The Night Watcher of Great Jing - Chapter 19

The thirteenth day of the third lunar month in the Longqing era.

Auspicious for sacrifices, seeking wealth, signing contracts, and marriage.

Inauspicious for breaking ground, burial, opening a business, or moving house.

Zhao Li sat on a rock on the slope of Mount Jin, studying the traditional almanac issued by the Imperial Astronomical Bureau.

After a moment’s thought, she plucked a stalk of grass from beside her.

Using the sap at the broken end to pick up mud, she crossed out *breaking ground* and *burial* beneath the list of prohibitions.

“There. No problem anymore.” She handed the corrected almanac back to Lu Zhao.

His mouth twitched. This little grandaunt truly did whatever she pleased.

When he did not move, Zhao Li said, “There are no real taboos. When we don’t like them, they’re all feudal superstition.”

The important point was that even if today were unlucky, they could hardly stop now.

“Fine. You’re in charge.” Lu Zhao walked away, not knowing whether to laugh or cry.

It was only a formality anyway.

Zhao Li rose from the rock and straightened her black fish-patterned uniform.

A worksite bustled in the distance.

Laborers conscripted from Shengjing dug into the slope and moved earth and stone with tremendous energy.

They should temporarily dam the Ancient Qin Canal before sunset.

Water governed yin. To resolve a Yin-Gathering Pool, the first step was naturally to cut off the endless supply of yin energy.

Once the canal stopped, the pool’s yin energy would no longer be replenished, and the danger would fall greatly.

At the same time, the blade in the White Tiger Biting the Blade formation would lose its force.

Then they could cut down the willows, break the configuration, and find the bride ghost’s corpse. More than half the matter would be settled.

“A-Li, the fish and meat are done. Are you sure you don’t want any?” Lu Zhao called.

Several Jingning Guard officers sat around a fire behind him. A skinned wild dog roasted above the flames, sizzling with fat.

Sticks ringed the fire, each holding a fish roasted golden-brown. One guard carefully sprinkled salt over them.

“No!”

Zhao Li waved and pulled a hard biscuit from inside her robe.

They had killed the wild dog in a graveyard. A large fleshy tumor protruded from its forehead, a callus developed from ramming its head against coffin boards.

What had it eaten to grow so fat? The answer was obvious.

The fish had come from the Ancient Qin Canal, whose bed was filled with fragments of human bone.

Once cooked through, neither would harm them. Whether they were disgusting was a different question.

Those rough men did not care. Zhao Li did.

She was not yet starving to death and could not swallow such things.

She stayed well away, gnawing her dry biscuit and trying to ignore the aroma drifting from the fire.

One mature-looking guard with a short mustache tore off a dog leg without waiting for it to cool.

He wrapped it in leaves, handed it to Lu Zhao, and lowered his voice.

“Thousand-Household Commander Lu, is that young girl really reliable?”

She looked tiny, and her face was tender.

The men had seen plenty of fierce women in the Guard. A young woman with catlike eyes hardly looked like one of them.

“Reliable?” Lu Zhao accepted the meat. “Drop the question. She is.”

He looked at the three men around the fire.

“I brought you here because I’m looking after you.”

“The three of you are unlucky bastards. Other than fighting skill, you have neither money nor connections.”

“Work hard under Hundred-Household Commander Zhao. Listen to her, and you will benefit.”

The three men nodded seriously.

Zhao Li gnawed her biscuit, keeping upwind of the roasting meat as she watched the worksite for mistakes.

With the last sack of rubble and earth thrown into place, the flowing Ancient Qin Canal was completely dammed.

“Time to work!”

Zhao Li stuffed the final piece of dry biscuit into her mouth and called to the men behind her.

Her clear voice carried through the mountain. The Jingning Guard officers around the fire rose.

They herded the laborers into a sheltered camp within a hollow.

Exactly eighty-eight vigorous men born in the Year of the Dragon strode forward, each holding a live rooster.

The throats of the bright-combed roosters were slit one after another.

Steaming chicken blood poured over the edges of axes.

Then each man washed down the blood left in his rooster’s throat with a bowl of fierce liquor to warm and quicken his blood.

Zhao Li stood on high ground and surveyed the formation.

Lu Zhao directed the eighty-eight men with flag signals, arranging them in the positions Zhao Li had specified.

A willow thick enough for one man to encircle stood before each of them.

Seen from above, the eighty-eight men formed a gigantic mountain-suppressing talisman.

Zhao Li looked up at the sun, placed two fingers between her lips, and whistled.

At the sharp signal, the blood-coated axes struck the tree trunks with a heavy thunk.

The mountain forest fell silent.

Then it exploded.

Black crows rose from the woods like a dark cloud, their cries ominous.

Animals crashed madly through the mountain. Timid rabbits and mice occasionally fled so blindly that they struck trees and died.

“Lord—Lord Shen, is this all right?”

Huang Li stood pale-faced on the slope.

He was over sixty and often indulged in courtesans and music. His vitality had declined with age, making him especially sensitive. Gooseflesh covered his body.

Daoist Xuanxu had produced a circular instrument from somewhere.

He turned in frantic circles, muttering, “Impossible. This is impossible!”

Shen Yan frowned. He was young and vigorous and did not feel the disturbance as sharply as Huang Li.

But his sight and hearing were keen enough to catch the frenzy of birds and beasts throughout the woods.

Among those present, only Lin Zhu felt little of the yin energy. Though elderly, he cherished his health and maintained himself well.

He merely thought the weather had suddenly grown cold.

He watched Huang Li and Daoist Xuanxu with contempt.

“Hmph. What a fine performance.”

To his eyes, someone hidden in the forest had startled the crows.

The cold weather? A change in the sky, nothing more.

This was a staged farce!

Such treacherous men deceived the people—and deceived His Majesty!

When he saw a young woman in a Jingning Guard fish-patterned uniform approach, Lin Zhu’s resentment reached its peak.

The Lin and Zhao families had both inherited traditions of farming, scholarship, poetry, and books. Yet they had produced a person like this.

Why had they ever acknowledged her and brought her home?

Lin Zhu had asked himself the question countless times.

“Lord Shen, is everything well at the Pacification Office?” Zhao Li asked.

Who put their leader on the front line?

She had told Shen Yan to remain safely at the Pacification Office, holding Fragrant Orchid Courtyard under guard.

She had not expected him to come anyway, much less drag along three old men.

One of them looked vaguely familiar and somewhat ill, glaring at her as if he might suffer a stroke.

It did not matter. The three appeared powerful and important. Surely they would not lose their minds and interfere.

“Everything is fine. I placed the area under heavy guard. These three lords insisted upon witnessing the matter, so I…”

He had brought them to see it with their own eyes.

Before Shen Yan could finish, Daoist Xuanxu rushed up.

“Young lady! What principle are you using to break the formation?”

An amateur watched the spectacle. An expert recognized the method.

Shen Yan’s report had been far too understated. Before arriving, Daoist Xuanxu had not realized how serious the danger was.

Only after Shen Yan brought them to witness it did he understand the nature of this Yin-Gathering Pool.

In the past, when the Imperial Astronomical Bureau encountered a yin-gathering ground, they sent people in to test it and filled the place with lives.

Those sites were mere ponds beside the great river of the Yin-Gathering Pool before him.

Thus Daoist Xuanxu, normally the very picture of immortal grace, went mad with excitement.