The Jianghu of Feng Qingcheng and Mo Xibei

Chapter 74

"Don't mention snakes to me." Mo Xibei couldn't help but feel nauseous again. She eats everything, but she just won't eat snakes, cats, civets, or anything like that. Snakes, in particular, are a different story. If you ask her why, she can't explain it. She just won't eat them. Not only can't she eat them, but the thought of them makes her feel terrified and uncomfortable all over.

Volume Two: The Wind Leaves a Mark, Chapter Twenty-One: The Treasure (Part Two)

"Truly a pampered princess, so easily swayed by snake meat. If you were to eat human flesh, who knows what kind of commotion you'd cause." Mo Xibei had just recovered from her nausea when a cold voice came from behind her. Though sarcastic, the familiar feeling struck her deeply. She turned around almost immediately. In the moonlight, a man stood not far away, his silver mask gleaming with its metallic sheen, hands clasped behind his back, exuding an air of elegance. "Fei Nan?" Mo Xibei exclaimed with delight, but as she moved her feet, Mu Fei Nan took two steps back first.

"I have disturbed Your Highness's conversation with the Minister, and I am truly guilty of a grave offense. Therefore, please allow me to take my leave." Mu Feinan did not even glance at Mo Xibei's surprise or even sadness. He simply bowed exaggeratedly as he spoke, then turned and left without looking back.

"How could he be here?" Mo Xibei remained silent for a long time before finding her voice. Her joy turned to deep disappointment. For a moment, she thought she would burst into tears, but she held them back by not blinking. She knew that being a princess would change many things, but she never expected that Mu Feinan would not even give her a chance to explain.

“He came with the factory supervisor, but he hasn’t shown up these past few days. I thought you knew he was here.” Chu Junfeng only glanced at Mu Feinan before keeping an eye on Mo Xibei’s reaction. Seeing the tears welling up in Mo Xibei’s eyes and his somber expression, he felt a sharp, aching pain in his heart. He quietly withdrew his hand that had been supporting Mo Xibei and answered in a way that sounded as indifferent as possible.

"Really? I understand." Mo Xibei nodded and strode back to her tent, where the food was still laid out. But she had no appetite. She spent the night alone, pondering the situation. Many times, Mo Xibei had already left her tent, wanting to find Mu Feinan and get to the bottom of things, but all around was silent. Everyone was asleep. She then realized that she didn't know where Mu Feinan slept; she couldn't possibly go into each tent to check.

The next morning, Huang Jin personally brought breakfast. It was a bowl of congee, two cold-dressed wild vegetables, several steamed buns, and a plate of thinly sliced cured meat. The refreshing taste of the wild vegetables quickly overshadowed the unpleasant memory of the snake meat from the previous night. After a simple meal, Huang Jin said that he wanted to ask Mo Xibei to go to the entrance of the treasure to check the terrain and situation.

Chen Youliang had clearly put a lot of effort into building his treasure trove. Mo Xibei followed Huang Jin to the edge of the cliff. There they saw many Imperial Guards busy preparing ropes, each as thick as a baby's forearm and several dozen feet long. One end was secured to rocks and trees, with several guards protecting it. The other end was already knotted. The knot was flexible, allowing the rope loop to be adjusted.

"The entrance to the treasure is halfway up the cliff. Your Highness will have to tie a rope around your waist and descend little by little." Huang Jin pointed, instructing his men to strengthen the defenses around the area, while he told a member of the Imperial Guard and Mo Xibei to each put a rope around their waists, adjust the size, and prepare to descend the cliff.

"Is there no other way to go?" Mo Xibei glanced down the cliff. The river was rushing and powerful. Not to mention going down the cliff here, just looking at it for a while would make one feel dizzy, as if one might plunge into the water at any moment.

"As shown on the map, there is only one road. Your Highness, rest assured, this rope is sturdy, and Lord Chu and Young Master Mu are personally leading men to guard it. There is absolutely no chance of anything going wrong," Huang Jin explained.

Mo Xibei then followed Huang Jin's finger and saw Mu Feinan standing on a big tree. His silver mask shone brightly in the sunlight. Although she tried to look at him, she couldn't make out his face clearly under the metallic sheen.

"Your Highness, let's go down and take a look." Huang Jin didn't wait for Mo Xibei to look again, and had already signaled the Imperial Guard to go down the cliff first to clear the way. Half a cup of tea later, the copper bell tied to the rope jingled. Huang Jin smiled and said to Mo Xibei, "It's all safe down there. Please follow this old servant, Your Highness."

