The stench spread through that place. She Wanlin wanted to leave, but Yangdan wouldn’t move at all — couldn’t pull him up, couldn’t drag him either. He was like a sharp stone jutting from the ground that you meant to pick up, only to discover it was actually the peak of a mountain.

She Wanlin felt sorrow in his heart too, unwilling to accept Little Bao’s death. He was the young master of the Fuyui Commandery Prince’s estate — since birth, whatever he’d wanted, he’d never lacked.

And now, having exerted such tremendous effort, he still couldn’t save one small friend? He suddenly felt that he was, in truth, nothing at all.

He couldn’t stop the wandering souls of the martial world who sought death on the Three Rivers, couldn’t give the corvée laborers of the Three Rivers a warm winter, couldn’t shelter one small tea plantation — he couldn’t even save Yangdan’s heart.

Yangdan was, perhaps, shattered just like Little Bao!

Setting aside his intent to leave for now, he quietly sat down cross-legged, waiting for Yangdan to calm down before departing this place.

He felt that everything he’d ever read, every skill he’d ever learned, wasn’t enough to explain what he’d witnessed tonight.

In all his more than ten years of life, everyone had been kind, everyone had liked showing him only their best side.

His grandmother, at home, would recite a sutra of deliverance even just for eating a river fish — even in her muddled state she feared retribution, feared that in hell someone would settle the full account with her.

Didn’t these people fear the same?

By the looks of it, they didn’t.

Not far from the high platform, on top of the main camp’s palisade, a spiked stake held seven or eight corpses, some fresh, some old, the stench overpowering.

Though his grandfather had often taken him to the Ministry of Justice’s prison, to hear court hearings, to watch beheadings, even to witness slow slicing, there’d always been one simple premise there — those people were bad people, they’d broken the law, committed crimes the law wouldn’t tolerate, and so had to die. That was the rule of the human world.

Even the young man he’d met on the river, whose death was tied up in feuds of the martial world — that, he could accept.

But why did Zhang Yongbao have to die? It didn’t make sense.

Zhang Yongbao’s life had been simple and harmless. He walked so timidly he didn’t dare set his feet down firmly, afraid even of stepping on an ant.

He never dared provoke anyone — so who could possibly bully him?

Below, the soldier grew angrier the more he spoke, and leapt down from the high platform, raising his whip to torment those who couldn’t fight back.

She Wanlin felt his ears ringing, his eyes seeing nothing of the world but darkness, the only light coming from below, the bonfire lighting up Zhang Yongbao’s face, swaying left and right, eyes open, as if still alive.

Sensing all the people tied to iron stakes in the middle of the grounds, that boyish admiration She Wanlin had once held for Old Chou instantly turned to ash, then gathered again into grief and fury.

Could it be that his own father had once gone through something like this too? After all, he and Yangdan came from the same place, learned the same things.

Had his own father been humiliated like this too, treated like a dog — no, even a dog had the dignity to bite back, any animal pushed far enough should still have the spirit to feel rage.

But the man now called Old Chou — what the Tan family had stripped from them first was precisely that spirit of rage. The Tan family was raising vicious ghosts.

And his father — when had he gone from ghost back to human?

No wonder, when he was little, he’d proudly told his father he’d grow up to become the sharpest old blade in the world just like him — his father’s face had smiled, but his eyes had been full of sorrow.

His uncles had all been the same, always smiling faintly, never saying a word.

This must be the nightmare they would never speak of.

And his mother would always grow anxious, immediately touching his head and saying, “What’s so great about your father, why learn from him? My little An’er just needs to be himself, hm?”

His father would nod approvingly. “Yes, yes, your mother’s right.”

He finally understood now why his father and uncles so often hid away — on spring days full of sunlight, they’d choose the corners instead, keeping themselves tucked away tightly, and only occasionally, in a rare moment of indulgence, would they reach out their rough, calloused hands to catch the light, then rub it against their faces, again and again.

