On New Year’s Eve in Shengjing, the usual strict curfew was no longer enforced.
The streets were packed, fireworks were set off, and the markets were lit up. It was extremely lively.
From the start of the twelfth lunar month until the Beginning of Spring in the new year, it was common to see peddlers carrying shoulder poles selling all sorts of flower lanterns in streets and markets. The people of the capital called it the “dengshi”, the lantern market.
The flower lanterns hanging from the peddlers’ poles were all exquisite; “Attract Wealth and Treasure”, “Xi Shi Gathering Lotus”, “Zhang Sheng Jumping the Wall”….each figurine was vivid and lifelike. There were also countless varieties of birds, beasts, flowers, and fruits. On the imperial street, the crowds of people were shoulder-to-shoulder, and nearly everyone held a flower lantern. Children laughed and played, carrying rabbit-shaped lanterns as they ran from the ends of alleys.
Xin Hexue and Zhou Shanheng had left their residence at dusk.
There was no wind or snow today, but since it was the end of the year, it got dark quickly.
All the lights across the capital were lit at night, and trees were ablaze with lanterns, looking bright and magnificent. Restaurants and shops also hung colorful canopies and trailing tassels.
The two of them walked side by side in the bustling crowds, no different from any other carefree couple in the world.
The market was bustling, and Zhou Shanheng lowered his head slightly to speak to Xin Hexue.
“That day, the residence of the Assistant Director of Merits and Assessments was crowded with visitors. Remembering what you said, I turned into the gate by the osmanthus tree and paid a visit.”
At first, Zhou Shanheng didn’t know who the owner of that simple residence was. But when he knocked, the gatekeeper saw that he was dressed as a scholar and seemed to immediately understand his purpose. Without asking anything, he led him inside to meet an old man.
The old man was really a chess fanatic.
Fortunately, after Zhou Shanheng had undergone Xin Hexue’s special training, he was able to fight back and forth with the old man. Although he didn’t win, he didn’t lose too badly either, and was even praised as a promising young talent.
At that point, Zhou Shanheng had already vaguely guessed the old man’s identity. So after two games, when the other party asked his reason for coming, he presented his scroll.
The old man read through it twice and stroked his white beard, looking quite satisfied. Then he smiled and promised to put in a good word for him with the chief examiner.
Zhou Shanheng had submitted his scroll to this Master Feng Ya in late October. Then, at the beginning of the twelfth lunar month, he heard news that the originally appointed chief examiner, the Assistant Director of Merits and Assessments, had fallen gravely ill and passed away. The very same Master Feng Ya to whom he had submitted his scroll, in fact the Minister of Rites, had been appointed as the new chief examiner due to his high moral standing.
Zhou Shanheng never expected things to unfold like this.
It seemed everything this year was going especially smoothly. Though the process had some twists and hardships, the outcomes all leaned in his favor.
Xin Huexue tilted his head slightly, his gaze meeting Zhou Shanheng’s warm, inky eyes. “Aren’t you afraid that I was the one who harmed that Assistant Director, just so Master Feng Ya could become chief examiner?”
Zhou Shanheng shook his head. “You wouldn’t do such a thing.”
Ah Xue had a kind heart and soft nature.
Xin Hexue had gone through several rounds of memory cleansing. Because he had stayed in the residence the whole time, Zhou Shanheng was able to be the first to see him and re-tell everything that had happened before. At the same time, Hen Zhen would sometimes appear in the middle of the night and ramble on about a bunch of messy and inexplicable things. In short, after all the nonsense, he added another perspective to Xin Hexue’s memory.
However, his memories remained a jumbled, patchy version.
Fortunately, tonight was already New Year’s Eve, and the imperial exams weren’t far away.
Many people were walking onto the corridor bridge, and as the crowd grew dense, Xin Huexue and Zhou Shanheng chose to walk along the quieter riverbank path.
Moonlight and the brilliant display of lights reflected off each other, and the wind gently stirred the willows, swaying like green clouds.
