Hidden Thread
Early the next morning, Long Tian went to Old Chen's Blacksmith Shop.
Morning mist still veiled the alley, and the shop door stood slightly ajar. When he squeezed through the gap, the forge had yet to be lit, and the shop was cold and deserted. Old Chen was crouched in a corner, sharpening a sickle. Hearing footsteps, he looked up at Long Tian, set down his whetstone, and tipped his chin toward the back courtyard.
Long Tian followed him into the little room in the back courtyard. Old Chen shut the door, felt around beneath the stove, and pulled out a small, unburned corner of paper. He held it out to Long Tian. Half a character remained on it-the upper half of "iron," written in vigorous strokes.
"Someone left this letter on my windowsill last night," Old Chen said quietly. "I burned it. But it said the Iron Guard Seventh Squad's file was taken out of the secret archives yesterday."
Long Tian took the scrap and glanced at it. Its edges were charred and curled, and the last of its warmth had long since faded. He held it in his palm and thought for a moment. "Who took it out?"
"It didn't say. But anyone who can enter the secret archives and take out a file has to be at least a captain in the Iron Guard. Your father only left the city last night, and someone pulled the file out today. The timing's too close to be a coincidence."
Long Tian fell silent for a moment. His father had only visited last night, and today the Seventh Squad's file had been taken out of the secret archives. That meant someone had been keeping an eye on the Iron Guard's old case files, or someone was watching the activity around the blacksmith shop. For no apparent reason, he remembered the gray-robed figure who had pressed a parchment map into his hand in the snow three years ago-Shen Mo. The man had claimed to be one of his father's former subordinates, but was he really?
"Grandpa Chen," Long Tian said, tucking the scrap of paper into his robe, "are you still safe here?"
Old Chen grinned, a row of fairly even teeth showing amid the wrinkles on his face. "I'm just an old blacksmith. Why would anyone watch me? Don't worry. You three kids wandering around the city are a much bigger target. Have you thought about how you're going to stay?"
"The age-group tournament," Long Tian said. "Chen Hao was going to enter anyway. Zhao Xiaopang and I can register as accompanying participants. Even if we lose, we'll be able to stay in the city a while longer."
Old Chen nodded, picked up the whetstone, and went back to sharpening the sickle. "Then go sign up. The age-group tournament is at the Martial Arts Square in the east of the city, and it runs for half a month. Stay at the inn for now. You can think about what comes after those two weeks when they're over."
Long Tian agreed, said goodbye to Old Chen, and returned to the inn. Zhao Xiaopang was still lazing in bed, and Chen Hao kicked him awake. Long Tian told them about the age-group tournament, and Chen Hao was already prepared-he had asked someone about the registration process before coming. That morning, the three went to the registration point beside the Martial Arts Square in the east of the city, filled out forms, had their cultivation levels checked, and collected their numbered badges. Chen Hao entered the thirteen-year-old group, Long Tian entered the eight-year-old group, and Zhao Xiaopang signed up as a volunteer event assistant, responsible for bringing water to the contestants and cleaning the platform, a role he cheerfully accepted.
On the way back from registration, Long Tian took an extra detour. Using the excuse that he was going to a bookshop to buy cultivation diagrams, he told Zhao Xiaopang and Chen Hao to return to the inn first, while he slowly made a circuit of the streets and alleys in the south of the city. He committed the route to memory-which alleys led to which streets, which intersections had guards posted, and which shops had the Iron Guard's gray banners hanging outside. As he walked, he used Shadow Dragon Power to sense the surrounding Soul Power fluctuations and watched for anyone tailing him.
After wandering for more than half a shichen, Long Tian made sure no one was behind him before returning to the inn.
That night, he sat cross-legged on his bed, spread the meridian diagram across his knees, and studied it by lamplight for the third time. In the area circled in vermilion, he had chewed over the sentence his father had copied down countless times: "If the dantian is the furnace and the Soul Rings are the charcoal, repeatedly temper the two Qis of light and darkness and return them to their origin." Though the steps that followed had been washed away, the words "repeatedly temper" at the beginning gave him a direction—rather than rush to find the method of Return to Origin, he would first practice the tempering process.
