劍問蒼天 - 第138章 頹廢 - 翰墨軒

Before he could finish, there came a "ding," and an ingot of silver bounced twice on the table and appeared before Boss He. He looked closely: the monkey had fished out the stolen ingot from somewhere and tossed it in front of him.

Boss He hastily picked it up and tucked it into his breast, but after a moment's hesitation he glanced at the monkey, took the silver out again, pulled open his collar, and slipped it into the clothes against his skin.

Just as he had put the silver away and was about to speak to the man once more, a voice suddenly came from the shop doorway:

"Is anyone here?"

Boss He started and turned to look. Three people stood at the door—two men and a woman. At their head was an old man holding a bamboo pole from which hung a white cloth bearing four characters: "Immortal Points the Way." Beside him stood a girl of seventeen or eighteen, delicate and pretty, a faint smile on her face.

Of these two, old and young, the elder had the air of a Daoist immortal, and the younger was lovely and refined. Behind them stood a middle-aged man carrying all the bundles, whose appearance was bizarre—he stood a full head taller than the other two, yet his face was long like a wild dog's, repulsive at a glance.

Boss He hurried to greet them. After all, the customer with the monkey clearly could not slip away unnoticed; better to attend to the newcomers first. He stepped up with a smile: "Yes, yes—three honored guests, will you be dining or lodging?"

The old man at their head chuckled, squinting with a smile: "What, Boss He, don't you recognize us?"

Boss He was taken aback and studied the old man carefully, but try as he might he could not recall him. Doing business by this old road, he saw so many passersby—how could he remember them all? He could only shake his head in embarrassment: "Forgive me, honored guest. I am getting on in years, and my memory is not what it was."

A look of pity crossed the old man's face. He shook his head and sighed: "Alas, what a pity, what a pity. Most mortals in this world are like that—immortal destiny lies before them, yet they have no discerning eye to see it."

Boss He was startled and at once felt a measure of awe. He looked the old man over carefully—white beard fluttering, bearing like a crane among men—surely a Daoist of high attainment. Though he could not understand why such a master should look like a street fortune-teller, and though the girl beside the old man wore an expression of considerable disapproval, he reasoned that a master's ways were naturally beyond the comprehension of ordinary folk like himself. If he could comprehend them, would he not be a master himself?

At that thought, a measure of respect had already crept onto Boss He's face. He said reverently, "Yes, yes—honored guest... no, Master, please come inside."

The old man assented, and with the "Immortal Points the Way" pole in hand he swaggered in first. The girl behind him shook her head with a bitter smile and turned to the man carrying the bundles:

"Daoist Wild Dog, let us go in and rest a while too."

The man grunted in reply and followed them in. The three sat down at a table, and the dog-faced man set the bundles down on the chair beside him with a "thump"—they seemed to carry no small weight.

These three were, of course, Zhou Yixuan and his granddaughter Xiaowan—and as for the dog-faced man, he was Daoist Wild Wolf, the last survivor of the Blood Refining Hall lineage. Ever since the battle at the Dead Marsh had ended, Daoist Wild Wolf had followed Zhou Yixuan and Xiaowan, wandering the world and making his home wherever he went.

At first, Zhou Yixuan had found the wild dog utterly unbearable, picking fault with him every other day and tossing out sarcasm at every turn. But Daoist Wild Wolf, for some reason—as if he had turned over a new leaf and become a new man—seemed not to hear a word of it and kept following along. Xiaowan, kind-hearted, could not stand it and often spoke up in his defense.