The sky hung dark and heavy, signal flares rising and falling one after another in the air, the sound of chaotic fighting still drifting in from outside, lending the atmosphere behind this compound an edge of tension.
Li Yanfeng paid no more attention to the two young men who had suddenly appeared, his tall figure striding toward Yan Yunzhi, who stood at the corner of the wall.
Toward these unexpected outsiders, he had already, out of a certain charity, offered a few words; though their reaction had left him more than a little irritated, further chatter now felt unnecessary.
Through years of martial training, Li Yanfeng had long since surpassed his teachers and rarely met a match. He had just struck down a great swath of fighters single-handedly with his club on the main street, then traded a few blows with that formidable spear-wielder — now, fully warmed up, his blood running like quicksilver, he was at the very peak of his form. Even if a whole crowd rushed him at once, he was confident he could knock them all down without much effort.
Still, there was business at hand that couldn’t be delayed.
He advanced with his club, and Yan Yunzhi’s body suddenly went taut in the darkness. The reckless young man beside them, seemingly with no idea of the danger he was in, spoke up again: “Aren’t you two in this together?”
Li Yanfeng’s club suddenly whipped out in a horizontal sweep.
As he stepped forward, the club in his hand swept sideways, silent yet swift as lightning, its striking end aimed at the boy’s right temple. This single strike carried the essence of the “Phoenix Nodding Its Head” technique from spear-fighting — a mere touch could crack a man’s skull like a clay pot; most people wouldn’t even have the chance to react before dying.
But every so often, unexpected things happen.
The boy froze for a split second — and then, at some point no one had quite seen, his two hands had already caught the club aimed at his temple, holding it fast.
“That’s not very nice of you…” His tone carried a note of anger.
A chill seemed to rise in the night air. In the next instant, the club held between the two of them suddenly bent, curving into a half-circle.
The hair on the back of Li Yanfeng’s neck stood on end.
With a resounding snap, the long club sprang back straight in midair. Li Yanfeng’s stance dropped abruptly, his body weaving like an afterimage, and then both fists came whistling out like giant pythons — the force of White Ape Arm-Extending Fist, savage and expansive. Meanwhile, the boy, having let go of the club, planted a foot on the ground and drove straight forward through the center. Li Yanfeng threw two punches in succession through empty air; on the third, his fist landed squarely against the boy’s defending arm.
Splat—
Mud sprayed around them, and the boy’s counter-punch slammed into Li Yanfeng’s chest.
What followed was a round of the most brutal, all-out exchange…
…
The autumn wind swept across the sky; overhead, rain clouds gathered and churned, like mountains flowing in reverse.
Along the streets near the Gold Tower, the chaos was still spreading. But signal arrows kept flying up in the distance, near and far — at this point, the forces belonging to the Wheel-Turning King’s faction were being mobilized in full, their converging momentum like a tide surging in from every direction.
At the eastern stretch of the street, Tan Zheng’s steps parted the drifting smoke on the road, his broadsword rising and then, the next instant, falling like a thunderbolt. Ahead of him, You Hongzhuo swung his blade in counterattack, the two long sabers erupting in sparks as they met in midair.
The clash of blades, fully unleashed, was heavy and fierce. At that moment, “Heaven Blade” Tan Zheng, his steps steady and measured, wielded his blade with both hands, while on the other side, You Hongzhuo, half his body soaked in blood, had also switched his one-handed quick blade to a two-handed grip. His eyes were fierce and merciless, his fully committed strikes swift yet heavy, and the clash of his blade against Tan Zheng’s long saber in the street was like a hurricane tearing through the air, the crackling impacts nearly forming a zone too dangerous for anyone else to enter.
If Tan Zheng’s blade carried an air of grandeur and steadiness, already possessing the bearing of a mountain-like grandmaster, then this young swordsman — still largely unknown — wielded his blade in this moment with an air of raw wildness and destruction, charging at that mountain like a newborn calf unafraid of the tiger.
He had already been wounded earlier under the crowd’s assault, and in his first several exchanges with Tan Zheng he hadn’t gained much ground either. But by now, half-drenched in his own blood, You Hongzhuo seemed to grow fiercer with every exchange, repeatedly changing his approach, and was now locked in a full head-on clash with Tan Zheng once more.
