The sword and the seal

Chen Du pondered the longsword in the stone casket for a while. The casket was intact and the seal undamaged, so he felt he could simply put it back. After a moment's hesitation, however, he picked up the sword.

The longsword felt heavy and solid in his hand, but it did not seem to have any particularly extraordinary qualities.

He looked at the seal again. Sure enough, the white dot was gone too.

Half the sun had sunk behind the western mountains.

The light on the mountain had noticeably dimmed, and the temperature had dropped considerably. Nightfall was only minutes away.

"Let's head down the mountain."

Chen Du spoke to Yunzhi.

"Yes!"

Yunzhi was noticeably more respectful.

Seeing that Chen Du had the longsword in one hand and Senior Xie tucked under the other, leaving him no hand to carry the two halves of the stone casket, and that there was still some wet mud on the casket, she volunteered to carry it. Whether they counted as two people and a cat or one person and two yao, they headed down the mountain path together.

A hidden fragrance rode the mountain breeze, and both were lost in thought.

"There's no need to be surprised. These were all left behind by the ancient patriarchs of my temple," Chen Du explained to her of his own accord. "That yao may have been sealed and suppressed here by an ancient patriarch too. Now that spiritual energy is recovering, and with centuries of movement in the earth's crust, something may have gone wrong with the seal, giving it a chance to escape."

"Yes..."

The lofty image of the immortal master in Yunzhi's heart showed no sign of diminishing because of his explanation. Instead, she thought, No wonder.

So this has been an immortal mountain and grotto-heaven since ancient times!

So the immortal master's patriarchs possessed such divine powers!

No wonder the immortal master has such vast divine powers!

Everything made sense now.

With such an ancient lineage, wouldn't her prospects be even brighter if she stayed on the mountain?

It seemed that when the immortal master had said "there's often activity on the mountain" that morning, he had sensed that a restriction on the mountain was coming loose and had made a special trip up to investigate.

And judging by the yao that had turned to smoke and fled today, even taking into account that it had only just broken free after being suppressed for so long and its cultivation was impaired, it probably still couldn't compare to her old friend. It must have escaped because the immortal master was still practicing a secret art and it was inadvisable for him to use his magical power or spells.

Isn't this just the opportunity I've been looking for?

The mountain breeze was still pleasant at night.

Since it was already dark by the time they returned, Chen Du wouldn't let Yunzhi cook dinner even though she offered. Instead, he took out two cups of instant noodles left behind by tourists.

Of course, her cooking really wasn't very good either.

"Follow my lead."

Chen Du slowed his movements. First, he turned the noodle cup around, then held the peel tab on the lid still so she could get a good look.

Yunzhi sat bolt upright, her eyes fixed on the cup. She turned it round and round in her hands like a juggler, feeling around it several times before finding the tab. Then she copied the immortal master and peeled it open, took out the fork as he did, and put in the seasoning packets one after another.

Whichever packet the immortal master picked up, she picked up; whichever he put in, she put in; however he squeezed a packet, she squeezed hers. She didn't dare change even the order.

This was not to be taken lightly. What she was learning was both a life skill and essential knowledge for fitting into this age!

As soon as the boiling water went in, a rich aroma quickly spread.

"Ah!"

That's the smell! That's what the immortal master's breakfast smelled like that morning!

"It's much like portable dry rations from ancient times. Just add boiling water, and you can eat it after a few minutes," Chen Du told her. "Halfway through, you can open it and give it a stir."

"Yes."

Yunzhi silently noted the detail.

The noodles were soon ready. Chen Du sat beneath the eaves with his back against the wall, eating as he thought about what had happened that day.

Yunzhi copied him and began to eat, and she was astonished.

It's so rich and delicious!

How could this be anything like ancient portable rations?

"Ah..."

For a moment, she felt like a beggar who had just entered the city.

No! I can't be like this!

Yunzhi, oh Yunzhi, you mustn't make a fuss. It'll make you look ignorant. You should be like the immortal master: even if Mount Tai collapsed before him, his expression wouldn't change. Even when he brought back an ancient sealed sword from the mountain, he just put it in his room and paid it no further attention. Even when a suppressed yao escaped, he wasn't in the least anxious to catch it again.

"I'm done. Take your time. When you finish, just pour out the soup and throw away the cup. Don't wash it clean and put it out to dry again."

Hmm? This cup is disposable too?

He doesn't want the cup, and he isn't drinking the soup either?

Yunzhi, who was in the middle of drinking her soup, froze on the spot.

Chen Du had already headed for the rear courtyard.

He was troubled, and he had been thinking things over.

First of all, the jade tablet stated clearly that the yao had once impersonated a door god and gone out to commit evil, causing panic. That was why the patriarch had suppressed it. It was probably no innocent creature. The fact that it had fled down the mountain without hesitation after breaking the seal probably bore this out.

The jade tablet beside the longsword was different.

The wording carved on the tablets was different too. The yao had been "suppressed," while the longsword had been "sealed away."

Could that be the difference between the black and white ink dots?

If a black ink dot represented a yao suppressed within the mountain, and a white ink dot represented a treasure sealed away within it, then the densely packed black and white ink dots that made up the entire mountain...

For a moment, Chen Du didn't know whether this was a fortuitous opportunity or a danger, whether he should be excited or worried.

Back in his living quarters, he picked up the longsword.