The rope around his waist was slowly lowered by the many Imperial Guards. Mo Xibei had also learned this rock climbing skill, which his master called the Gecko Wall Climbing Skill. Without rope, climbing up and down cliffs of several tens of feet was commonplace. However, Mo Xibei's transmigration had brought him a fear of heights. Although he had learned this skill, he would always feel weak in the hands and feet when practicing at a height of two or three feet. Therefore, in actual application, he was inevitably flustered.

Huang Jin had already gone down, and quite a bit of the rope had been lowered. Chu Junfeng stood beside Mo Xibei with a smile, encouraging him, "Don't worry, just walk like you normally would on a mountain path. Lower your body, grab the rope, and walk slowly backward. They won't lower it too quickly; everything will be based on your pace."

Mo Xibei tried to act nonchalant, but his palms were sweating, and after taking two steps, he couldn't help but stop and catch his breath.

“Your Highness, if you’re so afraid to go down, you might as well not go down at all. It’s just a bunch of rocks anyway, what’s so interesting about it? Besides, there are bound to be snakes in the crevices of the cliff. If you’re scared and slip and fall, you’ll endanger everyone.” Mu Feinan had already jumped down from the tree at some point and stood next to Mo Xibei, still speaking in a mocking tone and a nonchalant manner.

“If you don’t speak, no one will think you’re mute.” Mo Xibei glared at him fiercely, feeling resentful. Following Chu Junfeng’s instructions, he gripped the rope tightly, quickly retreated to the edge of the cliff, took a deep breath, and slowly descended the cliff.

"Since you're so worried, why provoke her like this?" Chu Junfeng glanced at Mu Feinan, watching her gaze follow Mo Xibei down without even breaking a sweat, and couldn't help but sneer repeatedly.

"She chose this path herself, so she has to face the consequences. I just don't want to see her make a fool of herself because she's too timid." Mu Feinan snorted coldly, turned around, leaped up a big tree, and continued to look around.

At the entrance to the treasure land, halfway up the cliff, Mo Xibei had been coming down for quite some time before she saw Huang Jin beckoning her through a narrow, rocky cave entrance that was only wide enough for one person to squeeze through. Adjusting her position, she slid through little by little until she reached the cave entrance and stepped onto solid ground, feeling a sense of relief.

The space inside the stone cave was not large, about the size of an ordinary room. However, after taking just one step, he felt as if he had stepped on something. The Jinyiwei guards who had arrived earlier had already lit torches. Mo Xibei took the torches and looked at his feet, almost jumping up in surprise.

It was a white bone, and judging from its length, it should be a human thigh bone. Inside the cave, such bones were a stark white expanse, and they had obviously been roughly cleaned up, piled up on both sides of the room.

"Why are there all these here?" Mo Xibei asked Huang Jin.

"I don't know, but it looks like they've been dead for at least a hundred years. There are dozens of skeletons. We found them when we first came down a few days ago and cleared them all aside." Huang Jin said casually, "Chen Youliang's treasure is hidden here. People have to dig caves and move things. I guess these people were either the ones who came to find the treasure later or the ones who moved the treasure back then. They were killed here to prevent the secret from being leaked."

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Volume Two: The Wind Leaves a Mark, Chapter Twenty-One: The Treasure (Part Three)

"No matter how they died, it was all for this treasure, which may or may not even exist. It just goes to show the old saying that people die for wealth and birds die for food." Mo Xibei lit his feet with a torch and tried his best not to touch the bones.

“We have carefully examined the cave and believe that the entrance to the treasure is very likely here.” Huang Jin pointed to the inside of the cave. Mo Xibei walked over, and at this moment, the Jinyiwei who had arrived earlier had lit two other torches and held them up to shine the light over.

It was an uneven stone wall, seemingly no different from the one Mo Xibei had just climbed outside. Touching it, one could even feel slippery moss on it. However, following Huang Jin's directions, Mo Xibei quickly discovered the problem: although the entire stone wall felt the same as the outside, there was a very thin crack in the lower right corner.

In fact, it is not unusual for a stone to have a crack. However, after touching it a few times, Mo Xibei discovered that the crack was about the same width as the blade of a knife, thin on one side and thick on the other. He felt the edge of the crack with his fingers and found that it even had a blood groove reserved for the blade.

