Chapter 50: Do Not Seek the Infinite Affairs Beyond the Self
Two junior sisters stood before Lin Jue, one on each side, with a gap between them, and each had an archer drawn and ready with bow and arrow.
Both junior sisters wore solemn expressions.
“I ask, you answer.”
Lin Jue said to them, holding his broadsword.
The two junior sisters remained silent and serious.
“What is your master’s name?”
“He Xianyu!”
“He Xianyu!”
They spoke simultaneously, heard each other’s voices, and turned to glance at one another.
“Yunhe Daoist!”
“Yunhe Daoist!”
Again, they spoke nearly at the same time, with identical tones.
“Huh?”
Lin Jue found it strange, pondering the reason, but did not pause his questioning: “Where did we meet?”
“On the road!”
“On the road!”
They exchanged a glance and added together:
“Beneath Langtou Mountain!”
“Beneath Langtou Mountain!”
They glanced at each other again, both frowning deeply, their expressions growing even more serious.
“Drank the Thousand-Day Wine!”
“Drank the Thousand-Day Wine!”
“Don’t speak together—answer separately. Next question, left one answers; second question, right one answers.” Lin Jue mused, “Where did the Thousand-Day Wine come from?”
Yet both junior sisters were suddenly startled.
“Brother, I can’t tell left from right!”
“Brother, I can’t tell left from right!”
“Then I’ll point to one, and that one answers.” Lin Jue sighed, “If you can’t tell, I’ll tie you both up and wait for Third Brother to return—or until dawn.”
“Alright!”
“Alright!”
Lin Jue pointed to the left: “You answer first!”
“Shan Jun!”
Lin Jue then pointed to the right: “Who did you meet afterward?”
“Wolf Demon!”
Lin Jue immediately frowned even tighter.
Both junior sisters fell silent, then showed signs of thought, and raised their heads simultaneously.
“Brother, it knows what we’re thinking.”
“Brother, it knows what we’re thinking.”
“Ask again.”
“Ask again.”
“When you ask, don’t think of the answer in your mind.”
“When you ask, don’t think of the answer in your mind.”
“Clever!” Lin Jue wanted to nod at the junior sister, but didn’t know which one was real, so he retracted his gesture and pointed to the left, quickly formulating a question: “What’s Fifth Brother’s name?”
As soon as he asked, he immediately calmed his mind, cleared his thoughts.
For an ordinary person this would be hard—even for one just entering cultivation—but Lin Jue had long practiced Qi-nourishing methods, so it was easy for him.
“Jing Qi.”
The left junior sister answered seriously.
As soon as she spoke, she lowered her head, closed her eyes, and cleverly resorted to wild, chaotic thoughts to block her own thoughts.
“What about Seventh Brother?”
Lin Jue pointed to the right junior sister.
“Women can’t hold office but can cultivate to become immortals, women must marry but if they become female Daoists they don’t have to wait, when I become an immortal and learn pulverizing stones no one will dare throw me into the river…” The right junior sister’s lips moved rapidly, whispering in a thin, swift stream of words, but as she went on, she gradually sensed something was wrong, her voice fading, reduced almost to habit.
“I don’t have to be called to work every day, I work only when I want to… I don’t have to… be… sold…”
Until she could no longer speak at all.
“Peng!”
The junior sister suddenly transformed into a monstrous bird, showing no visible wounds except a patch of crimson where Lin Jue had breathed pure Yang Qi upon her.
“Shu…”
An arrow shot out, piercing it clean through.
Another burst of flame spewed forth.
“Ga!!”
Amid a shrill cry, a cloud of black smoke and foul stench scattered, and the monstrous bird gradually turned to ash, vanishing without a trace.
Lin Jue waved his hand, summoning a gentle breeze.
The stench was blown out of the ancestral hall.
Everyone remained stunned, still dazed.
Lin Jue turned to the junior sister, frowning: “Sister, what strange thoughts were you silently thinking just now?”
The junior sister, shorter than him, looked up with a calm face, meeting his gaze without a word.
Hearing this, Lin Jue did not press further.
After a while, Third Brother returned.
