The strange visions in the sky had vanished like smoke at some unknown point. The hail, lightning, downpour, falling firestones, and everything else had long since stopped, leaving only a patter of fine rain.
Had he not witnessed it himself, Zhang Xing might have thought a violent earthquake had just triggered a landslide and severe convective weather.
But now...
"I never thought I'd live to see the Mountain-Splitting Lord and the Sea-Averting Lord." It was the heavily bearded Du Meng who broke the silence in the temple.
"The Mountain-Splitting Lord was that dragon with the tiger face?" Zhang Xing swallowed, stirring a faint burning pain in his throat. "And the one fighting him up in the clouds... that one was the Sea-Averting Lord?"
"Who else could they be?" Du Meng answered dejectedly. "One was right in front of our eyes, looking exactly like the stories said. We didn't see the other just now, but at the battle of Fallen Dragon Shoal, the tide suddenly rose, letting the Dongyi troops circle behind us in boats. They say that was the Sea-Averting Lord lending a hand in secret... Lad, tell me, immortals fighting like this only happens once in centuries. How did we end up caught in it?"
Zhang Xing said nothing. How the hell would he know?
Du Meng was about to say something else when he stopped in surprise. "You don't recognize the Mountain-Splitting Lord? Back in the army, you were the one telling us what the Mountain-Splitting Lord and the Sea-Averting Lord looked like. All those stories about Dongyi and the imperial court came from you too, didn't they?!"
Zhang Xing's heart gave a sudden jolt... Out here in these desolate mountains, if he said he had possessed their comrade's body, considering this backdrop of immortals, martial arts, and routed soldiers, along with the other man's build and his own aching old legs, wouldn't he immediately be taken for a wandering ghost and have his guts laid open with a single slash...? He hastily shook his head and bluffed:
"My head's been a complete muddle ever since you hit me awake. Besides, with what happened just now, I was scared right out of my wits..."
"That's true enough." Sitting on the ground, Du Meng nodded. "And you've always been slippery, lad. Saying one thing and doing another is normal for you... We fled all this way, and I never even knew you had a treasure like that hidden away."
Zhang Xing dared not say more. After a bout of grumbling, Du Meng fell silent too. They lay slumped in the temple, resting until evening drew near and they could put it off no longer, then tried to get up.
Unexpectedly, this time Zhang Xing actually managed to struggle to his feet.
"I told you, what do you need a doctor for? You just exhausted yourself fighting those slippery Southern Border fellows for flatbread back in that hollow. Then your body couldn't take that shitty Ice True Qi of yours, and you collapsed... Move around slowly and get used to it. Don't exert yourself recklessly. Wait while I find something useful." The bushy-bearded Du Meng still had his strength. As he spoke, he was already searching the temple.
Once Zhang Xing stood up, he saw at a glance what Du Meng was doing-rummaging through castoffs, presumably things the other routed soldiers in the temple had not had time to take when they fled.
Though the transmigrator had resolved to speak as little as possible, he could not help asking bleakly, "Those who ran outside... are they all gone?"
"How could they still be alive?"
Du Meng turned, seemingly about to lose his temper again. For some reason, however, there was little harshness in his voice this time. He merely sounded somewhat aggrieved, and rather long-winded:
"Besides, how could it just be those seventeen or eighteen who died? With all that, the whole mountain split open. And the main road below was the very road we marched in on. Eight thousand, if not ten thousand, escaped, and wouldn't they all have taken it? After this, they're probably all dead! Who knows whether it was deliberate? Still, we ought to know good from bad. If the Mountain-Splitting Lord hadn't appeared like that, the Dongyi pursuers would surely have swept in behind the Sea-Averting Lord. Then not only would the scattered fugitives have had next to no chance of survival, Dengzhou would have suffered the ravages of war too, and even more people would have died..."
Somehow, he trailed off toward the end. Zhang Xing, who had been listening closely and trying to sift out information, useful or otherwise, could only shake his head before struggling over to help him search.
