The temples he had splashed with filth didn’t dare receive worshippers for ten days to half a month—it was no different from having been destroyed.
Shen Qiyuan understood Ruyi’s meaning. He wrote a letter and sent it out with instructions, then squeezed together with her on the small wooden bed that was the only one in the grass hut to sleep.
The farmer’s house was naturally simple and crude, with the smell of moldy hay still lingering in the air. But with the two of them nestled together like this, they felt somewhat at peace.
Ruyi leaned against his chest and muttered quietly: “Great Qian’s Taoist priests slew dozens of small demons today.”
“You have the nerve to talk—when your disobedient demon monsters were leaving Great Qian’s borders, they also greedily ate several people.”
“That’s the nature of demon monsters. I can only try my best to find other things to substitute for them. I can’t explicitly forbid them from eating people.”
“Taoist priests slaying demons is also proper and right.”
“Hmph.”
Though they bickered with their mouths, they actually snuggled closer together. Ruyi was getting somewhat sleepy, still murmuring: “We agreed—from now on, matters between demons and gods will be handled outside, and not brought back into the house.”
“Alright.” Shen Qiyuan agreed with her.
Conflicting positions were unavoidable. One person’s sacrifice would be somewhat tragic, but if two people were both willing to take a step back, then there would always be a way.
Streams and crabapple blossoms, green shade and stone bridges—another spring day in Lin’an. Grand Preceptor Liu wore a cloak and secretly made his way to Puhua’s temple in the south of the city, sincerely praying that his son could safely return to Lin’an.
He brought many incense candles and paper money. While burning offerings, he smiled: “This temple is still the most efficacious, letting my son escape this calamity. Once Duke An, that old bastard, gives up his intention to continue filing complaints, this believer will certainly offer pig’s head meat again.”
He performed ceremonies and kowtowed, then knelt and chanted sutras. Grand Preceptor Liu patiently completed an entire set of offerings, then returned home in high spirits to write a letter telling Liu Yinuo to set out for the capital.
However, just as he had written the opening of the letter, servants outside came rushing to report: “Master, this is terrible! An urgent message came from Huai Prefecture saying Young Master Nuo has disappeared!”
“What?!” Grand Preceptor Liu hurried to the door to take the letter and read it. “What’s going on? How could a perfectly good person just disappear like that?”
After reading the letter, he urgently said, “Quick, prepare more things to take to the temple.”
He must have given too little—Lord Puhua was angry. This time, he’d simply take three large incense sticks as thick as arms and light thirty rows of incense candles.
After driving all other people out of the temple, Grand Preceptor Liu devoutly knelt and worshipped for an entire day.
However, early the next morning, a house servant came to report again: “Master, Young Master Nuo has been found, but he’s been imprisoned in Lord Zongzheng’s separate courtyard.”
Grand Preceptor Liu first felt joy, then alarm: “How could this be? On what grounds does the Zongzheng Bureau imprison him?”
“They say Young Master Nuo himself confessed to killing the concubine’s daughter at Duke An’s manor. He’s written and signed his confession. Lord Shen originally didn’t want to imprison him, but he insisted on charging into the separate courtyard himself.”
“This—isn’t this just confused!” Grand Preceptor Liu was supported by his house servant as they headed outside.
But halfway there, someone else came to report: “Master, Young Master Nuo has gone mad in Lord Zongzheng’s separate courtyard. Lord Shen had imperial physicians go examine him. They say evil demons have entered his body, and it’s beyond medical treatment now. You must hurry.”
Grand Preceptor Liu couldn’t catch his breath.
He had so devoutly worshipped the immortal—why would his son have evil demons enter his body?
With things having reached this point, he decided to first enter the palace to seek the emperor’s mercy.
However, perhaps because of the excessive incense candles from his worship, as soon as he reached the imperial presence, the emperor spoke: “Where have you been conducting worship?”
Grand Preceptor Liu trembled and didn’t dare make a sound.
Emperor Qian’an became serious: “Grand Preceptor, are you trying to conceal even from me?”
“Your Majesty, please forgive this crime. This subject—this subject didn’t intend to go to Puhua’s temple, but that place is effective!” Grand Preceptor Liu wept bitterly, “This subject had a son in his old age—just this one legitimate son. How could this subject bear to watch him suffer?”
“Puhua’s temple?” Emperor Qian’an slammed the table and stood up. “Grand Preceptor, you’re confused! Why do you think I issued the decree ordering you all to clear out the Puhua divine statues from your homes? That’s a harmful immortal, no different from evil demons!”
Grand Preceptor Liu sat down in shock and dismay.
Liu Yinuo lay on the bed in Lord Zongzheng’s separate courtyard, already mentally confused and barely breathing. Grand Preceptor Liu sat beside him, watching, both regretful and angry. He immediately sent people to fetch dung buckets and splashed every Puhua temple they could find.
His power was overwhelming—even if this act angered many worshippers, no one could do anything to him. With temples every ten steps in the city, if they couldn’t go to Puhua’s temples, everyone would just go burn incense elsewhere first.
In this way, three days later, Shen Qiyuan and Liu Ruyi waited for unusual activity.
“It’s come out.” Ruyi opened her eyes in the darkness.
Shen Qiyuan beside her, held her, his chin gently resting against her forehead: “Don’t rush.”
The nine-headed serpent was rarely active in Lin’an and wasn’t familiar with the roads, so last time it had to first show kindness to people before finding cattle. This time, when it came out, it would first search around places it had been before, then go to new places to hunt for food.
As he predicted, the nine-headed serpent’s first stop was still the farming household where they were staying.
A black shadow approached, looked left and right to confirm no one was around, then revealed its true form. Its massive body pressed against the earth—with one movement, it left crawling traces a zhang wide. Snake scales gleamed faintly in the darkness, nine heads lifted with bared fangs, snake tongues flicking in unison like a bunch of rotten, swaying meat skewers that looked terrifying.
It swallowed the cow in the cattle shed in one gulp. The cow didn’t even have time to cry out before becoming a hard lump that slid down from the snake’s mouth through its body, forming a bulging mass somewhere along its length.
This was the moment.
Shen Qiyuan flew out, and a light formation descended and enveloped the nine-headed serpent within it.
The nine-headed serpent reared up in alarm, but snakes that have just fed move much more sluggishly. It crawled left and right but couldn’t escape before the light formation fell.
Angrily flicking its nine snake tongues, its strange eyes fixed on the person standing on the rooftop.
“It is you.” Shen Qiyuan’s eyes ignited with fury, and his attacks immediately doubled in intensity.
The piercing white light made the nine-headed serpent shriek sharply as it crashed violently against the formation’s edge. After all, this was a demon monster with over two thousand years of cultivation—this impact made Shen Qiyuan’s form waver as well, with a feeling that the mud and sand were about to slip from his grasp.
Ruyi flew to another shed roof and, with a flick of her arm, cast down a huge black net that fell securely outside the white light, instantly stabilizing the wavering white formation.
The nine-headed serpent in the formation raised its heads angrily and spoke human words: “You’re also a demon monster!”
Ruyi gripped the other end of her arm guard and raised her eyebrows innocently: “So what? Can’t demon monsters attack other demon monsters?”
“If it were any ordinary day, sparring between you and me would be fine, but how can you act as this immortal’s running dog now and help him deal with me?” The nine-headed serpent was very angry.
“Oh?” Ruyi mockingly raised her eyebrows, “Aren’t you also an immortal’s running dog? Without Puhua’s protection, could you have survived to this day?”
“What Puhua?” The nine-headed serpent roared angrily, “I am a dignified divine messenger under the Demon King’s seat.”