"Have you tried it?" Mo Xibei looked up and saw Huang Jin looking very nervous.

"I tried it, and the knife went in just right, but nothing else worked," Huang Jin sighed. "Otherwise, I wouldn't have dared to trouble the princess to travel all this way here."

"But I think, if human blood is the key to unlocking the mechanism, then there's no difference between all blood. Have you tried it?" Mo Xibei inwardly scoffed at the idea that the noblest blood was the key. Blood has always been divided into four types, with further subdivisions like Rh-negative. He had never heard of a distinction between noble and lowly blood. Besides, even the most sophisticated modern instruments can only identify whether blood contains pathogenic factors; he had never heard of ancient stones being able to distinguish whether a person's blood was that of an emperor or a commoner.

"Legend has it that this treasure contains the Imperial Seal of the State. The records also specifically state that the process of opening the treasure must not involve the slightest mistake, otherwise the treasure may be buried deep in the mountains forever. We are here on the Emperor's orders, so how could we dare to try anything recklessly?" Huang Jin shook his head, speaking solemnly.

"Oh, that makes sense. But what if my blood doesn't work either, and the treasure remains unopened forever?" Mo Xibei immediately realized the seriousness of the problem. If his blood couldn't open the treasure, wouldn't he have to bear a heavy burden of guilt?

"Well... Your Highness is the Emperor's own flesh and blood. In the whole world, only you share the exact same blood as the Emperor, so there certainly won't be any problem." Huang Jin seemed to have considered this possibility as well, but only chuckled twice. He firmly insisted that there wouldn't be any issue.

"So when do you plan to officially open the treasure?" Mo Xibei asked Huang Jin while considering the possibility of escaping.

"Tomorrow and the day after are both auspicious days. We'll go up in a bit. Your Highness, please choose one of these days," Huang Jin replied, leading Mo Xibei to the cave entrance. After retying the rope, he rang the bell and was the first to climb up.

Beside him, the Imperial Guards were busy extinguishing the torches and asked Mo Xibei to climb up second. The stone cave, now dark and eerily cold, was filled with the extinguished torches. Mo Xibei quickly rang the bell on his rope and then climbed up the cliff using both his hands and feet.

The date was set for the day after tomorrow, but Mo Xibei had no confidence in opening the treasure and decided to postpone it for a day to see how things went.

Dinner was similar to yesterday's, but the stew was changed to pheasant stew with mushrooms. There are many mushrooms in the mountains, some poisonous and some edible. The extra dish didn't add much to the meal, but the preparation work was quite extensive.

"Bring Mu Feinan over here. I have questions for him." With a knife to her neck, Mo Xibei still ate heartily. Only after she finished eating did she give the order to a Jinyiwei guard at the door. She had figured it out. This identity was just a formality. Since Mu Feinan was hiding, she would find him just as easily.

Half an hour later, someone lifted the curtain and slipped in. Seeing Mo Xibei standing in the middle of the tent, he simply bowed and asked in a calm voice, "Princess, please come down. What are your orders?"

"Mu Feinan, do you have to talk to me like this to feel better?" Mo Xibei was annoyed. He lifted his foot and stood opposite Mu Feinan, glaring angrily at the expressionless metal mask.

"What is my status, and what is the princess's status? Apart from that, I really don't know how to speak to Her Highness." Mu Feinan snorted, swayed, and took two steps back.

"A person's identity is predetermined at birth and cannot be chosen. Why do you keep using this to fob me off? Let me tell you, I am Mo Xibei. If you keep making me angry, I'll beat you up." Mo Xibei was even angrier. She had come to him with a lot to say, but the person in front of her acted as if she were a contagious disease or at least a poison. She wished she could stay as far away as possible. So, she was decisive. Before she could finish speaking, she suddenly lunged forward and grabbed Mu Feinan by the collar.

"If I were you, I would let go." Despite being grabbed by the collar, Mu Feinan remained as indifferent as ever. "In a real fight, do you think I'm afraid of you? If you want to beat me, you'd better ask yourself if you have the strength to last that long." With that, he reached out to grab Mo Xibei's wrist.

Mu Feinan's hands were very cold, icy cold. When he grabbed Mo Xibei's hand that was clutching his collar, he used a lot of force, as if he wanted to crush Mo Xibei's hand bones into powder.