Book 49 Chapter 7 – The Wind and Cloud[1] in the Tang Palace
Kou Zhong spoke heavily, “It’s Shi Zhixuan. How did he do that?”
The first sentence was a conclusion, the last sentence was a question.
Only Shi Zhixuan could possibly know that they sneaked in from the underground tunnel. However, unless he had been following them via the tunnel to this place, how could he accurately throw something to the roof of the imperial study room, so that it crashed against the roof, rolled down, and fell to the ground, and thus alerting the palace’s imperial guards?
In order to guard against Shi Zhixuan coming to assassinate Li Yuan, the Great Tang’s palace city was already like stretched-taut, waiting-for-action-after-having-accumulated-energy – bowstring. This trick by Shi Zhixuan immediately triggered the formidable defensive power of the Great Tang’s Palace, like a sudden swelling of the mountain flash flood.
And the ones bearing the brunt were precisely the three of them.
Although from time to time they kept talking about the possibility of being found out after they entered the palace, for the most part they were just chatting and joking. Tonight’s trip was purely to explore, they never thought that they might fall into this situation, which probably could consign them to eternal damnation.
Xu Ziling decisively said, “Give all your knockout incense balls to me, you and Xibai take the short tunnel and go in secret to the Taiji Palace, and then from Taiji Palace find a way to escape, I will pull the enemy away.”
With one hand he received the knockout incense balls, which the two men handed over, with the other hand he took off his hood and loosened his hair, and put on the mask.
Kou Zhong’s mind was interlinked with his, this moment they had no time to talk nonsense, this was a choice within no choice. If Kou Zhong and Hou Xibai could escape with the gods did not know and the ghosts did not perceive, while on the other side Xu Ziling could also get away, then it could already be considered great success.
“Ziling, be careful,” Hou Xibai spoke in low voice.
This moment, outside the imperial study room, there were interweaving flashes of bright torches everywhere, evidently the enemies were rushing over from four sides, eight directions.
Xu Ziling slipped out of the window, while tossing two balls at the same time. Before the arrows and darts reached him, he made a somersault and leaped onto the roof of the imperial study room.
Thick smoke arose. The most brilliant thing was that it dispersed with the wind, so that the imperial study room disappeared inside the smoke.
Living high and looking down, in an instant Xu Ziling was able to grasp the entire situation. The imperial guards rushing over have not surrounded the imperial study room. The first to arrive would be the two groups of personal bodyguards from south and north, two gates, respectively. Just now the ones shooting arrows at him were the imperial bodyguards from the south gate, two of which had comparatively superior qinggong, they leaped at an angle and were about to arrive. Far away, from all directions, torches light were moving rapidly in this direction, if he was hesitating ever so slightly, he would surely fall into hopeless situation of being under siege of magnificent army with thousands of men and horses.
Xu Ziling did not let the enemy to have the opportunity to either fight or to close in around him. Sweeping upward to the roof ridge, he soared into the air and landed into the middle section of the study room. One foot lightly tapped the ground, he flew along the roof ridge of the front section, and threw himself toward the imperial garden. He threw two more balls, the entire imperial study room area was enveloped in blooming smoke of the knockout incense, the effect was magical, even Xu Ziling as the user also felt that it was hard to believe.
Near and far, people were rushing over, either on the roof or on the ground. Looking at their shenfa, it looked like there was no lack of martial art masters among them.
Xu Ziling leaped over the high wall and landed on the gravel path of the imperial garden. He threw two more balls, immediately thick smoke sprang up everywhere; carried by the wind, the smoke spread over the vast imperial garden, all around, it looked like real yet it appeared to be illusion as well.
Out of eight balls, he already dropped six. To Xu Ziling himself, it did not do much, but to Kou Zhong and Hou Xibai, the smoke provided much needed cover.
“Kill without mercy.”
Amidst his busyness, Xu Ziling looked at the direction where the voice came from, only to see dozen or so men pressing down on him from the other side of the imperial garden, the leader was, surprisingly, Li Yuan, the shout was coming from his imperial mouth. Other than him, the one Xu Ziling recognized was Yuwen Shang.
Hundreds of personal bodyguards were swarming over from the direction of the Taiji Palace and Xuanwu Gate. Were it not for the smoke, the torches’ light would have exposed him that not a single strand of hair would be hidden.
There was the twanging noise of the bowstrings as hundreds of powerful arrows were shots from the powerful crossbows from behind, like a torrential rain, with him as the target.
