Chapter 91: The Jade Hairpin
The heavy rain pounded against the bamboo-woven conical hats of the two men, crackling loudly.
Chen Ping'an said in a deep voice, "This hairpin is very ordinary, just common jade material."
A Liang stared at the serious-looking young man, as if he had heard the biggest joke under heaven. He bared his teeth, struggling to keep from laughing out loud. "What you say doesn't count."
Sweat oozed from Chen Ping'an's forehead, but it was quickly washed away by the rain splashing on his face. He looked at the man and asked, "Then what exactly do you want?"
A Liang asked with a smile, "Do you think you're going to die?"
At that moment, Chen Ping'an suddenly felt a surge of despair.
Because Master Ruan had come, and then gone.
And this man standing before him was still right here.
A Liang was still the same grinning A Liang, with that green bamboo sword slung diagonally across his body.
The man smiled at the youth—his short stature, his thin clothes, his sturdy straw sandals, and of course, that jade hairpin that added the finishing touch.
If he remembered correctly, there were eight beautifully carved small characters on the hairpin.
Chen Ping'an's lips were blue, and he asked in a trembling voice, "Can you let them go?"
A Liang didn't speak.
The night before his departure, Chen Ping'an had stayed up late under the lamp, trying to imagine all possible difficulties. He had not failed to consider that on this journey to the Cliff Academy to pursue his studies, they would encounter various obstacles, big and small. After all, just his enemies alone—on the surface, there were the Cloud Veil Mountain, the Old Dragon City, and the Zheng Yang Mountain—were all transcendent beings from the mountains, yet all bore a life-and-death grudge against him. So Chen Ping'an was very worried that because of him, the little girl in the red cotton-padded jacket would be implicated on her path of learning.
That day, when he told Li Baoping about the hardships he had endured as a child going into the mountains, it wasn't that the young man wanted to complain or put on airs as her junior uncle. Rather, Chen Ping'an wanted to tell the little girl one thing: that their journey to that academy which had already moved to Great Sui would definitely be longer than his trips into the mountains to gather herbs back then. If one day he was no longer around, unable to stay by her side, and Li Baoping still wanted to go there to study, but only because she lacked confidence in herself, then Chen Ping'an hoped she could be like that time when she went into the mountains—just take a few more steps, and as she walked and walked, perhaps she would eventually arrive.
Only, at that moment, those words were on the tip of his tongue, and Chen Ping'an suddenly felt that since they had only just started their distant journey together, saying such things would be too inauspicious, too unlucky. So he only said half of it, swallowing the other half back down, and instead changed it to hoping that she could become the first "little master" and female scholar. This was both to bring good luck and truly reflected Chen Ping'an's expectations for the little girl.
A Liang chuckled. "Even if we take ten thousand steps back, that hairpin is merely an ordinary scholar's ornament, and it doesn't belong to you. Even if we take a hundred steps back, I refuse to believe that Qi Jingchun would have kept such a hairpin with such solemnity for so many years without it hiding some secret. For example, it could be a small, unknown pocket world, or a piece of geomantic treasure land with the potential to become a paradise. And if we only take one step back, that would be even more impressive—it might be a token passed down through the generations of a literary lineage, like the tokens of the three main lineages of Daoism: a peachwood talisman, a feathered robe, and a Daoist crown. If that's true, and the hairpin really is Qi Jingchun's master's token, Chen Ping'an, do you think it's appropriate for you to wear it on your head?"
Chen Ping'an answered in a non sequitur, "A Liang, can you let Li Baoping and Li Huai go?"
A Liang asked with a smile, "How can you be sure that if I promise you, I won't go back on my word?"
Chen Ping'an's toes twitched slightly.
A Liang crossed his arms over his chest and laughed. "Young hero, don't be impulsive. We're still reasoning things out here, aren't we? It's not too late to resort to force after reasoning fails."
Chen Ping'an remained silent, his face pale.
A Liang looked the youth up and down. "You really do resemble them a bit."
A Liang dropped his playful expression and extended his hand. "Hand over the hairpin, and I won't kill them."
Chen Ping'an's fingers trembled.
A Liang said slowly, "This is Qi Jingchun's master's relic. It can also be considered one of Qi Jingchun's own relics."
Chen Ping'an raised his arm toward the top of his head.
A Liang smirked. "If you snap the hairpin yourself, I won't kill you. I never lie."
Chen Ping'an suddenly stopped his hand, took a deep breath, and stepped back with one foot, assuming a combat-ready stance.
A Liang asked, "Do you think that since you're going to die anyway, I'll also let Li Baoping and the others go? So even in death, you want to try to see if you can protect this hairpin with your own ability?"
Chen Ping'an said nothing. He stomped the ground heavily twice and charged in front of A Liang, throwing a punch.