There had been a full seventeen or eighteen routed soldiers in the temple, and their hurried flight had indeed left things behind. After gathering everything up, the two of them each fumbled a few flatbreads out of their clothes as well. Combined, they actually had twenty or thirty dry flatbreads, four or five weapons of varying lengths, and four usable helmets... There were also two and a half banners, roughly enough to make two bundles.
The greatest pity was the half-pot of flour paste, spilled straight onto the ground and impossible to recover. As for the copper coins and silver ingots lying there, they seemed absurd now.
"Not bad. Enough to keep the two of us alive." Looking at the things on the ground, Du Meng perked up a little, then glanced around and gave instructions. "We can't eat the flatbreads dry. We still need to boil some water... Walk slowly over to that leak and see about catching some rainwater. I'll shave some wood off the carvings and beams with my saber for a fire."
There was nothing wrong with those instructions. Zhang Xing immediately did as he was told, but scarcely had he begun catching water in a helmet when the bearded man asked a question behind him:
"Lad, whose temple do you reckon this is?"
Zhang Xing turned in surprise, then immediately grew tense... How had he forgotten this?!
Just thinking about it made it clear: this dilapidated temple, which looked ready to collapse from every angle and should have been the most dangerous place, had somehow held firm through the earthquake. It could hardly be called anything but a miracle.
And considering that even someone on the Mountain-Splitting Lord's level had to show it respect-or had simply been deceived-it seemed especially terrifying... After the spectacle that day, no one would be stupid enough to think this was a coincidence.
Of course, Zhang Xing had one more concern than Du Meng: he had transmigrated into this very temple. To him, that made its mystery and significance greater still.
At that thought, Zhang Xing abandoned the helmet catching water and carefully paced over by the last faint light. Soon, however, he felt relieved, even as though everything had suddenly become clear-on the robes of the statue missing half its head, he found the scattered horizontal strokes of the eight trigrams, and in the dust at its feet he found a blurred yet utterly familiar yin-yang fish design.
That explained it.
"This isn't a Buddhist temple. It should be a Taoist temple of Taishang Laojun, or at least one belonging to some of his relatives or disciples... It was just so old I didn't recognize it at first." There was actually a hint of complaint in Zhang Xing's voice.
Du Meng initially relaxed a little at his companion's undisguised relief, but soon grew puzzled again. "Who's Taishang Laojun?"
Zhang Xing gaped. "You don't even know Taishang Laojun?"
Du Meng's gaze swept over the Compass at the other man's waist, and he seemed to understand a little, but he still stamped his foot. "You couldn't even recognize the Mountain-Splitting Lord right in front of you, so what's wrong with me not knowing Taishang Laojun? There must be dozens of dragon lords and other lords under heaven, right? Still, this time we certainly owe our lives to Lord Laojun's kindness. Whatever else, we can't chop up his altar table. I'll go shave wood off the fallen beams."
Hearing this, Zhang Xing instead fell into a daze, even feeling a chill down his spine-never mind what difference there was between shaving beams and chopping up an altar table, he was almost certain this fellow was not pretending. Brother Du Meng, rough yet not without finer judgment, truly did not know who Taishang Laojun was!
That was downright chilling!
Of course, perhaps there was no need to be so chilled. After all, he himself had no idea what the Three Radiances and Four Sovereigns or those "dozens of dragon lords and other lords" were supposed to be.
Shaving the beams, rekindling the fire, boiling water, letting it settle clear, soaking the flatbreads... What followed proceeded step by step. Neither Zhang Xing nor the bearded man wasted any more words.
Having "eaten their fill" and "drunk their fill," the two lay in the ruined Taoist temple, practically beside a cliff, and still neither said a word.
