Chapter 73: Assassination on Flower Street
The night in Xianglong City was destined to be extraordinarily lively.
"Someone is following me."
As soon as Qin Mu stepped out of the city lord's mansion, he immediately sensed he was being followed. The cultivators from the mansion made no effort to conceal themselves—they likely felt there was no need to hide their tracks from a minor martial artist like Qin Mu, so they openly trailed behind him.
At this moment, flower parade floats were making their way through the city. The merchants had constructed floats several zhang tall, shaped like enormous exotic beasts and various deities and demons, with dancing girls performing gracefully atop them. The dancers were dressed in flamboyant attire, their costumes modeled after the stone statues from various villages. Walking along Flower Street, Qin Mu felt as though he had entered a world of wild gods and demons dancing in chaos.
Flower Street was deafeningly noisy, packed with people pressing against one another. Besides lanterns hanging on both sides of the street, there were also tall stone pillars topped with stone basins filled with burning oil, blazing fiercely.
There were also performers on stilts over ten zhang tall, each step covering six or seven zhang. These stilt-walkers held torches in one hand and gourds of oil in the other, taking a mouthful of oil and spraying it at their torches, sending streams of fire snakes several zhang long into the air.
The scene was lively and prosperous, yet it carried the wild, untamed savagery of the Great Ruins.
As Qin Mu walked through the crowd, the sky suddenly blazed with light. Thin threads had silently filled the air, crisscrossing and interweaving. These threads suddenly expanded, transforming into enormous silver dragons that swam back and forth above Flower Street at incredible speed.
As the silver dragons moved, one could see they were composed of countless written characters. They emitted a thunderous, demonic chant—obscure, profound, and incomprehensible.
Boom. Boom.
Violent tremors echoed through the air, accompanied by pillars of light shooting skyward. The light struck the darkness above Xianglong City and was absorbed without the slightest ripple. Even the terrifying shockwaves that crashed into the darkness vanished like stones dropped into the sea—no trace, no sound.
The crowd below grew even more excited, cheering wildly, completely unaware that what was happening above them was not fireworks but terrifyingly powerful beings locked in combat. Fortunately, the shockwaves were directed upward into the darkness of the sky; otherwise, the casualties among the common folk below would have been incalculable.
The silver dragons darted back and forth, and in the flickering light, several fearsome figures appeared like gods and demons—these were Xianglong City Lord Fu Yundi, the Black Venerable, the sallow-faced woman, and others, clashing in midair.
Qin Mu moved quickly through the crowd. This was not a safe place. Although the shockwaves from these powerful beings' battles were all directed skyward, what if one happened to strike downward?
That would mean rivers of blood, countless corpses!
Thunderous booms continued to echo above Xianglong City, rolling back and forth at incredible speed—one moment over the eastern district, the next over the western district, moving like lightning.
Behind him, the cultivators from the city lord's mansion continued their pursuit. Even as Qin Mu wove through the crowd, he couldn't shake them off.
"What happened tonight is truly bizarre. But I've caused trouble—I couldn't restrain my killing intent and slew the city lord's son. I need to notify Granny and Blind Grandpa as soon as possible and get out of here!"
Qin Mu was about to quicken his pace when suddenly a dragon's roar sounded from behind. A cultivator with a green dragon coiled around his body lunged at him. When he was still six or seven zhang away, the green dragon shot through the crowd, about to strike Qin Mu!
Just as Qin Mu prepared to dodge, a length of white silk dropped from a building beside the street, wrapping around the cultivator's neck and yanking him out of the crowd, pulling him up into a room on the upper floor.
Several young women rushed forward, hidden blades in their sleeves, and plunged them into the cultivator's chest.
Qin Mu looked up and recognized them—they were the young ladies who had invited him up when he first entered the city.
He continued forward, passing an alley. Inside the alley, a cultivator wearing a bamboo hat saw him pass by, shook his body, and a towering wave surged forth from the alley as if from nowhere. The wave coiled like a giant serpent, opening its maw to bite down at Qin Mu, with silver fish hidden within the wave—likely spirit weapons.
At that moment, the building next to the alley was a blacksmith's shop. The blacksmith was a giant over one zhang and six or seven chi tall, forging an iron long blade. The handle was one zhang five, the blade one zhang six. The giant grabbed the blade and, with a single thrust, pierced through the wall into the alley, impaling the bamboo-hat cultivator through the chest and pinning him to the wall.
The giant blacksmith then withdrew his blade, wiped off the blood, and continued forging, the flames in his furnace blazing fiercely.
Qin Mu stood stunned for a moment, then continued on. The gongs and drums on Flower Street were deafening. Figures leaped and bounded across the rooftops on both sides—cultivators from the city lord's mansion, rapidly closing in on Qin Mu.
One cultivator leaped down, but before he could land, a snake in a snake charmer's cage nearby suddenly extended its head. The snake's head grew enormous, opened its mouth, and swallowed the falling cultivator whole. Then it shrank back down and returned to its cage.
Several other cultivators landed and pushed through the crowd. One passed by a wine shop. The shopkeeper's assistant was happily watching the parade floats when he suddenly grabbed a large wine jar and, without a word, slammed it over the cultivator's head. The cultivator fell into the jar, his flesh and bones dissolving instantly, turning into a jar of wine.
The assistant set the jar down properly and sealed the opening.
Of the other cultivators from the city lord's mansion, one encountered a drunkard in the crowd who blasted him with a stream of fire, reducing him to ashes. Another ran into an assassin who slit his throat in the crowd. Another was pulled into a float by the women inside and was never heard from again.