Zhou Shanheng saw a street peddler on the opposite corner of the long street, carrying a pole stacked with a variety of goods. The young men and women leaving his stall all held lotus lanterns in their hands.
He turned to Xin Huexue and said, “Wait here for me a moment.”
Zhou Shanheng made his way through the crowd toward the other side. Xin Huexue saw him exchange a few words with the peddler, then hand over some copper coins with one hand and receive a lotus lantern with the other.
As he turned back and faced Xin Hexue, the corners of Zhou Shanheng’s lips lifted into a faint smile.
It was unclear whether someone had knocked over a flower lantern made of bamboo strips at the end of the street, or if some inn or restaurant had their festively decorated canopy ignited by sparks.
Thick blue smoke surged into the night sky, and a whole row of wooden inns below burst into fierce flames.
Someone shouted, “Fire!”
The fire spread visibly larger by the second, and the crowd retreated like a tide.
In the middle of this retreat, any moment of carelessness would result in being swept away with the human current.
Zhou Shanheng was just in this situation. As he was crossing the street to give Xin Huexue the lotus lantern, only three steps away, his shoulder was bumped twice. The lantern fell, and in the blink of an eye, all the faces around him were unfamiliar and panicked.
There was no time for him to turn back and search for Xin Huexue.
His steps faltered and he staggered toward the corridor bridge. He cupped his hands around his mouth and raised his voice, “Hexue! Hexue!”
But there were crowds of people around him, and everyone was calling out for their own relatives and lovers.
It seemed that even children had gone missing, and their parents were shouting themselves hoarse.
Zhou Shanheng stood frozen with panic, overwhelmed by a great sense of emptiness and dread.
……
This fire was unusually strange.
Xin Huexue assessed it.
He moved upstream against the crowd. Since this was along the riverbank, not many people had run past, so moving upstream wasn’t too difficult.
The fire’s origin was from the north end of the street.
The wind blew from the north, and the flames expanded rapidly, consuming the area. It was originally at a crossing of two streets. But with the tall hanging sign boards and dense decorations from the inns, only a single spark was needed to become an inferno on the narrow intersection. A few signboards bumped into each other in the northern wind, and the fire spread instantly.
Just watching it made one’s heart tremble.
In the raging fire, Xin Huexue saw the crimson and black karmic obstacles.
**The burdens or suffering caused by one’s past bad actions or sins.
It was a strange red-black mist that ordinary people couldn’t see. But through the eyes of a koi demon, those thick karmic obstacles lingered like clouds of smoke within the fire.
Because he had walked too close, the north wind whipped the flames almost right up to his nose, only to retreat again with a blustering show.
Xin Hexue saw several faces within the black cloud of karmic obstacles. Two caught his attention, one was the fox demon who had come to find him, who had impersonated the Minister of Rites’ relative; the other, he hadn’t seen before in his current memory, but it felt familiar.
When the gray smoke of the flames came over, Xin Hexue’s fingertips touched the red-black mist, and the images from the karmic obstacles reappeared before his eyes.
A mountain slope with fallen autumn leaves, a white silk ribbon hung from a sweet osmanthus tree, suspending a corpse. The pale face turned toward him.
Xin Hexue stood outside the image. In the center, he saw a tall monk in a golden-red kasaya, and standing next to the monk was himself.
Had he seen this scholar who had hung himself before?
Xin Hexue had an ominous feeling.
He smelled the damp chill that only came before a storm.
Because his memory was fragmented, he couldn’t retain any clues he sensed.
This made him uncharacteristically anxious, like fine sand slipping through his fingers and couldn’t be retained.
There was someone who should have appeared…but they only existed in the events passed down in songs and praise from others.
He subconsciously took a step forward.
A loud shout came from behind him: “Xin Hexue!”
A young scholar grabbed his wide sleeve. “Run, hurry! Do you want to die?!”
Xin Hexue turned in surprise. He didn’t recognize the man’s face.
At least, not from the past few days.