The two long sabers, each gripped with both hands, clashed in the air like a violent storm; for a time, neither gave ground, and with each small shift, their footwork carried them gradually toward the side of the street. Along the way, several tables and chairs by the roadside were swept into the violent flashing blades and sent flying as though exploded apart. A member of the Undying Guard rushed in from the side, spear in hand, apparently trying to reinforce Tan Zheng, but the moment he entered the fray, the blade’s light snapped his spear tip clean off, and the next instant the blade tore across his thigh and side, blood spraying through the air.
“Waaaaaaaaah—”
The enemy caught up in the flashing blade had also broken the balance of the duel; You Hongzhuo let out a beast-like roar from deep in his throat and still tried to press forward, but Tan Zheng ahead of him, his gaze calm as still water, brought down heavy, unrelenting waves of his blade’s aura from the front, cleaving apart his attacks. After several more strokes, You Hongzhuo staggered backward.
Tan Zheng’s steps followed as if he and his shadow were one, blade after blade coming down.
Amid the chaos of the street, Tan Zheng landed five consecutive strikes in the blink of an eye; You Hongzhuo, forced into an undignified retreat, found his defenses wide open by the fifth stroke. Just as he was about to be caught completely off guard, Liang Siyi’s blade and sword forced their way in from the side to block it — she took Tan Zheng’s strike, her arm going nearly numb from the impact, while Chen Juefang came slashing in from the other side like a specter, catching her with a strike that sent blood spraying. Liang Siyi, fighting now as though she’d already resigned herself to trading her life for his, swung her sword in a furious counterattack at Chen Juefang, who dodged out of reach once more.
“This is my fight! Get out—”
Liang Siyi shouted, blood-soaked from head to toe — this was a woman who had clawed her way up out of battlefields and piles of corpses, and she was still fighting with everything she had. You Hongzhuo, still stumbling backward, forced himself to swallow a mouthful of blood, grabbed a nearby member of the Undying Guard who’d charged in, and with a violent pull, hurled himself at Tan Zheng with everything he had.
The distance between them closed in an instant. Tan Zheng grabbed the Undying Guard member by the back with one hand, seizing him as a shield with his left while his right hand’s blade came slashing in; the Undying Guard soldier flailed and struggled uselessly, and You Hongzhuo spat blood at Tan Zheng as their blades clashed once more amid the spray of blood.
Onlookers far and near, watching the man and woman before Tan Zheng’s blade, both of them practically bathed in blood yet still fighting with everything they had, couldn’t help but feel a pang of sorrow at the sight.
…
On the western side of the long street.
Fierce sounds of fighting rang out from the second floors of some of the shops along the road. Tables and chairs came crashing through the wooden buildings’ doors and windows, smashing down onto the pedestrians in the street below, making the situation even more unmanageable; the shadow of a spear burst out through a rooftop too, sending roof tiles scattering across the sky with every swing.
Yue Yinping and Yue Yun, brother and sister, had blocked Jin Yongsheng, Shan Lifu, and Meng Zhutao from pursuing Yan Yunzhi. Trained by Yue Fei, the two siblings, who had spent years together, coordinated seamlessly. The younger brother, Yue Yun, was born with tremendous natural strength, and even without the weapon he usually favored on the battlefield, the Zhou-family Fanzi Fist he’d inherited carried a faint echo of the aura Chen Fan had once shown assassinating Bao Daoyi on the streets of Hangzhou — fitting the old saying that fists fear youth and vigor. His elder sister, Yinping, had originally specialized in Zhou Tong’s Five-Step Thirteen Spear technique; tall and lithe, both her spearwork and legwork were fiercely impressive. While her brother, wielding his monstrous strength, flung objects wildly about inside a building and even brutally smashed through a wall into the next room, she leapt up onto the roof beams and even burst out onto the rooftop to survey the whole scene from above. The two of them, coordinating with each other, dragged the fight raging across the area — aside from a few true masters, the scattered underlings could barely keep up with them at all.
