The night wind rustled past, leaves stirring faintly along the darkened roadside, the scent of blood spreading through the air. Liu Dabiao stood before Ning Liheng and Lou Jingzhi, cradling that long wooden box, as still and composed as a maidservant carrying a guqin.
With the Manichaean sect at its head, the true backbone of Fang La’s uprising had, for the most part, come from the ranks of the martial underworld’s outlaws and bandit heroes. Though among these people, mountain bandits and highway robbers made up the majority, and true heroes acting for the sake of country and people were almost nonexistent, this “martial world” was quite different from the one later depicted in wuxia fiction. Still, wherever there were outlaws gathered in any numbers, there were rules and customs of their own—whether three or five men, or three or fifty—each with their own particular way of life among themselves.
That way of life had been shattered the moment Fang La truly rose in rebellion. In the old days, if there was a grudge between people, they might rise up and fight it out themselves, or gather friends to wipe out an enemy’s entire household, with a great deal riding on personal valor and prowess. But afterward, anything short of an army several hundred or a thousand strong could no longer hold its own on the stage. Even the occasional grudge match between rivals now typically had to pass through a web of relationships involving well over a thousand people first—though in nature still a matter of calling in favors and building connections, the complexity involved was worlds apart from what it had been among a mere few dozen. The influence of pure personal prowess had by now dropped to an extremely low level.
Within Fang La’s ranks, moving against Qi Yuankang no longer had anything to do with the martial world at all. Though the Qi family had been struck suddenly, Qi Yuankang did have a genuine base of support—even strength sufficient for real rebellion—and though he could not turn the tables once the blow fell, the sons and soldiers under his command could not be entirely wiped out in a single stroke. Qi Yuankang originally had five sons, known to the outside world as the Five Tigers of the Qi Family; in this turmoil, some had been killed, others had escaped. That they would think of revenge was only natural—but as for who they might actually go after in seeking it, no one would have truly worried.
Whether it was Liu Dabiao, Bao Daoyi, Lou Minzhong, or Fang La himself, these were people not only formidable in their own skills, but each surrounded by layers upon layers of guards. In tales of the martial underworld, when the descendants of the wronged sought vengeance against ordinary men, that was easy enough—but against an official of standing, it was often near impossible; such men would never even regard them as genuine opponents. No one would have imagined that someone of Liu Dabiao’s standing would today stand here herself, waiting for them to come and try to kill her.
Even before the uprising, the Overlord Blade Manor had been the foremost sect in the martial world of Tiannan, with several hundred members within its walls all trained in blade work, and an even wider circle of influence capable of raising thousands more into an army if needed. With numbers reaching that scale, their standing within the martial world had already fundamentally changed. It was one thing for the occasional renowned figure of the martial world to seek out the Manor Lord for a friendly exchange of skills—but if you held a grudge against Liu Dabiao personally, and thousands of people came to cut you down for it, could that still be called the martial world at all? The girl herself had not yet grown up, had never once walked the paths of that world, and by the time Liu Dabiao passed away and she took over the Manor, preparations for rebellion were already half in place. What no one had expected was that although she had never walked those paths, she seemed to place even greater weight on their old customs and rules than most.
It was only now that Ning Liheng could truly understand the girl’s intentions. He was not so shallow as to think in terms of some cliché about a wealthy young lady not sitting near the eaves for fear of falling tiles—anyone who truly lived by such caution would never accomplish anything at all. Judging from their interactions over this stretch of time, the girl’s nature had simply always been this way; it was only his own being swept up in it that carried something of the flavor of unwarranted misfortune. He had only just walked back from the gates of death at the Four Seasons Hall today, his head still wrapped in bandages, his body streaked with blood and rather bedraggled—but for the moment, there was nothing for it but to draw his blade.
