Who else saw the river of blood?
All the other victims,few days before they died. Hilariously though,a similar dream had completely vanished from Yingyue's memory.
"A man whose face they couldn't see,"she mused as she walked beside Yuchen at the seaside, making sure to keep him between the sea and herself "could he be a demon or ghost of some sort? Or an evil cultivator? And what does it have to do with the sea? There clearly is something up with it, and if it's not fixed soon everyone here might just die ".
After speaking to the people close to the deceased, the two young cultivators had decided to inspect the sea.
"I can't even sense anything sinister. Can you, Shixiong?".
"No".
"So it's something we shouldn't joke with. Something dangerous and powerful enough to conceal its presence and aura from two people with a high cultivation base".
As she spoke, Yingyue twisted a strand of Yuchen's hair busily around her index finger.
When he noticed this, he jerked the strand from her hold so sternly that it left her finger throbbing with pain.
"Ouch!"she flapped her hand and blew on it, shooting him an irked look.
"Don't fool around".
"What exactly isn't 'fooling around' to you?"she retorted petulantly.
Yuchen definitely did not want to find himself trading words with her again, so he walked on ahead.
"Wha... wait, Shixiong!".
Yingyue sprang forward and caught hold of the back of his robes.
"Please don't leave me behind,"she said shakily"not when we're this close to the sea".
Yuchen looked at her.
"I'm..."she gulped"I'm scared of the sea".
Surprisingly, he actually stepped back to stand between her and the large body of water.
"Thanks"she murmured, twisting her braid around her finger now.
Yuchen nearly asked her if heaven would fall if she just did not twist anything around that finger of hers. But he was not going to engage her in another trivial conversation.
Never again.
"Do you swim, Shixiong? 'Cos it might come to that. We can't disappoint Dage by returning empty handed".
Yuchen came very close to pointing out that she could very well do the swimming.
"Psst, Shixiong, buy me a snack".
Yuchen looked at her like "seriously?".
"Hey, if you keep looking at me like that you just might get wrinkles at seventeen. A-Chao said you're forbidden from displaying 'excessive cheer', so if you won't smile I understand. But then, I've never seen A-Ling smile and yet I've never seen him scowl either".
All of heaven could bear Yuchen witness that he had not actually been scowling this time.
"Speaking of A-Ling, I wonder how he's doing. He doesn't have any friends besides me, so I'm afraid he might be too lonely. Geez, I really should hurry up and return to him. A-Ling is terrifically cute, you know. Sometimes I find myself wishing he had been born a girl instead, but then I think 'no , that's just me being selfish'. After all, there aren't nearly enough cute boys in the world, only those that appear to be cute. Don't get me wrong though, Shixiong. I think you're amazing in your own way. Everyone can't be cute, after all. It would really diminish the value of cuteness wouldn't it?".
Yuchen wondered if he should just turn and walk into the sea. This girl seemed to just love prattling nonsense into his ears, and she never even bothered to ask if he knew who in the world this A-Ling was.
"Young Master!".
Two of them turned to see a woman running towards them as fast as she could.
"That's one of the servants from the Chief's place"Yingyue said.
Even before she opened her mouth to speak, her panicked disposition already told them that something was terribly wrong.
"What happened?"Yingyue asked.
The woman did not even seem to notice her presence, much less hear her question.
She threw herself at Yuchen's feet and clutched the hem of his robes.
"Th- the chief... he's not moving... help... he's not moving...".
Yuchen's discomfort was obvious, but he shoved aside his reservations and spoke calmly to her.
"Take me to him,"then to Yingyue"you,stay here and continue with the inspection".
"Yes, Shixiong"she replied, lifting her hand to her head in a mock salute.
Yuchen could not help raising an eyebrow at her even as he left with the woman.
Yingyue stared until they were out of sight, wondering what exactly had happened. She would have loved to tag along and help out somehow, but then she had her work cut out for her.
She put some distance between herself and the sea, marvelling at the bravery of some children who stood in the shallows, arguing.
"You can't keep running from it"a chubby little girl was saying,"if you live in Haibin, you have to know how to swim".
