Chapter 23: Felling the Dragon

Ji Yunchen didn't seem to take offense at her insolence. He merely looked blankly at her for a while, then said dejectedly: "My 'Slicing Water and Tangling Silk' indeed isn't all that great – in any case, my deepest thanks to you for agreeing to help."

Xie Yun looked extremely disgruntled. He leaned against the stone wall of the chamber in sullen silence.

Wu Chuchu was the first to speak: "If Fei doesn't leave, I'm not leaving either."

Hua Zhenglong, who had returned at some point, looked at Ji Yunchen and asked: "Have you completely lost your mind?"

Ji Yunchen shook his head.

Just then, those copper gongs clanged again, loudly and urgently, that chilling sound echoing up and down the passageways. When that sound finally faded away, Hua Zhenglong lowered his head slightly, and with hapless exasperation on his face said: "Then I have no choice but to…"

As he said this, he'd already raised his hand to grasp Ji Yunchen's shoulder, intending to bring him away by force. Ji Yunchen didn't struggle at all, stumbling as Hua Zhenglong dragged him along, although his face remained impassive – only those unversed in martial arts would reflexively struggle when they had been seized. But an expert like Ji Yunchen knew that struggling would only be a pointless waste of energy.

Instead he lowered his voice, and said slowly and emphatically: "I've had enough of running away. Do you know what I was thinking just now?"

Hua Zhenglong's face tightened.

Ji Yunchen said softly: "I was just thinking – after all these years of searching, I've barely done anything at all after discovering who the real culprit was. So when he came knocking, why didn't I stay and face him in the inn? Why do I have to flee? Why do I have to run all over the place just to hide from him? It's simply because I know that I'm no match for them at all, and to turn tail and run when one encounters danger is just human nature. Brother Hua, I've become afraid of death. I had been dreaming of the day when I could stab my blade right through the Azure Dragon Lord's heart, yet now that he's here, I choose to hide from him. Isn't that absurd?"

As Ji Yunchen said this, he patted Hua Zhenglong on the hand: "Brother Hua, why would a useless cripple like myself have prolonged my feeble existence, if not in anticipation of a day such as this? If I am able to bring judgment on his head, then choosing to live on would at least have been worth it. There will surely come a day when this little bit of courage that I now have to kill him fades away, and then all I'd be left with is this feeble existence. Don't you understand what I'm trying to say?"

Hua Zhenglong stiffened for a second, then slowly loosened his grip.

Ji Yunchen said: "You should leave now."

Hua Zhenglong looked at him, and shook his head sadly: "But if I leave today, when will I ever get to come back here to bury your corpse?"

At this, Ji Yunchen's lifeless brows finally twitched slightly, as if his friend's words had somehow injected him with a frisson of vitality.

This was the very last bit of kinship that he had left in his entire life.

Hua Zhenglong asked: "How long more do you need?"

Ji Yunchen replied: "Twelve hours."

Hua Zhenglong nodded and said: "While I'm not extremely familiar with these tunnels, I've still passed through them several times at least. I'll help you to stall them for a while, although I'm afraid I won't be able to do so for a full twelve hours. You'll have to figure out the rest on your own."

Hua Zhenglong turned on his heel and left.

The two men's conversation had been absolutely perplexing to the others present – 'burying corpses', 'twelve hours', all of it was a puzzle. So when Hua Zhenglong abruptly departed, everyone except for Ji Yunchen was still too stunned to do anything in response. And while Ji Yunchen had grabbed his shoulder, the downtrodden chef probably only had strength enough to toss a wok, and certainly wasn't capable of holding his friend back.

The Divine Lotus Palms lightly plucked Ji Yunchen's feeble hand from his body with an effortless flick of his wrist, and darted out of the chamber. Ji Yunchen's face tightened with anxiety, and he hastened out of the chamber in pursuit of his friend. But the tunnel leading from the chamber turned right sharply before abruptly splitting into four or five different passageways, and when he rounded the bend, Hua Zhenglong's hefty figure had long since disappeared down one of these dark passageways, impossible to find.

Ji Yunchen's eyes suddenly reddened.

A snort was heard from the pale-faced fellow trussed up tightly in a corner of the chamber: "There's really no need for you to be so touched. Do you think that fatty fussed and cared for you so all these years, with nary a complaint, simply out of the goodness of his heart?"

Ji Yunchen turned his head away.

Yin Pei raised his head with some difficulty to look directly at him, and smiled: "The two of you are really quite something. I suppose birds of a feather really do flock together – you've both done things you're not proud of, yet don't dare to confess your sins before the people you've wronged. Instead, you make a whole lot of unnecessary sacrifices for them and think that this would suffice to make up for it all. And then you secretly get all weepy over what you think are such acts of heroism."

Ji Yunchen clenched his fists slowly, refusing to pay him any mind.

Lazily observing the expression on Ji Yunchen's face, Yin Pei said: "I'll do you a good deed and tell you what that fatty's really done, then. The Divine Lotus Palms Hua Zhenglong keeps saying that he owes his life to you. Well, I've heard that in the glory days of his youth, he wasn't fat, nor was he ugly, and was rather good-looking. He once played the hero and saved a damsel in distress, but foolishly endangered his life in the process, causing him to suffer serious injuries, and was on the verge of death. Back then it was you who saved him. That's roughly how the story goes, right?"

Ji Yunchen pretended not to hear him at all, as if those sarcasm-laced words were merely a dog yapping away. He spoke only to Zhou Fei: "Would you mind helping me to seal the passageway leading to this chamber first, to at least delay them a little longer?"

Zhou Fei was actually terribly curious about Yin Pei's story. But as she'd just been horribly rude to Ji Yunchen, she felt like she shouldn't offend him any further by hanging around here to eavesdrop. She strode out of the chamber with a stony face, rolled up her sleeves and started piling up rocks in the narrow passageway. Xie Yun came over to help her – he had nothing better to do now anyway, since he wasn't very well going to leave on his own – while using the consternation on his face to convey his extreme indignance at her the whole time.

Even though nobody seemed to be paying him any attention, Yin Pei continued prattling on with that tireless tongue of his: "The damsel that he'd saved had a pretty powerful enemy, who severely injured his meridians, and his life was hanging by a thread. Having previously learnt that the two of you were friends from Hua Zhenglong, that woman came to find you, in hopes of obtaining a 'Nine-Lives Pill' from you to save his life. You had one Nine-Lives Pill left at the time, but didn't give it to her at first. Instead, you merely channelled your internal strength into the unconscious Hua Zhenglong every day to prolong his life. That woman didn't complain at all, and was still extremely grateful to you. She seemed most innocent and kind, didn't she? Did you know who exactly this innocent and kind little beauty really was?"

Ji Yunchen sat down a distance away from Yin Pei, and pulled out a little bundle from within his robes, which was wrapped in greased paper. He unwrapped it to reveal more wrappings of various cloths inside, which he uncovered layer by layer to reveal several extremely slender silver needles.

Seeing that Ji Yunchen was set on ignoring him, Yin Pei continued talking to himself: "Many years back, the most renowned assassins' guild was called the 'Mingfeng Tower'. That woman was the youngest disciple of the Lord of Mingfeng Tower."

Zhou Fei had been eavesdropping keenly. When she heard this, the rock in her hand slipped to the ground, nearly bludgeoning her foot. Xie Yun caught it just in time. Zhou Fei thought to herself: The 'Mingfeng Tower'? And assassins at that! Were they by any chance related to the 'Mingfeng Sect' in the 48 Zhai?

This finally seemed to elicit a reaction from Ji Yunchen. He said evenly: "So what?"

That woman had only been a passer-by after all, and Hua Zhenglong hadn't ended up with her. Whether she'd been a good girl, or an assassin disguising herself as a good girl, it was none of his business. Ji Yunchen picked up one of those super fine needles, examined it closely in his hand for a moment, then slowly pierced it down through the top of his head.

His movements were extremely slow and measured, and he lowered his eyes to the ground as he performed them. This made it seem like he was doing something incredibly mysterious, as if he might conjure up a deity at any moment. He continued pushing the needle down, far deeper than one might when performing regular acupuncture, and had to stop three or four times in between. He seemed to be in excruciating pain, as a layer of cold sweat quickly formed on his forehead.

