Volume Two: The Mortal Realm Chapter Eighty-Seven: Great Cold Between Heaven and Earth

The snow had fallen for a day and a night, yet the ink-dark clouds overhead only grew heavier. Gazing into the distance, one had the illusion that the cloudbank covering the wilderness was about to descend upon the earth.

All around was dim, dead silence; between heaven and earth, it seemed there was nothing left but snow and blood.

A foot came down upon the white drift. A slender hand reached down from above and lightly picked up a flake tinged with red.

The hand brought the snowflake close to a handsome face.

With his face turned slightly aside, Yi Er inhaled the faint trace of blood on it and murmured softly, “Blood.”

He turned and slowly surveyed the bodies all around him, corpses that had only just been dragged out of the snow by the yamen coroner. In his indifferent eyes there was confusion and suspicion.

“Not their blood.”

“Sudden mass death without a single wound... what unexpected thing has been drawn into this game?”

“Second Senior Brother, I have news. They found the whereabouts of that Human Emperor body.”

Not far away, Yi Eleven hurried over and said to him.

“Where?” Yi Er crushed the snowflake in his fingers and looked up.

“In a ruined temple.” Yi Eleven wore a rather excited smile. “I’ve already ordered the prefectural troops to keep watch on the place in secret. And I gave strict orders: if that Human Emperor body tries to flee, they’ll stop him and buy us time.”

“A special constitution capable of killing Yi Fifteen—can the prefectural troops really hold him?” Yi Er asked, looking at Yi Eleven’s slightly pleased expression.

“That Human Emperor body doesn’t know any spellcraft. It won’t be that easy to deal with a large force of armed soldiers. As long as those prefectural troops are willing to risk their lives, merely holding him back is quite possible. And as for getting them to risk their lives...” A thin thread of mockery colored Yi Eleven’s smile.

“I told them that if they could hold that Human Emperor body until we arrived, I’d grant them the status of immortal dependents.”

“In this day and age, what those commoners want most is to cultivate immortality. Second to that, they want to become immortal dependents through some relative of theirs who is an immortal, so they can be exempt from tribute and taxes and enjoy a lofty status among commoners. From the looks on their faces, I suspect they’re already so excited they’re nearly mad.”

“There aren’t that many remaining immortal-dependent slots in the Watcher Office,” Yi Er said coolly.

“No matter. Second Senior Brother, you don’t need to worry about it. I was only dangling a carrot before them, like hanging an apple before a donkey to make it work. By then I’ll have my own explanation. Besides...” Yi Eleven glanced toward the nearby prefectural soldiers and gave a cold laugh.

“If they’re stopping a monster that can kill immortals, who knows how many of them will live through it.”

“That’s not important. The key is whether the sword-sacrificer and the Human Emperor body are together,” Yi Er asked in a frosty voice.

“No. At least, the watchers didn’t find any other person following that Human Emperor body,” Yi Eleven answered.

“Good. Let those commoners test the waters for us. Better than us running straight into some sword-sacrificer. Still, I should hurry back to the Watcher Office and report the matter of the sword-sacrificer to the mountain gate by talisman.”

“You go first and keep watch over that Human Emperor body.”

Yi Er fixed Yi Eleven with a stern gaze and ordered coldly.

Yi Eleven’s sneering face instantly contorted, a faint fear he could not suppress freezing there.

“No, Senior Brother, I’m only at the Spirit Aperture stage. What if I can’t beat that Human Emperor body? What if that sword-sacrificer really is connected to him—”

In panic, Yi Eleven looked at Yi Er with pleading eyes.

“Do not make me say this a second time. Go now. Immediately.”

Yi Er’s cold, authoritative gaze remained on Yi Eleven, his handsome face cruel and ice-cold.

Yi Eleven’s entreating expression met Yi Er’s severe, merciless eyes. The light in his own eyes dimmed bit by bit, and, afraid to defy Yi Er’s authority, he lowered his head.

“Yes, Second Senior Brother.” He bowed to Yi Er and turned to leave.

The instant he turned, Yi Er added coldly, “If you and the prefectural troops together still cannot keep a mere mortal Human Emperor body from escaping, then you’d best never return to the mountain gate.”

Yi Eleven’s half-turned body stiffened at once. He understood the threat hidden beneath Yi Er’s words. A flash of rage crossed the ugly, elongated face, but he quickly suppressed it himself.

Saying nothing more, he gave Yi Er a perfunctory bow and left.

Yi Er’s handsome, almost painterly face remained indifferent as he looked toward the heavy black clouds that seemed ready to hang over the whole plain.

The wind and snow howled as if surging straight from the junction of black cloud and white snow, battering Yi Er’s azure robe and making it snap in the wind.

Yi Er looked up at this dim and bitterly cold world, his eyes slightly chilled, and murmured, “Human Emperor body, sword-sacrificer, and the mysterious one who kills without leaving a trace.”

He turned toward the direction in which Yi Eleven had gone, a cold smile on his handsome face.

“If it were only a handful of prefectural troops, how could that be enough to probe the depths for me?”

