The fire wasn't spreading quickly when it first began. However, Fan Yun and the rest were situated at the centre of a cave. If they could smell the scorching scent, it meant that the fire has already broken out.
A deep rumble sounded. Above their heads, the ceiling shook and another wave of boulders fell down.
Wind and thunder roared fiercely, yet there was no rain. Thunder struck the mountain's boulders outside, giving rise to an earthquake within the rest of the mountains around it.
There were a few vents here leading the way out. However, even small children would not be able to leave or enter. At that moment, wind swept in from the opening above, howling wildly, creating unrest within the hearts of people. As someone else shouted fire!, immediately they fell into mild disarray.
The fire lent the strength of the wind and spread quickly.
Even crickets and insects would value their own lives; so even if these maidservants were trained to be as steady and calm as a block of wood, they were still human beings in the end. They knew that this place was well hidden and it would be troublesome to leave or enter. Thus, they didn't even know whether they could escape this place, so the more it went on, the more alarmed they were.
The kitchen was the only place with firewood, so the source of the fire could only have begun from the kitchen. Everyone ran their separate ways, some of them ran towards the kitchen to put out the fire, and some of them immediately tried escaping the cave. However, the ones who ran towards the kitchen would find out very quickly that it was already beyond saving. It was unknown who is the wicked person, despite the fire and smoke, still poured a trail of kerosene on the way, so that once the fire broke out, it was impossible to extinguish.
Among the chaos, Feng Xiao ran the opposite direction.
Cui Buqu's sleeping meridians were sealed by him. If there was no one to free them once more, he feared he wouldn't be able to wake up. Even with a fire breaking out, he would not be able to sense it. Once the fire spread to his doorstep, it would be too late to escape.
For the dignified and imposing Commander of the Zuoyue Bureau to be burned to death like this, such a manner of death would not live up to his attitude of a man of wisdom and craftiness. Even if he turned into a ghost, he'd come seeking Feng Xiao to accompany him into death.
It was unknown who had taken the luminous pearls on the mosaic stone walls. Without a light source, the sky was murky and the earth was dark, the smoke was thick and fires licked at his feet; even Feng Xiao found it slightly unbearable. It wasn't easy for him to find the way here, pushing aside the stone door, only to find that there was no one on the bed inside the room.
Feng Xiao's heart sank. Just as he was about to turn around, he heard a cold laugh behind him.
"So, your surrender really was faked! You're indeed an insider!"
In between the conversation, a sharp, strong wind swept into his nostril, aiming for a fatal spot at Feng Xiao's back!
Feng Xiao's reflexes were extremely quick. Before Yu Xiu spoke, he had already moved forward a few steps, his figure rising suddenly, grabbing the opportunity when Yu Xiu was near, he aimed a palm at the stone wall to fire himself to the opposite direction, facing Yu Xiu's palm head-on.
However, neither of them was affected. After one palm they separated, their figures incredibly quick as if diminishing into mere shadows. Both shadows fought in the darkness, judging their next move entirely just by listening to the breathing of their adversary. This sort of judgement didn't take more than a split moment, almost as if they've taken a trip to the yellow spring and back.
If not for Feng Xiao and Cui Buqu, these two people, Yu Xiu would have still been spending his days next to Prince Jin right now as his trusted confidant. Prince Jin was young and beautiful, although he hadn't made his move on Yu Xiu, both of them were close till there was an aura of a suggestive relationship between them. Yu Xiu was happy to turn this relationship to his advantage.
The Thirteen Pavilion of Yunhai was plotting a vast scheme, having people both within and outside of the Imperial Court. Yu Xiu was one of them by Prince Jin's side, and he wasn't against bending the knee to the Pavilion Lord, because at the end of the day, he was only concerned for Princess Qianjin; assisting the Pavilion Lord in his goals, at the same thing regaining the princess her freedom so she may be together with him. Yu Xiu was very enthusiastic about aiding the Pavilion Lord in accomplishing his conquest. After a few years of scheming, everything seemed like they were already in place, and what it lacked was only a timely opportunity.
However, this board of an almost-perfect chess was practically destroyed by Cui Buqu and Feng Xiao.