After the first needle was in, Ji Yunchen heaved a huge sigh of relief, and then said weakly to Zhou Fei: "Since you don't think much of the Northern Blade, Miss, would you allow me to test 'Slicing Water and Tangling Silk' against your moves?"

Zhou Fei's ears had been straining to hear Yin Pei's strange tale, while she was simultaneously staring at that peculiar needle in Ji Yunchen's hands with bated breath. Her mind was in two places at once, and when Ji Yunchen suddenly spoke to her, she responded with a distracted: "…Ah?"

"Forgive me for not being able to exchange real blows with you." Ji Yunchen pointed to a spot across from him, saying; "Please take a seat. Have you ever heard of an 'academic fight'?"

"A 'martial fight' involves actually exchanging blows, whereas an 'academic fight' only involves acting out the movements. People engaging in an academic fight might only state and explain the moves that they would use, or go through their motions without having any actual physical contact with their opponent. Nobody gets hurt – it's very amicable."

Zhou Fei hesitated for a moment, unsure if Ji Yunchen might be trying to pull something on her. Yin Pei, who was feeling quite neglected, cut in: "An assassin of the Mingfeng Tower was capable of killing even her own mother and father once she'd been paid. You'd thought her kind and innocent – Ji Yunchen, were you really that blind?" Yin Pei cackled: "You eventually gave your last remaining Nine-Lives Pill to her, saving Hua Zhenglong's life – Hero Ji, why did you change your mind, pray tell?"

Zhou Fei was distracted from Ji Yunchen's words again, thinking to herself: Oh yes, why did he do that?

Ji Yunchen seemed slightly out of breath, and said slowly: "When I left the frontier regions, my shifu gave me two Nine-Lives Pills. These pills can reputedly bring the almost-dead back to life, as long as the person still has a single breath left in him. If a regular person consumes it, it has the marvelous effect of promoting circulation and healing old injuries. I'd already used one of the two pills to save a friend many years back, and had only one left. I was saving it for you. You suffered from a birth defect that made you sickly since young, so your meridians were far too weak by nature. Not only would it be difficult for you to practice martial arts, you were also weak and prone to illnesses. I'd hoped that if I let you consume it when you were a little older, it might actually give you a new lease of life."

Yin Pei sneered: "But you didn't expect me to discover the truth, the real reason for that disaster on the Yin Clan, and run away. Don't you want to know how I managed to find this out?"

Ji Yunchen said: "I had a slip of the tongue when drunk…"

"You had a slip of the tongue when drunk, and I just so happened to be there to hear it?" Yin Pei burst out laughing, but because he was afraid that the Azure Dragon Lord might hear him, that laugh was suppressed into a soft, wheezing kind of laughter, like a punctured bellows, and it wasn't long before he began to grow out of breath: "Ji Yunchen, you are so incredibly naïve, through and through. Who was it that got you drunk, and drew this information out of you? Who deliberately arranged for me to hear it? And after hearing it, why did I leave without a word, without even demanding an explanation from you? After you'd realised that I was gone, did that woman also pretend to help you search for me?"

Sometimes, one could be completely in the dark about certain things when one was living through it – only many years later, when recounted by others, did the truth seem so obviously apparent.

Even an outsider like Zhou Fei could tell what had happened. To save Hua Zhenglong, that female assassin had come up with this plot for Yin Pei to uncover his adoptive father's secret, making them enemies overnight. Perhaps Yin Pei had left of his own accord, or perhaps he was compelled to leave due to her machinations…no one but those involved would know what had really transpired.

This was how the Nine-Lives Pill had ended up in Hua Zhenglong's belly without a hitch, and successfully preserved his life – then had Hua Zhenglong ever found out the truth?

It seemed like he had, after all.

One's closest kin, to whom one was most grateful, was in fact one of the main reasons for one's dire predicament – this was what Ji Yunchen was to Yin Pei, and also what Hua Zhenglong was to Ji Yunchen. Glancing at Ji Yunchen, Yin Pei broke out into stifled laughter once more.

The clang of the gongs resounded down the passageway once more. But it sounded more distant than the previous time – those phantoms roaming underground had narrowly missed them, and were diverted to another path instead. In the tense silence of the chamber, the clang of their gongs seemed like a sarcastic answer to Yin Pei's merciless questions.

The three other people in the chamber were listening raptly, at a loss as to what to say.

But Ji Yunchen simply shut his eyes, refusing to look at Yin Pei any longer. Grasping five or six of those extremely thin needles in the palm of his hand, he plunged them through the Fengfu[1] pressure point on his head, in the opposite direction of the natural flow of his Governor Vessel,[2] and right into his core. His sallow face suddenly reddened, but with an unnatural, feverish scarlet. He started breathing heavily, the sweat pouring from him and shivers running through his body. Then all of a sudden, his eyes flew open abruptly, the steely glint in his gaze aimed straight at Zhou Fei. He stretched out two fingers, and thrust them upwards at a bizarre angle.

Zhou Fei had straightened subconsciously. While outsiders might not think much of what they were seeing, it was a completely different story for those well-versed in martial arts. The Southern and Northern Blades were both legendary techniques. In Zhou Fei's eyes, Ji Yunchen's two calloused fingers seemed to suddenly transform into a long sabre. It slanted upwards at her from an inconceivable angle, the cold, gleaming blade running up against her chin.

One's throat was one's life. Zhou Fei couldn't spare any attention to ponder those revelations of the past anymore. She hastily took a step back, while lifting her sword-wielding arm up to block his blade. But just as she did so, she instantly realised her mistake – this position was too awkward, and she wouldn't be able to sustain it.

Shaking his head, Ji Yunchen swiftly hacked his 'blade' downwards.

Zhou Fei's grip loosened, her pupils constricted, and she nearly dropped the sword that Xie Yun had given her.

Wu Chuchu was watching them in utter confusion. All she could see was that Zhou Fei's expression had changed drastically after a few odd gestures from Ji Yunchen. She didn't know that to Zhou Fei, she'd already been sliced in two by 'Slicing Water and Tangling Silk'.

Xie Yun slowly straightened as well.

Ji Yunchen said slowly: "I need twelve hours, but Brother Hua can't keep them away for that long, and that pile of rocks outside can only trick them for a short while. I'm afraid that I'll still need your help in the end, Miss. This stretch of the passageway is narrow, so it'll be difficult for them to swarm in and surround us no matter how many people they have. That is where our advantage lies. The Azure Dragon Lord loves to pick on those weaker than him, so once he sees that you're but a young girl, he will certainly attack you on his own. As his reserves of internal strength are far greater than yours, the only thing you'll be able to rely on is your matchless swordsmanship. I'm going to show you an unparalleled technique that has one goal only – to kill one's opponent. If you are able to withstand twenty moves from this technique during the time that we have, the Azure Dragon Lord won't be able to harm you for a little while at least."

Zhou Fei didn't say a word, merely switching Xie Yun's good-looking but useless sword from one hand to the other.

She turned her body slightly to the side, erasing every single trace of exasperation and distraction on her face, and revealing a steadfastness that could remain unflappably calm even when faced with the most dazzling of moves, or the deepest of quagmires.

Then wielding her sword as she might a sabre, she placed both hands on its hilt, and drew it back before pressing it down. Her movements were neither quick nor dramatic, such that regular onlookers wouldn't even be able to tell that she had used any strength at all.

That was the first move of the Snow-Breaking Sabre – 'Mountain' – in its pure, unadulterated form.

Zhou Fei hacked her still-sheathed sword down before her. It cut through the air in a calm and unhurried manner, yet possessed a forbidding heft that was entirely at odds with this slight young girl's appearance. This one move was all it took to obliterate those infinitely strange and changeable gestures of Ji Yunchen's.

But Ji Yunchen merely turned his head to the side, and swiped his finger in a diagonal arc through the air.

In that split-second, Zhou Fei could almost hear the sharp screech of metal scraping against metal.

