Mutated Tao

The ox-cart steadily moved forward as it creaked here and there.

Meanwhile, Li Huowang and the rest were slowly walking beside the ox-cart.

After placing their luggage onto the cart, they didn’t have a lot to carry and were thus much more relaxed.

All of these ox-carts were bought by Sun Baolu from a small town that they had just passed by. They still had to travel a long way, and so it was necessary to purchase these ox-carts.

However, Jin Shanzhao was still carrying his bamboo basket as he hummed. He felt much better being surrounded by the lush green grass.

Since such an environment couldn’t be seen in the central region of Hou Shu, Jin Shanzhao knew that they were close to the border.

At that moment, he opened his map and tried comparing it with their current location.

“Hmm… A few more days and we should be able to reach the border,” muttered Jin Shanzhao.

Once he finished checking the map, he stored it once again and clasped his hands together toward Li Huowang. “Young Daoist, we will be reaching the border soon. Congratulations. As long as you exit the border and enter Qing Qiu, you will be fine.”

Li Huowang was still busy reading the Liar’s Scripture. Hearing Jin Shanzhao’s words, he raised his head and nodded before continuing with his reading.

“Where are you planning to go? Will you travel with us to Qing Qiu and the Liang Kingdom?” asked Li Huowang.

“No, I will not be joining you on your journey. I will send you off to the border and return,” replied Jin Shanzhao.

“Return? Where to? Aren’t you afraid they will capture you?” asked Li Huowang.

Jin Shanzhao smiled confidently. “No worries. I have my methods of protecting myself.”

Hearing this, Li Huowang turned to look at him; he had a feeling that the man was just bluffing. Back then, Jin Shanzhao was scared shitless by the outlaw soldiers, but now, he was trying to put on a brave front.

They were both still chatting when they saw a village in the distance.

Once they got close, the group stopped outside while Jin Shanzhao and Li Huowang entered the village to buy some food.

Having just two people helped them avoid garnering unwanted attention, and Jin Shanzhao was good with his words. It made communicating with the villagers much easier.

Li Huowang had no intention of stopping here. They had decided to quickly buy the food and continued with their journey; they needed to escape Hou Shu as fast as possible. Even though it was tiring, they had no choice due to the outlaw soldiers that were looking for them.

Just as they had entered the village, Li Huowang caught the scent of something nasty. He followed the scent and saw a pig pen. The pen was built directly below the houses.

When he saw what the black pigs were eating, Li Huowang’s voice trembled, “Do they… feed the pigs that?”

Looking at these pigs and the pig pen, Li Huowang recalled the Benevolent Nunnery and Abbess Jingxin who had died within the pig pen.

“Hmm? And why would you say that? Isn’t this usually how you rear pigs? This is why I don’t eat pork and dog meat; both of them feast on feces,” said Jin Shanzhao.

Li Huowang suppressed his sadness and looked at Jin Shanzhao. “Wait, you mean to say that everyone else does the same thing to rear their pigs?”

“Naturally. This was how it has been for hundreds of years,” said Jin Shanzhao as he picked up a stone and wrote something onto the soft soil. He wrote the character for ‘home’. Even though he used a piece of rock, his handwriting was still quite neat and meticulous.

“Do you see this? The upper part of the character symbolizes the roof of the house, while the lower part of the character symbolizes pigs [1]. A roof over pigs makes the character for ‘home’. Hence, people have been feeding pigs with feces ever since ancient times. If we can read characters and decipher their components, we can see how culture and tradition have shaped them,” explained Jin Shanzhao.

Li Huowang squatted down slowly and stared at the character. After a while, he touched the character with tenderness in his eyes.

“So this is home… Looks like I might’ve misunderstood the Abbess,” muttered Li Huowang. His eyes started to water when he remembered all the help that the Benevolent Nunnery had given him.

Even if the entire world had gone mad, that was one of the only places where he had felt warmth. Now that place is no more.

“Young Daoist?” As Jin Shanzhao saw Li Huowang’s emotion become unstable, he took a step back.

After traveling together for so long, Jin Shanzhao had long since noticed that something was wrong with Li Huowang. Even though Li Huowang had many powers, his mind was… off.

Hearing the voice, Li Huowang buried the character for ‘home’ with some soil and stood up. Then, he once again turned to look at Jin Shanzhao, his gaze back to normal.

“Old man, your identity must be very special,” said Li Huowang.

A regular civilian would only recognize some words; most of them were even illiterate. Then how did Jin Shanzhao write with such a neat handwriting, even with a stone?

Jin Shanzhao stood there and considered his question.

“I’ve saved your life and you won’t even tell me this? No need then. Let’s go and find some villagers to buy some food,” said Li Huowang.

Just as Li Huowang took a few steps forward, Jin Shanzhao called for him, “It’s fine. I can just tell you. I am actually a follower of Zhong Heng Jia.”

“Zhong Heng Jia?” Li Huowang turned around slowly. He didn’t know what those words meant.

As Jin Shanzhao began to explain what it was, his voice became more and more spirited, “The nations divide themselves while trying to unify everyone. The weaker nations would ally with each other to defeat a stronger nation; that is Zhong. On the other hand, a strong nation would try to conquer everything; that is Heng. Hence this is Zhong Heng.”

As Jin Shanzhao explained, Li Huowang slowly understood what he meant. It was a special job that existed only during times when the nations were divided.

Jin Shanzhao’s job was related to intelligence—to act as a tactician beside a warlord or an emperor; to help his lord with strategies and insights, to unify the nations.

To Li Huowang, all he understood was that Jin Shanzhao worked as an intelligent man that helped his lord to unify the nations.

“To understand the bigger picture, analyze the situation, be good at communicating, able to adapt to any situation, and have both intelligence and bravery while making snap decisions. This is what it means to be a follower of Zhong Heng Jia,” explained Jin Shanzhao.

When Li Huowang saw how proud Jin Shanzhao was of his work, he interrupted the latter, “Since you are so great, then why did you not try to persuade that General from before?”

Hearing this question, Jin Shanzhao became sheepish. “Uh… I’m afraid that in this case the sword is mightier than the pen, especially since we were dealing with the outlaw soldiers of Hou Shu.”

“Hehe.” Hearing this, Li Huowang just chuckled and walked further into the village with Jin Shanzhao following him.

“Young Daoist, I know that you don’t believe me, but don’t worry. Once you leave the kingdom of Hou Shu, I will make sure to do my own job and stop them from obtaining your whereabouts through me. Since you’ve saved my life, I will definitely repay you. Once I become an officer of the kingdom of Hou Shu—”

“But you still don’t have a lord. Doesn’t that mean you are jobless?” interrupted Li Huowang.

“No worries. I will get a job soon. Once I become an officer, I will never forget your help,” assured Jin Shanzhao.

“Sure, let’s talk about it once you have a job. But I would probably be in the Liang Kingdom by then,” said Li Huowang.

As they continued to chat, the atmosphere around them was quite pleasant and everything was going fine. However, at that moment, Li Huowang suddenly grabbed his sword as if preparing for a fight.

“Young Daoist?” Jin Shanzhao followed Li Huowang’s gaze and saw several black jars, each of them plastered with a red sheet that had the upside down character for ‘prosperity’.

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