The night passed and the watch changed twice without incident. The three boys broke camp at dawn, and continued on their way.

For most of the morning it was more of the same story from yesterday: walking through the forest, deviating from their course, getting their bearings, and continuing. Shortly before noon however, they finally broke out of the trees and arrived on the side of the road to Zaotong.

Now that they had found the road, they were sure that all they needed to do was follow it and they would reach their destination.

Even on the road, the canopy still blocked much of the light, so that they seemed to travel through a perpetual twilight.

This part of the forest was old. The tallest trees were so wide it would take ten men to link hands in order to encircle the bases. There was very little undergrowth, because of the lack of light reaching the forest floor. Ji Kang could see small woodland creatures scurrying about their business, though none came close to the road.

The road itself was little more than a cleared dirt track through the forest, with ditches on both sides for water drainage but he was left with the distinct impression that there was something stopping this road from being taken over by the forest. There was an invisible border, on one side the wild forest, on the other the man made road.

The sparse carpet of grass stopped dead at the edge of the ditches and although the forest was dotted with bushes and saplings, none came within ten steps of the ditches. The same went for the older trees.

Ji Kang suspected there was an agreement in place with the local spirits, he couldn’t imagine such an enormous landscaping effort to have been made by the local villages and towns. But he saw no shrines or any signs of them.

Walking down the road, all three of the boys were wishing they had a higher cultivation. As Qi Condensation cultivators they were unable to maintain their movement techniques for extended periods. The best they could achieve would be the time it took to burn a joss stick, and afterwards they would be exhausted.

If they were Foundation Establishment they would be able to maintain the pace of a fast run all day. In that case they could finish this three day leg of the trip in just one day.

They occasionally saw other travelers on the road, almost all of them going the other direction, although they did get overtaken by two riders who were also heading to Zaotong.

When it came time to stop for the second night, they hadn’t seen a stream recently so they set up camp beside the road. They took the same watches as last night, and it was equally uneventful.

It was only on the third day since leaving the sect that they heard the first signs of trouble.

Late in the afternoon they saw a farmer driving an empty wagon pulled by an ox coming down the road towards them. When they came alongside the wagon, Yu Shuren struck up a conversation with the woman.

“Good day madam, do you happen to know if this is the way to Zaotong?”

They had passed several forks in the road by this point and they weren’t all sure they had taken the correct path every time.

The farmer looked the three boys over with a curious gaze. It wasn’t uncommon to see martial artists traveling the roads, but usually they weren’t quite so young.

“This is the road to follow to get to Zaotong alright, you’ll get there before nightfall if you keep walking.” She answered.

“Thank you.” Yu Shuren cupped his fists and turned away to keep walking.

“I already told you that. There is no other road this could be, I was guiding our route the whole time.” Lu Wu grumped, displeased at this lack of trust in his navigation.

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“Of course, Young Master. I would never doubt your abilities.” Yu Shuren flattered, but he and Ji Kang were both still happy to have confirmation from a local that they were where they thought they were.

“You three from the Azure Grove Sect?” Their conversation was interrupted by an unexpected question from the farmer, they stopped walking and turned back.

They had expected her to drive off after answering their question, but she hadn’t given any sign of continuing on her way yet.

“That’s right madam, is there something we can help you with?” Ji Kang was the one to speak this time.

“Not as such, but seeing as you’re from Azure Grove I thought I’d warn you, there’s some rough folks who’ve been staying in Zaotong for about a month now, martial types. They said they were soldiers for hire, but they seemed only a step removed from bandits if you know what I mean. They’ve been getting rowdy recently, I heard they even harassed the innkeeper's daughter.” The woman said conspiratorially, leaning in despite not being close enough to whisper.

“Is that so? Thank you for the warning, madam. We’ll be on our guard.” Ji Kang cupped his fists and bowed.

The farmer seemed pleased with herself for having told them, and got her ox moving once again. Ji Kang, Yu Shuren, and Lu Wu watched her pull away from them before continuing down the road.

“What should we do about them?” Ji Kang asked the other two once they were some distance from the woman.

“Do about who? Oh, you mean those ‘martial types’ that the peasant woman was talking about? I don’t see that we need to do anything as of now. She’s obviously the town gossip. If they were cultivators, they wouldn't be going around harassing the local young women. And if they aren’t cultivators then we have nothing to worry about, we can handle some disgruntled former soldiers easily enough should they make trouble.” Lu Wu dismissed the woman’s news with a wave of his hand.

Ji Kang didn’t agree, but there was no point saying so. He caught Yu Shuren’s eye behind Lu Wu’s back. Yu Shuren shrugged, then tapped a finger below his eye; the two of them would just have to be extra vigilant.

As they got closer to the edge of the forest, the enormous trees grew sparser, replaced by smaller and smaller trees, eventually giving way to a cleared strip of land surrounding a small town.

Stepping out from under the overbearing canopy, it became clear that it was early evening. For the past day they had had trouble determining what time it was at any given moment, they could finally see the sun again.

The riverside town of Zaotong stretched out before them. The road they were currently on met up with a road following the river at the center of the town. Zaotong hugged the three arms extending from that junction like moss growing on a tree, with a multitude of lesser roads and alleys having been worn into the ground between the buildings by the press of generations of feet.

There was a small pier reaching out into the river, with a large boat already docked at it. That would probably be their ride out of this town, assuming Jin Xun, the relative of the senior sending the letter, was already in Zaotong.

If Jin Xun wasn’t here yet though, Ji Kang was worried the ship might leave without them and they would have to wait for the next ship going downriver.

“So where is he?” Lu Wu suddenly asked, breaking the silence that had lasted for the previous hour.

“What?”

“Who?”

Yu Shuren and Ji Kang asked simultaneously.

“Jin Xun, obviously. The elder’s relative we’re supposed to meet here? Where is he?” Lu Wu gestured widely while shrugging.

“Hmm, we could check at an inn? That seems like a good place to start looking for him.” Ji Kang suggested.

The other two agreed that was a likely place to find Jin Xun if he was already here and a good place to wait for him if he wasn’t, so they made their way to the town square.

Ji Kang walked towards the front door of the only inn in the square, as he got close he suddenly had an odd feeling. He had never felt something like this before, it was as if a bell was hanging from the base of his skull and someone had walked up and rung it.

He froze in front of the door to decipher this novel feeling.

Bang!

A body was flung out through the door and bowled Ji Kang over. Whoever the body belonged to showed no sign of getting up, laying mostly still and acting as a groaning, limp weight on top of Ji Kang. Ji Kang thrashed around until he got out from under the groaning person who had been thrown at him, and was in the process of disentangling his sheathed sword from the saber tied to the other man’s back when he heard a sinister laugh.

“Hehehe! Do you think we, the Tiger Ridge Gang are nothing? Do you treat my words as air? When I say it’s time for you to leave Zaotong, you should thank me for my magnanimity in allowing you to leave at all!” A burly man in an open sleeveless shirt loomed in the broken doorway of the inn, looking down at Ji Kang and the human projectile.