If they could get out of this in one piece, this single feat alone would be enough to make their names known throughout the wandering martial world.
But the situation, honestly speaking, wasn’t especially favorable. Neither Jin Yongsheng nor Shan Lifu was a mediocre fighter — even one-on-one, the outcome between either of them and the siblings would be genuinely hard to call. And of the three, Meng Zhutao in particular, despite his apparently injured shoulder, showed a martial prowess that seemed to faintly exceed even that of the two Baofeng Hall stewards. If not for the fact that his killing intent had cooled after slaying his elder and subduing his fellow disciple, and that he was somewhat unmotivated, uncertain of Jin Yongsheng and the others’ true intentions, one of the two siblings might already have been hurt.
Earlier, Jin Yongsheng and Shan Lifu’s main goal had still been to capture Yan Yunzhi. Now, with Yinping’s spear sweeping through the air like rain, she and her brother had barely managed to hold the three of them back after a chaotic scramble — and it was already stretching the limits of their ability.
Amid the fighting, Yinping was signaling to Yue Yun beside her — they needed to get out of here as fast as possible.
Yue Yun, in the midst of the melee, was anxiously signaling back: someone’s already gone after her.
Yinping only shook her head.
This fight had already bought their target a decent head start; at this moment, shouts were surging like tides through the night, near and far, and Gao Huiyun, the “Martial Overlord” under the Wheel-Turning King’s command, might well arrive with his forces in less time than it took to drink a cup of tea. They’d already done everything they could — staying now would only mean throwing themselves away as well…
…
In the dim compound not far from the street, Yan Yunzhi watched as the atmosphere shifted from calm tension to sudden eruption in the span of a single instant.
The two figures in the darkness had, only a moment before, still been exchanging words — but the instant their clubs locked in a contest of strength, the true reflexes of genuine masters had been triggered.
Before this, Yan Yunzhi had also considered how she might confront Li Yanfeng, but in that very instant, facing this young man from the southwest, this “Monkey King” of Tongshan’s body shuddered, and then his sprawling, sweeping White Ape Arm-Extending Fist came crashing down like a tidal wave. This was likely the violent reaction of a true martial grandmaster upon sensing genuine danger — Yan Yunzhi felt her vision blur for an instant, and then Li Yanfeng’s frame unfolded, fists whistling with fierce, cutting force.
Faint flickers of light fell from the sky, and it was in that very instant that what shocked Yan Yunzhi most was seeing the boy called Long Aotian charge straight into Li Yanfeng’s White Ape Arm-Extending Fist without hesitation. If Li Yanfeng’s fists, once unleashed, were like a towering wave crashing in from all directions, then the boy, in that reactive instant, was like a stubborn stone hurling itself straight into the heart of that wave.
The two figures’ fists met and crossed. In the dim light, Yan Yunzhi couldn’t even make out clearly the rapid, small-scale advances and dodges between them in that instant, but the sound — bang bang bang bang— — rang out, the sound of fists slamming into flesh. It was as though two savage beasts, upon first meeting, meant to overwhelm one another head-on in that very first instant, neither willing to give an inch.
In the next instant, a figure appeared abruptly and silently between the two of them.
It was the little monk who had been accompanying “Long Aotian,” and in the very instant the two fierce blows collided, he lunged at Li Yanfeng. In the darkness, Li Yanfeng let out an “Ah—!” His surging internal energy churned through the back of the compound; his body twisted and shifted, his fists sweeping with an ever-louder roar of wind and thunder, and in the faint glow of the flares, he seemed to unfurl seven or eight arms at once, while the little monk clung to him like a leech burrowing into bone.
Even Yan Yunzhi, well versed in the art of assassination, couldn’t make out what techniques the little monk was using with his hands in that moment, but judging by Li Yanfeng’s sudden reaction, he too must have sensed a genuinely dangerous threat — even as he dealt with “Long Aotian” in front of him, he was clearly also trying to shake off this little monk who clung to him like he had nothing to lose.
In another flash of light, Yan Yunzhi saw Li Yanfeng’s body spin backward twice; he’d caught the little monk’s hand, and in front of him, the boy named Long Aotian took a step and leapt, his right fist already swinging through the air.