Qin Mu walked the entire way, witnessing all this, his heart filled with shock and uncertainty. The cultivators sent to kill him by the city lord's mansion were numerous, yet they all died silently in the crowd.
"Who exactly is helping me? Could it be the Heavenly Demon Cult? Do they really have this much power in the city?"
He arrived at the inn and was about to enter when he suddenly saw Blind Man.
Beside the inn was a gambling house. Blind Man was being dragged out by two men in black and thrown to the ground. One of them kicked Blind Man hard in the backside and spat: "You're blind, yet you dare to cheat right in front of us? Do you take us for blind men too?"
Qin Mu hurried over, but Blind Man had already picked himself up, dusted off his backside, and called into the gambling house: "My bamboo staff!"
The door creaked open, and a bamboo staff was tossed out, bouncing off Blind Man's forehead.
Blind Man picked up his staff and chuckled: "My luck was off this time. Next time, I guarantee you won't be able to tell I'm cheating, and I'll win back everything with interest! Mu'er, is that you? Speaking of which, I encountered something interesting tonight. I saw a big mother bird all dressed up pretty going out for a stroll, with a little father bird following along."
Qin Mu was puzzled. "Just two birds, what's so strange about that? Grandpa Blind, let's go back to the inn."
The two returned to their room at the inn. Granny Si's startled cry came from inside, and Qin Mu hurried in to find Granny Si holding a money pouch, looking utterly astonished.
Qin Mu froze for a moment, then quickly pushed open the window and looked outside. The silver dragon formed by the Great Nurturing Heavenly Demon Sutra was still battling the fearsome beings above Xianglong City. He turned back—Granny Si was right there in the room. He was thoroughly confused.
"Could it be that the cult leader's wife I met at the city lord's mansion wasn't Granny Si?"
Qin Mu felt increasingly strange but smiled and said: "Granny, did you just get back? I brought some food for you and Grandpa Blind." He took out an oil-paper bundle, placed it on the table, and gently unfolded it.
Granny Si's cloudy old eyes showed a touch of emotion. She sat down unsteadily and smiled: "Mu'er is indeed filial. What's this pouch of dragon coins about?"
Qin Mu looked at her eyes, puzzled. Granny Si's gaze was indeed very similar to that of the Heavenly Demon Cult leader's wife, and the scent of rouge on her was exactly the same.
But then why was there still a silver dragon formed by the Great Nurturing Heavenly Demon Sutra outside?
He steadied himself and recounted his encounter in the alley.
Granny Si's expression turned strange. She stammered: "You used one dragon coin to earn over three thousand dragon coins? If I'd known you had that much money, I would have gone out carousing long ago instead of scamming meals."
Qin Mu then told her about meeting the beautiful woman at the city lord's mansion and what had happened there. "Granny, I killed the city lord's son. This place isn't safe—we need to leave as soon as possible!"
Granny Si pulled a jade hairpin from her hair and waved it. Suddenly, a thin thread flew in through the window. The thread automatically wound itself around the hairpin, forming a spool within a single breath, and she tossed it into her basket. She chuckled: "I turned the wife of Xianglong City's lord into a cow, and you killed his son. That Xianglong City Lord is truly unlucky. But there are even worse things waiting for him. He has committed too many evils—this is his due retribution. Those dragon coins are yours, earned by your own hand. Keep them; they may prove useful someday."
From outside came a series of earth-shaking roars. One voice was clearly the Black Venerable, shouting furiously: "The cult leader's wife has escaped!"
"Search everywhere! Find her no matter what!"
"It's pitch black out there—that demoness can't escape the city!"
...
Blind Man listened to the commotion outside, then suddenly said: "That young General Qin is staying here and won't leave. He carries the Map of the Yong River, so naturally he's waiting for the State Preceptor of Yankang. The State Preceptor is about to launch a campaign against the Great Ruins. This Xianglong City will bear the brunt of it. Young General Qin is staying at the city lord's mansion, which means Xianglong City Lord Fu Yundi has already reached an agreement with him. When the time comes, Xianglong City will be the first stronghold for invading the Great Ruins. This city is large enough to hold several hundred thousand troops."
Granny Si smiled warmly: "So Fu Yundi is going to die."
Blind Man nodded. "He must die. Mu'er killed his son. If Mu'er leaves the city, he will surely give chase—and that will be his death. The Great Ruins is not a place where the State Preceptor of Yankang can set foot. He'd best go back where he came from."
Qin Mu looked at Blind Man, then at Granny Si, unsure what scheme they were cooking up.
But come to think of it, it was strange. In the past, Granny Si never brought Blind Man when she went into the cities, yet this time she insisted on bringing him along. Qin Mu hadn't thought much of it earlier, but now that he considered it, there was definitely something odd about it.
Blind Man had been in the gambling house the whole time and never went out—how could he possibly know what happened at the city lord's mansion?
Or was Blind Man also at the city lord's mansion at the time?
"Mu'er, get some sleep early. Tomorrow, Granny might just become the city lord of Xianglong City!"
Qin Mu slept in the outer room while Granny Si slept in the inner chamber. Just as Qin Mu was drifting off to sleep, he suddenly heard Granny Si tossing and turning in the inner room, muttering quietly to herself: "Too excited to sleep! Tomorrow, not only will I haul away Xianglong City's dragon pillar, but this whole city will bear the surname Si! No, I can't sleep, hee hee hee hee..."