“You’re not annoying.”
The ice cellar indeed ran directly beneath the main hall of Tianji Temple.
Following the direction Yu Lin had indicated, Zhang Yao found the hanging ladder. Above it was the ventilation shaft of the ice cellar. The top was covered only by a wooden lid that hadn’t been sealed shut. Zhang Yao lifted the lid, and loose dirt immediately rained down onto him. At the same time, a nauseating burnt stench rushed into his face, surging through the ventilation shaft and into the ice cellar. Before long, even Yu Lin and the Fire Brigade soldiers beneath the Bodhi Pagoda smelled it.
“This is…”
It was unmistakably the smell of burned corpses. The Fire Brigade soldiers, who had spent half their lives dealing with fire, all changed expression at once.
Yu Lin’s heart sank. Unable to help herself, she shouted into the cellar, “Zhang Yao!”
There was no response.
Taking a deep breath, Yu Lin was about to climb down when Zhang Yao’s voice finally came.
“You don’t need to come up here.”
“What did you say?”
Zhang Yao was silent for a long while before replying.
“There’s only one living person. Everyone else is dead.”
The moment he finished speaking, a tremendous crash sounded ahead of him.
The Guanyin Hall, already burned down to little more than a skeletal frame, suddenly collapsed before his eyes. Blackened ash and charred wood rose into the night sky, drifting upward as they swirled through the air.
The ruined debris continued to burn fiercely. Amid the flames, countless scorched bodies could be vaguely seen.
There were no screams.
No groans.
Other than the constant crackling and popping of the fire, all was silent.
Even Zhang Yao, who had long since become indifferent to life and death, frowned at the sight.
As for the so-called survivor, she was lying beside the ventilation shaft. Both her hands were burned beyond recognition, as though she had desperately dug through a blazing inferno with them.
Zhang Yao crouched down and brushed the hair from her face.
Only then did he discover that she was a young woman.
The voice of a Fire Brigade soldier came from the direction of the ice cellar.
“Commander Zhang! Hurry over! The wind’s changing!”
Zhang Yao turned his head and looked.
Sure enough, the direction of the flames had shifted. The meditation quarters behind the Guanyin Hall had already caught fire, and the burning heat against his skin was becoming increasingly intense.
“Commander Zhang! Quickly!”
The voice came again from the entrance to the ice cellar.
“The fire from the main hall is spreading toward the Bodhi Pagoda!”
Giving the blazing ruins of the Guanyin Hall one final glance, Zhang Yao lifted the woman from the ground and climbed down the hanging ladder.
Beneath the Bodhi Pagoda, Yu Lin had already lit a fire starter to guide him.
“Are you carrying someone?”
“Yes.”
Zhang Yao answered, “A young woman. She’s still barely breathing.”
The Fire Brigade soldiers immediately reached out to help and pulled the woman down.
The group withdrew from the temple grounds and arrived at the open space before the ceremonial archway. Wang Chong had also brought men from the Five Cities Military Command and surrounded the area.
The Fire Brigade laid the woman flat beneath the archway.
Yu Lin crouched beside her and brushed away her tangled hair.
With a single glance, she recognized her.
The woman was Madam Liu’s daughter—Liu Yinglian.
The young woman’s breathing was already weak and faint. Enduring the pain in her own hands, Yu Lin loosened the front of Liu Yinglian’s clothing.
At once, Zhang Yao turned around and stepped in front of them, shouting loudly,
“Back up! Leave the wind path clear!”
The crowd immediately retreated.
Facing into the wind, Yu Lin knelt and let Liu Yinglian rest her head on her lap.
The wind had shifted. Moist air blew from the southern moat, lifting Yu Lin’s disheveled hair.
She lowered her head and repeatedly called Liu Yinglian’s name.
Yet Liu Yinglian’s chest still showed no sign of rising or falling.
Almost unconsciously, Yu Lin turned around and looked at Zhang Yao, who stood about ten feet away.
Zhang Yao opened his mouth.
“Out of ideas?”
Choking back tears, Yu Lin nodded.