Horse hooves and the neighing of horses suddenly echoed from the end of another street. It seemed the city watch had seen the fire from the observation tower and had come with water bags and fire-spraying tools to put it out.
But this fire couldn’t be put out by human effort.
Because the flames were tainted with karmic obstacles. Although Xin Hexue couldn’t see the true form of the demon, he could tell from the karmic mist that it was a powerful demon.
Bu Jincheng didn’t wait for Xin Hexue to regain his senses. Without another word, he grabbed his hand and led him away from the fire.
As they ran, he chattered nonstop to Xin Hexue: “You’ve been in the capital? I went looking for you at the dilapidated temple at the foot of Buzhou Mountain, but it was all covered in dust. Most of your things were gone too. Where are you staying now?”
As Xin Hexue listened, he suddenly looked around. “Did you see Zhou Shanheng?”
Bu Jincheng: “You mean the one who came out with you earlier?”
Bu Jincheng: “There’s a fire, wouldn’t he have run? What, you think he’s a three-year-old waiting for a flame demon to eat him, or hoping the monks of Taichu Temple will come save him?”
Bu Jincheng originally meant it as a joke, meaning that “flame demons” only existed in children’s minds.
But Xin Hexue’s eyes flickered. “You know the monks from Taichu Temple?”
Bu Jincheng looked surprised. “Hm? Sort of? When there was that snake demon problem at Buzhou Mountain, you told me to go report it to Taichu Temple.”
Xin Hexue finally realized.
This person was the one Hen Zhen had described as the shameless homewrecker who knew someone’s husband had died but still pretended to be pure and tried to move in, claiming to be a virgin.
Of course, through Hen Zhrn’s artistic embellishments, he had probably thrown a lot of dirty water.
Xin Hexue guessed that the “someone” referred to in that long rant was himself, or Hen Zhen wouldn’t have been so hostile.
But now wasn’t the time to verify identities. Xin Hexue said, “Go find the monks of Taichu Temple. This fire is suspicious…it doesn’t seem like an accident or arson.”
Bu Jincheng’s expression became grave, clearly understanding the hidden meaning in Xin Hexue’s words.
“Then you wait somewhere safe for me.”
They split up and went in different directions.
Xin Hexue followed the riverbank street back, but the fire had spread rapidly, and black smoke filled the air. He had to cover his nose and mouth.
The burning flames brought heat, and for an aquatic creature, this kind of heat was particularly uncomfortable.
Xin Hexue glanced at the branch canal of the moat. “…” Let’s find Zhou Shanheng first.
Meanwhile, Zhou Shanheng was also searching for him, with his hands cupped around his mouth like a trumpet. “Hexur! Xin Hexue!”
Thick black smoke hovered above, and he choked twice.
He leaned over and coughed, and when his eyes swept around the streets and alleys, he caught a glimpse of a white figure. “Hexue!”
Zhou Shanheng locked eyes with Xin Hexue from a distance.
Just a few steps away, a child’s cry suddenly rang out from the shadows.
A lost child crawled out from under the table of a lantern stall.
Then he saw Xin Hexue mouthing words at him: “Be careful!”
Zhou Shanheng looked up…the canopy above the inn was about to collapse.
It was made of colorful silk, and adorned with several lanterns. After catching fire, the wooden structure had already become embers. It couldn’t hold any longer and was falling straight down!
A child, a canopy, a roaring fire.
Zhou Shanheng’s vision turned to chaos.
He only had time to pull the child away.
His last thought was: fortunately Xin Hexue was far enough not to be caught by the falling canopy.
Scorching heat surged all around.
Then it felt as though a soft drizzle fell from the sky, bringing coolness.
Zhou Shanheng’s pupils widened. He flipped over to shield Xin Hexue, just barely avoiding the collapsing canopy.
Strangely, the canopy hovered midair for a few seconds before falling, which gave him time to dodge.
The huge wooden frame then crashed down beside them.
The child’s parents arrived just then, scooping up their lost child into their arms.
