Volume Five: Down and Out, Gazing North at the Cloud Monument — Chapter Eight: A Changed Face

Before long, the servant from earlier came scurrying back into the small garden clutching a rolled-up scroll. He dropped to his knees with a thud, raised both hands above his head, and presented the painting to Yan Muyun.

Yan Muyun maintained his stern countenance, took the scroll, and began to unroll it inch by inch. He glanced at the figure in the painting, then at Zhuo Hua, then back at the painting, scrutinizing and comparing them over and over with great care.

After roughly the time it takes to burn half a stick of incense, Yan Muyun slowly rolled up the scroll and handed it to his servant with an instruction: "Keep it safe." The servant acknowledged with a murmur and scurried away.

Once the servant had gone, Yan Muyun's demeanor shifted to one of reverence. He hurriedly prostrated himself before Zhuo Hua in the full formal kowtow—three kneelings and nine bows. The suddenness of it left the three people present utterly bewildered.

Zhuo Hua was the first to recover from the astonishment. He hastened to lift Yan Muyun up. "Pray rise, Minister Yan. Zhuo Hua is unworthy of such courtesy."

Yan Muyun shook his head, still kneeling, and spoke with a sob: "Your humble servant did not know the Yuanjun was gracing this city with his presence. Failing to receive you beyond the city walls is truly my offense. I beg the Yuanjun to mete out punishment."

"I was abducted here to Moonview City by villains—the matter was sudden. How could I blame you for it? Do rise, Minister Yan." Zhuo Hua reached out again to help him up.

Yan Muyun's heart settled. So the Yuanjun had not come to call him to account after all. He had feared that his years of lording it over this remote border town, far from the Yuanjun's reach, committing all manner of misdeeds, had somehow come to the attention of Cloudtop Heavenly Palace, and that the Yuanjun had come in person to exact judgment.

"Abducted by ruffians, was he!" Yan Muyun thought to himself, and he rose to his feet with the aid of Zhuo Hua's hand.

Once standing, Yan Muyun's face was streaked with tears. "That the Yuanjun has suffered such misfortune is the crime of his subjects. Ten thousand deaths could not atone for my failure!"

Su Geweng stepped in to smooth things over: "Fortunately, Minister Yan's household possesses a portrait of the Yuanjun handed down from his ancestors, enabling ruler and subject to recognize each other. That this old man could play a part in such a momentous reunion is a blessing for our Su family!"

Yan Muyun nodded and wiped the tears from his face—but with a bit too much force, smearing away a considerable amount of his makeup. His now blotched countenance made Su Mengling struggle hard to suppress her laughter behind Zhuo Hua.

Yan Muyun clasped his hands toward Zhuo Hua and said with a grave expression: "Yuanjun, may I ask which band of villains dared to disturb your majesty? I presume they have already been annihilated by the Star Lords of the Cloud Palace. If any remnants have fled and are hiding within Moonview City's borders, I will dig three feet into the earth to root them out."

"Such a timely display of loyalty! Yet all these years, I've never seen you take the mountain bandits and horse thieves so seriously." Su Mengling's words were pitched not too loudly and not too softly—just enough that everyone present heard them clearly.

Old Su set his face in a stern frown and glared at his daughter. Zhuo Hua looked somewhat embarrassed but did not let it show. Su Mengling, as usual, was entirely unbothered by her father's glare and frown; by long-standing habit, she rolled her eyes in return, which she considered a fair exchange of courtesies.

But the great City Lord Yan did not possess such equanimity. He knew full well that many of the things he did in peacetime could not stand the light of day, and that his reputation among the common folk had long since crumbled amid a chorus of complaints. If the Yuanjun were now to investigate the offenses he had committed, even his father—who had never acknowledged him by name—could not protect him. And so this city lord, who styled himself the foremost beauty of the Yan clan, turned alternately pale and red in the face, while his sumptuous robes were soaked through with cold sweat.

Zhuo Hua cleared his throat lightly and spoke up to dissolve the awkwardness hanging in the air: "It was the vanguard of the Dark Cruel tribe who carried me off here. They abandoned me in Moonview City, then vanished without a trace."

Hearing Zhuo Hua's answer, Yan Muyun was first struck with alarm: "What? The Dark Cruel tribe has invaded? And they kidnapped the Cloud Palace's Yuanjun at that! This is no small matter!"

But then he reconsidered. With such a monumental affair at hand, the Yuanjun and the constellations of the Heavenly Palace should be preoccupied with tracking down those invaders. The petty offenses he himself had committed were now hardly worth mentioning.

"How dare those Dark Cruel brigands infiltrate our Void? Do they not fear the august might of Cloudtop Heavenly Palace?" This time, Yan Muyun's words carried noticeably more confidence.

"It was that Lanling Fairy who let them in!" Su Mengling pouted her little mouth and said indignantly: "Who knows what that wicked woman was plotting! She let the villains in first, then used knockout drugs to put Big Brother to sleep."

"Hold your tongue!" Su Geweng barked at his daughter in a low, stern voice.

"Wh... what? It was Lanling Fairy who did this?" Yan Muyun's voice began to tremble. "Isn't she of the Xuanhuang clan? How could she bring her own mortal enemy into the fold?" Even if Yan Muyun were beaten to death, he could not bring himself to believe the matter had unfolded this way.

"Minister Yan, do not panic. Pray let me tell you the full story." Thereupon Zhuo Hua gave Yan Muyun a general account of the series of events from three months past.

"As things stand at present, it seems indeed that Lanling Fairy manipulated the entire incident from behind the scenes, stage-managing it all." After speaking, Zhuo Hua paused for a long while to catch his breath. Ever since the Breath-Chaining Pearl had left his body, he had felt visibly fatigued and taxed; at the least exertion or after so long a speech, his breath would fail to keep up.

