Chapter 176: Death & Sunshine, I

Master Shu's warm smile dimmed. He took a moment to study Wu Hao's facial expression, despite Wu Hao himself not knowing what his expression looked like.

"What do you mean, fuck?" he asked. An odd look overtook his face. "Wait. Don't tell me it's Du Jincang's little girl?"

"What?" Wu Hao asked. "What do you mean, is it her?"

"What do you think I mean?" Master Shu said, raising an eyebrow. "You're of that age, just about, aren't you?"

Wu Hao stared at the old man. "What the hell are you talking about?"

"Are you sweet on her?" Master Shu asked.

Unbidden, a memory of a scent of peaches rose out of nowhere. A trace of jealousy, the feeling of her sword rending through his body, the look on her face when he won against her weeks ago.

"No," Wu Hao said quickly, which apparently Master Shu thought was too quickly, because he chuckled. "No, that's not -"

"You're blushing," Master Shu laughed. "Simmer down, brat! I was your age, once. I know the feeling."

Wu Hao took a deep breath.

"No," he said, interrupting Master Shu's laughter. "It's not her. It's the Moonlight Sovereign, Ke Jiaming."

Master Shu's eyebrows raised. "What do you mean, it's the Moonlight Sovereign?"

Another memory - bitter cold. No peaches - it felt like the total absence of anything pleasant. Just the cold, the ash, and death. A feeling of being useless like nothing he'd ever felt before. A feeling of wanting to die - wanting everything to simply be over.

"He's working together with the Heavenly Demon Cult," Wu Hao whispered. They weren't the kind of words to be spoken out loud.

It really wasn't a surprise when the color was ripped from the carriage, this time, but Wu Hao still flinched. He made himself wait until Master Shu had himself back under control, though he did wonder how far the monochrome had reached in that time.

It wasn't a good sign, Wu Hao thought to himself, that the loss of control seemed to be coming quicker and quicker together. Was it like this for the other Sovereigns as well?

"You're sure?" Master Shu asked, putting on a calmer face.

"I'm sure," Wu Hao said. No backing out now, he told himself.

Master Shu raised his eyes up to heaven, muttering under his breath.

"How?"

Wu Hao hesitated.

"I don't recall."

"You must," Master Shu said. He leaned forward. "Please. You absolutely must be certain that what you are saying is true. If it is true, then..."

He trailed off. Wu Hao could imagine plenty of worst-case scenarios, though. He'd lived through one.

"I think I remember someone from the Diancang Sect being involved," Wu Hao said. "And - and cold."

Master Shu's black-and-white eyes bored into Wu Hao's.

"Cold?" he asked.

"Cold," Wu Hao repeated. "A deep, biting cold that froze everything. I saw him turn people into nothing but ice and shatter them. He killed people."

Master Shu closed his eyes and leaned back.

"Yes," he said quietly. "Yes, that could be him. Especially now that I'm a Sovereign, myself, there is something in me that is more than sure that it should be him. I don't understand why, or how - but it's as close to fact as we'll be able to have."

Wu Hao released a breath. Good, he thought. If he hadn't been believed, then the rest of the lie might have come collapsing down.

"Who else?" Master Shu pressed. "His brother? How many men does he have under his command? What is his position in the Cult?"

Damnit. Wu Hao tried to think it through very carefully. He wasn't actually sure when he was supposed to have gotten away from this supposed attack. If it was several years ago, then would Ke Shuang even have been there the way he would be in the future? It was impossible to say.

"He mentioned an apprentice," Wu Hao said dully. "I can't be sure, though. And all the rest is a blur to me."

"Hrmph," Master Shu said. He didn't untense, but he did relax slightly. "That's all? You had me worried there would be another Sovereign involved, boy."

"Just one Sovereign isn't enough?" Wu Hao asked, despite himself.

Master Shu smacked the top of Wu Hao's head.

"You little idiot," he said, and rubbed his hands, deep in thought. "Why didn't you tell me earlier? I tell you, in some detail, that I have been taking the necessary actions to prevent the rise of the Demon Cult, and you didn't think to tell me that you knew of a Sovereign who was involved?"

"I wasn't sure," Wu Hao said. "Until you confirmed it just now, I mean."

Master Shu frowned, but he let this slide. Instead he cast his eyes up to heaven, thinking.

"So," Wu Hao asked. "What now?"

A long silence fell. Wu Hao wasn't actually sure what he hoped Master Shu would advise they do. He didn't even know what he himself wanted to do. To flee? To fight? He was caught in the middle of both.

"We must still go ahead," Master Shu said. "We cannot do anything else. The Diancang Sect is one the sects I must absolutely visit. I've already sent a letter stating that I would discuss the Demonic Cult, once there. Anyone who makes it to Sovereign is no idiot, boy. It may already be too late."

Wu Hao twisted around in his seat, staring out the window. That hadn't occurred to him at all - the thought that perhaps there was another squad of Red Dawn deathsworn out there, waiting to ambush them. He pushed his senses to the limit, trying to detect anything, until Master Shu waved a hand.

"My range of detection is far further than yours," Master Shu said. "I don't sense anyone, and Ke Jiaming would not come alone, if only to make absolutely certain not a single one of us escapes the slaughter. I do not think he has gotten to the age he has by being a fool, especially not if he has been colluding wiht the Demon Cult."

Maybe, but Wu Hao would definitely keep his attention on the road, for the rest of their journey. He had thought that they wouldn't be ambushed, or if they were, that he or Master Shu would take care of the bandits easily.

If there might have been a Sovereign out there, though...

Master Shu fell deep into thought. He stared down into nothingness as the woods fell away behind them, instead revealing a pastoral landscape of rolling hills and distant plains. Master Shu didn't touch his books, or drink, or eat. The horses pulled the carriage along long, winding roads, occasional valleys so thin that the walls of the carriage must nearly have scraped against the rock, and villages that were little more than two or three houses.