Zhang Xing did not know what the bearded man was thinking, but to him, the day's experiences truly felt like a dream... If the mythlike events of the daytime had still felt unreal, then lying here at night, listening to the fire crackle and the fine rain patter outside the window, quietly feeling the aches throughout this body, directly and at length, breathing the air of this place, and sensing that cold current he could swiftly detect through some instinct alone... Zhang Xing could no longer hide behind the notion that this was some hallucination.
He had indeed transmigrated into an inexplicable, unknown world.
The only thing he could be certain of now was that this world's productive forces and relations of production seemed relatively backward. It very likely still had a traditional Eastern-style feudal political system, while also possessing a strong flavor of Eastern mythology.
Of course, all of this was conjecture. No one knew what was really going on-at least Zhang Xing did not, and at that moment he did not particularly want to know either. He wanted more to go home. He missed his cat, his warm bed, and his big-name Bianhu account.
But longing was one thing; the cold before him forced him to suppress every unnecessary thought. The reality was that he was plainly in a state of taking one step at a time, surviving one day at a time. Only once he made it out of the mountains alive and reached civilized society could he make long-term plans.
Gradually, exhaustion finally welled up beyond his ability to resist. With the sky for his canopy, the earth for his bed, and the ruined temple for clothing, the transmigrator curled up and closed his eyes to sleep. In his sleep, someone seemed to be crying in a dream; or perhaps he faintly heard someone crying in reality; or perhaps he himself was crying unawares. It might even have been merely an illusion caused by the rain.
Early the next morning, he woke to find the fire out. Zhang Xing could clearly feel that his body had recovered considerably. At the very least, he could now walk on his own, using a long saber for support.
The two wasted no time. They briefly soaked some flatbread in the water left over from the previous night, shouldered their bundles, and crawled out through the hole at the back of the temple to set off. The bearded man went ahead to clear the way, carrying his saber, while Zhang Xing followed with his cheat-or rather, his golden Compass-in hand, keeping a rough eye on their direction... At this point, quite apart from Du Meng already knowing about the item and what it did, even if Zhang Xing had wanted to hide it, he ought not conceal anything when they needed to entrust their lives to each other.
Yet they had barely struggled a hundred paces through the fine rain when a tremendous rumble sounded behind them. They turned in astonishment to find the ruined Taoist temple, so steady throughout that day and night, collapsing with a crash. The main structure crumpled into a mass and, before their eyes, rolled straight down the cliff the Mountain-Splitting Lord had "artificially" created on the other side.
The transmigrator stood in the rain, silent, his feelings too complicated for words.
Du Meng, however, unhesitatingly bowed down in the mud. After rising, he said feelingly to Zhang Xing, "Once we get back, lad, tell me the proper specifications for a statue of Taishang Laojun. At least I can put up a little family shrine for the venerable lord, to repay his kindness this time..."
Zhang Xing could only nod.
"They're all such powerful gods, devils, lords, and sages. How can there be such a gulf between them?" Du Meng turned and set off as he spoke. "Let's get down the mountain first and find a road."
Zhang Xing could only follow silently, leaning on his saber... What he failed to notice was that, when the Taoist temple collapsed, the needle of the Compass in his hand had briefly spun out of control. Only after Du Meng restated their destination had it steadied again.
PS: A few more words... First, thank you all for your love and support. Straight to first place on the donation rankings, with sixteen Alliance Leaders popping out of eighty donations, all familiar faces... After so long, you still remembered me. Whatever else, I ought to be moved to grateful tears.
Next, about updates... I don't have many chapters stockpiled (I'll tell you why after a while), so during the new-book period, I'll try my best to maintain a minimum of four thousand Chinese characters daily, ensuring your investments don't go to waste. If a chapter falls short of four thousand, or everyone gets particularly enthusiastic, I'll throw out some stockpiled material to make up the difference.
Then there's Qidian's year-end library event. I'm participating in that too, and there are cards. You can give it a try.
That's all. Wishing everyone a happy December 2, 2021.
Providing you with the renowned Water-Fearing Grenade's Exorcising the Dragon: Zhang Xing and Bai Yousi.
Before you continue