Yanzi stood with his arms folded on that patch of pole-tip no wider than a hand span. The snapping of the sash around his waist in the wind blended with the sound of the surrounding prayer flags flapping together in perfect harmony — so harmoniously that everyone present had completely overlooked his existence.

Yet the ancient sword in his hand radiated a presence that could not be dismissed.

This barely perceptible shift of presence was concealed within the sound of the wind, and unless one had personally exchanged blows with him, even the most accomplished martial artist might fail to detect it.

The sound Xiao Nanhui had heard a moment ago was the sound of this sword leaving its scabbard.

Some months earlier, the first time she had crossed swords with this man, she had nearly died beneath his blade.

When had he climbed onto the ritual platform? Aside from herself, had anyone else detected this assassin who had infiltrated the site of the ceremony?

Changmi Platform was flanked on all four sides by narrow and precipitous stone steps. Ascending them would take at least a few moments — by which time whatever was going to happen would have already happened.

Most critically, there was not so much as an iron hairpin on the platform at this moment. The nearest ritual officials held only implements of gold and jade, and even the generals who had received the honorary swords carried only short, brittle jade blades.

In this brief instant of distraction, when she looked up again at the top of the banner, the long sword in the purple-clad man’s hand was already raised high.

Xiao Nanhui felt it was not a sword at all, but a harvesting sickle raised over a field of green young wheat.

Every word of courtesy the ritual official had earnestly and painstakingly lectured her on that morning had now become so much wind in her ears. She kicked aside the offering table and incense stand that blocked her path, and at the same moment hurled the jade sword that the Emperor had just bestowed upon her backhand against the top of the ceremonial bell, the Libo Bell, above Fuqiu’s head.

The jade sword was unsharpened, its material hard but brittle. It shattered on contact with the bronze ancient bell, but in doing so produced a clear, ringing strike. The prematurely sounded bell rang out across Changmi Platform, drowning out all other sounds.

This warning strike drew the gaze of every person on Changmi Platform to the top of Fuqiu’s head.

Fuqiu perceived it only after the fact and slowly raised his head to look directly above him.

Thanks to this extraordinary angle, he first took in a clear view of the purple-clad assassin’s wide-cut lower garment and the soles of his feet, and only then noticed the slowly rising sword blade in his opponent’s hand.

This was the first time Xiao Nanhui had seen Fuqiu open his eyes.

The eyes that had always seemed permanently half-shut flew open wide as an ox’s; those legs which could not manage steps and had required a sedan to attend him now instantly sprang back to life. He leapt nimbly from the ground a full three meters in a single bound, and in the blink of an eye had retreated to the very back of the ritual officials’ formation. His voice, when it came, was thunderous — a match for the Eastern merchant who hawked flatbreads on the street of Yanfu:

“An assassin! Come quickly! Come quickly!”

This cry of alarm was like a great stone hurled into a deep pool, throwing every single person inside and outside Changmi Platform into chaos — more effectively even than the bell strike moments before.

But sound could not outpace shadow. The sword in Yanzi’s hand moved like a ray of light, plunging from midair in a straight dive toward the center of the Emperor’s back.

Xiao Nanhui felt the back of her robe soaked through in an instant. She gathered every last bit of her strength and charged toward the Emperor’s retreating figure, but still could not outrace that flash of light and shadow.

At this most critical moment, another shadow flashed out from below the altar where Fuqiu had been seated, rushing toward the purple-clad assassin’s sword from the opposite direction.

She had long known this loyal and capable guard was highly skilled in martial arts, but today, seeing him bring out his full effort in battle, his ability still left Xiao Nanhui somewhat in awe.

That bladework had already reached a pinnacle beyond compare. Unless met with a weapon that was its natural counter, it would be hard to find a worthy opponent in the world.

In this moment she finally understood why there was only Ding Weixiang beside the Emperor.

Because one was already enough.

A clang.

White blades clashed, the saber sang, the sword rang out.

The killing intent halted one foot from the Emperor’s back.

The saber artist and the sword artist each retreated several meters, unable to determine a victor — both were clearly somewhat surprised.

