Chapter 289: A Thousand-Mile Gift of Heads
(The chapter title is borrowed from a reader in the community.)
The white-robed youth was surrounded, but instead of retreating, he advanced. After a few punches, he had beaten that companion until the other had no strength to fight back.
This made all those involved in the hunting operation feel uneasy in their hearts.
If not for the burly man’s warning, the Array Master on the north side might have died on the spot.
The old man who was building a Mountain-Moving and Water-Pouring Formation for everyone was squatting on the ground, placing several earth-yellow small flags. Even though he hadn’t noticed anything unusual, he still unhesitatingly slapped his chest, shattering a hidden and expensive Substitute Talisman, and instantly swapped positions with a young disciple.
In an instant, a flying sword of uncertain solidity descended from the sky, like a chopstick plunging into water, causing ripples, extremely fast.
The bewildered young man was split open by the huge flying sword on the spot, from head to waist, cut in two. The two halves of the body fell to the ground, entrails spilling out, a tragic sight.
The flying sword, much larger than an ordinary swordsman’s sword, plunged into the earth, flickered and vanished, and the ground showed no change.
It was undoubtedly a sword cultivator’s lifebound flying sword.
The next moment, the Array Master again slapped his chest, seemingly using another Substitute Talisman, determined to sacrifice the life of a second direct disciple to ensure his own safety.
However, this time, the evil cultivator who had been caught off guard earlier now had some leeway and did not stand idly by. Standing in the distance, he had already taken out a small black pottery jar covered in runes, silently recited a mantra, gently shook it a few times, and a sinister black smoke shot into the sky. After leaving the jar, it split into three strands, heading respectively for the Array Master, the young girl, and Lu Tai, who was standing on a high branch controlling his flying sword.
The flying sword appeared out of thin air again, still falling straight down.
But it was not aimed at the Array Master who was slapping talismans, but at the young girl with a terrified face.
The rolling black smoke, formed by countless yin creatures and specters, covered the girl’s head like an umbrella.
But the huge flying sword was too powerful, breaking through the black smoke barrier like a bamboo, and still split the girl from head to toe with one stroke.
A young girl in her prime, thus perished on the path of cultivation.
She had strived for immortality, but in the end couldn’t even live past twenty.
Lu Tai, holding onto the main trunk of a large tree with one hand, looked displeased.
Truly, the law is one foot high, the devil is ten feet high.
That Array Master had actually not truly used the Substitute Talisman; the second slap on the chest was just a feint, luring him to point his sword at the girl.
Lu Tai had lost a move, but he wasn’t furious. On the mountain, cultivation was such that fools had no right to cross the mountain gate threshold, and even the most dull-witted person, even if they had wasted all their years on a dog, after decades or centuries, even a real dog would become a spirit.
So no one was an easy opponent.
That lifebound flying sword, though huge, was incredibly fast. Lu Tai stood still, letting the black smoke swarm to attack him. After killing the girl, the flying sword instantly returned to its owner Lu Tai and shredded the black smoke filled with resentment, wailing, and ferocious faces.
The evil cultivator kept shaking the pottery jar in his palm and sneered, “You dare to destroy my yin treasures? Let’s see how much spiritual energy you have to waste!”
One after another, strands of black smoke flew out of the jar, like a huge black flower blooming in his hand.
The Array Master was terrified of that guy giving him another sword strike, so he reluctantly took out a large handful of white beads and flicked his sleeve to scatter them. Dozens of beads hovered around him, arranged in patterns of Three Powers, Four Symbols, Seven Stars, Eight Trigrams, and Nine Palaces—the positions of the varying numbers of beads were very deliberate, forming protective formations. Once the formations were complete, they shone brilliantly, illuminating the old Array Master with a bright and majestic radiance.
However, this would delay the earlier formation-laying, costing a lot of time.
