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Book 46 Chapter 12 – Fighting Side by Side

When Xu Ziling returned to the Passionate Nest, waiting for him was Wanwan, who had already left but came back. She still looked so beautiful that make people’s heart trembling, but she also returned to her usual cold and detached, confident demeanor, as if there was nothing on earth could move her. However, Xu Ziling also felt that she was different from the past, only how different, he could not tell.

It was not until he stepped into the inner hall and saw her sitting on the chair by the window that he found out that her fragrant self was here, and that he did not have reaction in advance. The biggest reason of him being this not good was that he was worried for Kou Zhong that his mind was someplace else.

Wanwan looked at him coldly, her cherry lips lightly opened, she said, “It’s very late, where did Ziling stroll to?”

Xu Ziling sat down by her side and spoke heavily, “Didn’t you exploit me last night?”

Frowning, Wanwan said, “Can you not say something so unpleasant like that? Currently I am isolated and without help, shouldn’t you uphold justice and lend me a hand?”

Xu Ziling shook his head and spoke in displeasure, “If you want me to help you, why didn’t you deal sincerely and fairly [idiom] by asking me openly? Unexpectedly you came to deceive me! All those weeping endlessly, grieving for your Shifu, those are all lies. Your intention was to arouse my sympathy first, and then you used your understanding of my Long-Life Qi to help you successfully reaching the highest level of your cultivation of the Tianmo Da Fa; did I say it wrong?”

Wanwan was silent for half a day. Tranquil and even-tempered, she said, “When did Ziling realize that?”

Xu Ziling did not expect her to be so bold as to calmly admit it, a warning signal of danger echoed in his heart instead! Struggling hard to suppress the indignant feeling in his heart, he spoke indifferently, “I am too stupid! It was not until I saw you just now that I dare to be certain that I had fallen into your evil schemes.”

Wanwan’s eyes were fixed on the empty space in front of her, her voice turned cold, she said, “Ziling must not insult me anymore. I am now struggling to survive, otherwise my only way out is to acknowledge allegiance to Shi Zhixuan. You help me to become the new master of Yin Gui Pai, I help you to get rid of Shi Zhixuan. Each side derives benefit, won’t it satisfy rival demands?”

Smiling ruefully, Xu Ziling said, “You have thought about this very thoroughly and properly. You ought to want to get rid of Shi Zhixuan more than I do! He is the biggest obstacle to your desire to unify the demonic way.”

Wanwan let out a silver-bell like touching tender laughter, she shook her head and said with a sigh, “Ziling is wrong! Not only that, you are really wrong. As long as I’m willing to bow before Shi Zhixuan, he would love and protect me, and even fear that he is not good enough for me; perhaps he would even take me as his woman and let me to become his left and right arms to help him. However, you and Kou Zhong are the thorn in his side. Kou Zhong, he can still tolerate, because he could exploit him to control Li Shimin. But the relationship between you and Shi Feixuan is something that he cannot tolerate. The bigger issue is that your cultivation, both of you, is advancing by leaps and bounds every day; some day you might become some figures like Ning Daoqi or Song Que, which will pose a deep threat to the existence of our Holy School. You believe me, that’s good, you don’t believe me, it’s all right too. Shi Zhixuan will definitely not miss the opportunity to kill you.”

Listening to that, Xu Ziling was confused. Undoubtedly Wanwan’s remark was the truth, but when he was confronting Shi Zhixuan, he did feel that due to his relationship with Shi Qingxuan, at least for now, he did not have the intention to kill him yet. However, Shi Zhixuan’s real intention, nobody could fathom; this was an indisputable fact.

Wanwan finally looked at him. The originally ice-cold expression in her eyes was replaced by a complicated, difficult to understand look, as she spoke gently, “Can you trust me just this once? Last time Shi Zhixuan was letting you off, it was because he had received injury from Zhu Shi’s burning both jade and common stone move, to this day, his internal injury had not yet healed, therefore, he borrowed Shi Qingxuan to pacify you. Once his internal injury is completely healed, not only you will suffer calamity, Shi Qingxuan will also meet his deadly blow. Shi Zhixuan is a person without human nature, he definitely cannot be measured with ordinary human’s heart.”