While Ji Yunchen looked as sickly and feeble as one who was chronically ill, the expression on his face remained impassive, as if he had barely paid any mind to the blade that Zhou Fei had pressed down on him. While he was five or six steps away from Zhou Fei, his 'blade' raised in midair seemed to adhere closely against Zhou Fei's weapon, sticking to it like glue.

Zhou Fei's instantly felt like her 'Mountain' move was mired in quicksand, making it impossible for her to shake herself free of her opponent's effortlessly fluid 'blade' no matter how hard she tried. Her brow furrowed. She decisively twisted her wrists to one side, changing the placement of her blade, and swept the sword in front of her horizontally, transforming the move into 'Inconstant Wind'.

But Ji Yunchen shook his head again, and withdrew his hand.

Zhou Fei was perplexed.

Xie Yun suddenly spoke: "Unless your opponent is far less skilled than you, it'll be impossible for you to transition from your first move to the second. Either your weapon will be forced out of your hand, or you'll get hurt."

Zhou Fei: "…"

How was it that even he could see that?

"Hero Ji, exactly how long is that 'little while' that we need to stall the Azure Dragon Lord for?" Looking over Zhou Fei's head at Ji Yunchen, Xie Yun asked: "Fifteen minutes, half an hour, or two hours? If it's only for two hours, I think I should probably just go out and procure a few coffins for us all right now."

But Ji Yunchen had no way of knowing – it was truly up to fate.

Xie Yun then turned towards Zhou Fei again. He felt certain that if he tried to offer any more counsel, he'd only be resented for being a nag. The patience of this young girl was probably only as thin as a sheet of paper. In her head, she'd most likely crumpled him up into a ball already and kicked him miles away.

Gently reasoning with her certainly wouldn't work, and being stern with her was even less of an option – she would probably give him a swift kick in real life, not just in her head.

Xie Yun quickly decided to change tack. Giving Zhou Fei a most worried look, he said: "What about Miss Wu? She certainly cannot stay here. I need to get her to leave, but she refuses to. Why don't you try to persuade her instead?"

Zhou Fei had been all ready to bark 'shut up and scram' at whatever he had to say, but she couldn't now. At a loss for words, she turned to look at Xie Yun, and then at Wu Chuchu.

Wu Chuchu was smart enough to understand what Xie Yun was trying to do. When Zhou Fei looked over at her, she shrank back, squatting down and hugging her knees to her chest, and clamping her mouth tightly shut. Yet the look in her eyes was as clear as day – I'll follow only you, I don't trust anyone else.

His voice growing gentle, Xie Yun said: "Miss Wu, you've seen for yourself how powerful Mu Xiaoqiao is. While the Azure Dragon Lord might not be any stronger, he wouldn't be much weaker either. What's more, this fellow headed the four devils of the Mountain of the Living Dead, and all the ruffians within it. This means that not only is he skilled in martial arts, he probably has a whole host of tricks up his sleeve that are beyond our imagination. Once he finds us, not a single one of us here will be able to stop him. I won't frighten you with what might happen should you land in his clutches – I'm sure you can imagine it for yourself."

Zhou Fei had nodded in agreement at first, but the more he spoke the more she realised something was up – it seemed like Xie Yun's words were aimed at her instead.

Xie Yun added: "I've always thought that having the maturity and wisdom to know the right time to do the right things is more difficult than having prodigious talent. The wise know when they should advance fearlessly, but also when they should proceed cautiously and lie low for the moment instead. To be meek when the situation calls for boldness, or to charge ahead madly when one should be beating a retreat – what kind of foolish principles are those?"

Zhou Fei: "…"

This fellow's words were definitely aimed at her!

But it was too late – it was impossible to unhear what he'd said.

Zhou Fei admitted to herself that he was absolutely right. She had after all experienced the Azure Dragon Lord's power. And every time she ended up in a situation like this, while she wouldn't exactly shrink back, she tended to have brash thoughts like 'Just you wait – after I train hard for a few years, defeating all of you will be a piece of cake'. But this was only because she knew very well that the distance between her and the Azure Dragon Lord was probably about the same as the distance between her and Wu Chuchu. And yet…

Ji Yunchen continued to push yet another super fine needle into the Tanzhong[3] pressure point at the centre of his chest, his expression unchanged. He was a little out of breath as he said: "Young Master Xie has a discerning eye. You seem to be well-versed in quite a number of weapons, have you ever trained in any blade techniques?"

"I'm ashamed to say," said Xie Yun drily, and without the slightest hint of shame, "that I'm an expert at one thing and one thing only – running away as fast as possible."

Ji Yunchen didn't bother responding to that. He took a very deep breath, so deep that his brows seemed to be quivering slightly, and a good long while had passed before he finally let out that breath again. In a strained and faint voice, he said: "Young Master Xie, sabres have single-edged blades, while swords have double-edged blades, and sabres…..are the most courageous of all weapons, because their single sharp edge is always pointing forward."

"You're absolutely right," said Xie Yun coldly, "As long as you aren't using that sharp edge to slice your own throat."

Ji Yunchen ignored his sarcasm again, saying: "Without this little bit of courage and verve, whether you use the Snow-Breaking Sabre, or Slicing Water and Tangling Silk, the blade in your hands is but a useless piece of metal. I am living proof of this. The Snow-Breaking Sabre is capable of cleaving mountains and shaking seas, and splitting open the Milky Way. Now that the man who needs to be killed is within reach, her desire to crush him has already been aroused. If you force her to retreat now, she will remember the helplessness and cowardice of this moment for the rest of her life. Then even if she were to live to eighty, or a hundred, I'm afraid that her technique will likely progress no further than this."

Zhou Fei lifted Xie Yun's sword, examining it for a moment. Then she said to Xie Yun: "Say no more. Don't worry, I promise to keep you alive."

Xie Yun wasn't comforted in the slightest by her words. He looked steadily at her and said: "If I were afraid of death, I'd have stayed far, far away from you a long time ago."

In those rare moments when he didn't smile, Xie Yun could look somewhat wan and haggard. His words remained even and restrained as per usual, with no discernible rage. But the light in his eyes seemed to have been swallowed by an overwhelming disappointment, and gradually dimmed and darkened. When Zhou Fei's eyes met his, she instantly felt that she'd said the wrong thing somehow. She opened her mouth, unsure of how she should go about making things right.

Xie Yun lowered his head slightly. One corner of his mouth curved upwards into a faintly bitter smile as he said: "I'd thought of you as a cherished confidante, yet you only think of me as a coward who fears death."

Xie Yun looked away from Zhou Fei and walked towards Ji Yunchen, saying impassively: "Hero Ji's 'Soul-Searching Needles' are a highly risky technique. One's life can be in danger if it goes even a little awry. I'll help to make sure you're not disturbed."

Xie Yun had always seemed like someone who'd been born without a trace of a temper, a Mr Easygoing who was easily approachable and even easy to bully. Now that he'd suddenly grown aloof, Zhou Fei felt a little at a loss. She'd never really learnt how to own up to her mistakes, admit her faults and apologise. She hesitated, unsure of how she should go about doing so. And as she pondered this, the sound of the gongs, which had grown sparse, suddenly started to increase in frequency.

Ji Yunchen trembled at the sound, nearly causing the fine needle in his hand to go down crooked – but Xie Yun managed to hold his wrist steady just in time.

Then the sound of those gongs seemed to grow more distant again, and when the echoes faded, the faint sounds of weapons clanging could be heard – it was either that the Azure Dragon Lord had inadvertently activated one of the tunnels' booby traps, or that Hua Zhenglong had run into them!

Everyone in this little sealed-off chamber started to grow anxious again. Suddenly, a loud burst of laughter echoed all across the gigantic maze of secret tunnels at the foot of the Heng Mountain. Imbued with internal strength, every single word and sentence uttered by that voice was crystal clear, even from a great distance away. "Zheng Luosheng, do you believe in retribution?"

That voice belonged to Hua Zhenglong. 'Zheng Luosheng' was probably the Azure Dragon Lord's real name.

The sounds of the gongs and people fighting merged into a tremendous racket. Everyone in the chamber strained their ears, trying to discern what exactly was happening out there. And then suddenly, they heard the sound of a gong being struck heavily, as if it were a blow straight through someone's heart. That tremendous, echoing clang resounded up and down the passageways. And then there was silence.