Lin Jue had suspected he might be the giant bird in disguise, but now that he knew the bird could transform and understood its methods, distinguishing it was easy. Third Brother had clearly encountered the bird outside and been deceived by it too; as soon as Lin Jue tested him, he immediately understood.
“What does Big Brother like to do?”
“Him? Just a farmer! He digs soil and plants crops!”
The tone of this reply confirmed it: this Third Brother was real.
“Brother, come in quickly.”
“I saw the firelight and heard the shouting, so I knew it probably came back looking for you.” Third Brother said, “How many of them did you encounter?”
“Two. We killed one, one escaped.”
“Didn’t expect there to be three of these monstrous birds here.”
“Three?”
“One lured me away, two came back for you. After I eliminated the one that lured me, I returned just in time to meet the one fleeing from you—and I took care of it too.” Third Brother said casually, “This thing clearly hasn’t yet gained real power—just cunning and deceitful, not truly formidable. If you’d been prepared, alert and clever, even an ordinary person could have fought it off.”
“We were deceived by it.”
“Who isn’t?”
Third Brother walked over to examine Zhang Da’s injuries.
He was badly hurt.
Besides the wound on his chest, his face had been torn apart and wrapped in cloth—he might not recover, yet he was a true man, enduring it all while constantly calling out for his mother.
Third Brother could do nothing, so he went to Zhang Da’s home again and found all his family members unharmed; upon returning and telling him, he finally relaxed, closed his eyes, and fell silent.
“Sigh…”
Third Brother looked at Lin Jue and the other, sighed: “Demons and ghosts harm people! In the past, there were never so many troubles. The world grows increasingly chaotic—you must see this clearly early, so life will be easier when you descend the mountain!”
“Understood.”
“Understood.”
Soon after, everyone closed the ancestral hall door again and sat down, gradually growing drowsy.
Only the fox, lively by nature, refused to sleep, running wildly through the hall, occasionally sniffing deeply at the spot where the monstrous bird had vanished, as if trying to memorize or track its scent; when tired, it ran back to Lin Jue and curled up beside him.
…
The next morning, mist shrouded the mountain village.
Some households had already opened their doors.
Footsteps hurried through the village lanes.
The villagers, still shaken, hurried home; several black-clad warriors carried Zhang Da back to his house, while others rode off with Qingxuan Daoist’s token to summon the Daoists of Qiyun Mountain.
The two Qingxuan Daoists had also awakened and now arrived at the village entrance forest with many ritual implements.
Lin Jue and the others felt relatively at ease, following behind them.
Passing through the village, they glanced around.
Last night they hadn’t seen clearly; only today did they see what Xiao Chuan Village looked like.
In Lin Jue’s view, villages in this region could be divided into three types: one kind, like Heng Village, founded by renowned scholars and literati, where clans lived together, passing down traditions for centuries, some even with descendants serving in court; another, like Shu Village, filled with merchants, not prestigious but collectively prosperous through trade; and the third, ordinary farming villages, often home to multiple lineages, mostly poor.
Xiao Chuan Village was the third type.
Its houses were smaller, older, and more dilapidated; many lacked whitewashed walls or blue tiles, built instead of yellow mud and thatch. Already poor, it had suffered natural disasters and demonic attacks, leaving the village in ruin and its vitality faint.
Many people opened their doors in the morning, yet merely sat at their thresholds, watching them pass in silence, as if lacking the strength to speak.
“The people suffer,” said Third Senior Brother, seeing the villagers keep their distance; he sighed lightly, then glanced at his two junior disciples. “The lingering souls have been burned clean. Now we only wait for the Daoists from Qiyun Mountain to set up incense altars and open divine platforms, summoning divine power to purge the yin and death qi. Then this matter will be done. You two, don’t keep worrying.”
Before either could respond, he went on alone:
“I am thirty this year, a few years older than you. Such things are not uncommon. If you see them, help if you can, assist if you wish; if not, pretend you saw nothing. But in any case, do not let these matters disturb your inner peace.
“To dwell on such things helps neither resolve the matter nor aid your cultivation. In my view, better to drink.
“Do not ponder endless affairs beyond the body; enjoy the finite cups before you.
“…”
Lin Jue nodded; he understood well.
This was separating reason from emotion.
But if it were that easy, where would cultivation lie?
End of Chapter