The next moment, Chen Ping'an suddenly realized that A Liang's figure had disappeared from before him.
Chen Ping'an turned around stiffly, and sure enough, that conical-hatted man was standing there, but now with a hairpin in his hand.
A Liang sighed, as if he had no real interest in the hairpin. He extended it toward the youth. "Take it back."
Chen Ping'an cautiously stepped forward a few paces and took the green jade hairpin from him. In that instant, the youth only felt a weight on his head—the conical-hatted man had gently pressed one hand on his head. The two stood shoulder to shoulder, but facing opposite directions. The man, who had always worn a roguish face, sighed. "Chen Ping'an, don't do stupid things in the future. In this world, how could any lifeless object be more important than a human life? You must live. Even if you can't live well, you must still live. There is no greater principle than that under heaven."
The conical-hatted man patted Chen Ping'an's head and looked up at the pitch-black sky. He smiled. "You have to understand, no matter how valuable this hairpin is or how great its significance, since Qi Jingchun was willing to entrust it to you, he must have believed in you. So whenever you have to make a life-or-death decision, you must choose life, not death. Dying a heroic death, dying with fervor, dying gracefully—but dying is still dying."
The man withdrew his hand. "Qi Jingchun was very disappointed with this world. That's his business. You, Chen Ping'an, are you. Don't follow his example. You haven't truly seen the good and bad of this world yet. 'Life is short, yet often burdened with worries of a thousand years'—that's the concern of scholars. I, A Liang, am not a scholar. You, Chen Ping'an, are not one yet either. So..."
In the end, the man never said what originally came after "so." He only said softly, "Chen Ping'an, trust my judgment. In the future, you can walk a very long road—perhaps even farther than Qi Jingchun."
The youth asked softly, "Why?"
The man gently rubbed the handle of his bamboo sword and smiled. "Because I'm A Liang."
The two finally walked down the mountaintop together in silence.
Chen Ping'an asked, "What about those two on the hillside?"
A Liang thought for a moment. "Dead men?"
Chen Ping'an wanted to say something but stopped himself, then changed the subject. "Why didn't you take the hairpin?"
A Liang's mouth twitched, and he sighed mournfully. "After I got hold of the hairpin, I realized it was even worse than my worst-case scenario of taking ten thousand steps back. It was more like tens of thousands of steps back. It's really just a broken hairpin. So what would I want it for?"
The youth was speechless.
A Liang shook his head. "Real scholars are all poor. You'll understand later. I should have thought of it long ago. Given Old Man Moral Forest's temperament and Qi Jingchun's personality, it's only normal that an ordinary hairpin like this was passed down."
A Liang suddenly turned his head and grinned. "You know, you took something that I thought was in the bag. Do you know how many unnecessary detours I took because of that?"
The conical hat was drenched, and the youth was completely baffled.
A Liang snorted indignantly. "I even carved a character somewhere. But in the end, I came running over all excited, and this is the miserable result. So you'd better be grateful that I'm sparing your life."
He muttered to himself, "If you don't have the ability to carve two or three characters there in the future, I'll skin you alive."
Chen Ping'an said helplessly, "A Liang, can you say something I can understand?"
"Sure."
A Liang laughed heartily. "My name is A Liang. Liang as in 'kindness'."
Chen Ping'an finished the next sentence for him. "I am a swordsman."
At that moment, A Liang raised the corner of his mouth and slapped the youth on the shoulder. "Then it's settled!"
Chen Ping'an was even more puzzled. "Huh?"
But A Liang had already changed the subject. "Even a thousand-mile send-off must come to an end. I'll escort you to the border of Great Li and then leave. By then, I believe you kids will be able to travel and study cleanly, without any more murky affairs for a while. After that, you'll have to fend for yourself. Whether you can lead them to the Cliff Academy in Great Sui, and whether you can return alive to Longquan County in Great Li—it all depends on your own ability."
Chen Ping'an suddenly said, "Thank you."
From their first meeting until now, the youth had finally begun to fully trust this man who called himself A Liang.
A Liang shook his head. "It's nothing. I'm just making up for a past failing, which has little to do with you."
Many years ago, there was a young scholar named Qi who, tired of reading, once said he wanted to roam the jianghu together with him. At that time, the swordsman named A Liang did not nod in agreement.
The man felt that if he had been a little more patient back then, that young man wouldn't have ended up where he was today.
Finally, A Liang said, "Chen Ping'an, do you know?"
The youth said, "What?"
A Liang said earnestly, "From now on, you need to have genuine respect for peerless experts like me."
The youth asked curiously, "Can you beat Zhu He?"
A Liang felt a headache coming on.
He thought this guy was even more annoying than Qi Jingchun back in the day.