Ji Yuan shook the letter paper to make sure that he wasn’t missing anything, before folding it again and putting it back in the envelope.

“Seeing someone’s handwriting is like seeing the person. Du Heng’s left-handed handwriting is so smooth and powerful. It must be just like his martial arts: not perfect, but vigorously energetic.’

Putting away Du Heng’s letter, Ji Yuan read the letters of Yin Qing and Yin Zhaoxian from the beginning.

The content of Yin Qing’s letter was what he had expected. The majority was just an ordinary description of his current life. He also talked about reading by the river, which books he chose, the movements and reactions on the water surface, etc. However, he did not include any words related to “big black carp” or “old turtle.” This was his most recent letter, written just half a month ago.

Yin Zhaoxian’s letter was written in late autumn. Wan Province and Jin Province were actually not all that far from one another. However, Du Heng’s letter had arriver more than a month later due to the difference in the smoothness of travel and the varying level of development of the two provinces road systems. Additionally, Yin Zhaoxian was a prefect, so the speed of his letter delivery was significantly higher.

In the letter, Master Yin confided some of his worries to Ji Yuan, saying that even though he had been psychologically prepared, officialdom was still more complicated than he had imagined. From top to bottom, and even within the government office, there were numerous messes to clean up, and things like false flattery and greed were commonplace. Some people were good-for-nothings¹ who didn’t do anything aside from eat and drink, but they were unwilling to give up their positions. However, over the past two years, Yin Zhaoxian had improved his skills in mortal cultivation, and he had begun to reorganize Lishun Prefecture.

Of course, the main purpose of Yin Zhaoxian’s letter was not to complain to Ji Yuan — he was such a boring person. The really important news was that a doctor had taken Mr. Yin’s wife’s pulse and had confirmed that she was pregnant. Thus, he had written a special letter to inform Ji Yuan and Yin Qing of the news.

After reading his friend’s letter, his expression grew quite strange.

“Well… I don’t know how Yin Qing will feel after reading Master Yin’s letter…”

After reading the three letters, Ji Yuan stood in the courtyard for a while, thinking. He looked up at the branches of the jujube tree covered in snow, then stretched out his hand, and spoke to the jujube tree.

“I would like a new jujube.”

As soon as he had finished speaking, a red jujube fell from the branch and landed right in Ji Yuan’s palm.

Similar to how the previous rock felt after it had been turned into ashes, this fire jujube felt cool to the touch when held in the palm of his hand, but he could also feel a fire full of spiritual energy deep inside. Of course, the energy of this fire was softer.

After taking the jujube, Ji Yuan hurried back into the house. He found two locks, closed his door, and locked it, then did the same to the courtyard gate. Although the chance of someone coming to visit him was slim, at least people would know that he was away on a long journey, and they wouldn’t have to wait for him.

After he had finished all of these tasks, Ji Yuan stood outside the courtyard gate, took out a brocade bag from his arms, scrawled a message on it with the tip of his finger, and tossed it towards the courtyard of Ju’an Pavilion. With a whoosh, the bag drew an arc in the air and directly hung from the door of the main house inside.

The brocade bag hanging from the doorknob swayed from side to side. During this whole process, a small white paper head quietly poked out of the opening from the bag, looked around outside, then immediately shrank back inside.

Outside, after Ji Yuan had finished looking around, he no longer hesitated. He used a concealment technique, then jumped up lightly, whipped up a gust of wind in the air and rising to a high altitude. Then, he rode on a cloud and left Ning’an County.

. . .

Jin Province was located northwest of Ji Province, and directly north of the Capital Prefecture. In terms of straight-line distance, it was closer to Ji Province than to the Capital Prefecture. However, if ordinary people wanted to go from Ji Province to Jin Province, it would definitely take longer to travel than it would to go to the Capital Prefecture. This was because the travel conditions were too poor. Not only was the road rugged, but most of the waterways were unusable.

Although Ji Yuan was flying, without the same restrictions as there would be for land travel, his journey still wasn’t smooth sailing. After flying for three or four hours, the strong wind in the sky grew unstable, and even sometimes had a downward trend, so Ji Yuan had to be careful as he flew. If not for his primary concern of speed, there were some places where it would have been smoother to run on the ground.

About an hour after sunset, Ji Yuan set foot in the territory of Jin Province. With the dim sky above, he clearly felt that the temperature was much colder than in Ji Province.

This was a province on the northern border of Dazhen. In terms of prosperity, it was one of the poorest provinces in Dazhen, mainly because the population was relatively sparse. Natural disasters were not too frequent, but winter and early spring were very harsh, so there was significantly less time for farming.

The location where Ji Yuan landed was a town whose name he didn’t know. He hadn’t asked for directions or calculated it with a divination, but instead found this place using his sense of the energy in his chess piece.

As he stood outside the town, he opened his supernatural eyes wide, and inspected the situation of the town. Although it was a rough overview, at the very least he couldn’t see any obvious evil aura. However, the human vital energy in the town seemed rather weak, like a fire struggling to burn properly. This alone made Ji Yuan more cautious.

It wasn’t that there were few people. In fact, even if there were only one person, the intensity of human vital energy could vary.

There was only one small inn in Tingshui County. Although it was called a county, in Ji Yuan’s eyes it was more like a large town.

