The city passed through a night of chaos.

As dawn approached, two figures bounced along through the darkness back toward the Five Lakes Inn, sneaking furtive glances around to check their surroundings before finally stripping off their clothes by a nearby waterway to give themselves a quick wash.

The autumn river water at dawn was quite cold, but for these two, that was hardly anything to worry about. After carefully cleaning off the strange powder and smell that clung to their bodies and clothes, the two also took a moment to reflect on the night’s events.

“We got careless…”

“Mm-hm, turns out the bad guys have some real experts on their side too…”

“That last one’s skill was really something…”

Having summed things up this way, the two of them wore a distinct air of relief, as if having narrowly survived some brush with death. They then quickly got dressed and made their furtive way, once more, to the side of the Five Lakes Inn, scaling the wall and slipping in through the window into their small corner room on the second floor.

……

Light seeped in from the eastern sky. In Jiangning, it was an overcast day.

The chaotic fighting involving all five factions of the Fairness Party had gradually subsided across the city, though on some streets, fires still crackled and burned. Groups of soldiers were pushing water carts out to fight the fires, while others were pulling bodies and sacks up out of the river.

Though everyone had, in some sense, been involved in the previous night’s clashes, the bulk of the chaos had actually been concentrated in less than half the city. Some areas that had already seen intense friction became the main battlegrounds, while other, more consolidated districts had largely gone untouched — this, too, reflected a certain tacit understanding among the five factions of the Fairness Party regarding how to conduct their “grand gathering.”

Once the sun rose, the open fighting subsided, and each faction busied itself tallying and assessing the losses — or gains — it had suffered that night.

By midmorning, Wei Xuwen, having gone without sleep the whole night, finally made his way to the eastern side of the city to inspect the scene of the worst of the killings.

“Long Aotian, Alliance Leader of the Martial World; Sun Wukong, the Little Sage Equal to Heaven — was here. Heaven-Slayer, die die die!”

Seeing this crooked line of writing, Wei Xuwen’s eye visibly twitched, again and again, uncontrollably. The row of corpses in the courtyard bore ample testimony to the intruders’ brutality; he examined the wounds on several of the bodies with particular care.

The scene wasn’t the only one of its kind — before coming here, he had already visited another site where things had gone badly. That one belonged to a mid-sized holding under “King Yama,” and sometime near dawn, an explosion there had collapsed three or four buildings, causing considerable damage.

“So… this is where it started…” Wei Xuwen crossed his arms over his chest, his expression grim as he surveyed the scene. “These two… this Long Aotian and Sun Wukong… things… they charged in here, first killed the man guarding this place… that guy…”

He pointed at the man who had earlier been pinned to the wall. One of the men beside him leaned in and said, “Hu Hai.”

“…So they killed this Hu fellow first, set off the warning fireworks, and after a while, this Yu Cheng came with men to investigate, riding a horse — and got roped right in front of everyone and dragged off. On the way, he hit his head on a rock and died on the spot…”

“…And then, this so-called Alliance Leader Long Aotian and this Little Sage Equal to Heaven Sun Wukong still weren’t satisfied. By the time our Commander Huang Wanyong came to check things out again, the two of them followed him and set an ambush along that street. Once it was almost dawn and presumably everyone had gone to sleep, these… things tried to make their move on Commander Huang — only to be spotted by him, who came out chasing them.”

“…Huang Wanyong hadn’t expected them to have planted a barrel of gunpowder against the back wall — probably not even meant for him specifically, just lit and thrown when they got caught. Huang Wanyong chased them out, and ended up getting blown up along with it. And because there was also gunpowder stored where Commander Huang was staying, it blew up four or five buildings outright… And now you’re all telling me these two are here for me…”

Wei Xuwen’s gaze swept over everyone present, then settled again on that grotesque scrawl, “Heaven-Slayer, die die die.”

Someone lowered their head and said, “These two are highly skilled — appearing here at this time, we suspect they might be children of some great clan who came into the city with their elders, part of some family martial tradition.”

Wei Xuwen raised his hand and slapped the man across the face.

“Writing garbage like this and you call it a ‘family martial tradition,’ my ass! You bunch of dogs — go back and practice your handwriting today! Give it less than half a month and every one of you had better be writing better than this! Family tradition! I’ll give you all a family tradition to remember!”

He glanced again at the twisted scrawl on the wall. Last night, when all this had happened, he’d probably been elsewhere in the city preparing to make his own arrest — and though he couldn’t quite put it into words, he found himself struck with a strange sense that “when you gaze long into the abyss, the abyss also gazes into you.”