Ding Weixiang held the advantage of the home ground and seemed to have been prepared. With a single sharp whistle, the well-trained Black Feather garrison guards came streaming toward Changmi Platform from all four directions to encircle it. He was in no rush to advance; he simply positioned the Emperor carefully in the blind spot of the engagement and began quietly studying his opponent’s technique.

Yanzi stood below the Libo Bell, steadying his breath. He understood that a single strike had failed, and his opponent was evenly matched — continued entanglement would only grow increasingly disadvantageous. Yet he did not appear to intend immediate retreat.

At this point, the ritual officials, who had been panicking in utter confusion, finally came to their senses. Raising their ceremonial implements and dragging their long trailing robes, they began their slow, laborious movement toward the stone steps leading down.

In an instant, Yanzi suddenly launched an attack on the back of the last ritual official in the retreating procession.

Neither Ding Weixiang nor Xiao Nanhui, present on the scene, had anticipated this. A flash of white light, and the ritual official’s ceremonial sash was cut in two and fell to the ground; the jade box he had been holding in his hands was nowhere to be seen.

A masterful stratagem of drawing the tiger from the mountain.

Xiao Nanhui finally understood what Yanzi truly intended. His apparent assassination attempt had been a feint; his real purpose was to seize the imperial seal that left the palace only once a year.

Item in hand, the purple-clad sword artist wasted no more time. He flew from one point to the next, using the temporary platform pillars erected around the altar as stepping stones, leveraging off each to make his way toward the outer edge of Changmi Platform.

However, in the moments of that leaping retreat, the Black Feather garrison guards had already brought their bows to the ready. At Ding Weixiang’s command, a dark rain of arrows flew toward that retreating shadow.

Yet Yanzi managed to flip and dodge in midair, generating astonishing force without any point of leverage. The white blade in his hand whirled into an expanse of light that nothing could penetrate, and in the blink of an eye, he had cut down all the black-feathered arrows shot from the two-stone bows, sending them clattering to the ground.

Just then, a faint sound of bells arose from the southwest.

The purple-clad sword artist identified the direction from the sound, and in an instant had found the weakest point in the Black Feather guards’ formation. In a single rising and falling motion he had burst through a gap of more than ten meters. Ordinary guards were no match for him, and the encirclement that had not yet had time to close was torn open in a moment. Yanzi raised his sword and departed, moving as though through a place without a single other soul.

Such audacious behavior required the support of supreme martial skill, yet what Xiao Nanhui was far more concerned with at this moment was the sound of bells that had been mingled within the clamor of the crowd.

The bells had come from among the spectators, extremely faint and muffled — yet not entirely without trace. They sounded like an ordinary courier bell, or perhaps the ornament of some household’s female attendant, but on closer inspection, a discerning ear could tell the difference.

Most importantly, she had heard that kind of sound before — when crossing blades with those Pu Huna fighters at Seqiu.

On the other side, Ding Weixiang had already given chase after Yanzi. Xiao Nanhui had no time to think further. Running headlong into the oncoming stream of guards who had heard the commotion and come rushing, she sprinted down Changmi Platform, grabbed a soldier’s saber on the way past, and turned to pursue in the direction from which the bell sound had come.

The crowd outside had not yet learned what had happened ahead. Many were still immersed in the noise and excitement of the celebration, their gazes turned up toward the high platform, their words enthusiastic. Only she moved against the current, forging a difficult path through the crush of bodies.

Having just crossed onto open ground and entered the residential district of the town, Xiao Nanhui vaulted up onto the roof tiles and scanned for figures whose movement appeared as suspicious as her own.

Sure enough, in the deep alleys of a residential lane not far away, a figure flashed quickly past.

At this hour, the crowd watching the spectacle had all squeezed onto the main streets, and the alleys were otherwise empty — which made this an ideal moment for pursuit.

Xiao Nanhui dropped down from the rooftop and chased that figure deep into the alley.

After a moment’s pursuit, she could feel herself straining.

