Fu Xi Yan turned to Pei Yuan Jin. “The shell breaks, and that means it hatches?”
The first “break” referred to the arrow piercing the shell. The second meant the bird itself hatching.
Perhaps because it had been shot with an arrow, the Red Peng was in a bit of a temper. Its little beak went tap tap tap as it pecked the hole wider, then stuck its entire head out. Its eyes had not opened yet, and only a few tufts of short down covered the top of its head. Apart from being somewhat larger than normal, it looked exactly like an ordinary hatchling.
The Red Peng’s head turned left and right, then it began crying, “Aiya, aiya.”
Fu Xi Yan cradled the shell while riding. Looking at his lively bird daughter, his heart filled with the relief of having lost and regained something precious.
Pei Yuan Jin felt a little sour about it. But he had been the one to use the egg as an arrow shield, so he was at fault. Even if disaster had turned into good fortune, that did not erase the mistake. He therefore pretended not to see Fu Xi Yan fussing over it.
Yue Hu led them south without entering any towns, heading straight for the Jinjiang River.
They stopped twice along the way. Fu Xi Yan took the opportunity to catch insects, but the Red Peng refused to eat them. He tore beef jerky into thin strips, but the bird swallowed them only to spit them back out, then continued crying “aiya, aiya.”
Pei Yuan Jin watched from the side, afraid Fu Xi Yan might soften and feed it his own blood again.
Fu Xi Yan was also afraid of spoiling the bird until there was no going back, so he could only let it keep crying while correcting its pronunciation. “Call me dad. Dad. Dad… If you can’t manage that, call me Aye. Mm, hey, did you hear that? It called me!” He turned toward Pei Yuan Jin with a delighted smile, shamelessly interpreting “aiya” as “Aye.”
Elio’s Notes: 阿耶 (āyé) is an old or familial way of saying “father.” Fu Xi Yan jokingly hears the hatchling’s 哎呀 (āiyā, an exclamation like “aiya!”) as 阿耶.
Pei Yuan Jin reached over with a blade of grass and teased the bird’s beak.
The Red Peng let out a shrill “E!”
Fu Xi Yan exclaimed in delight, “Did it just say disgusting?”
Elio’s Notes: The hatchling’s cry is written 恶 in Chinese; Fu Xi Yan immediately extends it into 恶心 (ěxin), “disgusting” or “nauseating.”
Pei Yuan Jin: “…” You added the rest of the word yourself.
Because carrying the bird inside its shell was convenient, and the Red Peng itself showed no interest in climbing fully out, Fu Xi Yan simply held the egg like that for the entire journey.
Several black-awning boats were moored along the Jinjiang River. The shabbiest was the one on the far right. Its boatman crouched at the bow boiling water. Steam pushed at the kettle lid and puffed through the gaps, stubbornly leaving a thread of warmth in the cold evening.
After Yue Hu dismounted, the boatman immediately stood. He ignored the water that was already hot enough to drink, jumped ashore, and walked toward Yue Hu’s group. Their eyes met, yet neither spoke. They simply passed each other, moving in opposite directions.
Yue Hu and one subordinate took Fu Xi Yan, Pei Yuan Jin, and You Bai aboard. The boatman remained beside the horses. The two sides looked back at each other once more, then turned away and went their separate ways.
Fu Xi Yan sat inside the awning, supporting the egg with one hand and holding a warm teacup with the other. He carefully blew across the surface. If the bird refused food, surely it still needed water. Or fish, perhaps.
With this mighty river before them, fish certainly would not be hard to find.
Over the past two days, Yue Hu and You Bai had talked almost constantly. Yue Hu had more or less figured out the background of this former covert agent who claimed to be returning from afar, while You Bai had also learned that their appearance in the town had not been a coincidence.
The Southern Yu court was currently purging Rongcheng’s intelligence agents. Prince Yue had ordered that any agent whose identity had been exposed, or who believed it might have been exposed, could decide for themselves whether to remain or withdraw. The Strike Battalion’s mission was to receive those who chose to return.
You Bai had originally retained some suspicion toward Yue Hu, worried that Southern Yu might be staging some elaborate trap. Only after their boat crossed the Jinjiang River and entered genuine Prince Yue territory did the great stone in his heart finally fall.
Yue Hu, however, still remained suspicious of Fu Xi Yan and Pei Yuan Jin. Their performance in the town had carried an inexplicable sense of contradiction, as though their bodies were shrouded in layers of fog that made it impossible to see them clearly. Yet that very contradiction was completely unlike the composure expected of genuine covert agents.
