Chapter 163: Master Wei

By sheer luck, Fu Yangquan managed to slip from Zheng Zhuxi’s grasp. Before the watchtower could react, he fled the prefectural city and ran straight into the depths of a dense forest.

Suddenly, a figure appeared before him.

The figure wore a cyan robe and a cloth cap, hands clasped behind their back. His back was facing him.

"Master Wei." Fu Yangquan stopped in his tracks and bowed with a look of dread.

The cyan-robed figure did not turn around, and asked in an icy tone, "Do you have an explanation?"

Fu Yangquan’s expression changed immediately, a vicious malice flickering across it before he composed himself back into his amiable, full-faced appearance. He said in a cowed voice, "I have failed you. My identity was exposed by my junior brother, Liang Qian, and I am no longer able to maintain a foothold in Dingjiang Prefecture. I cannot complete the task you entrusted to me."

The cyan-robed figure slowly turned his head, revealing a face that was somewhat sharp and serpentine. The features were otherwise unremarkable, but in the center of the forehead sat a horizontal eye that flickered with an eerie light, as though concealing something terrifying. Much of the skin below the neck was covered in serpent-like scales.

"How was your identity exposed by Liang Qian?" The cyan-robed figure addressed as Master Wei spoke slowly.

Fu Yangquan could no longer restrain himself. His true face surfaced, filled with venom and hatred.

"That Liang Qian coveted my assets and actually brought people from the Brightnight Sect to investigate me. He forced me to expose myself."

Ding Songyan, playing the role of Master Wei, raised an eyebrow.

A Two-Faced can still lie even in dreams, deliberately distorting the truth...

Besides, this is no ordinary dream. It’s a genuine dreamscape with the mental defenses stripped away...

Amazing!

Perhaps Fu Yangquan genuinely sees nothing wrong with trying to harm Liang Qian. Isn’t it only natural for a Two-Faced to engage in vicious and underhanded schemes? You turning on me just makes you the wicked and despicable one, unworthy of being called human.

Right, so that’s the nature of the Two-Faced. They never believe themselves to be in the wrong. It’s always someone else’s fault, and they hold to that conviction even in dreams...

Interesting. First time I’ve encountered a genuine dreamscape that won’t yield a complete confession. Good thing I have a fallback...

Ding Songyan laughed.

"Where are your assets?"

Fu Yangquan paused.

"I-in the Heavenly Capital, with my wife and children."

The Heavenly Capital was the capital of the Gan Kingdom, standing apart from Qian Province and administered by Chaotian Prefecture.

"And how would Liang Qian go about taking your assets?" Ding Songyan’s voice dropped.

Fu Yangquan’s vicious and cunning face showed a trace of resentment and fear, cold sweat beading densely across his forehead.

"He would slip away to the Heavenly Capital, find a way to get close to my wife, use the special nature of our art to ingratiate himself with her and persuade her to remarry. Then he would cause the deaths of my poor children and grandchildren, and finally kill my wife as well."

That’s your own plan for going after Liang Qian’s assets, isn’t it? Ding Songyan wasn’t quite dumbfounded, but the Two-Faced’s cruelty gave him a small shock all the same.

Truly not human!

Ding Songyan’s expression grew solemn as he asked, "Do you still remember what I sent you to Dingjiang Prefecture to do?"

"I remember, I remember. To establish a foothold here, to recruit a few associates in corners where the Brightnight Sect cannot reach. One day in the future, someone would come to me. I was to give them my full assistance, cooperate with them, and obey their orders," Fu Yangquan said quickly.

Ding Songyan was just about to probe further for the identity and appearance of this person when he suddenly sensed a group of people approaching.

He withdrew his consciousness, opened his half-closed eyes, and took the opportunity of turning around to release the Great Dream of Three Thousand Years, returning to his normal state and concealing his physical anomalies.

Beside him, Zheng Zhuxi, who still had the last traces of candleflame and starlight fading from her eyes, turned to look toward the entrance.