[Zhou Shanheng’s love value +3]
[Zhou Shanheng’s love value is now full]
Zhou Shanheng frowned deeply. “It was too dangerous. Why did you come here!”
He examined Xin Hexue up and down for injuries.
Zhou Shanheng knew exactly why the canopy hovered midair, and how Xin Hexue had appeared next to him in an instant from dozens of steps away.
He was worried others might notice something unusual and discover Xin Hexue’s identity as a demon.
Zhou Shanheng hugged him tightly. “You used spiritual power. Do you feel uncomfortable anywhere?”
Xin Hexue’s expression was solemn. He now suspected that the fire just with its karmic obstacles was a deliberate trap.
If he hadn’t come, the burning canopy would have landed squarely on Zhou Shanheng.
Zhou Shanheng pulled Xin Hexue’s arm over his shoulder and tried to help him up, but then heard a quiet hiss. “Sss…”
“Are you hurt anywhere?” Zhou Shanheng asked anxiously.
But Xin Hexue looked toward the end of the street.
“The monks of Taichu Temple are here,” he said softly. “Take me back to the residence first.”
Golden Sanskrit characters spread like a heavenly seal, blocking the fierce flames in the dark sky.
Du Zhi turned his head with a blank expression, only to see a young man nestled in the scholar’s arms with his face buried.
Who was he?
The incense scars on Du Zhi’s head throbbed with pain.
A strange and familiar stirring arose in his chest.
He couldn’t remember.
The national monk Liao Yi called to him, “Du Zhi. Extinguish the fire.”
Du Zhi lowered his head. “Yes.”
……
Zhou Shanheng’s expression looked especially grim. He stared at the fishtail in the water, worry surfacing again and again in his eyes.
The lodging house only had a large wooden tub that could accommodate Xin Huexue’s half-fish form.
The Lantern Festival on New Year’s Eve was mostly ruined due to the fire. Zhou Shanheng carried him back and carefully examined him. The surface of Xin Hexue’s legs remained smooth and white, without any visible abnormalities.
But after he transformed them into a fishtail, there was an unusual red mark near the tail fin of the long and magnificent snow-white tail.
Xin Hexue raised his hand and touched it. Two pieces of scale fell off, revealing tender red flesh underneath.
Zhou Shanheng’s face was as gloomy as a dark cloud about to rain, and his jaw was tense, enough to show how much strength he had used to clench his teeth.
In contrast to Zhou Shanheng’s tension, Xin Hexue merely coughed lightly, dropped the two white scales in his palm into Zhou Shanheng’s hand, and casually said, “I give them to you. They can bring good luck.”
Of course, he was joking.
These scales, once detached completely from the body, no longer contained any spiritual power. They were merely ordinary, pretty ornaments.
Zhou Shanheng wanted to clench the scales in his palm, but even the base of his palm felt weak. He stared at the fishtail. “How did it become so serious?”
When the canopy had paused midair for a few seconds, Xin Hexue had appeared at his side. Zhou Shanheng had immediately shielded him and rolled to the ground. Aside from their clothes being stained with burnt paper ash, there shouldn’t have been any other accidents.
Xin Hexue raised his dripping wet hand, warm water sliding down his elbow.
He smoothed the crease between Zhou Shanheng’s brows, gently rubbing away the frown. “Alright, I’m fine. It’s just that the flame carried karmic residue and burned me a little.”
The reason Xin Hexue believed that canopy had been a trap aimed at Zhou Shanheng was because the flames hadn’t targeted him at first. But after he intervened to help Zhou Shanheng avoid the falling canopy, the red-black karmic flame quickly took a bite out of his leg.
The karmic residue in the flames touched Xin Hexue’s true body. Of course, ordinary human eyes couldn’t perceive it.
Zhou Shanheng fetched medicine for burns from a nearby clinic.
The powdered medicine was sprinkled onto the tender red flesh where Xin Hexue’s scales had fallen off.
Xin Hexue sat quietly at the head of the bed, only frowning slightly when the medicine touched the wound.
