Chapter 409: One Big, One Small

The Stone Gate Merchant Caravan smoothly loaded the remains of those from the escort unit and the delegations onto their wagons. After hauling them a little over a kilometer and a half, they happened to run into scouts from the escort unit returning on horseback.

Once the two sides met face-to-face, the scouts immediately led the caravan to see the escort unit’s deputy captain, Xiang Yunhuan.

With the captain already dead, the deputy automatically became the one in charge.

The once-arrogant force was now resting within the stone forest, their morale scraping the bottom. He Lingchuan only had to glance over to see that most of them were wounded.

Second Boss Shi intended to hand over all the bodies, but after a moment’s hesitation, Xiang Yunhuan actually asked the Stone Gate Merchant Caravan to continue transporting the remains to Baiyang Town up ahead, where the escort unit would take custody.

Hauling dead bodies was unlucky business, but this time Second Boss Shi agreed without much fuss because Xiang Yunhuan promised him, “I’ll report your contribution to my superiors.”

Second Boss Shi could tell the escort unit had lost most of their wagons and mounts. With casualties this heavy, they did not even have the manpower to carry their own dead. They could only borrow the hauling capacity of civilian caravans.

For the escort unit as a whole, it had been a day of pure humiliation.

The Wind Demon that hadn ot been seen for centuries had suddenly reappeared. The State of Chiyan’s envoy had been abducted. The escort unit itself had taken horrific losses, and even the spirit seed entrusted to them by the Baoshu King was now gone.

Worst of all, they still did not even know who was behind it.

Fortunately, the envoys from the states of Baixiang and Xuluo were still alive. And with the escort captain himself already dead in the line of duty, Xiang Yunhuan could at least return and give an account.

No matter what, the job still had to be done, the formation still had to be led. More than a hundred men were staring at him with desperate expectation.

Forcing himself upright, Xiang Yunhuan raised a hand and summoned a bird of prey, ordering it to fly back to Fufeng City with a message at once. He himself would continue the unfinished mission to escort the two envoys to the northern border, then return to Fufeng City to accept punishment.

Only when the bird swooped down did He Lingchuan realize there had been several bird monsters shadowing the escort unit all along. They had not shown themselves in the earlier battle, probably because the wind had been so violent that they could not even get anywhere near the Wind Demon.

High-altitude scouts such as these made perfect eyes and messengers. He Lingchuan could not help but let out a sigh of appreciation.

He heard Second Boss Shi trying to comfort Xiang Yunhuan, “This road’s been peaceful for hundreds of years. Who could’ve predicted the Wind Demon would ambush you? This isn’t your fault, Lord Xiang. Your superiors won’t be unreasonable.”

Xiang Yunhuan’s brow furrowed.

He Lingchuan cut in, “The real question is why the Wind Demon could return from the dead at all. That’s what’s worth investigating. If Lord Xiang can get to the bottom of it, you’ll be eliminating a hidden danger along this vital route.”

Mount Fengmo and Heiyan Stockade were key locations in the Baoshu Kingdom’s north-south artery. Every wagon and rider traveling the tundra passed through either of these locations. If the Wind Demon had truly revived, it would become an enormous threat to anyone taking this road.

So He Lingchuan was not exaggerating in the slightest. Second Boss Shi sighed as well. “Exactly! Didn’t our king disperse the Wind Demon ages ago? Could it be that in the four hundred years since then, this place has produced a second Wind Demon?”

Mount Fengmo produced the strange North-South Divine Wind. If it could nurture the first Wind Demon countless years ago, who was to say it could not nurture another?

He Lingchuan made a small dismissive wave. “Earth, water, fire, and wind, natural elements such as these have only a tiny fraction of a possibility to develop true sentience compared to other kinds of monsters. The chances of it happening are not even one in a million. At least, that’s true under current conditions.”

As for back in the Ancient Era? That was a different world entirely. With abundant spirit qi, all manner of absurdities could run wild. If you could imagine it, it probably existed.