This was not a good sign. Hua Zhenglong had clearly spoken so loudly in order to warn them all that the Azure Dragon Lord was approaching. If he'd managed to take down the Azure Dragon Lord right there, he would probably send them a similar signal. Zhou Fei's heart was in her throat. Wishing she could press her ear right up against the walls of this passageway, she strained her ears to pick up even the slightest bit of noise, but there was only darkness and quiet.

Yin Pei sneered: "Amazing – instead of running away, that fatty actually tried to stall the Azure Dragon Lord. But tsk tsk, it doesn't seem like he's had much luck. It looks like he's perished already."

Zhou Fei tightened her grip on the hilt of Xie Yun's sword.

But Ji Yunchen simply said, in a hoarse voice: "Let's go again. Don't get distracted."

Zhou Fei had no other options at this point. Even Xie Yun had stopped speaking.

Forcing herself to focus, Zhou Fei returned to her spot across from Ji Yunchen, and took a deep breath: "Okay, let's go again."

But perhaps she'd been affected by the sounds of those gongs – Zhou Fei felt a little off somehow. Her Snow-Breaking Sabre seemed to have run up against an invisible barrier, and even she could see the multitude of vulnerabilities and mistakes in her moves. In round after round of sparring, she was defeated before Ji Yunchen even made a second move.

In actual fact, if Ji Yunchen had still been capable of a physical fight, Zhou Fei might not have been rendered so helpless by him. She was something of a jack of all trades, master of none – given her age, it was frankly quite difficult for her to be a master of anything at the moment. But Zhou Fei had always been good at thinking on her feet, especially when under pressure, and when exchanging blows with others, she often managed to take them by surprise. A majestically imposing move might be followed the very next second by her nimbly rolling across the ground, and exhibiting an assassin's slyness and agility in close combat. After she'd learnt the Mayfly Formation from that old Taoist priest, her style of shifting seamlessly across disparate techniques had been greatly enhanced. Even if she'd been up against the Azure Dragon Lord, it wouldn't have been a problem for her to go at least a few rounds in the ring with him.

However, the problem now was that she wasn't exchanging actual physical blows with Ji Yunchen.

To outsiders, such 'academic fights' appeared quite bloodlessly boring, and all their strange gesturing back and forth was incomprehensible. However, the demands on one's technique were even higher than in an actual fight. Because in a real martial fight, a whole variety of factors like agility, strength, internal and external skills, and even one's frame of mind could affect the outcome. But now, with Ji Yunchen just sitting there on the ground, Zhou Fei couldn't possibly execute the Mayflay Formation around him. And she would be embarrassing herself if she used her usual hodgepodge of moves and little tricks against a legendary technique like 'Slicing Water and Tangling Silk'. Zhou Fei certainly wasn't going to make a fool of herself by attempting to be clever like that, and so could only spar back and forth with him using move after unadulterated move of the Snow-Breaking Sabre.

Ji Yunchen was a true blue disciple of the Northern Blade – despite the fact that he could barely lift a sabre, his every move surprised at every turn, as he effortlessly drew his opponent into the invisible world of his blade. Zhou Fei had thought that even though she hadn't mastered the Snow-Breaking Sabre, she'd been recently enlightened of the 'Mountain', 'Wind', and 'Piercing' moves, and therefore withstanding twenty or so blows from Ji Yunchen shouldn't have been a problem. She hadn't expected to be so hemmed in like this. The disparity between the two of them was instantly apparent. All along, she'd thought that she had at least crossed a threshold with her Snow-Breaking Sabre – but when up against Ji Yunchen, she found that she could barely withstand a single blow!

Zhou Fei had never felt so defeated before, which only made her increasingly frustrated. Those boasts that she had so recklessly uttered just now came back to haunt her, the shame weighing heavily down on her. And the more frustrated she got, the more she felt like that stupid sword in her hand wouldn't listen to her – especially after the distant clangs of those gongs suddenly started to pick up again.

Had Hua Zhenglong died already?

How long more would the Azure Dragon Lord and his lackeys take to find them?

How long more did she have?

Before this, Zhou Fei had never once doubted the blade in her hand. But now, the thought flashed across her mind: Am I really not quite suited to the Snow-Breaking Sabre?

Once this thought reared its head, it instantly took root and multiplied like a field full of springtime weeds, occupying every single corner of her mind.

Ji Yunchen immediately sensed this change in her, asking: "What's happened, Miss?"

Just as he spoke, the Azure Dragon Lord's navigational gongs clanged again, once. They sounded much closer than they had just now, as if they were already several metres away from them.

Zhou Fei shivered.

Wu Chuchu was still sitting in one corner of the chamber, hugging her knees to her chest. Xie Yun was staring down at the last remaining row of silver needles in Ji Yunchen's small cloth bundle, an inscrutable expression on his face.

Get it together, Zhou Fei thought to herself. The two of them stayed behind only because I boasted that I could protect them. Even if I'm completely useless, I must still give it a desperate try, or else their blood would be on my hands, and I'll never be able to make up for it, not even in our next lives.

Zhou Fei's feelings of defeat only lasted for a moment, before being firmly swept away by her grim determination to fight to the death. She thought to herself: Even if my technique is utter crap, I'll just use as much of it as I can. It's the only way to get out of this alive after all.

Casting aside all her fear and frustration, she shut out the sight of Ji Yunchen sitting before her and the urgent sounds of the gongs behind her. Leaning on her sword, she closed her eyes to think. All the blows that she'd just exchanged with Ji Yunchen now came alive in her mind, transforming into very real clashes of steel against steel. They flashed across Zhou Fei's mind, and then gradually faded, leaving only two blindingly bright blades seared in her brain – Zhou Fei's eyes flew open, and then wielding her sword like a sabre, she pointed it at Ji Yunchen.

Ji Yunchen's eyes flashed. This time, he actually hastened to make his move first, even though common courtesy dictated that a senior like him give way to a junior like Zhou Fei. With those cracked fingers of his, he dealt a lethal blow, which surged in an overwhelming wave of hostility towards Zhou Fei. Zhou Fei didn't even blink, simply executing the 'Wind' move again – even though she'd already tried this just now. 'Wind' was known to be both swift and changeable, sharing certain subtle similarities with the Northern Blade. But Ji Yunchen's vast experience dwarfed hers, and he quickly identified the flaws in her execution.

Ji Yunchen furrowed his brow. He hadn't thought that Zhou Fei's skills were so limited that she would be forced to use the same move twice. Well, he certainly wasn't going to do that himself. He pointed the tip of his 'blade' towards yet another vulnerability in Zhou Fei's move, different from the one that he had exploited before, attempting to fluster her and force her to withdraw.

But in that instant, Zhou Fei's shoulders slumped all of a sudden. While she lifted her sabre in what seemed like a futile attempt to block Ji Yunchen's blade, her entire body subtly shifted, and the very next second, her wrists jerked upwards abruptly – it was the second move of the Snow-Breaking Sabre, 'Parting the Sea'!

Ji Yunchen was astonished. The invisible gleam of his blade seemed to have been dulled by Zhou Fei.

And now, the sound of those gongs were growing louder and louder, till they were at an almost ear-splitting decibel. Those men seemed to have found the passageway leading to their chamber!

Wu Chuchu instinctively pressed her back to the wall. If she'd had fur, all of it would probably be standing on end by now. The person holding the gong seemed a little unsure – the frequency of the strikes changed, with one firm strike being followed by several uncertain ones. They seemed to be testing the road ahead, checking to see if the narrow passageway that Xie Yun and company had blocked up with stones was clear to pass through.

But Ji Yunchen and Zhou Fei were lost in their own world of sword and sabre, exchanging seven or eight blows in a matter of seconds. Zhou Fei's blade, which had grown sluggish just moments ago, moved freely again now. She seemed to have found her rhythm, as she seamlessly connected all nine moves of the Snow-Breaking Sabre.

And after ringing for a while, the gong started moving away from them again. It seemed like their false dead end had successfully duped the gong-wielding men.

Wu Chuchu heaved a huge sigh of relief, as she wiped her sweaty palms on her thighs. Her heart had been racing so fast it nearly burst.

