The bronze bell

The instant the fiery fiend crawled out of Du Cao's back, Wang Qilin thought he had returned to Earth.

Back on Earth, he had seen slow motion on television.

Not the kind where you followed along with your left hand and right hand-actual slow motion.

At that moment, time throughout the ancestral hall slowed down.

The fiend tore free of its human host and exploded into endless tongues of flame. Du Cao gave a bitter smile, the infant spirits retreated in panic, and a tear flew from the corner of Xu Da's eye...

Wang Qilin saw every detail clearly.

For an instant, everything slowed. An instant later, everything returned to normal.

The fiend vanished. Countless flames scattered throughout the ancestral hall. The infant spirits ran and darted about in a frenzy, but their bodies caught fire wherever the flames touched them.

Du Cao crumpled to the ground. Xu Da flung himself forward like a madman, scooped him up, and rolled toward a corner.

Some burning infant spirits tried to pursue and kill them, but Wang Qilin stepped forward to block their way.

His swift blade swept upward with several tongues of flame clinging to it. A flash of steel instantly stretched into mountains of blades and seas of fire.

Blazing supreme yang joined the bleak, chilling supreme yin. The supreme yin flowed without end, while the supreme yang surged like roaring mountains and crashing seas. Ice and fire formed two opposing extremes. With one sweep of the blade, the Furnace of Creation appeared and collected the crimson column of smoke the infant spirit became.

The other infant spirits retreated in panic. Wang Qilin's face was impassive, his heart hard as iron. Cold steel and fierce flames swept through them together. Already burned by the fiend's flames and weakened to the extreme, the infant spirits were chopped into crimson columns of smoke as easily as melons and vegetables.

The Furnace of Creation appeared and vanished one last time, just as Wang Qilin pursued his quarry to the coffin.

He lowered his head and looked inside. A layer of foul-smelling minced flesh lay within.

The Zhong family would have to prepare an empty tomb for their patriarch's clothes and belongings.

He released the sweat-soaked hilt. His saber fell to the ground and shattered like glass.

The blade could not withstand that treatment of alternating ice and fire!

Xu Da told him, "Keep it down. Master Cao is asleep."

Looking at Du Cao lying motionless in Xu Da's arms, Wang Qilin felt a deep sorrow, even if it had not quite flowed backward into a river.

He had known Du Cao only briefly, but Du Cao had treated him very well and had even saved his life before dying.

If the fiend had not burst from its host and turned into flames of the fiercest, purest yang to burn the infant spirits, he probably would have died here today.

Those infant spirits were terrifying, every one of them brimming with towering resentment!

And Xu Da had followed Du Cao for a year. Their bond was deeper still.

He slowly walked over and sat beside them. He did not know how much time passed before he heard muffled knocking. Bang! Bang! Bang!

The sound was distinct in the dark, silent night.

It came from the inside of the door.

Someone inside the building was knocking!

Wang Qilin grabbed the saber Du Cao had given Xu Da and rose, his gaze sweeping toward the doorway like a blade.

Zhong Youshou trembled under his gaze.

Wang Qilin let out a relieved breath, only then remembering that the three of them were not alone in the ancestral hall.

Xu Da's gaze was sharp too. He told Zhong Youshou, "Stop knocking. Our Master Cao is asleep. Let him get some proper rest."

Wang Qilin patted his shoulder. "Don't be like this. Be strong."

"Be strong about what?" Xu Da asked.

"Stop lying to yourself," Wang Qilin said heavily. "Master Cao is already dead!"

"Master Cao isn't dead. He just fell unconscious."

Xu Da held Du Cao out toward him. Du Cao's face was pale and his breathing faint, but he was indeed breathing.

He really had only fallen asleep?!

Grief instantly turned to excitement, and Wang Qilin was in the mood to continue handling the case.

He looked at Zhong Youshou. "Patriarch Zhong, you know better than I do what happened here, don't you? You also know what to do about the child in this lady's belly, don't you?"

Xu Da laughed. "Why are you telling an idiot all that?"

Wang Qilin sneered. "You and I might be idiots, but he certainly isn't!"

He continued addressing Zhong Youshou. "The previous patriarch was a formidable man, so his successor had to be a fool. And so you displayed just the right amount of stupidity. You got your wish and became the current patriarch. That meant the next patriarch would have to be someone formidable again-"

"Your grandson is quite formidable."

