Da Tang Shuang Long Zhuan Volume 13 Chapter 4 part2

While gobbling up the food, Kou Zhong laughed and said, "Who could have thought that that Ba kid is such a true friend; it is really unexpected.”

Heaving a deep sigh, Xu Ziling said, "We have not found Yucheng and the others; aren't you worried?”

Kou Zhong put down his bowl, empty with no single rice remained, and said with a wry smile, "In this kind of thing, worrying is not worth a fart. Fortunately the four of them have received our hand-down teachings, so the Heaven helps the worthy. Who knows, perhaps as soon as we go down the stairs, we'll see them eating. Let us go to the agreed meeting place and then the outcome will become apparent.”

Xu Ziling said, "Do you remember that man called Xu Xingzhi? Didn't you agree to meet him in Luoyang?”

Kou Zhong nodded, "Of course I do,” he replied, "This man is a natural talent in commanding the army. I already left some markings at the appointed place. When he sees it tomorrow morning, he will be waiting for me at the specified place. Let me, Zhong Shao, do the work, and you, Ling Shao, set your heart at ease.”

And then he added, "I have neither likes nor dislikes toward that Li kid, so fighting him face to face is not a big deal. But we have been brothers with Li Jing; this is what gives me headache.”

Xu Ziling was silent for half a day. He quietly thought that whatever resentment he had against Li Jing, in the end it would be difficult for him to have any malicious intention toward him. Thereupon he said dejectedly, "As long as you promise me one thing, I will help you get the Jade Annulus of the He Clan wholeheartedly.”

"As long as it is reasonable and fair, how could I not promise you?” Kou Zhong guardedly replied, "You just have to help me in this. If Li kid can't even defend the Jade Annulus of He Clan, it would greatly change Shi Feixuan and Ning Daoqi's impression on him.”

"You must never underestimate the enemy,” Xu Ziling crossly said, "Li kid is well versed in both literature and martial art [or civil and military]. No matter how you look at it, he is superior to us, not inferior. It's just that he falls short of you in the craftiness department. Once we are not careful, the boat will capsize in the ditch.”

Kou Zhong smiled and said, "He is as cunning as I am, but it is possible that he is not as flexible and pragmatic as us. We need to be intentionally unintentional. Especially since this is Wang Shichong's territory. Currently Wang Shichong and me are like honey to the bee. I only need to move a finger, Li kid may forget of leaving Luoyang alive.”

And then his eyes flashed a deep, cold murderous intent, as he spoke in heavy voice, "Li Clan without Li Shimin is just like a tiger without sharp claw, sharp teeth; any viciousness is gone. Do you understand?”

Forcing a smile, Xu Ziling said, "That is precisely my condition. Li kid exposed his whereabouts because of me, so you must not use this opportunity to kill him. If you want to kill him, you must wait for the next opportunity.”

Kou Zhong was stunned for half a day. Finally he sighed and said, "One lifetime two brothers; what can I say? Very well! I will face him on the battlefield in the future; whoever lose will have nobody to blame.”

And then he took out a roll of silk map from his bosom, removed the bowls, chopsticks and other things away from the table, and spread out the map, saying, "I'll let you take a look at this treasure. If after reaching Guanzhong, Zhanliang, Fengyi and the others are able to give me a sheet of similar thingy, nothing could be better than that.”

Ban Zhanliang, Niu Fengyi, and Zha Jie, three men were the three Inner Hall Masters of the Shuanglong Bang [twin-dragon gang, Book 6 Chapter 12, only it was ‘Gao Zhandao, not Ban Zhanliang] that they established. According to plan, they ought to precede the two boys going to Chang'an in secret, to do the preparatory work in digging out the ‘Duke Yang's Treasure' later.

Taking a closer look, Xu Ziling saw that it was the map of Luoyang City, complete with the streets, squares, rivers and bridges, city gate towers, and everything else depicted in detail.

Astounded, he said, "Wang Shichong really trusts you.”

Smiling, Kou Zhong said, "It's not that he trusts me, but he is showing trust in order to buy me, and I pretend to love Dong Shuni deeply. Actually, on the surface this man Wang Shichong looks naïve and honest, but he is a wily old fox. What he shows on the surface, quite another is in his heart. He is capable of not making neither movement nor noise, and then only after everything is arranged will he let you know what's going on.”

Xu Ziling examined the relationship between the Palace City and the Imperial City with rapt attention. His heart moved, he said, "Li Shimin came to Luoyang this time, could he have other reason than for the Jade Annulus of the He Clan affair? Do you remember that Ol' Ba once said that Li kid's old man Li Yuan wanted to get Dong Shuni as his imperial concubine? If this matter succeeded, it would be like Li Yuan and Wang Shichong are forming an alliance. Your ‘counting one's chicken before they are hatched' plan of using Wang Shichong to deal with Li Shimin will misfire!”

Kou Zhong laughed and said, "Don't worry! For this chick, Dong Shuni, rebelling has become second nature. Every time Wang Shichong arranged any man for her, she always refuses to accept. If I can exploit her mentality, maybe I can destroy the relationship between Li Yuan and Wang Shichong.”

And then, thinking out loud he muttered, "How can we steal the Jade Annulus of the He Clan without anybody knowing that we do it? Ha! I got it! I almost forget that you are the Scarface Hero, and I am your sidekick, the Pockmarked Face Bandit.”

‘Knock! Knock!'

Startled, the two boys looked at the door. They were greatly alarmed; just from the fact that even though this person was just behind the door, yet he still managed to hide from the two boys' ears, they knew that this person was by no means ordinary.

"Please come in!” Kou Zhong shouted.

There was no reaction from the outside at all.

Kou Zhong sprang up, darted toward the door and pulled the door open.

