The Zither in the Moonlit Tower, Part 3

The Xuankong Sect disciples entered the temple.

Yun Yao probed briefly and understood: this sect, nonexistent during her seclusion, trained its disciples in sword-body techniques—innate or acquired, their physical resilience surpassed even Ding Xiao’s tempered body.
No wonder they stumbled upon her group, surviving despite their ignorance.

When the Xuankong Sect disciples entered the mountain god temple, it was evening in the mountain, the sky darkening.

The Nightmare Threads blanketing the mountain couldn’t block the setting sun.
The horizon’s fiery clouds burned through the white mist, draping the mountain in a beauty too surreal for the mortal world.

Yun Yao stood at the temple door, gazing through the barrier at the “mist” growing rampant in the night.

“Martial Aunt, aren’t you coming in?” Ding Xiao asked cautiously from the doorway.
Behind her, several Qianmen disciples cast uneasy glances, as if fearing Yun Yao might vanish in a blink.

“I’m reinforcing the array,” Yun Yao paused, her eyes flicking up lazily over Ding Xiao’s shoulder to the disciples. “Staring so hard—what, got a fledgling complex?”

Her words landed on He Fengming.
His face flushed, annoyed. “We’re just concerned for Martial Aunt’s safety.”

“Concerned for me, or worried if something happens to me, you’re trapped?” With He Fengming, Yun Yao never spared face.
Before he could retort, she turned.
The red-robed girl scoffed lightly toward some unseen direction outside. “Relax. I don’t much care if you live or die, but since I promised him to bring you in, I’ll bring you all out, not one less.”

“…”

He Fengming swallowed his reply.
His gaze, complex, lingered on her slender, bold red figure at the barrier’s edge. The white mist, ablaze with sunset, was a world-consuming fire, ready to swallow her in a blink.

The Xuankong Sect’s lead elder, familiar with He Fengming and his pride as a core Qianmen elder’s prized disciple, found his deference to a young female disciple odd.
After exchanging information—mostly Qianmen providing, Xuankong Sect lacking—the elder couldn’t help asking, “Who’s that outside?”

He Fengming snapped back. “She’s our mission’s lead… Little Martial Aunt.”

“Martial Aunt?” The elder blinked, as if mentally sorting Qianmen’s hierarchy.

Ding Xiao puffed up proudly. “She’s the direct disciple of our Little Martial Aunt Ancestor, Lord Hanyuan’s fellow disciple, Yun! Yao! Jiu!”

Outside, Yun Yao, hearing every word: “…”

The resounding three syllables made her hand tremble, nearly botching a stroke of the array.
The following flattery was unbearable; she sealed her hearing temporarily.

Finishing the last stroke, she exhaled.
Standing, she circled the chaotic, scribbled array three times, pausing.
“Shouldn’t have drawn it wrong, right?”

The original host found array lessons dull, sleeping through most, and centuries without practice left her uncertain.

But time was short.

Her expression cooled, chin lifting, gazing beyond the barrier.
The last vibrant sunlight was devoured by white mist, the cold moonlight fragmented, seeping into the fog. Shadows of trees and grass stirred an unsettling, eerie chill.

Steeling herself, Yun Yao turned, stepping back into the temple.

By now, Qianmen’s boasting had ended, and Xuankong Sect was venting their woes—
“…Our thirteen peaks each sent one disciple for routine training. Who’d expect this disaster—oh, Martial Aunt Yun! Please, sit!”

The Xuankong Sect elder, noticing her entry, rose eagerly, clearly swayed by Qianmen’s hype, his attitude deferential.

“No need.”
Cutting off his enthusiasm, Yun Yao said bluntly, “Nightmare Beasts originate in the Tianhan Abyss of Two Realms Mountain, a frigid, sunless place. They thrive in cold, fear fire, and are strongest at night.”

“Oh?” The elder’s smile faded. “Then tonight’s dangerous? Can this array hold?”

Though Xuankong Sect was among the four great sects, this elder barely qualified as elite, newly breaking into Soul Transformation from Nascent Soul. He was overwhelmed.

“It won’t hold, so we can’t stay,” Yun Yao stepped aside, revealing the temple’s outer ground. “We must leave.”

They saw, amid the impenetrable night and eerie white mist, a complex golden array of twisted patterns glowing on the ground.
Its crude appearance resembled a charlatan’s scrawl, but even unactivated, its latent spiritual energy stunned the higher-cultivated disciples.

