The Bamboo Shadow Enters the Cell
That faint sound kept drawing nearer.
At first it was like wind slipping across wet stone, so light it was nearly swallowed by the drip of water. Then it became something else—like the tip of a slender bamboo staff touching the ground and lifting away at once. It had none of the sodden heaviness of an ordinary guard's boots, and none of the slow, measured tread of the Crimson Flame Palace men in red robes.
Fang Yingjie held his breath.
Fang Tieshan was still slumped against his arm, his breathing so shallow it was terrifying. Li Ying's torment a short while ago had all but drawn the last ember out of him. If Fang Yingjie had not used the inner force he had honed over ten years in this underground prison to sustain him, the man in his arms would likely already have breathed his last.
Even so, Fang Tieshan was listening.
Those dim, sightless eyes turned ever so slightly toward the cell door. Years in an iron prison, years under torture, had honed his hearing until it was keener than that of ordinary men. The moment that faint sound rose from deep in the passage, he had already heard that something about it was different.
Not Li Ying's people.
Not an ordinary guard either.
Yet after that first light tread, two other sets of footsteps followed.
Those were much heavier. Boots struck the wet stones with the blunt coarseness common to dungeon guards. Fang Yingjie felt his heart tighten, and the hand with which he supported Fang Tieshan clenched despite himself.
Outside the iron door, they stopped.
One of the guards spoke, hesitation in his voice.
"Protector Li was only just here. I do not know why the Envoy has returned, or what further orders there may be?"
The man outside did not answer at once.
A moment later, under the dim yellow glow of the lamp, a dark red token slipped from his sleeve. It was not large. Black iron edged its rim, and in its center was carved a cluster of fine flame lines. The moment the two guards saw it, both lowered their heads.
The man's voice was hoarse and cold.
"Too many questions."
The words were not loud, yet they pressed down hard enough that neither guard dared speak again.
One of them hurriedly drew out a key and stepped forward to unlock the door. The key struck the iron ring with the usual clatter, but there was less of the habitual brutality in it than usual, less of that deliberate urge to humiliate. The other guard stood to one side with the lamp in hand, head bowed, not even daring to look up.
The bolt drew back.
The iron door opened.
A spill of yellow lamplight leaked in from outside.
That man entered first.
He wore the dark red robe of the Crimson Flame Palace. The color of the robe, the belt, the dark patterns at the cuffs, even the damp mud clinging to his boots, were almost indistinguishable from the red-robed men Fang Yingjie had seen for years. By clothing alone, he could only be taken for one of the Crimson Flame Palace's Punishment Hall.
The two guards followed him in, one with the lamp, the other standing by the door.
Instinctively, Fang Yingjie tightened his hold on Fang Tieshan.
In a voice so low it was almost soundless, Fang Tieshan said, "Do not move."
Fang Yingjie stilled at once.
The man in dark red did not come forward immediately after entering.
He stopped first and let his gaze sweep quickly across Fang Yingjie before it came to rest on Fang Tieshan. In that single glance, he seemed already to have taken in a great deal, yet his face betrayed nothing.
The guard by the door lowered his voice and asked, "Envoy, shall the two of us remain here and await further orders?"
At last the man in red turned his face slightly.
He did not look at the guard. He only said coldly, "Get out."
The guard froze.
The man's voice sank lower still.
"And what is to be discussed here—do you think the likes of you are fit to hear it?"
Both guards changed color. They bowed their heads in haste.
"Yes. Yes, sir. We take our leave."
The one holding the lamp hesitated, as though meaning to take it with him.
The man in red said coldly, "Leave the lamp."
The guard hurried to hang it on the iron hook beside the door, then both men withdrew.
The iron door was pulled shut behind them. But the bolt was only dropped halfway. From outside it would look locked fast; from within, a sliver of leeway remained.
The cell dimmed again.
Only then did Fang Yingjie truly see that although the man wore the dark red robe of the Crimson Flame Palace, everything about him was different from theirs.
Whenever the Crimson Flame Palace entered the cells, no matter how quiet their feet, there was always a cold oppression in their breath, like the back of a blade slowly laid against a man's neck. This man was different. He had drawn his presence in so deeply that he seemed no more than a length of bamboo shadow hidden in the night. He stood plainly before the door, yet looked as though he might slip off the edge of the lamplight at any moment.
He still did not speak.
Only after the footsteps of the two guards had retreated some distance outside did he let out the faintest breath and turn his eyes once more to Fang Tieshan.
And when he saw clearly the chains through Fang Tieshan's shoulders, the old wounds beneath his shoulder blades, and that face nearly dried hollow by years and torment, something in his eyes finally trembled.
Then he lowered his voice and asked, "May I ask... are you Dragoncloud Divine Hand Fang Tieshan, Great Hero Fang?"
Fang Tieshan did not answer.
His face remained slightly turned, those dim gray eyes empty and fixed toward the door. After a moment, he asked only, coldly, "Who are you?"