After a moment’s thought, he cupped his hands and said, “This one is the Bloody-Handed Butcher, Ning Liheng. As for the grudge between the Qi and Liu families today, I would be willing to serve as arbiter…”
No one paid him the slightest attention once he’d finished speaking. Four assassins had come from the Qi family, though only Qi Xinyong had fully revealed himself—there might well be others still hidden in the dark. Given the circumstances tonight, even Lou Jingzhi understood this could not be measured by the standards of the martial world—if the Qi family’s people tried to invoke such rules here, the moment the army arrived, they would be as good as dead regardless. The young lord, son of the Left Chancellor, glanced at Ning Liheng with an expression as though looking at a fool. Of everyone present, the only one who seemed to take Ning Liheng seriously at all was the girl standing ahead of him. As the night wind blew past, and the two sides remained locked in a tense standoff for a moment, it was she who turned her head to glance at him, the corner of her mouth curling up faintly, a clear, bright amusement in her eyes.
As if what Ning Liheng had said was some deadpan joke, it seemed, in that moment, to genuinely amuse her.
And it was in that very instant that she turned her head that Qi Xinyong suddenly tightened his grip on his steel spear, stamped down, and closed the distance between them with startling speed! The rush of cutting wind sounded sharply; ahead of Ning Liheng, the girl was still turned back, still smiling—and then came a sharp crack, sounding from somewhere against her chest.
In that instant, there had been no visible motion of her hands at all—only that long wooden box, which had abruptly slid its lid open. The next moment, she too turned to face forward.
The rush of cutting wind now sounded from every direction at once!
From behind, a spear meant to take a life shot through the air, flying straight for Lou Jingzhi, while two dark shadows lunged out fiercely from the sides. In front of Ning Liheng, the long wooden box that had held the blade was flung backhand by the girl, rocketing past Ning Liheng’s side and hurtling toward the rear—while the girl’s own figure, propelled by the blade’s hilt, launched forward like a cannon shell, rushing straight toward Qi Xinyong and his oncoming spear.
Bang, bang, bang! A tremendous clanging like hammer on iron rang out, sparks bursting where metal met metal along the length of the street.
The wooden box that had held the blade collided with the steel spear flying in from behind; splinters scattered through the air, and the spear itself bounced up into the sky, a figure rushing in swiftly from that direction. Along the street, Lou Jingzhi drew the sword at his side beside Ning Liheng, and the six household guards protecting him sprang into motion in the same instant. Of the two figures who had rushed in from the side, one was tall and powerfully built, letting out a roar as he charged forward, his long spear transformed into a three-section iron rod that seemed to wrap itself around one of the six guards, a blade-wielding man, pinning him and driving him straight toward Lou Jingzhi, while his companion beside him swept a great spear like a striking serpent, wildly beating aside any guard who tried to intervene.
Ning Liheng pressed himself toward a nearby shop, while Lou Jingzhi tried to regroup with his guards. Seeing the enemy charging straight at him first, he clutched his sword and hurried aside as well. Among his household guards, one or two had genuine skill; together they moved to intercept the two men closing in from the side, while also managing to block the one who had thrown the spear from behind. In an instant, the fight became a chaotic tangle, figures darting and weaving, the street thrown into utter disorder.
The blade-wielding man had originally had both his blade and his own body pinned by the opponent’s three-section rod—the man was tall and imposing, and the sheer force of his charge had driven the guard steadily backward. But after a moment, the guard’s blade began to fight back desperately, planting his feet to hold his ground against the larger man—only for the brute’s savage face to loom suddenly close, a headbutt slamming into his skull. His head rang with a dull roar, his body wrenched through several positions, and just as a nearby comrade tried to rush to his aid, the big man shoved him forward as a human shield—and just as he was starting to react, a sudden, sharp pain tore through his abdomen.
The young man following at the big man’s side wielded a spear with brutal precision; seizing the opening, he thrust it straight through the guard’s body, the spear tip erupting from his back, and even as he gritted his teeth and drove the blow home, he pressed the strike onward toward the guard standing just behind the blade-wielder.
Only three men had come with Qi Xinyong this time—the two skilled at throwing and wielding spears from behind were household retainers of the Qi family, while the young man beside the big man, wielding his spear with such precision, was none other than the Qi family’s fifth young master, Qi Xinhan. Before his rebellion, Qi Yuankang had originally harbored ambitions of serving the state faithfully; his first four sons had been named after the virtues of loyalty, valor, righteousness, and integrity respectively. By the time his fifth son was born, he had felt his household already had enough martial-minded children, and decided this one would instead study for the imperial examinations and aim for a place in the Hanlin Academy—hence the character “Han,” meaning “academician,” in his name.