With a resounding thud, the fist landed squarely on Li Yanfeng’s face. Li Yanfeng’s body dipped, seemingly flinging the little monk off into the distance at the same instant; and in that same moment, his frame seemed to shrink inward, and a rising kick swept out sideways — the instant after taking the punch to the face, it caught the charging boy square in the chest.
All three figures went flying like cannonballs.
Li Yanfeng’s body rolled several times across the ground before finally forcing himself upright against the wall’s corner; the little monk, clinging like a ghost, had been flung by Li Yanfeng into a farther corner of the wall, shattering several clay pots with a crash, but got back to his feet the next instant as well; and the boy, having thrown a punch and taken a kick to the chest for his trouble, planted his feet a few times in the mud, arms spreading through the air, feet sliding backward — and yet he had already steadied himself, letting out a long breath, seemingly with boundless power still surging through his frame.
Yan Yunzhi had seen something similar once in Tongshan, though she had no idea what internal cultivation method this boy practiced that produced such a stance when he unleashed his full power. But as a martial artist herself, she had to admit that even she felt her blood stir at the sight of it.
The exchange between these three had unfolded in just a handful of breaths — Li Yanfeng and Long Aotian’s brutal head-on clash, the little monk’s leech-like, dangerous advances, and then Li Yanfeng shaking off the little monk, taking a punch to the face, and countering with a kick — the entire sequence had been fierce and extraordinarily clean.
In truth, even with the slightly undignified punch to the face, what Li Yanfeng had shown was already an extraordinarily formidable display of boxing skill and reaction. He’d started off matching Long Aotian blow for blow with White Ape Arm-Extending Fist; once the little monk rushed in, the entire shape of his fighting style had already begun shifting toward Monkey Fist, and amid his leaps and dodges he’d avoided two of the monk’s lunges, then grabbed the boy’s arm and flung him away — and even while flinging the little monk aside, he’d managed to spin and kick at the same time, fighting off two opponents at once in a genuinely beautiful display of combat.
— If he’d been facing opponents closer to his own age, this performance would have been utterly unremarkable.
But at this moment, he was facing a boy of no more than fifteen or sixteen, and another who looked even younger — and the skill these two displayed made them seem like monsters.
Back in Tongshan, Yan Yunzhi had been pinned to the ground by this Long Aotian in the space of a single glance, so she already knew his martial skill far exceeded her own — but she never would have imagined he’d be capable of standing his ground in an unyielding head-on clash against a true martial grandmaster like Li Yanfeng.
And as for the little monk who’d been flung aside — he was likely the one rumored to be the “Four-Foot Lecher Demon.” Though he looked even younger, in just those few brief moments he had managed to force Li Yanfeng to willingly take a punch to the face rather than let him get close — proof enough that, once he got within striking range, his methods could well prove lethal.
The night was hazy and indistinct; not far off, the uproar at the Gold Tower continued to spread. Yan Yunzhi clenched her jaw, her heart pounding.
Against the wall opposite, Li Yanfeng’s tall figure had already straightened up. His face bore the mark of the punch he’d taken, his long hair now disheveled, his body caked with mud from rolling on the ground. He raised his arm, grabbed his own robe, and tore it straight off, revealing beneath the dim light an upper body carved as if by knife and chisel — and in his silence, killing intent radiated outward.
Further off at the wall’s corner, the little monk, having shattered several jars and pots, seemed to have melted into the darkness there, only now letting out an “Amitabha—”: “Benefactor, your strike was far too vicious. You truly are a wicked man.” The words carried the weight of an old sage, yet the voice was distinctly childish, producing an oddly unsettling effect in the listener.
The boy called Long Aotian was the only one of the three still standing; his frame unfolded, then slowly settled, and from his mouth came what seemed an endlessly long breath, drawn in and released.
“Jiangning truly is a gathering place of heroes and turmoil today,” Li Yanfeng spoke from the darkness. “All manner of strange characters have shown up.”
“I asked you a question. Care to answer now?” the boy said as well.
“Asked what?”
