head...
Another one! Another fucking cheat and swindler in the brothel! Did they take her Spring Splendor House for a charity hall?
Several ferocious brothel thugs punched and kicked Master Ming, giving him a vicious beating before dragging him to the stable in the back courtyard.
Her old face pale with rage, Liu Jinyue stood before Master Ming holding a horse club and asked grimly, "You old bastard, you dare swindle me out of food, drink, and free girls? I'll ask you one last time: can you produce the silver or not? If you can't pay fifty taels, I'll have your arms and legs broken and throw you into the paupers' burial ground!"
His hair disheveled and his body covered in wounds, Master Ming merely opened his eyes, revealing their cloudy, vacant gaze, and coldly spat out one word... "Scram!"
In the courtyard where Scholar Zhao had concealed himself, the black-robed figure solemnly studied the long-dead corpse on the ground, a flicker of doubt crossing those eyes...
"A single wisp of sword qi extinguished every trace of life in an entire courtyard? Wei Wuchen... Could you have crossed the threshold of the Ninth Realm? That shouldn't be possible..."
The black-robed figure raised their head and examined the tall tree nearby.
The tree was still lush and green, but to a cultivator like the black-robed figure, its life force had long since been severed!
The weeds in the courtyard and the insects lying dead in every corner... all had lost every trace of life!
"Is this a warning not to harm Master Ming? Wei Wuchen... You endured for thirty years, and now you've attained such a realm. Was it all merely to take revenge on that woman?"