And yet, of the five children, it was this very Qi Xinhan who turned out to possess the greatest natural gift for martial arts. Still young in years, his skill with the steel spear was fierce and precise, and within the army he had long been called a second Zhao Zilong. But now, with his family destroyed and his father dead, that same precision had turned utterly savage. Roaring, he spun the impaled man around several times, his spear slashing through, tearing the man’s entire abdomen open until, when the body finally fell, it looked as though it had been cut clean in half at the waist. The man’s internal organs had already been shredded to ruin by that point—he had died before enduring that particular agony—but the shower of flesh and blood that filled the air in an instant turned the street nearby into something resembling a scene of pure carnage.
Though Lou Minzhong was Left Chancellor, and had once, in his days moving through the martial underworld, been himself a man of both letters and arms, he had by now devoted himself almost entirely to matters of scholarship and governance. It wasn’t that there was any shortage of skilled fighters who had come to serve under him—but Lou Jingzhi, in his day-to-day life, mostly spent his time talking books and chasing girls, and among the guards his family had assigned him, there were not many truly skilled hands. After all, those who had genuinely come to join the cause were looking to accomplish something greater, and had little enthusiasm for the job of guarding some young lord’s son. Of the guards present now, only two or three were genuinely formidable—yet the two Qi family retainers had already thrown their lives away entirely, and with Qi Xinhan, driven by his blood feud, pressing forward with the ferocity of a man who feared nothing, they had in short order left the guards scrambling on the defensive, and soon another was killed by Qi Xinhan.
With Lou Jingzhi present this time, the Qi family’s men had not come simply to seek revenge without a plan. Qi Xinyong had taken on Liu Dabiao, while the other three had, from the very start, set their sights on Lou Jingzhi. It wasn’t that they genuinely believed there was something between Lou Jingzhi and Liu Dabiao—but there was a chance of it; moreover, in this kind of political struggle, Lou Minzhong himself must surely have been among those who consented to the Qi family’s destruction; and finally, if Lou Jingzhi died right in front of Liu Dabiao, then even if they failed to kill Liu Dabiao herself, Lou Minzhong would inevitably fall into enmity with the Overlord Blade Battalion as a result. Their assault on Lou Jingzhi now came with overwhelming, unmatched force—and it left Ning Liheng, crouched off to the side with his blade, entirely overlooked.
After all, the reputation of the Bloody-Handed Butcher had never carried much weight; no one in the Qi family recognized him.
This side of the fight had run headlong into killers from the very first instant, blood spraying and danger lurking at every turn—yet it was the clash between Liu Dabiao and Qi Xinyong that proved truly astonishing to watch.
Of the Five Tigers of the Qi family, Qi Xinhan possessed the greatest natural talent, but Qi Xinyong, being somewhat older, had walked the paths of the martial world and weathered real battles, his spear technique powerful and steady—the finest, in fact, of the four men present. He charged forward spear in hand from the very first instant, his footwork never leaving the ground, yet astonishingly fast, his form like an arrow in flight, closing the distance in the blink of an eye, the rush of cutting wind sharp and sudden, as though he had compressed great distances into a single stride. The steel spear in his hands moved like a living serpent, its tip never staying still, weaving and darting within a small circle ahead of him—in an instant it had closed over ten meters of ground.
This was an exceedingly refined technique known as the Level-Center Spear—a form whose basic movement was, on its face, unremarkable, appearing in some form in nearly every school of spear-fighting: nothing more than a level thrust straight at the chest. Yet this Level-Center Spear was also among the hardest of all spear techniques to block; mastered to its highest degree, a single careless thrust could threaten chest, abdomen, shoulder, or throat all at once. Qi Xinyong’s internal strength was formidable; though his hands, gripping the spear with both, remained still, he had already set the shaft trembling with the spring of its own steel through sheer force alone. The two of them were still separated by that collapsed awning; as he charged forward, Liu Dabiao’s own momentum, hurled from that direction, sent the splintered wood scattering across the ground.
With a sharp cry, the spear tip thrust forward—and in the very next instant, sparks burst violently into the air, his forward charge abruptly, forcibly slammed to a halt!