He first activated all three Soul Rings. Black, white, and a third color of light lit up in his dantian. The powers of light and darkness flowed back and forth along the inner walls of each Soul Ring, separated by those layers of "bridges" so that each followed its own path. He took a deep breath and tried to do as the diagram said-loosen a gap.
He carefully dimmed the luster of the layer of patterns on the inside of the First Soul Ring. The patterns had tightly connected the two forces of light and darkness, standing between them like a sluice gate pulled taut. Long Tian loosened a sliver, allowing only a tiny bit of the powers of light and darkness to brush past the edge of the gate on the Soul Ring's inner wall.
Hiss-a stabbing pain shot up from inside his dantian, like a red-hot needle piercing his meridians. He grunted, sweat breaking out on his forehead, but he did not stop. That sliver of mingled light and dark Qi crept slowly along his meridians, scorching their walls with heat and cold wherever it passed, the pains intertwining. But Long Tian noticed that the pain was much weaker than the agony that had nearly torn him apart when he brought his hands together three years ago. His meridians had been nourished and strengthened by the three Soul Rings over the past three years, and could withstand an impact of this degree.
He maintained that sliver of intermingling for one breath, two breaths, five breaths... At the tenth breath, the mass of Qi dispersed on its own, and light and darkness separated and returned to their places. Long Tian opened his eyes and panted for a while, then looked down at his hands. His palms were slightly red, but there were no injuries.
It could work.
He closed his eyes and tried again. Each time, he held it for two breaths longer than before. By the fourth attempt, he could already last around twenty breaths. Although the pain did not lessen during the process, he gradually grasped the trick to it-the pain was worst when light and darkness first mingled, then slowly subsided. As long as he endured that initial sharp sting, things would be much steadier afterward.
He practiced for five days straight. During the day, he accompanied Zhao Xiaopang around the city and went to the Martial Arts Square to look at the venue; at night, he shut himself in his room and repeatedly tempered the light and dark Qi. On the fifth night, he could already loosen the gate in the First Soul Ring by more than half, allowing light and darkness to mingle continuously along the Soul Ring's inner wall for nearly half the time it took to drink a cup of tea. The stabbing pain in his dantian had dulled, as though it were being slowly rubbed with sandpaper.
He tried loosening a gap in the Second Soul Ring's gate as well, carrying out both tempering processes at once. The pain doubled, but his meridians held. He gritted his teeth and endured for a dozen breaths or so, his clothes soaked through with sweat. When he finally collapsed onto the bed, exhausted, he was grinning.
Chen Hao pushed the door open to bring him water. Seeing him lying on the bed drenched in sweat like a boiled shrimp, he frowned but asked nothing. He set the bowl of water on the table and turned to leave. At the doorway, he paused. "The tournament starts tomorrow. Don't practice too late."
"I know." Long Tian rolled over and blew out the oil lamp. In the darkness, he felt for the edge of the rolled-up diagram against his chest, his fingers lingering on the rough paper.
Meanwhile, in a gray-brick building in the central district of Spirit City, two people sat facing each other in a secret room brightly lit by candles. A yellowed file lay open on the table. The ink on its cover had faded, but the words "Iron Guard Seventh Squad · Autumn of Year 2638 · Top Secret" were still legible. The person seated by the window turned to the inner pages, his gaze falling on a sheet bearing a diagram of the human meridian structure. It was almost identical to the one against Long Tian's chest, except that the area circled in vermilion was more detailed, and densely written annotations filled the blank space at the bottom of the page.
The person opposite spoke, his voice low. "One man from the Seventh Squad got away back then-Tie Shan. We've investigated him all these years. He's been hiding out as a blacksmith in some southwestern town, and he seems to have made a move recently."
"You found him?"
"We did. But we haven't made a move yet. That son of his is much more interesting than he is." The person reading the file closed it and tapped the cover twice. "Light and Dark Twin Dragons, three rings, eight years old. He's staying in the city now and has signed up for the age-group tournament. Tell me-is he following the same path as his father?"
The person opposite was silent for a long while. Candlelight flickered soundlessly over the table between them. The faded character for "secret" on the file's cover shifted between light and shadow, like a half-open eye watching quietly from the darkness.