Jiaosong was a small place; the alley walls were far lower than those in Quecheng. A person passing through would find it cramped, to say nothing of the woodshed piled high with winter firewood deep in some of the alleys, which made running at full speed impossible, and even walking quickly was considerable effort.

Rounding a narrow lane, she ran straight into an old fortune-teller carrying a battered signboard. Both of them stumbled and staggered for a couple of steps.

Though it was only a moment’s delay, by the time she quickly apologized and looked up again, there was not a trace of the person to be found at the alley’s mouth. The empty lane looked as though there had never been anything suspicious about it at all.

Frustrated, Xiao Nanhui quickly grasped something, reached out, and seized the fortune-teller by the arm.

“Did you just see someone pass by? Which way did they go?”

The fortune-teller had just taken a knock and was somewhat disgruntled. Seeing that Xiao Nanhui needed something from him, he began to act difficult.

“Not at all, not at all.”

Xiao Nanhui was anxious to know where the person had gone and would not give up. She pressed again:

“I also had urgent business — I saw that person come through this alley, which is why I was moving so quickly. Did you truly not see anyone pass? Did you not see that person’s face?”

“This old man’s legs are lame and his eyes are blind — what could I possibly see?”

This time, there was something rather intriguing in the tone of the reply.

He was clearly not blind, yet called himself blind-eyed — this was the sort of self-deprecation meant to invite further inquiry.

Just as they reached this impasse, a figure dropped down from the other side — it was Ding Weixiang.

Ding Weixiang glanced at Xiao Nanhui, then looked at the fortune-teller beside her and promptly dismissed him.

“Where’s the target?”

Xiao Nanhui did not bother with pleasantries, and did not dwell on the fact that this person had appeared suddenly before her.

“Lost them.”

Having said that, she saw the ugly expression on his face and knew he had also lost Yanzi. She took the initiative to offer a truce:

“I’ll spare you a scolding for now, and you need not lecture me again. What’s more, I saved your master once again up on the platform. We’re even.”

Ding Weixiang let out a cold snort, but did not bring up past grievances either. He simply gave the fortune-teller a cold look.

The fortune-teller had no idea what sort of figure Ding Weixiang was, and was still twirling his two thin mustache hairs, intent on continuing to bargain with Xiao Nanhui.

“This gentleman here can also judge who is right and who is wrong. It is not that this old man refuses to help — only that, because of this ceremony, a good half the people inside Jiaosong County have gone out to watch. This old man has not had a single customer, has not had a meal for several days, and now his head swims and his mind is all muddled. He truly did not notice any such suspicious person.”

Xiao Nanhui felt as though she were looking at Wu Xiaoliu some decades hence.

It was a pity this one was not plump. When playing clever, he lacked that layer of good-natured charm to carry it off, making him come across as particularly grating to look at.

She was just about to resort to her usual tactics and had not yet had time to draw her weapon, when Ding Weixiang — who had been silently watching the situation unfold — read the entire game in a moment and moved one step ahead of her, yanking out his saber with a sudden sweep.

With a swish, the bamboo-pole signboard on the fortune-teller’s back was split cleanly in two, and the battered yellow felt hat on top of his head had a hole sliced clean through it.

The force control, however, was remarkably precise. The man felt only a cool draft on his scalp, followed by the flutter of two snipped hairs drifting down.

Ding Weixiang said without expression: “Yanyi Garrison officer on duty — I saw you standing right by a criminal. If you do not cooperate, I will have no choice but to take you in for thorough questioning.”

The sharp words Xiao Nanhui had not yet said were swallowed back down, and then she felt one should not be quite so ruthless, and added a few words to soften things: “If you cooperate, your silver is guaranteed — only do not be too greedy.”

In the end, it was those two words — silver — that did the work. The fortune-teller’s face lit up in an instant, and his whole demeanor became considerably more agreeable.

“It is this old man’s honor to relieve the officers of their trouble. That person did pass right in front of me, and I got a good, clear look.”

“In that case, come along with me back to the Black Feather camp for a formal inquiry.”