The evil cultivator knew that a few words couldn’t persuade this old Array Master who feared death and cherished his life. While controlling the black smoke to attack Lu Tai, he reminded, “Hurry up and set up the formation, or else our thousand-li journey will be wasted. And if we can’t kill those two, there will be endless trouble. You weigh it yourself!”
The old Array Master’s face changed between dark and light. Gritting his teeth, he removed half of the small formations and withdrew dozens of beads. This way, the speed of setting up the formation across various places increased a bit.
The southern battlefield.
The burly man fell to the ground, vomiting blood uncontrollably, as if trying to spit out his heart, liver, and intestines. The soil was stained scarlet, a miserable sight.
He was a genuine fifth-rank martial artist, with a body hardened through years of training, making him very tough.
However, on the path of martial arts, he had never encountered a wise master’s guidance, so his journey was rough and difficult. The foundation of the three body-tempering realms was riddled with flaws. Advancing from the fourth to the fifth realm was reckless, so barring accidents, he would never reach the sixth realm in his lifetime.
A living person can’t be choked to death by a single piss, so he took to crooked paths. His art of invoking gods came from half a damaged scroll, obtained through “scavenging.” Since he only had the first half, he only knew how to invite but not how to send away the god—“Easy to invite a god, hard to send it away” is the principle.
Each time he invoked a god’s possession came at a great cost. After nearly twenty years of exploration, begging and pleading with people, extensively buying such immortal books and secret scrolls, he barely managed to control the sequelae of this god-invocation art.
Especially today, halfway through the invocation, that white-robed youth punched the “divine spirit” back to its altar. For the strict rules of god invocation and true descent, this was extremely rude, so the backlash was severe. Strands of soul essence drifted out from his acupoints, like three incense sticks, rising faintly.
After the three incense sticks burned out, there was still no sign of stopping. Mist rose from the burly man’s back. These mists were the manifestation of a fifth-rank martial artist’s spirit, the fundamental essence of a pure martial artist.
The man said hoarsely and unclearly, “Save me!”
The Qi Practitioner skilled in the Five Elements Wood Method frowned deeply. Reluctantly, he withdrew the Mountain-Moving and Tree-Uprooting technique aimed at the white-robed youth and came to squat beside the burly man. His fingers formed hand seals, his face flushed red. Between his fingers, faint dots of light drifted up from the ground, swirling around his fingertips, and then he fiercely slapped them into the burly man’s back.
The burly man’s body, lying in the mud, twitched. His face instantly turned rosy, and from all major joints of his body came crisp sounds like soybeans popping. Like dead wood meeting spring, the burly man turned over, executed a kip-up, and stood up holding his double maces, full of vigor with no sign of weakness.
The Qi Practitioner who had saved him said in a deep voice, “Put it on the account.”
The man gritted his teeth and glared at the astonishing white-robed youth, nodding. “Once we take down these two fat sheep, everything will be fine!”
That night on the Hantian Street of the Fuji Sect, that guy who looked more delicate than a girl spent lavishly, enough to make even a Golden Core wild cultivator feel ashamed. Not that a Golden Core cultivator couldn’t afford that many Xiaoshu coins, but you should know that the handsome young master bought only expensive toys like Yangzhi Beasts, Spring Dream Spiders, and Talisman Paper Dolls—not offensive magic treasures for killing enemies, nor defensive heavy weapons for saving lives!
Cultivators of the Indus Leaf Continent, whether orthodox immortals or wild cultivators, who would speak a poor version of the Indus Leaf elegant speech?
Two young men clearly from another continent traveled only through forests and market towns, going north for a thousand li without once visiting the immortal mountains along the way, and no great cultivator ever came to visit them. What did this mean? It meant these two rookies came from noble backgrounds, loaded with money, accustomed to an easy life since childhood, but ignorant of the deep waters of the martial world and the strong winds of the mountains!
If they didn’t take down these two filthy rich greenhorns, how could it justify their years of bitter cultivation? Apart from seeking opportunities everywhere and living by the edge of the knife, they also had to bow and scrape like dogs to the mountain immortals, taking their money to clean up the dirty business they disdained to do themselves, bearing infamy, fleeing for their lives, starting over somewhere else—when would this cycle ever end?