The clash of steel on steel rang out in a mad clatter, like beans popping and crackling in a hot pan; the disciplined, precise thrust Qi Xinyong had aimed straight at her chest was knocked off center almost instantly. Liu Dabiao swung that massive blade—by rights heavy and unwieldy—with a speed that had, in this moment, reached its absolute peak. Her feet, in simple white embroidered slippers, spun and turned in a blur, her skirt hem snapping like unfurled silk, her body coiling together with that great blade—arching, thrusting, colliding, swinging, cutting—as though she carried the blade, and the blade, in turn, carried her, the two of them whirling together in an unrelenting storm of motion!
Qi Xinyong tried to steady his spear’s momentum, but it was simply impossible; amid the ringing clash of steel, his own forward charge ground to a halt, forced backward, and that retreat only accelerated further and further. His steel spear whirled ever faster in his hands, even as he let out a series of raw, guttural roars.
He had wielded the spear for years, trained personally by his father, and handled that great weapon as naturally as an extension of his own arm—by several degrees more skilled, in fact, than the man Ning Liheng had faced back at the Four Seasons Hall. Now, with each roaring cry, he poured every last ounce of strength and experience into the fight, the great spear in his hands moving like a staff, a whip, a serpent, throwing off countless afterimages into the night air. But as the exchange dragged on, Liu Dabiao’s assault only grew more ferocious by the moment, and his own footwork was forced back faster and faster, his position growing steadily more dire.
His Level-Center Spear was, by design, meant to pivot around a single central point—but from the very first exchange, that center had already been shattered, and the opening only widened further with each pass. Liu Dabiao’s blade first struck at his spear tip, then, inch by inch, spread its reach further along the shaft, striking now at the tip, now at the middle section—it looked, for all the world, as though some enormous iron ball had come crashing down into his defenses, while his own spear’s momentum resembled nothing so much as the ribs of an umbrella suddenly blown apart in a violent storm! However wildly he lashed his spear about, there was simply no way to stop that great iron ball’s inexorable advance.
Beneath the collapsed awning, the tables and chairs there were smashed to splinters the moment the two combatants crashed through them. In weapons, the old saying held that an inch longer meant an inch stronger—but pitted against Liu Dabiao’s blade, Qi Xinyong’s spear had, in the blink of an eye, been driven back another ten-odd meters, every advantage lost. He finally wrenched his grip loose with all his strength and threw himself sideways, leaping clear—the massive blade swept over the top of his head, shearing off a great swath of his hair. In the next instant, Liu Dabiao, wielding that great blade, lunged after him from above. He had barely managed to straighten himself and glance back when, more than ten feet away, he saw the girl’s figure whirling and spinning like a gale, her feet weaving in constant motion, skirt and sleeves whipping like a dance—yet the great blade she dragged behind her came slashing toward him now like the sudden strike of a startled swan.
With a thunderous crash, Qi Xinyong, man and spear together, was sent flying through the air; only because he’d managed to raise the steel spear in time to block did he avoid being cut clean in two. Even so, a searing pain shot through the flesh between his thumb and forefinger, leaving him with the sensation that his very grip might tear apart. Had he not experienced it firsthand, no one would have guessed that this girl, who appeared so slight and delicate, could unleash such terrifying force while whirling her body through the air like that.
While Lou Jingzhi’s side remained locked in chaotic combat, amid the thunderous crash from the other fight, Ning Liheng pressed himself close to a nearby shop. By now the shop’s awning had already been destroyed, but the owner was still inside. That this man had managed to keep his shop open under such circumstances suggested he had some connections of his own—but faced with the current situation, he too had been frightened senseless, cowering inside the building, at a complete loss, sharing Ning Liheng’s predicament in that regard. Across the way, Liu Dabiao, having just sent Qi Xinyong flying with a single strike, paused for a brief moment, both hands gripping her blade as she prepared to press forward—and it was in this exact instant that another steel spear thrust out of the darkness, aimed straight at the girl’s back.
This attacker had been hiding earlier among the buildings alongside the street, and only now made his move—meaning to catch the girl in that brief gap between her spent momentum and the gathering of new strength, and lock her down before she could move as swiftly as before.