She had just used the Candle-Star Pupils to look at Fu Yangquan, and had genuinely seen the second face—the vicious and ferocious one.

The arrivals were people from the county yamen, led by Marshal Yi Qincang.

"What happened here?" Yi Qincang looked at Fu Yangquan lying unconscious and gravely wounded.

"Two-Faced," Zheng Zhuxi sheathed her sword and spoke plainly.

Ding Songyan supplemented, "For the details, you can ask Elder Liang."

Yi Qincang listened to Liang Qian’s account while signaling to his subordinates to flip Fu Yangquan over, remove his Huayang Daoist cap, and undo his hair.

Fu Yangquan’s second face—twisted and equally pained—immediately came into view.

"So it really is a Two-Faced." Yi Qincang waved for Liang Qian to stop, and said gravely to Ding Songyan, "Leaving this kind of threat alive is trouble enough, and it’ll affect the people around him. Best to deliver a corpse to the Langhuan Bureau. Young man, I’d have to request you use your spirit channeling and get to the bottom of it."

Wh... Zheng Zhuxi was both taken aback and amused.

I deliberately left him alive specifically so I wouldn’t have to rely on Junior Brother’s spirit channeling, and now you’re the ones relying on it...

Ding Songyan suppressed the urge to tease his senior sister since that sort of thing could only be done in private.

Once the constables who had accompanied Yi Qincang killed Fu Yangquan on the spot, Ding Songyan, already prepared, looked at the trembling ghost and asked, "How did you become a Two-Faced?"

At the same time, through the Chaos Realm and Celestial Heart perception, Ding Songyan confirmed that with the Two-Faced’s death, the ghostly black miasma that could contaminate others had also dissipated and ceased to appear.

Fu Yangquan’s two faces alternated, one moment seething with hatred, the next wallowing in self-pity.

"Not long after I arrived in the Gan Kingdom, I befriended a man called Master Wei. After three months of doing work for him, I became a Two-Faced without realizing it.

"Afterward, he arranged for me to enter politics and smoothed my path to advancement. I suspect there are quite a few Two-Faced lurking in the Gan Kingdom’s imperial court."

Ding Songyan followed up by asking what Master Wei looked like, and Fu Yangquan’s description matched almost exactly the figure he had impersonated in the dream.

Both Zheng Zhuxi and Yi Qincang began searching their memories of the different versions of the Secret Classic of Mountains and Seas they had read, trying to identify which divine beast or monster corresponded to Master Wei’s physical anomalies.

Fu Yangquan’s account of his own mission matched what he had said in the dream closely enough, but Ding Songyan no longer needed to probe indirectly. He asked outright, "Who is the person you were waiting for?"

"I don’t know." Fu Yangquan shook his head. "Within a year, he would come looking for me at my junior brother’s place. As long as he could say the words ’Master Wei,’ I was to give him my full assistance."

A peripheral operative... Ding Songyan tried several other questions, but got no useful answers.

He turned to asking about the Two-Faced directly.

"How long does it take for a Two-Faced to contaminate someone and complete the conversion?"

"Depending on how resolute the target’s mind is, it normally takes three months to half a year. If the target is surrounded entirely by us Two-Faced, it only requires half a month or less.

"If I single out a specific person, I can briefly influence their mind within a quarter of an hour, but that won’t cause them to become a Two-Faced. It may even strengthen their ability to resist the Two-Faced’s erosion afterward."

A somewhat effective inoculation? Ding Songyan finally understood why Fu Yangquan had kept emitting that ghostly black miasma and attempting contamination even though he clearly couldn’t convert him, his senior sister, or Liang Qian in a short span of time.

"What is the maximum number of people you can erode at once?" Ding Songyan asked, switching the question.

These were questions that Zheng Zhuxi and the others cared about as well. For his part, Yi Qincang had a baffling conviction that a martial fanatic like Ding Songyan must have been sent by the Langhuan Bureau.

Fu Yangquan’s lingering soul grew increasingly fearful, his figure trembling.