"You plan three moves ahead with every step, and three generations ahead within a single lifetime. Patriarch Zhong, you're the truly formidable one!"

The wrinkles on Zhong Youshou's aged face deepened.

Wang Qilin barked, "You know the truth of this case better than we do. Tell me, if I report every detail to the imperial court, what will it do?"

Investigate thoroughly!

Execute the entire household!

Exterminate all nine degrees of kinship!

Reincarnation and rebirth was a profoundly evil art that violated the natural order and human morality. Even the imperial family was forbidden from touching it.

Yet someone in this little rural backwater had mastered it. Once the court learned of this, it would certainly deal with it by the harshest possible means.

All traces of his former simple honesty and dullness vanished from Zhong Youshou's face. He abruptly dropped to his knees. "Please show mercy, Lord Wang! The child this woman is carrying-I'll dispose of it tomorrow. No, immediately! Please spare our Zhong clan, Lord Wang!"

Wang Qilin was silent for a while, then said, "Dispose of that monstrosity, and never mention this case again!"

With the case settled for the time being, he told Xu Da to open the door. Du Cao needed a room to rest in.

There was no door Xu Da could not kick down. If there was, he would kick it again!

The moment the doors opened, Xu Da dodged aside.

Cool moonlight shone in. There was nothing outside.

"What's wrong?" Wang Qilin asked.

Xu Da gave an awkward smile. "Nothing. I thought someone outside might splash me with black dog blood again."

He stepped outside, looked around, then pointed down the mountain and shouted, "Fucking hell! Your Zhong clan really has no guts! You saw ghosts in the ancestral hall and ran away in the middle of the night? You're abandoning the ancestral hall, skipping the former patriarch's funeral, and leaving even your current patriarch behind?"

Wang Qilin followed him out for a look. A dragon of fire stretched along the road below. The Zhong family had fled with torches in hand, bringing their households along and helping the old and young.

Zhong Youshou stamped his foot. "I'll certainly set this family straight afterward!"

After a furious bout of cursing, he quietly slipped the vajra bell to Wang Qilin. "Please accept this, my lord."

Wang Qilin frowned. "What sort of man do you take me for?"

"You misunderstand, my lord," Zhong Youshou whispered. "This humble commoner isn't trying to bribe you. I'm handing this strange object over to the authorities!"

"If my guess is correct, the evil reincarnation art our Zhong Clan ancestor practiced must be connected to this object. And this isn't some little handbell. It's a bell!"

"Our Zhong Clan ancestors originally bore the surname Tian. They changed it to Zhong, taking this bronze bell as their surname. During the previous dynasty, they even used it as the clan's totem."

"But only that ancestor of mine knew what was strange about it, because ordinary people never got to see this bell. It took me all sorts of inquiries just to learn this much."

"If ordinary people never got to see it, how did you manage to find anything out?" Wang Qilin asked.

"Who would guard against an idiot?" Zhong Youshou said.

The Tian clan, who had only just descended the mountain, were called back again. Zhong Youshou immediately arranged for someone to induce an abortion in the young married woman.

Wang Qilin wanted to supervise, then suddenly discovered that the bronze bell was gone.

He looked into his sea of consciousness. Flames surged beneath the Furnace of Creation, but it was not refining the bronze bell.

The bronze bell was sitting inside the furnace, rather than floating above its mouth to be refined.

Xu Da came over to him. "What are you standing there in a daze for?"

"Nothing." Wang Qilin set aside his questions about the bronze bell and first warned Xu Da, "You must never tell anyone the truth about this case. Otherwise, not only will the entire Zhong clan have all nine degrees of kinship exterminated, but we'll be killed to silence us as well!"

Xu Da nodded. "I know. We have to keep this secret. A moment's thrill spilling the beans, and the whole family ends up at the marketplace execution ground!"

One was a strongman and the other a Wandering Star. To the imperial court, they were as insignificant as flies. The imperial family would not preserve their lives at the risk of letting such a profoundly evil art as reincarnation and rebirth leak out.

That consideration had also played a part in Zhong Youshou giving him the bronze bell. He wanted to entangle Wang Qilin in this secret.

What remained uncertain now was what Du Cao would say.