Late Night Tales Of The Capital

Chapter 146 Ailing Mansion, Re-birth of the Divine Sect
Beneath Luoyang City.

The vegetable sellers had stopped shouting, and the teenagers who were returning from their spring hike stopped fooling around. The armed escorts and merchant caravans stopped moving, and even the vapor in the air seemed to have condensed at this very moment.

“His Majesty has passed away?”

The simple words carried a deeper meaning. The implications for this current dynasty were nearly destructive in nature.

Ye Que looked surprised, while Lei Tianyou looked more shocked. The other young disciples were still stunned. Red Bean, on the other hand, had not really reacted.

“Mr. Ye, Mr. Ye,” Chen Chenchen of Broken King Gorge shouted as he walked up to Ye Que. There was no reaction from Ye Que, as if he was already lost in his thoughts.

After a long while, Ye Que eventually replied Chen Chenchen, “What’s the matter?”

“How old is his Majesty?”

“He was over 50,” Ye Que replied after thinking for a while.

“The Tang Dynasty was formed in war, and the emperors it produced were usually martial artists. Some of them already possessed a high cultivation base, and have longer lives than ordinary people. If he died just after 50 years of age, he’ll be considered to have died an early death,” Chen Chenchen analyzed softly.

“Could there be some hidden agenda here!” A young disciple guessed.

“Don’t make any conclusions of your own. We’re in Luoyang now, and the walls have ears here.” Lei Tianyou glared at the disciple behind him. He did not look too at ease himself, however.

They had already said parting words just now. Ye Que remained deep in thought for a while longer beneath the castle walls before leading Red Bean into the city. At this moment, the checks at the city gates had become much strict in nature. People who entered or were leaving the city had to undergo a set of extremely complicated procedures, and the baggage they were carrying needed to be checked over. The merchant caravans transiting through the city underwent even more thorough checks; each carriage had to be searched a few times.

The soldiers in charge of the checks had obviously been replaced; they were not the usual city guards.

In the blink of an eye, long queues appeared before the 18 entry and exit gates of Luoyang City.

No one cursed, made a commotion or resisted. Even a fool could tell the severity of today’s incident. The Emperor had passed away suddenly, and he had not made any arrangements. It would be logical even for the city gates to be shut, and all entry and exit in and out of Luoyang stopped, much less strict checks to be held.

An air or nervousness engulfed the entire Luoyang City.

Qian Shuxiao had processed an identity card for Ye Que before, while he was in Luoyang City. He had also been registered in the Judicature, which governed the practitioners in the city. As such, he could easily be identified.

It took one entire hour before Ye Que could walk past the city gates into Luoyang. The soldier manning the post did not speak when checking his identity, but he looked somewhat wary. Ye Que was still thinking about the Emperor’s death and did not realize this.

“History continues to be rewritten!”

Ye Que let out a pensive sigh. “In the world that he used to live in, the Emperor could not have died at such a time; he would at least have a dozen years left to live. From this, I can deduce that Li Chunyu’s father, our Emperor, must have been perfectly healthy. Some external force must have hastened his death.”

“It might even be an assassination.”

“Could this have something to do with the devils’ invasion?” Ye Que continued to ponder as he frowned. “Could devil spawn already have infiltrated the royal palace? Impossible! The Tang palace has a set of extremely procedures in check and is protected by countless practitioners. Devils will not be able to enter as and when they wish, much less get near to His Majesty. If they could, the Tang Dynasty would have been destroyed a hundred times over.”

He stood within the city and turned back to look at the white streamers covering the city walls.

They glinted under the sunlight, but they gave off a strange, mournful aura.

“Seems like I have to plan for certain things earlier than I thought now.”

The aura of nervousness gradually dissipated as he walked further into the city. Countless numbers of emperors had passed away in the Divine Capital, which stood for millennia, before. Rulers died and empires fell, but Luoyang itself remained intact. Its citizens had experienced all sorts of big events. Even though the death of an emperor was big news, and much blood could possibly be shed next, it did not have anything to do with these common folk.

Life had to continue on.

Money still had to be earned.

Meals still had to be taken on time.

Places which were meant to be vibrant would still remain so. The gambling houses would not shut its doors, the brothels would not turn customers away, and liquor stores would not sell their products at half price. Even the academies and lecture halls would continue to function as before. The only exception would be the royal relatives, important officials and influential nobles; most likely they would have immediately acted. In which direction would Luoyang head next, and who would hold power?

The afternoon ticked slowly by in such a conflicted environment of calm, nervousness, vibrancy and suppression.

Ye Que walked somewhat aimlessly through the streets.

He walked along Xuanwu Street until Yong’an Street, before turning eastward. Red Bean did not know where they were heading, and Ye Que did not even bother to look where he was heading.

