Backslash

They talked more to pass the time while Yujin healed. After two hours, his body was just exhausted and no more wounds existed.

"Little friend, how much did you heal?" an elderly voice surprised them.

"Great–" Long Xue was about to greet but stopped after seeing Long Tian's pale face.

"Master Long," Yujin got up from the ground and greeted him respectfully, "I healed completely."

"That's great," Long Tian gave a tired smile, "And you, why aren't you with your parents?" He looked at Long Xue with sharp eyes.

"...Are you okay?" Long Xue held his sleeve and asked with tears in her eyes.

Long Tian patted her head with a bitter smile and said, "I'm fine, just a little tired."

"Are we going to be safe?" Long Xue asked with a face full of concern.

Long Tian was silent for a moment, but that was enough to tell them the situation was grave.

"There's no danger for now," Long Tian said after a short sigh, "The main force of the enemy was severely wounded by me, but...

"The enemy was ahead of us in asking for reinforcements, we are in a predicament if they arrive first than our own reinforcements."

Yujin's face turned gloomy and Long Xue's tiny body trembled.

Long Tian sighed and looked at Yujin, "You are good."

Yujin was surprised and didn't know why he was suddenly praised, "Thanks for the praise, I owe the sect for what I am today."

Long Tian laughed with a meaningful look and said, "I hope your friendship with Long Xue is as deep as it seems."

Yujin frowned and had a bad premonition.

"Greatpa, will our reinforcements arrive soon?" Long Xue asked.

"...I don't know," Long Tian didn't lie to comfort her, but instead told the truth, "But we are a step late after all, so we should prepare for the worst outcome."

"No..." Long Xue was visibly affected.

"Young boy, you did a wonderful job hiding yourself, but I hope you can do your best for Xue'er if the worst happens," Long Tian sent a hidden sound transmission to Yujin.

Yujin understood he was discovered by Long Tian and felt afraid, he didn't know him enough to trust him.

"Don't be afraid, I bear no ill intention towards you," Long Tian sent another around transmission as if expecting Yujin to feel afraid, "I just discovered it, the guard who saved you told me you managed to knock out someone at the peak of the Qi Refining Realm with a single punch."

Long Tian gave Yujin a deep gaze and asked, "Do you know what I did to the guard?"

Yujin's face turned gloomy and he shook his head in silence.

"I didn't kill him, but I forcefully erased his recent memories, it would permanently affect his own cultivation. It will be almost impossible for him to discover."

Yujin felt his heart beating wildly, but he didn't know the sound transmission technique yet to ask more about it. He spent the days after his breakthrough practicing the Heart Sutra, instead of that technique.

"I did it to someone loyal to our family... because of you, do you understand?" Long Tian's voice turned deep, "I want you to pay it back by protecting Long Xue if something happens! That would have been that guard's job, but he is still unconscious and can't do anything right now."

Yujin took a deep breath and nodded.

"You two, what are you doing just staring at each other?" Long Xue suddenly asked while throwing a tantrum, "Don't tell me you are talking using that technique! Not fair!"

Long Tian laughed and kissed her forehead, "Your Greatpa is going to discuss some matters with your father."

Long Xue pouted and was still angry at him.

Long Tian didn't care and just left.

"What are you two talking about?" Long Xue asked with sharp eyes, "Tell me!"

"We are talking about what kind of gift we will give each other if we survive," Yujin lied without batting an eyelid, "And we WILL survive, Master Long is too powerful to lose.

"He is someone at the peak of the Golden Core Realm, after all."

"Really?" Long Xue was suspicious.

"When did I ever lie to you?" Yujin snorted, "Friends don't lie to each other!"

Long Xue still looked suspicious, but he just closed his eyes and sat on the ground.

Yunin frowned and felt something unknown was in his waist, he grabbed it and saw that it was a book.

'Since when?' Yujin asked himself and examined the book.

It was a secret technique named "Stone Breathing Technique," it was a somewhat rare kind of technique used to hide one's own cultivation base.

Instantly, Yujin knew who gave it to him.

'Thank you, old man...' Yujin sighed in his heart and felt his sense of belonging growing again.

He noticed that the one single person responsible for him having a sense of belonging to the sect was Long Tian. Although Long Xue was his friend, he didn't think she had anything to do with it.

The person who accepted him despite his poor talent was Long Tian. The one who didn't forget him and even reserved him extra tasks was Long Tian. And the one that probably allowed him to be friends with Long Xue was Long Tian as well. Otherwise, why would a mission related to her be reserved for Yujin?

Yujin glanced at the small girl beside him, who was playing with her hair with a bored face. He found a strong feeling of duty.

He patted her head unconsciously, surprising Long Xue, "What?"