Had it been the old Jiejian and Zuoyue Bureaus, both of them had always been balancing each other out. However, it was unknown since when these two had got mixed up with each other. Cui Buqu was sly and crafty, Feng Xiao's martial arts were unsurpassed; either one of them would not have been a threat, but when they worked together, the consequences were something that Yu Xiu had witnessed for himself. Back in Western Göktürk, he obviously had the chance to get rid of Cui Buqu once and for all, but Feng Xiao had bulged out from the blue and disrupted the scene. If Cui Buqu died, the Zuoyue Bureau would be like a nest of dragons who lost its leader. Without this person who is incredibly skilled in schemes and plots, even if Feng Xiao's martial arts were number one beneath the sky, how much can he do?
Yu Xiu hated these two people for continuously ruining their schemes, and hated Feng Xiao the more for robbing him of an eye. Since he knew that his surrender was faked and that he came here scouting for information, naturally he left no room for mercy. Every attack of his was fatal, wanting to claim his life!
Feng Xiao had no heart to fight.
Since Cui Buqu couldn't be released from his sleeping meridians so quickly, and his whereabouts were unknown, then there was only one possibility: Someone else had taken him.
Even Yu Xiu could feel Feng Xiao's panic of wanting to free himself.
However, he doesn't know the reason for his adversary's panic.
Yu Xiu's impression of Feng Xiao and Cui Buqu remained in the state they were in before they left the capital. From his perspective, the Jiejian Bureau and the Zuoyue Bureau both have their own plans to wrangle benefits. They were just working together for a short amount of time. They couldn't share any sort of relationship. Now that Feng Xiao was in a hurry to look for Cui Buqu, Yu Xiu could only deduct that perhaps the other had something important on him.
As the thought flew past, Yu Xiu rushed out of the door in pursuit, chasing the other at the speed of light. Every time Feng Xiao wanted to use his strength to whip the other away, he always caught up. The ally was narrow and it was impossible to spread out.
He was pursued until he felt a little annoyed. Once he turned a corner, he immediately leapt out of the exit.
At this moment, the cave was already in chaos.
Some people were in a hurry to look for the exit and some others were in a hurry to look for a temporary place of safety to hide. No one could pay Feng Xiao and Yu Xiu any attention, and it was unknown where Fan Yun and Yuan Sansi had gone. Feng Xiao even suspected that sickly invalid Cui Buqu cannot be completely exempt from the cause of this chaos. However, the other had been wounded so gravely that he could not even walk steadily, how would he drop something so troublesome upon someone else?
On the day Yu Xiu freed himself from Feng Xiao and ran, he was treated by the Thirteen Pavilions' Pavilion Lord himself, he was even entrusted with an incredibly poisonous secret weapon named the 'Ever-flowing Waves'. This item was colourless and shapeless, light as a goose's feather. However, once inner strength was infused, it would cancel out the enemy's true qi and pierce into their skin, melting itself into their bodies and disrupt their meridians, tossing them into unimaginable disarray of pain.
Just now he had attacked a few times, yet Feng Xiao had been incredibly sly, avoiding him at all costs. Till now, his figure had been continuously blocked by falling boulders. After a while, Yu Xiu raised his knife and avoided it. At the stroke of Feng Xiao's sleeve, he used the chance to land a palm. His left finger flicked and a ferocious slashing of wind flew at his adversary's shoulder. The enemy's body wavered a little as he felt that something had gone amiss.
Yu Xiu did not give the other a chance to even breathe. Immediately afterwards, he bent his fingers like claws, aiming for the other's skull. However, Feng Xiao disappeared in the blink of an eye. His entire person had disappeared, thus Yu Xiu grabbed thin air!
The other must have used a trick of deception. In reality, he had manoeuvred his way to the back of the boulder and so he went, not even hesitating before mustering his strength and hurried.
There was nothing behind the boulder. In front, behind, left and right, everywhere was fog. There were only a few luminous pearls there, looking far yet near, floating around, as if his move just now had brought him into another dimension!
Yu Xiu said 'No good', in his heart and knew that he felt for it. He had been led by Feng Xiao into the Twin Spinning Compass Array!
He had heard Fan Yun speaking about this array before and he knew how to walk out of it in normal circumstances. However, before his eyes were the boulders formed forests and waves upon waves of rumbling resounded. Atop his head it seemed as if another heavy rain would pour soon; it was not the array he walked in before.