They had once been to a place as ugly as this!

Mechanical clanking echoed from the cliff caves, beasts roared with hunger in waves, and Yangdan, who’d been lying flat all this while, suddenly shuddered.

He jerked his head up, staring fixedly at those faces — his own brother, the brother who’d taken him and fled. They’d said, let’s get out, at least eat one full meal before we die.

She Wanlin snapped out of his deep thoughts, wanting to reach out and comfort Yangdan, but was stunned to see the man on the wooden platform holding a steel blade, hacking more wounds into the hanging corpse — wounds that no longer bled, but still gave off the smell of raw flesh.

Little Bao swayed, with no one to depend on. He’d been harmless to this world alive, and even more harmless in death, accepting all its evil.

But was that really right?

Several fierce bears, gaunt jackals, even a ferocious tiger were released from the cliff-cave enclosure, and the moment they emerged they charged straight for their food. Just as they were about to tear into their prey, She Wanlin drew the saber at his waist.

Dark clouds covered the sky, not a single star daring to bear witness to the human world below. Yangdan, with his back to She Wanlin, stood up, swaying but steadying himself, and said, “My brother’s waiting for me down there, you… go.”

With that, he leapt down.

She Wanlin was startled for a moment, then plunged downward alongside Yangdan at speed.

He summoned all his strength, holding back a swell of furious grief, thinking of nothing, fearing nothing, rising up like a true young man moved to act for the simplest of reasons.

The fierce dogs chained to the siege carts suddenly all barked together toward one spot.

The soldiers in the yard all looked up together, and saw two shadowy figures falling like shooting stars.

The dogs hadn’t noticed She Wanlin and Yangdan earlier because Yangdan had been kneeling in exactly the same posture as the others below — now that he’d stood up, the dogs naturally started barking wildly.

With two such obvious targets discovered in an instant, the officer who’d been standing on the high platform broke into a savage grin and swiftly waved his arm toward the empty air.

Archers hidden in ambush stood up and unleashed a barrage of arrows toward Yangdan and She Wanlin.

This place was called Kangna Mountain, home to vicious dragons, utterly indifferent to human death — but today was different, for they’d run into an unexpected variable, and that variable was She Wanlin, whose childhood name was An’er. He was the first seed that the Old Blade and his reincarnated kin had planted in this world; he was destined to achieve greatness, to prove a grand path, and to break every wicked blade under heaven.

Seeing the rain of arrows fall, She Wanlin had already positioned himself in front of Yangdan. He reached out, gripped an iron pillar, swung his hand to tear the chain apart, and swung the humiliating stake with all his strength, breaking open a fierce path of survival through the arrow storm before him…

That iron pillar had been driven deep into the rock, weighing no less than eight or nine hundred jin — and it had just been lifted so easily? A chain as thick as a child’s arm, torn apart so effortlessly? And then flung at the high platform with such ease?

It was as if some demon had descended, leaving the soldiers all staring in dumbstruck shock.

The iron pillar whistled through the air, and the two fierce bears were swept up by the immense force, howling and shrieking in pain, their clumsy bodies smashing into the bonfire on the high platform, sending countless sparks rising into the night sky…

It was like a sudden violent gale sweeping through, like the vast river’s waves crashing against a shallow shore, dust and smoke rising everywhere. The frightened guards on the high platform blew their ox horns and struck the alarm gongs urgently, and more people came rushing out.

Wave after wave of arrows came, but She Wanlin moved swiftly — each time they came, he’d pull another iron pillar from the ground and swing it through the soldiers, kicking up clouds of dust. Wails rose all around as men and beasts fought over the same ground, the beasts long since starved, snatching up whatever fresher meat they could get their claws on and tearing right into it…

“Someone! Someone, help…”

More people poured out from beyond the camp, more massive dogs were released from their leashes.

