At the third quarter of the Hai hour, Pi Yanlin crouched in the shadows beneath the palace walls, the soles of his shoes scraping against the moss on the bluestone slabs.
He was dressed today in worn-out, gray cloth peasant clothes, a broken-toothed wooden comb tucked into his waistband—a trick taught to him by an old mortician from the Xuan'an Bureau. Palace servants favored using broken combs as identification, and the guards found the sight familiar and non-threatening.
"Third layer of the Breath-Regulating Technique: exhale like a drifting silk thread, inhale like morning dew." He closed his eyes, and when he opened them again, he felt his own breathing become as light as a willow leaf floating on the surface of water.
Chapter 48