Chapter 410: Mountains and Clouds Obscure the Sky
Back in the county capital’s Corrections Division, in D-132, Xu Qing frowned as the boy vanished. Then he walked toward the Paintedfolk’s cell.
Perhaps because of the threat of the shadow, the old Paintedfolk man didn’t hide away. Instead, as Xu Qing approached, he quickly clasped hands and bowed in greeting.
“I am Sir Inkwell of the Paintedfolk. Well met, exalted Jailer.”
“What was that thing?” Xu Qing asked the old man.
“Sir, that boy was destiny aura!” Sir Inkwell responded immediately.
Xu Qing’s gaze became sharper.
In response, Sir Inkwell shivered. For some reason, he was getting the feeling that this jailer was different from the others. Generally speaking, Sir Inkwell didn’t care about the guards in the prison. Because of the unique qualities of his species, it wouldn’t even bother him if the people in the painting ripped the painting to shreds. After all, they were illusory. However, when this particular guard sent his shadow into the cell, Sir Inkwell had felt an intense sensation of deadly crisis. It had seemed to him that the shadow really could devour him. That got him nervous, as he had the feeling being eaten would be painful.
When he saw Xu Qing’s eyes flicker, Sir Inkwell said, “With all due respect, exalted Jailer, I have no idea what that destiny aura is doing here. It was here when I got locked up. In fact, I have you to thank, exalted Jailer. That destiny aura loved to stay in the Paintedfolk world, and because of that, I never dared to show myself in the open. I always had the feeling it wanted to eat me. That was why I could never warn you of the situation. I truly hope you can forgive me, exalted Jailer.”
Sir Inkwell knew that it was unlikely this jailer would believe him. After all, he had never made any indication he wanted to offer a warning. But he still had to say the words. Sometimes providing an explanation and not providing an explanation could lead to very different results. At the very least, it went to show what his attitude was.
Xu Qing looked coldly at Sir Inkwell. He didn’t believe much of what the man said, and wasn’t inclined to question him. So he turned and went back to the door. There, he sent his shadow out with orders to stand guard. It was a bit of a reward.
The shadow was very excited, and let out happy fluctuations that made it seem like it had just been given a new toy. Quickly separating into fourteen parts, it went over to the fourteen cells. The cloud troll wasn’t eating anything, as the curious shadow was doing the eating instead. The woman trembled and ceased trying to coax the scarecrows to sleep. Because of the shadow, the scarecrows trembled and rose to their feet, ready to accept orders. In fact, shortly after, they were arrayed around the woman, glaring at her aggressively. The Rockdevil was turning, but not of its own accord. The head was pushing it. Both inmates were terrified, as a shadowy whip had appeared in the cell, which repeatedly lashed in their direction. The over twenty figures inside the Paintedfolk scroll painting were no longer smiling. They looked terrified. And that was because the shadow was laying atop the painting, licking its lips.
All of the prisoners seemed demure and quiet.
However, the boy would occasionally appear and look at Xu Qing, and his gaze always seemed focused on the right wrist. He seemed extremely curious. Eventually, he sat down cross-legged in front of Xu Qing and cupped his chin with his palm.
Xu Qing looked at him. He knew that this boy was the secret of D-132.
Time passed. Half a month.
During that time, Xu Qing didn’t experience any further strange incidents when he left the Corrections Division. Under his management, nothing unusual happened in D-132.
However, whenever the inmates there saw Xu Qing, their eyes shone with terror. And that was because they were always missing body parts. It was the work of the shadow. The shadow couldn’t control its curiosity, and would occasionally take a bite here or there. Thankfully for the inmates... their gruish nature ensured that the bitten spot would grow back by the next day.
The head didn’t chatter anymore. When Xu Qing passed by, it would sigh.
“Don’t stomp me to death! Don’t kill me! OW!”
The boy had gotten used to Xu Qing. Whenever he came for duty, the boy would manifest and sit next to him. He almost seemed like a follower who had been tasked with bodyguard work. On some occasions, the boy would run over and watch the shadow striking fear into the hearts of the inmates.
As for Patriarch Golden Vajra Warrior... he looked miserable. Xu Qing didn’t put him away into his bag of holding. Instead, he gave him work similar to the shadow. As of now, there were two additional jailers in D-132.
The patriarch seemed very interested in the Rockdevil. Then, he and the shadow apparently came to some sort of agreement, after which the patriarch took over management duty of that specific cell.
The shadow was most interested in the Paintedfolk. It loved laying atop the painting and licking its lips. Eventually, the painting turned blurry.
