Volume Two: Blood on the Bodhi Tree Chapter Thirteen: The Archfiend

Chapter Twelve: The Great Demon

"Murderer!"

At those words, an uproar broke out among the crowd. Seeing this, Captain Zhao stepped up to Xiao Yan and said, "So then, Xiao Yan, do you plead guilty?"

"Are you an idiot?" Xiao Yan merely lifted his head a little and glanced at Zhao once. "You can't even make the most basic judgment, and you call yourself a constable?"

But his eyes did not linger on Zhao for long. He soon lowered his head again and went on carefully cleaning the wound on the dog.

He looked utterly unconcerned about offending the constable standing before him.

And yet Xiao Yan had once faced the great northern relief efforts without flinching, not even before the Ten Great Families. How could he possibly be afraid of a petty constable?

At this, Zhao's expression changed at once. But with She Qianqian present, he forced himself to stay calm and said in a deep voice, "Come back to the magistrate's office with me."

"Old Wu left here alive," She Qianqian said coldly. Then she turned to the old woman. "Isn't that right?"

"Th-this..." The old woman frowned, suddenly unable to speak. After thinking for quite a while, as if trying to sort through her thoughts, she said, "But after he was treated here, he went home and died! At the time, that rogue monk was pressing all over my son's chest. I knew he must have used some evil trick!"

"In my view, it was definitely that rogue monk using some sinister art, and only after he went home did he die! Captain Zhao, you must uphold justice for us..." someone shouted after hearing this.

By then, Xiao Yan had finally finished dealing with the dog's wound. He stood up and said, "Ha, sinister art! With imaginations like yours, why not go write a novel? ... Hah, I'm a little sleepy. I'm going back to sleep. All of you, stop making noise."

With that, Xiao Yan turned and walked toward the house.

"You can't go!" The old woman rushed forward and grabbed his sleeve. "No one who killed my son is allowed to leave!"

"You... and..." The old woman pointed at Xiao Yan, then at She Qianqian and the daughter-in-law. "And you two! Even if I have to drag you there myself today, I'm taking you all to see the magistrate. If Captain Zhao won't do it, then I will!"

"Mrs. Wu, please don't be upset. I will certainly give you an explanation," Zhao said, stepping forward to smooth things over. Then he waved a hand to the constables behind him. "Arrest Xiao Yan! Take him first to the dungeon and await the county magistrate's interrogation."

"Yes!"

Several constables immediately came forward.

"Nobody move!" She Qianqian drew the butcher knife from her body with a swish and said coldly, "Come any closer, and you die."

Seeing this, the constables stopped in their tracks and exchanged glances before looking toward Captain Zhao.

In truth, She Qianqian did have some backing in Bai Cao Town. First, her master was Bian Yiqin, the teacher of the imperial physician serving the emperor himself. Second, She Qianqian was of the Northern Li Family, and such a great clan was not one that a small town like Bai Cao could afford to offend.

"Sigh... you're going too far," Xiao Yan said with a frown. He gently pulled the old woman's hand away and said calmly, "Mrs. Wu, let me ask you something. Last night, besides coming to us, did you also go to those so-called immortals?"

"This... and what if I did?" The old woman grew uneasy at once, clearly thinking of certain possibilities. Even her tone had lost some of its confidence.

"So what? Are you saying you're going to doubt the immortals?" said a woman who had come along, stepping forward to speak.

As soon as she said that, others came forward too.

"How could the immortals hurt anyone? They're all people with divine arts!"

"Exactly! That rogue monk! You can't just say such things!"

"..."

"Ha... then let's sort this out properly. I'll speak, and you just listen," Xiao Yan said without a trace of anger, smiling faintly the whole time.

"Hmph!" The old woman snorted coldly, but perhaps because she felt somewhat guilty, she did not object.

The crowd also waited in confusion for Xiao Yan to continue.

"First, Mrs. Wu, you and your daughter-in-law came here for treatment. Did you give us any money? Did we ever prescribe any medicine for you?" Xiao Yan asked the old woman with a faint smile.

"This... no..." The old woman frowned. She felt somewhat at fault in her heart, yet her face still held an angry expression.

"Then how can you say you came to our clinic for treatment? At most, we merely examined your son. We never truly treated him, so your claim that we 'treated him to death'... hehe... is nothing but nonsense," Xiao Yan said, shaking his head as he looked quietly at the old woman.

"But it was definitely you!" The old woman's voice had clearly grown much smaller by then, as if she no longer knew how to refute him.

"In fact, after that, you took your son to those immortals, didn't you? You handed over all your deeds and land titles to them, didn't you? Yet you never gave our clinic even a single coin... So why is it that now, after your son has died, you come here to settle accounts with us? Your logic is truly impressive," Xiao Yan said, the smile fading from his face.

"You... how..." The old woman's voice had become much weaker.

"It has nothing to do with me!"

At that moment, Xiao Yan suddenly cut her off and shouted.

"So you're saying your son's death has nothing to do with me?"

His sudden outburst turned every face in the crowd deathly pale.

The old woman herself was so frightened that she staggered back a step. "You..."

"I'm no good person! Don't come looking for trouble with me!" Xiao Yan swept his gaze across the crowd, letting it finally rest on Captain Zhao. "Without evidence, don't act like an idiot!"

At this, Zhao's face flushed red with anger. He wanted to shout back, but could not think of a way to refute him.

"All right, disperse," Xiao Yan said, shaking his head and yawning. "Hah, I'm going back to sleep..."

As Xiao Yan passed through the courtyard, he saw a figure constantly brandishing a long sword.

With every strike, the figure recited a line of poetry.

Xiao Yan smiled faintly and shook his head, muttering under his breath, "So even Li Bai likes to show off like that..."

...

Captain Zhao came out with a dark look on his face. He had originally wanted to invite She Qianqian to a poetry gathering, but she refused him as well.

After thinking it over, he blamed everything on that monk named Xiao Yan.

He would have to report the matter to the county magistrate when he returned. Xiao Yan was clearly taking aim at the immortals.

That was something the county magistrate could not accept. So Xiao Yan had to die.

If the power of the government could not be used, then perhaps only the heroes of the martial world could help. The county magistrate had many martial experts under him, and the immortals' side also had their own masters.

By then, it would be enough to make the scene look like a feud among the martial world. After all, this was not the first time such a thing had been done.

Thinking of this, Zhao's mood improved somewhat. As he passed through the town square, he saw a sea of people and many martial artists gathered together, seemingly inflamed with passion and discussing something in heated voices.

Curious, Zhao walked over, only to find that these martial experts were not locals. However, he recognized several of them. They were all first-rate experts from the north, and all of them were members of the Ten Great Families of the north.

Zhao frowned, feeling puzzled. He remembered that the county magistrate had only recently mentioned famine in the north. By rights, it should not have been resolved so quickly, and these martial artists should not have been here either.

"That great demon! He is hated by gods and men alike! The north is already suffering famine and food shortages, and yet that rogue monk still wants to waste grain! Today, I, Huang He, call upon all the heroes here to surely rid the people of this scourge! My thanks to all of you."

The speaker was Huang He, of the Northern Huang Family.

After Huang Long was killed by Yue Badao, Huang He had taken over as the head of the family.

At this, Zhao became interested. After all, the Huang Family was a major clan. In terms of wealth or martial standing, the whole of Bai Cao Town together probably could not compare to even one finger of the Huang Family.

If he could make acquaintance with the Huang Family, that would be splendid.

But a rogue monk? A great demon?

Could it be that another demon of extraordinary martial power had appeared in the north, one so formidable that it required the intervention of the Ten Great Families?