Chapter 149
Chapter 149
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>Translator: Ryuma
>Chapter: 149
>Chapter Title: Nuo Play
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The Siqu border pass was reached soon.
Unexpected yet reasonable, the checkpoint had been set up by the soldiers, seemingly to guard against spies.
The entire border fortress was extremely strict—even the smiles on the faces of those entering were all but gone.
Thanks to the power of silver, both groups passed through the checkpoint smoothly.
Leaving behind the river- and lake-filled lands of Siqu, everything around turned desolate, the trees gradually thinned out by the encroaching Gobi.
By the evening of the tenth day, there wasn't a single tree in sight anywhere.
The deeper they ventured, the more barren it became. Li Huowang had already guessed that this was likely the true face of Houshu.
"Hoo~" Zhao Wu, on night watch, exhaled a puff of white breath.
He rubbed his frozen-numb hands and kept breathing warm air onto them.
It was nearly early summer—no reason for it to be this cold. But out here in the wilds with no sheltering rocks from the wind and no firewood to make a fire, it was freezing, naturally.
He turned his head for a glance. Envy filled Zhao Wu's eyes as he watched Li Huowang sleeping beside the carriage with Bai Lingmiao in his arms.
He looked down at his own frail body, his gaze brimming with self-loathing.
He wanted a wife too, but a useless cripple like him—no woman would ever have him.
Drawing in a breath of the dry, frigid air to chase away his drowsiness, he mustered his spirits and practiced writing characters on the ground with small pebbles.
Some had been taught to him by Li Shixiong; the others he'd stubbornly begged Gao Zhijian to teach him.
"I have to learn my characters. I definitely have to learn!" Determination burned in Zhao Wu's eyes.
He would prove to his father that he wasn't worthless!
Once he could read, he could make money writing letters for others, just like the fortune-telling blind men at the temple fairs.
Once he could read, study enough books, he could sit the imperial exams and become a great official!
"By then..." As he lost himself in fantasies of the future, he suddenly sensed someone behind him.
The anomaly sent a chill through Zhao Wu's entire body in an instant.
His frame began to tremble uncontrollably. Steel resolve in his heart, he was just about to shout a warning to the other shixiong and shimei when a hand without fingernails clamped over his mouth. "Don't make a sound—it's me!"
Li Huowang's voice instantly set Zhao Wu at ease.
He kept his voice to the barest whisper. "Li Shixiong, what's wrong?"
His eyes scanned the surroundings—only pitch-black Gobi everywhere, nothing else.
"Shh—something's creeping up. I'll test first to see if it's alive."
Staring intently at one spot, Li Huowang cleared his throat and bellowed toward it. "Three elders, four youths rely on the road; a sea dragon stirs from the river's flow. Which set's stirring up trouble now?"
Li Huowang's voice carried far across the empty Gobi, rousing the others from sleep.
"Spring rites open or closed?" came a reply from afar, in a voice even hoarser than Li Huowang's.
"Spring rites open!"
"Side by side—toss a vine?"
Li Huowang gave a Daoist salute in that direction. "One Linglong Pagoda! Facing the green stronghold, back to the sands! Copyhand vine!"
"So it's True Person Li. Just passing through, or here to wait?"
"Merely passing by, shopkeeper. What's your honorable surname?"
After Li Huowang spoke those words, there came no further reply.
Not until the sky began to lighten at dawn did Li Huowang realize the man had left long ago.
"Didn't expect Zhao the Escort Head's argot to come in handy so soon." Li Huowang muttered to himself.
Though he'd keenly sensed the man's arrival the night before, he hadn't been able to make out clearly whether it was one person or a group.
Resolving the situation with just a few words of exchange was for the best.
After all, with bandits of unknown origin, who knew what trump cards they might be hiding?
When Lv Zhuangyuan heard of the close call from Li Huowang's lips, a wave of aftershock washed over him.
"My word—just how long have we been here, and already the road agents are upon us. Looks like Houshu's no peaceful place either."
Li Huowang shouldered his scattered belongings and stood.
"Peaceful or not, we're just passing through. Let's get moving—push hard today, and we should make it to a town before dark."
The rest of the road went smoothly. Though the surroundings remained barren, there were no more road agents.
Even as Lv Zhuangyuan showered Li Huowang with nonstop flattery, they finally spotted signs of human habitation.
"Dad, why's that horse so weird? Why's its back got two humps?" Lv Xiucai asked.
"You idiot? That's a camel!"
"Ding-a-ling-a-ling~" The camel bells jingled on as the camel train plodded slowly forward along the hard-packed road.
Li Huowang glanced at the camel drivers and noted their veiled faces—likely to fend off the wind and sand.
The camels' appearance was like a signal. Soon, more and more people began to appear and gather.
They finally reached Houshu's first town just before nightfall.
The moment they entered, Li Huowang could see how the people of Houshu differed from those of Siqu—the architecture coarser, the clothing rougher.
Many in town had their faces veiled against the sandstorms.
It had its advantages, though—the other shixiong and shimei in their black-gauze hats and cloaks wouldn't stand out here.
"Let's go—find an inn to settle in. After over ten days on the road, everyone deserves a rest."
Relief washed over the faces of the travel-worn group.
Days without fire or water weren't fit for humans.
The group blended into the town's flow of people, following along with the others.
The aromas of roasting meats and noodle soups from nearby stalls tantalized everyone's taste buds.
As they walked, they came to a wide-open space that seemed to be the town center.
The sudden beat of drums and clash of gongs drew all eyes to the thronging crowd.
"This must be the Nuo play," Li Huowang murmured, watching the three figures leaping and cavorting amid the press of bodies.
Head shakes, body twists, crouching shivers, wrist circles, stamping steps, darting leaps.
The three had their heads wrapped in red cloth and wore fearsome wooden masks—their dance moves utterly bizarre, as if no human mind could have conceived them.
The weird choreography was underscored by the chaotic rhythms of gong and drum.
Every so often, a horn-like instrument would join in.
The sound issuing from that black ox horn resembled the wailing of a female ghost.
Gongs, drums, ghostly cries, matched to the eerie dance—however Li Huowang looked at it, it made him profoundly uneasy.
Yet the people around him sat entranced, utterly absorbed.
"What's this? This counts as opera?" Lv Zhuangyuan, as a fellow performer, voiced his utter disdain.
No sooner had his words left his mouth than the three figures began to writhe even more violently.
As they twisted, sharp white fangs began to tremble and sprout from the mouths of their wooden masks, growing out like roots taking hold.
Not just one or two fangs, but a full sixteen.
The sixteen fangs quivered in time with their Nuo play, syncing perfectly with the rat-a-tat-tat of the drums and gongs.
"This is... fang play?"
The three's fang-play skills were masterful. As Li Huowang watched the white fangs retract and extend from their mouths, he almost believed they were truly growing right out of them.
(End of chapter)