Note: My friend said the square brackets [ ] broke the immersion of reading, so now I’m going to use the superscript “a” like this^a to denote a sentence I’m not sure about. For informational notes, I’m still using numerical superscripts like before

yo guys i’m on a rolllll and my schoolwork is sufferinggg

——

San Lang looked at him for a moment, and then smiled. “I’m going to leave for a bit.”

He said this rather casually, and then turned around and left. Xie Lian probably should have chased after him to ask what the matter was, but he had a strange feeling that the young man really would return in a short while. So Xie Lian went back inside the temple himself.

The stuff in the bag of rubbish that Xie Lian had gotten yesterday in the town streets was scattered all over the place. He fished around, and his left hand found a cooking pot, while his right found a kitchen knife. He looked at the fruit and vegetables on the shrine table, and stood up.

After a length of time that would have been needed to burn a stick of incense, footsteps could be heard outside of the Pu Ji Temple. They were slow and steady, and brought to mind the casual and unruffled appearance of the young man.

At this time, the fruit and vegetables that Xie Lian had been holding had turned into two plates full of food. He looked over his work, heaved a deep sigh, and, as he didn’t want to do this any longer, put down his equipment and went outside to meet the approaching figure, who was indeed San Lang.

The young man stood outside the temple. Perhaps he’d been in the sun for too long, for he had taken off his red coat and tied it around his waist, leaving only a light white shirt on his torso with the sleeves rolled up. All in all, he looked very tidy and clean. His left foot was stepping on a long wooden plank board, while his right hand held a machete, which he’d probably gotten from one of the villagers. The machete looked hefty, though San Lang held it casually, and looked especially sharp too. He looked like he was carving and skinning the wooden plank board^a. Seeing Xie Lian come out of the temple, he said, “I’m making something.”

Xie Lian walked over to see that he was making a door. It was exactly the right size, neat and rather beautiful. The cuts were perfectly sleek and smooth, the craftsmanship skillfully done. Because the young man had seemed like the sort that has never done a day’s work in his life, Xie Lian was quite surprised at how good it was. “You’ve worked hard,” he said to San Lang.

San Lang laughed. He tossed the machete away and picked up the newly made door, knocking it a few times. “Since you’re going to put charms on the entrance, wouldn’t it be better to put it on a solid door?”

Then, he nonchalantly pulled aside the curtain and went inside.

It seemed that the mass of security spells on the door had not even a drop of effect on San Lang, and San Lang hadn’t cared at all from the start what they were.

Xie Lian picked up the door and installed it on the temple. He couldn’t help opening it, closing it, opening it, and then closing it again, marveling at how well it was made. Opening and closing the door a few more times, he realized he was being a bit stupid. San Lang had already sat down inside the temple. Xie Lian threw the door close and, on the shrine table, he placed a plate of mantou that the villagers had given as an offering to the temple earlier that day.

San Lang simply looked at the mantou and then started laughing out loud, as though he’d seen through something. Xie Lian pretended as though nothing had happened and poured a couple bowls of water, preparing to sit down, when he saw a small tattoo of a Chinese character on San Lang’s bare arm. San Lang noticed his gaze, and pulled down his sleeve, and said with a smile, “I got it when I was young.”

As he’d pulled down his sleeve to cover it, it probably meant San Lang didn’t want to talk about it. Xie Lian understood. He sat down and took another look at the painted portrait on the shrine table. “San Lang, you draw really well. Did you have a teacher?”

San Lang used his chopsticks to poke at a mantou a couple of times. “No teacher. Drawing for myself gives me pleasure.”

Xie Lian said, “You even know how to draw the heavenly image of the Crown Prince of Xian Le.”

San Lang smiled. “Didn’t you say I know about everything? Of course I know how to draw him.”

It was quite a shamelessly cheeky answer, though his attitude was frank and didn’t at all seem to intend any offense or suspicion. San Lang seemed quite comfortable getting asked these questions. Xie Lian decided not to keep prying.

Suddenly, there came a ruckus outside the temple. Both of them raised their heads, meeting each other’s eyes.

Someone rapidly knocked on their door. “Great Immortal! There’s a problem! Please help!”

Xie Lian threw the door open to see a crowd in surrounding the shack. The leader of the group, upon seeing him, exulted, “Great Immortal! This person is dying! Please help!”

Hearing that a person was nearly dying, Xie Lian rushed out to see what was happening. Only to find the villagers surrounding a young Taoist follower with messy hair and a dirty face, his entire body covered in yellow sand and dirt, wearing ripped clothes and tattered shoes. It looked as though he had been running around like this for days and had spent the last bit of energy crawling here before finally passing out.

Xie Lian said, “Don’t worry, he’s not dead.” He stooped down to the body and poked around the body. After a while, he found that this young Taoist follower was carrying rather unusual things on his body, like a Bagua¹ and an iron sword, and some kind of instrument. This was not a Taoist follower of the regular kind. Xie Lian fell in deep thought.

In a short while, the young Taoist follower gained consciousness, and said in a scratchy voice, “…Where is this place?”

A villager said, “This is Pu Ji Village!”

The young Taoist said, “…… Finally, finally, I’ve finally escaped.…”

Then he looked around everywhere, and suddenly widened his eyes. He said in an alarmed voice, “Help, help! I need help!”

Xie Lian had anticipated this sort of behaviour. He said, “My fellow Taoist friend, please calm down. What’s wrong? Who is it you want to save, why do you need help? Please explain clearly.”

The villagers piped up as well. “That’s right, don’t be scared! We’ve got a real heavenly official here! He’ll surely help you settle whatever you need to!”

Xie Lian, “???”