From the burly man being beaten half to death by five consecutive punches of the Divine Drummer Style, to the Qi Practitioner using a secret technique to steal the local landscape’s qi fortune and successfully heal him—all of this happened in just a few blinks of an eye.
Chen Ping’an was blocked by strands of sword qi controlled by the middle-aged Sword Master, preventing him from finishing off the iron-whip burly man in one go.
Controlling a sword with qi was a very impressive immortal technique in the martial world.
In many isolated places, the so-called “flying sword taking heads from a thousand li” described in poetry and books did not actually refer to sword cultivators, but to Sword Masters who often appeared before the common people. Compared to mountain sword immortals and martial world swordsmen, half-baked Sword Masters were stuck in the middle and especially liked to seek fame.
When a Sword Master controlled a sword to kill an enemy, what came out of their sleeves often included both sword qi and real swords—the former excelled in quantity, the latter in power.
Light cavalry harassing the formation gained advantage, heavy cavalry charging the formation achieved victory; the two cooperated, and neither could be lacking.
The Sword Master confronting Chen Ping’an was clearly a master of this art. His sleeves billowed, and on the surface of the cuffs, waves of cyan light flickered, from which shot strands of cyan sword qi, extremely fierce.
Fortunately, the Sword Master could control at most two strands of sword qi at a time.
Chen Ping’an dodged fairly easily, not at all stretched thin, but he was very tightly constrained.
Chen Ping’an did not use tactics that would hurt himself as much as the enemy. After heavily injuring the burly man earlier, due to the Sword Master’s interference, even though the Qi Practitioner saved the man, he only symbolically blocked a bit. This caused the Sword Master to misjudge; he had laid a sword qi trap near the burly man, but Chen Ping’an suddenly accelerated and charged straight at the Sword Master, nearly breaking into a distance of one zhang from him.
The Sword Master, breaking out in a cold sweat, had to use his true trump card.
That solid small sword did not fly out from his sleeve but quietly emerged from the topknot on his head. It turned out that the jasper hairpin was the “scabbard” used to conceal the small sword.
It was a small sword shaped like an emerald green willow leaf, without a hilt, extremely slender, spinning rapidly around the Sword Master, stirring up wisps of light green fireflies.
The Talisman Daoist warned sharply, “My two Dry Well Talismans can hold for at most twenty more finger-snaps! Finish this quickly, cut down this little bastard! Once his flying sword breaks out of the cage, we’ll all be waiting in line to have our throats slit!”
The old Daoist’s face was haggard, his ten fingers thin. While speaking, he slowly rotated his hands, presumably controlling the two talismans that had captured First and the Fifteenth. The old Daoist’s voice trembled with anger, “Your intelligence said this kid was a martial artist swordsman, didn’t it? Now not only is he a sword cultivator, this brat actually has two flying swords, two! If I didn’t have a bit of savings and had refined two precious talismans originally intended for my disciples, we’d all be finished this time! The previously agreed dividends are off!”
The burly man looked grim, strode towards Chen Ping’an without looking at the old Daoist, and said dully, “Changing the dividends is easy to discuss; you won’t be shortchanged.”
The old Daoist snorted coldly.
His heart was in turmoil as he stared fixedly at the white-robed youth.
Since when did sword cultivators have such a powerful physique?
And that handsome young master still standing on the tree was also a sword cultivator with a lifebound flying sword. No wonder the two dared to swagger in a foreign land—two sword cultivators, three lifebound flying swords. Even if they swaggered from the Jade Gui Sect of Indus Leaf Continent to the Indus Leaf Sect, as long as they didn’t provoke those immortal mansions themselves, how many wild cultivators would dare to mess with them in ordinary times?
