Futile Devices Scans

Wei Fu cooperatively let out a villainous laugh. “A secret? Take it up with my fire starter.

“Those who are soft fear the hard, those who are hard fear the ruthless, and those who are ruthless fear the reckless” was worthy of being an ancient maxim. Yu Gong Zhao Ye’s persuasion had struck directly at the heart of the matter as well, and Xie You Lan’s reason was finally scorched dry by that tiny, trembling, flickering flame. “Stop!”

Wei Fu said, “Please speak.”

Xie You Lan squeezed a sentence out from between his teeth. “Have you never wondered why meteorite iron is so rare in this world and impossible to buy even for a thousand gold, yet Jiang—your mother was able to use a meteorite-iron short sword as part of her dowry? What kind of family did she come from, and what sort of background did she have?”

Wei Fu corrected him, “Our mother.”

Xie You Lan choked on one breath. “…”

He barely managed to swallow down an entire cartload of cutting remarks and put on an expression that said he would not waste words on this fool, then coldly turned to the main matter. “The earliest verifiable ancestor of the Jiang family can be traced back three hundred years to Jiang Chi, the Director of the Imperial Academy during the reign of Emperor Xianzong of the Ning dynasty. He once associated with Wang Gu He, a famed mystic of his time.”

“According to Strange Records of Kaiyun, Wang Gu He was born with penetrating sight. Looking upward, he could read celestial phenomena; looking downward, he could inspect the terrain. Wherever he pointed, rare treasures could often be obtained by digging there. He was also skilled in physiognomy and could determine a person’s lifespan. At one hundred and one years old, he suddenly burned several scrolls from his bookcase. A white crane flew down from the western heavens, and he mounted the crane and ascended to immortality.”

“Jiang Chi borrowed a scroll from him, but before he could return it, Wang Gu He ascended. This scroll recorded methods for discerning qi and locating hidden deposits, and it also included a copy of the Earth Mirror Map, marking the locations of many treasures.”

“You’re saying this piece of silk is the legendary Earth Mirror Map?” Wei Fu looked Xie You Lan up and down with suspicion, then asked pityingly, “You don’t also believe Chang’e lives on the moon, do you, Brother You Lan?”

Xie You Lan answered icily, “If you don’t want me to send you to meet Chang’e, then shut your mouth and listen.”

Wei Fu immediately turned to Yu Gong Zhao Ye. “Your Highness, look at him.”

Yu Gong Zhao Ye repeated mercilessly, “Why provoke him when you know what he’s like? Just pretend you got bitten by a dog. Come on, don’t stoop to his level.”

Everyone: “…”

“Rumors cannot be fully believed, but they also cannot be completely dismissed.” Xie You Lan rolled his eyes at Wei Fu and continued, “Whether or not Wang Gu He truly possessed supernatural abilities, the Jiang family has passed down its expertise in prospecting for three hundred years since Jiang Chi. In the early years, some members once served the court as mineral masters and enjoyed great prestige for a time. Later, when chaos came to the realm, the family moved east to avoid war. By our maternal grandfather’s generation, they made their living forging sabers and swords. Although they had the name ‘Qieyu Villa’ in the jianghu, in truth they had already become craftsmen.”

“However, forging blades and smelting iron are still closely related to mineral deposits, especially since the sabers and swords made by Qieyu Villa were more durable and sharper than those of others. The materials they used were a secret formula. Moreover, although our maternal grandfather never spoke of his family’s inheritance, he loved collecting all kinds of unusual ores.”

His gaze drifted toward the iron box in Wei Fu’s hands. “It is said that the Jiang family’s accumulated knowledge over the centuries, supplemented across several generations, became an Earth Mirror Map filled with mineral deposits across the Nine Provinces. My father schemed so carefully to arrange a marriage with the Jiang family because of this.”

Wei Fu and Yu Gong Zhao Ye had been listening as though to a storyteller, but by this point, their expressions finally changed slightly.

He said “Nine Provinces.” That meant not merely the borders of one country or a handful of mountains and rivers, but the various states beneath heaven.

If such a map truly existed, then even if most of the mineral deposits marked upon it had already been mined, it would still be a lethal, world-shaking treasure. Once its existence became known, none of the emperors of the realm would ever sleep again.

