Qingshan

Chapter 75 : Chapter 75

Chapter 75: The Rescue

In the night.

Chen Ji returned to the rooftop's edge and stood upon the high, overhanging eaves, calmly looking down.

Did the Heir have something to hide?

If he did, the man had spent three years at Donglin Academy and couldn't have accomplished anything suspicious.

If he didn't, then it was awfully convenient that he'd returned precisely now and turned up at Jin Fang of all places.

Chen Ji frowned, trying to piece together the clues. There were far too many missing.

In the courtyard below.

The Heir realized the jianghu swordsmen had abandoned him and spun around, cursing. "Aren't they supposed to be jianghu heroes? Don't they always preach about brotherhood and loyalty? This is beyond disloyal!"

The six agents had already charged into the courtyard and had the Heir and Baili pinned against the wall. One spoke coldly: "Resisting arrest means heavier charges."

Baili spoke up. "We're--"

Before she could finish, the Heir gave her sleeve a discreet tug and cut in: "We're just ordinary citizens here for a night out in Red Cloth Lane. We haven't broken any laws. Why are you chasing us?"

The agents studied them closely, seemingly trying to make out their features by moonlight. After a moment, one hesitated. "...The Heir? The Princess? I recognize you. The Secret Spy Division has solid evidence that Jing Dynasty agents are operating inside Jin Fang tonight. Your presence here is far too convenient. You'll need to come with us to the Inner Prison."

The Heir's heart sank. The Ceremonial Directorate had been looking for leverage against Prince Jing's household for years. Many of the Prince's former retainers had been taken into the Inner Prison and never come out again.

Once inside the Inner Prison, his title wouldn't matter.

Seven years ago, Prince Huai had been arrested by the Secret Spy Division for secretly hoarding armor and hand crossbows, and died in the Inner Prison that same night. Six years ago, during the great drought in the central provinces, Prince Jin had remarked over wine that the drought was heaven's punishment for Emperor Ning's negligence in governance. The Secret Spy Division had seized him on charges of "invoking false prophecies" and thrown him into the Inner Prison. He died within the month -- along with two senior astronomers from the Imperial Observatory.

The Heir knew full well that Ning Dynasty princes were no more than wild grass before the Eunuch Faction. If he entered the Inner Prison today, he might never walk out.

With that thought, the Heir laced his fingers together to form a step. "Baili, you go first!"

The agents' expressions turned cold. "Nobody's leaving. If the Heir has nothing to hide, why not come with us willingly?"

The Heir spat a curse, snatched up a bamboo broom from the courtyard, and planted himself between the agents and Baili. "Go with you to the Inner Prison, where even innocence becomes guilt? Then come and get me! If you have the guts, kill me right here!"

Chen Ji watched in silence from above.

Save them, or don't?

If he didn't, the Heir and Baili would inevitably be dragged into the Inner Prison no matter how hard they fought. Jinzhu was already hunting for evidence that Prince Jing's household was colluding with the Jing Dynasty. Catching the Heir and Baili here tonight was a gift landing right in his lap -- he could easily manufacture a pretext for interrogation under torture.

If he did, six agents were no easy task, and reinforcements could arrive at any moment. More importantly, Chen Ji had come here tonight to kill Shopkeeper Yuan, not to rescue anyone.

And yet, on this same Red Cloth Lane, on this same kind of night -- how pleasant it would have been to finish the wine first, then stroll to the Drum Tower to watch the sunrise.

The strip of cloth around Chen Ji's right hand was wrapped tight, and the short blade he gripped was slick with blood that slowly traced down the edge, gathering into a single crimson bead at the tip before it dropped onto the grey tile.

By the time the blood hit the tile, Chen Ji had vanished from where he stood.

...

...

"Come on, then!" The Heir swept the broom in a wide arc, trying to drive the agents back.

But these were the Secret Spy Division's elite -- hardly the sort he could hold off. The six agents fanned out in a crescent. One stepped in and swung his saber in a casual chop that sheared the broom clean in half.

The Heir stared at the shorn stub in his hands, bitterness flooding his chest. He spoke in a strained voice. "I'll go with you. But let my sister go. She's just a girl -- what could she know?"

The agent shook his head. "Nobody's leaving. If not for your distinguished status, we wouldn't be wasting breath on pleasantries. Come to the Inner Prison quietly, and neither of you will be harmed. Once we've verified your innocence, you'll be released."

The Heir's voice hardened. "How many people walk into the Inner Prison and walk back out? Do you honestly believe that yourselves? Aren't you afraid Prince Jing's household will settle this score?"

"Your Highness, we've arrested full-blooded princes in our time. You won't intimidate us. Move in. Seize them."

Several agents rushed forward.

The Heir tried to resist, but one agent slipped past his guard and drove a fist into his stomach. He doubled over in agony, vomiting wine and bile onto the flagstones.

These killers from the Secret Spy Division truly did not care about his title. They knew exactly how badly their superior wanted Prince Jing's household brought down. Allegiance determined mentality.

In the scuffle, someone wrenched Baili's arms behind her back. Cold sweat beaded on her forehead from the pain, but she didn't cry out, only stared defiantly at the agent before her.