Ding Weixiang seemed for some reason to be in a hurry to return and report to his master, and insisted on taking the man back to the Black Feather garrison for questioning. Xiao Nanhui refused to yield.

“Have him draw it now. The person appeared not long ago — his memory is still fairly clear. If we wait until after a night’s sleep, there will be even fewer details he can recall. By then he will have played a few tricks, and will we not have paid him that silver for nothing?”

Ding Weixiang frowned. “There is no sketch artist here. Who exactly would draw it? Surely you’re not suggesting you do it?”

Had Xiao Nanhui ever drawn a picture? Of course she had — and before she had even had a chance to show it to Xiao Zhun, Dujuan had mistaken it for some kind of suspicious talisman and thrown it out.

“This—” she feigned reflection, still not having thought of how to continue, when the fortune-teller at her side let out a knowing chuckle, baring a mouthful of yellow teeth.

“In my early years of making my way in the world, I did portraits for people — I still have some skill at it.”

As he spoke, he took the writing brush tucked into the brim of his hat, licked it on his tongue to wet the ink, then drew a sheet of yellow talisman paper from his breast pocket. He thought for a moment, then set brush to paper.

After approximately the time it would take to drink one cup of tea, the fortune-teller set down his brush and presented the paper to the two of them.

“Officers, please take a look.”

Ding Weixiang only glanced at it once, apparently finding it somewhat rough, and turned his head aside.

Xiao Nanhui looked at it more carefully. In her heart she thought: this fortune-teller’s brush had real skill. With just a few strokes the likeness was remarkably vivid, and even the mole beneath the lips had been dotted in quite convincingly.

She pointed at that mole, her tone somewhat skeptical. “He passed right in front of you — only for an instant — and you even remember a mole on his face?”

The fortune-teller let out another knowing chuckle. “Every trade has its tricks for making a living. I read people’s facial features and tell their fortunes, so I have always had a particular eye for eyebrow height, eye level, the pattern of wrinkles, where a mole falls—”

The fortune-teller began to hold forth at length, but Xiao Nanhui could not quite take it in. Her eyes were fixed on the portrait in her hand, and she had fallen into a kind of daze.

“Do you not feel,” she said, “that this portrait looks rather like someone?”

Ding Weixiang, who had been standing nearby with his eyes closed, heard her words and looked again at what had been drawn on the talisman paper.

The person in the portrait had hollow cheeks and a pair of triangular eyes that did not look like those of a person blessed by fortune. Yet his forehead was very high, giving an impression of authority. That authority was somewhat undermined by the mole beneath his mouth, which lent the whole face a slightly feminine air.

The portrait gradually overlapped with an image from memory, and Ding Weixiang’s expression slowly became one of disbelief.

“How could it be him?”

“But—” Xiao Nanhui’s voice had also grown somewhat difficult.

On the other side, Ding Weixiang already knew what she was about to say. “But Zou Sifang is already dead.”

More than half a year had passed since the Huozhou affair, and had it not been for the portrait before them, perhaps in another year or two, even the name Zou Sifang — along with that unmemorable face — would have slowly faded from their memories.

Yet no one had imagined that at this time and place, this name would suddenly leap back out.

The laborious events of the Zou Mansion in connection with the secret seal were still vivid in her mind. Xiao Nanhui had seen with her own eyes Zou Sifang sink into the marshland at Bai Yaoguan together with that fake jade seal — how could there be any mistake?

The dead cannot return to life. Could it be that the ceremony here at Changmi Platform had truly communed with the gods and spirits and summoned the soul of Zou Sifang back? Or had someone seized the occasion to deliberately stage such a supernatural spectacle?

But why, of all people, Zou Sifang?

Was the mysterious stranger who had been ringing bells among the crowd to guide Yanzi to an escape route merely someone who happened to resemble Zou Sifang — or had Zou Sifang, in truth, never died at all?

What connection did he have to the whole affair? Was the master that A’Lu had spoken of none other than him? Had he been manipulating the Pu Huna to attempt assassination and steal the seal time and again, and if so, to what end?

Xiao Nanhui gazed at the portrait in her hand and fell into silence.