The villagers hadn’t even seen what sort of powers he had, and they were already talking about him as if he were a real deity. Xie Lian didn’t know what to say, and thought, “I can try to help settle things but I don’t dare guarantee absolute results like that.” He asked the Taoist follower, “Where did you come from?”

“I… I’m from Ban Yue Guan!²”

The villagers looked at each other. “Ban Yue Guan?” “Where’s that?” “I’ve never heard of it!”

Xie Lian said, “Ban Yue Guan is in the northwest region of China. It’s very very far. How did you get here?”

“I… I got here with great difficulty.”

He spoke unclearly, and was obviously in an unstable state of mind. In these circumstances, the more people there were crowding around, the harder it was to speak, as the cacophony of chattering everywhere made it difficult to hear and be heard. Xie Lian said, “Let’s talk inside.”

He supported the fellow up and brought him to the temple. Xie Lian then turned around to say to the villagers, “Please go home, everyone. No need to stay.”

The villagers, however, were a bit too enthusiastic. “Great Immortal, what’s the matter with him?” “Yeah, what’s the matter?” “If there’s any problems all of us can help!”

The more enthusiastic they were, the less help they could bring. So Xie Lian, unable to do anything else, lowered his voice and said, “This… could be some sort of demonic possession.”

The villagers were alarmed. It would be terrible to be possessed! It was probably not a good idea to stay, eh, let’s all go back home, come on, he’s probably in good hands. Xie Lian tried not to laugh, and closed the door. San Lang was still sitting by the shrine table, twirling his chopsticks in his hand. He lifted his eyes to look at the Taoist follower, staring quite intensely. Xie Lian said, “Don’t worry about it, continue eating.”

He sat the Taoist follower down and stayed standing himself. “My fellow Taoist, I’m the keeper of this temple, and I’m also a follower of Tao. Don’t be nervous. If you have something you need to say, please say it. If there’s something you need help with, I’ll do my best with my humble abilities. Just now, you were talking about Ban Yue Guan – what’s going on there?”

The Taoist follower exhaled. As he was now free from a crowd, and was listening to a mild, placating voice, the fellow finally calmed down. “Have you heard of Ban Yue Guan?”

Xie Lian replied, “I have. Ban Yue Guan is somewhere in an oasis in the central Gobi Desert. It’s quite beautiful at night under a half moon, and could be said to have gotten fame for having a most bright and beautiful landscape.”

The Taoist follower said, “Oasis? Beautiful landscape? That was a couple hundred years ago. Right now, a better name for Ban Yue Guan [Note: “Half Moon Guan”] should be Half Dead Guan!”³

Xie Lian was stumped, and stared blankly. “Why?”

The fellow went green in the face, frighteningly green. “Because no matter who or how many people pass there, at least half of them would disappear without a trace. Is that not half dead?”

He’d never heard of this. Xie Lian said, “Who’d you hear this from?”

“I didn’t hear this from anyone. I saw this myself!” He sat up and said, “There was a caravan that needed to pass the place. They knew it was evil, and so they hired our entire fleet of cultivators to escort and protect them. Only…” He was briefly overcome with indignation and grief. “Only, after the one trip, I’m the only one left!”

Xie Lian raised a hand to ask him to sit down again, to calm down. He said, “How many of you were there?”

“Our entire fleet, including those in the caravan, numbered around sixty!”

Around sixty people. The demon Xuan Ji had a victim count that was fewer than two hundred in a hundred years, as Ling Wen had tallied during the post-investigation. According to this fellow, this situation had been persisting for over a hundred years, and if every time there were this many people disappearing, then it was a major catastrophe. Xie Lian asked, “When did Half Moon Guan start becoming this Half Dead Guan?”

“Around a hundred fifty years ago. It was only after the place became a demon territory.”

Xie Lian continued to ask carefully about the details of their trip and this “demon territory”, but throughout the discussion, he felt that something wasn’t right. He couldn’t quite conceal his misgivings, and so as they continued talking, he raised an eyebrow^a.

At this point, San Lang interrupted with a single question.

“You ran all the way over here from Ban Yue Guan?”

The fellow said, “Yes! Ah! I narrowly escaped death.”

San Lang said, “Mm,” and said nothing more. However, with just that one question, Xie Lian realized what was wrong.

He turned around and asked, “Running all the way over here, you must be quite thirsty.”

The fellow looked startled. Xie Lian had already placed a bowl of water in front of him, and said, “There’s water here, my fellow Taoist friend, drink some.”

Staring at this bowl of water, the fellow had a look of happiness⁴ that flit by his face for split second. Xie Lian waited by the side, his hands in his sleeves.

Since he’d run all the way from the northwest in a panicked flurry, he should be famished and parched. Judging by his appearance, he didn’t seem like he had time to rest and take a drink of water anywhere.

However, since waking up, this fellow had talked quite a bit and hadn’t made a single request for a sip of water. Since entering the temple, he hadn’t given a single glance at the food and water on the shrine table either.

He didn’t seem like a living person.

 

 

1 – The Bagua or Pa Kua are eight symbols used in Taoist cosmology to represent the fundamental principles of reality, seen as a range of eight interrelated concepts. Each consists of three lines, each line either “broken” or “unbroken”, respectively representing yin or yang. Due to their tripartite structure, they are often referred to as “trigrams” in English. (Wikipedia)

2 – translates to “half moon barrier” 半月关

3 – it’s punny. Also, he actually said “半命关” which is actually “half life guan” but “半命” sounds so much more ominous in Chinese than it does the literal English counterpart “half-life”

4 – wtf i’m confused too but let’s find out next on dragonball Z, tgcf edition

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