THE YILING MATRIARCH

Chapter 17 : Time Immemorial - Part 10 : The Devil's Hour

After Wei Meifeng was taken by the Wen, no one could find even a hair trace of where she had disappeared. This tormented Lan Wangji relentlessly through the following year as his mind thought of nothing but her unknown whereabouts. Night after night, once he could tear his focus away from his duties on taking care of his clan, he would consult the spirits for Wei Meifeng to find out if she had joined where his parents were. Thankfully, things in Gusu were slowly returning to their previous state, but they were still not the same as long as his shining light was missing.

During one such nightly session, the blue glow illuminated his Guqin as Inquiry played on the strings with a younger disciple by Lan Wangji's side. Listening to the returned notes as he communicated with the spirit, Wangji's face fell at what it told him as the form slunk back into the water; there was still no news of Meifeng's whereabouts. This had to mean that she was still alive somewhere, which lifted his heart just a bit.

Suddenly hearing a pair of soft footsteps, Wangji turned around thoughtlessly thinking it was Meifeng walking up to him, and his heart leapt. Peering deeper into the darkness hoping to see his lover, Lan Wangji instead saw his older brother revealing himself from the tall grasses, yet he was still glad to see after being missing for weeks. Lan Xichen, seeing his anxiousness and politely given bow, urged him to stand up straight.

"Wangji, please don't bow for me brother. I trust you have been well?" His younger brother's body relaxed from his formal welcoming, his slightly eased expression still tense with unspoken worry. Lan Xichen understood that Wangji and Miss Meifeng had started a committed relationship around the same time of her disappearance, so her absence was a great weight upon him. Looking at the summoned spirit, he said, "Since the souls have responded to your song of Necromancy, Ms. Wei is still missing I assume?" Wangji's silence was his answer as Xichen placed a brotherly hand on the younger Lan brother's shoulder. "Do not be disheartened. You will see her again. She is afterall not the type of woman to be so easily defeated."

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Like all oppressing empires, a rebellion against the Wen's reign of tyranny was coming to a boiling fruition, as any willing to fight for it was welcomed to a joint council to talk of mutiny in the far reaches of the Cloud Recesses in Gusu. All present leaders of the clans, including the formerly missing Jiang Cheng and the leaders of smaller clans, had a reason to agree to the terms given at the round table of justice against all the wrong done to them. At the lead of this battle for freedom were Lan Xichen, Nie Mingjue, and Jin Guangyao, whose prowess in battle had been noteworthy previously before everything had gone downhill.

With the power of numbers behind them, the battle was taken instantly to the Wen clan and Wen Ruohan himself with 8,000 Cultivators behind them in Qishan, taking back settlements that the Wen had taken under their absolute control as they went. In every town they reclaimed, the Wen thugs holding it were wiped out as they enforced rightful justice and pushed further towards the Nightless City. They were of course met with resistance in their plans in the form of heavy attacks both day and night, as well as spies sent to send word of their headquarters. With the situation they were dealt with, their quest to overthrow the Wen often appeared impossible.

Yet, in many of the towns the united clans freed during the course of their campaign, there they too found odd talismans scattered around every building belonging to a high ranking Wen official before they mysteriously perished. Lan Wangji in fact found a multitude of them in one specific town, bringing a single back for inspection as he had initially found them odd before he had discovered their purpose. Instead of working to keep unwanted spirits away, the bloody talisman in fact drew them in with infused life energy; this fact alone was alarming, being that of black sorcery many looked down on for how dangerous it was.