The man paused.
Then, in a lowered voice, he said, "This junior is Feng Feiyun."
He stopped for a breath, then added, "My Master is Feng Wuying."
Fang Yingjie's whole body jolted.
Feng Feiyun.
Those three words were like a stone hurled into the dead water that had lain unmoving in his heart for ten years.
Fang Tieshan still did not believe at once. He said coldly, "How does the disciple of Feng Wuying enter a place like this?"
In a low voice, Feng Feiyun answered, "By borrowing the skin of a Crimson Flame Palace man."
A trace of coldness tugged at Fang Tieshan's mouth.
"Skins can be borrowed. Names can be borrowed too."
Feng Feiyun's expression sharpened.
He did not grow angry, nor did he rush to defend himself. He said only, "It is right that Great Hero Fang should doubt me."
Then he said, "This junior did not come tonight to win Great Hero Fang's trust. I came only to confirm two things."
Fang Tieshan said coldly, "Which two?"
Feng Feiyun replied, "First, whether Great Hero Fang is still alive."
He paused, his gaze sweeping over the deathly cell before returning to Fang Yingjie.
"Second, what other person is imprisoned here besides Great Hero Fang, and what clues may be hidden in this place."
As he spoke, a flicker of uncertainty passed through his eyes.
Plainly, when he had entered just now, he had already seen Fang Yingjie seated beside Fang Tieshan, but he still did not know who this blood-soaked young man, with a grown man's frame, could possibly be.
Fang Yingjie could bear it no longer.
He looked at that face—far more mature now, yet still carrying a trace of the lively spirit it had once held. His throat moved. Then, hoarsely, he called out:
"Mad Monkey..."
Feng Feiyun went rigid.
In that instant, the caution on his face, the hard-won steadiness, the cold menace he had put on for disguise—all of it cracked.
Slowly, he turned to look at Fang Yingjie.
At first there was only wariness and doubt in his eyes.
This young man's face was pale; the blood on him had not yet dried. Ten years in the dungeon had ground his features into a quiet gravity, and his shoulders and back had long since broadened. Where was there any sign left of the sickly child who had once looked as though a hard gust of wind might blow him over?
But Mad Monkey was not a name that just anyone in this prison could have known.
Feng Feiyun stared at him for a very long time.
So long that heat rose into Fang Yingjie's eyes, and he almost thought he truly would not be recognized.
Then it was as though Feng Feiyun had been struck hard by something. His voice turned raw.
"You..."
He stepped half a pace closer, staring hard at Fang Yingjie's brows and eyes.
"Don't tell me... you're that little invalid?"
Fang Yingjie wanted to laugh.
But before the corner of his mouth had even lifted, tears had already fallen.
He nodded.
Feng Feiyun drew in a sharp breath.
"Fang Yingjie?"
In a low voice, Fang Yingjie said, "It's me."
Feng Feiyun stood staring at him blankly. Only after a long while did he mutter hoarsely, "That life of yours... it's hard as iron."
But when he finished, his own eyes had reddened as well.
"Ten years," he said.
"We searched for you for ten years."
For a moment the cell fell silent.
Fang Tieshan had not spoken once.
He sat in the darkness with those dim gray eyes open, still listening.
Listening to Feng Feiyun's breathing.
Listening to the tremor Fang Yingjie could not suppress when he had spoken the words Mad Monkey.
And listening to the old feeling that split open in the man's voice the instant he recognized little invalid.
After a moment, Fang Tieshan said quietly, "Yingjie."
Fang Yingjie turned at once.
"Father."
Fang Tieshan asked, "You know him?"
Fang Yingjie looked at Feng Feiyun. His eyes were still red, but he nodded with complete seriousness.
"I do."
His voice was hoarse.
"He's Feng Feiyun."
"When I left Mount Hua and went south all the way to the Four Seas Gang at Taihu, he was the one looking after me along the road."
"He never spared me with his tongue. He called me little invalid day in and day out. But whenever trouble came, he was always the first to stand in front of me."
At that, Fang Yingjie's eyes burned again.
"I won't mistake him."
Fang Tieshan fell silent for a while.
Feng Feiyun did not interrupt.
He knew that at this moment, nothing he could say would matter more than this one sentence from Fang Yingjie.
Only after a long while did Fang Tieshan say coldly, "You had better not."
The words were still cold.
But compared with before, a line had loosened.
Feng Feiyun lowered his head slightly and said, "Great Hero Fang's caution is only right."
Fang Tieshan said, "Speak of what matters."
Fang Yingjie's throat tightened.
There was so much he wanted to ask.
He wanted to ask what had become of Mount Hua.
He wanted to ask whether his mother had returned there over these years, whether she had still been searching for him.
He wanted to ask about Xuanyuan Xi, Xi Qian, Zheng Chong, and all the brothers of old—whether any of them still remembered him.