"No..." Yujin grinned and shook his head, "Nothing, I just wanted to pat your head."

Long Xue pouted and turned her head to the other side, visibly resentful.

As time passed and the hours flew by, the atmosphere in the manner turned even graver. After two days, everyone began to doubt if the reinforcements were truly in the way.

After three days... the worst happened.

Out of nowhere, a giant golden hand appeared in the sky and hit the formation protecting the manor. The barrier began to show small cracks but quickly healed.

"Old man, give up and open the damn formation!" an angry feminine voice came from outside.

"Go to hell!" Long Tian shouted back, "You are just a brat still wet behind the ears. Show yourselves, old bastards!"

Two golden hands, bigger than the one from before, hit the formation with great momentum, and it began to crack deeply, showing signs of collapse.

"Fuck! Is your sect crazy?" Long Tian shouted full of anger, "Are you truly aiming for a sect annihilation war?"

"Stop being a hypocrite and open the damn formation!" the female voice sounded again, "You actually don'needet to open it. You know that, right? What is your choice?"

"I'm not like your whore mother, who raised a bastard daughter like you!" Long Tian" 's tongue was venomous, "I'm not someone like her, that betrays the ones who trust me!"

"I will kill you!" the woman outside screamed and a huge tornado of fire appeared above the formation, "Break!"

"In your dreams!" Long Tian snorted and the formation seemed to be reinforced by many extra layers of energy.

The tornado of fire was unable to form a single crack in the formation.

Long Tian suddenly appeared beside Yujin with Long Xue in his arms, "Take her, I will send you far away."

"Why me?" Yujin asked, "There are many powerful people here, better than me."

"Not only the city, but the surroundings are also full of enemies with sensory abilities and artifacts," Long Tian shook his head and explained, "If someone with a high cultivation base appears, they could be easily sensed."

Yujin instantly understood his intentions and took Long Xue in his arms, "It's the second time."

"Huh?" Long Time didn't understand.

"The second time I lost a place I can call home," Yujin sighed with a bitter smile, "Why?"

Long Tian was silent for a moment and then patted his shoulder, "Everything built by human hands will eventually disappear, we shouldn't put affection on places, but on people."

He then pointed at Long Xue, "My family is my home. The people I love are my home."

Yujin took a deep breath and contained the tears that almost flowed down, "I will protect her, please survive too!"

"I don't know about me, but her parents have some chance of surviving," Long Tian sighed with a tired look, "But it won't be safe for her to run with her parents, their enemies were just too strong and numerous."

"Survive," Yujin suddenly grabbed Long Tian's arm, "You must survive!"

Long Tian smiled warmly and patted his head, "Yunwei sure has good eyesight, still. She managed to pick up a wonderful child, I'm sad to be away from her, but I'm glad she is not here."

Long Tian gave Yujin a talisman and explained, "It is a space transmission talisman. Using it will transmit you a few dozen kilometers from here, but it will also alert the enemy. That's why having a higher cultivation base means being more likely to be discovered, they don't expect someone with a low cultivation base to be teleported outside, since it is an extremely valuable talisman."

"Do her parents have one?" Yujin asked, "Why give it to me?"

"Because it has a limit of two people, and the cultivation base can't exceed the foundation establishment realm," Long Tian explained and his expression suddenly changed.

The formation began to show signs of collapsing out of nowhere, and numerous attacks took the opportunity to completely shatter it.

"Go!" Long Tian's aura exploded and he activated the talisman.

Immediately, without giving Yujin the chance to react, they were teleported away.

'Survive, old man,' Yujin sighed in his heart and tried his best to not lose consciousness due to the strong dizziness caused by the teleportation.

After a couple of seconds, Yujin found himself in a forest, he didn't hesitate and began to run with all his strength while carrying Long Xue.

Moreover, he also circulated the stone breathing technique, he managed to reach the initial mastery level with it after just a few days.

His cultivation seemed to recede to the third layer and his aura weakened considerably, thus diminishing the chances of him being discovered.

Long Xue was still at the third layer of the Qi Refining Realm, despite her parents' many efforts and her own good talent, but it was actually a good thing at that critical moment.

With a speed faster than someone at the peak of the Qi Refining Realm, Yujin distanced himself from the point he teleported very quickly. After a few dozen minutes, he was dozens of kilometers away, despite the difficult terrain full of obstacles.

Yujin never stopped and continued to run hour by hour, until the sky darkened, and he still didn't stop. When the sun began to show itself the next day, he felt the exhaustion finally hitting his own awareness of the surroundings and decided to stop.

Although he was always using the escape technique, he was still full of true qi because of the Furnace, which quickly replenished it by refining the spiritual qi around him.