Inwardly, Xu Ziling broke out in a cold sweat, because Wanwan’s analysis carried a persuasive power, what she said was very likely to be the real situation, plus Shi Feixuan had also said that after Shi Zhixuan ‘recovered’, the first person he was going to kill was his own daughter. Such saying like cruel tiger won’t eat its own cub and a savage person like Shi Zhixuan were two completely different things. He could choose not to believe Wanwan, but he could not but believe Shi Feixuan’s prediction, not to mention he had personally promised Shi Feixuan that he would strive his hardest to eliminate Shi Zhixuan.

That night clearly Shi Zhixuan was coming to deal with Hou Xibai, but changed his plan because of Xu Ziling’s intervention, so he pretended to come specifically to see Xu Ziling, even advised him to go to Bashu to look for Shi Qingxuan. Perhaps it was all because he did not want Xu Ziling to block his hands and hinder his feet in here, to obstruct his grand plan to unify the demonic school.

Wanwan’s speech came word by word into his ears, “To kill Shi Zhixuan, now is the last chance. Otherwise, if you wait until he is fully recovered, then even if the three grandmasters of the world join hands to deal with him, he would still have the ability to escape unscathed.”

Xu Ziling still held fast to his last line of defense by not telling her that Shi Zhixuan was Holy Monk Dade, who was sitting in meditation; he spoke heavily, “Even if we have the intention to kill him, but where are we going to find him, and how are we going to make our move?”

Wanwan replied, “About that, leave it to me, as long as you are willing to agree to fight side-by-side with me, that’s enough. Oh, Ziling! For your own sake, you must not miss this once in a thousand years golden opportunity.”

Xu Ziling turned his head to meet her eyes, Wanwan’s gaze suddenly became as sharp as blade, as if she was able to see through inside his heart.

Xu Ziling’s heart trembled; he could clearly feel Wanwan, in terms of essence, qi, and spirit, none was not greatly advancing compared to before; she was no longer Wanwan of the past.

Yet the tone of Wanwan’s voice was extraordinarily calm and gentle, as she spoke indifferently, “With one sentence, you can decided the future fate of our Holy School.”

‘Thump! Thump!’ Xu Ziling felt that his own heart was jumping rapidly; he drew out a long, long breath, fighting hard to calm himself down. It was quite a while later that he made up his mind, “Very well!”

Kou Zhong woke up naturally from his meditation. The first light of dawn had just penetrated from outside the window, a new day has just begun, thereupon new troubles would follow.

The assassination of Wang Shichong, practically it was impossible to plan and prepare, they could only see the opportunity and act. At the time where the war was looming, inside the city of Luoyang, any wind blowing, any grass moving, nothing could be concealed from Wang Shichong’s, as well as Rong Fengxiang’s eyes and ears.

Therefore, Yang Gongqing and Zhang Zhenzhou could not mobilize the troops and horses, moreover, they did not dare to notify other high-ranking military officers who harbored disloyalty in their hearts; they could only, out of the kindness of their hearts, even though it was inappropriate, to make mental preparation with the trusted aides under their commands.

Killing Wang Shichong, they only had one shot; one failed strike, they would incur Wang Shichong’s personal guards’ counterattack, there would be no second chance. Wang Shichong himself was a genuine-goods-at-fair-prices martial art master; although he could not be compared to Du Fuwei, Huang Gongcuo, that level of experts, but if he was alerted on time, surely to withstand several moves of Kou Zhong’s all-out strike would not be a problem. Therefore, Kou Zhong must create the most favorable situation, he must grasp the fortunate timing to render him a fatal blow. As far as what would happen after the successful assassination, only Laotianye would know.

Thinking to this point, Kou Zhong sighed inwardly. He had a faint feeling that this assassinating Wang Shichong operation was a dangerous military mission, a grand gamble of life and death.

The sound of hoof beats was heard from the outside, it came from afar but quickly got near.

Kou Zhong focused his power into his ears, and he was immediately shocked.