But all of those words rose only to lodge in his throat.
Some things Feng Feiyun might not know.
Some people might long since have left no news behind.
And there were names which, once spoken aloud, might meet with nothing but silence—and Fang Yingjie feared he would not be able to endure that.
By then, however, Feng Feiyun had already forced that momentary loss of control back down.
He tilted his head and listened toward the door, then said in a low voice, "We cannot stay here long."
Fang Yingjie's face changed.
"You can't take us out?"
Feng Feiyun looked at the chains piercing Fang Tieshan and his expression darkened.
"Not today."
Fang Yingjie felt a chill go through his heart.
At once Feng Feiyun said, "That does not mean I am not here to save you."
He lowered his voice further, speaking with great speed.
"The only reason I got in tonight was because I stole a gap. There are three layers of hidden watchposts outside, two rounds of guard changes, one water gate, and one concealed barrier. I have only traced half the way in. The way out is not fully settled yet."
Then he looked at Fang Tieshan.
"And the chains on Great Hero Fang—I cannot break them either."
Fang Tieshan did not contradict him.
Feng Feiyun went on, "More important still, Great Hero Fang is too badly hurt. If I drag him out by force, he will die before we are even clear of this passage."
At Fang Yingjie's side, the hand hanging at his waist slowly clenched.
Looking at him, Feng Feiyun lowered his voice a little more.
"Little invalid, I know you're in a hurry."
Heat surged into Fang Yingjie's eyes.
Feng Feiyun's own eyes were red, but he said no more on that. He only listened toward the door again, then spoke in an even lower tone.
"After that Tongshun Escort consignment was delivered into the wrong hands, we kept digging."
"It was only later that we realized many of the lines had already been cut from the shadows."
Fang Yingjie's gaze sharpened.
Tongshun Escort.
The mistaken delivery.
The false Fang Zhongyi.
The dusk and cold wind beneath Eaglebeak Ridge that night seemed to rise all at once from the bottom of his heart.
Feng Feiyun paused, then continued, "After that night, many lines were broken."
"Not openly."
"On the surface, everything was still there."
"Taihu was still Taihu. Biyue Manor was still Biyue Manor. The Jiangnan waterways still carried boats as they always had. But the people who truly touched the heart of it, the ones who had actually handled the old affair, the roads by which one could really keep tracing it onward—they all kept drawing back, layer after layer, in the dark."
As he said this, his eyes sank.
"Only after Master went back over everything again and again did he come to think the trouble most likely lay with that letter."
Fang Yingjie said nothing.
He knew which letter Feng Feiyun meant.
Back then, when Tongshun Escort was taking him and Xi Qian north, the letter that should have been delivered into Fang Zhongyi's hands had traveled with the escort. Later, the man posing as Fang Zhongyi deceived Tongshun Escort, took them away—and took the letter with them.
In a low voice, Feng Feiyun said, "That letter contained several lines we had pursued in those years."
"The Taihu water routes. The outer lines in Jiangnan. Biyue Manor. Even the shadow of suspicion around Prince Ning's estate was tied up in it."
"If the letter had fallen into an ordinary man's hands, he might not have understood it."
"But if it fell into Li Pu's hands, that was another matter."
At the name Li Pu, the temperature in Fang Tieshan's breathing seemed to drop.
Li Pu.
After more than twenty years, that name was still like an old needle that could slide straight into the seam between his bones.
Back then, the man had posed as Yuwen Wushe. Even Fang Tieshan himself had once been deceived by him. The lamplight at the inn that night, the rescue on the road—only when it all turned to blood in the end had he learned that he had misjudged the man from the very beginning.
Even he had mistaken Li Pu.
How much less could the men of Tongshun Escort have seen through him?
A low, cold laugh pressed out of Fang Tieshan's throat.
"Li Pu," he said.
"So it was him after all."
A flicker passed through Feng Feiyun's eyes.
"Great Hero Fang knows this man as well?"
Only after a moment did Fang Tieshan answer coldly, "I do."
"More than twenty years ago, I already fell into his hands."
For a moment, the cell grew stiller still.
Fang Yingjie's heart lurched.
"Father..."
But Fang Tieshan said nothing further.
He knew this was not the time to reopen old accounts. Li Pu, Li Ying, the Crimson Flame Palace—every one of those names was a venomous snake that had coiled around half his life. But what truly mattered now was not where the blade had first come from all those years ago. It was whether the son he had only just found again could still leave this place alive.
Feng Feiyun did not press him. He only continued in a lowered voice.
"Master said as well that the man who posed as Fang Zhongyi was most likely Li Pu."
"To copy a face, a build, a birthmark, a token, a wooden tally—even the pathways of saber-work and palm-force—to that degree... there are not many in the martial world who could do it."
"If it really was him, then he saw every line in that letter."
"In other words, from that moment on, he knew where our investigation had already reached, what we suspected, and how we meant to keep tracing it."
