Jin Se

Chapter 61

Final Valume

Third year of Puqing, beginning of autumn.

Shi Wuduan, who'd been missing for over a month finally returned to Huaizhou. Overjoyed, Gu Huaiyang welcomed him personally.

Meng Zhongyong was even more exaggerated. He hauled Shi Wuduan up in a bear hug, and pounded his back like an anvil, nearly cracking his shoulder, and yelled, "Let's have a feast! A feast! Eldest brother, little six is back! We've gotta celebrate!"

Yet, Shi Wuduan only went through the motions of greeting them. When he smiled, he seemed distracted, as if his heart wasn't in it. He passed it off as being tired and told everyone to go back to what they were doing. After everything settled, he went alone to the relay station where refugees were being sheltered, rolled up his sleeves, made a bowl of thin porridge, then sat down and slowly sipped it.

Wearing old and ragged clothes, his lips dry and cracked, with a pale and haggard complexion, he seemed like a weary traveler who'd come from afar.

At first glance, he seemed no different than those lost souls fleeing from the wreckage of their homes. Yet the beauty of his face, despite its lack of emotion, still shone through as he sat there silently, staring into the sky. Calm as if he knew where he came from and knew where he was going.

Every person who passed him by couldn't help but take a glance at him. But for some reason, none of them ever looked at him twice.

Before mid-autumn, large quantities of grain suddenly left the northwestern region, as if an invisible hand had swiftly snatched all the grain off the market. The price of rice soared, the court was, as ever, unable to spare any silver. Yan Zhen knew that this was revenge for the time he'd used the Merchant Association's movements to lay a trap for Gu Huaiyang.

It was simply the confluence of opportunity, luck, and fate. Though he was little over forty, Yan Zhen's hair was already streaked with grey. During the day, he plotted and planned with inhuman confidence. At night, he always wondered if he'd made the right move.

Unwittingly, when he recalled the sky platform atop Jiulu Mountain and the stick that'd been hurled by the wind, the weariness in his heart increased tenfold.

With the Demon Lord's whereabouts unclear, the shadow demons ran rampant. No one was able to bring them to heel. The treaty of the great sects was broken, the Xuan Sect had taken a devastating blow, and the Dacheng Sect's attitude was unclear. In the court, Zou Yanlai was watching him, Zhang Zhixian was watching him, all of the civil and military officials were watching him, the emperor was watching him, and the citizens of Puqing were watching him.

At the moment, the court appeared to have the upper hand, but Yan Zhen knew that in reality, he'd already lost by a single move. The court had been building its armies for a thousand days, yet they were near evenly matched by the Redscarf Army's "lowly rabble." It was nothing to be proud of; that was number one.

Number two, though he'd known of Shi Wuduan's activities in Haining and known that his reach was long, he couldn't have imagined that it extended so far that he was able to influence the northwest's grain market.

Shi Wuduan seemed to have an astonishing sixth sense when it came to money, making calculations so fine that they accounted for every tael of silver, knowing how to acquire money, how to spend money, and how to obtain what he wanted without wasting a single coin.