Xu Ziling shot straight up into the sky, so that all the arrows and darts hit empty air. He continued rising up nearly fifteen zhang into the air, his right hand swiped his waist, he took off the ox tendon hook rope and shot it toward a tall tree near the partition wall behind him, while at the same time he borrowed the force to traverse the air, leaving the imperial garden, and casting himself back in the direction of Li Yuan’s bedroom palace.
This move was beyond everybody’s expectation; they were no longer able to besiege him inside the imperial garden.
However, Xu Ziling was well aware that he was still not out of danger. Because Li Yuan’s bedroom palace was the place with strictest security within the imperial palace, the outer palace wall was something that was difficult for flying bird to cross even more. If he was delayed even for a moment, Li Yuan and his group of martial art masters would be able to overtake him, then he would fall into the situation where there was only death without any opportunity to live.
And his last magic weapon was only the remaining two knockout incense balls inside his pocket.
When Xu Ziling threw the knockout incense balls, Kou Zhong and Hou Xibai did not dare to hesitate; they flew out of the main entrance, and then entered the imperial garden via the secret door. Under cover of the smoke, taking advantage of the enemy’s attention was completely focused on Xu Ziling, they stealthily flew toward the fake mountain rock. By the time they entered the underground tunnel, the imperial garden was full of torchlight and the imperial guards like wolves and tigers. The situation was dangerous to the extreme. After slight hesitation, they had no choice but to flee without Xu Ziling.
While running, Hou Xibai asked, “Can Ziling get away?”
Full of confidence, Kou Zhong replied, “Don’t look at this kid’s usual na?ve and honest look; he is actually more cunning than me.”
‘Qiang!’
He drew the Moon in the Well.
Hou Xibai came to himself; he lighted a fire stick.
In a flash, the two reached the exit under the dragon seat in Taiji Palace. Kou Zhong told Hou Xibai to put out the fire stick, he spoke in low voice, “If your Shi Shi is really hanging around our tail and entered the palace after we did, then the place where he is most likely waiting for us is precisely upstairs. As soon as we are out, we see one, we kill one, we see a pair, we kill a pair.”
Hou Xibai nodded to indicate he understood. Taking out the Fan of Beauty from his sleeve, he said, “Open the lid!”
Xu Ziling tapped the roof ridge with his toes, immediately he spun around like a tornado, so that all the arrows, dart, and secret projectiles that were about to touch his body were slipping away, none was able to bring him any harm. At the same time, the hook rope in his left hand shot out, it grabbed a large tree by the building, abruptly changing his entering-the-enemy-siege momentum to moving horizontally in the air. And then with a nimble technique he pulled back the hook rope and landed on top of the winding corridor separating the courtyard.
The entire rear palace was turning into a boiling battlefield, with hundreds of torches illuminating the area that everywhere was as bright as daytime, the dark of the night lost its usefulness as a cover. The roof of the palace halls was covered entirely by the imperial guards climbing over; were it not for the life-saving hook rope he would not be able to move even for a single cun.
The Great Tang’s imperial guards displayed a high degree of organizational ability and their steely discipline; group after group of men advanced and pressed down in the operation to encircle and annihilate him. As long as one group was able to entangle him, he would certainly be unable to leave with his life intact.
He was still one courtyard away from the high wall, about twenty zhang high, separating the Taiji Palace and the East Palace. The top of the wall was covered densely with imperial guards, with bows and arrows in their hands, ready to shoot. His target was the watchtower, about thirty zhang high, at the southeast corner. If his hook rope was able to grab the top of the building, he could evade the arrows and the darts, and escaped into the East Palace area, and charged straight toward the outer palace wall.
A group of more than thirty imperial guards saw him leaping toward the top of the winding corridor, hastily they also rushed toward the winding corridor, raising their sabers and spears, ready to deliver a frontal assault to him.
The many top quality martial art masters under Li Yuan’s leadership, like dozens of lightning and typhoon, surged on from behind. Were it not for Xu Ziling constantly changing direction, perhaps he would have been surrounded early on. This moment they were merely about fifty zhang away from Xu Ziling, and would be able to reach him in the blink of an eye.
Xu Ziling was dropping down; if the imperial guards on the winding corridor managed to force him land on the ground, it would be akin to falling among the tigers and the wolves, surely there would be no luck to escape. He already calculated accurately; throwing himself toward the winding corridor was just a ruse to confuse the enemy. Before the enemy’s weapons reached his body, he pulled the hook rope back, and shot it again to grab another big tree outside the winding corridor’s wall, changing his going-down-at-an-angle momentum into a going-up-at-an-angle momentum, barely evading the enemy’s interception, like a big bird soaring in the air, toward the top of the building on the southeast corner.