The courtyard house where he stayed was located at the southern part of the city, near the Tongjin Canal, so in front of the house was a street, behind the house was the river. Now, not only from both ends of the street several dozen of riders were galloping over, there was also the sound of many swift boats splitting the water on the canal. All of a sudden this small courtyard house was heavily surrounded. Could it be that the assassination plan already fell through and stood exposed?

Reaching out, he grabbed the Moon in the Well lying on the side of the bed.

Wang Xuanying’s voice shouted from outside the door, “Shaoshuai, open the door.”

And then came the sound of someone banging on the door.

Hou Xibai, his entire body was covered in the stink of wine, came back. Xu Ziling was still sitting on the chair, staring blankly. The former sat down next to him and asked excitedly, “Did you steal it?”

Xu Ziling responded crossly, “Fancy that you still have this kind of leisurely frame of mind. Among the martial art masters of Mi Qing Dao, which one is surnamed Xu?”

Hou Xibai shook his head in disappointment, he said, “I only know one ‘Tian Jun’ [heavenly lord] Xi Ying of Mi Qing Dao. Among the Holy School’s Two Sects and Six Ways, this Way [‘dao’ of Mi Qing Dao] conducts are secretive. However, listening to the tone of Shi Shi’s voice when talking about them, his relationship with them should be quite good, on account of Mi Qing Dao is always in favor of unifying the various Ways of Holy School into one. Did you encounter this man last night?”

Xu Ziling told him in details about his experience last night. Immediately some of Hou Xibai’s tipsy feeling disappeared, his countenance changed, he said, “Unexpectedly Mi Qing Dao is willing to join hands with Yin Gui Pai without Shi Shi supporting it from behind?”

Knitting his brows, Xu Ziling said, “What’s so strange about that? In Bashu, didn’t Yin Gui Pai worked together with Xi Ying to lure Song Que to come to Bashu?”

Hou Xibai replied with grave expression, “How could that be the same? At that time, Zhu Yuyan was still alive, at least she was still the official leader of the Holy School, plus Shi Shi was still suffering from strange illness. None of the various factions of the Holy School would submit to each other, moreover, they would not easily form an alliance. Now, only Shi Shi has enough qualifications to unite the various like-a-sheet-of-loose-sand factions of the Holy School into one.”

Xu Ziling’s heart was moved. He began to have some understanding that Wanwan’s remark that she was isolated and without help was not false assertion at all.

Hou Xibai accompanied Xu Ziling staring blankly for half a day. Heaving a deep, deep sigh, he said, “If Shi Shi forced me to declare my position, what do I do?”

Xu Ziling reached out to grab his shoulder. With meaningful and heartfelt words he advised him, “How about finding some remote and faraway place to lie low until the fuss dies down [orig. to avoid the wind] for a little bit?”

As if his dream was shattered, Hou Xibai asked, “What do you do then?”

Smiling bitterly, Xu Ziling replied, “I want to throw out everything, to immediately set on a journey to Luoyang to find Kou Zhong, to force him to disband Shao Shuai Army and renounce his vain attempt in contending for hegemony over the world.”

Severely shaken, Hou Xibai looked at him. Shaking his head, he said, “You are not joking? Kou Zhong is that kind of person who was born to gallop fast on the battleground, no different from a person like me who love to go to the pleasure house to cuddle on the red and leaning on the green jade.”

Letting go of his hand on Hou Xibai’s shoulder, Xu Ziling spoke feebly, “Recently he has repeatedly indicated that he is fed up with wars, now that Luoyang is a dead end road, perhaps I could seize this fortunate timing to convince him.”

Hou Xibai sighed and said, “Sometimes I might also be fed up with the life rolling about the pleasure houses, but am I not still inevitably linked to those places? Because there is nothing that appeals to me more. All my unique skill that I am expert in, like reciting poetry and creating couplets, the four arts, zither, Go, calligraphy, painting, only in pleasure houses I can find people who appreciate it, people who can give sympathetic response to it. Kou Zhong is just like that, battlefield is the best place that can put his strong points on display. You want him to be like you, to live a leisure-cloud, wild-crane life, our Shaoshuai absolutely cannot handle it.”