But barely seconds after that, a massive clang was heard from the passageway leading to the chamber, causing the rocks that they had piled up there to collapse instantly. Wu Chuchu shrieked in terror.

It was actually bright outside already. But as everyone in the chamber was either anxious, or exasperated, or immersed in their own world, their nerves as taut as the strings of a drawn bow, none of them noticed the dim shafts of light that streamed in from the unobstructed passageway.

When that pile of rocks collapsed, Zhou Fei still did not snap out of that almost transcendent state that she was in. All the surrounding noises and movements had become crystalline, clearly and exquisitely defined. The blade in her hand, Ji Yunchen before her, as well as the massive clang of the gong behind her all seemed to be connected by an invisible string. Zhou Fei simply let her blade follow where that string led – she didn't even have to think. It just felt completely natural to her.

Before the last rock in the pile fell to the ground, she had leapt forward through the shower of shattered rocks, brandishing her sword.

Xie Yun had probably nicked this sword from Zhao Ming Chen. As the only thing of real value on that trickster, there was more to this accessory than just a flashily bejeweled scabbard. It emitted a sharp howl as it was unsheathed, and the grooves on both sides of the blade flashed with a gleam so chilling it could almost split hairs.

The passageway was only wide enough for one person to pass through. The man right in front, who was now pushing aside the fallen rocks, was the unlucky victim of Zhou Fei's blade. Before he could utter a sound, Zhou Fei's sword had pierced him right through the heart, causing him to perish on the spot. The sword had cut through his flesh like a knife through butter, without any resistance. Drawing her hand back, Zhou Fei pulled the corpse closer towards her with her sword. The man's lifeless body blocked the narrow passageway perfectly, a human-shaped shield for her.

The torches in the narrow passageway flickered, causing the shadows of the humans within to flicker too.

Zhou Fei looked ahead of her by the light of her opponents' torches. Lightly scraping the tip of her sword against the ancient soil wall, she said: "I've been waiting for you for one whole night."

The next gong-wielding man looked back at her over the corpse, unsure for a moment whether he himself was more eerie, or whether this young girl who'd seemed to attack out of nowhere was more frightening. Uncertain if he should advance or retreat, he remained frozen right there.

Just then, someone behind him said sternly: "Come back."

The gong-wielding man said submissively: "Yes, my Lord."

Looking at Zhou Fei warily, he backed out of the narrow passageway, holding his copper gong up in front of him protectively and crouching behind it. When he reached the bend in the passage, he bowed deeply at the person standing there. A moment later, the Azure Dragon Lord strolled into view, his hands behind his back. In the dim passageway, the torchlight flickered across his fish-like face, distorting his already-grotesque features and making him look even more terrifying.

The Azure Dragon Lord swooped towards Zhou Fei, arriving before her in the blink of an eye. For him to get to where he was today, she wasn't sure how much was owed to his skills, and how much to his underhanded tactics, but it was clear that he ranked among the top pugilists in the martial arts world.

He was a towering man, and preternaturally ugly. The oppressiveness of his presence as he whooshed down this narrow passageway was indescribably terrifying, much more so than when he had been outside in broad daylight. If it had been possible for Zhou Fei to retreat, she would most probably have fled. But she'd just sparred with the Northern Blade for one entire night, forcing her to doubt herself again and again to the point of desperation, till she decided to risk everything and go all in – even if the king of hell himself were to come swooping down on her just then, she would not have let him pass. She would have blocked his way even if it killed her.

"You've got some guts." The Azure Dragon Lord didn't seem to be in any hurry to fight, instead fixing her with an enigmatic smile.

The flickering torchlight could hideously distort an ugly visage – but conversely, it could give a beauty an almost ethereal quality.

The Azure Dragon Lord looked Zhou Fei over with appraising eyes, saying: "Your swordsmanship seems to hail from the 48 Zhai. Such a cumbersome technique is certainly not suited to beautiful young maidens – where are you from?"

Zhou Fei had been incensed the second she'd set eyes on him. And when he opened his mouth to speak, she wished for nothing more than to gouge his lecherous eyeballs out.

But she now understood why Ji Yunchen had asked for her help – the extremely narrow passageway leading from the chamber was large enough for only one person to pass through at a time. If it had been the Divine Lotus Palms Hua Zhenglong blocking the passageway instead, a lascivious and cowardly fellow like the Azure Dragon Lord certainly wouldn't have stepped forward himself. And while the gong-wielding man that he was sure to have dispatched in his stead might not be all that powerful, the man would have had a whole arsenal of underhanded tricks up his sleeve – Hua Zhenglong must have succumbed to these just now.

While they might succeed at briefly besting a villain in a competition of martial arts skills alone, they had zero chance of winning once it came to who could be more shamelessly underhanded in a fight.

Only a young girl like Zhou Fei, standing there all alone, would cause the Azure Dragon Lord to let his guard down.

Zhou Fei stroked her thumb against the hilt of her sword, forcing herself to suppress her fiery rage. After a few moments, she finally asked, her face hard and tense: "What happened to Senior Hua?"

"Who?" The Azure Dragon Lord blinked. Then the next second, he threw his head back in fake laughter, saying: "Do you mean that overstuffed fatty? Ha, why ask when you already know the answer to that?"

Zhou Fei was stroking the hilt so hard that she dislodged one of its more loosely set gems.

The Azure Dragon Lord said with false magnanimity: "Now, now, to kill you would be such a pity. Why don't you follow me instead? If you're willing to join me, I won't hold whatever you've done thus far against you. You'll get to enjoy the best delicacies and drink the finest wines, and servants will grovel before you, waiting on you hand and foot. You'll get whatever your heart desires, any gold and jewels that you might fancy. Isn't that far better than the state you're in right now?"

Zhou Fei's gaze fell on the corpse blocking the passageway: "You won't even hold that against me?"

With an indifferent look on his face, he waved his hand dismissively: "This is nothing. There's plenty where it came from. Kill as many as you like."

Zhou Fei fell silent. With her peripheral vision, she could see that Ji Yunchen seemed to have finished piercing all those needles into his body. She had no clue what those 'Soul-Searching Needles' were, but all she knew was that the Northern Blade now looked like a porcupine on the verge of evolving into another creature – his face was turning alternately green and red, and it was obvious that he was at a crucial juncture of his transformation, although she had no idea what he would turn into.

Xie Yun, who was by Ji Yunchen's side, looked at her and shook his head firmly.

If it had been another woman standing here before the Azure Dragon Lord, someone slightly older and a tad more experienced, she'd probably be able to sweet talk and flatter him into distraction. But a tender young girl couldn't do that – and someone like Zhou Fei, who was not quite so tender, was even less capable of doing so. She simply wasn't that kind of person.

It was taking almost every single ounce of Zhou Fei's concentration to contain that furious rage which threatened to spill out of her. Speech eluded her for the moment. Mistaking her silence for shyness, the Azure Dragon Lord grew even more lecherous, stretching out a hand towards her and wheedling: "What's there to consider? Come over here and tell me your name."

Xie Yun's face darkened.

She could still let things go if only his mouth was moving, but now that his hands had started to move towards her, the very last precarious string of Zhou Fei's self-control snapped. She hauled up the corpse on the ground and held it up in front of her, smearing the Azure Dragon Lord's outstretched hand with blood, then unsheathed her sword and thrust it upwards. It headed straight for the Azure Dragon Lord's throat like a poisonous snake.

With a 'tsk', the Azure Dragon Lord slid two full steps backwards without seeming to exert himself at all. Reaching for the tip of Zhou Fei's sword with his bare hand, he smiled: "It's always more fun when they've got a bit of a temper."

While his movements seemed deceptively languid, he'd actually channelled 70 or 80 percent of his internal strength into his outstretched palm, attempting to catch Zhou Fei unawares and seize her. But just as his hand touched the tip of her sword, Zhou Fei's sword slyly moved back down, sliding out of his reach in an instant.

The Azure Dragon Lord was a little surprised. This girl was wielding her sword like a long sabre, and her swordsmanship was more advanced than he'd thought!

