No one could tell how long the corpse had lain there. It was a gruesome sight: half the body was picked clean down to bare bone, the limbs incomplete, with many marks of beasts' teeth on what remained.
Where flesh still covered the bone, it had rotted long ago, giving off waves of stench.
All around the body lay dead maggots, in great swaths.
The one hand it still had gripped a letter, holding on tight.
Fang Shuwen took one look, and his brows drew together.
It was not that he had never seen a dead man. Over the years, inside Julu City, he counted himself a man of some experience. Now and then a rotting corpse would come floating down the stinking drains.
Only this one was different...
He was still turning it over when Zhou Qingmei said in a low, sharp voice:
"Careful. It may be poisoned!"
"You saw it too?"
Fang Shuwen raised an eyebrow.
"A rotting corpse is the finest breeding ground maggots could ask for, yet these have all died off for no reason.
"And look how clean the ground around the body is—not a single insect left..."
This was a time of chaos. The imperial court was weak, and warlords had risen on every side; local strongmen were everywhere. Bandits in the hills, thugs on the roads, devil cults and crooked schools ran wild with no one to check them.
That was why Fang Shuwen had never dared leave Julu City all these years. His martial arts had been too weak to protect him, and once he ventured outside the walls, he would end up like this corpse.
In truth, in the half day the two of them had spent galloping along, they had already come across more than one body. No one knew how those people had died, how long they had been dead, or whether mothers and fathers were still waiting for them at home.
And who had done this to the corpse before them was a case with no leads whatsoever.
Fang Shuwen had no intention of tracing it to its root, of investigating a truth there was no way to investigate.
But there was one thing... no one poisoned a corpse for no reason at all.
"Look at the half of him that's gone—that was beasts feeding. So he did not die of poison; if he had, there would be animal carcasses lying around him.
"If there truly is poison on him now, someone must have put it there on purpose, and recently."
Zhou Qingmei spoke in a low voice.
Fang Shuwen pointed at the maggots on the ground.
"That tells us the same thing. This fellow certainly did not die of poison."
"Then what was the poisoner after?"
At that, the two of them exchanged a look, and each saw the same thing in the other's eyes.
"We can't take the main road."
Zhou Qingmei sighed.
"An open spear is easy to dodge; a hidden arrow is not. If we keep to the main road, we are asking to be stabbed in the back."
Fang Shuwen stared at the letter in the corpse's hand, curious.
"He's clutching it that hard. What do you suppose is written in it?"
Zhou Qingmei gave him a look.
"Too much curiosity will be the death of you."
But having said so, she drew a pair of gloves from her clothes, put them on, and reached for the letter.
"Careful," Fang Shuwen said quickly. "I only said it offhand. We needn't read it at all."
The Yijin Jing itself had the power to ward off poison, but he did not care to take the risk lightly.
"Don't worry. These are deerskin gloves."
Zhou Qingmei said,
"For anyone who walks the jianghu, they are basic kit. They keep out the worst poisons, so you don't fall foul of something for no reason.
"Hold your breath in a moment."
Fang Shuwen nodded, and saw that she had already broken the seal and drawn the letter out. She unfolded it, and the two of them leaned in together to read.
When they finished, they stared at each other, each silent.
The letter had almost nothing to do with their present situation. It was only a family letter. It read:
"To my wife Jiaxiu, may these words find you well.
"Three months since I left home, and my longing for you grows worse with every day. I am sending this letter home through the Julu Escort Agency to comfort your heart, and I hope you will not be angry with me.
"Business has gone well. The twenty taels I carried when I set out have grown to a full hundred.
"I hear there are rare goods to be had in Julu. I mean to stake my whole fortune on buying them, and once I have sold them off at Yong'an, I can count on a profit of fifty percent. I will surely be home then.
"I have also heard that Guangning is uneasy, with a lecher abroad at night. When darkness falls, wife, bar the doors tight and on no account go out.
"Passing through Lingguang, I happened upon a fisherman who took a pearl from a river mussel. Set in a hairpin, it would make you look even more radiant. I haggled a long while and at last got it for the price I wanted.
"When your husband comes home, it will be yours.
"You bear the whole burden of the household, and the toil is great. Take care of yourself, and do not worry or fret over me.
"Your husband, Huaijin."
The letter was short, only a few lines, and yet his longing showed in every one.
Then to look again at the state of the corpse—even Fang Shuwen, who had long since counted himself hard-hearted, could not help a soft sigh.
"He must have meant to find an escort agency here in Julu City to carry this letter home. He never expected to meet his end before he reached the city," Fang Shuwen said quietly.
"The silver he was carrying is gone too, and that pearl he meant for his wife has vanished as well."
"There's nothing rare about this."
Zhou Qingmei laid the letter back beside the body.
"In a lawless age, human lives are worth no more than grass. Those of us who take up the chivalrous path only want to make such things a little less common.
"But the only way to put a true end to them is for the realm to be united under one rule, and this age of chaos to be over."
Fang Shuwen made no reply. There was no telling how long the corpse had lain there, and no telling how long ago the business of the lecher in Guangning City, as the letter described it, had happened.
It might well have some connection with what Zhou Qingmei had run into. The news had spread even beyond Guangning City, far enough that this merchant, traveling on his business, had heard of it.
His thoughts turning, he shook his head slightly.
"Let's go."
Zhou Qingmei nodded.
They rode no more. They could not be sure the poisoner had meant it for the two of them, but even a one-in-ten-thousand chance had to be guarded against.
They left the horses, slipped into the forest, found a safe spot, ate a little of the dry rations they carried, and went on their way.
Another half day passed quietly, but when night came there was no shelter to be had.
Hawks circled overhead, and now and then a hawk's cry carried in every direction.
The weather was none too good either; it looked ready to rain at any moment. Fang Shuwen happened to spot a hollow in a tree, most likely some beast's den, though there was no sign of the beast now. If the two of them squeezed in, they could make do for the night.
Zhou Qingmei was not squeamish about it, and nodded in agreement.
They lit no fire that night. In times like these, the fewer complications the better, and with internal skill as deep as theirs, a little chill was nothing.
The rain came down once night had fully fallen.
They took turns keeping watch. Zhou Qingmei took the first half of the night while Fang Shuwen rested. He did not really sleep. He sat cross-legged and cultivated his internal skill.
His doubled aptitude and comprehension were not to be wasted. The Yijin Jing had nothing left to practice; it was already complete.
But there was still the Jade Stillness Art to work on.
That internal skill was meant for laying a foundation at the start; its internal force was mild and shallow, and as the Yijin Jing's internal force had grown outward, this skill had almost entirely merged into it.
Still, whether because the Yijin Jing had made up for his aptitude, or because of that doubled boost besides, practicing it by the book actually brought him a little progress.
It was not much, but Fang Shuwen was not about to turn his nose up at it.
Halfway through, however, he suddenly heard a grunting, heaving sound rise out of the rain-filled night.
He simply opened his eyes, and met the gaze of Zhou Qingmei, who had turned to look at him.
Neither spoke. They walked out into the rain of their own accord and followed the sound.
A moment later, from behind a large tree, they poked their heads out to peer.
There was a hunched old woman, skin wrinkled and hair white as a crane's, an iron spade in her hands, grunting and heaving as she dug among the trees.
Such a scene, in the rain, was utterly absurd and uncanny.
Chapter 9