Yue Hu could not decide what their background really was. When he asked You Bai, You Bai could not explain it either.
Yue Hu found a sack of millet among the supplies at the bow, grabbed a handful, and held it out to Fu Xi Yan.
Fu Xi Yan froze. Yue Hu smiled. “Newly hatched birds may like this.”
Fu Xi Yan thanked him and, like an ordinary doting father, took a small handful from Yue Hu’s palm. Then he held it beside the eggshell and coaxed gently, “Baby, be good. Baby, eat.”
The Red Peng’s eyes were still closed and it could not see a thing. Its head turned toward the sound. After fumbling around for a while, it finally found the target and pecked down. The millet missed its mouth, but Fu Xi Yan’s palm started bleeding instead.
Pei Yuan Jin said nothing, but killing intent spread with his thoughts. Killing intent had nothing to do with true qi. It was the aura other people sensed when someone genuinely meant to kill, its strength determined mainly by state of mind, will, experience, and similar factors.
Standing nearby, Yue Hu could clearly feel the long saber at his waist tremble uneasily.
Fu Xi Yan took Pei Yuan Jin’s hand and stroked the back of it with his thumb to calm him. At the same time, he looked toward the saber. “General Yue’s blade has an unusual origin.”
Yue Hu rested a hand on the hilt, as though showing it off. “It was bestowed by Prince Yue.” He did not explain what made the weapon extraordinary.
Fu Xi Yan did not press the question.
Spiritual artifacts and treasures were divided into four great grades: Heaven, Earth, Mystic, and Yellow. Yellow was the weakest, but a spiritual artifact was still a spiritual artifact. That Prince Yue could equip so many men with them showed his resources were anything but ordinary. Without the enhancement from those sabers, Yue Hu’s men might have possessed excellent formations, but they would not necessarily have been able to hold Vajra Stage martial artists. This was one of Prince Yue’s hidden cards and also evidence of his determination to restrain martial power.
Fu Xi Yan was a martial artist himself, yet after seeing so-called experts kill people as casually as cutting grass, his sympathies leaned more toward Prince Yue. Extraordinary martial strength was not terrifying by itself. The frightening thing was imbalance. If the strong only became stronger while the weak only became weaker, the result might not be victory for the strong and defeat for the weak. It might instead be ruin for both. When people grew arrogant enough to believe they had mastered the supreme power of Heaven and Earth, Heaven and Earth might very well slap them down.
In his previous life, everyone had been wary of such possibilities. Here, people’s shallow understanding of Heaven and Earth made them ignore them, even as they dreamed of mastering that power and replacing it. It was both wildly ambitious and foolishly arrogant.
Pei Yuan Jin withdrew his killing intent, but continued watching the Red Peng out of the corner of his eye. Whenever its head stretched too far out, he pushed it back inside with one finger.
Seeing such “loving interaction between father and child,” Fu Xi Yan simply handed the egg to him.
Pei Yuan Jin accepted it with obvious distaste.
The Red Peng could not see yet, but its senses were sharp. The instant it realized it had changed hands, its cries softened, as though cautiously testing the new person. When no response came, the calls quickly grew angry and shrill. After Pei Yuan Jin pushed its head back, it immediately popped out again, stretching desperately toward Fu Xi Yan.
Fu Xi Yan, a shameless father, watched the show from the side without the slightest intention of intervening.
Yue Hu sat down across from Fu Xi Yan. He held millet in his hand and rubbed it absently while making casual conversation. The questions wandered all over the world, but somehow always circled back to Fu Xi Yan and Pei Yuan Jin’s origins and destination.
Fu Xi Yan followed along and spouted nonsense. No matter what Yue Hu guessed, Fu Xi Yan praised, “Brother Yue has sharp eyes.” But what exactly those sharp eyes had seen, he never explained.
At last Yue Hu understood what it meant to punch cotton. He gradually gave up probing. He was a military man, and this sort of roundabout interrogation had never been his strength. Still, he understood that the man before him was probably no ordinary bodyguard.
Fu Xi Yan did not care what Yue Hu thought. He had come on this journey to repay Prince Yue’s favor. How and when he repaid it would be his own decision.
He did not want to contact Prince Yue directly. The two of them belonged to different countries, after all. It was better to preserve an unspoken understanding at a distance; that was better for both sides.
A single river separated two entirely different arrangements and atmospheres. The moment they entered Prince Yue’s territory, the heightened security was obvious. When they reached shore, there were people openly waiting to receive them and others watching from the shadows.
