The first shadow to show itself slipped through the Fang grounds and soon reached the ancestral hall. With a single roll of its body, it went inside.
Fang Zesheng now lay under house arrest there. Fang Lin had not mistreated him—merely stripped away his authority and forbidden him to leave.
The shadow strode into the hall. Fang Zesheng had not yet turned in, but sat kneeling before the soul tablets of the Fang forebears.
The shadow spoke: "Fang Lin has gone out. I have a bad feeling about this. Should we—"
"Let him be." Fang Zesheng did not turn around. "He has grown up. It is only natural he wants to prove himself."
"But—"
"There is no 'but.' It was my own selfishness that cost us the finest young man of the next generation of the Fang clan. Now the trade route through the State of Yun has failed too, and compared to the other two clans, the Fang have no future. If Fang Lin wants to gamble, then let him take one gamble.
If he wins, so much the better. If he loses, I, as his father, will cover for him. Even if I have to stake the entire Fang clan, as long as he truly grows in the end. I am willing."
The shadow said nothing more.
It was loyal to Fang Zesheng alone.
Faced with Fang Lin's seizing of power, Fang Zesheng had never truly lacked the strength to resist. He had merely indulged his son's choice once again.
...
Jiang Chen kept a careful distance. His deepening mastery of the Four-Spirit Body Refining Art let him command his flesh with precision. He could keep pace with his quarry without calling on the power of Dao arts.
He did not need to keep up with Fang Lin—only with the shadow who was tracking Fang Lin.
Easily avoiding the city guards patrolling the night, the three shadows sped through the city, one after another, and left Maple Forest City through the southern gate.
And the city guard camp lay just beyond the southern outskirts.
"What is Fang Lin trying to do?"
Jiang Chen hesitated, weighing whether to send some word to Wei Feng and Zhao Lang. But thinking of the Bureau's hidden sentry ahead, he decided against it.
A man of the Justice Enforcement Bureau was bound to have a way to contact the authorities at a moment's notice. If anything truly went wrong, there would be no delay.
He soon noticed the route shifting.
They swung wide around the city guard camp, continuing south.
To the southeast of Maple Forest City lay Fengxi Town, and farther on, the direction of the Three Mountains City. Due south, past the guard camp, stood only Ox-Head Mountain—nothing singular about it had ever been heard of.
By Jiang Chen's reasoning, if there really were a heretic cult, a lair of the left path, they would hardly hide themselves right under the nose of the city guard.
Maple Forest's guard army was formidable, and with Wei Feng's breakthrough, the city now boasted one chief general and two deputy generals, all at the Soaring Dragon realm, plus five deputy generals at the Grand Unity realm—enough strength to take on any force. Once they unfurled their battle-array tactics, they could raze cities and take strongholds outright.
But Fang Lin truly did climb Ox-Head Mountain.
Ox-Head Mountain had two humps, shaped like ox horns, which was how it came by its name.
The peak was not high, the scenery unremarkable. No bandits made their nest there, no ferocious beasts ran rampant. Even if there had been, the the city guard's training exercises would have swept them clean.
Yet this ordinary mountain, at this moment, suddenly gave Jiang Chen the feeling of a man-eating beast. He could not say from where this crushing pressure came.
Looking back from here toward the guard camp, the campfires had become pinpricks of light.
Jiang Chen forced the unease down and followed the distant shadow up the mountain.
Whatever the cost, at least he had to know whom Fang Lin had come to meet. That alone would close the case. And with his eighth-rank Zhou Heavenly realm cultivation, the perfected Violet Dawn Sword, and his Flamebloom Dao art brought to full mastery, with the Bureau cultivator ahead as warning, he judged he could escape if anything unexpected arose.
Every so often a strange bird-call sounded, making the mountain woods seem even quieter.
The unease only grew.
Jiang Chen's grip on his sword tightened, but he did not draw it; the gleam of a blade could well give him away.