Except some abysses were rather dignified. Others were absolutely ridiculous…

“Have Lu Xian arrange men to catch them,” Wei Xuwen said, waving a hand to give the order. “I’m going to teach them how to write!”

……

The light falling from the sky looked gray; over the open fields, clouds drifted and mist swirled.

“Find Chen San.”

That afternoon, at the Dongsheng Inn in the southern part of the city, someone announced this name.

Coming down from upstairs, You Hongzhuo was somewhat surprised to see An Xifu, her arm now wrapped in bandages.

“What happened?”

“A bit of an incident. Let’s talk as we walk.”

An Xifu’s left arm was injured, and a faint medicinal smell clung to her. She smiled and turned to head out of the inn.

The sky looked heavy with coming rain, and most of the pedestrians on the road wore hurried expressions — some rushing home, others packing their bags to leave the city.

“War and chaos everywhere,” An Xifu said with a smile. “We’d originally thought that with the Fairness Party holding this grand gathering and opening things up to the whole world, much like the gathering in the southwest, it would be a good thing — so everyone rushed to come, and those already living in the city weren’t in a hurry to leave either. It wasn’t until last night that people realized there’s no unified ‘Fairness Party’ among the five factions — every one of them acts like a lunatic. So you see, all the roads out of the city are jammed today.”

“I hear that, fighting aside, all the factions still made sure this morning to keep supplies and grain moving both into and out of the city,” You Hongzhuo said. “Which suggests they don’t actually want to scare everyone away.”

An Xifu nodded. “Coming down here in such a hurry from the Jin region, we admittedly underestimated the complexity of this whole situation at first. You see, with the five factions holding this grand gathering, courting the goodwill and support of every faction under heaven, they naturally wouldn’t want to casually offend any of the delegates who came… But this business with Miao Zheng has shown us it’s not that simple — there are new developments we hadn’t anticipated.”

“You found Miao Zheng?”

“He sent word to us yesterday afternoon and arranged a place to meet.”

“Then why didn’t I…”

You Hongzhuo hesitated slightly. The Miao Zheng thread was being handled by Liang Siyi, and these past few days You Hongzhuo had been paired with Liang Siyi scouting several of “King Yama’s” locations, without any success. In principle, since the other side had reached out, it should have continued to be Liang Siyi making contact.

“I thought it smelled like a trap, so I didn’t tell Siyi,” An Xifu said.

You Hongzhuo frowned, glancing at the injury on An Xifu’s arm. An Xifu smiled and tapped two fingers of her right hand against her left arm. “It really was a trap… fortunately, I’d come prepared.”

“Then Miao Zheng…”

“…He’s likely… in serious trouble now.”

A few scattered pedestrians moved along the street; the two of them walked through the gloom-shrouded streets, falling silent for a moment as the wind blew past, stirring up fallen leaves.

“What does Miss Liang… think about all this…”

“Brother You, why do you think we reached out to you for help in the first place?”

“Hm?”

“This time, the number of people we brought isn’t small, but it isn’t large either. Coming to Jiangning, we’ve been able to reconnect with some old comrades from the Manichaean faith, and find various other kinds of help here and there. That I suddenly turned to you, Young Hero You, for help — have you ever wondered about the reasoning behind that?”

An Xifu turned to look at him, his gaze direct — this was, admittedly, quite a blunt thing to say. In a martial world this vast, none of them were novices or greenhorns anymore; bringing an untrustworthy person into an operation conducted so far from home could mean the total collapse of the whole effort. Why trust you outright, why turn to you for help, just because you fought side by side once, years ago? Believing that alone was enough was, in truth, a rather calculating question, and not a particularly polite one to raise — but You Hongzhuo had, of course, thought about it himself.

He simply looked at An Xifu and said nothing.

An Xifu paused. At that moment, a light drizzle began falling from the sky, and the two of them crossed the street toward the eaves along the roadside.

“Siyi is a very responsible young woman.”

“…But sometimes, she pushes herself far too hard.”

“…Of course, that’s not really her fault either. All these years on the battlefields up in the Jin region, she’s watched so many brothers and sisters-in-arms fall. She’s still young — it’s only natural she hasn’t yet learned to see past all of that…”

The autumn rain gradually began falling over the long street. The two of them stood beneath the eaves as An Xifu spoke these words, and You Hongzhuo listened for a while, watching the rain.