“A Mountain-Shifting Array?” He Fengming gasped.

Yun Yao glanced at him, surprised.
She’d thought him a haughty fool, at best a strong elite disciple. Mu Hanyuan’s choice to include him made sense now—his insight and experience outstripped his peers. Lu Chang’an’s lineage had invested heavily in him.

His words puzzled Xuankong Sect, but Qianmen’s others realized, their expressions turning odd and complex.
“Mountain-Shifting Array… Didn’t the Sect Leader use it during a sect competition at Qianmen? Isn’t it a top-tier array only core elders access, sealed in the treasure pavilion’s top floor, off-limits to regular elders?”
“She’s new, right? How does she know it?”
“Maybe Lord Hanyuan taught her?”
“Possible…”

Yun Yao nearly retorted—

She’d personally sealed those array diagrams in the library’s top floor. How did it become Mu Hanyuan teaching her?
Was he their savior?

But time was tight; she didn’t bother.

Her divine sense, limited to a hundred zhang, sensed the forest’s restless tremors—quaking flora, sluggish streams wailing. Nightmare Beasts were converging.
Though ferocious, their threads were near-unstoppable except by supreme cultivation, not this sentient.
Someone was controlling this. She had to get them out now.

“Less talk. You know it’s a Mountain-Shifting Array, so you know its function?” Yun Yao swept the disciples. “Move—”

“…I’ll do it.”
As if after agonizing, He Fengming, jaw clenched, stepped forward.

Yun Yao paused, tilting her head. “?”

Before she could ask, the Xuankong Sect elder did, confused. “Do what? What’s this array for?”

“It teleports living beings within a hundred li, distance depending on spiritual energy,” He Fengming said slowly under their hopeful gazes. “But it requires someone outside to anchor it, supplying energy.”

“—”

Their fleeting hope of escape froze.
They exchanged uneasy glances.

The night’s terror needed no explanation; even together, they couldn’t resist. One person staying was certain death.

He Fengming turned to Yun Yao, his expression unreadable. “Such a large array needs at least Nascent Soul cultivation to anchor. Martial Aunt likely chose me when drawing it—I’m the only fit among the disciples.”

“…”

Qianmen disciples’ gazes flooded Yun Yao.
Their expressions were odd, but none spoke—her clashes with He Fengming were no secret. Yan Ruoyu, relieved her low cultivation spared her revenge, didn’t dare defend him.

Yun Yao listened, paused two breaths, and nodded casually. “Fine, since you volunteered, you’ll do.”
She didn’t glance at him. “Others, into the array.”
“…”

He Fengming’s fists clenched, then slowly relaxed, his face oddly relieved.

Ding Xiao, the last Qianmen disciple to leave, hesitated at the door, words unspoken.

“I hate life-for-drama nonsense,” Yun Yao leaned against the doorframe, frowning. “Want to stay with him?”
“…”

Ding Xiao, silenced, glanced at Yun Yao puzzledly but hurried into the array at He Fengming’s urging.

Then came Xuankong Sect disciples.
Their elder thanked Yun Yao and He Fengming profusely, nudging his disciples along.

Until—

“Wait.”
Yun Yao’s voice cut through.

Nearly swallowed by the chaotic night, the red-robed girl straightened from the doorframe, her fingers curling in the air.
Her gaze shed its laziness, revealing a sharpness colder than moonlight.
“Elder, you said each of your thirteen peaks sent one disciple for training?”

“Y-Yes,” the elder said nervously. “Is there a limit on the array’s capacity?”
“Thirteen peaks?”
“Yes, our thirteen sword peaks are known to the Immortal Alliance—”

“Then why, with six disciples in the array, are there eight figures behind you?”

“—”
“?!”

They froze, horrified. Moonlight in the temple flickered like ghostly flames, dim and wavering.

A night breeze swept through the dilapidated temple.
In the coldest moonlight, at the temple’s darkest corner, a figure, always facing away, turned.

In the shadowed moonlight, a pale face emerged between strands of hair—

Featureless.

“No less from Yun Yao’s direct disciple. At this life-or-death moment, you notice such trifles?” A raspy, shrill, cackling voice echoed from countless corners. “Then the blood debt from three hundred years ago at the Demon Realm’s Heaven’s End Abyss—shall you repay it for her?”

Before the words faded, the shadow under the moon morphed into a dark blood streak, shooting toward Yun Yao by the door.