He muttered: "Slicing Water and Tangling Silk…has that defenceless piece of trash actually managed to teach you a thing or two in one day?" The almost languid, meandering style of Zhou Fei's upward thrust and smooth withdrawal had something of 'Slicing Water and Tangling Silk' in it. It was a pity that she wasn't quite proficient in the technique, though. Someone with a discerning eye could see at a glance that she had hastily picked up those two moves. Even if she had been extraordinarily gifted, and been able to commit things to memory perfectly after just one look, the moves would still be a little stiff when actually executed.

The Azure Dragon Lord smiled: "What a shame."

As he spoke, he channelled internal strength into his arm again, and lifted it to collide with Zhou Fei's sword. A clang was heard where it made contact with her sword. Zhou Fei felt like she wasn't up against flesh and blood, but rather a rod of iron. His arm was hard as can be, and even caused her sword to bend slightly. Zhou Fei stumbled forward, seeming to be caught off guard. The Azure Dragon Lord immediately reached out to grab her collar.

But she spun to the side instead, and shoved the corpse in her hand right into the Azure Dragon Lord's arms.

That corpse was also tall and broad-shouldered. Its bloodied face bore down on its former master, bestowing the Azure Dragon Lord with a sloppy kiss. Shocked and furious in equal measure, the Azure Dragon Lord pushed the corpse aside, slamming it into the wall of the narrow passageway. The passageway quaked with the force of that collision, sending a shower of soil and loose rocks down upon them. The long sword in Zhou Fei's hand now moved in a languid semi-circle, before its meandering movements abruptly changed, and it hacked viciously down onto the Azure Dragon Lord's head.

Those languorous moves had just been a front!

Her sword now was akin to a fearsome dragon plunging into the depths of the sea, howling as it hurtled downwards. But it immediately met with an immense opposing force, which travelled up the sword from its tip. Prince Duan's sword must have been worth more than a person's life – it didn't break, even under such pressure, the tip of the sword merely quivering violently. And at the same time, a strand of hair floated down in the dim passageway: she'd actually managed to rip the Azure Dragon Lord's hood off his head, and even slice off a piece of his hair!

During the numerous times that Zhou Fei had been defeated by Ji Yunchen, she had done more than concentrate on her own moves. While she hadn't made a deliberate effort to learn the Northern Blade's technique, the constant exposure to Ji Yunchen's fluid and deadly moves had allowed her to comprehend what true, continuous unbrokenness really looked like.

When Zhou Fei had encountered the Azure Dragon Lord on the narrow mountain path, she had come to a vague understanding of the links between the nine moves of the Snow-Breaking Sabre. Now that she'd had one whole night to focus on the technique, she found that she suddenly grasped this more fully – each and every technique contained a multitude of moves, and each and every move could shift and change in numerous ways. As long as one made slight adjustments to each of these moves, they could all come together to form a complete, unbroken set of moves. This multitudinous flexibility was exactly what the Snow-Breaking Sabre's 'Inconstant' move was about.

One brilliant move might just be luck, and two such moves in quick succession might just mean that one was in good form that day. But Zhou Fei had executed move after move that caught him by surprise. And with the very last hack of her blade that had actually managed to split his hairs, the Azure Dragon Lord knew that he had to start taking her seriously. The last time he'd exchanged blows with her, Zhou Fei had only been a novice who'd used subterfuge to flee, but now, her skills were enough for one to sit up and take notice.

He looked darkly at Zhou Fei in the narrow passageway as he said: "I've changed my mind. Little girl, I absolutely cannot allow a murderous person like you to train for another ten years."

Of all his words thus far, these were most to Zhou Fei's liking. She smiled coldly: "It'll take me less than that to kill you."

"What impudence!" With a loud roar, the Azure Dragon Lord delivered a palm strike of immense force towards Zhou Fei, his sleeves billowing.

Zhou Fei brandished her sword without the slightest trace of hesitation.

If it was the heavy responsibility for the lives of Xie Yun and company that had made Zhou Fei tell herself at first that she absolutely could not retreat, it was now the Azure Dragon Lord that caused her defiant nature to rear its head.

Xie Yun said from behind: "Watch out, he's probably wearing body armour beneath his clothes."

Spying a glint of metal beneath the Azure Dragon Lord's billowing sleeves, Zhou Fei thought to herself: No wonder my sword felt like it was running up against an iron rod. I almost thought that he was impenetrable.

The Azure Dragon Lord snickered, his hand reaching for Zhou Fei. Zhou Fei thrust her scabbard forward, which ran up against his palm with a crack. But the expression on her face swiftly changed – something was off about that sound!

The Azure Dragon Lord's fingers suddenly seemed to extend by several inches, as several long knives shot out from them. They hurtled over the sword in her hand, right towards her forearm! Zhou Fei had reacted instantly, but it was still too late to draw her hand back completely. Several bloody gashes appeared on her forearm, deep enough to see bone.

Xie Yun felt like he himself had been scratched by that fish-faced fellow. The corner of his eye twitched violently.

Laughing heartily, the Azure Dragon Lord continued his advance. The whistling of his sharp blades as they hurtled towards Zhou Fei was enough to make one shiver. They came at her at irregular intervals, making them near impossible to dodge, especially since the narrow passageway restricted her movements. Within seconds, many more gashes appeared on Zhou Fei's body. She seemed to be incapable of retaliating, beating a constant retreat. In the blink of an eye, she was already backed up to the entrance of the chamber, where she had no choice but to hold her ground and fight.

Xie Yun whipped his head around to look at Ji Yunchen.

But the man seemed to have lost all consciousness of his surroundings, and his breath was so feeble that it was inaudible. All the colour on his face had faded away, replaced with a deathly grey.

The Azure Dragon Lord appeared to be enjoying himself now. Stopping short of fatally injuring Zhou Fei, he looked at her squirming from side to side with the smug look of a cat playing with a mouse. He continued to add several more wounds to her body, before reaching out a hand to grab her breasts. Zhou Fei shrank back sharply, and in her apparent panic shoved her scabbard into his palm to push him back. The Azure Dragon Lord clamped his fingers on it. The sharp knives extended from his fingers again, and he grinned as he pushed the scabbard forward. It looked like he was about to grab Zhou Fei.

Xie Yun couldn't take it anymore, and rushed forward.

But Zhou Fei smiled suddenly.

She was now backed right up to the entrance of the chamber, with its wide empty space behind her – while her opponent was currently at the narrowest point of the passageway.

By the time the Azure Dragon Lord realised that something was up, and attempted to withdraw his hand, it was too late. The intricately jewelled scabbard that he'd grabbed had lodged itself in the palm of his hand, and couldn't be detached quickly enough.

Zhou Fei's erstwhile skittish sword now grew vicious. In the blink of an eye, she slashed her sword three times, each and every deadly blow seeming to come out of nowhere. From his lewd teasing at the beginning, to his attempts to kill her later on, the Azure Dragon Lord had thoroughly underestimated her. He had not expected this at all. Two of the retractable knives in his hand were broken instantly, and the centre of his palm sported a fresh wound.

The Azure Dragon Lord swiftly retreated several steps. The sleeve of his robe had been split open from the shoulder all to the way the wrist, revealing the body armour beneath.

Zhou Fei thought to herself that it was such a shame – if not for that gleaming coat of body armour, she would have severed this old fellow's arm.

While she was incapable of sweet talk and flattery, she'd picked up on her own the kinds of techniques suitable for hunting large carnivorous beasts. She knew how to use a strategic retreat and even shed a little bit of her own blood to get a sense of her enemy's peculiar weapon, while also lowering his guard – and then waited for the prime opportunity to deliver a fatal blow!

Zhou Fei gently shook her wrist, flicking off the droplets of blood on her sword. She looked out the corner of her eye at the scene behind her, first glancing over at Ji Yunchen, who was still sitting there immobile, and then at Xie Yun, who she just realised had rushed forward. He looked a little bewildered.

She hurriedly whispered to him: "What are you doing?"

Xie Yun: "…Helping you."

Zhou Fei said curiously: "Helping me with what?"

Xie Yun: "….Shielding you."

Zhou Fei hadn't actually intended to laugh, but couldn't hold it in no matter how hard she tried. She'd already offended Xie Yun once just now, so this giggle only deepened the offence. He looked away from her, pretending that she didn't exist.