Immediately the sound of people drinking, laughing and playing finger-guessing game flooded into their ears like a rushing tide, but they did not see anybody, not even a waiter, either outside the door or along the corridor.

Koo Zhong withdrew, stuck his big head out and looked left and right, and closed the door. His countenance changed, he said, "This is bad!”

Xu Ziling was frightened as well; he spoke in heavy voice, "Could it be Ning Daoqi or Shi Feixuan was standing outside the door, eavesdropping our conversation?”

Returning to his side and sitting down, Kou Zhong blew out a mouthful of cold air and said, "I think we can relax. Ay! I am only talking about he is eavesdropping outside the door. Because there are people coming and going along the corridor all the time, only a moment ago there was no one, so he took the opportunity to warn us. Obviously he has been watching us for a while.”

Xu Ziling could not help his scalp from tingling; he said in low voice, "This person, at least in term of qinggong, is superior to us. Problem is if the opposite party is either Shi Feixuan or Ning Daoqi, your grand plan to steal the treasure is destined to fail.”

Shaking his head, Kou Zhong said, "I can guarantee that this person could not hear us. Because with you, Ling Shao, in here, nobody can evade your keen intuition. Secondly, the doors of this restaurant are of very high quality, it has high degree of sound-proofing property, plus we deliberately talked in low voice …”

‘Knock! Knock!'

The door was knocked again. Just like before, there was no other sound, not even footsteps.

Kou Zhong whispered in Xu Ziling's ear, "Only by using the ‘win by a surprise move' tactic will we be able to regain the initiative and can't be led by the nose by others. Hey! How about pretending to be cowards?”

Xu Ziling's mind was interlinked with Kou Zhong's. After exchanging glances, they put down some silver and folded back the silk map. Laughing aloud, like a wisp of smoke the two boys disappeared via the window. First, they leaped up onto the roof, and then traversed the more-than-ten-zhang of empty space, and landed in an alley by the bridge, which was crowded with residential buildings. With several leaps, up and down, they were already far away from the restaurant.

This moment, a ‘thousand-beauty, hundred-charm', petite and nimble, young girl appeared on the roof. Staring hatefully at the direction the two boys disappeared, she stomped her feet, gnashed her teeth and said, "I want to see where can you flee? The moment the Jade Annulus of He Clan falls into your hands is the moment you are going to die.”

Kou Zhong took Xu Ziling to a multi-story building on which door was carved ‘Luoyang Square', three characters [luo yang fang]. Behind the building was precisely the Luo River, which cut across the City of Luoyang from west to east.

Very proud of himself, Kou Zhong said, "This time I am confident that the opponent would not be able to follow us. In my opinion, the person knocking the door was definitely not Shi Feixuan or Ning Daoqi, because they are followers of Dhyana [Zen] Way, who are particular about ‘touching something and leave it there'; how could they do such a lowly deed like knocking on our door twice?”

Xu Ziling nodded in agreement, "But still,” he commented, "This person is definitely not an easy opponent. The most difficult to deal with is that we do not even know whether this person is a man or a woman. He is hidden in the dark while we are completely exposed, hence we are absolutely at his mercy.”

Reaching out, Kou Zhong put his hand on Xu Ziling's shoulder and said with a giggle, "We were using the technique Ol' Ba taught us, dodging to the left and fleeing to the right in downtown area for more than half a sichen, if we still cannot throw him off, we, two brothers, could only accept misfortunes as decreed by fate!”

The two boys entered the long and narrow alley. Frowning, Xu Ziling asked, "Where are you taking me?”

"Home, of course!” Kou Zhong replied cheerfully.

Xu Ziling was stunned, "Home?” he asked.

While walking along, Kou Zhong focused his attention to listen to any movement in the houses on both sides of the alley. Giggling, he said, "The two of us are the Bangzhu [gang leader] of the Shuanglong Bang; how could we not have even one secret lair? Ha! Right! In here! Come in, please!”

Xu Ziling's eyes followed Kou Zhong, who was jumping over the wall and entered in, absentmindedly before it dawned on him.

Before the two boys and Gao Zhanliang [sic] and the others separately went up north, Kou Zhong and their subordinates had a discussion for a number of days, naturally one of the topic was setting up this hideout inside the city of Luoyang. And Kou Zhong must have seen secret markings left by Gao Zhanliang and the others, which indicated the direction and location of this address, hence he was able to find this place.

Thinking to this point, Xu Ziling could not help admiring Kou Zhong's meticulous planning and attention to details. The biggest advantage of this secret hideout was to let the gang people know where to meet when they went to Luoyang.

Kou Zhong sat comfortably in a high-backed chair; raising his arms and sticking out his legs, he had a big stretch and said with a sigh, "This house is not bad!”

Sitting down across Kou Zhong, Xu Ziling looked out the window, at the small courtyard under the bright sunlight. "How come I can't see even a speck of dust in this house?” he asked in astonishment, "Everything is clean and tidy, even the flowers and plants in the yard are neatly trimmed. Who's taking care of it?”

Acting as if everything was as it should be, Kou Zhong said, "Don't think that Zhanliang is just a boor; the fact is, he is extremely attentive. Only by doing this others won't suspect anything. My guess is he's hired people to clean it up on a regular basis; perhaps every three days, once every six days.”

Shaking his head, Xu Ziling said, "I still feel that something is not right.”

Right this moment, an alarm went off in the two boys' hearts at the same time.

Wanwan's soft and deep voice rang out from outside the door, "Ziling guessed correctly! Since I had nothing to do while waiting for you, I became edgy and cleaned up the house to pass the time!”

The two boys' countenance changed immediately.

[Translator's note: Huang Yi messed up names quite often. This time the original was ‘guan-guan'; however, since she was an important character, I decided to keep the name ‘Wanwan'.]

Chapter end