The top of the palace hall was full of archers. Seeing him flying over toward them from high up in the sky, they immediately released the arrows and darts, powerful and accurate, simply unavoidable.
Xu Ziling roused his fighting spirit, thinking that if he could obtain a foothold on top of the palace hall, he could use the hook rope to catch another tree, and then he could reach the watchtower, his target, and from there he could charge into the East Palace.
With a strange whistle, Xu Ziling converted the true qi within his body, from falling down to shooting horizontally, evading the closest powerful arrow by mere hairsbreadth, and then before the enemy released the second round of powerful arrows, like a tiger charging into a flock of sheep, he entered the crowd of the enemies on top of the palace hall, giving everything he had, so that those who resisted him were swept by the wind, not a single one was able to stand. Falling to the east and collapsing to the west, they dropped down from the roof ridge, and fell down to the ground, causing great chaos among the enemies.
However, with just this slight delay, Li Yuan’s group was able to shave the distance to thirty zhang; the situation was extremely critical.
Xu Ziling shot from both sides, he blasted a group of four enemies swarming over from the other side of the roof ridge, sending them falling to the ground. He was about to set foot on the roof ridge, suddenly one man and one woman appeared on the roof ridge. The man laughed heartily and said, “Xie Wang, where are you going? This pair of ignorant husband and wife has been waiting respectfully for a long time.”
Since the beginning of his escape, Xu Ziling has never thought that the other side would mistake him as Shi Zhixuan. But this time he did not have time to think, running for his life was more important.
This pair of man and woman’s shape and appearance was distinct. The man was dressed in scholar attire, the woman was wearing embroidered long skirt. The former only wielded a shield, the latter’s jade hand grasped a sword. They were standing casually, yet they carried some kind of steady-like-an-iron-tower defensive momentum; they were absolutely not ordinary martial art master imperial guards. The man’s head was full of silvery-grey hair, but he only looked like a middle-aged man, and could be considered quite handsome; however, looking at his eyes, he ought to be an old senior who has had his fill of worldly affairs. The woman looked graceful and gorgeous, with myriad of bearings, the hair on her temples grizzled, but the impression was that her beautiful hair was still shiny and jet-black.
Xu Ziling had brilliant insight, he knew that he would not be able to easily charge through this barrier. With a stern shout he pulled the flying daggers from his waist and shot them in rapid succession.
The stone lid moved across to reveal the exit.
Kou Zhong and Hou Xibai held their breath and waited. Unexpectedly there was no detectable movement on the outside at all, everything was quiet.
Knitting his brows, Kou Zhong said, “Could it be I am guessing incorrectly? Let me get out first and take a look!”
The person following the saber, he soared into the air.
The vast and empty Taiji Palace Hall was as serene as before, there was no trace of Shi Zhixuan.
Kou Zhong felt strange inwardly. He was already more than ten zhang high in the air, and was about to change his qi to sink down when strange change appeared suddenly.
From inside the tunnel came the sound of whistling qi power, intermingled with Hou Xibai’s muffled grunt and the intense noise of clashing true power.
Kou Zhong cried ‘Bad!’, only then did he realize that Shi Zhixuan unexpectedly crept behind them, watching for a good opportunity in the dark tunnel to mount a sneak attack toward Hou Xibai. Not only Shi Zhixuan’s martial art skill was above Hou Xibai’s, he also had deep understanding of his disciple’s skill, plus he took unfair advantage of Hou Xibai being caught off guard; naturally he totally occupied the advantageous position.
Kou Zhong calmed himself down and focused his attention, he did not allow his concern about Hou Xibai and his anxiety to affect his mind. Taking a deep breath, man and saber become one, he dropped down into the tunnel again.
Qi power carried a whistling noise, it echoed along the tunnel.
The sound of fighting stopped.
Carrying Hou Xibai, Shi Zhixuan flew out of the tunnel’s exit, fast as lightning, his fist struck the tip of Kou Zhong’s stabbing downward saber.
