#save the circle in dao. it’s an impossible situation to do right in

[villainanders]

One thing is that for all the times Irving used his influence to protect Anders there were even more times he didn’t protect apprentices he was either less personally invested in or that he didn’t think had talent that was worth investing in. At least on some level Anders is very aware that is survival in the Circle has been hinged on one authority figure finding him likeable and/or useful

[wenqtranslations]

Mo Dao Zu Shi 魔道祖师 - Chapter 7

魔道祖师 Translation Project by 杨文秋 （为了学读中文 )

So I realised there were several versions of the novel floating around. So far, I’ve been reading (and translating) the old version -- but after skimming through the revised one, I think I like it better. Probably because the author went back and did some more foreshadowing. This chapter is half from the old version, and half from the new version. I’ll be continuing with the newer version from here on.

Chapter 7

Jiang Chen soon suppressed his enmity.  

Though he was hardly pleased, he was a sect leader. He could not behave like that hot-headed youth Jin Ling.

Ever since the fall of QingHeNie sect, the cultivator society was supported by the tripod of three big families. The sect leaders of Jin and Lan families were close friends and together, they dominated YunMengJiang sect. Of the three families, YunMengJiang sect stood alone. Though Lan Zhan wasn’t the sect leader of the Lan family, he was a distinguished cultivator, held in high esteem, had close relations with his family leader. If he could avoid tearing these relations, then he’d avoid it if he could.

Jiang Chen’s sword “San Du” [TN: Three Poisons 三毒] and Lan Zhan’s sword “Bi Chen” [TN: avoid dust/earth避尘] had never seriously crossed blades before, no one knew in whose hands the deer would fall. Though Jiang Chen had that protective item “Zi Dian” [TN: purple lightning], Lan Zhan had his “Wang Ji” [TN: free of worldly concerns] zither of similar repute. Jiang Cheng could not tolerate being caught in the tail-wind, disadvantaged. Unable to fully grasp a situation, he’d never make a brash move.

He slowly removed that left hand from his ring.

It seemed like Lan WangJi was determined to interfere. It would be inconvenient to continued being the bad guy. He’d make a note, for now. There would be plenty of opportunity to collect this debt later. Jiang Chen weighed the matter, turned and regarded Jin Ling’s fuming expression. “HanGuang-Jun wants to penalise you: receive his teaching this time. Managing the juniors of other families is no easy matter.” he said, contemptuous.

Lan WangJi never spoke impulsively. He seemed to not have heard him.

His tone bristling, Jiang Chen retorted, “Why are you still standing here, you waiting for that spirit-eating beast to stick itself on your sword? If you can’t catch it, after today don’t think to find me anymore!”

Jin Ling glared at Wei WuXian but didn’t have the nerve to glare at Lan WangJi. He sheathed his sword, bowed stiffly to his two seniors and retreated with bow in hand. Lan SiZhui said, “Master Jiang, GuSuLann sect will repay you in full for destroying the spirit binding nets.”

Jiang Cheng gave a cold laugh. “No need.” He chose the opposite direction and started down the mountain. His underlings mutely followed him, long-faced. In their heart knew they couldn’t avoid a disciplining.

Waiting until their silhouettes disappeared, Lan JingYi grumbled, “Master Jiang -- this person!” then remembered the Lan family’s teachings and the person standing silently behind him. He shot an alarmed look at HanGuang-Jun, shut his mouth and shrank back.

Lan SiZhui gave Wei WuXian a faint smile. “Son of Mo, we meet again.”

Wei WuXian pulled up the corners of his lips in response.

Lan WangJi spoke, command simple and direct. “Go back to work.”

The many juniors were reminded of their mission on DaFan mountain. Their attention focused, waiting for the rest of HanGuang-Jun’s command. LanWangJi continued, “Do your best. Stay within your limits.”

His voice was both low and magnetic. Hearing it any closer, would surely make a listener’s heart tremble. All the juniors chorused an affirmative. Not daring to linger, they set off towards the depths of the mountain forest. Wei WuXian knew Jiang Chen and Lan Zhan were indeed two opposite personalities – even their commands were delivered in sharply opposite way. Lan WangJi gave him a small nod. He could only respond with a blank stare.

