Nightfall

Sangsang looked at the moon in the night sky. When it was full, she felt as powerful as she had been in the past countless years; when it waned, she felt weak more than ever, or in other words, she could feel herself weakening in the Kingdom of God. That man once said that the moon was bright or dim, and it might wax and wane, just like the unexpected fortune of people. So what did that mean to her?

She felt like leaving the mortal world and return to her own kingdom as soon as she fell in the Snow-capped mountain, because she smelled danger. She would be in danger no matter if she was in the Kingdom of God or in the mortal world. However, the gate to the Kingdom of God had been destroyed, how could she go back?

Different people looked at the same moon on the Peach Mountain tonight, and their thoughts also wavered; some of them considered leaving, some wanted to stay, and some weren’t sure if they would like to meet each other.

She stood at the gazebo behind the Divine Hall of Light for a long time. She left until the moon disappeared. To the east of the mountains, the sky was growing brighter, casting morning light upon her.

The morning clouds were radiant with splendor, then they were gone with the wind, leaving the red and warm sun there. She was showered with the sun light with her eyes squinting, looking peaceful and beautiful.

She was the rule and the Dominator of the world. She might have fallen into the mortal world, becoming a mortal, but all she needed to recover was the sunlight. The red sun, no matter if it was real or not, had the real light and heat which were the source of her power. As for the wine and dishes, she had them just for her mortal body, or she needed them mostly to weaken her own consciousness.

She was now very plump, or nearly fat. The black clothes with many embroidery flowers looked small on her. She had grown tall and white, looking quite different from how she used to be for the past 19 years, but her eyes didn’t change at all. They were pure, long and thin like willow leaves.

Her eyes grew even thinner as she squinted, much like those willow leaves on the bank of Yanming Lake in Chang’an City. She wasn’t closing her eyes, so she could still see things.

The red sun jumping out of the morning cloud, along with the threads of clouds and fog and the thin water fall on the cliff, were all in her bright eyes. She saw birds flying between the cliffs, cubs in the far away mountains, rocks revealed by the ebb tide, and sea water steamed by the heat of the sun.

All the pictures indicated that the rule of the world was running stably, and the rule was unshakable, so the world was stable, too. The Qi of Heaven and Earth, and all other materials were distributed in such a balance, and she was the rule; she then felt satisfied.

Her face was expressionless, but deep in her eyes there seemed to be emotion of an enchanted human. She was enchanted by the harmony between the world and herself.

She continued to stand on the gazebo behind the Divine Palace of Light, watching the scenery. The scenery seemed to be changing all along but it actually stayed the same. She never left until the night fell, and moonlight shone again.

The moon was different from how it looked last night, and she didn’t like the change.

The moon waxed and waned. She was never worried about her own good or bad fortune, but now she smelled the aura of life and death. She hated it because it was the aura which only humans could feel.

The scenery behind the Divine Palace of Light became unstable because of her hatred. Her hatred was turning the whistling of wind in the woods into thunder in her ears. The waterfall falling into the fog sounded silent, but she felt someone was playing drums. The peace she enjoyed had been long gone. She had drunk up all the strong wine in those jars, and nothing would change even if she threw all those jars off the precipice.

“I’m going out for a walk.”

She looked at the bright moon on the night sky and said.

The two girls in white were so shocked, and they were speechless because the saintess had never stepped out of the Divine Hall of Light since they came to the Peach Mountain. Nobody else in the West-Hill Palace had seen her face. They wondered why she was leaving, and where she was going.

An ordinary horse carriage stopped in front of the Temple of Light the next morning.

The Big Black Horse popped its head out of the palace, and looked at the two war horses from West-Hill. It had an endless kill intent in its eyes, and it was trying to scare off the two war horses to create an opportunity for itself.

She walked out from the depths inside of the Divine Hall, and took a glance at it.

The Big Black Horse hurriedly took a few steps back, and bent on the frozen ground of the hall. It was grinning, and looked happy, or even a little bit flattering.

She got on the carriage and closed her eyes to rest. One of the two girls in white served her in the carriage; the other one whipped the horse, driving the carriage away from the Divine Hall of Light and down to the foot of the Peach Mountain.

An ordinary carriage looked even more conspicuous in the solemn Divine Hall, but it was strange that no priests or deacons seemed to have noticed the carriage, and nobody had heard the whipping and clopping. The carriage drove down the mountain like a ghost.

The carriage didn’t stop at the foot of the mountain. It continued driving forward, crossing more than a ten-mile mountain path, and arrived at a small town. Then it was pulled over by a shop opposite the Taoism Temple of the town.

…

…

Ning Que woke up early. He warmed up by practicing the cutlass techniques, and then he started to breathe while in meditation. The resourceful Qi of Heaven and Earth in the Peach Mountain taken inside and turned into his own Great Spirit. He was carrying out the whole process very carefully.