"Shh..."
Suddenly a waft of fragrant breeze surged over him. Jiang Chen felt himself wrapped in something warm and soft, and a hand covered his lips.
His body stiffened, then relaxed. It was not that he had no room to react—it was that he had recognized who it was.
"White Lotus?" he asked in a low voice, once that hand gradually slipped away.
The hand slid from his lips, seized his chin, and turned his face fully around.
And so Jiang Chen saw White Lotus, whose face was veiled with that black-mesh spirit artifact.
"Why are you here?" Her gaze was fierce, but her voice was kept very low.
It seemed on this Ox-Head Mountain, too, there were beings even she had to be wary of.
Jiang Chen gestured with a finger toward the distance, indicating he had tracked someone here.
White Lotus released his chin, then abruptly grabbed his hand.
"Come with me!"
Her robes fluttered; she darted through the mountain woods like a night bird, and soon vanished from sight.
...
And almost at that very moment, Fang Lin, high on the mountain, suddenly turned his head!
The one who had tracked Fang Lin all the way here was indeed the Bureau's hidden sentry.
He was Shan Cha's right-hand man, assigned to this task for his shrewdness and capability. Throughout the journey he had been careful, always keeping his distance.
But when he saw Fang Lin turn his head in the distance, he knew at once that something was wrong.
Without a second word, he shook out a stick of yellow alarm incense, ran a single fingertip across it to strike a spark, and made to light it.
The instant the yellow incense caught, the Bureau would immediately know. When the yellow incense burned to ash, that meant the one who had lit it had fallen into mortal peril.
But this stick of yellow incense... did nothing. No matter what, it refused to light!
He went to form a hand-seal to summon fire, when a long, pale, slender hand reached over and lightly took the stick away.
Then he felt himself grow feather-light, and began to float.
Higher and higher.
It was only then that he realized the figure still standing there dumbly, its hand still raised in the seal-casting posture—was not that himself?
Then what was he now? A soul?
Terror seized him; he struggled. But it was all pointless.
A violent agony came flooding over him, "submerging" him, shattering him into pieces.
The man with the bone mask loosened his grip and let the broken, shredded soul drift away.
"A man of the Justice Enforcement Bureau, after all." The one who had already gotten the intelligence laughed softly. "Shan Cha does have a commendable nerve."
Fang Lin stood among the mountain trees, watching from afar the Bone Mask Messenger ripping out the soul and drawing it away to interrogate.
He could not hold back the chill welling from the depth of his heart, but his expression remained calm.
From the moment he had chosen to place his own father under house arrest, he had understood what choice he had made.
It was his own choice.
He could only rely on himself now. He had to grow—and there could never again be any turning back.
"The Justice Enforcement Bureau has set its eye on me. What do I do now?" he asked.
"That man is dead, which is as good as admitting there is something wrong with me."
"What is wrong with you?" The Bone Mask Messenger's voice was genuinely surprised. "Is there anything unusual about a hidden sentry dying in the line of duty? Who can prove his death has anything to do with you?"
"Milord." Fang Lin was both aggrieved and resigned. "I serve you in all sincerity. I have done everything I could, and there is no road back! Please, stop toying with me."
"No, no. I am not toying with you. I speak to you in all sincerity too. If the Bureau investigates the Fang clan, what could they possibly find?"
"Nothing. I have already cleaned up every loose end. And besides... I do not even truly know what meaning the tasks you had me carry out were meant to have. The Bureau will find nothing at all."
"Then let them investigate."
Fang Lin sighed. "But sometimes they do not need evidence."
"That is true for ordinary people." The Bone Mask Messenger laughed. "But do not forget, you are a student of the Dao Academy."
"I do have suspicion on me. The Academy will not necessarily protect me, will they?"
"Poor boy. You have no idea what you possess." The Bone Mask Messenger let out two chuckles and turned to walk back into the mountain. "Today's affair is cancelled. Go back."