Ning Chen and Feng Qizheng reached the stables without trouble.
The bailiffs on night watch were all in the front courtyard. There were watchmen in the rear courtyard too, but not many, and they were on the outer wall, worried about thieves coming over it from outside.
For men with Ning Chen’s and Feng Qizheng’s skill, getting to the stables was easy enough.
They dealt with the few guards on the back gate and rode out of it.
The crossroads of Yangping County were still watched at night.
Ning Chen and Feng Qizheng wasted no words on it. They went straight at the constables, put them down in short order, and rode off.
“Ning Chen, where do we go now?”
Ning Chen thought about it. “Two ways to do it. One is Xiuzhou. By the time we get there it’ll be first light, and we slip out of the city in the crowd.”
“Two is we go and find Old Gao and Old Chen and hide in the mountains.”
“If it were you, which would you take?”
Feng Qizheng thought it over. “I’d say we go and find Old Gao and Old Chen. We hide in the mountains and wait for the Chief to bring the musket battalion.”
Ning Chen nodded slightly. “That could work. But we don’t know how things stand with Old Pan. I’m worried he’s stuck inside Xiuzhou and can’t get out.”
“Never mind. We’ll do it your way and go find Old Gao and the others.”
They rode all night.
The two of them came to the place where they had met the hill bandits.
By now it was light.
The two of them went up into the mountains.
Before long they found the marks Gao Ziping and Chen Chong had left.
The mountains here were high and the woods were thick, and the tracks were hard going.
The two of them wandered around and finally, halfway through the afternoon, came upon Gao Ziping and the rest.
It was not that Ning Chen found them. The men Gao Ziping had posted as lookouts found him.
Gao Ziping and the others were hiding in a natural cave.
The cave was large. Twenty-odd people in it still left it looking empty.
“Is there anything to eat? I’m starving to death!”
The moment they met, Feng Qizheng was shouting about being hungry.
Ning Chen was hungry too. One dry ration last night, and nothing since.
Yang Yongwang said, “If my lords will wait a little, I’ll go and get you something to eat.”
The four of them went outside, found a spot away from everyone and sat down on the ground.
Chen Chong could not wait. “How did it go? Did you find anything?”
Ning Chen nodded.
Chen Chong said excitedly, “Then can we go back to the capital?”
Ning Chen shook his head. “I have bad news for you. Our cover is blown.”
“The city of Xiuzhou will be shut up tight by now. I doubt a fly could get out of it.”
Feng Qizheng cut in. “That’s nonsense. It’s winter. There are no flies.”
Ning Chen: ???
“Ha. That’s a very funny joke.”
Gao Ziping and Chen Chong, on the other hand, were badly startled.
“How were you found out?”
Ning Chen went through it for them in outline.
Far from being annoyed, Gao Ziping and Chen Chong burst out laughing like men with no heart and no lungs in them.
“Who’d have thought you’d slip up too? Found out because of Diaochan, of all things.”
Ning Chen rolled his eyes. “You can still laugh about it?”
Chen Chong said, laughing, “Why not? Hasn’t the Chief gone back to the capital to fetch help?”
Ning Chen sighed. “Xiuzhou will be sealed and guarded to the death by now. I’m worried Old Pan can’t get out.”
Gao Ziping laughed at that. “You don’t know the first thing about what the Chief can do… He’ll reach the capital without any trouble and bring back help.”
“Years ago the Chief went out on a case and a big jianghu gang came after him to kill him. There were over a hundred of them, and every one of them good. Guess how it went.”
Ning Chen was curious. “How?”
“One man, one blade, and the Chief cut his way straight out through them… A hundred and more, and the Chief took down close to half.”
Ning Chen was shocked. “Old Pan is that good?”
Gao Ziping said, “More than good. In the whole Inspectorate only Geng the Purple Coat can get the better of the Chief, and even he only takes it by a hair after a hundred exchanges… Nobody else is a match for him.”
“So the Chief will get back to the capital, and no doubt about it.”
Ning Chen was astonished, and at the same time a little reassured.
Feng Qizheng leaned in, curious. “There was no chance to ask on the road. What’s written in that book of evidence we got?”
Ning Chen was about to speak when Yang Yongwang came over.
“My lords, come and have something to eat.”
Ning Chen and Feng Qizheng got up and went.
The only thing to eat in the mountains was game.
Yang Yongwang had roasted them a rabbit.
Ning Chen and Feng Qizheng sat down on a rock at the mouth of the cave and dug in.
There was not even any salt, and the two of them still ate with real appetite.
That night a bonfire was built in the cave.
Everyone was asleep.
Ning Chen sat by the fire and went through the book of evidence.
Qiu Mingde had recorded it in detail.
By Qiu Mingde’s record, the fruit of the immortals’ flower was carried to a dyeing and weaving works in the city of Xiuzhou.
A dyeing and weaving works on the face of it. In fact the place where the immortal powder was worked and refined.
Ning Chen guessed the dyeing works was the cover because the smell of the dyes was strong enough to hide the smell of the immortal powder.
He turned further on, and his eyes narrowed sharply.
Most of the finished immortal powder was sent to the western frontier.
But where on the western frontier? Qiu Mingde had not recorded it… Perhaps he did not know either.
“The western frontier?”
Ning Chen’s eyes narrowed.
Outside the western frontier lay the Xiliang Kingdom.
And the man holding the western frontier was the Fourth Prince.
Ning Chen had never met this Fourth Prince, but he had heard he was bold and skilled in war and had held the western pass a long time.
Fuck!!!
It can’t be.
Prince Duan is in league with the Fourth Prince?
Is all the immortal powder sent to the western frontier ending up in the Xiliang Kingdom?
Could the Fourth Prince be trying to destroy Xiliang with immortal powder?
Then Ning Chen’s face went stiff.
A very ugly thought had come to him… could the Fourth Prince be using immortal powder to control the soldiers on the frontier?
Just then Feng Qizheng turned over and startled Ning Chen out of his wild thoughts.
He put his head down and read on.
Besides Yangping County, Xichuan County and Dongle County were also growing the immortals’ flower.
Xichuan County had brought a crop in years ago.
Yangping County and Dongle County had only succeeded this year.
How much had been planted? Qiu Mingde had not set it down… He used four characters and no more: in vast quantity.
Ning Chen put the book of evidence away. With this, there was enough to convict Prince Duan.
Then he took out the secret letters.
He opened them and found that the letters carried no name and no signature.
And the contents of them were ordinary greetings, nothing more.
Qiu Mingde would never have hidden a few ordinary letters away.
There had to be much more to them than that… perhaps some cipher was needed to read them.
Ning Chen turned them over and over and read them several times, tried scrambling the characters and setting them in a new order, tried cutting off the heads and the tails… but several methods later he was no wiser.
All Ning Chen could do was put the letters away and wait until Qiu Mingde was taken.
For the next several days Ning Chen stayed hidden in the mountains, waiting for Pan Yucheng to bring men to their support.
The rest of it was bearable. There was a pool not far off where he could wash, and it was cold, but a man could stand it.
The one thing he could not stand was that there was nothing to eat but what they hunted every day. Never mind the lack of salt—eat enough of that and you can’t get anything out.
Ning Chen had not moved his bowels in two days.
From Xiuzhou to the capital and back was half a month.
Ning Chen was genuinely afraid he would be dead of it before Pan Yucheng arrived with men.
And while Ning Chen was worrying about the state of his own body, he saw Feng Qizheng come tearing up the little track in the distance, holding his trousers up.
(End of Chapter 309)