When Ye Que recollected himself and lifted his head, he realized that he had walked up to the tall doors of a huge yard. This was his destination when he entered Luoyang in his previous life, and he had come back to the same place in his youth, when he arrived by carriage. Now, he found himself back at the same spot after wandering aimlessly.

The General’s Manor!

The first thing Ye Que saw was the familiar yet foreign huge signboard. He shifted his gaze downward and noticed that the red gate was filled with dust. As he observed closely, he noticed that the bronze handles of the gates had even rusted a little. The red doors themselves were shut tightly.

This was the General’s Manor!

It should have been swept and cleaned everyday by people. How could its gates end up in such a rundown condition? He had only left Luoyang for just a while!

“Could it be that news of Ye Yunhai joining the Devils has already reached Luoyang?”

“Or have the deaths of all Ye Army soldiers left the General’s Residence with no backup?”

“Or, has Ye Zhengru’s death led his residence to exit history’s performance stage and left this huge manor with no Master?”

Ye Que stood silently in front of the General’s Manor. He did not speak a word and looked calm, but he was feeling extremely emotional within! “No matter hold cold-blooded, distant the old man who used to reside in this manor was, he could be considered as having given his all for your Li family empire. He served the Tang Dynasty till his very last breath.”

“Do you have to trample on his estate after his death?”

Wild thoughts surged in his mind before quickly dying down.

“What status do I have to reminisce about the past? How many know that I’m Ye Zhengru’s son, and how many people know my true identity? Most importantly, whoever cared for the pitiful woman that lived in the countryside of Wei City?”

No one!

Perhaps, this was karma.

After standing silently there for a while, Ye Que turned to head west, without any further thought for the General’s Manor. At the very least, he did not look sad or emotional at the very least, as if the decline of the Ye Estate had nothing to do with him at all.

Ye Que walked with his arms crossed behind his back.

Red Bean followed closely behind.

“Was that your home?” Red Bean asked suddenly.

Ye Que did not speak, as if he had not heard her.

“You mentioned the General’s Manor in the stories you told me before. It should be that manor we were just at, right?” Red Bean asked curiously. “You don’t have to deny that. I know just by looking at you; it must be.”

“However, it doesn’t look like how you’ve described it. There seems to be something wrong; there’s no one inside. I tried to sense for any signs of life, but there’s no one within the manor, none at all,” Red Bean said.

“I told you before that the General’s Manor isn’t my home. My home is in Wei City. It just happens that an old man with some connection to me stays there. It doesn’t matter anymore, and he’s dead,” Ye Que said very calmly.

“You’re not telling the truth,” Red Bean replied.

“I’m not lying, at the very least,” Ye Que said.

“You know, those are two different concepts.”

“I don’t know!”

They went back and forth as they walked along Yong’an Street. The sky was cloudless, and the sunlight was abundant. However, the trees lining the street had shed all of their leaves in anticipation of winter, and the grass along the pavement had already turned yellow and decayed. Even the small river that circled around the city had begun to freeze. One could not see any fish by looking within them. There were no sparrows chirping, and even though there were people teeming around, there was smoke from fires being lit everywhere.

They walked along Yong’an Street past the Bridge of Long Life. After walking further, two rows of doors appeared in front of them.

From their decor, one could tell that they belonged to the same owner.

It was not quite right to call them shops, however. They did not sell anything, and there was no place for one to pay for any kind of service here. This was because they belonged to a seminary.

The Divine Sect Seminary.

It was said that some people came to cause trouble on the opening day of the seminary. They blocked the path leading into the Sect, but in reality these people helped to generate publicity for the Divine Sect. At least half of the residents of Luoyang City came to know that a Divine Sect Seminary had been set up on Yong’an Street and that it was teaching methods of cultivation to people for free.

These were not “body strengthening exercises” meant to fool civilians.

They were cultivation techniques that could really turn one into a “Taoist Immortal” of legend.

In everyone’s minds, it was something far more powerful than the martial arts manuals of Jianghu sects.

At first, not many people believed this to be true. “After all, was it not true that only young prodigies with great talent could begin cultivation?”

“How could ordinary civilians like us, who are just waiters, errand boys, stall owners, hawkers, blacksmiths, farmers, female singers, students, etc., begin cultivation?”

“Are they joking?”

A few curious people would want to find out for themselves anyway.

Which gambler did not enter a gambling parlor with hopes of winning money? Even though they knew that the dealer always wins, they were gambling on that one lucky chance.

The first batch of people who began heading to the Divine Sect Seminary was of the same line of thought. It was free anyway, and they just had to spend some time there. They thought that most likely this was just a gimmick, but what if it was true? They were talking about legendary cultivation methods? If they were lucky and successfully mastered those techniques, wouldn’t they become “Taoist Immortals”?

They could turn stone to gold, ride the clouds and behead their enemies from hundreds of kilometers away…

They felt excited even by thinking about it!

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