Chapter 686 — The Old Angler by the Cold Pool
The Herdsman of the Wasteland · Page 1 of 4
"His Majesty sends the Sun Guardian to Taihuang Heaven — it seems I must make the trip to the Sun-Herding Clan myself!"
Shen Mu left the imperial palace, summoned the Dragon Qilin, and rode straight for the Desolate Ruins. Six days later he came to the Dawn Spring, and there he met Yan Jingjing.
They had not seen each other for several years, and the girl had grown up; she had blossomed into a young woman of striking loveliness. Seeing Shen Mu arrive, she came dashing out at once and said with a laugh, "Cowherd Brother, look at my legs — they're completely healed!"
Shen Mu's gaze fell upon her. The girl wore rather loose garments: a flowered-pin ceremonial gown, a pale blue outer robe, and beneath it a chest-wrap embroidered with a three-legged crow.
Her outer robe was very long, nearly trailing on the ground, so that her legs could not be seen.
By the look of the workmanship, it must have been made for her by Yu Zhaoqing. The Sun-Herding Clan had done the Heavenly Feather Clan a kindness, and after the Heavenly Feather Clan settled in Jingping, the two families had often visited one another.
Yan Jingjing turned her waist sideways and lifted one side of her skirt, baring a leg. The girl's leg was very slender — only there were no trousers beneath, and her skin shone white as snow, an arresting sight indeed.
Shen Mu felt a fleeting stirring of improper thoughts, but he suppressed it at once. He had once examined both of Yan Jingjing's legs and touched them more than once, so he still had a measure of self-restraint.
"Show me the other one too," Shen Mu said. "I'll check whether the two legs are the same length."
Yan Jingjing gathered one side of her skirt in one hand, waist turned, and with the other hand lifted the other side of the skirt and held it against her breast.
Shen Mu crouched down to examine them. The girl's legs were pressed close together, with scarcely a gap between them, and he laughed. "They really are healed through and through."
The Sun-Herding Clan Chief walked over, coughing again and again. "Ahem, ahem — Sun Guardian, in front of outsiders, put your skirt down."
Yan Jingjing hurriedly let her skirt fall, her cheeks faintly red. Shen Mu hastily stood up, and only then did he notice that the Woodcutter Sage was standing behind the Clan Chief; because the Clan Chief was a man of immense stature, far beyond ordinary folk, he had not been visible.
The Woodcutter Sage looked at him with a smile that was not quite a smile. Shen Mu's expression did not change. "Master, what brings you here?"
"The Dawn Boats were designed by me," the Woodcutter Sage said with a smile. "I have come this time to take back the blueprints for the Dawn Boats that I left here, and hand them to Jingping, so that Jingping's Heavenly Artisans may build several Dawn Boats and Soul Boats."
Shen Mu said with a smile, "I came this time meaning to dismantle the Sun-Herding Clan's Dawn Boats, draw up detailed blueprints, and build a few anew. It is fortunate you arrived so quickly, Master — otherwise, had I gotten here first, the Dawn Boats would already have been taken apart by me."
The Sun-Herding Clan Chief's ruddy face turned black in an instant, as though the sun had gone out. He thought: "Dismantle the boats? Last time you came, you dismantled our sun! Luckily we fished another one back out, and now you want to dismantle our boats..."
The Woodcutter Sage walked toward the Dawn Spring. "The Dawn Boats are not especially troublesome. But with Jingping's present foundations, such a colossus could not be designed — that is the way of accumulated depth. I designed the Dawn Boats and the Soul Boats, but the highest attainment in the crafting of things in the Kaihuang Era was not mine. It belonged to another!"
Shen Mu's heart stirred. "Might that person be the Venerable Buddha?"