Chapter 131 — Parting

The Great Shaman said mildly, "You know as well as I that according to the legend handed down through the generations of our Miao people, only the Xuanhuo Mirror and the Eight Ferocious Xuanhuo Formation can suppress the beast demon. As things stand, not only is the Xuanhuo Mirror not in our hands—even if we seized it from that young man, I fear no one could wield it; and as for the strange and unfathomable Eight Ferocious Xuanhuo Formation, still less does anyone know of it. So in such circumstances, that young man is truly the only hope of all living things on our Southern Frontier. Even if I die in a foreign land, I must go with him, hoping only that before I die I may save the life of his friend, and that he will remember this kindness and one day lend aid to all our Miao people."

Tu Magu's lips trembled slightly; the wrinkles on his aged face ran deep, and unknowingly a few tears seeped out. Facing the Great Shaman, he slowly bowed his body down and pressed his forehead to the cold ground.

The Great Shaman smiled, a trace of desolation in his expression too. "After I go, do not trouble yourselves over me. If that young man has a heart, he will likely bring my bones home. The affairs here will rest entirely on you."

Tu Magu did not raise his head. In a low voice, faintly choked, he said, "Great Shaman, rest assured."

The Great Shaman said gently, "This journey of mine means death, and in truth it is nothing much. But you in the Southern Frontier will face fierce storms and high waves in days to come. The other four tribes do not know the height of heaven or the depth of earth, and seeing our Miao in decline, they will likely kick a man when he is down. And in the Ten Thousand Wild Mountains the beast demon may revive at any moment; a great calamity is coming. You bear a heavy burden—take good care of yourself."

Tu Magu gritted his teeth and gave his assent.

The Great Shaman rose slowly, cast a glance around, and suddenly spoke again. "If in the future things truly grow desperate—though Qili Tong is the place where our Miao people have lived for generations, it is not beyond forsaking. So long as the people live, there is hope for the days to come."

Tu Magu's face paled a few shades more. Slowly he said, "Yes."

The Great Shaman gave a long sigh and walked slowly outward.

When that stooped figure, supported by Tu Magu and followed by Ming Li and Xiao Bai, came down from the altar on the mountainside, not many people noticed.

But as the sound of footsteps carried, the figure of the Great Shaman—who had not appeared in the streets of Qili Tong for longer than anyone could remember—was at last noticed by the Miao folk. With shouts of joyful surprise rising one after another, more and more Miao dropped the work in their hands and gathered around.

The Great Shaman smiled and waved continually to the Miao around him, but never once did he stop his steps, walking steadily toward the exit of Qili Tong.

At last the Miao began to sense that something was wrong. In the crowd, voices began to call out loudly in the Miao tongue; though Ming Li and Xiao Bai could not understand them well, they could guess what the Miao were crying.

The Great Shaman's face seemed somewhat desolate too; upon that weathered countenance the smile gradually faded, replaced by what was unmistakably grief.

Only he remained silent.

Only he waved.

Slowly he walked on.

Tu Magu too had halted, standing at the front of the crowd, silently gazing at that stooped figure.

By now cries of alarm and weeping had risen into a din; many were thrown into panic, and more still had fallen to their knees before the old man receding into the distance.

Ming Li, walking behind the Great Shaman, looked silently at the old man and was startled to find that upon that aged face, at some unknown moment, tears were streaming.

At last they reached the passage leading out of the valley, and behind them the sound of weeping filled the whole valley.

The old man's body began to tremble faintly. Suddenly he turned sharply back, and once more gazed upon this land, this valley, this sky...

The Miao in the distance cried out in alarm, and many leapt up from the ground in joyful surprise.

Yet in the next instant the Great Shaman shut his eyes tightly, as though to carve everything in this land into his heart; his brows knit, and once again he turned his body away.

A sudden stillness fell over the valley.

Countless gazes seemed to cry out soundlessly behind him!

The muscles of the Great Shaman's face twitched slightly; slowly, slowly, he set his feet forward and vanished into that passage.

Within Qili Tong, all was silent.

A long while later, no one knew who first began to weep aloud; in a moment the whole valley was filled with the sound of mourning.

The Ten Thousand Wild Mountains.

Beyond the Black Forest, across seven perilous mountain ranges, stands a high mountain ringed year-round in black mist, where a sinister wind howls. And beneath this bare mountain, without a single tree or blade of grass, there was in fact a great cave. Its mouth stood thirty zhang high and fifteen wide, and ceaselessly, year in and year out, a cold wind rushed shrieking from it, mingled with shrill uncanny sounds, as though the soul of some raging fury howled on without end.

Dead center at the cave's mouth stood a stone statue, the size of a living person, plainly the figure of a beautiful woman, facing deep into the Demon-Quelling Cave, standing silently. The cold wind that howled year-round blew without pause upon the statue, giving out a low sound, like a frail plank of wood sheltering from the storm in a tempest.

Yet she seemed never to retreat!

The witch-fiend, all in black, now stood before this statue, gazing at it in silence.

The evil dragon at his side seemed especially in awe of the statue; instinctively it drew away, looked about this way and that for a while, gave a cry, stretched out its four legs, and ran up the high mountain. Soon it vanished into the black mist.

The icy, piercing wind stirred the witch-fiend's black garments, and amid this desolate scene the man seemed to grow gradually unreal, cloaked in a trace of insubstantiality.

So he stood gazing, on and on, so long that even Jin Pingyue began to wonder whether this man in black had not turned into a stone statue himself.

Her narrow escape from the Black Forest, and the chance discovery beneath that great cliff of a Life-Taking Blade thrust deep into a crack in the rock, led Jin Pingyue to guess dimly: could the Life-Taking Monk, great general of the Underworld Cult, have entered this place even before she had?

Yet the Life-Taking Blade was there, and the Life-Taking Monk was nowhere to be seen. The man gone, the weapon left behind—the danger this implied was easy to imagine, and most likely the Life-Taking Monk had met with disaster. Truly, in the Ten Thousand Wild Mountains every step was a deathtrap.

Yet after pondering, Jin Pingyue still followed the witch-fiend's tracks in secret. Along the way she learned that the witch-fiend possessed strange arts, and she grew all the more cautious, not daring the slightest negligence, still less daring to approach that black-robed monster and that evil dragon. And since the witch-fiend most likely believed the tracker behind him had died in the Black Forest, he never noticed Jin Pingyue, and so let her follow all the way to the ancient Demon-Quelling Cave.

At this moment Jin Pingyue lay behind a small mound in the distance, watching that black figure from afar, and could not help wondering whether this man in black meant to stand before the woman's statue for a lifetime.

From the time he reached the Demon-Quelling Cave until now, the witch-fiend had stood motionless, gazing at the statue, for more than four hours.

Just as Jin Pingyue, bored, was about to close her eyes and doze off, the witch-fiend's figure at last stirred. Jin Pingyue roused herself and quickly looked closely.