In the chaos, her gaze swept across the courtyard -- and suddenly she went still.

One of the agents sensed something wrong and spun around with trained alertness.

In the same breath, he raised his saber to slash behind him -- but his arm had barely risen past his head when a figure closed in silently from the darkness.

A hand clamped onto his arm like an iron vise, freezing the blow mid-swing.

In the space of a heartbeat, the shadow braced against the man's locked arm and drove his short blade in twice -- once into the kidney at the waist, once beneath the ribs into the lung. The knife in his hand darted like a viper's tongue, lethal and merciless.

A nearby agent, horrified, chopped his saber down in a rescue strike. But the figure deflected it with a casual flick of his short blade. Steel met steel in the darkness, throwing sparks, and with a sharp ring, the long saber snapped.

The agents' faces changed. They had seen more jianghu blade masters than they could count, but never one who shattered swords as easily as snapping twigs.

No blade aura. No arcane enforcer techniques. The man had simply flicked his short knife, and their forged steel had cracked like an icicle.

Baili, still pinned by an agent, stared at the figure. His face was smeared with black charcoal, his eyes unfamiliar. But no matter how she looked at his frame, it felt achingly familiar.

Then she noticed it. The killer in the darkness, weaving and pivoting through the fight, seemed to have trouble with his right leg.

He seemed to know the leg was a weakness, and was doing his best to hide it. But a serious wound couldn't be hidden no matter how hard one tried.

Baili thought of someone. Someone whose leg was injured too.

And yet she couldn't, no matter how she tried, reconcile the image of that quiet apprentice who swept the clinic floor with the ruthless killer before her eyes.

It was as though two figures existed -- one in light, one in shadow -- inherently contradictory.

Her expression grew complicated.

Then she saw the agents draw hand crossbows from behind their backs and take aim. She cried out before she could think: "Watch out -- crossbows!"

The courtyard went still. Chen Ji hoisted the agent's body in front of him as a shield, and from behind the man's drooping head, half of Chen Ji's charcoal-blackened face peered out, calmly regarding the crossbows in the agents' hands.

The agent he held was coughing up bloody foam, his pierced lung failing.

The dying man coughing blood. The cold-eyed killer hiding behind him. One still, one fading -- the scene was as brutal as it was enigmatic.

Baili watched, and the answer she'd been forming wavered again. The person in her memory always wore a smile, as if he would never raise his voice in anger. Even when questioned, he only lowered his head in silence, offering no rebuttal.

The agents searched for a firing angle but couldn't find one.

In the standoff, the wounded agent's eyes finally closed. His saber arm fell limp, and the long blade slipped from his fingers.

Chen Ji dropped the short knife without hesitation and caught the falling saber.

In the instant he reached for it, a crossbow bolt hissed toward his exposed face.

Everyone's vision blurred. Chen Ji tilted his head the merest fraction, and the bolt sailed past. By the time it thudded into the wall behind him, his head had already returned to its original position, still shielded behind the dead agent, still calmly watching them all.

Before the agents could reload, Chen Ji charged forward, shoving the corpse like a battering ram. Bolts thudded into the dead man's body or flew wide.

He closed the distance.

Chen Ji cast the body aside and sprang from behind it, engaging the four remaining agents in close combat. Sabers shattered one after another.

The agents had never felt so powerless. The killer before them seemed to have no openings at all. Every shift, every pivot guarded his entire body -- an impenetrable fortress.

Four against one, and they still couldn't find a single chance for a killing blow.

A killing blow? They couldn't even wound him. Their blades barely managed to nick his clothes, never drawing a drop of blood.

The agents didn't know what style this was. Every famous school of saber in the jianghu could be named on one hand, and none of them had ever heard of technique this watertight.

What they didn't know was that whenever Chen Ji showed even a sliver of an opening against Fenghuai, it was seized and punished instantly. One opening meant one more death.

That merciless, extreme forging had ensured that defense -- not offense -- was the first thing Chen Ji learned.

You cannot attack until you cannot die.

The agent holding Baili pressed his blade against her neck. "Drop your weapon. Or I kill her right now."

But Chen Ji acted as though he were deaf. He continued fighting without the slightest pause in his blade.

The agent froze. Escorting the Princess to the Inner Prison was one thing. Slitting her throat right here was another matter entirely.

He gritted his teeth, released Baili, and charged in to reinforce his comrades.

Baili was free. Yet she didn't run. She stood rooted to the spot, watching the fight, calling out warnings: "Watch your back!"

The reinforcing agent lunged in with a diagonal slash aimed at Chen Ji's spine.

Chen Ji heard the warning and spun. His saber followed his body's turn.

The two blades crashed together head-on. Chen Ji twisted his wrist, and his edge rode up against the incoming blade, scraping sparks in a shower of firelight.

The agent's eyes, dazzled by the sparks, couldn't react before Chen Ji reversed his grip and raked the blade upward -- from wrist to throat.

Blood sprayed.

Chen Ji looked toward Baili and the Heir. His voice was low and hard. "Go. Stop getting in the way."