Xu Ziling dejectedly said, “You seem to know him better than I do.”

Hou Xibai struggled to rouse his spirit, he said, “Ha! I decided not to go! Even if I want to go, I will have to complete the Hundred-Beauty Painting Scroll to be left for the fragrant later generations before I’ll think about it. Ha! I am thinking of writing a hundred verses on the scroll, each verse describes one beauty. No one has ever accomplished this feat before. If you could continue to work hard on stealing the ‘Han Lin Qing Yuan Tu’, it would be even more perfect.”

Xu Ziling could not help splashing cold water on him, saying, “When your Shi Shi come to look for you, what do you do?”

Hou Xibai’s mood suddenly rising, he laughed and said, “I’ll simply contend with him on strong grounds! Who told him to train me to become such a person who loves wind, flower, snow and moon, trite poetry subject [idiom]?”

Shaking his head with a wry smile, Xu Ziling said, “You seem to have completely lost your fighting spirit. Could it be that my encouragement to you has no effect at all?”

Hou Xibai dejectedly said, “Even if I master Bu Si Yin Fa and defeat Yang Xuyan, so what? If Shi Shi wholeheartedly wants to kill me, in the end it would still be difficult for me to escape his vicious attack.”

Xu Ziling said, “Every morning when you, LaoGe came back from the pleasure house, you seem to be just like this, disheartened like a defeated rooster, completely without the will to fight! But as soon as the night comes, you are like shedding your mortal body and exchanging your bones, to become another person altogether. Have a good sleep! I’ll see you at dusk.”

With blank expression on his face, Hou Xibai watched him standing up, and asked, “Are you going to Chen Fu to learn how to run pawnshop business?”

Shrugging his shoulders, Xu Ziling said, “Perhaps I’ll go to visit Ji Qian first. Where is her fragrant residence?”

Kou Zhong’s mind moving at the speed of light, he quickly analyzed the situation before his eyes. This matter concerned his own life and death, also his grand plan whether he ought to help Wang Shichong to defend Luoyang or not.

If Wang Shichong really made up his mind to kill him, his smartest move would be to break the siege and escape, and no longer paid attention to Wang Shichong’s business.

But unless Wang Shichong knew about his subordinates’ operation to assassinate him, killing Kou Zhong was a really unwise move. It would both break down his relationship with Dou Jiande and would make him the mortal enemy of the Shao Shuai Army located southeast of him. There would be a hundred harms without a single benefit.

Therefore, the current problem was probably just Wang Xuanying’s private operation, outside of Wang Shichong’s knowledge. Even though it was not easy to deal with, it would still be better than if Wang Shichong exhausting his martial art masters to besiege and kill him.

While responding, “Taizi [crown prince] keep calm, don’t get excited, Xiaodi is coming to open the door and welcome you,” Kou Zhong strapped the Moon in the Well to his back, and concealed the Piercing the Sun folding bow on his left shoulder inside the outer robe that Chuchu made for him, and unhurriedly walked to the front section.

He had just pushed the front hall’s main door open, and has not set his foot on the steps yet, ‘Bang!’ the door bolt snapped, the outer courtyard door was smashed open, Wang Xuanying urged his horse to charge inside; following tightly beside him was Rong Jiaojiao, with murderous intent across her whole face, her almond eyes were opened wide.

In the blink of an eye, the courtyard was full of sitting-high-on-horseback, murderous-looking warriors of the Zheng Kingdom, the martial art masters, Wang Xuanying’s personal guards, everybody was glaring at Kou Zhong, their hands were pressed on their weapons.

Kou Zhong understood what happened. Chuckling, he said, “If Taizi is using this kind of frame of mind where you can’t even wait for the door to open to fight Li Shimin’s Xuan Jia [black/mysterious armor] warriors, you will undoubtedly lose.”

Pointing his halberd-fingers at him, Wang Xuanying angrily said, “Shut up! Let me ask you, our Great Zheng regards you as an honored guest, why did you unexpectedly go to the Rong mansion last night, killing and burning? Are you not considering our Great Zheng worthy in your eyes?”