Yangdan no longer cared about anything at all. Perhaps, before, he’d occupied some middling rank in the Old Blade camp, but today his heart was set on something, and so he feared nothing. Whatever came at him, he cut down decisively, hacking through with each swing to carve out a bloody path.

The vast camp descended into chaos…

No telling how much time passed. This was, after all, a mature military camp — to cultivate more vicious ghosts, the Tan family had stationed here the most seasoned troops of the Tan family army.

They quickly withdrew, no longer clustering together. The shield-bearers advanced swiftly, raising their long shields with a low shout, forming a double-layered defensive formation, with rows of cold, sharp spears bristling out from the gaps between shields, advancing coldly and menacingly toward the high platform in the center.

She Wanlin pulled up the last iron pillar and flung it with all his strength. The shield formation scattered, then reformed, and finally stopped moving.

Yangdan finally reached the base of the platform, his mind blank. His whole life had only ever known one thing: bitterness.

It was a taste born into him, born in a gate of suffering, raised on a river of suffering. The greatest act of defiance in his life had been asking his father — didn’t you say if you sold my brother, you wouldn’t sell me too?

His father had knelt and kowtowed to him, saying, go, whatever I owe you, I’ll repay you as an ox or horse in my next life.

But wasn’t being an ox or horse actually a good life? The rich family in the village had a big black ox — the rich man hired someone to tend it, fed it bean cakes, even called in the healer from across the river when it fell ill.

Too bad that ox had bad fortune — it died in the end, and the government office sent someone to inspect its corpse, and the whole village came out to watch the excitement, everyone full of regret.

When his own brother was sold, no one felt any regret. Now it was his turn to be sold, and still no one would feel any regret.

And so, Yangdan spoke the most venomous words of his life, struggling to say to his father, you won’t even manage to become an ox or horse in your next life… His father wailed and wept.

Yangdan, blade in hand, climbed the high platform step by step. The junior instructor’s face showed fear.

Yangdan advanced a step; he retreated a step.

What a strange feeling this was — this man’s face carried every kind of evil, yet he’d never shown this before?

Could he too feel fear?

The small blades he’d killed had filled the mountain streams behind the camp, even raising hundreds of jackals and vultures back there on the leftover flesh — throw a corpse down, turn around, and it was already gone, leaving only something like a dark cloud, an indistinguishable mass of the human world.

Could he too feel fear?

The junior instructor had nowhere left to retreat, stumbling backward off the platform and nearly falling. A row of shields slowly advanced, blocking in front of the platform. Yangdan held the blade in both hands, his eyes fixed on his brothers up in the air. His goal was crystal clear — get over there, take his brother, walk far, far away, find some place with no one around to live out life as an ox or horse.

The kind of ox or horse with good fortune — sheltered when cold, fed bean cakes when hungry, the owner too fond of it to ever strike it, even hiring a cowherd to tend it, needing only a little effort to make the owner dote on it to death.

There must be a place like that somewhere in the world. He stepped back a few paces, swung his blade and severed a row of chains, and the people there dropped down with a series of thuds.

Among the now-unshackled blades in the yard, some knelt, some retreated.

She Wanlin’s hands paused in their motion too.

His father and uncles were also blades — when they fought, raising their weapons, they only knew how to advance, had no concept of retreat at all.

No — the batch the Tan family had trained here were not truly blades at all.

The shield wall advanced, spears thrusting through the gaps in rapid succession then quickly withdrawing, trying to force Yangdan back. Yangdan finally moved forward, leaping into the air and swinging his blade — fed, rested, he’d stored up a body’s worth of strength, and split the slanted shield wall wide open, reaping a great many arms in the process.

The junior instructor’s head flew up into the air, letting out one brief cry.

Screams of agony, wailing, the shield wall retreated a step to reform its formation, slowly shifting to make way as the siege crossbow carts were pushed forward — but unfortunately, the moment these two contraptions appeared, another massive iron pillar fell from the sky and smashed the crossbow carts to pieces…

This wasn’t strength a human should have. Everyone stared in shock at that black-clad figure.