Seeing all that, Xu Qing did some calculations. Based on what the other jailers had told him, every month, their quota would reset, allowing them to deal with inmates however they saw fit. That said, the quota was based on how many inmates were in each cell block. Because of that, Xu Qing only had the right to get rid of two prisoners. That was a bit disappointing.
“There just aren’t enough inmates in D-132,” he murmured.
As he pondered ways to get more inmates into the cell block, Sir Inkwell tremulously called out to him. “Exalted Jailer. I have a secret I want to tell you. I don’t want anything else in return other than... if you think the secret is worth it, please get rid of the shadow.”
Xu Qing ignored him.
Voice trembling, Sir Inkwell said, “Exalted Jailer... do you know how many people are actually locked up in D-132?”
He sounded absolutely terrified, as if he had no choice but to reveal this secret to Xu Qing.
Hearing that, Xu Qing frowned and looked over coldly. There were fourteen inmates in the cell block. He’d known that from the beginning, and had checked on them as soon as he arrived. Besides, he had already discovered the secret of D-132.
Beyond that, it seemed like Sir Inkwell was being deliberately mystifying, which was suspicious.
Xu Qing was about to look away when, all of a sudden, his expression flickered as he remembered something.
“Exalted Jailer, you just sensed it, didn’t you...?” Sir Inkwell asked, voice trembling. “Exalted Jailer, do we really have fourteen inmates here? Think back. Scour your memories. When you do so, can you determine... how many prisoners there actually are? Did you really figure out D-132’s secret?”
Sir Inkwell’s voice grew fainter and fainter until it vanished. Xu Qing looked at Sir Inkwell’s cell, his eyes glittering. Sir Inkwell was obviously trying to lead him to a conclusion, that much was obvious.
Regardless, he searched his memories to confirm the information. On his first day here, he had carefully checked all the inmates. There were fourteen. The first was the cloud troll. The second was the human woman. The third was the Rockdevil.... The thirteenth was the head, and the fourteenth was Sir Inkwell.
“Fourteen. For sure.” He even took out the jade slip and reviewed all the information, confirming that there were fourteen inmates.
And yet, for some reason, Xu Qing felt like his memories contained different information. That said, he wasn’t sure what it could be. Standing, he walked over to the cloud troll’s cell.
After examining it, he started strolling the path, looking into all the cells until he finally reached Sir Inkwell. Along the way, he yet again counted fourteen.
As he stood outside Sir Inkwell’s cell, he looked grimly at the blurry painting. Then, he mentally sent a message to Patriarch Golden Vajra Warrior. Instantly, the black iron skewer shot out, circling around the entire cell block, entering into each cell to inspect it. Afterward, he informed Xu Qing that there wasn’t anything out of the ordinary.
After that, Xu Qing had his shadow inspect everything. When it was done, it sent him fluctuations via divine will. Just as before, there was nothing unusual.
There really were fourteen inmates.
Xu Qing’s face darkened further, and he had the shadow send a section of itself to the painting.
Sir Inkwell appeared, looking extremely nervous as he wailed, “Exalted one, I really had no choice but to say that stuff. That shadow was about to eat me! I had to do it to buy some time! Otherwise I’d be done for. Exalted one, please forgive me! Forgive me. Just this one time!”
Xu Qing didn’t say anything. His eyes grew colder.
Sir Inkwell trembled even more violently as his anxiety turned into terror.
Finally, he blurted, “I’ll just say. The real secret, exalted Jailer, is that the Corrections Division is really only worried about one inmate. And it’s... a god!”
“Explain,” Xu Qing said.
“Exalted Jailer, I’m not actually sure of every detail. I just once heard a prisoner older than me explaining that the Corrections Division was built on top of the sealed clone of a god. That... is why the palace lords always stay here.”
Xu Qing thought back to his first time coming to the prison, and how he had heard howling from the depths of the chasm. Then he thought about the vibrations he had sensed from deep down. What was more, dead inmates were thrown into the bottom of the chasm, as if they were food. As those thoughts coalesced, and he realized the implications, he realized why Sir Inkwell had been acting deliberately mystifying.
A moment later, Xu Qing looked at Sir Inkwell and called the shadow away. The shadow seemed disappointed, but couldn’t disobey. All it could do was focus on having fun with the other inmates. Patriarch Golden Vajra Warrior did the same, and returned to his spot watching over the Rockdevil. D-132 was back to normal. Everything was normal.
The boy formed of destiny aura appeared again. He always showed up close to Xu Qing, as if he wanted to stay close to him.
Several days passed.
Everything was going normal for Xu Qing. However, he was putting a lot of thought into what Sir Inkwell had told him. For some reason, he couldn’t stop thinking about it.
Eventually, one day when he was about to get off work and head back to his sword pavilion, he saw a familiar face in the Corrections Division.
It was Kong Xianglong.