Although the spiritual qi there wasn't dense enough for the furnace to increase his cultivation base, it was enough to replenish the lost true qi.

He was surprised that Long Xue was still unconscious, but he understood why Long Tian did it. If she was awake, she could be a dangerous variable in a fight.

Yujin felt he was very lucky to have been found by enemies, but he didn't lower his guard. After a few minutes of rest, he took Long Xue and began to run again.

He was heading towards the direction the reinforcements were supposed to come from. If they were close enough to each other, the reinforcements would sense their presence because of a special mark left by Long Tian on Long Xue's clothes.

After running for days, with exhaustion slowly hitting him to the point of his body and mind showing signs of collapse, Yujin heard a strange sound coming from behind him and his heart sank.

He put Long Xue down and shouted, "Show yourself."

"What a little bastard, you gave me a hard time those days," a middle-aged beautiful woman appeared from between the trees, she was gasping for air but her eyes were full of murderous intention.

Yujin felt a great threat coming from her and knew he wasn't an opponent the way he was, but he had no choice.

After a short explosion of ideas, he took the two spirit stones out of his pocket and used the Furnace to absorb them in a single instant.

He hit his bottleneck without hesitation, breaking it easily. He felt his spirit root thirst for spiritual qi and the Furnace quickly provided it with the energy it needed.

A vortex of spiritual qi formed around him and his aura climbed from the third layer to the fourth, and then to the fifth. The stone breathing technique couldn't be maintained because of the breakthrough.

That small layer advancement enabled his transforming true qi to thoroughly liquefy, drop by drop it began to accumulate. The liquid true qi was much stronger than the gaseous true qi, several times stronger even.

The woman sensed something was wrong and attacked him immediately, she didn't underestimate him despite his low apparent cultivation base. She thought he was still hiding it.

A sword appeared in her hand out of nowhere and a golden glow covered it, she slashed towards Yujin without holding back.

Yujin felt a great threat coming and hurriedly avoided the blow, but he was still hurt in the chest. A long cut mark appeared on his chest, and blood began to flow out like a waterfall.

Yujin used the pain as a stimulant and urged all his new strength to fight the woman. His body technique was obviously useless against the sword, so he focused on avoiding her attacks while trying to find an opportunity to hit back.

He needed a lot of time to let the liquid true qi transform his body and strengthen it, but he didn't have that luxury and had to fight with what he had.

Punches, kicks... He embued small lightning bolts in his attacks, but it was clearly weak against his enemy.

"What the hell, why are you fighting like a complete moron?" the woman began to laugh sinisterly after a few minutes of fighting, "Don't tell me you know nothing beside those small techniques?"

Yujin was silent and used the moment she talked to suddenly hit her by surprise on her arm, he managed to send the sword in her hand flying and hurriedly tried to hit her in the chest, but she avoided his blow with some ease.

"You bastard!" she was quick to recover her sword and began to attack him again, more fiercely than before.

Yujin's eyes turned fierce as he suddenly began to get flashes of the past when he helplessly watched the people of his village being murdered and raped. When his family fell apart and his father died...

He steeled his heart and let the woman's sword pierce his right chest, the sword pierced his body like tofu.

He grabbed the woman's arm with all his might and muttered with a vicious voice, "Die!"

"Get off!" the woman kicked Yujin's stomach, making him vomit blood, but he didn't let her go.

He grinned viciously and urged the Furnace... to absorb her energy.

The woman's expression changed and she felt a horrifying suction force robbing her true qi, "Demon bastard! Get off!"

The more she struggled, the stronger was the suction force. Not only her true qi but her blood qi and even her soul energy... Everything was being sucked away.

"No!!!" She screamed in panic as her hair turned gray and her body showed signs of aging, "Please stop!"

"Fucking die!" Yujin cursed and spat blood on her face.

As her energy was refined by the furnace, Yujin felt a huge backslash. Absorbing other people's energy with the Furnace had a grievous price.

The problem wasn't the energies, they were all cleanly refined into pure energy, but it was a punishment given by the Furnace itself.

After a few minutes, the woman, who turned into an old dry corpse, fell to the ground.

At the same time, Yujin felt a huge torment in his mind and body, as if thousands of poisonous needles were piercing his body and soul.

He used the last bit of consciousness he had to expel the energy he just refined outside his body. The backslash would be much worse if he used that energy, he even had a probability of dying or driven to insanity on the spot.

The Furnace obviously hated the action of absorbing other people's energies, and Yujin knew it from the beginning. Not only that, it repudiated absorbing the energies of any living being.

Before Yujin fell completely unconscious, he saw many figures falling from the sky towards him.