Chapter 231: Wardens of the Night
Chapter 231: Wardens of the Night
At her father’s question, Zheng Zhuxi pressed her lips together.
She neither lied nor resorted to her junior brother’s artful evasions. After a moment’s thought, she answered, "Possibly."
Zheng Ziming met his daughter’s gentle yet resolute gaze and sighed, his feelings mixed.
"I’ll consider it."
......
After hiding his senior sister’s letter with the two masks in the east wing, Ding Songyan returned to the main room.
Twelfth Madam Luo was carrying a dustpan of charcoal toward the kitchen. When she spotted him, she teased, "You’re looking awfully pleased with yourself."
"Am I?" Ding Songyan rubbed his face.
I can’t let it show. It would be bad if Demoness Ji saw me like this.
He turned to Twelfth Madam Luo.
"May I borrow some paper and a brush?"
"Two copper coins!" Twelfth Madam Luo said as she left.
I am not letting this fellow eat, drink, and use my things for free again!
Ding Songyan only wanted to write his reply in Twelfth Madam Luo’s rear courtyard, safe from the demoness’s prying eyes. He had no intention of taking her writing supplies for nothing. He laid two copper coins on the table, ground his ink, and considered how to hint at his situation and what he meant to do.
Demoness Ji’s true aim is still unknown, and I don’t know how far I can push her. Resist too fiercely, and it might backfire. If I fall out with a Supreme Master who cultivates a Chaos art and fail to stop her for good, the Brightnight Sect won’t be able to withstand what follows. I’ll have to feel my way forward, little by little.
Once he finished his reply, Ding Songyan hid it in the east wing for the time being. He tidied Twelfth Madam’s main room, then returned to the estate’s side courtyard and immersed himself in writing his story.
Deep into the night, when all was silent, Ding Songyan’s face took on deerlike features and his eyes bulged. He concealed himself among carved railings and wooden pillars, window frames and roof beams, overhanging eaves and roof brackets, making his way toward the inner study.
Commander Han Shun’s quarters lay nearby.
Ding Songyan meant to slip into Han Shun’s dream and discover what secret assignment Prince Kang’s estate had undertaken.
The closer he came to the inner study, the more guards patrolled the grounds. Without his ability to track everyone within twenty meters, including hidden sentries, and steer clear of them in time, the Treatise on Sharing the Shadows of the World alone would not have kept the guards from noticing him and mounting a search.
Ding Songyan stopped a little over forty meters from Han Shun’s quarters and hid in a storeroom full of sundry items.
His face sharpened, his eyes grew horse-shaped, and blue-black scales appeared across his skin.
He withdrew into a hidden corner and closed his eyes.
His consciousness spread outward. The world around him seemed to fall away, leaving a dim, boundless void.
Hazy clouds floated in the void. Each was a dream belonging to someone within 115 meters.
Even at the perfected Great Proliferation Realm, the Great Dream of Three Thousand Years normally extended the user’s consciousness only about 90–96 meters. But Ding Songyan also cultivated the Mystical Pass True-Nature Preservation Art. With a strong soul, robust spirit, and resilient will, he had pushed beyond the realm’s usual limit and could sense dreams 115 meters away.
He could not tell which dream belonged to Han Shun, so he began searching them one by one.
No sooner had his consciousness entered the first cloud of mist than the scene before him changed.
High in the dream’s sky, a scarlet light flared like a campfire.
The "campfire" swelled and stretched into a towering figure.
It was enormous and roughly human, with narrow cheeks and red shoulders. Fifteen similar, illusory divine beings surrounded it, all linked arm to arm.
"Dream fiend!" the godlike figure thundered. Its arm extended like a long-handled saber, stabbing toward Ding Songyan.
The motion drew many other arms into the attack. In an instant, they filled the air like a forest.
The dream itself receded, leaving only the dim, boundless void and the figure Ding Songyan had formed from his consciousness.
His figure began to tremble as though it had met its natural enemy.
As a nightmare intruding on another’s sleep, he could normally do as he pleased inside a dream, even kill without leaving a trace. Now he had been ripped out of it.
At his present mastery of the Great Dream of Three Thousand Years, he could neither carry true qi into the dream with his consciousness nor merge the two. Before those stabbing arms, he was as helpless as a bird stripped of its wings or a small snake robbed of its fangs.
The legacy of the Sixteen Divine Beings! Recognition flashed through Ding Songyan’s mind.
The Secret Classic of Mountains and Seas recorded: "East of the Feathered People, Sixteen Divine Beings keep watch over the night in this wilderness for the Celestial Thearch. Their cheeks are narrow, their shoulders red, and they all link arms. They command the long night, slay sinister evils, drive off dream fiends, and watch over good and evil."
Those who inherited their arts could enter dreams themselves—and were the bane of dream fiends and sinister evils.
In a flash, Ding Songyan entered the Celestial Heart state.
Drawing on the Celestial Heart, he made his consciousness-formed figure step forward and to the side through the dark void, advancing instead of retreating.
The figure merged with the flow of qi between heaven and earth. Though it had no true qi of its own, it spread the fingers of its right hand like a flower opening toward the red-shouldered divine being’s outstretched arm.
Ding Songyan’s figure darkened, seeming to become part of the boundless void.
The instant his splayed fingers touched the narrow-cheeked being’s fingertip, the void blazed with light. The scarlet "campfire" shone through his indistinct figure, and he began to melt away like snow beneath a blazing sun.
The void shuddered, barring the red-shouldered divine being from advancing any farther.
A moment later, Ding Songyan’s figure dissolved completely, leaving not a trace.
