Chapter 5 The Sparrow Ghost

The Jiuling Tower was as tall as a hill, with thousands of stone steps winding upwards. At the top of it, a copper statue of a colossal bird flying could be vaguely seen. That was the place where the imperial family of the state of Zhao held the memorial ceremony as well as the shrine for the annual great sacrifice to heaven. The bottom of the Jiuling Tower was surrounded by eight huge copper furnaces, one of which had already got flames in it. The turbulent flames were spurting heat waves with sparks scattered around. Even if Ning Qinshui’s corpse was covered with a sheet of white cloth, the rotten flesh and decayed bones could still be seen. Song Ce glanced at the young man and the young girl behind him. The young girl frowned, which indicated that she must feel extremely painful; the young man who dared to talk wildly just now must drop the absurd thought when he saw the scene. However, after carefully observing Ning Changjiu for a while, Song Ce still couldn’t see much emotion on his face. Oh, he must be pretending to be calm. Song Ce just wanted to say a few words when Ning Changjiu walked over and bowed slightly to the corpse out of respect. Ning Xiaoling looked at him nervously and forced herself to follow up. With her eyes closed, she bowed to the old chap she resented very much reluctantly. Song Ce folded his hands in front of his belly, with his sleeves drooping. Currently, wars and battles often broke out between the state of Zhao and the state of Jin. People were plunged into misery and suffering for a long time, so he didn’t have sympathy for these two young people. All he wanted to do was to send them away as soon as possible. While he was lost in thought, Ning Changjiu had arrived in front of him and said, “Let’s go.” Song Ce heaved a sigh of relief, thinking that this young man finally gave up. Of course, he wouldn’t scorn the young man. Instead, he only said, “Someone will send you away later.” Ning Changjiu shook his head. “Lord Song, I mean, let’s go to the junior general’s mansion.” Song Ce was greatly startled. “What did you say?” Ning Changjiu said, “It was uneasy last night. Something happened in the junior general’s mansion. The victim should be the son of General Wang Yangyu.” “Who told you that?” Song Ce asked. Ning Changjiu replied, “By deduction and calculation.” Song Ce did not speak but the way he looked at the young man in front of him was changed. “Interesting.” Ning Changjiu met his gaze quietly. After a while, Song Ce took a deep breath and said in a deep voice, “Follow me.” ... The servants were waiting outside the junior general’s mansion while several guards stood aside, putting their hands against their swords and knitting their brows, who seemed a bit frightened. “Since the death of General Wang Yangyu, the junior general placed many statues of Buddha at home. Today, the junior general burned joss sticks as usual. After he bowed three times, his head thudded on the ground and didn’t rise. The maid felt something was wrong so she went over there to check on him. Then she smelled the smell of blood... His throat was cut open and his chest was not seriously injured but it was bleeding massively. The blood seeped through his clothes and showed the vague shape of a weird bird.” “Sparrow ghost?” “Yes! This is the fifth victim. All the victims had the blood sign in their chests, including the Taoist priest hired for exorcism.” “Has such a thing happened before?” “No.” “What happened 20 days ago?” With an unhappy expression, Song Ce looked at the good-looking young man. “Lad, you may have learned some skills from your master, but no one can save you if you are too opinionated.” While they were speaking, Song Ce had already led him across the threshold and walked towards the junior general’s mansion. Ning Xiaoling followed behind them with her head lowered, not daring to interrupt. As they went across the gate, there came the smell of blood instantly. The dark and thick blood plasma wiggled like a long snake. At the end of the plasma, before the stately golden statue of Buddha, a strapping and yet dead young man knelt down motionlessly. Looking from behind, the skin of his neck was rotten like being scalded by boiling water. Covering her mouth and nose, Ning Xiaoling couldn’t help but take two steps backward. Ning Changjiu walked up to him, squatted down and tore off the clothes on his chest without changing his countenance. The weird bird pattern was made up of countless small red spots, which seemed to have been pricked by thousands of needles. After observing it for a while, Ning Changjiu looked at Song Ce’s frowning face and asked, “Lord Song, what on earth happened 20 days ago?” Song Ce also flew into a rage. “Taoist priests only need to exorcise evils. Just do your job if you can; if you can’t, just let the others do it. Why so many questions?” Ning Changjiu said, “If the sparrow ghost is not subdued, there will be more deaths. However, if we can find the cause of the problem, this will be much easier to handle.” Song Ce glanced at him and wanted to flare up but in the end, he still sighed, “Go back. Supposedly, the reclusive cultivator will arrive at the imperial palace in a few days. By then, the problem will be resolved.” Ning Changjiu asked, “What if you are the next victim tomorrow?” Ning Xiaoling was startled and looked at her fellow disciple in horror, wondering how dare he talk like this in the imperial palace? Song Ce glared at him and asked, “You are so concerned about this matter. What do you want?” Ning Changjiu didn’t answer him. The somewhat tense atmosphere was broken by the voice outside the door. “Here comes His Majesty!” Song Ce’s expression changed slightly, and the other accompanying officials had gone out to receive His Majesty. From the luxurious chariot at the door, a man dressed in a bright yellow outfit came down. He was young indeed, but the way he acted had expressly shown his majestic bearing of an emperor. He stood at the door, gestured for the officials and guards to rise, and then looked at the hall from a distance. Bending over, the guard next to him was saying something to him. The young emperor was listening to him with vague sadness on his face. Then he said a few words generously, probably expressing his compliment for the father and his son’s merits as well as regret for their current mysterious death. Then, he lifted the front of his outfit and wanted to cross the threshold. In a hurry, the officials around him quickly dissuaded him, all of whom looked sad. They said that although His Majesty was an imperial descendent, now the state of Zhao was in a