Its hilt and scabbard were made of dark wood, plain and archaic, with little ornamentation, but it was pleasing to the eye.

"Shing!"

Chen Du drew the longsword.

Under the light beneath the temple eaves.

Yunzhi held the noodle cup in one hand and a bug Senior Xie had just brought her as an extra snack in the other. She was torn over whether to pour out the soup like the immortal master, keep drinking it, or throw the bug in and cook it a little before continuing to drink. Suddenly, the hairs on her body stood on end.

Her scalp tingled, and goosebumps rose on her skin.

She turned to look. It was the rear courtyard, where she was not allowed to go.

This was nothing more than an ordinary iron sword.

The Daoist in the living quarters casually waved the longsword around. It made only a faint sound as it cut through the air. There was no surging sword qi, no disturbance of spiritual energy, and nothing else mysterious about it.

The longsword wasn't even sharp.

When he ran his hand along the blade, it felt a little thin but did not cut his flesh. It couldn't even cut through toilet paper easily, and was far less sharp than a kitchen cleaver.

It was more like a sword worn for decoration.

In that respect, it was almost the same as the other iron swords in the Daoist temple.

He recalled that people in ancient times really had often worn swords, a custom even more common among Daoist cultivators. Even in the present age, cultivators in Daoist temples often practiced swordplay to cultivate their character. Perhaps the patriarch back then had simply been unable to let go of his friend, and unwilling to see his friend's sword ravaged by the years, rusting and rotting away, had sealed it up as a keepsake.

"What use is this?"

Chen Du put down the longsword and continued thinking about the yao.

[A yao falsely claimed to be a door god and went out to commit evil, greatly alarming and disturbing the people. Suppressed for a hundred years.]

The hundred years had surely passed long ago.

Yet it had remained suppressed until now.

Chen Du thought it over and felt that it had most likely been suppressed sometime in the middle or late Ming dynasty. Before the hundred years were up, the spiritual energy of heaven and earth had begun to run dry.

That patriarch might not have become an immortal, but died a natural death, and with spiritual energy running dry afterward, the temple's lineage had also been broken. The yao itself should have returned to being ordinary as spiritual energy ran dry, and might very well not even have lived to see the change of dynasty. But perhaps because the seal was so powerful, it had somehow produced an effect similar to Yunzhi sealing and suppressing herself, allowing it to survive the centuries when spiritual energy had run dry until now. In all that time, no one had been capable of finding it, waking it, and releasing it.

Of course, these were all Chen Du's guesses, but he thought they were quite reasonable.

That left a great many questions.

Once the spiritual energy of heaven and earth ran dry, the yao would inevitably have fallen asleep too, and those centuries of sleep would have passed in an instant for it. Did that count as being suppressed? The patriarch had suppressed it for a hundred years, so was that term over now or not?

Chen Du quickly shook his head and cast the thought aside.

That was looking at it from the perspective of the temple's patriarch. In truth, he had neither the standing nor the ability to decide the matter.

And yet it also concerned him closely-

Would the yao think that the patriarch's suppression had helped it escape a great upheaval of heaven and earth, and be grateful for it?

It was possible, but he couldn't count on being that lucky.

Then, having been suppressed here and having escaped from here, would it bear a grudge?

Today, it had also seemed to sense him, turning to look at him before fleeing in a panic. Had it seen him and been frightened off for the moment?

Would it come back for revenge?

Chen Du had only gained magical power for the first time today by swallowing a spirit fruit. He had not even worked out a method of qi cultivation, and still couldn't freely control the magical power in his body, much less use any spells. Faced with an ancient yao that a patriarch had suppressed for a hundred years, he was clearly little different from someone who had never cultivated qi.

If it learned that the Earth Sage Temple's lineage had now been broken, and that he was the only person left in the temple, yet a treasure tree could still grow there and it was a grotto-heaven blessed land, would it come looking for trouble?

After leaving and going down the mountain, would it cause chaos as it had in ancient times, alarming and alerting the outside world, or even exposing him?

If he was exposed, his cat would be exposed too. Even he, a human, felt a trace of unease, so what would become of his cat?

Chen Du was deeply troubled.

"The ancient patriarch knew the yao might break free. Could he really have left no way to deal with it? Or did he leave one, only for it to be lost amid all the violent upheavals of history?"

Should he pretend not to know now, or try to take action?

With his head aching, Chen Du took out the jade tablet again.

As its spiritual resonance dissipated, the vermilion seal impression in the lower right corner also seemed to have grown somewhat blurry.

"This really was stamped with that seal, wasn't it?"

Seeing that they were about the same size and that the characters were nearly identical, Chen Du took out the seal and compared it with the impression.

The two matched perfectly, without the slightest difference.

But the moment they matched, the spiritual energy of heaven and earth on the mountain seemed to stir.

"Hmm?"

Sensing that something was amiss, Chen Du immediately sat down solemnly at the desk. He took out some vermilion seal paste, worked the seal into it again and again, then carefully aligned it with the impression and stamped it onto the jade tablet.

Whoosh! The mountain wind burst through the window!

The curtains were flung high, and the papers on the desk rustled wildly. Starlight like fine sand, moonlight like flowing water, and the pure aura and spiritual resonance of the mountain all seemed to answer a summons. They surged into the jade tablet through the small impression left by the seal, forming mysteries beyond observation or comprehension, and in the blink of an eye were all drawn into the tablet.