He Lingchuan continued, “Even if heaven and earth somehow birthed a second Wind Demon, how could it be such a coincidence that it appeared right on the Ethereal Sect’s old ground?”

Second Boss Shi had spent over a month with him by now and had learned his habits. “Brother He, stop dangling the hook. You clearly know something.”

“We’ve all visited the ruins of the Ethereal Sect. At a cave by the exit, there’s a wall with three huge engraved characters written in ancient immortal script that reads ‘Wind Lord Cliff.’ So back in the Ancient Era, the Ethereal Sect and the locals actually referred to the Wind Demon as Wind Lord.” He Lingchuan’s tone stayed calm as he said, “To them, it was very likely a spiritual creature that guarded the immortal sect and the tundra, not some evil creature. This means that those Wind Lion Lord statues were probably created in its image.”

People made statues of gods, sages, guardian spirits, and water spirits because they believed such beings could shelter and protect them. So carving statues for the Wind Demon or Wind Lord was not strange at all.

“But did you notice something? Those Wind Lion Lord statues almost always appear as a pair—one big, one small.”

He pulled a pair from his storage ring. The large one was about the height of a human, while the other was about half that, at under one meter tall.

Second Boss Shi replayed what he had seen in the caves and nodded hard. “Yes! Yes, that’s true! Whether it be the statues in the fields or the caves, they’re always in pairs. The locals told me it’s because the Wind Lion Lords come as male and female.”

“How could a Wind Demon even have a gender?” Xiang Yunhuan had heard the locals talk too. He turned to He Lingchuan. “Are you saying the Ethereal Sect actually had two Wind Demons?”

“Right.” He Lingchuan patted the stone carvings lightly. “One big, one small, just like these two.”

Imitation came from reality. If there had not been two Wind Demons, why would the Ethereal Sect have created statues like that?

Xiang Yunhuan’s face tightened. “Are you saying that our king subdued one Wind Demon, but missed the other?”

That was a dangerously loaded conclusion, and He Lingchuan did not touch it. He only said mildly, “You said it, not me.”

Xiang Yunhuan: “...”

He Lingchuan tapped the smaller Wind Lion Lord statue. “Wind Lion Lords might not be male and female, but they could be father and son. This smaller one might’ve been born from the larger. Or call it... fission or cloning?”

The Baoshu King itself was neither male nor female, yet it could still produce spirit seeds that were essentially extensions of itself.

Then why could the Wind Demon not do something similar?

Xiang Yunhuan’s voice turned rough as he said, “Even if a smaller Wind Demon survived, why would it lie low for four hundred years and then suddenly attack us? Was it awakened?” His eyes abruptly focused. “Could it be related to the Chiyan envoy?”

The core mission of this trip was to escort three envoys back to the northern border.

The Wind Demon’s attack threw everything into chaos. Someone used the opportunity to abduct the Chiyan envoy, leaping straight off the cliff with him.

At the time, the winds were too fierce for bird monsters to approach the battlefield. After the fight, Xiang Yunhuan had ordered the bird monsters to search for the envoy, but deep down, he already knew that there was a nine-in-ten chance that they would find nothing.

Did the mastermind of all this really stir up a disaster of this scale, risking even the Baoshu King’s wrath, just to capture a single Chiyan envoy?

A mere congratulatory envoy entering the realm, just an ordinary human... what could possibly be so special about him?

He Lingchuan watched Xiang Yunhuan’s face and said, “Lord Xiang, do you know that before the Baoshu King’s birthday celebration, on the night of the imperial nectar eruption, an E’ling deputy envoy was murdered? Investigations suggest the killer meant to target the Shanyu envoy, but killed the wrong snake.”

“I know about the E’ling deputy envoy’s death.” Xiang Yunhuan looked at He Lingchuan oddly. “Who are you?”

The young man carried himself with striking presence, but earlier, Xiang Yunhuan had been too exhausted and too bitter to even ask his name.

