Nightfall

The relationship between Ning Que and Ye Hongyu had always been very subtle ever since they met many years ago. It was because they had felt irreconcilable hatred for each other and also fought side by side.

Before the Rite to Light, he went to the Divine Hall of Judgement to see Ye Hongyu, and she did him a favor. Ning Que was still grateful and wanted to pay her back, so he answered her question sincerely.

Which was more important, faith or revenge? Ning Que knew that Ye Hongyu was practical, just like himself. Then her question must point to something specifically, but what was it?

“After you and Haotian left, the Abbey Dean came to Peach Mountain.” Ye Hongyu explained, “The Hierarch seemed to submit himself to the rule of the Abbey Dean, but actually Taoism is still in the balance of power. Long Qing has become very powerful. All these things bother me.”

Ning Que said, “So you chose to leave Peach Mountain.”

Ye Hongyu said, “I just came to see where you are taking Haotian.”

Ning Que asked, “Why do you want to see her?”

After a moment of silence, Ye Hongyu answered, “I just want to gain courage through her.”

Ning Que somehow understood what she meant, “I think you have already started. I really want to know the hatred between you and Xiong Chumo.”

The purge from last night was a reaction of the Divine Hall of Light be means of the divinity of Haotian. The Divine Hall should not have responded so quickly and resolutely. However, it’s not hard to see that it was the Hierarch’s trusted followers who conducted the last purge inside the Divine Hall of Light.

The purge would inevitably shake the authority of the Hierarch in the end.

Ye Hongyu did not answer directly but claimed, “I am only doing what Haotian would love to see.”

Ning Que said, “You are playing the strategy of controlling Haotian and commanding Taoism.”

Ye Hongyu looked at him and mocked, “Isn’t it exactly what you have been trying to do?”

Since she refused to tell the details of her hatred, Ning Que didn’t try to get to the bottom. He went silent for a while and asked, “What is your plan if you were to ever succeed?”

Ye Hongyu answered, “I will figure that out later.”

Ning Que asked, “What is the point of becoming the new Hierarch of the Divine Hall or the Abbey Dean?” He once said similar words to her in Chang’an last year.

“The Academy always needs a cause to justify its actions, but for me, I only value whether or not an action is worthwhile.”

Ye Hongyu added, “I have already made up my mind regarding my own business. Where do you want to take Haotian? The whole world is now trying to guess your destination.”

Ning Que answered, “I don’t get to pick our destination. In fact, she is the one who wants to see the world. All the places we visited were picked by her.”

Ye Hongyu didn’t know how to respond, for the current situation had never appeared in human history. Even the Abbey Dean had no experience of this, so he did nothing but waited quietly.

Ning Que said, “Now I can only take one step and look around before taking another.”

Ye Hongyu said, “It’s like crossing the river by feeling the stones.”

Thinking of the picture of how they crossed the Great River, Ning Que smiled and said, “We don’t have to feel the stones while crossing the river.”

Their conversation ended here. Ye Hongyu returned to Peach Mountain with two thousand cavalrymen. The punishment that Haotian applied to Taoism was bound to continue, but no one knew when the storm would stop.

Ning Que and Sangsang left the capital of the Qi Kingdom and continued their journey west. They walked between the cyan hills in the spring rain and came to Red Lotus Temple, which had been burned into ruins.

Looking at the rubbles, weeds among the rubbles, burned wood and the wild mushrooms grew on the wet wood, Ning Que went silent for a long time and was hit by mixed feelings while thinking of what Ye Hongyu had said.

In the past, Long Qing led the cavalrymen to attack Ning Que and Sangsang. Ning Que in desperate circumstances, seriously injured Long Qing with Practice of Taotie, and broke the Knowing Destiny, which all happened in front of this dilapidated temple.

Now, Long Qing was more powerful.

Ning Que knew how proud and confident Ye Hongyu was. The whole world saw Long Qing as a charming man, but in her eyes, he was nothing but an ordinary subordinate.

Now she had to admit the power of Long Qing.

Then it meant that Long Qing was indeed powerful.

Many people thought that Ning Que and Long Qing were nemeses for their whole lives and would end their competition with the death of one person and the final victory of the other.

Ning Que should have been the one who feared the most if Long Qing had gotten stronger. However, Ning Que didn’t feel nervous at all and expressed his feelings while looking at the dilapidated temple in the spring rain.

Nobody dared to oppose Ye Hongyu’s action of launching the purge and weakening the power of the Hierarch only because she did it in the name of Haotian. Of course Ning Que didn’t need to worry about Long Qing since he was traveling around with Haotian.

Ye Hongyu controlled Haotian and commanded Taoism, so Taoism was naturally under her control.

Ning Que travelled around the world with Haotian, so the world was naturally peaceful.

Ning Que and Sangsang left the Divine Hall, went south to the Great River Kingdom, went to the Wa Mountain to visit Lanke Temple, and then went to Qi Kingdom and visited Red Lotus Temple. After traveling for several months, they finally entered the South Jin Kingdom.