The children around her nodded encouragingly at the skinny boy she was trying in futility to convince.
"Gee,"Yingyue muttered"if he doesn't want to swim then let him be".
A loud bark drew her attention away from them. She turned to see a black dog strolling past the stalls of the seaside market, obviously hoping to stuff its belly with some of the freshly caught fish on display.
Yingyue's eyes lit up instantly. She really had not expected to see any pets in a town so close to the sea. Without delay, she skipped over to it.
"Hey there,"she addressed the dog cheerily"how are you today?".
As she spoke, she extended a hand to pat it.
To her utmost surprise, though, the dog closed its teeth upon her hand.
"Ouch!"Yingyue cried, snatching her injured hand back and flapping it vigorously.
"Bad doggie!"she declared, pointing resentfully at it.
However, either the dog could not tell good from bad,or its conscience was really not being active.
Because it simply panted at her, wagging its tail. Before Yingyue could decide between kicking it and granting it forgiveness,a loud shriek attracted her attention.
She turned immediately, only to see that the skinny little boy had been pushed into the water after all, and the children hovered at the shallows, shouting "you can do it!", too young to understand that their counterpart was,in fact, drowning, even as he struggled to keep his head above the waters.
"These kids... what do they even think they're doing?!".
Without thinking, Yingyue raced for the sea and dived after the child. Only when she was already in did she think "wait, what?", even as she secured the boy. Fortunately, he had not gotten too far from the shallows, so getting him to land was not too difficult.
At the end of her heroic venture, Yingyue looked even worse off than the child she had rescued. Her skin was unnaturally pale, and she was trembling badly, her heart hammering so hard she was robbed of breath in an instant. People gathered around her, leading her away to a fire at one of the stalls.
Meanwhile, beneath the deepest depths of the sea,a pair of bright blue eyes flickered open.
*
*
*
Yuchen was led into the Chief's bedroom, which was so cluttered with carvings that he felt instantly uncomfortable.
The elderly man was sprawled on the enormous bed, completely drained.
The sixth victim.
Yuchen knew that nothing more could be done for him, but he walked forward and took his wrist, checking for a pulse that was not there. This was a bad habit of his. Despite how excellent he was at acceptance, he found death extremely difficult to accept.
That was why he had held so tightly onto his father's corpse even as the body became so cold it made him shiver. Why he had struggled to get to the battered, broken mess that was his mother in death, even as several hands pulled him back, covering his eyes so he would not look, would not see.
Those memories from eleven years ago seeped into his mind, flooding his mouth with a bitter taste.
Yuchen shook his head, his eyes tightly shut.
Feel nothing, he reminded himself, remember nothing. Detach yourself.
And just like that, he was a placid lake again, without so much as a ripple.
"He's dead"he said.
A wave of sorrow broke over the crowd of servants that had gathered.
"But... you're a cultivator. Do you mean there isn't anything you can do?".
"Not even cultivators can bring back the dead. I apologize for your loss".
There was silence.
Maybe it was his calm visage,or his apathetic voice,or his attempt at politeness despite all these, but something made a servant hurl a calabash at him.
For half a second, there was a flash of light, and the calabash lay in two equal halves on the floor. Yuchen faced them, his sword drawn.
Its name was Fenlide,a sword whiter than snow and nearly as tall as a grown man.
Every cultivator knew this sword, and even these people who knew nothing about cultivation found themselves cowering.
"We were wrong!"they cried.
"Have mercy, Daozhang!".
But Yuchen had already lost whatever interest he might have had in them.
He was thinking.
The chief was the sixth victim. At this point, it was as Yingyue had said, every single person in Haibin was as good as dead if they didn't find the culprit immediately.
"Daozhang, behind you!".
Yuchen did not need the warning. Fluid as water, he stepped to the side, cleanly avoiding the creature that came at him, before bringing his sword down on it. Surprisingly, there was a loud clang,as if the blade had connected with steel, and the target shot past like a projectile before landing on its feet and turning to face him.
Two bigger surprises: the "creature" was actually the gnarly corpse of the chief, and the eyes that looked back from his face were a bright blue.