“When I was in the southwest, I heard they have something there called psychological counseling. They say that when people spend all their time on the battlefield killing others, or watching their brothers and sisters die, it’s easy for their minds to become… unhealthy. For people like that, there’s this kind of… counseling available. It really is a remarkable thing…”

An Xifu laughed and sighed. “These past years up north have been far too hard. Marshal Wang is a man of extreme temperament, and without money or grain to spare, there’s a great deal he simply hasn’t had the luxury to worry about. Back then, to raise funds and supplies, there were things done — some of them unavoidable, some of them genuinely unfair to people — plenty of them.”

Having said this, he turned to glance at You Hongzhuo, and seeing that You Hongzhuo was only listening attentively, he continued. “Ning Yi is a fussy sort of person, always full of odd little principles that seem strange at first. Back in the day, in Hangzhou, he used that whole notion of ‘everyone is equal’ to thoroughly win over people like Xigua and Chen Fan. And now look at the state of Jiangnan…”

As he spoke, he gestured toward the pedestrians hurrying along the street through the curtain of rain ahead. “Back then the Sacred Duke wanted equality; today the Fairness Party wants equality; in the future, plenty more will want equality too. But no matter how good the idea sounds, how it’s actually carried out — that’s the real question. In this whole world right now, only the southwest has managed to be even somewhat careful, somewhat thoughtful about it. As for the rest of us, I’m afraid we’ll just have to make do, little by little, for now…”

“…What can I do to help?” You Hongzhuo asked.

“Help keep an eye on Siyi,” An Xifu said. “Wei Xuwen, working through Miao Zheng, wants to catch someone — this is a very unusual move. By rights, if he genuinely hoped to build outside connections, whether he killed or captured someone from the Jin region wouldn’t make much difference either way — either way, he’d have thoroughly offended a major power. We’re still looking into the reasoning behind this. But as for Miao Zheng… I doubt things will go well for him.”

“Mm.” You Hongzhuo thought it over, and once he’d fully understood, nodded. “Understood. I’ll go kill Chen Juefang… or Wei Xuwen, I suppose.”

“…Huh?”

Under the eaves, An Xifu’s brow furrowed, and only then did he look at the other man with a look of genuine concern.

“Do you… need counseling too?”

“I was joking.”

You Hongzhuo laughed.

Outside the eaves, the rain fell in a fine drizzle. The two of them chatted a bit more about small matters before finally going their separate ways.

The autumn rain that began falling over Jiangning on the twenty-first of the eighth month continued on and off for several days after, and the dampness within the city never let up.

This unending drizzle reduced how often people ventured out; those without a clear purpose mostly stayed indoors, at home or in inns, chatting and passing the time. The delegates from various outside factions kept up their networking without pause. On the twenty-second of the eighth month, “Equality King” Shi Baofeng entered the city, followed soon after by the arrival of Heavenly King Gao and Zhou Shang. The representatives of the various major powers negotiated alliances and counter-alliances, each promoting their own vision to the crowd — for instance, the group representing Dai Mengwei put forward the concept of a “Chinese Martial Arts Assembly,” which quickly became the hottest topic on Jiangning’s martial arts scene.

Of course, only a small portion of people accepted Dai Mengwei’s proposal and lined up to take part right away; the majority remained focused on the ongoing conflict north of the Yangtze between the factions of Liu, Dai, and Zou Xu.

“That Zou Xu fellow, came out of the southwest, you know. As for those surnamed Liu and Dai — well, let’s see if they can even keep their lives first…”

This was, for most people in Jiangning at this time, a fairly common view of the situation to the north. Among the warring parties, Liu Guangshi had money and connections, Dai Mengwei had prestige and reputation, while Zou Xu’s side carried the identity of a Huaxia Army defector — an identity whose significance could cut either way. But if it truly came down to weighing things on the scales of war, this was, after all, the first large-scale clash of major powers across the realm since the Jurchens’ departure — and even the scholars who liked to claim the deepest understanding of the world’s affairs remained, for the most part, conservative and watchful in their assessment of how the battle for Bianliang would unfold.

Of course, Dai Mengwei, well aware of human nature, had already made a point of saying that he would “wait until the dust settled at Bianliang before making good on this promise” — a way of hedging his bets while still building momentum for himself. If he lost the battle for Bianliang, all this talk could simply be forgotten as if it had never been said; but if Dai Mengwei truly managed to reclaim Bianliang for the Wu Dynasty, then the momentum behind the “Chinese Martial Arts Assembly” would rise accordingly — a case of the winner taking all, carefully arranged from the start.