The cell turned deathly quiet.
Feng Feiyun said, "That is why the investigation was so difficult in the years that followed."
"It was not that there were no lines left. It was that every line looked as though someone had touched it in advance."
"Master dared not investigate openly. He could only leave me in Jiangnan to watch, bit by bit."
He let out a low breath.
"And once I began watching, I never dared leave again."
Fang Yingjie listened with a tightness in his chest.
In a low voice, Feng Feiyun said, "The place I watched most closely over these years was Biyue Manor."
Fang Yingjie's heart jolted.
Feng Feiyun continued, "At first I only felt there was something unclean about that place. Madam Wen is too good at dealing with people, too careful never to leave a trace. In public she was always the same gentle woman, speaking for others, smoothing over their troubles. Up and down the waterways, everyone called her a good woman. But some boats, some people, some lamps burning deep into the night—none of them sat right."
His voice sank lower still.
"Then over the last few years, I gradually discovered that every so often she would leave the Manor once."
"Each time she changed boats, changed attendants, changed docks. Sometimes she took the open waterways; sometimes she veered off into old hidden channels. She moved with extreme secrecy."
"I tailed her several times."
"But every time, halfway through, the trail broke. Either the boat vanished as though into air, or the people changed clothes, changed identities, and slipped away from another false dock. It was as though she knew from the start someone might be following, and every step of the road had been laid out to shed pursuit."
Fang Yingjie felt his fingers slowly tighten.
Feng Feiyun said, "Until this time, when she personally took an even deeper hidden route."
He paused.
"Following old water markers, traces of exchanged boats, and two false docks, I tracked her all the way here."
His eyes darkened.
"And only after reaching this place did I learn—"
"That the Madam Wen of Biyue Manor was Li Ying."
The cell went utterly silent.
It felt to Fang Yingjie as though something had slammed down on his chest. The lamps in the front court of Biyue Manor years ago, the bowl of porridge in the waterside pavilion, Madam Wen's gentle voice as she spoke—everything surged back in an instant, only to overlap with the cloying fragrance that had filled this dungeon moments ago.
In a low voice, Feng Feiyun said, "Before this, I knew only that something was wrong with her. I did not know who she truly was."
"She had hidden herself too deeply."
Fang Tieshan turned his face slightly, those dim gray eyes angled emptily toward Feng Feiyun.
"Does Feng Wuying know of this place?"
Feng Feiyun shook his head.
"Not yet."
Fang Yingjie's face changed.
"So I have to get out," Feng Feiyun said.
He looked straight at Fang Yingjie and spoke each word distinctly.
"Thirty days."
"Give me thirty days."
"Thirty days from now, there will be one major change of guard here."
"Food, water, and lamp oil are sent in every day. But the water-gate keys, the watchwords for the patrols, and the shifts of the hidden sentries are only changed together once every thirty days."
"That is the day things will be at their most chaotic—and the day there will be the greatest chance."
"I will return, report everything to Master, prepare what is needed to open the locks, cut the chains, and keep a man alive—and I will learn the retreat route clearly."
Then he turned to Fang Tieshan and bowed with solemn respect.
"In thirty days, this junior and my Master will come to fetch you both."
Fang Yingjie stared at him.
Thirty days.
Only thirty days.
And yet down in this place beneath the earth, thirty days could stretch as long as a lifetime.
He had only just found his father. That father's life hung by a thread. He had only just seen his mother's severed head; his spirit had not yet dragged itself back from that cry of "Mother." He had waited ten years before someone from the world above finally reached him.
And now that man was leaving again.
Unable to stop himself, Fang Yingjie asked, "What if you cannot come?"
Feng Feiyun did not answer at once.
The cell fell still.
But Fang Tieshan spoke first.
"Let him go."
Fang Yingjie whipped his head toward him.
Fang Tieshan lay against his arm, breathing weakly, yet his calm was terrible to behold.
"If he tries to take us out tonight, all three of us die here."
Feng Feiyun lowered his eyes and did not deny it.
Fang Tieshan said, "To get in once already means he walked the edge of death. Whether he can get in again will depend on his skill—and on Heaven's will."
He paused, and when he spoke again his voice was heavier.
"Do what must be done."
Fang Yingjie felt his throat tighten.
Feng Feiyun pulled a small paper packet from his breast and thrust it swiftly into Fang Yingjie's hand.
"This is Heart-Guard Powder," he said.
"There is not much. Use it sparingly. If Great Hero Fang's breathing will not hold through the night, take only a little—no more than would sit on a fingernail—and dissolve it in water."
Then he produced a narrow strip of black iron, thin as a sliver.
"Hide this well. You can scratch the wall with it, pry at a crack with it—whatever use may come."
Fang Yingjie closed his hand around both as though he would crush them into his palm.
Feng Feiyun looked at him once, then said quietly, "Stay alive."
