Old Shang turned forlorn and mournful once he heard about Old Man Chen losing his eyesight. His son judiciously ushered us out of the main hall. He made some arrangements for our accommodations and had a manservant lead us to our rooms while he attended to his father and prepared the feast tonight.
Later, Shang the younger came to me and he told me what he knew about Old Men Shang and Chen many years ago.
It was the year 1976; a year recurring so frequently in this story of ours. The same year when the calamitous Tangshan Earthquake took place. Everywhere was turmoil and pandemonium in the entire northeastern region of Hebei province following the huge disaster, so was the Underworld due to the great loss of lives. Fearing that evil parties might exploit the turmoil to exact their insidious schemes, the Underworld mustered help from all mediums and practitioners of magic from across the lands to help restore peace. The message from the Underworld was conv
Old Shang began laughing loudly. "Hahahahah! That squat shorty is the Fifth of the Six Terrors! A friend as close as a brother of mine!" He gulped down his liquor and went on, "We enjoyed quite a reputation out here away from the borders. Hence, people began calling us the Six Terrors of the Frontier! All six of us served during the relief of the great earthquake long ago and we met your father then. It was during our battles together that we came to respect and admire him. He is not one of the Six, but he remains a brother to us. I'm the Third of the Six, so you can call me Third Uncle. The shorty is the Fifth, so you can just call him Fifth Uncle too." So these are the Six Terrors, I thought to myself. The name of the Six Terrors traveled far and wide; their exploits were known to all practitioners of magic and arcane skills across the land. Each of the Six was rumored to possess extraordinary powers or skills, but they rarely ventured away into China proper, preferr
So this was magic of Zhu Mei, the Fifth of the Six Terrors: the magic to control the earth and enable its user to control the movements of a target! This was the sorcery behind the mysterious trap-like enchantment that had us walking around the Labyrinthian Canyon like mice in a maze! This is one of the two most fascinating magic used to manipulate movements, said Old Shang, with the other being Father's Autumn Decline. So this was the reason Godmother would have wanted me to learn something from Zhu Mei, I reflected. Father's magic was like a fairy tale and myth from a bygone age to me; I would never be able to perform the things that he could do nor would I be able to achieve the feats that he did. Learning Zhu Mei's magic, on the other hand, seemed more realistically doable to me. Everyone laid drunkenly sprawled on the floors of the fortress when the feast ended. Delirious and badly-stoned, Old Shang tugged on my arm, asking me to stay for a few more
I could hardly believe my ears when I heard Aunt Ulan uttered the words. So this was the true reason she was so anxious to expedite matters! She wanted me to bring her to Wu Zhong where she could once again see Father! "Is this even fine?" I collapsed into a chair and fumbled miserably for other options. Still, my mind was completely blank! Just as I was still grappling for ways to answer, Godmother spoke suddenly, "Sister, I think it's better if you stay here." Aunt Ulan stared at her, shocked by her words. Quietly, she turned to Godmother, who promptly continued, "There was indeed passion between Murong Hai and us, Sister. But the time has long gone, and you are a mortal. Mortals grow old. Even today, Murong Hai maintains a youthful and exuberant appearance, while you are now a frail old lady? Do you really wish to let him see you like this? Frankly, Sister, even I... Even I would never dare show myself before him again!" Godmother must have remembered
Mr. Zhang and Uncle Quan knew nothing about the history behind Old Man Chen's blindness. In fact, not many at the Institute knew about the affair, not even Old Man Xie, his former comrade, realized that Old Man Chen had gone blind decades ago because he tried to help Shang Pei. Old Man Chen stopped to take a heave from his cigarette. "That nitwit Shang Pei came to Tangshan immediately after the earthquake that year and Brother Hai assigned him to serve at Wu Zhong, as part of a team that comprised of me and Old Xie here. He would spearhead any offense with his sorceries while we provided him our support. We depended much on him especially in duels!" "Quit trying to be humble, Blind Master," Lin Feng added, "Old Shang was full of praises for you both when we met him. He could not stop bragging about how powerful you were! You three were even known as the Triune of Wu Zhong!" "Humph... The Triune of Wu Zhong..." Old Man Xie snorted coldly, albeit, with an a
I said nothing at first, leading him to a snooker lounge where we had a game of billiards. But he could see that I had something to talk to him about. Unable to concentrate with the game, he pointed his snooker cue at me and bellowed, "Come on! What is it that you wanted to talk about!?" To me, the Center was a joint venture; a shared interest that should be equally divided between us three. So was the decision which I strongly believed that we should make together. Apprehensively, I asked Lin Feng, "So, how go things between you and Yuanyuan?" He was surprised to hear me saying this; this was one of the last questions he was expecting to hear from me. "Well, what else? We're still the same," he answered after shrugging his shoulders, "My parents are fine. But I have yet to meet her parents." I nodded and took a swig from my can of Coke. "You know Chongxi also has a girlfriend now, do you? A girl called Xiao Yu?" He merely nodded. My head bobbed slowly to
With Edelweiss' ferocity, she could easily take down three people herself. More so, since the thief was merely a petty hoodlum who knew nothing other than to cheat and lie. But the crowd of onlookers witnessed only how Edelweiss had pummeled the thief; they did not know that he had tried to steal her purse. With all of them being none the wiser, they wilfully made a report to the police and Edelweiss, together with the thief, were arrested and brought to Zheng Shuang's station. As the clock slowly ticked in the interrogation room, the officer-in-charge's questioning was hardly helped by Edelweiss' restlessness as she was worried about my dinner instead of trying to cooperate. Reluctantly, she merely responded during the interrogation with angered snorts and disdainful chuckles. What should have been a simple inquiry turned into a lengthy wrangle no thanks to Edelweiss' poor attitude and the accusation by the thief that she carried a knife. T
The farmer would have thought this would have been a trivial case of just keeping his chickens safe from predators and the encounter with the weasel might discourage the beast from having second thoughts about his chickens ever again. But in the second morning when he woke up, his fields were covered with litters of bricks and roof tiles! Still wearing his trademarked blank and dull expression as he listened intently, Chongxi merely responded with a blunt and short "oh" when the farmer's tale reached its end. He peered at his future mother-in-law and the farmer. "Which sort of fertilizers do you use at the farm?" he asked quietly. Puzzled by his question, the farmer blabbered, "Manure from horses and mules, of course!" Chongxi chuckled viciously. He whispered into the farmer's ears who nodded, taking in everything he said and gave the farmer a name card, telling him to place another call to us; we would accept the case. Chongxi then declined the offer of an upfront pay
With great effort and time, we finally managed to recover Aunt Ulan's soul and saved her before returning from Inner Mongolia. It was in this journey that I had had the chance to know another of Father's former paramours, who later became my Godmother. My life was nearly lost during an avalanche when I was thrown off a cliff and Edelweiss leaped into certain death after me. Thanks to Godmother's magic, we were both alive although Godmother was initially perturbed when she found out I was the progeny of Murong Hai after saving us. Fortunately, all's well that ends well was true. Godmother eventually joined us in the rescue of Aunt Ulan. What was more, the avalanche had also broken the ice between Edelweiss and I that we were now lovers. In a conversation with Godmother, I later discovered the true reason Father had refused his ascension into the Heavens: it was the disappearance of the Dragon-slaying Blade which was once possessed by Bian Das