The unending autumn rain reduced the frequency of large-scale clashes breaking out outside, and in the days that followed, what did occur outside was mostly smaller-scale incidents of violence.

At the Five Lakes Inn, every night as darkness fell, two young figures, cloaked in straw raincoats, would slip out into the curtain of rain. “Alliance Leader of the Martial World” Long Aotian and “Little Sage Equal to Heaven” Sun Wukong pursued Wei Xuwen’s whereabouts according to their own particular rhythm.

The two young heroes had no shortage of ideas of their own; their operations sometimes succeeded, sometimes failed. When successful, they typically left behind a crooked signature — a signature whose tagline gradually evolved from “Heaven-Slayer, die die die” to lines like “Wei Xuwen, go to hell,” “Zhou Shang is a stupid dog,” “slandering the innocent is despicable,” and “He Wen loves Gao Chang.”

— Back in the village school in Zhang Village, writing “X loves X” had always been a particularly mortifying form of humiliation; anyone whose name got paired that way would turn red-faced and speechless. The young monk was entirely on board with this style of insult too, feeling it was truly wicked of his big brother to use it. Of course, to the genuine villains on the receiving end, it did occasionally leave them puzzled: weren’t you two here to kill Wei Xuwen? Why are you writing that He Wen loves Gao Chang…

Of course, sometimes their operations also failed, when they happened to run into real experts. When their operations failed, the aftermath was invariably chaotic and thoroughly messy — the two young men were highly skilled, but given the particular emphasis in their family or their master’s teachings, their instincts and methods for fleeing a scene were even more outstanding still.

The older of the two, Long Aotian, was well-rounded across the board — not only could he fight and run, but the traps he set and the throwing knives and similar hidden weapons he deployed left opponents utterly unable to guard against him. Meanwhile, the one nicknamed “Little Sage Equal to Heaven” Sun Wukong had taken the principle of “strike once, then flee instantly if it misses” to its absolute extreme — even those skilled enough to defend against the pair’s assassination attempts would often come up empty-handed in the pursuit that followed, sometimes even losing a fair number of their own men along the way.

Over these few days, autumn rain blanketed the sky and earth of Jiangning, soaking the houses and shacks a damp, ashen gray — yet within the gossip circles formed across the various inns and gathering places, the mood was anything but gloomy. In most of the inns, teahouses, and taverns, the consumption of wine and snacks had risen noticeably compared to before. Amid this wave of public chatter, beneath the political discourse, in the world of gossip, rumors about the “Five-Foot Pervert Demon” Long Aotian and the “Little Sage Equal to Heaven” Sun Wukong had gradually begun to surface.

“…I hear these two came from who knows where, but they’ve really been stirring things up in the city lately — and say what you will, their skill really is something else. They’ve already tangled with Wei Xuwen’s side several times now…”

“…Forget just Wei Xuwen — you don’t even know the half of it. These days, everyone looking for this ‘Five-Foot Pervert Demon’ in the city — it’s not just ‘King Yama,’ but ‘Wheel-Turning King’ and ‘Equality King’ too, all of them putting out word that they want his head…”

“…I heard this ‘Five-Foot Pervert Demon’ is actually a disciple of some western-regions master called the ‘Hundred-Foot Pervert Demon.’ Ever since coming into the Central Plains, he’s been up to no good — Wei Xuwen’s side, the ‘Wheel-Turning King,’ and the ‘Equality King’ have all had daughters ruined by his hand. As for the grudge with the ‘Equality King’ — that started back in Tongshan too, defiling the daughter of that Tan Gong Sword Yan family, remember that story? Remember it?”

“…Hey, don’t talk nonsense, there’s no such thing as a ‘Hundred-Foot Pervert Demon’…”

“…You just don’t understand — that’s how they do things in the western regions, everything numbered in sequence. Look at his junior brother, this ‘Little Sage Equal to Heaven’… his title’s probably ‘Four-Foot Pervert Demon’…”

To the men of the martial world, this sort of gossip circulating around wasn’t something to be taken too seriously — the occasional mention, told with dramatic flourish, was just the usual fodder for idle chatter over tea. But as the news spread further, it inevitably began reaching ears that shouldn’t have been hearing it.

In the northwestern part of the city, on territory currently under the control of “Fair King” He Wen — now considered the best-policed district in the city — Qian Luoning, who had already had a formal meeting with He Wen and returned to his inn, happened, one day while eating breakfast, to overhear a conversation like this. His mind, having spent these days entirely occupied with matters of state, was left thoroughly confused for a moment.

