Seeking Truth with a Sword

Chapter 423 - 374: Welcoming the Bride

"We must leave."

The brocade-clad elder, whom Pei Jing respectfully called Mr. Wan, pondered for a moment before saying quickly, "When the dead borrow the path, evasion is best."

Just as Sun Xinzhi, a Judge of the garrison, was about to ask where to go, he saw Mr. Wan bring his palms together, the fabric of his brocade clothes rustling loudly as an overwhelming Spiritual Power, centered on his gaunt figure, spread out, permeating every corner of the carriage.

"Rise!" Mr. Wan bellowed, veins bulging slightly on his forehead as he used his formidable Telekinesis to lift the entire carriage, intending to move it off the rails.

The carriage floor tilted upwards, and the hanging oil lamps swayed in response, spilling warm oil onto the ground.

Screams and shouts erupted from the compartments on either side of the corridor. The common sense education they had received from a young age on resisting Aliens spurred them to shake the Heavenly Bell even harder, desperate to dispel the Evil Spirits.

Such powerful Telekinesis...

Li Ang took half a step back, avoiding the waves of discomfort emanating from Mr. Wan due to his release of telekinetic energy.

Moving heavy objects was no great feat. Even Li Ang himself, aided by Mo Si, could physically shake this carriage. But because pressure equals force divided by the area of application, if Li Ang had been the one lifting, the carriage itself would inevitably have been damaged. Mr. Wan, however, could do so effortlessly without harming the passengers.

The carriage began to detach from the tracks bit by bit, gradually levitating above the rails and moving towards the adjacent forest.

SCRAPE!

Suddenly, from the wooden sleepers beneath the rails, countless pale arms shot out, grabbing the wheels and undercarriage firmly. They yanked the nearly detached carriage back down onto the rails with immense force.

BOOM!

The heavy impact twisted and deformed the rails. It also caused the carriage’s wooden floor and doors to fracture repeatedly. Most of the glass windows shattered, allowing the icy night air to pour in.

The passengers’ screams were incessant. Before the five people at the head of the train could react, they saw the bridal procession, which had been more than two hundred steps away, flicker closer like ghosts—one hundred fifty steps, one hundred steps, fifty steps. With every blink, the party of nearly a hundred people flashed nearer, until they stopped just a dozen steps from the carriage.

The sound of drums and music gradually ceased. The men adorned in red wore identical, unnerving, vacant smiles, the flames of their torches flickering in the wind.

Pei Jing, one hand forming a sword technique, stood ready with the Canghai Sword at his waist. He Fanshuang squinted, holding several talismans in her open palm. Sun Xinzhi, a Judge of the garrison, reached into his robes, ready to pull something out at any moment.

Neither side spoke, merely staring at each other in the night wind, motionless, like the dead.

Or perhaps, the word "like" could be omitted.

Li Ang watched the bridal procession, his face expressionless. The smiles of this group seemed carved from the same mold. Their red clothes were too thin and of poor quality, resembling paper effigies. Most crucially, their chests showed no rise or fall; not a single one was breathing...

Inside the carriage, due to the broken doors, some passengers sensed the commotion. They subconsciously poked their heads out and glimpsed the scene before them. Every one of them turned pale with terror, shrinking back into their compartments with mournful faces, desperately shaking the Heavenly Bell. However, it was utterly useless; the truly cunning Aliens were completely unfazed by the sparse ringing.

The bridegroom, encircled by the wedding procession and wearing a red official uniform, grinned and shouted loudly, "Thieves must be beaten, guests must be received! Inform the sisters-in-law to come out and see!"

The expressions of the five at the front of the carriage changed slightly. What the bridegroom in the red official uniform had said was not some bandit’s jargon, but a legitimate, poetic wedding challenge!

Like the long poem recited by the Faith Cultivation Cardinal at Furong Garden on Chinese Valentine’s Day, this was a well-known traditional custom.