Fang Yingjie's eyes had gone fiercely red.
Feng Feiyun looked once more at Fang Tieshan and cupped his fist in salute.
"Great Hero Fang. Until thirty days from now."
Fang Tieshan said only, "If you cannot come, do not throw your life away."
Feng Feiyun started, then smiled a little.
"Great Hero Fang should save those words for my Master."
When he had said that, he gathered the dark red robe back around himself, turned, and pulled open the iron door.
The guards outside seemed still to be waiting in the distance.
As Feng Feiyun stepped out, his voice changed back into that deliberately flattened hoarseness.
"No one is to approach this place. If anyone dares open this door within the next half-hour, he will bear the consequences himself."
The guards hurriedly murmured their assent.
The iron door shut again.
The lock fell into place.
And that bamboo shadow vanished from the dungeon as suddenly as it had come.
Fang Yingjie sat there holding the packet of Heart-Guard Powder and the sliver of black iron in his palm for a long time without moving.
Only when Fang Tieshan gave a low cough did he suddenly come back to himself and hurry to steady his father.
After laboring for breath for a while, Fang Tieshan said, "Do not think only about thirty days from now."
Fang Yingjie lowered his voice.
"Father?"
Fang Tieshan turned his face slightly.
"I may not live to see thirty days from now."
The blood drained from Fang Yingjie's face.
"You will."
But Fang Tieshan spoke as though he had not heard him.
"And even if I do, I may not make it out alive."
Fang Yingjie said urgently, "Feng Feiyun said he would bring Feng Wuying."
"Whether others come or do not come—that is their affair."
Fang Tieshan said, "What belongs to the Fang family cannot wait to be passed on until others arrive."
The remnant lamp in the cell gave a small jump.
Fang Yingjie froze.
Slowly, Fang Tieshan lifted a hand and groped until he caught Fang Yingjie by the wrist.
That hand was so gaunt that only the joints seemed left, and cold enough to frighten him—yet it still carried a grave, weighty strength.
"Yingjie," he said.
"Thirty days."
"I will pass the Dragoncloud Palm on to you."
Fang Yingjie's throat tightened sharply.
Fang Tieshan went on, "The Fang Family Fist, and the Fang family saber art as well."
He drew a breath, and his voice sank lower.
"But for the fist and the saber, you can only memorize them first."
"The formulas, the sequences, the stepping points, the hidden pivots of force—you are to carve them into your mind."
"If you get out one day, if you find ground on which to stand, a saber to hold, someone to ask, then you may practice them slowly."
His fingers tightened slightly, pressing against Fang Yingjie's wrist bone until it hurt.
"In these thirty days, the only thing you are truly to practice is the Dragoncloud Palm."
Fang Yingjie nodded hard.
"I understand."
Fang Tieshan let himself sink back against the stone wall.
Only after a long while did he say quietly,
"Then we begin today."
Tallying the Days
There was no sun and no moon in the dungeon.
Those thirty days were nothing more than a line a man forced into existence inside his own heart.
After Feng Feiyun left, Fang Yingjie found himself listening, at first, for every sound beyond the iron door. He listened for the faint tap of bamboo somewhere deep in the passageway, for any change in the guards' footfalls, for the chance that the red-robed people of the Crimson Flame Palace might suddenly come again.
But outside, the silence was unnatural.
After Li Ying's last visit, the red-robed men never came again to question Fang Tieshan.
No chains were hauled.
No questions were asked.
No dark-red hem came sweeping slowly in through the doorway.
Only the guards came as usual, bringing food, adding water, refilling the lamp oil. Yet even those guards seemed to have been given instructions. They no longer kicked or beat the two of them as casually as before, and even the coarse buns were thrown a little nearer than usual.
That silence brought no comfort.
If anything, it felt more like an invisible hand pressing the whole underground prison deeper into the earth.
Fang Yingjie knew the Crimson Flame Palace had not forgotten them.
Li Ying had not suddenly discovered mercy, either.
She was only waiting in a different way now.
Waiting for the last ember in Fang Tieshan to burn itself out.
Waiting for Fang Yingjie to be worn mad by hope.
Waiting for the appointed day to come, so she could see whether they would break more easily then than before.
Fang Tieshan said only one thing about it.
"Don't mind her."
Then he began to teach.
But the first thing he taught was not Dragoncloud Palm.
It was how to count the days.
Using the shard of black iron Feng Feiyun had left behind, Fang Yingjie scratched the first mark into the very bottom of the stone wall near his corner.
The wall was cold with damp, and the iron made only the faintest rasp when it bit into stone.
The stroke was shallow.
Yet down beneath the earth, where there was no sun and no moon, it was like cutting a narrow seam of light into the dark.
Hearing the sound, Fang Tieshan asked, "What are you marking?"
"Tally marks," Fang Yingjie said.
Fang Tieshan fell silent for a moment, then gave a low grunt.