Folding his arms across his chest, he addressed the Azure Dragon Lord loftily: "I've heard that there exists a master craftsman in Penglai of the Eastern Sea. He has a pair of gifted hands which can practically make stone into gold, and forge numerous great weapons…one of his creations is a material called 'Clouds of Dusk'. This material is said to gleam brightly all over, appearing like a fluid pool of moonlight in the dark. It's incredibly light, and when worn as armour, impenetrable."

Yin Pei, who had been sitting there in silence all this while, slowly clenched his fists.

Glancing casually over at him, Xie Yun continued: "According to what I've heard, the Sword of Mountains and Rivers Yin Wenlan had a set of such armour custom made for his wife. Isn't it a little tight on you?"

Xie Yun spoke with an enigmatic air, and it was impossible to tell if he was speaking the truth. Even now, the Azure Dragon Lord still couldn't tell what his game was.

Licking the wound in the palm of his hand, his vicious beady eyes shifted to land on Xie Yun: "What are you trying to say?"

Seeing that Xie Yun looked like he was about to launch into yet another one of his long spiels, in an effort to help her distract the Azure Dragon Lord, Zhou Fei heaved a small sigh of relief as she massaged her aching wrists. The various wounds on her body, large and small, had started to hurt now, with a vengeance. If the Azure Dragon Lord hadn't been there, she would probably have grimaced.

Xie Yun gave him a leisurely smile: "I just found something a little strange – since you have all these possessions of the Yin Clan on hand, why didn't you become the next Sword of Mountains and Rivers?"

As he said this, he seemed to be inching forward slowly. Just as he was about to reach the entrance of the chamber, he was blocked from going any further by a thrust of Zhou Fei's sword.

When he said this, the expression on the Azure Dragon Lord's face changed drastically. His face tensed up, all traces of that lecherous look on his face gone now. He even lowered his voice subconsciously, asking: "What else do you know?"

"Oh, there's nothing I don't know." Xie Yun halted just behind Zhou Fei's sword.

While Zhou Fei was well aware that he was spouting nonsense yet again, something about the way he spoke still made her feel compelled to listen. The Azure Dragon Lord, who had no idea that Xie Yun was bluffing, was certainly even more hooked. Xie Yun leaned forward slightly, and said in a hushed voice: "Sea Blends Into Sky."

Zhou Fei shot him a perplexed look. She didn't understand why he'd started waxing lyrical about nature all of a sudden.

To her surprise, the corners of the Azure Dragon Lord's eyes actually started twitching madly, and then without warning, he looked right past Zhou Fei and reached out to grab Xie Yun. Zhou Fei had been hoping that Xie Yun's silver tongue would buy some time for her to catch her breath, but it turned out that this fellow wasn't here to help, but to hasten his death. Not only was he completely unhelpful, he'd made the situation worse!

Zhou Fei couldn't very well let him perish like that. So gritting her teeth inwardly, she brandished her sword to block the Azure Dragon Lord.

But the Azure Dragon Lord seemed to have grown tired of frivolous sparring, and delivered a full-strength palm strike right at her. Zhou Fei had a strange sense of déjà vu. She recalled how Li Jinrong had struck her down from the wooden pillar in Xiushan Hall with just one blow – in the face of immense strength, sometimes all tactics and techniques were quite simply useless.

Zhou Fei felt a tightness in her chest as that overwhelming force surged towards her, yet she had no choice but to meet it head-on. While she continued to move her sword forward, she started to feel a sharp pain in her chest. She had probably been injured already. But Zhou Fei had suffered whippings at the hands of Li Jinrong since young, and while her skin hadn't grown impenetrable from these, she was far hardier than the average person. Not only did she have a much higher tolerance for pain, she was also extremely willing to expose herself to it. She thrust her sword forward unflinchingly.

The tip of her sword bounced off the Clouds of Dusk, like a thunderbolt flashing across a parched night sky, shattering its dim moonbeams.

That was the Snow-Breaking Sabre – 'Piercing'.

Parrying her sword with a single arm, the Azure Dragon Lord unleashed a series of thirteen palm strikes in quick succession, which was one of his signature moves. While Zhou Fei's Mayfly Formation allowed her to feint left and right, and retreat and advance strategically, she was still skating on thin ice – one of the Azure Dragon Lord's powerful strikes swept her to the side, dislocating her shoulder instantly. Zhou Fei's arm fell limply to her side.

She felt as if her meridians had been pushed to their absolute limit. They were beginning to ache painfully, as if they were about to burst. She stumbled, nearly losing her balance, and frantically looked over at Ji Yunchen. The man was still completely immobile!

It seemed like they were done for. Zhou Fei thought to herself: Hadn't it been twelve hours already? What exactly did Ji Yunchen plan on doing to 'finish him off'? To sit by the side and recite incantations that would send the Azure Dragon Lord to hell?

At least the Azure Dragon Lord didn't seem in a hurry to kill her. Xie Yun was now his target.

In one great stride of his long legs, Xie Yun moved behind Zhou Fei: "There's really no need to get so worked up, sir, why don't we talk things through calmly instead? Which of those four words – Sea, Blends, Into or Sky – has done you wrong? I'll be sure to never mention it in your presence ever again."

This fellow tantalised and provoked in equal measure – the Azure Dragon Lord looked like a starving man who had a juicy meat bun dangling before him. His eyes were practically boring holes into Xie Yun. But Zhou Fei was most inconveniently in the way, her long sword preventing him from seizing his prey.

The Azure Dragon Lord bellowed: "You insolent brat!"

Zhou Fei expected him to unleash yet another series of palm strikes, and took a deep breath to brace herself. But instead, the Azure Dragon Lord stretched his hand out, and something in his palm gleamed.

Someone as highly skilled as him was still resorting to such underhanded tactics in a fight! This fellow had no shame at all!

Zhou Fei knew that there was no way she would be able to dodge his hidden weapon in time. But just then, her vision was obscured as the person behind her now pulled her behind him. Upon encountering real danger, that burdensome fellow who had been cowering behind her mere moments ago now rushed before her, throwing his arms around Zhou Fei and using his own back to shield her.

Zhou Fei's line of sight was completely blocked by Xie Yun's lanky figure, and it took her a few breaths to figure out what had just happened. Her heart leapt into her throat, as if she had just missed a step atop a soaring cliff, and the sword nearly slipped from her hand.

Xie Yun was indeed a man of his word – he was really shielding her like he said he would!

After this thought flashed across her mind, Zhou Fei finally absorbed what had just happened. She heard a ringing in her ears, and it felt like her brain had evaporated into a cloud of white smoke. She couldn't move – it was as if someone had frozen her in place.

The Azure Dragon Lord actually had a literal trick up his sleeve – the Nine-Dragon Elder had been just like his master, at least in terms of his preference for using hidden weapons – with the force of his immensely powerful palm strike, he had flung two little hooks at Zhou Fei. While they were only the size of a fingernail each, their tips gleamed with what looked like a poisonous substance.

But before these deadly hooks could latch onto Zhou Fei, Xie Yun had darted before her.

Zhou Fei's eyes widened: "Xie…"

Xie Yun chuckled gleefully as he whispered into her ear: "I knew that he wouldn't bear to kill me."

Zhou Fei: "…"

Just as those deadly hooks were on the verge of digging into Xie Yun's back, the Azure Dragon Lord quickly shook his arm out again, knocking away his hidden weapons in something of a panic. He knew that he couldn't let this fellow die before hearing what he had to say about 'Sea Blends Into Sky'.

Zhou Fei didn't give the Azure Dragon Lord a chance to catch his breath. Using Xie Yun as her shield, she thrust her sword through the gap between his arm and torso, aiming precisely for the Azure Dragon Lord's throat.

The Azure Dragon Lord could have easily delivered a crushing palm strike at Zhou Fei, or use any manner of sly tricks to take her out right there. But now that Xie Yun was in the way…four mysterious words had reduced the Azure Dragon Lord to sparring with Zhou Fei just to avoid harming the fellow.