In common folk marriage ceremonies, the bridegroom, leading the wedding procession, would openly march to the bride’s home and loudly proclaim, "Thieves must be beaten, guests must be received! Inform the sisters-in-law to come out and see!" The bride’s relatives, in turn, were expected to respond, "Unaware of which distinguished guest arrives, approaching our door late at night? Who is this gentleman from afar, what eminent talent is he? With a spirit so bright and clear, what brings you here?"

Both parties would then take turns reciting, completing the poetic challenge. The man would declare his background, status, and abilities, expressing his admiration for the woman. The woman, in turn, would demonstrate modesty and dignity. Only then could the wedding process proceed.

In Li Ang’s view, this was both a bad custom and, in a way, not. From a societal perspective, the complex and cumbersome wedding procedures were a burden to both parties. In an environment with undeveloped productive forces, such customs helped ensure marital stability and reduce divorce rates—after all, remarrying was incredibly exhausting and troublesome. And from a deeper perspective, this set of wedding customs, passed down from ancient times, seemed, much like the Haotian Bell and Heavenly Bell, to offer the newlyweds a degree of protection from the prying of Evil Spirits.

As for the present situation, this ghostly wedding procession used this ritual to make it clear they hadn’t just coincidentally appeared on the tracks; they were specifically targeting this carriage.

Li Ang, Pei Jing, and Mr. Wan exchanged glances; none of them spoke. Though this hundred-strong wedding party appeared lifeless, with no Spiritual Energy fluctuations, and seemed to pose no threat to the five Cultivators, the Academic Palace and the garrison had far too many cases proving that Aliens did not play by the rules. These Aliens would not follow the myriad "rules" of the Cultivation World, where the Cloud Patrol Realm surpasses the Rain Listening Realm, and the Rain Listening Realm surpasses the Body Concealing Realm.

The power of Aliens was the rule.

Seeing the five remain silent, the bridegroom in the red official uniform maintained his smile and continued, "Indeed, I am a gentleman from Chang’an, from a notable family. Thus, I come to pay my respects, as a token of glory. How fare the sisters-in-law? And how are they in spirit?"

Li Ang and the others’ expressions changed again. In a normal poetic wedding challenge, this line wasn’t meant to state the bridegroom was actually from Chang’an. Instead, it was a way to feign having a Chang’an household, boasting of the groom’s affluent family background to curry favor with the bride’s relatives.

The other party had directly skipped the lines that the bride’s relatives were supposed to ask, "Unaware of which distinguished guest arrives, approaching our door late at night?" forcefully advancing the poetic wedding challenge.

Pei Jing felt his hair stand on end, a chill coursing down his spine. His mind inadvertently flashed back to words once spoken by Doctor Zhang Liang of Alien Study in class— "Many customs you deem ordinary and insignificant are, in fact, experiences accumulated over millennia by people resisting the pervasive influence of Aliens and demons. Behind these customs lies a history stained with the foul blood of countless bizarre deaths—all due to underestimating these entities."

What to do?

Before he could turn to look at the others, the bridegroom in the red official uniform spoke again, at an extremely rapid pace, "Without talent, I have arrived at the exalted gate. Grateful for the inquiries, yet overwhelmed in preparation...

"Hearing your lofty words, I am impelled to seek you out. A gentle and lovely lady is a gentleman’s good match..."

The meaning of these phrases was simply a repeated declaration of love, an earnest plea to the bride’s relatives to show favor and allow the bridegroom to see the bride.

All five were acutely aware that once the poetic challenge concluded, it would signify the bridegroom meeting the bride—the successful culmination of the wedding procession!

The bridegroom and the entire wedding procession were dead, inanimate objects. The "bride" they took would naturally face only death.

Pei Jing’s thoughts raced. While continuing to manifest the Sword Intent of the Canghai Sword, ready to turn hostile at any moment, he desperately racked his brain, recalling the folk studies and Alien Study content taught at the Academic Palace, searching for an escape.

In Alien Study, "the bride" didn’t necessarily refer to a specific woman with an unfulfilled marriage contract; it could also refer to a concept... For example, the lives of everyone in the carriage.