But She Wanlin was looking left and right, thinking, he needed a blade now.

Yangdan turned and climbed onto the high platform, looked down at the ground, walked over, knelt, and held his brother close in his arms.

I didn’t know. You came looking for me.

If I’d known, I wouldn’t have run.

Brother!

Everyone around had been thoroughly intimidated by She Wanlin’s immense strength. From a corner, another officer emerged, standing cautiously in the middle of a circle of round shields, sizing things up. Seeing Yangdan’s face — identical to the corpse’s — he too was startled, and cursed, “Damn that Cai Xianzi, tricking money right out from under me.”

After cursing, the officer pointed at Yangdan and bellowed, “Dog slave! You saw what happened to the last person who helped you — who gave you the nerve to come back… come back! Just you wait, you…”

He then spotted the black-clad figure and shut his mouth.

The rule at the Kangna Mountain camp had always been: deserters die, and informants are richly rewarded. Cai Xianzi had traded a corpse for reward money, thinking that this boy called Yangdan would never return to Kangna Mountain in his lifetime — so he’d killed Zhang Yongbao instead, earned himself a reward, but in doing so had brought a demon down upon the camp.

She Wanlin was clever enough to understand the whole situation the moment he heard this. Fine — Cai Xianzi, once I get back, I’ll wipe out your entire clan.

With that thought, he leapt into the shield formation, moving with lightning speed to grip that officer’s neck — not to kill, just to snap the neck bone — then flicked his hand to draw out the straight blade the man had been holding, leapt onto the high platform, and stood with blade held horizontally, guarding in front of Yangdan, standing proud and unyielding at the center of the bristling weapons.

Up on the platform, Yangdan carefully tried to close his brother’s eyes, but sadly they wouldn’t close — too late now.

She Wanlin looked down at Little Bao’s face, about to say something, when he heard someone behind him ask, “Rebel, do you know where this place is?”

She Wanlin spun around at once and saw, from the cave mouth the beasts had charged out of, a squad of heavily armored soldiers emerging in formation, holding spears and halberds, surrounding an old man as they came out.

This old man was clearly the one in charge. He showed no fear either, approaching the platform step by step, stopping about a zhang away, hands clasped behind his back, and asked again, “Do you know where this place is?”

She Wanlin looked around and said with certainty, “Hell on earth?”

The old man immediately caught his youthful voice and roared furiously, “How dare this little brat spout such nonsense! You must have been led astray by this boy into wandering into the wrong place. Let me tell you — this is the Great Liang army’s camp! Founded by Great Liang’s Duke Wusu, this is the Old Blade Camp, the elite training ground under the founding Marquis Tan’s command! Everyone you’ve killed are officers and soldiers of the imperial court — aren’t you afraid your whole clan will be executed down to the ninth degree of kinship?”

She Wanlin tilted his head and asked, “Great Liang army? Founding marquis? Two monkeys of the Tan family — which one are you?”

“Shut your mouth, you insolent little brat, how dare you rebel…” The old man, utterly furious, was about to launch into a tirade when he suddenly heard someone shout, “Hey!”

The moment that “hey” rang out, four dark shadows flew out from either side of the high platform, cold light flashing as long blades swung down at She Wanlin.

She Wanlin, hearing that strange call, raised his blade behind him and blocked twice in rapid succession, sparks flying everywhere, then pushed off the ground, spun his blade in a full circle, and the attackers were cut clean in two, colliding and shattering apart on the ground — a gruesome death.

Such decisive action startled even the man watching below, his heart trembling — and it startled the old man too, his face changing color, though not because of She Wanlin’s strike, but because of that inexplicable shout of “hey.”

Who had reminded them, who had shouted it? None of that mattered now, anyway — the men were already dead.

He muttered under his breath, “How could this be? This shouldn’t be happening.”

