Chapter 81

“Four years ago, my own martial sister was killed by those irredeemable fiends.”

Chen Shu froze, sensing the unspoken emotions behind He Yu’s words. The motion of handing him the gourd stopped abruptly, and she drew it back to her chest instead. Her fingers tapped restlessly on its surface, betraying deep discomfiture.

“How could that happen? What were the circumstances? Wasn’t Brother He nearby?” she asked, tilting her head, barely stopping herself from adding, “Didn’t you try to save her?” Thankfully, seeing He Yu’s resigned expression, she instinctively recognized the impropriety before voicing the last part, swallowing the words.

However, even unspoken, He Yu grasped her implication perfectly. He smiled faintly, a bitter tinge to it.

“I was beside her. Right in Fangcheng. I watched as that gang of bastards captured her, then…” He seemed unable to continue, leaving it hanging before changing direction, “If it weren’t for me being there, her skills were actually sufficient for escape. It was thanks to her participation in the last Sword Discussion Tournament that our sect managed to survive the first two rounds. In terms of innate talent, hard work, her ability to respond in critical situations—even compared to the elders—she truly excelled…”

“Oh, I see,” Chen Shu murmured, blinking blankly.

Such raw death wasn’t unfamiliar to her—she had Tianyu Mountain, and recently the floods that claimed hundreds, displacing countless more. Judged by scale alone, those tragedies were far more harrowing than one death.

Back then, she was only thoughtfully moved. Having grown accustomed to the wilderness, she saw falling autumn leaves and dying birds and fish as natural decrees, inevitable matters of course. Thus, even human death manifested as a palpable but ultimately distant sorrow, visible yet hard to grasp.

But He Yu was different. He Yu was the second… “good person” she had met after descending the mountain.

If fledgling creatures imprint on the first being they see as parent, whether human or beast, then the second holds a unique significance too. Chen Shu, perhaps unconsciously, was like that fledgling during this first venture into the mortal world, picking up bits and pieces from her surroundings, learning and mimicking.

It was precisely this gentle, sorrowful silence from He Yu that now struck her uniquely, leaving her utterly flustered.

Not only did she lack the knowledge to comfort him, but she also didn’t understand why she didn’t share his grief. This heightened her awkwardness. She managed only that brief response before helplessly resuming fiddling with the gourd.

A long silence stretched between them, broken finally by He Yu.

“…As our sect rarely ventured out,” he began slowly, his words spilling out as if pent up for too long, “That time, it was because a trusted merchant urgently requested our carpentry skills for some mechanical contraptions. The timing was tight. To take the shortest path, we had to pass through Fangcheng.”

When we left the sect, it was just the two of us. When we completed the job and prepared to return, it was still just the two of us. But traversing Fangcheng—entering the city at first seemed uneventful. It wasn’t until we exited and were besieged in the wilderness that we realized how foolish we’d been to think that way. People were lost, money was lost. By the time we returned to the sect, Master was so furious he nearly stormed over there, and in his rage, an old illness flared up. He’s been recuperating at the sect ever since.

“I’m advising you against going not out of cowardice, but because I believe there’s something fishy going on. Suppose you go and not only fail to find the sword, but also get ambushed by these well-prepared villains? Wouldn’t that be losing the big for the small? As the saying goes, a gentleman does not stand under a precarious wall—that’s the principle here.”

“But I’m not some stuffy scholar! What precarious wall… I live in a precarious wall!” Chen Shu retorted. Her words were indeed true, though saying it this way made it sound a bit like obstinate nonsense. “Had you told me about this earlier, why would I have dawdled at Diancang Pass? I would’ve gone straight from Yingqiu City to that Valley of Villains—”

He Yu blinked, quite certain he’d misheard. He remained silent for a while, letting Chen Shu chatter enthusiastically.

“Originally, I worried that if a good person found my sword and was reluctant to return it, wouldn’t that be troublesome?” Chen Shu declared, giving He Yu’s shoulder a deliberately hearty pat. “After hearing what you said, that the people of the Valley of Villains are bad eggs, isn’t that even more convenient? If he’s reluctant to give it back, I’ll just clear out the entire valley!”

Hearing this, He Yu felt an even bigger headache coming. He hurriedly cut off Chen Shu, who was getting excited and even waving her hands about as if measuring something against him. “It’s not necessarily true that your sword is actually there! Didn’t I just say? That news coming from the Valley of Villains could very well be fabricated nonsense, a trap to lure you there. How can you just believe it?”

“Oh?” Chen Shu froze, then snapped back to attention. She smacked her chest and plowed forward stubbornly. “Never mind! I have a psychic bond with my sword! Brother He, you probably don’t fully understand. I awakened my sword with blood, so there’s a blood-red trace on it… I have a Blood Pact with that sword! I can sense its location! Right now, it’s… it’s in the Valley of Villains!” As she spoke, she thrust out her hand to point, flustered and without thinking, randomly jabbing her finger towards the side where the setting sun hung.

He Yu looked at her, torn between tears and laughter. He wrapped his hand around hers, gently turning her stubborn index finger to a new direction. His voice was soft.

“…This is the direction to the Valley of Villains.”