“What a great storm of snow.”

He gazed at the dark sky already covering the whole wilderness and gave a soft laugh, sighing under his breath.

...

Li Han had gone into eternal sleep behind that half-collapsed divine statue.

The enormous fallen head of the statue lay to Li Han’s front left, facing the pale face that had drooped there, and though it was covered in dust, one could still make out its expression of mercy and compassion.

But what Li Han saw in his final moments was not the deity humanity had once worshiped. Gods and immortals no longer blessed mortals.

The only warmth and comfort that could bring him despair’s mercy was the faint beauty left behind in memory.

For countless ages, the weak had lived by submitting to fate, begging powerful gods and immortals for protection. But why should gods and immortals protect mortals weaker than themselves?

Mortals, having long since moved beyond the jungle and into self-governing society, seemed to have forgotten the law of the wild: strength was never meant to shield the weak, but to let the strong devour the weak.

And yet how many still dreamed that immortals protected the realm? How far would they have to be driven before they woke?

Ye Mingke’s mood was heavy. The scenes of these two blood-soaked days replayed in his mind, leaving him gloomy, burdened, and exhausted.

But he forced himself to rally, because he still had to go on, and this time he was not alone; beside him was another small life.

He settled Li Han’s body, bowed respectfully before the corpse, then reached out and gently lifted the still-unconscious A Ru to his feet.

It was the first time he had held A Ru. The girl’s body was so tiny, so soft and fragile, that his heart could not help but soften. Though his control over strength had already reached the finest degree, he still worried that he might hurt her when lifting her.

The girl’s little braid brushed his face. He lowered his head, closed his eyes, and solemnly promised the tiny child in his arms, “Don’t be afraid, A Ru. No matter who stands in the way, I will give everything I have to protect you. I will take you safely to Imperial Sun City.”

His words, resolute and faintly mad, echoed through the empty ruined temple, while outside the temple the wind and snow raged.

His voice paused. His gaze fell upon Li Han, who had already fallen into eternal sleep.

“I’m sorry, A Ru.”

He said it softly, his voice hoarse.

Beyond the temple, something seemed to lurk beneath the vast storm of snow.

Ye Mingke, his face stern and cold, lifted his eyes toward the tightly closed temple door, his gaze as icy as frost.

He first set A Ru down, wrapped her in Li Han’s overcoat, then used layer upon layer of cloth strips and rope to bind her tightly to his back. At last he strapped on the sword box Sword Uncle had left him.

Apart from the sword box, the bow and arrows, even the dagger and wooden sword, had been lost in that snowy night. Now he was unarmed.

Yet feeling the warmth of the little one on his back, his heart was calm and utterly resolved.

He walked to the temple door, reached out, and pulled open the somewhat damaged heavy wooden panels. The storming snow rushed in, striking his face head-on, and in an instant his body was dotted with scattered snowflakes.

He raised those clear, limpid eyes and looked up at the sky beyond the temple.

But in those bright eyes there was only darkness, and more darkness.

Outside, the sky had turned as dim as night. Heavy black clouds hung low, stretching unbroken to cover every inch of heaven within sight, pressing down on every soul beneath the vault of the sky.

Yet Ye Mingke had not the slightest hesitation or fear. He set off with long strides, treading through the thick snow, walking step by step toward the far horizon where sky and wasteland met, his lowered gaze carrying a cold gleam like a sword’s edge.

The snowfield was silent, as though there were no one there. With his eyes lowered, he stepped forward, one step after another.

Suddenly, with a sharp slap, his lifted foot froze hard in the snow.

Because within his lowered gaze, a pair of unfamiliar feet had appeared.

Then came the faint rustle of countless footsteps in the snow, the sound of long blades being drawn, and also the very familiar, taut little cry of a bowstring drawn to full tension.

At the edge of his lowered vision appeared countless pairs of feet.

“This world is far too cold; it is truly unsightly.”

With his eyes closed, he tilted his head slightly, his voice weary.

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

The sound of countless arrows tearing through the air shattered the dead silence of the snowfield, and innumerable shafts shot toward him from every direction.

Ye Mingke drifted backward. His right hand extended, index and middle fingers slightly parted, and like pinching down a tender leaf, he plucked the foremost arrow from the air, turning it over and taking it into his hand in a blur.

The arrow storm from all sides bore down. Ye Mingke’s figure suddenly flickered and warped, and in that tiny space there seemed to be many afterimages of him, each precisely evading every arrow that could be avoided.

At the same time, the arrow he had taken also blossomed into countless afterimages in his hand, scattering innumerable pinpricks of cold light.

Clang, clang, clang.

Dense impacts rang out all at once. The steel head of the arrow in Ye Mingke’s hand struck against other arrowheads, and here and there sparks flashed and vanished.

After the arrow storm passed, Ye Mingke still stood there holding the arrow. Slowly lifting his eyes, he looked at the prefectural soldiers who stared back in terror as though they had seen a monster, and he murmured coldly to himself:

“Why do you dare draw your blades against monsters, yet when facing immortals, all you know is to wag your tails and beg?”