Zhang Yao stepped forward a few paces and glanced sideways at Liu Yinglian.
“Both sides of the ears. The Shenmen acupoint. Can you find it?”
Yu Lin hurriedly brushed aside Liu Yinglian’s hair. Then she pulled a hairpin from Liu Yinglian’s head and stabbed it into the Shenmen acupoint near her ear.
Liu Yinglian’s brows tightened.
She coughed violently.
At last, her eyes slowly opened.
The moment she saw Yu Lin, her emotions erupted.
Struggling desperately, she tried to grab hold of her.
But she had forgotten that her hands were burned so badly that not a patch of healthy skin remained.
The instant her fingers touched Yu Lin’s body, the piercing agony nearly drove her mad. She almost collapsed from the pain.
Yu Lin desperately steadied her and said,
“Yinglian, it’s alright now. Don’t move yet. Your hands—put your hands down.”
Zhang Yao showed no concern whatsoever for the miserable state of the woman before him.
Lifting his robe, he crouched down and addressed Liu Yinglian.
“Listen carefully. Everyone behind the main hall died inside the Guanyin Hall. You’re the only survivor. That isn’t normal. The fact that you survived is definitely no coincidence either.”
His gaze sharpened.
“Tell me. How did the Guanyin Hall catch fire?”
Liu Yinglian’s lips moved.
She seemed to want to say something to Yu Lin.
Yet not a single sound emerged from her throat.
Zhang Yao grabbed her chin.
“Burned your voice out?”
“She can’t speak.”
Zhang Yao froze and looked toward Yu Lin.
Yu Lin’s eyes were slightly red.
“She’s mute.”
Zhang Yao released Liu Yinglian and stood up with folded arms.
“Then write it.”
The moment those words were spoken, both of them looked toward Liu Yinglian’s hands.
Only a few scraps of flesh remained visible on them.
There wasn’t a single place she could touch without agony.
Yu Lin pressed her lips together and said nothing.
Shaking his head, Zhang Yao looked toward the burning temple behind them.
“You saved her for nothing.”
Yu Lin closed her eyes.
Although she still didn’t know exactly what had happened inside the Guanyin Hall, she understood perfectly what Zhang Yao meant.
The Guanyin Hall had caught fire, reducing Tianji Temple to ashes.
Of everyone inside the hall, only one mute woman had survived.
She couldn’t speak in her own defense.
Her hands were burned so badly that she couldn’t even write a statement.
A person like her was no different from a blank sheet of paper.
She could be spread out before the court and have any crime written onto her.
Arson.
Murder.
Destroying a temple.
Crimes that should have been shared by countless people could now all be placed upon her shoulders alone.
To Zhang Yao, she truly could be that “one person whose death saves a hundred.”
Sure enough, once Zhang Yao finished speaking, the other Fire Brigade soldiers gathered around.
Liu Yinglian stared at the people before her in terror, desperately trying to communicate something.
Yet apart from a few hoarse, indistinct sounds emerging from her nose and throat, she could make no other noise.
“She can’t talk?”
“Looks like… that’s right.”
The crowd fell silent for a moment.
Then suddenly someone shouted from within the group,
“Then… then she must have started the fire!”
Immediately another voice followed.
“That’s right! She started it! Look—she still has lamp oil on her!”
The moment those two statements were made, the Fire Brigade soldiers became agitated.
Their voices grew louder and louder.
Two of them rushed forward and knelt before Wang Chong.
“Commander Wang! Around Mid-Autumn there were several torrential rainstorms. The entire city of Liangjing was soaked through. There’s no way Tianji Temple could have suddenly caught fire! And even if it did, it couldn’t possibly have burned this badly in only half an hour!”
“There must have been arson!”
“For all we know, she even splashed lamp oil throughout the main hall!”
Wang Chong glanced at Zhang Yao and was about to speak.
But before he could, another man grabbed his leg.
The man was already crying.
“Commander Wang! We did everything we could to fight the fire! But if someone deliberately set it and poured lamp oil everywhere, how could we possibly stop it?”