This group was a mix of all sorts; they normally wouldn’t have come together, but they gathered for profit. Although each person’s cultivation level wasn’t too high, they each had their strengths. And on this journey, they had a hidden expert advising them, so even if it came to killing a Golden Core cultivator, as long as the target didn’t notice in advance, the group could contend with them, perhaps even obtain a vast fortune.
For example, his own participation this time was because he had his eye on that young Yangzhi Beast.
Determined to get it!
They had actually already overestimated the two young men, but hadn’t expected them to be so troublesome.
This time, with the middle-aged Sword Master going all out to entangle the youth, and the Wood Method Qi Practitioner in this forest environment having a natural advantage, he even drove ancient trees to uproot themselves and stagger like old men. The burly man took out a vermilion pill, tossed it into his mouth, and his skin became burning hot and red.
He was going to invoke the god and bring down the true spirit again!
The branches of the great trees lashed down like whips at Chen Ping’an. While dodging, Chen Ping’an also had to evade one or two insidious cyan sword beams, creating a dangerous situation.
Fortunately, Lu Tai quickly sent a telepathic message, teaching Chen Ping’an how to deal with those strange trees. After that, each of Chen Ping’an’s punches precisely shattered a hidden string of characters attached to the trees. Only when Chen Ping’an successfully destroyed the characters would silver light shatter, and the tree would collapse, its lush green leaves instantly withering.
Lu Tai also reminded Chen Ping’an that the old Talisman Daoist who had imprisoned the two flying swords might not be telling the truth about twenty finger-snaps; it could likely be thirty, or even longer.
Chen Ping’an’s expression was blank—presumably he couldn’t afford to be distracted. After smashing all the strange trees, the burly man who had already abandoned his iron whip had successfully invoked the god. His eyes were white, devoid of any human light, like a deity coldly overlooking the mortal world.
But Lu Tai was a bit surprised in his heart.
Because he sensed that after hearing his reminder, Chen Ping’an’s mind didn’t stir at all, clearly having already seen through the old Daoist’s scheme, thus maintaining such calm.
Young as he was, he was a seasoned veteran.
Lu Tai leaned on the tree trunk with one hand. Compared to Chen Ping’an’s fierce battle against various experts, his side was quite boring.
His flying sword “Needlepoint” could no longer kill the old Array Master, and the dark smoke of yin spirits from the pottery jar couldn’t do anything to Lu Tai either.
Moreover, Lu Tai casually took out a five-colored silk rope and tied it around his arm. Although this item was far inferior to a woman’s colorful belt, it was a considerable magic treasure for ordinary Qi practitioners. The five-colored rope wrapped around the arm consisted of: a Life-Extending Core, which enhanced the absorption of spiritual energy; a Weapon-Repelling Silk, which made one impervious to weapons (though not all weapons, otherwise it would be a semi-immortal weapon rather than a treasure); an Evil-Averting Cord, whose tip rose like a spiritual snake to blow away evil qi; a Sword-Ejecting Thread, which could fly out on its own, somewhat like a Sword Master’s controlled flying sword; and finally, a miniature Binding Demon Rope.
The strength of Lu Tai’s magic treasure lay in its comprehensiveness, covering both offense and defense.
But ultimately, unless the opponent was a Golden Core or Nascent Soul cultivator one or two realms higher, everyone feared attrition—fearing being killed by ants like an elephant.
Fortunately, today Chen Ping’an was occupying the enemy’s main force. The “idle” Lu Tai felt an unprecedented twinge of guilt. This time they had indeed been careless, not expecting the other side to be so bold as to gather so many people to besiege them, and their perseverance was remarkable—they had tailed them for a thousand li.
On the northern battlefield, the evil cultivator, probably pained by the constantly dissipating black smoke, shouted to the old Daoist, “Do you have any more Dry Well Talismans? If so, toss one over quickly. I’ll owe you, and later he and I will pool money to repay you!”
The old Daoist was so angry he jumped up and down, cursing, “Have your father’s!”
The evil cultivator was furious inside, but could only endure for now, thinking that there would be a time to settle accounts with this stinking Daoist in the future.