Yan Yunzhi saw the boy called Long Aotian point a finger toward her. “You two — aren’t you in this together? Had a falling out?”
Li Yanfeng frowned and stepped forward. “Together? Do you even know who she is?” He walked to where his club had fallen, swept it with his leg, and the club snapped up against the nearby wall, bouncing back, at which point Li Yanfeng caught it cleanly in hand.
The boy called Long Aotian lowered his pointing hand.
Further off in the darkness, the little monk walked over, and Li Yanfeng glanced at him from the corner of his eye. His club hung low at his side, but in that moment even Yan Yunzhi understood that what everyone here was about to face was the current-generation “Monkey King,” fighting now with everything he had, holding nothing back.
Silence settled over the darkness for a moment. Long Aotian said nothing, lowering the hand he’d pointed at Yan Yunzhi. Then he said, “Li Jianfeng — your whole family did evil in Tongshan. Do you even know what you did wrong?” He didn’t press further about the relationship between Li Yanfeng and Yan Yunzhi; for some reason, as he spoke these words, even his tone seemed to drop, growing faintly heavier.
“Did… evil… in Tongshan…” Li Yanfeng gave a faint smile. “So. You’re that Five-Foot Lecher Demon…”
“I’m not.”
The boy stepped forward, and Li Yanfeng lowered into a fighting stance.
“I am your long-lost fa— grandfather!”
In the next instant, Yan Yunzhi saw the club in Li Yanfeng’s hand whip up like a whirling tornado, and on either side of him, Long Aotian and the little monk surged forward, circling in from two directions, launching a near-simultaneous assault on Li Yanfeng from opposite sides.
Li Yanfeng let out a wild “Waaah—!” His figure danced madly through the darkness, part ape, part monkey, part something else entirely, part madness. His club came down like thunder; Long Aotian darted past it, and the great pile of debris and mud beneath the ground erupted outward, the club’s sweep sending mud, rubble, and filth flying in every direction. Li Yanfeng plunged into the scattering muck, while behind him, in the darkness, the silent gleam of a blade slid past.
Amid the club’s wild dance, the three figures wove and crossed through the air; and then Yan Yunzhi saw Li Yanfeng’s club-wielding figure suddenly charge straight at her.
Yan Yunzhi, herself a martial artist, saw this sudden eruption of violence and dropped her sword low, swinging to meet it. In the very next instant, she heard a curse — “Fuck” — ring out ahead of her, and her body reacted almost before she consciously registered it, lurching backward. Li Yanfeng’s club, seemingly vanishing from sight in the darkness, suddenly reappeared with a bang against the wall where she’d just been standing, sending stone chips flying.
Li Yanfeng, unleashing the full force of a true martial grandmaster, came sweeping toward her like an unstoppable tide. Her body was already flying backward, but in the next instant, her right hand, raised in a defensive posture, suddenly exploded with pain, and then his club swept horizontally, striking her across the ribs.
Even as her body was still flying through the air, Yan Yunzhi saw Li Yanfeng’s club seemingly shatter into pieces midair — a figure had slammed into Li Yanfeng from the side, and the two of them crashed thunderously into a crumbling wall at the side of the courtyard.
Yan Yunzhi fell from the air and rolled across the ground; she knew her ribs might well be broken, but she rolled once and forced herself back up. Not far from where she now stood, an entire section of earthen wall came crashing down with a roar, along with the surrounding debris, trash, and jars, all shattering apart — and the boy’s figure snatched up a water-filled clay jar and smashed it down onto Li Yanfeng’s head with a crash, sending shards and filthy water spraying everywhere. Li Yanfeng, in turn, threw an equally savage punch that knocked him down into the rubble; from behind him, the little monk lunged in, hand sweeping toward Li Yanfeng’s throat.
Li Yanfeng’s right arm, bound with a slender iron ruler, snapped up in a block, and a faint, crisp clang of metal on metal rang out. That small, ghostlike figure tangled with him in midair, followed by two more vicious thrusts. Li Yanfeng had only just managed to fling this maddeningly persistent figure away when Long Aotian, having scrambled back up, was already lunging at him again, throwing another punch — Li Yanfeng blocked it several times, each time with the same crisp clang of metal striking metal.