"Anyone within about six meters of me can be eroded. But each conversion costs me five years of my lifespan."

Goes against the natural order, does it... So the Two-Faced’s contamination does have its limits... The Demon Seed method doesn’t consume lifespan, but it’s constrained by the quantity of power stored within the Demon Seed itself... Ding Songyan laughed.

"No wonder you’ve gone gray at the temples before sixty, despite having long reached the perfected Great Proliferation Realm.

"Apart from Master Wei, have you had contact with any other Two-Faced?"

"No." A puzzled expression crossed Fu Yangquan’s lingering soul. "The number of Two-Faced seems far smaller than I expected. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have failed to encounter even one. I can recognize them on sight."

That’s strange. Ever since the Two-Faced fled Mount Dique, they’ve been hiding in the shadows. Setting aside their own reproduction, their ability to convert others alone should be enough to expand their numbers steadily... Ding Songyan pressed on with more questions, puzzled.

But Fu Yangquan, as a converted Two-Faced who had only ever dealt with Master Wei, simply had no more information to offer.

Before long, the soul dissipated amidst a wail.

"What was that?" Yi Qincang, who could hear but not see, asked in confusion.

"Not sure." Ding Songyan shook his head with a look of perfect innocence. "It may be some defect in this kind of converted Two-Faced, or it may be that my spirit channeling works somewhat differently from others and inflicts a degree of harm on lingering souls. I haven’t met another person born with yin eyes. Uh, aside from the Jiguren Qu Zhongheng, so it’s hard to say."

"No matter." Yi Qincang, having gotten the information he wanted, offered reassurance instead.

Zheng Zhuxi watched from the side, her mouth slightly open.

If I didn’t know what had actually happened, I’d probably think he sounded perfectly sincere...

Everything he said was true, but only half of it, and it was delivered with the tone of uncertain speculation...

Still, it was a necessary concealment. We can’t let the imperial court learn Junior Brother’s secret after all...

"Which divine beast or monster’s lineage does Master Wei cultivate?" Ding Songyan asked his senior sister and Marshal Yi.

Every one he could think of was either not serpentine, or did not have a third eye.

"Nothing matches." Zheng Zhuxi slowly shook her head first, then said in thought, "Perhaps the physical anomalies are somewhat altered in a Two-Faced?"

Two-Faced... two faces... Prompted by his senior sister’s words, Ding Songyan had a sudden flash of insight. He looked at Zheng Zhuxi and Yi Qincang.

"If both faces have three eyes, wouldn’t that make six eyes in total?"

"Serpentine, six eyes..." Zheng Zhuxi’s eyes lit up. "I know what it is. The Suanyu!"

Suanyu: shaped like a serpent with four wings, six eyes, and three legs, and its cry is its own name. The result of consuming it? Quickens the heartbeat and draws blood, and its territory is filled with dread.

The Secret Classic of Mountains and Seas described more than one creature with six eyes, but among those that were also serpentine, only this one fit.

Yi Qincang gave a slight nod, speaking from memory.

"The Suanyu’s lineage is an unorthodox branch, but it’s not considered a top-end one. The art is called the Heart Demon Scripture."

"The ability to covertly erode others and convert them into fellow Two-Faced, combined with the Heart Demon Scripture?" Ding Songyan felt his scalp prickle.

That was absolutely a case of the whole is greater than the sum of the parts!

The Two-Faced had found the art most suited to them. The Suanyu may have only two traits, but the Heart Demon Scripture and the Two-Faced were an exceptional match!

"This needs to be reported to the Martial Prohibition Bureau at once." Yi Qincang had grasped the terrifying implications as well.

With a grave expression, he turned to Liang Qian.

"The matter of Fu Yangquan is not to be breathed to anyone.

"I’ll find someone who resembles Fu Yangquan to take up residence here. We’ll see whether waiting by the snare will pay off. Let’s see if we can draw out the person who was meant to come looking for Fu Yangquan’s help."

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