Chapter 104 Tonight's Gathering (III)

　　Said:　　This feeling cannot be dispelled by any plan; sorrow in the mirror.　　The old beauty once wandered about with my youthful days.　　Years later, when we meet again, she is like a startled swan.　　One backward glance, and an old love returns to the heart.　　In the nineteenth year of Kaiyuan (731), the autumn wind was bleak and leaves drifted outside Chang’an. Li Chenghao parted with Li Bai amid tears at the tavern; thereafter Li Bai took his wife Xu and left Chang’an, leaving Li Chenghao alone in the winehouse, his garments rustling. Though Li Chenghao vowed to restore his parents’ honor, his old love would not be forgotten; it shadowed him wherever he went. Recalling the scene when Ye Zhongrong displayed his art — every gesture suffused with immortal bearing — Li Chenghao resolved to find his trail and to ask Zhang Xiao and Xiao Lan about the entanglement of their past and present lives.　　One day the rogue marshal learned where Ye Zhongrong was staying and intended to tell Li Chenghao, but his appetite for battle had not faded: he wanted one more duel with Li Chenghao. When opportunity came, he set out to assail him.　　One rainy, overcast day with fine drizzle, Li Chenghao rested at an inn. The rogue marshal received secret news that Ye Zhongrong had taken lodgings in a secluded valley on the southern slope of Mount Zhongnan. He had meant to inform Li Chenghao but his desire for combat remembered their unfinished duel at Luoyang’s Luoxia Valley and he resolved to renew it. So when Li Chenghao passed through a bamboo grove outside the city, the marshal