In fact, the burn didn’t hurt much. Strictly speaking, it wasn’t even a true burn, it was that the karmic flame had bitten off a chunk of his spiritual power.
“Sleep first.”
Xin Hexue: “This medicine doesn’t work on me.”
Zhou Shanheng’s shoulders and back tensed, as if crushed by those words. The color drained from his face. “Then will it heal?”
Xin Hexue glanced at him and teased, “Maybe not, unless you have a Taixuan Zhenyuan Pill. But it’s fine, it’s just two scales, it doesn’t even hurt.”
Xin Hexue: “Rest first.”
……
When Xin Hexue woke up, it was already New Year’s Day and heavy snow was falling.
Thick snow had piled up downstairs, too much to sweep away. He could only wait for the sun to come out and melt it.
Unfortunately, it wasn’t a sunny day, just continuous snow and rain.
Zhou Shanheng wasn’t there.
He had apparently left instructions for the servants at the lodging house to deliver all meals for the day to the guest room door.
Xin Hexue didn’t see Zhou Shanheng return until dusk.
He asked, puzzled, “Where did you go?”
Zhou Shanheng stood at the door of the guest room. He had already shaken off the thick snow on his robe downstairs, but it was still covered with snowflakes, so he patted it off again at the door.
His cloth boots were soaked, as if he had trudged through deep snow. The melted snow hadn’t had time to dry before being wetted again.
Zhou Shanheng silently moved to the bedside. “I couldn’t find it.”
Xin Hexue: “What?”
Zhou Shanheng: “The Taixuan Zhenyuan Pill.”
Xin Hexue: “?”
Zhou Shanheng: “I asked all the pharmacies and clinics in the city. They said they didn’t have it.”
Xin Hexue suddenly remembered that this was what he had casually said last night to fool Zhou Shanheng.
Those pharmacies and clinics probably didn’t just say no, they might have even cursed him as crazy.
Xin Hexue was surprised, “Are you stupid? I was joking last night. There’s no such pill.”
Zhou Shanheng’s eyes were dark, and his voice was hoarse. “Then your wound…”
He looked like a stubborn big dog, guarding Xin Hexue’s side, and burying his head in a corner of a dead-end.
How many pharmacies and clinics were in the capital? A hundred? Two hundred? No wonder he’d been out all day.
Xin Hexue sighed. “The scales will grow back.”
He raised the tip of his tail. Where the two fish scales had fallen off last night, milky-white, thin scales had already begun to regrow. Like bamboo shoots sprouting, still tender and lacking toughness.
Although there was no serious problem, Xin Hexue felt a bit itchy on the other scales as well.
It seemed like he was entering a shedding period and needed to shed his scales.
But the current circumstances weren’t ideal.
Xin Hexue said to Zhou Shanheng, “I need to go to the dilapidated temple at the foot of Buzhou Mountain.”
……
Xin Hexue returned there once again.
But unlike the dilapidated temple Bu Jincheng had described as dusty, it was actually clean and tidy.
After pushing the wooden door, Xin Hexue fell silent.
Who carved a statue of him and placed it in the main hall?
The wooden statue was vividly lifelike, its appearance resembling the Water-Moon Guanyin, with delicate features, draped ribbons, beaded ornaments, and feet stepping on a lotus.
The sculptor had even added a beauty mark to the center of the forehead.
The eyes were gently lowered, gazing at the masses with compassion.
Xin Hexue didn’t know who viewed him this way.
But now wasn’t the time to find out.
The dilapidated temple was next to Buzhou Mountain, and with mountains came water. Xin Hexue needed to find a lake or a spring deep enough to rest and shed his scales.
Fortunately, the path through the bamboo forest behind the temple led to a natural hot spring.
Xin Hexue leaned his head back, resting against the stone wall of the mountain spring, his hair spreading in the water like ink.
The spring water gently surged, and steam rose in swirls.
Everything was so comfortable that Xin Hexue’s mind grew drowsy.