Kou Zhong felt as if he was struck by lightning, his five viscera and six bowels surged over unbearably, he nearly vomited blood. Shi Zhixuan’s astonishing qi power rushed forth along the saber like a flood, Kou Zhong’s body refused to follow its master’s order, it flew toward the middle of the palace hall. By the time his feet touched the ground, Shi Zhixuan casually put down the unconscious Hou Xibai on the floor, and walked over until he was about a zhang away in front of Kou Zhong, where he stood still with his hands behind his back, and said with a smile, “It’s rare! It’s rare! Unexpectedly you are able to block Ol’ Shi’s full-power punch. It can clearly be seen that both Shaoshuai’s saber technique and your power have made great progress.”
Kou Zhong pressed down his surging blood and qi with great difficulty; the Moon in the Well pointed at this most terrifying demon not only within the demonic school, but in the world as well – from a distance, he spoke in heavy voice, “My little life is here, I want to see if you, Xie Wang have the ability to take it away?”
Remaining calm and unruffled in the midst of chaos, Shi Zhixuan looked back at Hou Xibai, lying on the ground, before he turned around again and said with a laugh, “Xibai only has his acupoints sealed by me, he still has not lost his ability to see and hear, I hope Xibai is not going to either see or hear someone whom he considers as a good friend would be greedy for life, afraid of death, would be a scoundrel who abandon friend and escape.”
Kou Zhong was so angry that he nearly flew into rage while was also extremely anxious. Taking a deep breath, he said, “Despicable!”
The Moon in the Well swiftly hacked down.
Seeing this, Xu Ziling drew out a mouthful of cold air; he had never seen anybody using a shield as light as a feather like this, as nimble as a deity, ever-changing; it just didn’t matter from which angle his flying daggers were coming, or what technique he was using to shoot them, the opponent’s shield flipped and flew, or block it hard-on, or he used the edge of the shield to hack, every single movement was able to block the flying dagger. Xu Ziling shot ten flying daggers, yet not a single one was lucky enough to be spared. He threw the flying daggers using a technique that the daggers were joined together as string of pearls, shooting toward the pair of martial art masters, husband and wife, who blocked his way, yet the husband was able to use his shield to block all.
These things happened in a lightning or flint-spark speed, and were over in the blink of an eye. Suddenly the shield pressed down right on his face, while to the right of the shield a sword light was flaring greatly. The sword and the shield worked together like a seamless heavenly clothes, coming straight with powerful momentum. On the roof slope, the other warriors reorganized their battle array and charged toward him. This slight delay has caused him to fall into heavy siege. Li Yuan and the others had chased to the winding corridor, which he swept past a moment ago. The situation was critical to the extreme point.
The woman shouted tenderly, “Xiu Ge! He is not Xie Wang!”
Xu Ziling let out a stifled groan, the tip of his foot forcefully shot out a bit high, he launched a punch over the empty air to blast the shield coming down at him from about a zhang away.
‘Boom!’
Qi power clashed; without the slightest bit of fancy, fake move, fiercely striking each other in stake-it-all move.
The shield-wielder martial art master’s entire body shook, but Xu Ziling was shaken by the impact force that he was thrown backward, and was falling toward Li Yuan’s group. This was beyond the enemies on the roof slope’s expectation, immediately their troops disposition was thrown into great chaos, the sound of shouting shook the sky.
Li Yuan and the others did not expect that Xu Ziling would drop by their door; seeing that there was no time to lose, more than a dozen men leaped into the air to intercept him midair.
Seeing Li Yuan personally made his move to lead, the imperial guards on the ground’s morale was greatly aroused, they shouted together to cheer their lord.
The shouts and cheers rose up to the heavens, shaking the entire palace complex.
Naturally Xu Ziling was not that stupid. The hook rope shot horizontally across, it grabbed the trunk of a tree nearby, changing his direction so that he was traversing sideways. Li Yuan, Yuwen Shang, and a group of martial art masters among the imperial guards completely pounced on empty air.
Xu Ziling changed his strategy, the tip of his foot tapped on the horizontal branch near the top of the tree, he easily pulled the hook rope back, and swept across to the roof of a small pavilion, and then he somersaulted, used the hook rope to grab another tree, and high up in the air he threw himself toward the watchtower on the southeast corner.
One after another the powerful arrows that were shot from the top of the city wall and the watchtower fell through.
Right this moment, from among the group of imperial guards on the ground, a shadow, using rapid-beyond-human-comprehension shenfa, shot up vertically toward him.
Xu Ziling was still gliding in the air about twenty -zhang high from the ground; he could feel the fierce and severe momentum with which the enemy was coming at him. Just by looking at how the opposite side was able to shoot up twenty zhang into the air to intercept him, he knew that the opponent was at least of Li Yuan, Yuwen Shang’s caliber, or even surpassed their level.