For once, Yu Gong Zhao Ye looked faintly dazed and murmured to himself, “Maybe we really should burn it. Something this big…”

Afraid that his soft-eared younger brother might actually listen, Xie You Lan immediately erupted in fury and condemned Yu Gong Zhao Ye. “Can you have even the slightest ambition? Is Longsha not short of money at all?!”

Wei Fu finally put away his unreasonable act and thought seriously for a moment. “That doesn’t seem right. Setting aside whether the map is real or not, with your honored father backed by the power of Beizhu Palace, if he wanted the Earth Mirror Map, wouldn’t it have been faster to seize it by force? Why go through such a roundabout and tactful method as marriage?”

Xie You Lan said, “The Earth Mirror Map only appears in ancient records. Whether or not such a thing truly existed, he himself wasn’t certain. The Jiang family understood the principle that possessing a jade invites disaster, so they guarded this secret extremely tightly. Whenever my father showed even the slightest intention of probing, our maternal grandfather would block him.”

“He had already searched every corner of Qieyu Villa in secret, yet found nothing, and still he refused to give up. Even if the Earth Mirror Map remained out of reach, there was still Mother’s photographic memory. How could he possibly let that go so easily?” Xie You Lan said with no lack of mockery. “Half probing, half exploitation. Perhaps there was a little true feeling and a little false affection mixed in. Who knows?”

“So it seems our mother parted ways with the old Palace Master Xie because she saw through his ambitions and schemes?”

Xie You Lan said, “Mother’s dowry probably wasn’t the meteorite-iron sword, but the Earth Mirror Map.” He tapped his temple in indication. “Recorded on paper, it couldn’t be guarded against thieves. Recorded in her mind, no one could find it.”

“She was not swept away by emotion. Even when they were most affectionate, she never revealed a single word to my father. The old bastard probably thought she was an ignorant woman and never suspected her, so he turned against her too quickly.”

Wei Fu asked, “Then how do you know Mother had the Earth Mirror Map?”

Xie You Lan said, “After she left, the old man hunted her like a madman whose tail had been chopped off. At first, I thought it was because he felt humiliated. But over the years, his new and old lovers came and went. Forget ‘faithfulness’; it was practically a den of lust. Yet every time he mentioned Mother, he was still so obsessed that it became rather baffling.”

“Before he died, I asked him why he couldn’t let go of that hatred. Of course, he refused to admit he had done anything wrong. He only said Mother was no good and had stolen Beizhu Palace’s secret manual. I asked him what secret manual it was, and whether it could really be more important than the Cloud-Rising Through the Mountains Technique. Then he faltered and changed his story, saying it wasn’t a secret manual, but the greatest treasure beneath heaven: the Earth Mirror Map.”

“No wonder you spared no effort, followed us from thousands of miles away, and personally came knocking.” Wei Fu said, “But your honored father never had concrete proof that the Earth Mirror Map truly existed, did he? On what basis are you so certain that what Mother left me must be the Earth Mirror Map? Couldn’t it possibly be a letter meant for me or something like that?”

“…” The words “stupid fool” in Xie You Lan’s eyes nearly smacked Wei Fu in the face. “What do you think allowed her to survive in the hands of the Ten Aspects Sect after being captured by Yanyuan? Her mediocre medical skills?”

“For a hundred years, the Yilin Kingdom never conducted large-scale mining on Tianxuan Mountain. Why was Yanyuan able to begin mining immediately after conquering it?” Xie You Lan’s thin lips were sharp as a blade, and each word he spat out was cold and cutting. “She was able to get aboard Na Yan Zhun’s boat and have him personally protect her because she sold him Tianxuan Mountain’s mines.”

In that instant, an uncontrollable chill surged up from the depths of Yu Gong Zhao Ye’s heart, like the shape of a bamboo-leaf viper slowly emerging across a safe, harmless green meadow.

What had happened more than a decade ago was too distant and too painful. When Jiang Feng Xun spoke of it, she had vaguely brushed past many things. Yu Gong Zhao Ye had thought she simply did not wish to recall those old experiences and had not examined them too closely.

And when he later recounted it to Wei Fu, Wei Fu had been utterly overwhelmed by grief. Forget thinking carefully; the fact that he had not fainted was already a miracle.

The more Yu Gong Zhao Ye recounted it to Wei Fu, the worse the latter’s grief became. Forget carefully thinking things through—being able to stay conscious at all was already a miracle.