From a young age, Lan Zhan’s behaviour was so proper it gave people a toothache. He wore his face solemn like a wooden board, as if there had never been a lively time in his life. Whenever they’d touched upon the subject of Wei WuXian’s cultivation path, he’d look as if he had sand in his eyes. Lan SiZhui would have already told him about what happened in the Mo household. He should know he practiced the demonic path, yet still nodded in greeting. Probably to thank him for helping untangle the Lan family from that mess. This courtesy was rarely something Wei WuXian received. Gratefully, he returned the act, but when he next raised his head, Lan WangJi had already vanished.

After a pause, he also went down the mountain.

He couldn’t take the kill. He would not snatch it from Jin Ling.

That it turned out to be Jin Ling.

LanLingJin sect had many disciples, yet he met Jin Ling. If he knew, would he mock him “a mother to birth you, no mother to raise you”? If it was someone else who said this to Jin Ling, he would let this person experience first-hand what troubles issued from a loose tongue. Except the one who said it, was him.

He stood quietly a while. Then, Wei WuXian raised his hand and slapped himself soundly across the ears.

He swayed. The slap was full of strength, his right cheek burned. From the corner of his eyes he noticed the donkey. He put down his hand, and the donkey ambled over. Wei WuXian pulled at its long ears and laughed bitterly, “You wanted to be the hero and save the damsel but made me do the act instead!”

The donkey groaned. Upon reaching the foot of the mountain slope, a cultivator walked towards them. Four hundred or so spirit binding nets had been destroyed in one sweep of Lan WangJi’s sword. The disciples loitering near Buddha-Foot Town were coming up again. Wei WuXian entertained the thought of chasing them back down, but eventually stepped aside and cleared a path.

This crowd of disciples walked and grumbled among themselves.

“This little Jin son. Jin family and Jiang family both spoil him like that,  he’s already so bossy at this young age. If you let him take over LanLingJin sect in the future, the cultivation society’s going to overturn the heavens! We may as well not live!”

Wei WuXian slowed his pace.

A tender-hearted female cultivator ventured, “Jin family and Jiang Chen, how can they not spoil him? Both his mother and father passed away at such a young age and he barely escaped with his life. He lived, but lost so much.”

“So what if his parents are dead, many people’s parents are dead. Imagine if everyone turned out like him, it’d be terrible!”

“Really, how could Wei WuXian do this. Jin Ling’s mother was his fellow disciple and Jiang Chen’s older sibling. She was like a sister to him when they were younger.”

“Jiang YanLi was also wronged, raising this traitorous wolf. Jin ZiXuan was another tragedy. Dying in such an awful way, just because he’d entangled with WeiWuXian in the past.”

“How come Wei WuXian was mixed up with everybody…”

“That’s exactly right. Apart from that rabid dog he keeps, have you heard he had good relations with anything else? Families that loathe him are everywhere, people are angry, heaven is angry. Even he and HanGuang-Jun look at each other with mutual hate, like fire and water.”

“With that said, HanGuang-Jun sure saved us today …”

After walking a distance, suddenly the bubbling noise of a creek entered Wei WuXian’s hearing.

This was a sound he hadn’t heard on the way here. Wei WuXian realised he’d went down a different fork.

Leading the donkey, he walked to the side of the creek. Above the bank, the sky was clear of leaves and branches. The moon touched the creek’s frost cracked surface. Wei WuXian peered at his rippling reflection.

Suddenly, he savagely slammed the water, shattering this leering clown face. Raised a dripping hand, he washed off his makeup.

A handsome young man appeared in the waves. As if he’d been cleansed by the moonlight, he appeared bright eyed, relaxed brows, his mouth a gentle curve. Head bowed in concentration, around his eyes clung water droplets like suspended tears.

It was a young face. A stranger’s face. Not the heaven inverting, bloodied wind inducing YiLing Patriach Wei WuXian.

He stared at this face for a long time. Wei WuXian gave it a wipe, rubbed his eyes, and sat heavily on the bank.

It wasn’t that he couldn’t endure denouncement. In the past, he’d been clear about his choice. What he would face from today, his heart was well warned: remembering YunMengJiang sect’s teaching --- “to know the impossible and persevere”.