“…Right, I can feel it’s stronger in this direction,” Chen Shu fibbed, her face flushed and heart pounding. “My sword is definitely this way!”

“…Alright,” He Yu shook his head, ultimately agreeing. “You really are set on venturing into the Valley of Villains?”

“Exactly! Even if my sword really wasn’t found by people from the Valley of Villains,” Chen Shu said, an idea suddenly sparking. She seized He Yu’s hand, her eyes shining as she stared at him, puffing up her cheeks. “The clue of that pattern means I can help Lord Shen solve the case too, right? Won’t you just come with me?”

“…Fine.” He Yu hesitated for a long moment, finally sighing and muttering. “I’ll put my life on the line to accompany the ‘gentleman’ then.”

—

With this matter settled between them, Chen Shu became even more excited.

It wasn’t that her days at Diancang Pass had been dull. On the contrary, she had found these times quite flavorful. But ultimately, she had bid farewell to too many acquaintances successively during this period. First He Yu and Yun Shen, then departing from Shen Jie on the mountain path outside Yingqiu City. Even though once in the city, Yan Ji, Li Chou, Ying Wei, Xuan Qin, and others were still present, she hadn’t managed much time with them either. In the days following that chaotic “case investigation,” one after another, she had to say goodbye to them all. The feeling, naturally, wasn’t exactly pleasant.

It might be more accurate to say that in those days, Chen Shu had unconsciously buried herself in busywork.

However carefree her nature might be, after experiencing such liveliness and forging these new friendships, she couldn’t help but feel a pang of loneliness.

He Yu’s arrival was undoubtedly a stone breaking the calm water surface.

Sword-seeking, case-solving, accompanied by He Yu — nothing could be more appealing or straightforward for Chen Shu. The Valley of Villains was like a carrot dangling before her, making her heart itch incessantly.

Evening settled as they arrived back at the small courtyard littered with broken walls and ruins. He Yu, perhaps busying himself for her benefit or his own—was clearing out another barely inhabitable room. Chen Shu perched atop the low section of the outer wall near the entrance gate, legs swinging back and forth. Her gaze alternated between the sky and the doorway—the door itself long gone—where she could see He Yu moving inside, occasionally asking if he needed help.

He Yu refused twice. On the third pass, a townsman from Diancang Pass walked by beneath Chen Shu’s dangling feet. The man looked up, smiling, and greeted her, “Miss Chen! Not busy today? Finished your work and resting up?”

Chen Shu promptly swung her other leg over the wall to the outside and cheerfully began chatting with him.

From this conversation, she learned that grain from multiple cities had finally arrived—including some very old, stored rice. Liu Mao, worried it would spoil further, had already started cooking portions to distribute to every household.

Grain from Yingqiu City had arrived only that very day—truly deserving the phrase ‘delayed’. Consequently, many people were being recruited to the magistracy this evening just to tally the grain. With the previous records destroyed along with the officials who died in the flood, these tasks, beyond the barely literate soldiers under Liu Mao, all required the help of enthusiastic scholars and educated townspeople.

Chen Shu listened. Before she could reply, her head suddenly snapped around. She peered towards the room inside the crumbling wall where He Yu was staying and piped up clearly, “Now that they’re hauling grain over from Yingqiu City, it certainly must require a whole lot of carts and horses, right?”

“Of course!” the man outside the wall replied animatedly. “Though Yingqiu City sent significantly less than the other cities supplying grain recently, it’s still storing the reserves for a whole city! Even setting aside just one-tenth or half a tenth for us would probably fill this whole courtyard! Imagine how much transportation that requires? Surely you’ve seen the grain convoy from Mengcheng, Miss Chen? It filled the roadways from the magistracy clear to the marketplace entrance—a distance covering three entire street crossings! Wouldn’t you call that requiring carts and horses?”

“Alright, alright, got it! Just a street’s worth of carts and horses—look at you boasting!” Chen Shu retorted with a laugh. After a moment’s thought, she waved dismissively toward the man outside. “Thanks anyway!” Before he could reply, she leaped down into the courtyard, shouting, “Brother He! Brother He! I need to talk to you!”

Uninterrupted, He Yu’s silhouette continued moving within the room. His voice coming out sounded a bit unsteady as he labored.

“—Told you, don’t need your help!”

“Not asking about that!” Chen Shu rushed to the doorway of He Yu’s room, nearly startling He Yu as well. She braced herself against the doorframe, blocking the dim light that was neither fully sunset nor moonrise. She likely didn’t even notice He Yu’s surprise on his face—or simply didn’t care—and continued speaking on her own, “That’s not what I wanted to say! Don’t bother packing now—let’s set off tonight!”

“…Huh?”

At these words, the movements in He Yu’s hands truly stilled. Seeing that Chen Shu’s excitement hadn’t waned a bit, she eagerly explained again upon hearing his questioning sound.

“The grain Yingqiu City sent has arrived! I heard there’s an entire fleet of carts—a whole street! Or maybe two streets? Anyway, they’re heading back to Yingqiu soon, so why not ask them? Let’s borrow a couple of carts.

“We’ll head out tonight and travel toward the Valley of Villains!”