The Heir opened his mouth to say they should all leave together, but Baili pressed her lips together and pulled him toward the wall. "Move. We can't help him here -- we'll only break his focus. Once we're gone, he can leave too."

"Oh -- right." The Heir scrambled after her.

An agent tried to give chase but was cut down by a single stroke.

Chen Ji stood at the base of the wall, saber held low and level, coldly barring the agents' path. Blood dripped steadily from the blade, and its smooth surface reflected the blood-red moon overhead.

Once the Heir had cleared the wall, Baili sat astride the top, her face smudged with grime. She glanced back. Thinking of the jianghu swordsmen who had fled, and then at the blood-soaked figure fighting alone below, her expression grew complicated. "Be careful."

Then she dropped down the other side and ran.

The courtyard fell quiet. Only three agents remained, spread in a crescent, pressing Chen Ji against the wall. They shifted their footwork, searching for his openings, finding none.

Just as they settled in for a standoff, waiting for reinforcements, Chen Ji attacked.

Once, sparring against Fenghuai, every death had left him frustrated. But now he understood. The saber arts bought with countless deaths were his reward.

Four figures wove together. The blade in Chen Ji's hand arced like crescent moons, breaking three sabers and cutting three throats.

...

...

Chen Ji stood bent over, panting. He picked up the short knife he had dropped and tucked it back into his sleeve.

He didn't flee. Instead, he climbed the ladder back onto the roof.

Limping, he made his way to the ridgeline and lay flat on his stomach, peering down into Red Cloth Lane.

Below, countless disheveled patrons and pleasure-house girls had been herded out of the various establishments by the agents.

Chen Ji scanned the crowd for Shopkeeper Yuan. Tonight's handoff was the most critical event -- the man couldn't possibly have stayed away.

Yet as building after building was emptied and everyone was driven onto the flagstone lane, he still couldn't find Shopkeeper Yuan anywhere.

Something was wrong.

This was nothing like what Chen Ji had expected.

Red Cloth Lane was not in chaos. Nobody was trying to breach the Secret Spy Division's perimeter, nobody was fighting the agents, and the Trouble-Solver Guards that Jinzhu had specially requisitioned from Mengjin Camp hadn't even been deployed.

Lin Chaoqing sat calmly on his horse, bamboo hat low over his eyes. "Lord Jinzhu, it seems you're no different from Jiaotu and Yunyang after all. Though I suppose you were luckier -- at least you didn't dig up a Grand Secretary's father's coffin... The Chief Punishment Division's Trouble-Solver Guards and Fish-Dragon Guards serve as the Inner Court's personal escort troops, yet we're dragged out day after day to share in your disgrace."

"Don't be hasty." Jinzhu hopped down from his horse with a smile and seized a middle-aged man who'd been trying to slink away. His tone was friendly. "What's your name?"

"This humble one is Wu Dongliang."

"And what do you do?"

"I'm a tax clerk in Xin'an County..."

Jinzhu raised an eyebrow. "A mere tax clerk. Why were you running?"

He didn't need the answer. Ning Dynasty law forbade officials from visiting brothels. Elegant singing troupes were borderline acceptable, but being caught in a place like Red Cloth Lane meant immediate dismissal.

The law had been set by the founding emperor. By now everyone turned a blind eye, but every so often some unlucky official was exposed and stripped of his post.

Jinzhu cursed his luck under his breath and ordered his agents to verify the man's identity. Then he moved to another middle-aged man. "And you? What's your business?"

"Reporting to my lord, this humble one is a Hui merchant. I've come to Luocheng to buy furs and sell them in the south... Here is my travel pass."

Jinzhu took the pass and glanced at it. One look told him the man had only arrived in Luocheng that evening.

He smiled thinly. "Search. Check every last person's identity. See if there's anyone suspicious."

By now Jinzhu's heart was sinking fast. He had not expected to trip at the finish line like this. Where had things gone wrong?

The agents began methodically screening every individual. These people were southern Hui merchants, northern Shanxi traders, common street peddlers, petty gang leaders from Luocheng -- every one of them could clearly account for their background. Their household registrations and travel passes showed no sign of forgery.

Chen Ji watched in silence.

Apart from the two black-clad men he had killed on the rooftop, not a single person down there looked like one of Shopkeeper Yuan's agents.

Were they simply that well-disguised?

No. That wasn't it. Chen Ji scanned the lane more carefully and realized that the madam and Yan'er were also missing from the crowd.

Someone had tipped them off. Jinzhu's operation had been leaked in advance.

That was why the madam and Yan'er had fled before the raid.

Chen Ji suddenly recalled something. When the carter -- the Division Officer -- had interrogated him at the Hundred Deer Pavilion, the man had mentioned knowing exactly which evidence Yunyang and Jiaotu had seized from Liu Shiyu's home. There was a mole planted right beside Jinzhu.

A mole with access to the Secret Spy Division's seized evidence and clearance to learn of tonight's operation.

Chen Ji was certain that with Jinzhu's level of caution, he would have kept tonight's plan under the tightest possible lock. Yet the information had still leaked.

Who?

Just then, Jinzhu whipped his head toward the rooftop. "Who's up there? Seize him!"