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Even during lunch, he wandered out of the carriage without looking up, and then simply sat there, dead to the world.

Wu Hao was glad that he'd decided to pack some things from the banquet last night. When taking that out, before he began work on the array that would reheat the food, his awareness brushed past the case of poisons.

Right, he thought. Maybe - maybe he could just rewind time. Tell Master Shu much earlier. Prevent them from setting course to the Diancang Sect at all. That way, everything would be... safer. They would avoid danger.

Thinking it through, that was the safe option.

And yet...

As if aware of his thoughts, that was the moment Master Shu woke up from his thinking and grunted.

"Boy," he said. Wu Hao rolled his eyes, wondering what the master had decided. He glanced over at the old man and expected despair there, or a grim awareness of what might have to be done.

Instead, he saw a cautious excitement.

"This is good," Master Shu said slowly. "What is most vital, in war? Knowledge. Know the enemy and know yourself and in a hundreds battles, you will not face defeat. What we lacked, during the Second War, was knowledge, most of all. What you have just given me is that we know at least one of our enemies."

"He's a Sovereign," Wu Hao said. "How much does knowing who he is help?"

"It matters because he is a Sovereign," Master Shu said. "Think about it, boy. Yes, you were late in telling me. But you have made me aware of the enemy, and that is an opportunity that we must take advantage of."

Wu Hao stared. An opportunity? The more he thought, though, the more he figured out what Master Shu meant. This was a fight they might actually stand a chance in.

Not he alone against the Moonlight Sovereign, he knew that much. But he had Master Shu, who seemed at least a match for another Sovereign, judging by his fight against Tang Shibai. And Wu Hao himself was now a second-grade martial artist. He might be able to contest against a first-grade, like Ke Shuang would become. Maybe there were others in the Diancang Sect who were secret converts to the Demon Cult as well, but he had no way of knowing.

But - honestly - did all that matter? His hands unclenched as he reminded himself of who - what he was.

He could die and wake up again. That meant that whatever Master Shu's ideas were, he could afford to give it a try. It was like the tournament a few weeks ago. The possible gains were enormous. If they were able to take down the Moonlight Sovereign, they would strike a massive blow against the Cult.

The first massive blow that he would strike at all, beyond just telling Master Shu about the rise at all.

"And if we manage to reveal that he's part of the Demon Cult," Wu Hao said slowly, thinking out loud, "then the rest of the world will have to see, as well."

Master Shu nodded, though he seemed unconvinced. "Hopefully."

"Right," Wu Hao said. "I understand."

"No, you don't, brat," Master Shu said bluntly. "And that is how I'll keep it, no matter the cost. You, boy, will never know war. This I swear to you on my wife's grave. There will never be a Third Demon War."

Wu Hao nodded slowly, hiding his skeptical grimace.

Maybe, he thought. He still thought it far more likely that there would be. But maybe.

"What do you need me to do?" Wu Hao asked eagerly.

"You," Master Shu said, "will do absolutely nothing to make them realize that you know. You will not tell anyone there, no matter who. You will not talk to the traitors, if you can at all help it, and neither will you go out of your way to avoid talking to them. Act as though you simply don't know. Act natural - act normal."

Master Shu thought about this again.

"Maybe not act your kind of normal," the master corrected.

"What?" Wu Hao asked. "What does my kind of normal even mean?"

"Like you were raised by wolves," Master Shu said bluntly. "Until, that is, the wolves rejected you for being a violent, unmannered maniac."

Wu Hao scowled.

"Manners are stupid."

Master Shu snorted. "No, brat. Manners are what distinguished civilized men from the barbarians up north or across the oceans. Manners, in point of fact, are vital to my plan."

"Which is?" Wu Hao asked.

"Still to be finished," Master Shu said, and cracked his neck. "Although I have most of it nailed down. And, more importantly, it isn't to be told to the likes of you. The less you know, the better. For you, simply pretend you don't know anything unless I specifically tell you otherwise."

And, no matter what Wu Hao tried, the old man refused to budge on this. Training resumed with a vengeance, as if Master Shu was afraid that Wu Hao would run out of bruises. More books were shoved at him to read. He was tested, repeatedly, on checking that he actually remembered what he read, and that his arrays worked, and that he knew where they were going and why.

It was good that there wasn't any attempts to make him "act natural". Wu Hao still didn't know what that meant. Wasn't that acting without acting? How the hell did that work?

In short he was almost glad to be able to stumble out of the carriage when they finally reached the Diancang Mountains two weeks later. It felt like it had been longer, but all the same it somehow also felt like it had been three days. Master Shu had spent most of his time muttering to himself, preparing arrays on a higher quality of paper than was actually available on the market, and occasionally grimacing or rubbing his hands in silence. It was unsettling.

The Diancang Sect had sent a few of its members out ahead, to walk with the carriage as they entered the foot of the mountains. A long, twisting and small road led higher up, disappearing behind the back of the mountain in the distance. Large, elegantly written signs proclaimed these were the mountains closest to the Sun, bringer of all life, and then featured several lines of poetry Wu Hao didn't bother reading.

The problem, though, was that one of those advance members was Ke Shuang. He was standing at the stairs that led upwards to the mountain.

He was smiling, though it looked forced. A spear had been slung behind his back - one made of real steel, as far as Wu Hao could tell. His hair was black right now, unlike that of every other main-branch Diancang Sect disciple Wu Hao had seen. He was handsome, wearing high-quality clothing, and he was making an effort not to look too bored.

For the second time in as many weeks, Wu Hao couldn't stop himself from saying, out of pure reflex, "Fuck."