"One set is five days."
"Yes," Fang Yingjie said. "Six sets make thirty."
From that day on, every time the food came, Fang Yingjie counted it once. He quietly checked the water, the lamp oil, the changing of the guard against one another as well. If the rhythm of a day seemed off, he would not make the mark at once. He would wait until the next round, until the footsteps matched the food and water again, before scratching in the stroke.
He did not dare miscount.
Those thirty days were too heavy.
Too heavy for even one stroke to be set down carelessly.
By the third stroke of the first tally, Fang Tieshan could finally swallow half a bowl of cold water.
The Heart-Guard Powder truly did help.
It could not restore the vital essence Li Ying had torn from him. The most poisonous thing about the Yin-Flame Essence-Seizing Art was never how much baleful force it left behind, but how soundlessly it drew away a man's true essence. Once the oil in life's lamp had been spent, it could not be replenished with a dose or two of medicine, nor with a thread or two of inner force.
But the Heart-Guard Powder could still guard the heart.
That night, Fang Yingjie had forced his own inner force into his father's body and dragged him back from the edge of extinction on a single thread of dying fire. Yet that remnant flame was too weak. A touch of night-cold, a recoil from old wounds, and it might scatter again. The Heart-Guard Powder was like a thin lampshade around that last flicker of light. It could not keep out the whole long night, and it could not add much oil to the lamp, but it could just barely shelter the faint glow at the center of his chest from going out.
Whenever Fang Tieshan's breathing grew ragged at night, Fang Yingjie would dissolve the tiniest pinch of the powder in the dregs of cold water at the bottom of a bowl, then feed it to him slowly.
Sometimes the water would not go down.
Then Fang Yingjie would wet his fingertip with it and rub it little by little along his father's lips.
Several times Fang Tieshan tried to push him away.
But he did not even have the strength for that.
In the end, he only said coldly, "Use it sparingly."
"Even sparingly, it still has to be used," Fang Yingjie replied.
Fang Tieshan muttered a curse under his breath.
"Stubborn whelp."
Fang Yingjie lowered his head, and the corner of his mouth moved, just slightly.
Had the words come from anyone else, they might have stung.
But from Fang Tieshan's mouth, they felt like a thread—fine, almost invisible—binding him at last to the two words Fang family.
By the time the first tally was complete, Fang Tieshan had begun passing on the Fang Family Fist.
He could not demonstrate.
Chains locked through his shoulders, and the slightest movement was enough to draw a cold sweat from him. But he spoke slowly, and with absolute clarity.
"The Fang Family Fist does not seek the strange," he said.
"It seeks first a single word: upright."
"If the body is not upright, the fist scatters. If the breath does not sink, the force floats."
Sitting at his side, Fang Yingjie closed his eyes and recited silently after him.
Not to practice.
Only to remember.
Thirty days were too short. What truly had to be forged down here beneath the earth was Dragoncloud Palm. The Fang Family Fist was the foundation, yes, but no one could set the frame firm and make its roads familiar in a handful of days. For now, he could only memorize the general principles, the sequence of the forms, the footwork, the angles of the eyes, the position of the hands, the turns, the advances, the retreats, every point of force and timing without losing a word. If he ever got out, then he could bring it properly to life.
After a pause, Fang Tieshan recited the foundational verses first.
"The fist begins at the root, and the root is born in the feet.
"When the feet are set, the waist can join; when the waist joins, the back can open.
"When the back opens, the shoulders sink; when the shoulders sink, the elbows drop.
"When the elbows drop, the wrists come alive; when the wrists come alive, the fist becomes true.
"A true fist does not fight for an inch of speed. First it guards the center of the whole body."
Only after the guiding verses did he begin the first set of fist formulas.
Now it was no longer only principle, but the actual frame of the blows, word by word.
"Opening stance: left foot touches empty, right foot roots the weight.
"Left palm opens level, palm inward, guarding the center gate; right fist draws to the ribs, knuckles turned upward, half an inch of force hidden within.
"Advance half a step—do not snatch with the body. The waist turns first; the shoulders follow after.
"The left palm probes without seeking distance. The right fist strikes without leaving the ribs.
"If the enemy presses the wrist, sink the elbow and change the shoulder. If the enemy seizes the center, withdraw the left foot and use the right fist to seal the heart."
Fang Yingjie repeated it under his breath.
When he reached "right fist draws to the ribs," Fang Tieshan cut him off at once.
"You left something out."
Fang Yingjie stopped immediately.
Fang Tieshan said, "Knuckles turned upward, half an inch of force hidden within. You cannot leave out the word hidden."
A chill went through Fang Yingjie. He repeated it again from the beginning.
"Right fist draws to the ribs, knuckles turned upward, half an inch of force hidden within."
Only then did Fang Tieshan continue.
The formulas that followed were far more than a few lines.