At the table beside him, two men and one woman — one of the men a cripple — along with several core members of the Huaxia Army who had come over, all reached up to cover the sides of their faces.

“What’s going on.”

Qian Luoning picked up his tray and moved to a different table.

Hei Niu explained quietly to him: “…From what we’re hearing now, it sounds like our little brother has come into the city.”

“How on earth did he end up with grudges against ‘King Yama,’ ‘Wheel-Turning King,’ and ‘Equality King’ all three at once?”

“Who knows,” said Yuwen Feidu beside them, pinching his own mouth shut, his voice barely audible. “Though when it comes to causing trouble, I suppose… he was trained by all of us, after all…”

“You’re actually proud of that, you bastard!” Qian Luoning shot him a glare.

“Finding a bit of joy in hardship…” Yuwen Feidu sighed.

Xiao Hei sat there cradling his face in his hands. “We’d originally wanted to figure out who was responsible, deal with them quietly, and suppress the news. But that ‘Monkey King’ Li Yanfeng is of fairly high standing, so we wanted to discuss it with you first before acting — we thought delaying three or five days wouldn’t hurt anything. Who could’ve guessed… it spread just like that. Nobody imagined he’d actually be right here in the city…”

“There are two things to handle now. First, find him and bring him back so the Master and Mr. Ning can teach him a proper lesson,” Hei Niu said, calmly skewering a steamed bun with her chopsticks. “Second, since word’s already gotten out, we might as well drown it out with something bigger. We’re going to be fighting regardless, so let’s plan it out — take down one or two of the three factions that have a grudge against Little Brother. If the Fair King’s territory erupts into fighting here in Jiangning, with people dying left and right, no one will remember any of this in the future.”

Qian Luoning stared at her. “You’re going to go do the killing yourself?”

Hei Niu pointed her chopsticks ahead. “Have Yuwen do some sniping — the odds of success are pretty good…”

The people at the table all propped their chins in their hands, lost in thought. Qian Luoning glanced around, then said, “Look over there…” and swatted Hei Niu on the head.

Hei Niu pouted. “You could just say it properly, you know.”

“Actually, what Hei Niu’s saying makes some sense…”

“Boss Qian, you’re a wise man — I said Hei Niu deserved a smack, I never once suggested we go shooting people with guns, how could you all be so cruel, black-hearted bunch…”

Hei Niu glared at him. “You literally just said—”

Xiao Hei sighed. “Let’s just blow up the cripple tonight and be done with it…”

“Enough.” Qian Luoning sighed as well. “You lot go out these next few days and look for him. Try not to let anyone else get to him first — if his identity really gets out, it’ll be a lifetime of embarrassment for us… And that ‘Four-Foot Pervert Demon’ — whoever he is — if you run into him, look after him too…”

“It’s ‘Little Sage Equal to Heaven,’ Boss Qian, people call him ‘Five-Foot Pervert Demon,’ you can’t just start calling him that too…”

“Great, now it feels like the whole city’s looking for the two of them — Little Brother’s really got enemies on all four sides now.”

“Heh heh, honestly, I think after this whole Jiangning business is over, that ‘Five-Foot Pervert Demon’ name is going to stick with Little Brother for the rest of his life…”

“Don’t go around saying that once we’re back…”

“Would I ever say something like that?”

“I wouldn’t.”

“Well, I definitely wouldn’t… this is all your fault, the both of you…”

The group ate and chatted, all with perfectly straight faces.

Since it was still morning, the “Alliance Leader of the Martial World” and the “Little Sage Equal to Heaven,” these two figures now at the center of so much talk, were fast asleep back in their room at the inn. Ning Ji had originally planned to use Wei Xuwen’s head to wash away the unflattering rumors about himself, but these past couple of days, he’d begun to think that killing Zhou Shang would do just as well. Aside from having encountered a formidable figure named Lu Xian during the previous night’s operation and exchanging blows before retreating, the two of them still had no idea just how many parties were now hunting them from every direction.

Under that same curtain of rain, outside a camp belonging to the “Wheel-Turning King’s” “Undying Guard,” three bodies had been strung up high — the remains of Miao Zheng and his family, having endured torment to the very end.

They had originally made contact with Liang Siyi, then, after the plan fell through, defected to Wei Xuwen’s side — and now, through some strange twist, their bodies had found their way back into the hands of the “Undying Guard.”

Liang Siyi stood at a distance, staring blankly at the scene before her. A little further off, You Hongzhuo watched her quietly, and let out a sigh…