Dense and gloomy air was everywhere, like arrows formed from ice and water, brushing against Yu Xiu's robes. If not for him averting it quickly, there would be a few more scars on his body. There were even trap mechanisms of flowing sand beneath his feet, and the difference of a single step would be similar to being dragged down by a ghost hand, pulling him into the abyss and trapped within the flowing sand.
Fan Yun once said that this array was infinitely changing. Yu Xiu hadn't believed it in the beginning, but only now did he experience the capabilities of Fan Yun. Only now did he know why the Pavilion Lord thought highly of him. If this array was utilized, never mind entrapping one or two top martial artists within it, even if there were a hundred trained Forbidden Armies, it was guaranteed that none of them would return.
From the side of his ears, there was the sound of swords and knives clanking. Yu Xiu could not tell if that was the combat of real people, or if it was produced by the array.
His back hit a boulder and it didn't move. His handsome expression sunk. For a moment, he gave a cold smile.
Feng Xiao was already infected by the 'Ever-flowing Waves', and very quickly it will take effect. He needed to find him before he left this array, then it will be the death of this Commander of the Jiejian Bureau.
...
When Cui Buqu woke up, he didn't know that his sleeping meridians were sealed, nor did he know that someone had come here to release them.
However, when he reached out to touch, he realized that there was something on his bed.
It was a bottle of kerosene.
This plaything could cause a fire to spread out quickly.
However, he recalled that there was nothing like this in the room before. People from the Thirteen Pavilions of Yunhai couldn't even wait to torture him, so they would not have delivered a bottle of kerosene here.
This item wasn't left by Feng Xiao, then, it should be Fan Yun.
Fan Yun and himself were years apart, each of them holding their dreams and goals they wanted to achieve. They have never even written letters to each other. However, in Cui Buqu's impression of him, this Master Fan would not be so easily pulled to the side with someone to achieve treason. The Thirteen Pavilions of Yunhai could perhaps attract people like Yu Xiu and Yuan Sansi, but they were not enough to move Fan Yun's heart.
Before this, Fan Yun had continuously hinted to him, and it had proven everything.
Cui Buqu sat up slowly and fumbled around for a while, finding something else that was interesting.
It was a dagger—the one that Feng Xiao used to pierce his heart before—and the fire starters that belonged to him before were all here. They weren't taken away.
There was also a set of robes meant for maidservants.
Even if Feng Xiao left all these things here for him for self-defence, Fan Yun would have failed to notice it.
Judging from all the phenomenon, the Pavilion Lord of the Thirteen Pavilions of Yunhai was not a feeble fool. It must not have been easy for Fan Yun to join the Thirteen Pavilions of Yunhai. He might have even done a lot of things to obtain the trust of the Pavilion Lord and become his strategist, serving as the mainstay for the vast scheme of things.
Yet the other was now secretly assisting him, adding fuel to fire, going so far to even leave a bottle of kerosene for him, as if he was afraid that he wouldn't stir something up.
Regardless of what side Fan Yun was at, since he is already in possession of these things, Cui Buqu would put them to good use.
There were a lot of luminous pearls lighting up this place. The only place that fire could be used would be the kitchen. So, he already knew what Fan Yun wanted him to do.
Knowing was an instance itself; being able to create chaos in this place also suited Cui Buqu's goals. He didn't mind that he was being used.
Through this, they could make use of the fire and find a way to escape for themselves.
Cui Buqu coughed, blood surging up his throat. This rotten body didn't seem like it could create chaos easily. However, if he could withstand the silence, then he would not be Cui Buqu, the one who had toiled winds and rolled waves.
He carried the dagger and kerosene with him, his gaze falling upon the maidservant's clothes, and the corner of his mouth twitched.
There were a lot of guards here who brought knives with them. On usual days he could pass himself off as one of them, but now his legs were weak and his hands shivered, it was more convincing if he'd passed off as a maidservant.
Author's Notes:
Feng Xiao: The wheels of fortune take their turns spinning; in the past, it was me; today it is you. Everyone sings! (T/N: Probably referring to taking turns crossdressing.)
Cui Buqu: "..."