Death Sutra

Chapter 831: Questions Arising at Night

Shangguan Ru’s tent was no different from those of other people’s. Even as Gu Shenwei looked at it from far away, he seemed to be able to hear the faint sound of her breath. After a while, he sneaked into the nearby camp of the Second Consort.

This camp was much larger. The Second Consort’s exclusive tent was giant and very obtrusive. Most of the people in the camp was asleep. There were only a few guards awake, aimlessly pacing back and forth to keep themselves warm.

After observing the camp for almost an hour, Gu Shenwei started approaching his target slowly. He believed that nobody would have anticipated his unexpected operation, but being extremely cautious had become an ingrained habit.

From time to time, he would hide himself in a certain position. The emptiness behind him was like a bottomless cliff, making his flesh creep from the discomfort.

There was a little tent next to the Second Consort’s main tent. Most people wouldn’t even notice it during daytime.

Standing at the door, Gu Shenwei tapped the hilt of his saber twice. In this quiet night, the sound was exceptionally clear - for vigilant killers, it could even be deemed a little harsh.

Gu Shenwei moved to another position immediately.

Quite a while later, a figure came out from behind the tent instead of from inside.

After staring at the Dragon King’s position for a while, Qian Ying the green-faced assassin turned around and walked toward the outside of the camp. Hunched over, she moved in the shadows just like common Golden Roc killers did, except her speed was extremely fast, like a fleeing snake.

Gu Shenwei followed her closely. Before long, they arrived at a relatively secluded spot in the camp. Still cloaked in the shadows, Qian Ying suddenly stopped, turned around, and faced the Dragon King.

“I want to ask you something,” Gu Shenwei said. He had to stand underneath the cold moonlight.

“Why should I answer?” This was the first time that Qian Ying had ever spoken before the Dragon King, and her voice was just as plain as her appearance.

“Because I’ll defeat you.”

“I made a promise,” Qian Ying replied. She had promised the Unique King and Shangguan Ru that she would never hurt the Dragon King.

“You did. But if I attack you and you fight back, you wouldn’t be breaking the promise.”

Qian Ying kept silent.

“If you win, whether I’m alive or not has nothing to do with you. If you lose, you just have to answer a few questions truthfully. Don’t worry. None of the questions have anything to do with Golden Roc Castle.”

Green-faced assassins were better at concealing their emotions than common killers, but when Gu Shenwei had first met Qian Ying, her eyes had revealed a tinge of hostility as she was leaving the tent. From that, Gu Shenwei had thought of this idea of a kung fu competition.

Qian Ying hesitated.

“I killed Guan Shang,” Gu Shenwei added.

Guan Shang had been another female green-faced assassin, and she was also Shangguan Fei’s guard as well as a spy sent by Waning Moon Hall. Gu Shenwei and Lotus had killed her in the An Kingdom’s royal palace in Xiaoyao Lake because she had been supporting Han Wuxian.

There was no friendship among green-faced assassins, but deep down in their hearts, all of them were very proud.

“This doesn’t count breaking my promise?” Qian Ying asked uncertainly.

“I will be the one to strike first. You’d just be defending yourself.”

Qian Ying fell silent again. Gu Shenwei unfastened the Five Peaks Saber and slowly placed it on the ground. He had been gradually ridding himself of the restrictions that were the killers’ rules. Since the opposing side didn’t have a narrow saber, he wouldn’t use his weapon either.

The first move Gu Shenwei made was not to charge at Qian Ying, but rather to meld into the shadows.

He would abandon the rules of killers, but he wouldn’t give up the killer skills he had honed.

Behind them, there was one of the few livestock pens of the army. The cattle and sheep in it were the main source of Norland armies’ provisions. And at this moment, this pen had become natural camouflage for the both of them.

In a blink, Gu Shenwei circled behind Qian Ying, drew a dagger, and feinted with a stab.

Qian Ying counterattacked quickly and fiercely. Without any obvious movements, the dagger in her hand was already approaching the Dragon King’s chest.

Gu Shenwei slipped into the livestock pen from below the rails. Qian Ying pursued him hotly.

