Nightfall

The Fearful Vermilion Bird

On the 6th year of Tianqi era, during wartime between the Tang Empire and the Yan Kingdom, the right-wing troops led by General Xia Hou missed their appointment. In the face of admonishment from the imperial court, Xia Hou defended himself by claiming that they were ambushed by Yan cavalry at Huangfeng Ridge, and his right-wing troops had to exterminate the enemy before setting out again, and that was how they were delayed.

What the people in Chang’an were unaware about was that, the Yan troops that Xia Hou’s right-wing troops supposedly exterminated were border civilians of the empire who lived around the Huangfeng Ridge area. Several villages were wiped out by the right-wing troops, and the heads of the adult men were used by Xia Hou to pose as those of Yan cavalry leaders, so they could blame Yan Kingdom for the massacre.

The extermination of an entire village would top the headlines anywhere, especially at Tang Empire. The imperial court didn’t necessarily buy Xia Hou’s justification, and they did send competent investigators to verify the incident. However, by then the villages had been completely wiped out leaving no witnesses behind. Moreover, the investigators were not entirely clean either, so the imperial court ended up with the conclusion that Xia Hou was telling the truth after all.

As punishment for wiping out these villages, Yan Kingdom had to compensate Tang Empire with a large fertile territory of the Hexi Area, and even sent their crown prince as a hostage to ease the anger of Tang Empire. Nevertheless, not many had any idea of the cries of pain and injustice suffered by those villagers who were wrongfully slaughtered and burnt, nor did anybody know that a scrawny and dark-skinned young boy managed to escape from the village.

That boy was Zhuo Er.

He and Ning Que met at Min Mountain back in the days, where he left with a cultivator, until today.

“Hey! Which state have you achieved by now? Is it No Doubts State or Seethrough State?”

“Well, I didn’t expect you’d have any idea about states of cultivation!”

“Sure, since cultivation is such a simple and silly thing anyway.”

Actually, Ning Que just enjoyed showing off his newly acquired knowledge in front of a friend whom he hadn’t seen for such a long time.

“Seethrough State my ass! My poor but dear master only barely managed to achieve No Doubts State on the day of his demise, and as of poor little me, I’m still struggling in the Initial State! I wouldn’t need to go undercover if only I were more powerful!”

Ning Que looked at him with mocking face and said, “I don’t understand what the poor old man saw in you back in the days, and I’m still intrigued that he insisted on taking a thick-skulled lad like you instead of me!”

To his surprise, Zhuo Er remained quiet for a long time and finally admitted. “In the end I’ve always wondered whether it would have been a better idea if my master took you with him rather than me, since you’re so smart, and you wouldn’t have ended up like me, still unable to get anywhere close to General Xia Hou after spending so many years in the army, and not even capable enough to get any valuable intelligence.”

Looking at him quietly, Ning Que burst out laughing. “Who says you haven’t got any valuable intelligence? At least we now know how many times Xia Hou goes to the toilet each day, don’t we?”

“Well, such intelligence won’t help towards killing him.”

“It does help,” said Ning Que with a serious face and looking right into his eyes. “On my way here, I killed one of Xia Hou’s assassin crews, and it was all thanks to the intelligence you have gathered for me throughout these years.”