Fortunately, there wasn’t anything too urgent.
He just needed to wait for the imperial exam to end, his scales to shed, and Zhou Shanheng to get first place.
Everything was going smoothly.
So, in the warm breeze of the first month, Xin Hexue relaxed and napped for a while.
When he opened his eyes, it was already dusk.
It seemed that he had slept for several hours.
Fortunately, he was an aquatic koi demon so it was fine.
He had merely taken a nap, but suddenly, a dog had grown at the bottom of the spring.
The dog kept licking his tail.
Xin Hexue reached into the water, grabbed the other’s collar, and yanked Hen Zhen out.
There was a loud splash.
Hen Zhen’s vertical pupils locked onto Xin Hexue, his sword eyebrows and chin dripping with water. “How did your tail get injured?”
Xin Hexue didn’t answer his question.
Someone like Hen Zhen would never rest easy about him, and wished he could keep an eye on him all day.
Even if he really had to leave, he’d definitely have spies planted throughout the capital.
The fact that Hen Zhen had found him so quickly after only a few hours showed how efficient his little demon spies were.
Naturally, how could he not know the source of the injury.
Xin Hexue had a question of his own and asked calmly, “Where were you on New Year’s Eve?”
Hen Zhens expression went blank for a moment, then turned to disbelief and nameless anger. “You suspect me?”
He repeated each word slowly: “Xin Hexue, you suspect that I hurt you?!”
Xin Hexue had only asked a question, but it was as if he had trampled on Hen Zhen’s sincere heart and ground it into the mud.
His eyes filled with gloom, and red surged like rivers overturning and seas boiling.
Xin Hexue frowned slightly. He’d seen Hen Zhen go mad before, so his expression remained calm, and his voice was steady.
“I didn’t suspect you.”
“Then what do you mean?” Hen Zhen seemed ready to snap. “Why are you so cold to me now? You know that even if I stabbed myself to death, I wouldn’t hurt a hair on you. So you asked me that on purpose? I knew it, you’ve long been tired of me….”
“All those poor scholars outside clinging to you, one after another…they’re younger, so you want to cut me off cleanly?”
“Heh, you think I can’t live without you? You really want to cut me off?”
“Haha, I’m not even that reluctant to let you go.”
“You’re not going to say anything? Xin Hexue, you’re so pretentious…”
Xin Hexue didn’t even get a chance to speak.
Hen Zhen’s barrage of words gave him a headache.
A crisp slap rang out.
The crows in the pine forest were startled and flew away.
Xin Hexue said coldly, “Act normal.”
Hen Zhen stood frozen in place, the left side of his face marked with a red slap print.
Only then did Xin Hexue soften his voice, seizing the chance to explain, “I didn’t say I wanted to cut ties with you, and I didn’t suspect you either.”
That great demon indeed carried karmic residue, but the aura of the karma was different from Hen Zhen’s and he could clearly feel it.
Xin Hexue cupped Hen Zhen’s face. “I just haven’t seen you for a long time. I was worried about you, hmm?” He asked seriously, “So, were you at the Anning Tower on New Year’s Eve?”
Aside from that, he couldn’t think of any other reason why the monks of Taichu Temple would arrive so late on a festival when they should have been on high alert, only appearing after the karmic fire had already grown intense.
Hen Zhen muttered, “Mm, I was planning to take back my original body.”
Hen Zhen: “You really don’t suspect me? You believe in me? You’re even worried about me?”
Xin Hexue: “Mm.”
The red in Hen Zhen’s eyes dissipated.
He leaned in close to the young man’s face, kissing from his earlobe down to the hollow of his neck again and again. He whispered obsessively, “I love you, I love you, I love you…” His pronunciation was clear. “Ah Xue, don’t ever think of getting rid of me.”
Xin Hexue thought he had slapped Hen Zhen into obedience.
Turns out, he’d slapped him into heat.
While the two of them were pressed together, his two brothers greeted him rather enthusiastically.