For Sangsang, this was a war between her and the world. For Ning Que, this was the means to make her stay on earth. For the both of them, this was also the retrospection of the trip during the autumn a few years ago.

For the human world, their trip had been given more complex and sacred meanings. Countless pairs of eyes watched and followed their footsteps. Many people even forgot about eating and sleeping as they felt Ning Que and Sangsang’s ups and downs, and naturally they also forgot the disputes with each other.

There was an unnamed small lake in the south of the South Jin Kingdom. Compared with the Great Swamp in the north, it was so shabby. It was also very quiet since it was located in a deserted mountain, without inhabitants.

Ning Que sat on the lakeside and grilled fishes.

The bonfire was controlled very well. Ning Que was good at using Haotian’s divine flame to cook. The surfaces of the fishes had been roasted to a golden color, but the flesh were still tender.

Sangsang took the grilled fish from Ning Que. She stared blankly at the lake rather and expressed her appetite with the speed of eating like she usually did.

The lake was very small and looked very pitiful among the mountains.

The reflection of moon could be seen in the lake as long as one was sitting by the lake.

It was a full moon, and the bright moon hung in the night sky, shadowing all the stars. The moon sprinkled its silver glows on earth and even illuminated the fishes in the lake.

Looking at the reflection of the bright moon waving gently with the lake water, Sangsang looked pale and a little tired.

Ning Que had long noticed the phenomenon. Whenever the full moon was in the night sky, Sangsang would become weak, and when the moon was waning or there were clouds, she would become strong again.

Of course, this kind of strong or weakness was only relative to her inherently infinite power. She was more powerful than all the cultivators together in the whole world even in her weakest moment.

The war between the Headmaster of Academy and Haotian would affect the human world even though it happened in the sky, for Haotian was on earth.

The moon does wax and wane, and people do suffer old age, illness and death. Sangsang became more and more human. Ning Que could figure out the cause, how could she not?

“You wish for me to be dead this much?” Sangsang looked at the bright moon in the lake and said to Ning Que. She once said so in her mind when she saw Ning Que jumping into the abyss. Now, she finally said it to his face.

Ning Que went silent for a long time and said, “We’ll figure this all out.”

Sangsang said, “This is an objective question, not a subjective one.”

Ning Que didn’t know how to reply.

The lakeside was very quiet. With the night wind breezing the water, the moon was broken and then slowly gathered together again as the water surface swayed, as if nothing had happened.

In the depths of Sangsang’s eyes, countless stars died out and then reborn, which expressed her anger.

Countless stars in the night sky which were too dim to be seen suddenly shined brightly and instantly shadowed the brilliancy of the moon.

All of a sudden, the human world became bright and white in the middle of the night.

The small lake among the mountains was especially bright, as if it was the divine kingdom of light.

With innumerable divine flames falling, the lake water began to boil and filled with mist. The fishes in the water were terrified, wandering around and desperately drilling deep into the water, but how could they escape from the god’s anger?

A thunderous roar sounded in the mountains.

The lake water spewed up into the night sky, like a huge fountain, and the splash rose over the summit behind.

The falling lake water was a warm rain, like tears.

The stars gradually dimmed, and the lakes and mountains gradually became quiet.

Hundreds of fish lay in the mud of the lake, flipping their belly and sending out steam, like they were cooked thoroughly.

Ning Que and Sangsang were all wet and looked very embarrassed.

The rain re-aggregated into the lake and gradually became clear again.

Sangsang had mud on her face and looked like a naughty child.

Ning Que brought a basin of lake water and squatted in front of her, then wet the towel and wiped the mud stains off her face gently and carefully.

…

…

If a god could ever fall in love, it must be just for a moment. Sangsang was calm and silent most of the time. Being calm meant everything was still in her calculations, and being silent meant she thought that no human being was qualified to communicate with her spiritually. Ning Que might be qualified, but she got tired of him lately.

Walking together in such a calm and silent way, they left the mountains and lakes and came to the fields with crisscross of paths. The carriage had already been broken, and only the big black horse followed them silently.

Along the state road, Ning Que and Sangsang walked into Linkang, the capital city of the South Jin Kingdom. Ning Que was quite familiar with this city, and he directly went to the slum area in the eastern part of the city.

The streets were still cramped, the smell was still unpleasant, the buildings temporarily built by households were still teetering, and the curtains outside the latrines were still too short to cover the person inside. However, there were some changes.

There were less visible sewage on the streets, and the streets had became relatively dry, with fewer mosquitoes and flies. The most important thing was that people walking inside seemed to be livelier.

Ning Que was rather surprised that the slum area had changed so much in less than a year. He was amazed at the man who preached in the mean alley.

There were hundreds of people in front of a decrepit house, listening to someone preaching. The person who was preaching wore an old long gown and had an old chopstick in his Taoist bun. He looked calm.

What he preached was the West- Hill literary canon, but the way he explained it was quite different.

Sangsang looked at them and suddenly said, “These people should be burned to death.”

…

…