Only -- he’d thought his heart was an unyielding rock, but It turned out to be human after all.

The donkey seemed to know he was in a bad mood. Quietly, without that impatient braying, it waved its tail and left. Wei WuXian sat by the creek bank and didn’t react. The donkey looked back, stamped its hoof. Wei WuXian ignored it. The donkey trotted back in a huff, used its teeth to bite the lapel of Wei WuXian’s robe, tugging.

He didn’t care to leave or stay. But since he’d been bitten already, Wei WuXian let himself be pulled away. That donkey lead him underneath a copse of trees and circled a patch of grass. A ripped golden net hung, and below it, a sealing pouch rested in the shrubbery. It’d certainly fell from the possession of some unfortunate cultivator who’d struggled free from the net. Wei WuXian picked up the pouch and opened it. Inside was a good assortment of items: medicinal gourd, talismans, demon mirror and the ilk.

He rummaged a while and picked up a talisman at random. A tongue of flame flickered to life.

A Shade-Flame Talisman was burning. As the name implied, it used shade-energy as fuel, it would automatically ignite in the presence of shade energy. If the shade energy was dense, it would burn more ferociously. It burned as soon as it was taken out, meaning a spirit was not far from Wei WuXian.

Seeing the fire light, Wei WuXian was on his guard. He lifted the talisman and swept around him. Turning to the east, the flame dimmed. Turning to the west, the flame shot up. He walked a few steps towards this direction and saw a hunched white silhouette appear underneath a tree.

Wei WuXian approached slowly. The muttering of the old spirit grew clearer.

“It hurts, it hurts.”

Wei WuXian asked, “Where does it hurt?”

That old one groaned, “My head, my head.”

Wei WuXian said, “Let me see.”

He went closer to one side of the old one, and saw a large, blood-red hole on his forehead. This was a dead spirit, likely to have been murdered by someone smashing their head in. He wore burial clothes, made of expensive material and craftsmanship. He must have already undergone the necessary rites and been placed to rest into the grave. It wasn’t the lost spirit of a living person.

However, this sort of dead spirit should not appear on DaFan Mountain.

Wei WuXian knew it was not good news. He jumped onto the donkey’s back, with a slap and a shout, spurred it towards where Jin Ling had gone into the mountain.

Many cultivators were gathered near the old graveyard, like waiting for a rabbit near a treestump *. Some people bravely hoisted spirit-summoning flags, but only succeeded in summoning a group of wailing spirits prostrating themselves on the ground. Wei WuXian pulled the donkey to a stop, swept the scene. He asked in a ringing voice, “Excuse me, answer me something. Those sons of the Jin family and Lan family, where did they go?”

Without the makeup on his face, people were willing to answer at last. A disciple replied, “They left this place and went to the Heavenly Woman’s shrine.”

Wei WuXian repeated, “Heavenly Woman Shrine?”

That group of scattered, rural families, having heard the nets had been destroyed, had snuck up again. The middle-aged man, upon seeing the clothing and that bucktoothed mule, realised it was the lunatic who’d saved them early. Embarrassed, he pretending nothing was wrong. That round-faced young girl pointed the road. “That way. It’s one of the shrines in the rock grotto.”

Wei WuXian asked, “What entity does it pay homage to?”

The round-faced girl said, “I think … I think it’s a naturally formed Heavenly Woman deity.”

Wei WuXian nodded. “Many thanks.”

At once, like a surge of flame, he rushed towards the Heavenly Woman shrine.

A lazy man taking a wife, thunder uncovering a coffin, a man mauled by wolves, a father and daughter losing their spirits each after the other, burial clothes of high quality … these were beads to be strung into a complete string. No wonder the demonic compass could not point a direction, the spirit summoning flag would be of even less use. They’d all underestimated the thing on DaFan Mountain.

It was not what they thought it was!

   *I think this was the story where a farmer found rabbits near a treestump several days in a row. So he dropped everything he was doing and decided to wait near the treestump for rabbits – but of course the few first times was a fluke. No more rabbits appeared. So the moral of the story is: don’t be that farmer, seek out your own opportunities instead of trusting to chance!