"So, Yuanjun, your Breath-Chaining Pearl was taken, your cultivation was abolished, and you haven't a single magical implement on your person—you're just like an unrefined mortal?" Yan Muyun seemed to have no interest whatsoever in the fascinating tale Zhuo Hua had just told, and instead latched onto only these points.

Su Mengling bounced over to Yan Muyun and said hurriedly: "So! That's why my father brought Big Brother here to see Uncle Yan—to ask if you would lend him your precious Breath-Chaining Pearl."

Zhuo Hua nodded and took over the conversation: "If Minister Yan can part with the pearl and lend it to me, I have my own means of recovering half my cultivation within a few months. Once I return to the Cloud Palace, I shall send someone to return the pearl to you."

"Of course, of course." Yan Muyun nodded like a hen pecking at rice, answering without quite addressing the question, his eyes darting about as he calculated something or other in his mind—though his back and shoulders did seem noticeably straighter than before.

"'Of course' what? Are you lending it to him or not?" Su Mengling was getting impatient. After all, she was only sixteen or seventeen; expecting much worldly tact from a young girl was simply asking too much.

"Just a moment ago it was 'Uncle Yan' this and 'Uncle Yan' that! Now what sort of talk is this?" Yan Muyun's demeanor seemed to have shifted; the tone of his voice was changing too, the endings of his sentences drawn out longer and longer.

Su Geweng sensed something amiss and hurried forward to apologize on his daughter's behalf: "Do not take offense, Brother Yan. My daughter lost her mother at a young age, and the whole family has always indulged her and spoiled her rotten. You are a man of great magnanimity; surely you won't hold a grudge against a little girl!"

Yan Muyun snorted through his nose, his voice dripping with sarcasm: "Without a mother's discipline, this little girl truly knows nothing of decorum. Fit only for the back alleys." He cast another sidelong glance at Su Mengling.

Su Geweng, deeply fearful, bowed deeply in supplication and said: "The City Lord's admonishment is well taken. When I return home, I will certainly discipline her strictly—strictly."

"And so, Minister Yan. Will you lend the Breath-Chaining Pearl or not?" Zhuo Hua, who had likewise noticed the shift in the man's attitude before him, withdrew his earlier easygoing smile and assumed instead that lofty bearing he wore when standing atop the Cloud Palace, looking down upon all beneath him.

"Yuanjun, pray hear your servant's words. This Breath-Chaining Pearl was obtained by me at the cost of my very life and limb. Though I myself do not cultivate, I have already engaged a cultivation master for my son, training him day and night in the Immortal Descendant's mind technique without a moment's slack. And so, this pearl was in the future to be passed down to my boy. If I present it to the Yuanjun now, my son's fate in cultivation would be ended, and his wish to one day defend Cloudtop Heavenly Palace would come to naught. My poor, pitiable son!" As he spoke, Yan Muyun actually began to weep, his already smeared face now a riot of colors, almost too ghastly to behold.

"And what is your intent, then?" Zhuo Hua regarded the tearful Yan Muyun with cold eyes.

"My thought, Yuanjun, is this! His Majesty first buys the pearl with gold, and then your servant takes that money and buys a lesser pearl for my son. That way, we neither delay Your Majesty's great undertaking nor fail my child's wish. Would that not be perfect? I humbly pray the Yuanjun will consider it." Having said this, Yan Muyun bowed again, but this time the gesture was visibly more perfunctory.

"And what price would you set on this pearl?" Zhuo Hua continued to watch Yan Muyun's performance with a cold stare.

"Good heavens, Yuanjun! This Breath-Chaining Pearl of mine is a rarity in this world—crafted from the finest Brightmoon Stone, forged by the great artisan Shen Yuehua of the Sheng Clan in the Western Qi Prefecture with heart and soul. It is the finest of the mortal-grade treasures!" Yan Muyun was preening as he boasted of his pearl, when he suddenly caught sight of the look in Zhuo Hua's eyes. At once a chill ran from the soles of his feet all the way down his back, and he shut his mouth. He got straight to the price: "When I bought it before, the pearl already cost three thousand taels of gold. And in these times, Brightmoon Stone is rare indeed—fine quality is nigh impossible to find at all. If the Yuanjun truly wishes to buy it, then... then let it be eight thousand taels of gold." Yan Muyun quoted his price with a guilty conscience, even extending a trembling hand and gesturing with eight fingers.

"How much?" Su Mengling demanded loudly. "Eight thousand taels of gold? Why don't you just go out and rob people?" Her fair pink cheeks were flushed red with fury, and her small chest heaved with agitation. She clenched her teeth and balled her little fists so tightly that it seemed if Yan Muyun said another word, she would charge forward and knock him senseless.

"Come now, Miss Su, no need to get excited! In this day and age, even a first-grade mortal pearl sells for fifteen hundred gold. My ninth-grade pearl at eight thousand is hardly excessive, is it?" Yan Muyun spread both palms before his chest, as if warding off the very real possibility that the sixteen-year-old girl might indeed lunge at him and beat him black and blue.

"I have no money." Zhuo Hua's face was expressionless; his voice flat. "But I will take that pearl."

"No money?" Yan Muyun gave an oily chuckle. "Then I can't help it. Even if you are the Yuanjun of the Cloud Palace, you can't just snatch my pearl in broad daylight, now can you?"

"I will pay it." A weathered, weary voice sounded low from behind the others. It was soft, yet it startled everyone present. They turned to look—it was Old Master Su.

"Brother Yan, I will buy your pearl." Su Geweng said it again. His head was bowed, his expression unreadable, but his tone was unusually resolute.