Scratching his head, Kou Zhong asked, “Do you want me to shut up or to answer you?”

Wang Xuanying was even more enraged.

Rong Jiaojiao shouted tenderly, “Still want to build sentences and exchange words? Today, if you exist then I perish. Charge!”

“Hold on!” Kou Zhong thundered, “Let Xiaodi ask clearly first; is Taizi coming here this time on imperial orders?”

Wang Xuanying was slightly startled, but immediately roared in anger, “To kill you, the insignificant Kou Zhong, do I need to ask for Fuhuang’s instructions?”

The men who came with Wang Xuanying started to realize that Wang Xuanying did not receive Wang Shichong’s order to come to kill Kou Zhong, none did not reveal a hesitating expression. If because of this Wang Shichong extended the blame, at most Wang Xuanying would only be scolded, but they, this bunch of attendants on his left and right, might have to bear serious charge.

Remaining calm and unruffled in the midst of chaos, Kou Zhong said, “I nearly misunderstood! I thought Taizi is using public office to avenge private wrongs, turns out it has nothing to do with the public at all, it’s purely for personal grudge, you are sticking out your head for the sake of a secret society woman. Humph! This time Xin’an is lost, the Li Clan main forces just about to arrive at Cijian, Taizi still has this kind of leisurely frame of mind and lose your head. What benefit killing me will bring to Great Zheng? Unless you, Taizi think that your Fuhuang don’t have enough enemies, go ahead and enjoy yourself to the full. Otherwise, we should not be fighting.”

Wang Xuanying’s countenance alternated between red and white indeterminately, apparently, after listening to Kou Zhong’s reminder, he began to think about the serious consequences of killing Kou Zhong.

Kou Zhong knew that it was difficult for Wang Xuanying to step down the stage, he turned toward Rong Jiaojiao and said, “How is Xuyan Xiong doing? Without Rong Da Xiaojie in Chang’an to accompany him, his days must be unbearably lonely.”

Shaken, Wang Xuanying looked at Rong Jiaojiao, his pair of eyes shot a look of hatred.

Rong Jiaojiao was so angry that her pretty face turned deathly white, she spoke angrily to Wang Xuanying, “Don’t listen to him babbling nonsense out of nothing [orig. 生安白造, according to Baidu, this is a Cantonese slang: indiscriminately creating incidents in a stable environment]; why haven’t you made your move?”

Adding fuel to the fire, Kou Zhong said, “If Taizi is willing to step aside and calmly listening to several words from the bottom of Xiaodi’s heart, you will know whether Xiaodi is framing others out of nothing [another explanation of the aforementioned slang].”

And then he shouted to the men on Wang Xuanying’s left and right, “You guys judge and consider it yourselves, I, Kou Zhong, am unafraid to face Xieli’s Golden Wolf Army’s ten thousand horses and a thousand troops, do you think at this moment I would slander others to save my own life?”

Naturally on Wang Xuanying’s left and right, none dared to respond, but looking at his expression, they knew that not only his words had threatening power, they were convincing as well.

The murderous intent in Wang Xuanying’s pair of eyes was flaring greatly, to such an extent as to give the impression that he had turned insane. Glowering at Kou Zhong, he spoke heavily, “Today, no matter how splendidly your tongue links the flowers, it will be difficult for you to escape death.”

Throwing his head back, Kou Zhong let out a long laughter and said, “If I had known that Taizi’s mind is already made, there is no need for me, Kou Zhong, to waste so much lips and tongue. If you are a hero, take laozi’s three saber strikes. If within the three saber strikes I cannot capture you alive again, I will kill myself on the spot.”

Wang Xuanying’s pair of eyes revealed a blazing hatred mixed with shame; he roared, “F*ck your Niang! Charge!”

Kou Zhong sighed inwardly. This fool created such a mess, potentially the big plan to assassinate Wang Shichong would fizzle out. If this moment he kill or injure a large number of Zheng Kingdom warriors, perhaps even Laotianye would not know how to tidy up this desperate situation.