The old Daoist completely looked down on that evil cultivator who was neither human nor ghost. Seeming afraid of the end of the twenty finger-snaps, he secretly shook his sleeve, as if preparing something.
The two talismans imprisoning the flying swords trembled more and more violently.
The old Daoist had a bitter feeling he couldn’t express.
Earlier, he had loudly claimed that he could only trap the flying sword for twenty finger-snaps, as Lu Tai had guessed, deliberately deceiving Chen Ping’an into thinking he could recall the sword after twenty finger-snaps and wreak havoc. But now the old Daoist was like a mute eating bitter herbs—unable to voice his pain. It turned out that those two precious talismans could indeed only trap the flying sword for about twenty finger-snaps, not the expected forty!
The talisman was called the Dry Well Talisman.
It could suppress a lifebound flying sword.
It used seven small nails made from lightning-struck wood, arranged in the shape of the Big Dipper, embedded into special talisman paper using secret arts. Then one liang of flying dust that fell from within a great wind’s tail was scraped off—specifically from Buzhou Wind, one of the eight winds. The talisman pattern depicted a sword trapped in a well, with the words “immovable” written on the back. This was the main structure, with many other “branches and leaves” of the talisman added.
This was a top-grade secret talisman from a heterodox school of the Talisman Sect in Indus Leaf Continent. Although it was inferior to what Lu Tai called “Sword Sheath Talisman” and “Mountain Sealing Talisman,” it was not to be underestimated. It was a life-saving talisman for mid-realm Qi Practitioners to deal with sword cultivators, worth a thousand gold.
Crafting a single Dry Well Talisman with its complex materials was time-consuming and costly.
Within a radius of ten zhang, once this talisman was activated, encountering a flying sword would render a sword cultivator’s lifebound flying sword as immobile as a person standing in a dry well.
The quality of the talisman depended on how long it could trap the flying sword.
To lift the restriction, one only needed to chant a mantra, flick one’s sleeve, and blow air, and the “well-imprisoned” flying sword would be free to go.
Others spent ten years sharpening a sword; the old Daoist spent ten years refining a talisman. No amount of cherishing was too much.
On both battlefields, the great battle was in full swing.
Deep in the forest, two people were watching from afar.
Watching the fire from across the river.
One was the guest who had competed with Lu Tai for the Yangzhi Beast in the Fuji Sect shop—short in stature, unremarkable in appearance, with a slightly smug expression.
The other was a red-robed swordsman with a long sword at his waist, tall and imposing. At this moment, he held his hand on the sword hilt, watching the battlefield situation, and smiled, “Earlier, everyone thought you were making a mountain out of a molehill, and I was no exception. Now it seems, thanks to your caution, it saved me a lot of trouble.”
The red-robed man was a sixth-rank peak martial artist swordsman.
In the martial world beneath the mountains of Indus Leaf Continent, he was a veritable grandmaster of the sword. Though already in his seventies, his face was still as fair as jade. For decades, he had roamed over a dozen countries with his sword, rarely meeting a match.
Moreover, the long sword at his waist was an incredibly sharp immortal treasure, allowing this martial artist swordsman to boldly claim, “Below Golden Core Earth Immortal, one sword can injure the enemy. Below Dragon Gate, one sword can kill,” and few in either the mountains or the common world disputed it.
His fame was great, and he was unrivaled in charm. Countless women adored this martial world sword immortal who did not seek longevity. Some rumors even said that Empress Zhao of the Yunlu Kingdom had an affair with him. As for chivalrous ladies and fairies from famous martial clans, their admiration for this red-robed sword immortal was beyond count.
The unremarkable man chuckled, “My caution, Ma Wanfa, is a habit. I suffered too many losses and hardships when I was young, so I remember: when dealing with these well-born immortals, we martial folk must use all our strength like a lion catching a rabbit, devouring them in one go. Otherwise, even if we barely win, it’s a pyrrhic victory with little gain.”