This old man’s name, it turned out, was Tan Shouju, an illegitimate branch member of the Tan clan. Though he called Tan Shouyi “cousin,” Tan Shouyi looked at him the way one looks at a dog — since the founding of Great Liang, he’d only managed to scrape together a fifth-rank marginal military post, which was rather awkward for him.

Great clans judged status by bloodline this way, especially the Tan family, especially a Tan family harboring ambitions of rebellion — everyone had their own hidden aspirations, just lacking the opportunity.

Seeing the wealth and status that came from two marquises in one family, Tan Shouju wanted all the more to secure some standing for his own branch, and so he’d taken on this immoral job without regret — after all, the main branch had done the same thing before him.

Ever since Tan Shouju had taken up the post of head instructor of the New Blade Camp, he’d devised many methods, striving to train a batch of Tan family elite blades even more obedient, even more formidable than ingrates like Chen Dasheng.

With no wars currently underway, and no Black Cavalry Commandant to serve as a whetstone, he could only set them to slaughter each other, to fight for survival against beasts, refining them through repeated trials to filter out the impure. In ten years, he’d only managed to train fewer than a hundred new blades, and after dealing with this recent mutiny a few days ago, that number had dropped to under sixty — now losing a few more here too, his heart ached to the point of shattering.

He’d originally thought that even though these blades were young, if dozens attacked together, even someone like Chen Dasheng might not be their match.

But from that one “hey,” something had felt off — everything felt off.

It seemed the blades he’d trained lacked patience — but from this one man’s single strike, he glimpsed a long-lost quality of true bladesmanship, that kind of decisiveness that gave no quarter to anyone — something he’d only ever seen before in a former slave-dog.

He suddenly recalled something Tan Shize had once said — when I train blades, I always make sure they glimpse a bit of hope, because without some hope, who’d want to keep living? Let this teach you: the will to survive is always more powerful than the will to die.

Just now, those few, though skilled and obedient, had shouted “hey” — clearly seeking death.

Understanding this, it struck him like a thunderbolt from the sky. Tan Shouju knew things had gone terribly wrong — the Tan family had spent ten years, cost countless lives, poured tens of millions of strings of cash into Kangna Mountain enduring hardship in secret, all just to raise a group of dead blades.

Watching the iron pillars torn up, chains snapped and unbound, yet the new blades still lying prostrate on the ground, Tan Shouju broke into a cold sweat, thinking, it seems… he’d killed the wrong ones.

The blades with the will to live — he’d hung them all up on the high platform.

Several streams of fresh blood splattered onto Yangdan’s and Zhang Yongbao’s faces.

The blood was warm, soaking into the skin with a lingering heat. All around, silence, as Yangdan tilted his head to look at the corpse lying beside him, then at his own brother, unwilling to accept it, and finally reached out and used his sleeve to wipe his brother’s face — strangely, his brother’s eyes had closed on their own.

A numbness spread through his heart, and Yangdan jerked his head up to look at She Wanlin.

But She Wanlin was staring blankly at the blade in his own hand. The clashes, the blocks, the killing just now had all been pure instinct — but those few men, hadn’t they seemed to be seeking death themselves?

Why would they want to die?

Yangdan slowly gathered his brother up in his arms, and looked at She Wanlin, asking carefully, “Would you… take him with you? Please?”

She Wanlin looked at Zhang Yongbao’s closed eyes and asked, “Me? I take him?”

Yangdan nodded firmly. “Mm.”

She Wanlin asked him, “And you?”

Zhang Yongbao looked at the familiar sky and earth around him, looked at the familiar faces of the dead at his feet. He’d fought for survival alongside these people, fought over food with them — even the jackals and dogs down in the abyss came out as whole families, but he’d only ever had himself. All these years… these were the only people he’d ever known.

He’d been outside before, but had long since forgotten how people out there lived. Even without anyone hunting him down, he felt he couldn’t go on living either.

Yangdan wanted to smile, and he pulled the corner of his mouth into something like one for She Wanlin. “Today, today that meal of yours, it smelled so good. Do you eat like that every day, every single day?”