He’d only just flung off the maddening little monk, and now, facing the boy’s attack, he found himself staggering backward through sheer danger, before finally toppling into the mud and water. The boy lunged in and was kicked away, but before Li Yanfeng could get back to his feet, the boy grabbed a large chunk of brick from the rubble beside him and smashed it down toward his head and face. Li Yanfeng fought desperately to block it — it turned out to be a mud brick, and though heavy, it burst apart in midair with a loud crack. Still unable to get to his feet, Li Yanfeng dropped into a ground-fighting stance, kicking out fiercely with both legs to hold his attackers back, then rolled backward, and Long Aotian and the little monk both surged in from either side once more, the three figures colliding violently once again, sending a nearby, already crumbling rockery scattering apart.
Yan Yunzhi stood there, for a moment barely even feeling the pain in her ribs.
This was the first time she had ever witnessed fighting this brutal and utterly without form or dignity. Earlier, out on the long street, Li Yanfeng, single-handed with his club, had swept aside a whole crowd, displaying the full bearing of a true grandmaster; and in all the sparring matches and duels she’d witnessed before, participants held back at the decisive moment, and even where skill clearly differed, everyone maintained a certain grace and decorum.
But what she was watching now looked exactly like the most brutal kind of battlefield slaughter — both sides had unleashed pure killing intent, determined to destroy each other by whatever means necessary. Even Li Yanfeng, in a fight like this, hadn’t managed to maintain a shred of grandmasterly dignity; the Large and Small Monkey Fist styles, normally known for their agile, well-measured leaps and dodges, hadn’t given him a single chance to even leave the ground in this fight. Locked in this mutual dragging, grappling brawl, he had all but become a mud monkey himself.
Was this… the fighting style of the southwest?
Yan Yunzhi thought of the boy’s origins, of that legendary place she’d heard of, and felt something hot stir within her heart. Her right hand, struck by Li Yanfeng’s club, was bleeding freely; she now gripped her sword in her left hand, ready to charge in.
She didn’t even know who she meant to help, but somehow it felt as though it wouldn’t matter which one she killed.
Long Aotian was locked in a brawl with Li Yanfeng amid the rubble, the blade in his hand thrusting toward the other man’s face only to be deflected; he glanced up and saw the girl he’d crossed paths with back in Tongshan foolishly raising her sword to charge in, and cursed: “Damn it! Get out of here, now—” His body was immediately kicked away by Li Yanfeng, leaving him winded.
Not far off on the street, someone came running toward them — an old man in a long robe, carrying an abacus. He moved swiftly; catching sight of the people here by the faint light as he ran, he seemed rather excited, calling out from a distance: “Miss Yan—” his internal power surging outward as he came.
By the time he drew close, he’d already taken in the scene of utter devastation before him — a bedraggled figure standing amid a heap of rubble, covered head to toe in mud and even blood; if he hadn’t looked closely, he might not have even recognized this as the same “Monkey King” who’d struck fear into the entire length of the street not long before. In truth, it was precisely because Li Yanfeng had earlier torn off his robe that he now looked so much more disheveled from this fight — Long Aotian’s clothes were still mostly intact, and though he’d taken some injuries, they didn’t show on the outside, nowhere near as bad as Li Yanfeng, caked head to toe in mud and filthy water.
What had happened to Li Yanfeng? And who was this boy? How had it come to this?
“Mount Tai Abacus” Jin Yongsheng had only gotten halfway through his sentence before he found himself struck with sudden uncertainty. Meanwhile, seeing reinforcements arrive for the other side, Long Aotian and the little monk instinctively stopped fighting as well. Everyone exchanged glances, and for a moment, the scene fell into an odd silence.
“…Brother Li, what… happened to you?”
Not knowing quite what else to say, Jin Yongsheng finally spoke after a moment, his tone even, asking the question.
Li Yanfeng looked at him, then raised a hand, his expression somewhere between a smile and something else entirely.
“This girl. She’s yours now.”
“…Hm?”
Jin Yongsheng’s brow furrowed.