Yue Hu showed an identification token to the contact. Apart from the subordinate who remained to handle the boat, everyone followed Yue Hu toward a row of low houses by the riverbank for another identity check.
Rongcheng’s retreating spy network had also given the Southern Yu court an opportunity.
Some agents had been captured, turned, and then sent back to Rongcheng as Southern Yu infiltrators. A war different from the open clash of blades on the battlefield had quietly begun in the shadows.
You Bai passed inspection quickly. Fu Xi Yan and Pei Yuan Jin, unsurprisingly, did not. Yue Hu had certainly contributed. In his report, he directly classified the two as dangerous individuals of unknown origin and unclear motive.
Fu Xi Yan was helpless. If he had not wanted a convenient ride toward Qingjiang County to buy medicine, he should have handed You Bai over to Yue Hu and gone their separate ways.
That option had obviously become much harder now.
This place was a dedicated station for receiving Rongcheng agents. The people responsible for checking them belonged directly to Prince Yue’s Territorial Security Office. Once Fu Xi Yan and Pei Yuan Jin entered the Territorial Security Office’s sights, keeping a low profile was no longer possible.
The Territorial Security Office remained suspicious, but did not immediately resort to harsh measures. At the critical moment, You Bai revealed one piece of information: the two might be Northern Zhou agents.
With Southern Yu in civil war, Northern Zhou’s status as friend or foe had become delicate. Forcing a potentially neutral party into the enemy camp would not be wise.
The Territorial Security Office therefore stayed calm and sent the three, You Bai included, farther south to the Awaiting Orders Station. All agents withdrawing from Southern Yu who passed loyalty screening were temporarily housed there.
If you wanted to know what color a person truly was, the best method was to place them against a field that was entirely white or entirely black and see how clearly they stood out.
By this point, Fu Xi Yan simply accepted whatever came.
At worst, he could run up to Qin Zhao and shout, “I’m here to keep our appointment!”
With that psychological safety net in place, he and Pei Yuan Jin both settled down. Mainly Fu Xi Yan did. Even though Pei Yuan Jin could not use true qi for the moment, his mood was no different from usual. In fact, his state of mind of advancing without retreat had only become firmer lately. Otherwise, he would not have used an egg to block an arrow at the critical moment and accidentally let the arrow hatch the egg.
On the road, You Bai repeatedly looked as though he wanted to say something to the men from the Territorial Security Office. Just before they dismounted, he finally could not resist advising, “Things aren’t easy in Northern Zhou. Why not switch allegiance?”
Fu Xi Yan and Pei Yuan Jin had both saved his life. If You Bai acted too coldly, people might think him ungrateful. But if he became too friendly and the two had some hidden problem, he might implicate himself. In the end, he could only offer this lukewarm suggestion.
Fu Xi Yan sighed. “I was born a free bird. Why willingly shut myself in a cage?”
“A tired bird must eventually return to its nest.”
“Heaven and Earth are vast. Why fall in love with only one nest?”
Seeing that the Territorial Security Office men were listening carefully, You Bai heaved a dramatic sigh and said no more.
Once they reached the Awaiting Orders Station, Fu Xi Yan and Pei Yuan Jin did not encounter the storm of pressure they expected. Like You Bai, each was assigned a separate room, though the rooms were spaced far apart.
Pei Yuan Jin did not even glance at his own. He lifted a foot and entered Fu Xi Yan’s room instead.
The person assigning rooms said nothing, merely exchanged a look with You Bai. They had half believed You Bai when he said the pair were lovers. Now it appeared the claim had not been false.
Fu Xi Yan closed the door, placed the egg on the table, and rubbed his hands together excitedly. “Why don’t we take apart one of the quilts and make it a nest?”
Pei Yuan Jin showed little interest.
Fu Xi Yan therefore began wandering around the room on his own. There happened to be a spare thin quilt inside the wardrobe. He took it out, bunched it into a rough nest, then smiled at the Red Peng. “Dad’s going to help you break the rest of the shell now. Don’t rush.”
Whenever the Red Peng heard him, it became full of energy. No matter what he said, it would respond with several loud cries of “aiya.”
Fu Xi Yan started peeling away shell while humming a song.
“You’re just like a tiny little bird, smiling sweetly in my arms… Hah!”
Fu Xi Yan, who had been standing beside the table removing shell, suddenly leaped as though someone had stepped on his tail. In one bound, he landed on the ceiling beam and clung there trembling.
Pei Yuan Jin, who was sitting by the window, looked at him in confusion.
Fu Xi Yan pointed at the bird on the table, his body still shaking faintly. “There’s a monster.”