She Wanlin nodded, and Yangdan smiled with envy. “Then from now on, you should live like that every day.”

He stepped forward, wanting to place his brother into She Wanlin’s arms, but She Wanlin didn’t take him, and instead asked, “What about you?”

Yangdan said, “I… I want to die here.”

Having said this, he smiled, looked around at the high platform, swung his blade one-handed to strike sparks, lighting a torch nearby, and tried hard to find the right words. “It seems… it can be like this too. I want it to be like this…”

He turned his face to She Wanlin, pleading. “Is that all right?”

He looked with a kind of envy at those cut in two, thinking he really should have died here long ago.

As Yangdan finished speaking, the dark clouds overhead seemed to hear him and part. All those still kneeling seemed to wake up at once, each raising their heads to look at the platform, look at the corpses.

Right — there was still a choice to be made after all.

The wooden platform finally caught fire, the flames growing stronger and stronger, and they crowded together, stepping one by one into the platform’s flames, as if lining up to cross the bridge to the underworld.

She Wanlin didn’t understand why people would make such a choice, but seeing their expressions ease, seeing a flicker of human spirit return to their eyes, he thought — perhaps, he couldn’t stop this kind of death.

Tan Shouju was terrified beyond words, shouting, “What are you doing, do you want to die… no, wait, this old man was wrong, let’s sit down and discuss this again, come down, someone, stop them, someone, help… come down!! Stop them…”

No one listened to him. The new blades all wore looks of ease on their faces — being able to choose death themselves, protected by someone, no longer watched over and denied even the choice to die, no longer tormented further.

Hearing Tan Shouju’s shouting, instructors from various divisions came forward together to stop them. She Wanlin didn’t take Zhang Yongbao, and Yangdan thought, fine then, might as well die alongside my brother soon — after all, we came into this world together too.

To grant his companion’s wish, this boy nonetheless bent down, picked up a blade, and went for the instructors closing in.

He thought, in this whole life of his, he’d finally managed to do one thing right.

She Wanlin felt a pang of sorrow in his heart, turned back to glance once more at Little Bao, and thought to himself, Little Bao, rest well.

Having thought this, he took two steps to stand before Yangdan, and together they held their blades horizontal, guarding those who sought death.

Tan Shouju was furious beyond measure and terrified out of his wits — he’d worked countless children to death over the years, and now he couldn’t even keep this last scrap for himself?

How was he supposed to explain this to the clan?

He watched as the new blades, as if in a frenzy of celebration, threw everything burnable into the fire, trying to make the flames grow so large they could never be put out, so they could each go in one by one to enjoy their death. He glared at She Wanlin and shouted, “You — how dare you!! Do you know what you’re doing? Do you know what you’ve done? Do you even know who they are, what kind of witchcraft did you use to bewitch these — these people into wanting to die! You…”

He’d finally admitted they were human beings, at least.

She Wanlin’s heart held nothing but grief and fury. He swung his blade through the empty air and said, “Shut your mouth!”

Tan Shouju choked on his words, only to hear that damned boy continue, “They were never blades to begin with — just a group of pitiable people.”

The silver blade’s edge cut through all the gloom, and the young man declared loudly, “A true old blade never takes a single step back — even facing a thousand troops and ten thousand horses, it would cut straight through!!”

Tan Shouju stumbled back, and finally, eyes closed, gave the order, “No need to hold back anymore.”

Flames roared up into the sky, countless vultures circling above. Huo Qiqian, dragging Old Chou along by the collar, cursed at him without pause: “How much rice have you eaten at my house, you traitorous old wretch, my son’s still so young…”

Old Chou, thoroughly exasperated, bobbed up and down in midair, arguing back reluctantly, “Jade unpolished… cannot become a vessel…”

“Shut your damn mouth for me! My son does whatever he wants to do, how much of my family’s food have you eaten — spit it all out for me today…”