Even outsiders could not help but sigh with regret over Jiang Feng Xun’s tragic experiences. Yet while listening to those bloodstained, tear-soaked memories and quietly watching the white-haired Jiang Feng Xun, Xie You Lan had remained silent and composed. One of them had been painstakingly weaving a lie, while the other had calmly searched for flaws in her story the entire time.

For a mother and son to reach this point, one hardly knew whether to call it fortunate or tragic. In any case, Xie Jing probably would not have been able to outplay either of them.

Yu Gong Zhao Ye had known Xie You Lan for a long time and had even been deceived by him once before, so he had always held considerable prejudice against the man. Yet after traveling together all the way from Bihan City to Yun Lake, he had almost begun to believe that the new Palace Master of Beizhu Palace really was the sort who was “sharp-tongued but soft-hearted,” whose words never matched his feelings.

Wei Fu stared at him in shock.

“So you started suspecting her back then?”

“Otherwise?” Xie You Lan sneered. “Right there in the cave, she told you about the wine buried beneath the tree in front of me, then quite properly handed the ring over to you so that you could obtain whatever was inside this box. Did she think that would fool me? If it weren’t a treasure, why would she have been so secretive and unwilling to speak plainly? She was simply biased toward you, afraid that I would try to take it by force, so she pretended to put on a show of treating me well!”

Before the words had even finished leaving his mouth, Xie You Lan suddenly snapped his long whip outward. A piercing shriek split the air as it lashed toward the iron box in Wei Fu’s hand. Yu Gong Zhao Ye immediately raised his saber to intercept it, but the soft whip’s movements were unpredictable. Its true target was the fire striker in Wei Fu’s hand. The tip of the whip darted like a snake striking from its hole and extinguished the flickering flame with a single snap.

“Careful!”

Yu Gong Zhao Ye swung his saber aside to knock away the whip. Xie You Lan flicked his wrist, and the whip rippled through the air in a wave-like arc before snapping back like a ghost to coil tightly around the blade. Fine steel wire had been woven into the whip. The saber could not sever it. Yu Gong Zhao Ye was forcibly dragged away from Wei Fu’s side.

“Why are you still standing there?” Xie You Lan barked. “Take him down!”

At his command, the black-clad swordsmen surged forward as one. Yet instead of turning back to protect Wei Fu, Yu Gong Zhao Ye used the force of the whip’s pull to launch himself directly toward Xie You Lan. His saber twisted through the air, winding the whip around itself as though reeling in a kite string. In an instant he appeared before Xie You Lan like a phantom, slashing horizontally at the man’s wrist with his scabbard.

Though the scabbard lacked an edge, it was heavy. A direct hit would have broken bones at the very least, forcing Xie You Lan to release the whip. Xie You Lan snorted coldly and struck the scabbard with his left palm, then bent his elbow and drove it toward Yu Gong Zhao Ye’s chest.

“Yu Gong Zhao Ye, no matter how capable you are, at best you can fight me to a draw. But my foolish little brother couldn’t even truss a chicken. The two of you are doomed to lose—”

“Not necessarily.”

Yu Gong Zhao Ye abruptly released the saber in his right hand. Gripping the top of the scabbard, he drew it free. A flash of cold steel burst forth. A second, shorter blade concealed within the scabbard swept past the tip of Xie You Lan’s nose.

“Don’t be so certain.”

He deliberately emphasized the final words.

“Palace Master Xie, you’re already surrounded.”

Xie You Lan: “…”

Had this man gone mad?

“Ugh!” “Ah!” “Ow!”

Wherever the white streak of sword light passed, cries of pain followed. The swordsmanship contained no unnecessary flourishes, yet it was astonishingly refined. One strike, one opponent—no wasted motion, no wasted words. In moments, the entire courtyard was filled with the clanging sounds of weapons hitting the ground.

“Hero…”

The instant Wei Fu saw that figure from behind, an inexplicable sense of familiarity and security welled up inside him. Even though the man was cutting people down as casually as chopping vegetables, Wei Fu found the sight immensely reassuring. Then the swordsman turned around, and upon seeing those drooping eyes—eyes so distinctive that they eclipsed both age and appearance—Wei Fu immediately understood the source of that feeling.

The swordsman in green sheathed his sword and turned back toward the completely unharmed yet utterly dumbfounded Wei Fu. He dipped his head slightly in greeting.

“Young Master Wei, we meet again.”

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