Pei Yuan Jin lowered his eyes. The Red Peng’s eyes remained shut and its head was lifted, but beneath the bird body extended something that looked almost exactly like a snake’s lower half. He had never raised a Red Peng himself, but in his memory they did not look like this.
He picked the bird up and examined the junction between bird body and snake tail. The transition was completely natural, with no trace of abnormal joining. It seemed to have been born that way.
The Red Peng cried anxiously in his hand, each call louder than the one before.
Pei Yuan Jin put it into the quilt nest and said to Fu Xi Yan, “Probably a mutation.” If it were some kind of demon, it would not let him hold it so easily without resisting.
Fu Xi Yan clung to the beam and refused to come down. Pei Yuan Jin asked several times before he finally stammered, “Snakes… I really can’t do snakes…”
Pei Yuan Jin, himself an enthusiast of furry creatures, looked down at the Red Peng with a trace of dislike.
He was not afraid of snakes, but he did not particularly like them either.
“Then give it away.”
The instant he said it, Fu Xi Yan looked at the little creature in the quilt and felt reluctant again. Even if he had not carried it for ten months, he had still painstakingly hatched… or rather, shot it out. Giving it away just like that seemed too heartless.
Thinking this, he finally climbed down from the beam and edged closer one step at a time. The Red Peng seemed to sense his approach and suddenly spread its wings and lunged toward him.
In that instant, Fu Xi Yan saw only—
Snake tail.
Snake tail.
SNAKE TAIL!
…
Pei Yuan Jin bent down and picked up the Red Peng, which had hit the floor sprawled flat and dizzy. Then he looked up at Fu Xi Yan, who had already jumped back onto the ceiling beam.
Fu Xi Yan clenched his fists and whispered, “Find it a good home.”
If they were staying within Southern Yu, then the obvious “good home” was probably Prince Yue. No matter how strange the Red Peng looked, with Prince Yue’s wealth, resources, intelligence, and temperament, he would never mistreat it.
But not long after saying it, Fu Xi Yan regretted the idea again. The best place was still the Immortal Treasury Palace. For one thing, the Palace loved collecting rare birds and beasts and had professional keepers. For another, if the bird stayed under his own eyes, he could still visit it later.
That meant the responsibility for caring for the bird while they remained in Southern Yu fell to Pei Yuan Jin. Fu Xi Yan would handle errands and supplies instead. He asked for clean water and fresh meat, then sat at a distance and watched Pei Yuan Jin feed it.
This time the Red Peng ate well. It swallowed all the fresh meat without spitting any out.
Fu Xi Yan sat in the farthest corner of the room. From this angle, the quilt blocked the snake tail and only the bird body could be seen. It looked like an ordinary, adorable little Red Peng.
Fu Xi Yan sighed. “Birds and snakes should have reproductive isolation, right? What species is this thing supposed to be?”
Pei Yuan Jin said, “Whatever species it is, finding a male bird to pair with it will probably be difficult.”
Fu Xi Yan had still felt a little repelled by it moments ago, but his anxious-father instincts immediately returned. The thought that his bird daughter might be doomed to lifelong singledom made him worry. “Forget a male bird. Even a female bird might not want anything to do with her.”
Pei Yuan Jin said, “It’s fine. Humans don’t like her either. She’ll get used to it.”
“…” Fu Xi Yan sent him a resentful little look.
After Pei Yuan Jin finished feeding her, the Red Peng visibly quieted down. She stopped crying “aiya, aiya,” circled her nest once, and settled down to rest.
Afraid of disturbing her sleep, Fu Xi Yan lowered his voice. “What mythical beast has a bird’s body and a snake’s tail?”
Pei Yuan Jin thought for a moment. “If it had a turtle shell on its back, it would resemble a Xuangui. One was said to have helped Great Yu control the floods.”
Fu Xi Yan knew many historical myths in this world overlapped with those from his previous life, so he was not surprised. “That sounds pretty good.”
Pei Yuan Jin continued, “Six eyes, three legs, four wings, and it would be a Suanyu. The name comes from its cry. Its role is rather like a crow’s. Both are considered inauspicious.”
Fu Xi Yan immediately rejected Suanyu. “Six eyes, three legs, four wings, and it cries suanyu, suanyu. Not a single thing matches. Since nothing matches, let’s pick Xuangui.”
Pei Yuan Jin looked completely indifferent.
“Actually, it should have its own name.” Fu Xi Yan pondered. “I’m its dad. My surname is Fu, so it should take my surname. Let’s call it Fu Gui Gui!”
Since it was a girl, a reduplicated given name sounded cute.