He Lingchuan produced a silver token from Grand Tutor Sha’s residence. “I have ties to Young Master Sha Xinghai of Grand Tutor Sha’s household. I was invited to attend the celebration.”

On Baoshu territory, that token was genuinely useful.

Second Boss Shi immediately piled on with a broad grin. “Young Master He has already promised Young Master Sha that once he finishes his business in Lingxu City, he’ll return to Fufeng City to take up an official post.”

The way he phrased it was carefully chosen. It made it sound like Grand Tutor Sha’s household was begging He Lingchuan to come back and serve.

“I see.” Xiang Yunhuan’s guard lowered slightly. Capable people taking posts in monster states was nothing unusual, and some such people even moved between states. “So you think this whole chain of schemes was aimed at the envoys?”

He Lingchuan spread his hands. “It’s only a guess.”

“No, it’s a plausible one.” Xiang Yunhuan nodded. “I used to handle part of the post office defenses at Willow Lodge. The Shanyu and Chiyan envoys stayed in the same walled compound.”

First, the other party targeted the Shanyu envoy, then later abducted the Chiyan envoy, and in Fufeng City, those two envoys had even been living practically next door to each other.

Could that really just be a coincidence?

He Lingchuan’s eyes glistened. “Convenient for them to exchange things, too. Could there have been a handoff?”

Xiang Yunhuan nodded. “That makes sense. If those two had some private plot, meeting during my king’s birthday celebration would’ve been the perfect cover.”

After thinking a moment, he added, “The Shanyu delegation arrived in Fufeng City two days later than scheduled. Their servants mentioned that along the road, a thief stole the special envoy’s storage pouch. They claimed that it contained silver, odds and ends, and even their travel documents. They lost time recovering it.”

“So something was stolen?”

“It wasn’t lost in the end. They said everything was recovered.”

He Lingchuan’s mind clicked into place. “That explains why the Shanyu delegation didn’t pass through Three-Heart Plain on schedule. Something delayed them on the road.”

Fushan Yue had waited there and found no prey, so the E’ling envoy became the unfortunate substitute.

At that moment, the bird monster the escort unit had sent out earlier returned with a report: they had found the Chiyan envoy’s corpse on the mountainside of Mount Fengmo. His neck had been snapped.

Hearing this, Xiang Yunhuan pressed hard at his temple, and the last sliver of hope in his chest died. The mastermind had gotten what he wanted.

After that, he had no time to keep talking. He had an entire basket of problems to deal with.

And He Lingchuan, at last, had strung the whole sequence together into a single line.

The State of Shanyu intended to give a “gift” to the ruler of Chiyan, but instead of presenting it openly in Chiyan territory, they used the Baoshu King’s eight-hundredth birthday celebration as cover. The Satte of Shanyu’s envoy carried the treasure into Fufeng City, delivered it at the Willow Lodge post office, and handed it over to the Chiyan envoy to bring back.

In other words, it was a private transaction between two rulers, a transaction deliberately kept out of public view.

However, Fushan Yue had gotten wind of it from somewhere and planned to intercept the treasure en route.

He first set up an ambush on the path the Shanyu envoy was supposed to take, setting up at Three-Heart Plain. But then, imperial nectar erupted that night, and he ended up killing the E’ling envoy by mistake. Meanwhile, the Shanyu envoy’s schedule had been delayed by the theft of his personal storage pouch, so he never walked into Fushan Yue’s prepared kill zone. He made it safely to Fufeng City and completed the handoff with the Chiyan envoy.

This meant that the “treasure” had officially ended up in the Chiyan envoy’s possession.

Upon realizing that, Fushan Yue followed them into Fufeng City.

He intended to strike the Chiyan envoy there, but He Lingchuan wanted payback for being hunted at Three-Heart Plain, so he reported him. The authorities showed up, and Fushan Yue’s plan was derailed again.

Fortunately for Fushan Yue, the man was nothing if not persistent.

He still had Plan C. He used the Wind Demon to ambush the escort unit, then seized the Chiyan envoy amidst the chaos.