“Tianji Temple ended up like this not because we failed to respond in time!”
“We… we…”
“We’ve been wronged too!”
Listening to these accusations, Liu Yinglian struggled to sit up.
Facing the Fire Brigade soldiers, she knelt and desperately waved her horribly burned hands, trying to explain.
But none of them would even look directly at her.
They simply continued crying out their grievances to Zhang Yao and Wang Chong.
Watching the scene unfold before her, Liu Yinglian finally stopped struggling.
Her hands slowly dropped.
She looked once more toward the burning temple.
Then silently turned toward Yu Lin.
She could not speak.
Her face was covered in tears and filled with despair.
Looking at that face—so strikingly similar to Madam Liu’s—Yu Lin remembered the words Madam Liu had spoken to her at the execution grounds.
“Women cannot save women.”
Those words were truly discouraging.
But Yu Lin refused to accept them.
“I’ll help you.”
Hearing those words, Liu Yinglian bit her lip and shook her head through her tears.
Yu Lin shifted forward on her knees and caught hold of Liu Yinglian’s trembling body.
Softly, she said,
“Don’t cry. And don’t lose hope. I’ll definitely help you.”
“How?”
The question came from Zhang Yao.
He stood beside Yu Lin.
The firelight cast his shadow across her body, carrying with it an almost invisible sense of pressure.
Yu Lin remained silent.
Liu Yinglian looked up at her and shook her head again.
“You’re about to do something that annoys everyone once more, aren’t you?”
Zhang Yao chuckled.
That laugh finally drew out the bitter smile Yu Lin had been suppressing.
She raised her dirt-stained hand and wiped her face.
“You think I’m annoying too?”
Holding Liu Yinglian close, Yu Lin looked up and asked him.
Yet the moment she spoke those words, her heart felt as cold as an ice cave.
She was no longer the Vice Minister of Justice.
Before her “death,” she could stake her life on a gamble to win legal protection for herself and the female prisoners of the Ministry of Justice prison.
Now she had fallen into slave status.
Yet she still wanted to fight for others, still wanted to seek that tiny fragment of so-called justice that everyone else considered insignificant.
It was like a praying mantis trying to stop a chariot.
People would probably see her as both pitiful and hateful.
But she had always been that kind of person.
Difficult.
Stubborn.
Unwilling to accept fate.
“I don’t.”
Zhang Yao shifted to one side.
The shadow pressing down upon her quietly moved away as well.
His voice was calm and indifferent.
“But since you want to live so badly, you should stay away from fires.”
“Stay away from people doomed to short lives.”
Yu Lin supported Liu Yinglian’s body and replied,
“But I don’t think that way. Whenever something happens, I always want to ask one question.”
“‘Why?'”
The moment she finished speaking, she felt Liu Yinglian’s elbow lightly bump against her ribs.
Looking down, Yu Lin saw Liu Yinglian pressing her lips tightly together, forcing a faint smile toward her.
Then she slowly raised her right hand.
Only then did Yu Lin realize that Liu Yinglian had been keeping her right hand clenched into a fist the entire time.
Now the burned flesh had fused together, making it impossible to open.
“What’s wrong?” Yu Lin asked. “Does it hurt?”
Liu Yinglian shook her head.
Her gaze remained fixed on her right hand.
A few muffled urging sounds escaped her throat.
Zhang Yao crouched down and used the handle of his knife to support her arm.
“She’s holding something in her hand.”
The moment Liu Yinglian heard that, she nodded frantically at Yu Lin.
Zhang Yao looked at her.
“You want to give it to her?”
Liu Yinglian continued nodding.
Zhang Yao turned back to Yu Lin.
“You don’t dare pry her hand open?”
Yu Lin did not answer.
The truth was that she simply couldn’t bear to do it.
Seeing this, Zhang Yao asked no further questions.
He turned to Liu Yinglian instead.
“Endure it.”
A hoarse scream of agony entered Yu Lin’s ears.
Then a stone fell from Liu Yinglian’s hand and rolled to a stop beside Yu Lin’s knee.