Most of the livestock were asleep, still standing, and unaware of these two intruders. They let the two move around under their bellies, unconscious of the fact that sharp daggers were moving to and fro beside their tender legs.

Both Gu Shenwei and Qian Ying had been trained in Golden Roc Castle, which meant that they generally wouldn’t leap to any high positions - in other words, they would rather stay on the ground.

Nobody was here to witness this intense fight. The distance between them never grew more than five steps apart, and they were grappling each other fiercely for most of the time. The two daggers flickered before their eyes, constantly passing through each other, but never actually clashing.

Although they didn’t have any prior agreements, they both wordlessly agreed to not stab any livestock. As a killer, it would be shameful to make unnecessary noises.

Qian Ying’s kung fu was somewhat different from Guan Shang’s - it was far better. Sending her to guard Shangguan Ru indicated just how much the Unique King liked his youngest daughter.

If it were just one or two years ago, Gu Shenwei believed that he would have had to use Death Scripture swordsmanship to defeat Qian Ying. But now, he had more alternatives.

After around thirty moves, Gu Shenwei had grasped Qian Ying’s general attack pattern. Even as the dagger in his right hand continued dancing without any change, he thrust forward with his left hand in a palm attack.

Qian Ying hit back head-on.

Gu Shenwei was startled. He had exerted his frosty Qi in that attack, but she seemed totally uninfluenced. Not having enough time to analyze how this could be, he had no choice but to continue striking with increasingly faster palm attacks.

Qian Ying met each palm attacks with her own, refusing to retreat a single inch, which was why Gu Shenwei nearly failed to control his internal power and almost slapped her to death when she suddenly fell down.

After kicking Qian Ying’s dagger aside, Gu Shenwei cautiously bent over and checked on her.

Qian Ying had passed out. The accumulated frosty Qi in her body had finally gone beyond her tolerance.

Qian Ying gradually came around. The first thing she saw was a giant, round cattle belly which looked like a huge falling rock in the darkness. The Dragon King was not around.

She grabbed her dagger and gently mobilized her internal power only to find that the coldness in her body had disappeared. The only plausible explanation was that the Dragon King had cleared it from her body.

Gu Shenwei had returned to the position where the fight had originally began and retrieved the Five Peaks Saber.

Standing behind him, Qian Ying felt an indescribable feeling in her heart. The Dragon King, who used to be just a common killer, was better than she could have ever imagined. She felt that this was very frustrating.

“The first question.” Gu Shenwei turned around as he asked, “You haven’t been practicing the Daoless Divine Power?”

“No,” Qian Ying answered coldly.

Gu Shenwei had never competed with Guan Shang in terms of internal energy, so he knew nothing about their manuals. But he had always thought that the green-faced assassins, as the most elite group of Golden Roc killers, were supposed to practice the Daoless Divine Power. Unexpectedly, he had been wrong.

“What are you practicing?”

“No.”

“You’re highly resistant to frosty Qi.”

“Yes.”

“Do you know why?”

“No.”

If these answers had been given by another person, they would have sounded perfunctory, but Gu Shenwei believed that Qian Ying was just telling the truth, because the green-faced assassins were just tools, and because Golden Roc Castle probably didn’t want them to know anything.

Gu Shenwei didn’t ask any more questions about this. This was not the purpose behind his suggestion of the kung fu competition with Qian Ying. “You’ve been spying on the Second Consort. Has anything unusual happened recently?”

“What do you mean by unusual?”

“Did she meet any strangers or talk to Duodun?”

“In the past five days, the Second Consort hasn’t met any strangers. Duodun came over twice, and they talked about you both times. The Second Consort has asked Duodun to have in-depth discussions with you, but Duodun refused. That’s all.”

Gu Shenwei was surprised yet again. He felt that the Second Consort was becoming increasingly volatile. She had apparently participated in the conspiracy that had failed because of Duo Ercha losing control of his temper. However, was a single failure enough to thoroughly change her mind?

Qian Ying could see that the Dragon King was suspicious of the Second Consort’s mentality, but she didn’t try to explain that the Second Consort’s attitude towards the Dragon King hadn’t actually changed that much - she just hoped to take before giving.

“Did the Second Consort mention Luoluo and his army to anyone?”