The red-robed swordsman smiled, “Ma Wanfa, as agreed before, I was to support you to prevent accidents, and the sword on the white-robed youth’s back was already promised to me. Now that an accident has happened and I truly need to kill enemies myself, then...”
The man nodded. “The Sword-Nourishing Gourd cannot be given to you, and you are not a sword cultivator anyway. But the two youngsters have at least one spatial ring between them. I need to take out the contents for dividends; you can take the spatial ring itself. How about that?”
The red-robed swordsman squinted and smiled, “Excellent.”
The man hesitated. “Although the situation is decided, we must still be careful. The white-robed youth is probably at the end of his rope. The one who looks like a girl might still have strength in reserve. How about you go after him first? Then the other one won’t be able to jump around.”
The red-robed swordsman shook his head. “The one on the tree has a treasure protecting his arm and a flying sword darting about in secret. It’s hard for me to succeed in one silent blow. But that white-robed youth, I can kill with one sword stroke. Once his comrade is gone, that delicate-skinned little fellow will surely lose his composure. Then whether I kill him or you do it yourself won’t matter.”
The man thought for a moment and nodded in agreement. “That would be best.”
Then he smiled, “The old Daoist’s two Dry Well Talismans are about to give out. When will you act?”
“Right now!”
The red-robed swordsman’s figure had already disappeared, with only a lingering echo left.
The branch he had been standing on hadn’t moved at all.
This showed the speed and martial skill of this grandmaster.
On the southern battlefield, Chen Ping’an and the burly man who had invoked the god were locked in a fierce fight, with the latter having two helpers. The battle seemed messy and would likely continue for a while.
A streak of red light fell from the sky, as fast as thunder, tearing through the battlefield in an instant. Sword qi was fierce and filled the surroundings.
A drawn sword stabbed straight at the white-robed youth’s heart.
The sword struck without any suspense.
The red-robed swordsman curled his lips. Interesting and yet boring again.
He’d killed another so-called cultivation genius.
But in the next moment, the red-robed swordsman was about to retreat violently, even planning to abandon his immortal treasure sword.
Because life was the most important.
The crowd was stunned. The grandmaster’s entrance was too imposing; everyone was afraid to interfere, so they stopped, lest after he killed the youth, he casually stab them as well, calling it a mistake.
When one less person meant more dividends for the rest, who among the survivors would be unhappy?
But the next scene was unforgettable.
The white-robed youth, who had been as pristine as snow, after being stabbed in the heart by the red-robed swordsman’s sword...
The white robe began to ripple from the point of impact, revealing its true appearance.
A golden robe!
It was as if many flood dragons were hidden in the golden clouds.
Chen Ping’an no longer deliberately suppressed the power of this Dharma robe left by an overseas immortal. He no longer intentionally showed weaknesses, seeking injuries to make himself look bloody.
So this sword pierced the golden robe but didn’t even scratch the Dharma robe.
Lu Tai hadn’t said anything.
But Chen Ping’an had been waiting for this exact moment.
Waiting for the hidden master to deliver the final blow.
If he didn’t come, Chen Ping’an wouldn’t lose.
If he came, Chen Ping’an would gain greatly.
On this journey, from the first time he left Lizhu Cave Heaven for the Great Sui Academy, to the second time he left his hometown for Inverted Suspension Mountain.
Constant caution, day after day of striving for “no mistakes”—Chen Ping’an had finally reaped the reward.
In an instant.
The red-robed swordsman had just released the sword hilt when the youth, ignoring everything, stepped forward against the sword tip and reached back to draw the long sword from his back.
One stroke sliced off his head.
Even Lu Tai was stunned. Then he looked around and smiled sweetly at those terrified individuals, “You all sent your heads from a thousand miles away. Truly, a light gift but heavy sentiment.”
Chen Ping’an sheathed “Long Qi” back into the scabbard, took a few steps forward, and gently grasped the long sword with his other hand, standing still.
Holding the sword in a reverse grip.
There was a bit of cool elegance in that.