Looking down, immediately his soul flew away and scattered, he cried ‘Not good!’ inwardly.
Finally Kou Zhong had first hand experience confronting what Xu Ziling called the Shi Zhixuan without any flaw, the kind of don’t-know-where-to-start feeling.
It was like he was standing there, but it also felt like he was not there. Kou Zhong was simply unable to grasp his position, let alone to predict his next move.
However, his saber already carried once-gone-no-coming-back momentum, changing his move would only expedite his defeat. The saber strike carried concentrated spiraling energy, so that no matter how formidable Shi Zhixuan’s Bu Si Yin Fa was, chances are he would not dare to meet it head-on.
Shi Zhixuan let out an indifferent laugh, suddenly he swayed to the left and right at astonishingly high speed, just like he suddenly grew into several incarnations, hard to tell which one was real, which one was illusion. Suddenly he appeared on Kou Zhong’s left side, his sleeve brushed toward the side of Kou Zhong’s forehead.
Unexpectedly Kou Zhong closed his eyes, while spinning his body around and brandishing his saber, carrying with it intensely cold, fierce and severe saber qi, the saber blade, like it was assisted by a deity, chopped Shi Zhixuan’s brushing sleeve.
‘Pow!’
The reaction force from Shi Zhixuan’s brushing sleeve sent Kou Zhong spinning away; it was only after staggering a bit did he manage to steady himself, and then he took another swing toward Shi Zhixuan.
Shi Zhixuan stood firm like a mountain peak; calming his qi down, he spoke leisurely, “That saber strike was more like it; does it have any famous name? Is it one of your Eight Methods of the Well?”
Inwardly, Kou Zhong was greatly astonished, why did Shi Zhixuan look like he had a lot of time in his hands? Why didn’t he seize the opportunity to pursue and attack? This did not make any sense. Since Zhao Deyan already stated his condition that Shi Zhixuan must kill Kou Zhong and Xu Ziling, he shouldn’t miss this once-in-a-thousand-year golden opportunity.
What kind of ghost trick was he playing?
It was possible that Shi Zhixuan did not know that Kou Zhong and Xu Ziling could eavesdrop his secret conversation with Yin Zuwen over such a far distance, because he could not possibly know the two boys’ exclusive ability to borrow power from each other, hence he should not be aware that he, Kou Zhong, knew about the condition that Zhao Deyan proposed to him.
Kou Zhong laughed aloud and said, “That move did not have any famous name; it is called ‘Shen Yi’ [body/one-self’s intention], the wonder of it lies between intentional and unintentional, it was passed on from the ‘Heavenly Saber’ Song Que’s xinfa.”
Shi Zhixuan’s pair of eyes emitted fierce and severe expression; letting out a cold snort, he said, “‘Heavenly Saber’ Song Que, there will come a day the Ol’ Shi will let him know that his Heavenly Saber is just a rotten copper, rusty iron representing his failure and disgrace.”
Kou Zhong spoke with a sneer, “Go ahead, toot your horn in front of me, a houbei [younger generation]! If you are willing to look for him, the Senior, to fight, I guarantee that for him, the Senior, it would be something that he seeks but fail to get, it would be extremely welcomed.”
Shi Zhixuan did not take any offense; with a slight smile, he spoke slyly, “Who will win, who will lose, someday in the future, the fact will prove it, no need to waste words. Remembering that it was not easy for you, Kou Zhong, to make your name, and it is so remarkable that you are able to master such a saber technique to such level, I am going to give you a way to survive.”
Kou Zhong spoke quietly, “Xie Wang, you are not joking, are you?”
Shi Zhixuan replied, “How could I have the leisure to joke around with you? My darling disciple took away my teaching from me. Don’t worry! No matter how rebellious and naughty he is, he is still my, Ol’ Shi’s disciple. It’s just that for the time being, he cannot live a wind, flower, snow and moon life, or to accompany you, two little kids stirring up trouble everywhere. As long as you hand over the stolen ‘Han Lin Qing Yuan Tu’, Xibai will immediately recover his freedom. Ol’ Shi will give you one day. By nightfall tomorrow, put the painting on the table in Xibai’s little hall, or this agreement will be cancelled.”
Kou Zhong laughed aloud and said, “You want to take Xibai away? You must ask Laozi’s Moon in the Well first!”
The man and saber became one, he charged toward Shi Zhixuan.
1 Chapter title: unstable situation.