The Fang Family Fist had been passed down road by road, not in a handful of phrases. After the opening stance came advancing, retreating, turning the body, changing the shoulder, sinking the elbow, sealing the gate, breaking the gate, close-body short strikes, turning back to guard the ribs, crossing the steps to seize the center. Every part had its own formula. Among them were hard, plain-sounding techniques like Mountain-Smashing Elbow, stele-breaking punches, stone-breaking hammer blows, heart-breaking step-crashes, and the Iron Gate Body Check. Their names were rough and unadorned, but inside them lived all the Fang family's ruthless skill in close combat. Mountain-Smashing Elbow was meant to break through the enemy's guard at close range. The stele-breaking punch met force head-on. The stone-breaking hammer drove short power downward with crushing weight. The Iron Gate Body Check used fist, elbow, and shoulder together, all for the sake of smashing open an opponent's frame within the space of a few inches.
Where the left palm should probe first and where the right fist should follow after; where the heel had to be rooted and where the knee and hip had to close inward; where a fist could travel three inches and no farther, and where it was better to give up half a step than lose the center gate—every one of those points was minute, exacting, and tightly bound together.
So Fang Tieshan taught it section by section.
And Fang Yingjie memorized it section by section.
Some parts required only the road of the fists.
Some required the footwork as well.
Some had to be fixed in the mind together with the position of the hands, the shoulders and back, the waist and hips.
Fang Tieshan could not rise and show him the movements, so he had no choice but to use the most foolish method, and the hardest one: to knead every crucial point into words, and force Fang Yingjie to remember them dead true before anything else.
If Fang Yingjie misremembered one word, he started over from the beginning.
If he dropped the word hidden, he started over.
If he recited "sink the elbow" as "drop the elbow," he started over.
If he said "draw back the left foot" instead of "withdraw the left foot," he started over too.
Before long, those fist formulas were pressing into his head like wave upon wave of water. His lips grew numb from repeating them. The dim lamp blurred before his eyes. Still he did not dare miss a single word.
Because he knew these were not a few abstract lessons about boxing.
They were the roads the Fang family had beaten out with their bodies, remembered with their blood, and handed down from one generation to the next.
Leave out one line, and one day the fist would arrive there and find an inch of emptiness.
And that inch might well be the difference between life and death.
By the time the second tally was only half finished, Fang Tieshan began teaching the Fang family's saber art.
There was no saber in the cell.
All Fang Yingjie had was that shard of black iron.
But Fang Tieshan would not let him imitate the motions.
"The saber as well—memorize first," he said.
"A saber in the hand is the easiest thing in the world for letting a man's heart grow浮."
"Especially now, when you have no blade. If you force yourself to use that scrap of iron in its place, you'll only teach your hands the wrong measure."
So Fang Yingjie put the black shard away and sat back down at his father's side.
In a low voice, Fang Tieshan said, "The Fang family saber does not seek speed.
"A fast saber is easily blown loose.
"And once it is blown loose, it cannot bear weight."
Fang Yingjie asked, "A saber has to bear weight too?"
Fang Tieshan gave a low laugh.
It was a very short sound, but it no longer carried the same coldness as before.
"A man has to bear weight," he said. "Of course his saber does too.
"A saber may stay sheathed.
"But if it comes out, you must know why you are drawing it.
"Do not kill wantonly. Do not kill blindly. But when the time truly comes to cut, the hand must not soften."
Fang Yingjie stored every word away in silence.
After a pause, Fang Tieshan began the governing formula of the saber art.
"The saber begins in courage, and courage is hidden in the heart.
"If the heart is not upright, the saber goes wild.
"If the body is not steady, the saber floats.
"The spine of the blade bears the force; the edge cuts off the road.
"Before drawing, ask the heart. Once drawn, do not turn back."
When he had finished the general formula, he began on the first road of the saber.
Now it was no longer only principle.
"Opening stance: right foot presses the ground, left foot opens half a step.
"Before the saber leaves the sheath, sink the shoulder first. When the saber is about to leave, the elbow must not float.
"A horizontal cut rises no higher than the throat. A diagonal press never leaves the shoulder line.
"A reverse lift passes beneath the ribs. A sinking chop falls through the center gate.
"If the enemy rushes the body, drag the saber and retreat half a step. If the enemy abandons his gate, turn and cut at the root of the wrist."
Fang Yingjie repeated after him.
"Opening stance: right foot presses the ground, left foot opens half a step.
"Before the saber leaves the sheath, sink the shoulder first. When the saber is about to leave, the elbow must not float."
At that point, Fang Tieshan said suddenly, "Say it again."
Fang Yingjie started, then repeated it at once.
"When the saber is about to leave, the elbow must not float."
In a low voice Fang Tieshan said, "Remember that word—float.
"If the hand floats, the saber goes light. If the heart floats, the saber goes wild.
"The Fang family saber may be slow. It must never float."
A heaviness settled in Fang Yingjie's chest.