In this inn, named Yingke Inn,² several of the upper rooms had not changed tenants for over half a month. It was Du Heng and some of his warrior friends.

What was strange was that all three of the upper rooms, adjacent to one another, had the wooden walls on either side of the middle room completely smashed through.³ The nine beds in the three rooms had been pushed as close together as possible. There were several stoves in the room with charcoal fires burning, making the inside warm.

In the center of the third consecutive room sat Du Heng, with his horse and sword beside him. The longsword had not been sheathed, and was currently grasped in his left hand, stuck in the ground. Although his eyes were closed, just based on his appearance, he was clearly ready to attack at any time.

There were three other martial artists in robes nearby. Some sat in front of the tea table, while others sat cross-legged on the ground, practicing their internal energy exercises. The beds that had been pushed close together were all occupied. Three of the individuals were healthy, while the other four had pale faces. Even while they were asleep, their bodies were curled up as if cold.

“Knock knock knock…”

“Who is it?”

When the knock on the door sounded, Du Heng suddenly opened his eyes. One of the warriors by the table asked with a low voice.

“Sir, the hot water is ready. Would you like me to bring it in?”

It was the inn servant’s voice. Du Heng winked at one of the warriors, and the other nodded, stood up, and opened the door. He looked carefully at the servant before answering.

“Bring it up. By the way, is there any news?”

The servant yawned and glanced inside before answering.

“It’s winter, what news is there? The roads are all blocked by heavy snow this time o year. Not many people are walking around.”

“Well, go ahead and continue your work.”

“Ah, alright!”

After watching the servant leave, the warrior closed the door again.

“Warrior Du, we have been in this county for so long, and everything has been peaceful. it seems we have truly gotten rid of it this time.”

Du Heng looked at his companion, frowned, and shook his head.

“Not necessarily, we must not let our guard down. Our opponent this time is not a mere black market scum. If we are not careful, we will be doomed!”

“Yes!”

“Alright!”

While others echoed their agreement, their eyes were filled with worry.

“We were really delayed by this winter, otherwise we would have long since made it to the Capital City.”

“There’s nothing we can do. Jin Province is vast and sparsely populated, and the roads are even worse. If these small counties were county capitals, they wouldn’t even be as large as those in Nei Province. These don’t even have a City God Temple!”

As if to ease the atmosphere, someone made a joke as they spoke.

“At least after this encounter, I will have something to talk about when I go back to the martial arts world. Warrior Du, I remember that there was a story about a master from your Du family who killed a ghost while drunk. We’re not too far behind in skills, eh?”

Du Yutian’s tale of beheading a ghost after getting drunk was no secret in the martial arts world. Of course, very few thought it true, including the former Du Heng. However, the individuals currently present were now more willing to believe it.

Du Heng didn’t say anything. However, the other party continued self-deprecatingly.

“But we can’t seem to kill those ghosts!”

At this point, the man who had just spoken did not know whether he was afraid or angry.

“Dammit! We clearly chopped off that witch’s head, but she still managed to survive and come back to our door again. Those horrifying ghost children were almost all fine, aside from the one who caught fire when Warrior Du used his sword to chop them up. If I tell this story to anyone else, no one would believe this kind of thing!”

“The most abhorrent part is this poison. Even with Li Tongzhou’s powerful martial arts, he couldn’t force out the poison. He sued up all our medicine, and now he’s dying even faster. Otherwise, if he and Warror Du were sitting here together, how could we have gotten here… Alas!”

Du Heng had been sitting there holding his sword and listening to the others, but he himself didn’t say a word.

“Brother Du, do you think we can escape?”

The man next to him had dark circles under his eyes, and looked as tired as Du Heng. As soon as he spoke, the room grew silent.

Du Heng looked at him, then looked around.

“Of course we can. We have written so many letters, help will definitely come!”

“But given the current situation in Jin Province… Those letters might not be sent out until after the winter has passed, but before the end of winter…”

The warrior did not continue speaking. Everyone knew that they had not realized the seriousness of the matter in time before winter had set in, so they had been healing their companions. It wasn’t until winter that the situation had suddenly became strange, and the injuries of the wounded who should have been stable deteriorated.

“I refuse!”

Du Heng shouted in a deep voice, boosting the spirits of those around him.

“I once received news from the Wei family that one of my great masters had returned home from his travels, and they suggested I go visit him. At the time, I was out of town and couldn’t return, but I had written him a letter before the start of winter. As long as my master can receive the letter…”

“Clack tak tak tak! Tak tak tak…”

A subtle sound rang out. Du Heng stopped talking. The warriors in the room all subconsciously looked up.

One of them got goosebumps all over his body. He pointed upwards and whispered.

“The roof…”

T/n: Dun dun dun… guess I’m leaving you on a cliffhanger this weekend. See you Monday!

Also, to answer a question from Jxxniee: footnotes are a free WordPress feature! When in edit mode, you can click on the upside-down ^ (next to the B, I, and link icons while typing paragraphs) and click “Footnote.” Hope that helps! Happy translating!

1. Lit: sacks of rice
2. 迎 (yíng): to welcome, 客 (kè): guest/visitor. “The Welcoming Inn” sounds like it could implement the trope of “graphics for little children with gore underneath” horror trope very easily, to be honest
3. T/n: well, I can’t imagine they’ll be invited back to stay at this inn

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by Aunomay Read