critical condition. Therefore, His Majesty should protect himself well. How could he risk his life? The young emperor finally stopped due to the officials’ dissuasion. While talking, the young emperor was slightly annoyed to vaguely see the young man and the young girl standing in the hall, but as the latter were dressed in the Taoist robe, he didn’t hit the ceiling. With a sad look, he enjoined the surrounding officials to take care of the matter and then finally returned to the imperial palace by chariot as if he was relieved. Ning Xiaoling looked away indifferently and said in a low voice, “So hypocritical... This is the emperor of a state?” Ning Changjiu smiled and asked, “If you were the emperor, would you come in?” Ning Xiaoling whispered, “How can a woman become an emperor?” The young emperor returned to the palace and the officials also left. When Song Ce came back and saw the two young people standing still as before, he got even more displeased. The emperor had just arrived but they didn’t go out to greet on bended knees. It was lucky that the emperor didn’t blame them. Now, what were they doing here? He couldn’t be bothered to pester the pretentiously sophisticated young man so he said to the guards around him, “Send for a coroner to carry out an autopsy and then arrange someone to send these two Taoist priests out of the imperial city.” Ning Changjiu didn’t seem to hear him. He still stood there, but his gaze settled deep in the hall. “Who is there?” Ning Changjiu asked. Deep in the hall, an old voice came with a bit of surprise. “Lad, you have a keen eye. Who is your master?” Deep in the dim hall, a wooden crutch with deep wood grain tapped the ground lightly. Then, along the wooden crutch, a figure was taking shape like sand agglomerating. Gradually, a stooping old man appeared, but there was mist between him and the other people so his real face couldn’t be clearly seen. Ning Changjiu looked at him quietly without answering. Song Ce was startled and then put on a stern face, saying seemingly out of respect and humbleness, “Lord Wizard Patriarch, why are you out of the closed-door training?” The old man referred to as the Wizard Patriarch smiled with a hoarse voice. “I’m tired of reading so I’ve gone out for a walk.” Song Ce had vaguely heard of what book he was reading, so his facial expression became more respectful. “Congratulations, My Lord. You must be one step away from being immortal.” The old man waved his hand and looked at the corpse kneeling in front of the statue of Buddha rather than give any reply. The old man slowly raised his hand and the surrounding air seemed to stagnate with his movements. Song Ce seemed assured and said with a smile, “Now that Lord Wizard Patriarch is out of the training, how can the evil hide itself?” As the sleeves of the old man’s robe bulged, the figure across the mist started to shake. From the grey robe sleeve, a finger as dry as the burnt wood reached slowly out of the mist and pointed at the corpse. No one spoke anymore. They were all holding their breath. Ning Changjiu’s expression changed slightly. Before the old man’s finger reached the corpse, an extremely unpleasant burning smell suddenly came over. Then, someone screamed, and suddenly an unknown fire broke out under the corpse. No one knew where the flame came from. It just spread around within an instant and covered the whole corpse. The next moment, the flame seemed to burn from the hell and a creepy chill rippled here and there. Along with the flames, the mysterious Wizard Patriarch surprisingly withdrew his hand. Behind the mist, he held his breath and said seemingly in anger, “Blood Feather?” After he uttered the two words, the mist faded like the sand blown away by the wind and he himself also disappeared. On the cliff north of the imperial city, an ancient towering tower stood in the gray and white forest with withered trunks. The ancient copper high platform, pulled by several huge iron chains, was buried deep in the lifeless forest. Under the huge disk that looked like an altar, an ancient tower-like spire protruded, where light could hardly cover. Down along the ancient tower, every window was so dark black that no light could be let in. Within the ancient tower connected to the altar, a gray-haired old man sat cross-legged. His forehead was very narrow, but his chin was wide and sharp. The color of his skin resembled the deadwood in the forest. His pupils hidden under his wrinkled eyelids were like the eyes of a dead fish in the muddy water. The old man’s thin torso was wrapped in the snow-white linen clothes. It was dark all around, except a beam of light shed through the spire in the middle that happened to fall on his stooping spine. Snap. The old man suddenly opened his eyes, and the ancient scroll in his hand was folded. “It has staged a comeback... And it did at the moment. How dare it!” He rubbed the jagged and shattered pages. It was hard to tell whether he looked happy or sad. Yet, the pages were like the flames that had licked his fingers. It was somewhat hot. ... The wizard patriarch who was supposed to be in the closed-door training appeared mysteriously and then disappeared silently, leaving a charred corpse on the ground only. The people finally came to their senses after being astonished. Thinking of the two words that the wizard patriarch said before disappearing, they grew even more frightened and then started to whisper. Ning Xiaoling asked in a low voice, “What is…Blood Feather?” Ning Changjiu said, “It is the legendary evil sparrow. Legend has it that the red falcon in the mountains was stained with the blood of Rosefinch God and thus turned into an evil-god hybrid. As a very powerful creature, it hides in the mortal world and rarely shows itself. There are very few records of it.” Ning Xiaoling’s eyes widened. She had a lot of questions but she did not continue talking. Song Ce stood aside, and the hands in his official robe couldn’t help but tremble. He rolled his eyes with a changed countenance, muttering in a low voice, “Blood Feather? How come… Isn’t it her?” Ning Changjiu asked, “Who is she?” Song Ce was a little crazy and ignored the question. The man next to him heaved a long sigh and said, “She is...” Just before he could continue speaking, another voice came from outside the palace, interrupting what he was going to say next. A young man in black knelt at the door, with a look of horror in his expression. “Her Highness... Her Highness has arrived!” In the autumn drizzle, before the palace gate of the junior general’s mansion, the dense umbrella ribs supported the dark red old umbrella cover, wide open.