Standing in the dark void, the red-shouldered divine being realized it had lost all trace of the "dream fiend."
......
In the storeroom, Ding Songyan’s lifeblood roiled and pain stabbed through his head. He came close to bleeding from his eyes, ears, nose, and mouth.
His consciousness had taken a serious blow.
Had he not entered the Celestial Heart state in time and borrowed a little of heaven and earth’s power, his extended consciousness could never have withstood the red-shouldered being’s attack. It would still have been wounded and scattered, but it would also have left a trail back to his body.
That would have been dangerous indeed.
Ding Songyan swiftly derived the Treatise on Sharing the Shadows of the World and blended himself into a wooden crate full of sundry items.
Rather than flee at once, he stayed hidden where he was and listened as night guards and Grandmasters on duty rushed out to search for the intruder.
Soon a squad of guards entered the storeroom. Ding Songyan’s Chaos Realm had already let him examine their physical traits and confirm that none cultivated an art like the Candle-Star Pupils, so he did not hastily abandon his hiding place.
The guards probed every shadow with their weapons. They were clearly experienced.
Yet each sword or saber stopped an inch short of Ding Songyan without touching him.
Establishing the Six Directions had subtly distorted their sense of position and distance, and none of them noticed.
Only after the area had been searched and fallen quiet did Ding Songyan slip back to the side courtyard at his leisure, avoiding several formidable fighters along the way.
Before long, guards came to the side courtyard and asked him to help find the intruder with his Candle-Star Pupils.
Naturally, the search turned up nothing.
After spending half the night on the search, Ding Songyan sat wearily on the edge of his bed and grumbled to himself.
The estate’s defenses really are formidable. They’ve prepared for all kinds of threats, even someone entering dreams...
I’d never encountered an art that counters dream entry before. I grew too confident...
But of course. The Huangliang Sect is no secret society, and neither are its arts. Places like the imperial palace and a prince’s estate are bound to guard against them...
The legacy of the Sixteen Divine Beings has never appeared in Great Zhao before. Did the estate recruit its inheritor from another kingdom?
Ding Songyan reviewed his mistake carefully, determined to learn from it.
He would not be able to investigate the secret assignment through Commander Han’s dreams anytime soon. Nor did he normally encounter the man, making it difficult to eavesdrop on his thoughts with the Mirror Lake Divine Reflection.
No pride, no impatience. Wait. Ding Songyan lay down and fell into a deep sleep, giving his injured consciousness time to recover.
......
By the next morning, the estate seemed back to normal, though beneath its calm surface the guards remained on alert.
On his day off, Ding Songyan left Lotus Whisper Street, collected his letter from Twelfth Madam Luo, then strolled toward Golden Spring Street near the northern city.
That was where the Xie family lived.
Before Ding Songyan could ask the gatekeeper to announce him, Xie Fengchao came out escorting a man of about thirty.
The man wore a loose robe and had canine ears, sharply defined contours, and features with an old-fashioned cast. He gave Xie Fengchao a nod and went on his way.
The warm smile on Xie Fengchao’s face slowly faded. He muttered a curse, "That prick..."
Before Fifth Young Master Xie could finish, a voice sounded beside his ear.
"Who are you talking about?"
Xie Fengchao jumped with a start and turned to find Ding Songyan smiling at him.
"When did you get here?" Fifth Young Master Xie breathed out in relief.
Ding Songyan answered with a question of his own, "Who was that man?"
"A son of the Fang lineage’s main branch." Xie Fengchao abandoned his elegant manner and curled his lip. "Didn’t become a Grandmaster until thirty-two, never even made the Orchid Fresh List. He’s nowhere near as good as his brothers and sisters, yet he still looks down his nose at people."
"Oh?" Ding Songyan clicked his tongue and laughed.
"Why let him get to you?
"Once you become a Heaven-Man, you’ll be a direct-line son of the Fang lineage.
"Once you reach the Spirit Platform Realm, the Xie family will be the Fang lineage’s main branch."
"Don’t you think you’re giving me too much credit?" Xie Fengchao asked with a laugh.
Only then did it occur to him how strangely Ding Songyan had appeared.
"What brings you here?"
"I’d like your family to deliver a letter to the Zhengs in Changhua." Candlelight appeared in Ding Songyan’s eyes as he scanned every living thing nearby. He made the surrounding space faintly congeal so their voices could not carry.
He had deliberately chosen to discuss the matter in public, where everyone could see them, so it would look aboveboard and give the demoness no cause for suspicion.
"To Miss Zheng?" Xie Fengchao asked in surprise. "Has your sect’s Hongxin Trading Company gone out of business?"
"Can’t you say anything decent?" Ding Songyan scoffed, then turned serious. "I’ve offended someone. I’m worried they might read the letters between me and Senior Sister, and the Hongxin Trading Company has no powerhouse to guard them."
Xie Fengchao looked more puzzled than ever.
"A powerhouse? What sort of powerhouse would read the letters you exchange with your senior sister?"
What kind of powerhouse would be such a creep?
"Never mind that. Will you help or not?" Ding Songyan could not explain, and had no desire to try.
He slipped the letter to Xie Fengchao without attracting notice.
"Of course. It’s a piece of cake." Xie Fengchao accepted the letter and tucked it away carefully. After a moment’s thought, he added, "The banks do have plenty of formidable people. I’ll decide when and how to send it, so the person you offended can’t guess when or how it’s going."
With that settled, Xie Fengchao suddenly smiled.
"Your timing is perfect. Come, there’s someone I want you to meet."