The morning fog was not yet dispersing when he finished practicing. As he walked along the path behind the Book Hall, a light flower fragrance reached him, making him feel freshed. The red sun had completely leaped out of the morning clouds, and the fog had finally disappeared. It was till then that he found he had been surrounded by thousands of blooming peach flower trees, so he frowned in disgust.

No peach flower had ever bloomed after the Headmaster climbed here to drink, and cut off all the peach flowers on the mountain. This spring, the Eternal Fire in the Divine Hall of Light suddenly went out, and peach flowers bloomed over the mountains. The flowers never withered, even though now it was already midsummer.

He loved the peach flowers in front of the Academy because they were brought there by the Headermaster from Peach Mountian, but he didn’t like these peach flowers here in the West-Hill Palace because they were the symbol of the Headmaster’s passing on.

There seemed to be a path hidden in the peach flowers, but Ning Que didn’t know where it led. He went there and felt the mountain wind turned cold all of a sudden. Flowers were shivering on the branches, as if winter had come in a moment.

A great tactical array was hiding in the peach flowers. No wonder the Headmaster had cut them that year. Ning Que decided to leave immediately as soon as he figured this out.

Given his cultivation state and accomplishment in Talisman Taoism, it wouldn’t be hard to leave, but at the same time it was impossible for him to break the array and move forward.

At the moment he felt a familiar aura in the peach flowers, and he could even vaguely sense the feelings of the flowers. Though he was a layman in the tactical array, he knew the key point to break the array was that the blossoms were open to him.

Other people would be shocked and confused by the sudden change, or they would even temporarily retreat. Ning Que was not one of those because he figured out the cause of the change immediately.

The flowers wouldn’t stop him because they were blooming for her.

The fragrant pink petals drifted down when rubbed by the corner of his clothes. There was no need to tell the direction or to mind the powerful tactical array in the flowers. He was following the feelings that peach flowers give him, and it didn’t take him long before he walked out of the peach woods which used to be an extremely dangerous place for cultivators.

Outside the peach flower woods was the precipice.

He stood by the precipice and looked up at the eminent Divine Palace. Then, he found he had already reached the middle of the mountain. He looked to the opposite side, and still found a precipice standing in front.

The precipice he was standing on was part of Peach Mountian, so was the precipice in the opposite side. They were under several Divine Palaces, but for unknows reasons, they were independent from the Peach Mountain.

They were separated by a hundred feet, without any bridges but mountain wind in the gap. Cool aura came out of the foggy gap, and nobody knew how deep it was.

A hundred feet was not far for cultivators, and especially for those from the Devil’s Doctrine. Judging by the ground and the moss on the precipice, nobody had been here, or had been to the opposite precipice. The two precipices had never met each other.

The two precipices had been staring at each other for thousands of years, silent. Did they ever hate each other?

Chilly wind blew from the downside of the precipice. After the fog dispersed, something showed up on the opposite precipice. Ning Que had an excellent eyesight and he tried to make sure if they were rows of stone windows. He kept waiting and watching until the mountain wind came again, and the fog dispersed. Then, he found there were indeed stone windows on the precipice.

“Is this the legendary You Prison of the West-Hill Palace, used to imprison its traitors?”

He looked at the opposite precipice and frowned.

After a while of watching, he suddenly closed his eyes. Tears dripped along his eye corners.

Many predecessors of the Devil’s Doctrine had been imprisoned to die in the You Prison in the past thousands of years; the Great Divine Priest of Light had been prisoned here for more than ten years, which reminded Ning Que of Master Yan Se; the stone windows on the precipice were now giving out a bloody and melancholic aura, which might make other people feel sympathy, but not Ning Que. That wasn’t the cause of his tears.

It was because his eyes hurt.

There was nothing here except for the mountain wind, however, he felt like thousands of invisible fingers had touched his eyeballs moments ago.

The fingers were gentle, but he could’t bear the extreme pain and shed tears because the eyes were the softest part of the human body, though he had made great achievements on the Great Spirit.

Moments later he opened his eyes, and looked at the precipice once again. Then, he closed his eyes again and shed more tears because the fingers touching his eyes grew more powerful.

He was sure that the aura touching his eyes came from the precipice, and he knew if he insisted on looking, the power striking back would grow stronger.

There was a great array between the precipices to block those who tried to peep into the You Prison. Nobody could avoid being touched on the eyes whether they were standing a hundred feet away from the precipice like Ning Que, or they were standing a thousand miles away from here. People could see it not because their eyesight fell on it; it was because the precipice cast its picture in their eyes, along with the power of the array.

The array was called Eye Touch.