Qian Ying thought for a while before replying, “The Second Consort told Duodun that Luoluo’s army is undefeated and that their morale is extremely high at the moment. So, we shouldn’t fight them head-on. However, Luoluo’s troops mostly consist of the tribes, mostly the Naihang Tribe. Then the Second Consort said that she was willing to aggrieve herself and patch things up with Zhesu, and hopefully, she could convince the Naihang Tribe members in Luoluo’s army to betray Luoluo.”

“What did Duodun say?”

“Duodun disagreed. He said that he’d rather become a fugitive than have the Second Consort yield to Zhesu and Duo Ercha.

Gu Shenwei could imagine how happy the Second Consort must have been at that moment.

“So it didn’t work?”

“The Second Consort still secretly sent a messenger out, but I don’t know whether it worked or not.”

Except for his hostility towards the Second Consort decreasing, Gu Shenwei had so far received nothing of note from these inquiries. So he then asked a question that he originally hadn’t been planning to ask. “Did you find out anything about the issue that Instructor Shangguan asked you to investigate?”

Shangguan Ru believed that there had to be some hidden secret about the Dragon King’s parentage, and that the Second Consort was an insider. So, she had asked her wing guard, Qian Ying, to disguise herself as a servant in the Second Consort’s camp so as to spy on her.

“I didn’t. The Second Consort never mentioned this to anybody, but once, Duodun asked her why she insisted so heavily on allying with Dragon King. Her response was that she was confident of controlling Dragon King. Duodun asked her about the details, but she refused to tell him. Master believes that there were hidden meanings in the Second Consort’s words. Nothing more.”

Gu Shenwei decided to put an end to these inquiries. His speculation had been proven wrong. The Second Consort and Duodun weren’t conspiring against him. Not all his premonitions were accurate, so this mistake was normal.

Actually, it should have occurred to him long ago that Shangguan Ru would have told him if Qian Ying had heard something of note.

Gu Shenwei was just about to leave when he suddenly recalled his experiences with Han Fen and realized that he might have just asked the wrong questions, and that Shangguan Ru might have done the same.

“Duodun. Was there anything unusual about him?”

“My task is not to spy on him.”

“You haven’t answered my question.”

Qian Ying kept silent, so did Gu Shenwei.

“Last night, Duodun met someone named Silver Condor. After that, he seemed very happy. I heard this when I was delivering gifts for the Second Consort along with three other maidservants.”

Gu Shenwei had no more questions. “If Instructor Shangguan doesn’t ask you, you don’t have to tell her about this.”

Qian Ying didn’t reply. Taking the Dragon King’s reminder as the end of their transaction, she turned and left. Before leaving, she said, “If we have another chance, I hope to compete with our sabersmanship.”

She was still unconvinced.

After returning to his tent, Gu Shenwei contemplated what he had learned for quite a long time, reimagining every person he had met yesterday to analyze their facial expressions.

That morning, when they were scouting the battlefield, Mo Lin had seemed totally normal. But at night, when he had been giving out assignments, Mo Lin was a little uneasy. And when Mo Lin heard that he was to protect Mo Chu, he seemed relieved.

Mo Lin was also good at hiding his mood. Gu Shenwei was only able to discover these faint signs after he had learned that Mo Lin had been hiding something.

Liman and Azheba had also seemed nervous, though the imminent war might be only partly responsible.

Gu Shenwei stepped out of the tent again, and this time he didn’t tried to stay out of sight. He ordered a guard to summon Han Fen.

Han Fen had been conscientiously acting as a prisoner, an idler, and a crafty sycophant all along. When the guard called for her, she was sound asleep. She still had eyes filled with sleep, and kept yawning even as she entered the Dragon King’s tent. After walking directly to the soft bed, she lay on it, and mumbled, “The Dragon King’s bed is softer than mine…”

“Tomorrow I want you to protect someone attentively.”

“Okay.” As soon as she finished speaking, Han Fen started snoring.

Gu Shenwei decided to assign Han Fen to protect Mo Chu. But the uneasiness in his heart wasn’t alleviated at all, as he didn’t feel like he had found the core conspiracy yet.