Pei Yuan Jin: “…”
He suspected he would never once call it by name in his life.
Fu Gui Gui had one very bad habit: someone had to stay beside her while she slept. The moment everyone moved away, she would suddenly wake and begin crying “aiya, aiya.”
Fu Xi Yan therefore had Pei Yuan Jin put her nest on a stool beside the bed. But Fu Gui Gui slept restlessly. She started the night in her own nest, then before long would wobble toward the bed.
That would have been fine in itself. Pei Yuan Jin lay on the outside as the first line of defense. The problem was that she could break through that first line and head straight for Fu Xi Yan’s face.
Fu Xi Yan heard movement, opened his eyes, and a snake tail whipped straight toward him. His soul nearly left his body. He smacked the bird away instinctively, immediately came back to himself, and then nearly lost his soul a second time as he threw himself after her.
Fu Gui Gui, completely unaware that she had just wandered along the border between life and death, apparently thought her bird father was teaching her how to fly. She cried “aiya” twice in delight.
Fu Xi Yan put her back into the nest. The hand that had touched her snake tail scrubbed furiously against the quilt. He said irritably, “Did I owe you in my previous life or something?”
“No.” Pei Yuan Jin, who had been lying quietly in the middle, suddenly spoke.
Fu Xi Yan froze. “What?”
Pei Yuan Jin looked at him and said calmly, with no room for argument, “In this life or the last, the only person you’re allowed to owe is me. And I owe only you.”
Fu Xi Yan asked with complete sincerity, “Am I supposed to shout my fated tormentor now?”
Fu Gui Gui loudly cried “aiya” in agreement.
After an entire night of throwing the bird away and picking it back up, Fu Xi Yan saw the sun the next morning and found it indescribably lovable. Compared with the deadlock of coming and going in darkness, being able to see sunlight spread across the earth again truly made a person understand the beauty of life and the meaning of existence.
He decided to say goodbye.
Their mission of escorting You Bai was complete. They had no reason to remain.
The Territorial Security Office clearly did not intend to let them go so quickly, especially after investigation confirmed that the bird egg they carried was actually a Red Peng.
Red Peng were not only treasured by beast tamers. They were also rare and valuable to armies skilled at training birds and beasts for combat. Quite a few people inside the Territorial Security Office had become envious.
As a result, two opinions formed internally regarding what to do with Fu Xi Yan and Pei Yuan Jin. One side supported You Bai’s proposal: recruit the two and use them to maintain contact with the Northern Zhou court. The other wanted to eliminate an unstable element before it could grow. Most of the people advocating the second option had their eyes on the Red Peng.
The Director of the Territorial Security Office, however, was no shortsighted fool blinded by profit. People capable of obtaining a Red Peng and carrying it around so casually could hardly be ordinary agents. The world was filled with countless schools and martial artists. If they acted recklessly, who knew what enormous power they might provoke?
He said, “Turning hostile over a mere beast is unbelievably shortsighted! The fact that they can subdue a Red Peng already shows their strength. Better to make that strength our own.”
A subordinate said, “But they want to leave.”
The Director waved a hand. “If they are Northern Zhou covert agents, then give them an opportunity to gather intelligence.” The enemy of one’s enemy was a friend. As long as the other side was willing to strike at his enemy, he did not mind offering assistance.
Thus, after Fu Xi Yan and Pei Yuan Jin were left waiting for two days, they finally received a mission.
…
“A mission?” Fu Xi Yan stared.
You Bai smiled. “The Director of the Territorial Security Office is one of Prince Yue’s favored men. If you earn his approval, your future rise will be only a matter of time.”
Fu Xi Yan: “…”
To tell the truth, their standing with Prince Yue himself was already quite good. As for becoming rich and powerful… why wait for another day when today would do?
Seeing that Fu Xi Yan said nothing, You Bai continued, “This mission is not only beneficial to Rongcheng. For Northern Zhou, it is also an opportunity that rarely comes twice.”
Fu Xi Yan still did not answer.
You Bai therefore had no choice but to continue. “Do you know the Spirit Sect?”
Fu Xi Yan, who had already settled on the childish refrain not listening, not listening, turtle chanting scriptures, finally looked at him.
You Bai lowered his voice. “The Spirit Sect’s Holy Maiden is preparing to visit Yuzhang.”
Fu Xi Yan raised his brows. “Who is the Spirit Sect’s Holy Maiden?”
You Bai looked at him doubtfully, as though asking how a Northern Zhou covert agent could possibly not know something even he knew.
He whispered, “Ban Qing Yu.”