"I'll remember," he said quietly.
Only then did Fang Tieshan continue.
And the formulas that followed were far more than these few lines.
The Fang family's saber art had been handed down road after road: horizontal cuts, diagonal presses, reverse lifts, sinking chops, dragging the blade, turning strikes, sealing the gate, breaking formations. There were also short saber methods for close quarters, long saber methods for horseback, gate-guarding saber methods, and saber methods for fighting by night. Among the heavier roads were techniques such as Cutting the Wave at the Gate, Severing the Current Across the River, Breaking the Stockade and Opening the Mountain, Lifting the Golden Beam in Reverse, and One Stroke Divides the Peak. Cutting the Wave at the Gate was for meeting force and pressing it from the front. Severing the Current Across the River was for sealing the road with a level blade. Breaking the Stockade and Opening the Mountain was wide and forceful. Lifting the Golden Beam in Reverse rose from below in a returning lift. One Stroke Divides the Peak was among the heaviest and deepest methods in the Fang family saber—something not to be used lightly by anyone whose inner force, courage, and heart were not all steady.
Where the spine of the blade had to carry the force, and where the edge had to cut off the road; where one could retreat half a step and hide the steel, and where one had to seize the center and cut the wrist; where a blade should seal the gate, where the body itself should yield the road, where it was better to wound one's own shoulder and arm than leave the person behind one exposed—every part had its own formula.
Fang Tieshan could not demonstrate.
Fang Yingjie could not practice.
So again he could only memorize it, one section at a time.
The road of the saber.
The footwork.
The breath that had to be gathered before the blade ever left the sheath.
And the moments when the saber should not be drawn at all.
Those words fell into the dungeon without any gleam of steel.
Yet as Fang Yingjie repeated them, he began to see, faintly, a wind he had never known—a broad wind sweeping over the plains of Shandong. He saw a training ground outside a fortified manor. He saw his father in youth, standing in dust with saber in hand, and when the blade fell, the earth-smoke broke apart in all directions.
He had never truly seen Fang Stronghold.
He scarcely remembered the place where he had been born.
And yet these fist formulas and saber roads were like old bricks, one after another, slowly building a blurred home inside his heart.
On the night the second tally was completed, Fang Tieshan suddenly asked, "Do you still remember Fang Stronghold?"
Fang Yingjie was silent for a long time.
At last he said softly, "No."
Fang Tieshan said nothing.
Fang Yingjie went on, "I was very young when I was taken to Mount Hua to recover. Mother came to see me sometimes. I remember her. But Fang Stronghold…"
He paused.
"I remember only a gatehouse, very high. And the wind. Nothing else is clear."
Resting against the stone wall, Fang Tieshan did not move for a long while.
Just when Fang Yingjie thought he would not speak again, he said at last, "The wind at Fang Stronghold sits lower than the wind on Mount Hua."
Fang Yingjie lifted his eyes.
Slowly, Fang Tieshan went on.
"The wind in Shandong runs close to the ground. In autumn it comes across the manor fields carrying the smell of earth, and the smell of grain with it. East of the training ground stands an old scholar tree, and beneath it there is a well. When your grandfather was young, he used to sharpen his saber by that well."
His voice was low.
Yet inside that hoarse quiet was a warmth long absent.
"There are not only martial men in the Stronghold.
"There are tenant farmers, escort men, children in the clan school, an old scholar who keeps the accounts, women who mend clothes for the guards in the courtyards.
"Fang Stronghold is not a signboard.
"It is a place where many people live their lives together."
Fang Yingjie listened in silence.
Fang Tieshan continued, "When I was young, I always thought the Fang Stronghold's name had been won by the palm."
He paused.
"Later I learned it wasn't only that.
"The palm can keep enemies back.
"But what truly holds a household upright is that there are people willing to keep the rules, willing to honor trust and righteousness, willing to reach out when others are in trouble.
"You must remember the Fang family precepts."
At once Fang Yingjie straightened where he sat.
One word at a time, Fang Tieshan said:
"Honor the old and respect the worthy.
"Treat others with sincerity.
"Make no distinction between high and low."
Something shook inside Fang Yingjie's chest.
He had heard those words once, long, long ago.
Perhaps his mother had said them to him.
But now, spoken from Fang Tieshan's mouth, they felt as if they had finally fallen back onto their root.
"I'll remember," he said softly.
Fang Tieshan said, "Remembering is not the same as reciting.
"If one day you get out of here, do not slight those weaker than you.
"Do not bow before those stronger than you.
"And when you meet someone who ought to be saved, act within the measure of your strength."
When he reached that point, his voice sank slightly.
"But do not let yourself become the kind of thing the Crimson Flame Palace is."
Fang Yingjie lowered his head.
A long time passed before he spoke.
"Father, I won't."
Fang Tieshan did not answer.
He only lifted that withered hand and closed it lightly around his son's wrist.