Zhou Fei's moves at the beginning had been a little choppy and unnatural. But having exchanged more than a hundred blows in quick succession with the Azure Dragon Lord, she had refined and improved her moves as she went, the life-and-death situation forcing her to ease into her technique. It was several degrees smoother and more skilled now.

The two of them had joined hands to actually outwit this monstrous devil by being even more 'underhanded'. It was a near-miracle.

Such sly tactics were the Azure Dragon Lord's bread and butter. It had been years since his hands were so tied in a fight. The fact that a young girl barely out of her teens had landed him in such a predicament filled him with enough fiery rage to burn the entire Heng Mountain down!

The two of them continued to spar back and forth. Knocking Zhou Fei's sword away with an armour-clad arm, the Azure Dragon Lord slid to one side to get an unobstructed view of the chamber behind her. Wu Chuchu, who had been watching anxiously from the sidelines, met that fish-faced fellow's vicious gaze all of a sudden, which sent shivers down her spine. Hatred spewing from his eyes, the Azure Dragon Lord pretended to reach behind Xie Yun's neck for Zhou Fei. Just when Zhou Fei ducked behind Xie Yun and pulled him backwards, the Azure Dragon Lord used his fingers to flick an object into the chamber, right at Wu Chuchu's chest!

Neither Zhou Fei nor Xie Yun could have saved her in time.

But just then, a scarred hand stretched out in front of her. As effortlessly as one might swipe a mosquito, it caught that flying object – an incredibly sharp nail.

Ji Yunchen coughed twice. The silver needles on his body were nowhere to be seen. Zhou Fei had no idea what had happened to them, if they had been pulled out or disposed of somehow. He looked down at the little nail in his hand, turning it over as he examined it. He coughed again, weakly. Then he said to Wu Chuchu: "Please move inside a little, Miss. I don't want you to get hurt."

He still looked absolutely downtrodden. His back was still abjectly bent, and his hair was still grey and brittle, although there seemed to be a slight sheen at the top of his head now. He wasn't handsome, charismatic, cool or at ease. Even his eyes contained an inexpressible melancholy.

But when he 'melancholically' raised his head to look at the Azure Dragon Lord, Zhou Fei saw the expression on that devil's face change instantly. He gestured behind him, prompting his lackeys to rush forward and swarm the entrance to the chamber – while it seemed like the Azure Dragon Lord was striding fearlessly into the chamber, he'd actually let his lackeys go before him, safely ensconcing himself amongst them.

Observing this, Ji Yunchen said: "Zheng Luosheng, I can see why your skills haven't improved even after all these years."

The Azure Dragon Lord looked closely at Ji Yunchen, saying darkly: "I've heard rumours…"

"That the Northern Blade has been rendered toothless," Ji Yunchen continued, "Or else you wouldn't have been able to sleep soundly at night all these years, would you?"

Zhou Fei glanced over at Ji Yunchen's little cloth bundle, which was still lying open on the ground. The fine silver needles that he had been using just now hadn't been placed back on the cloth, nor had they been flung to the side. They seemed to have vanished into thin air. She whispered: "How…"

Xie Yun shushed her: "I'll explain it all to you…"

He'd wanted to say 'I'll explain it all to you later', but midway through his sentence recalled all those life-threatening things Zhou Fei had just done that made him want to tear his hair out. Taking off his outer robe and flinging it at Zhou Fei, whose clothes were a tattered bloody mess, he shot her a look and said: "…never."

Zhou Fei: "…"

Sneering to keep up appearances, the Azure Dragon Lord said: "The Northern Blade truly is great after all, with the ability to make even a cripple stand up once more – this is just perfect, really. I was afraid that I would never have the privilege of witnessing exactly how great the 'Two Blades and one Sword' was. Since you say that I haven't improved, I must see for myself how much further the Northern Blade himself has advanced."

Despite his boasts, the Azure Dragon Lord seemed to have no intention of stepping forward and fighting himself. With a wave of his hand, the gong-wielding men around him instantly assumed their positions with well-trained speed, forming a smaller but more precise version of the 'Collapsing Mountains and Emptying Seas' formation, and readied themselves to move in on them. Ji Yunchen gently flicked his finger. The ropes binding Yin Pei suddenly loosened, somehow. That pale-faced young man swiftly freed himself of his bindings, gazing at his adoptive father's back with a mix of emotions on his face.

Ji Yunchen said: "Leave now, and take good care of yourself out there."

He chuckled softly. Then he moved, all of a sudden. The gong-wielding man right at the front of the formation didn't even have any chance to react before meeting his end. Before he could even raise his weapon, he had lolled forward like a puppet, his neck falling across his own blade.

Ji Yunchen shoved the dead man aside and grabbed his sabre. He looked at the Azure Dragon Lord, aloof and indifferent.

As Ji Yunchen had stood up, caught the nail, killed the gong-wielding man and snatched his weapon, his eyes seemed to grow increasingly tranquil, the melancholy in them fading. It was as if his soul, which had been detached from his body for twenty years, was gradually coming to life inside of him again. Zhou Fei's grip on her sword subconsciously tightened – for just a split second, she'd felt that even the bloodied sword in her hand had shivered.

In this underground chamber, there was no way of knowing what the weather was like outside. A sudden gust of wind swept through the passageway, through the entrance that Xie Yun hadn't sealed up tightly when he'd re-entered. It extinguished the torches, and brought with it a dampness in the air. The gong-wielding men's torches flickered wildly, rippling the shadows of the people gathered within.

The Azure Dragon Lord roared: "What are you doing still standing there! You useless blocks of wood!"

While the Northern Blade was formidable, in the eyes of the gong-wielding men the Azure Dragon Lord was still a far more fearsome tyrant who could make their lives a living hell. At his command, several of them charged at Ji Yunchen without further hesitation.

Ji Yunchen lightly swung the sabre in his hands, looking somewhat weary. He repeated himself, although it was unclear to whom: "Leave now."

But none of the people around him were willing to leave, least of all Zhou Fei, who was staring almost unblinkingly at that legendary 'Slicing Water and Tangling Silk'. To her, and even to the entire martial arts community of the central plains, the 'Two Blades, One Sword, and Withered-Glory Hands' were like a few withered lotus roots in the mud – they'd existed for sure, and certainly bloomed brilliantly for a summer. But now, their glory was a faraway thing of the past that people only spoke of sometimes.

The Northern Blade had become a chef, and all that was left of the Sword of Mountains and Rivers was an empty scabbard – it was enough to make one feel ashamed on their behalf.

Who would have thought that 'Slicing Water and Tangling Silk' would see the light of day again?

Zhou Fei had thought that the Northern Blade would be a like blinding flash of light, dangerously lethal and unpredictable. But the sabre in Ji Yunchen's hand was far from being as dazzling as she'd imagined it to be. In fact, the rigid and methodical movements of his blade seemed even less conspicuous than those few strokes which he had traced out with his fingers just now.

He seemed to be executing a most ancient and straightforward technique to kill, and moved with a deeply rhythmic ease. Whether the gong-wielding men closed in tightly around him, or hounded his every step, nothing could disrupt the inherent pace of his movements. The dull gleam of his blade brought to mind the numerous fine strings of that great machine in the Ink-Washing River. The broad face of his blade and its slender body were a mere vessel, enlivened by his technique that seemed to have a soul and spirit of its own. And while that spirited soul seemed to be just a single sharp line, when it moved it was like an intricate spider's web of a thousand strings, leaving behind only the slightest trace of blood…and taking a human life with it.

Unlike Zhou Fei, it wasn't Ji Yunchen's style to run all over the place. There almost seemed to be an invisible circle around him that confined him to within a metre of his original position, and which he lazily refused to take a single step out of. Anyone who dared enter this circle would have their throats slashed instantly.

This was what a technique to kill really looked like.

All along, Zhou Fei had thought that the intention to kill meant one had to be overpoweringly, fiercely savage. Only now did she witness what it truly meant to kill – it was being extremely subtle, extremely calm, not obvious in the slightest, yet utterly and inescapably pervasive.When that frail and downtrodden chef simply stood there, his back slightly hunched, his blade cast a spell over the entire chamber, causing the people within to shake in fear.

That cursed formation which had been such a headache for Zhou Fei to break was merely a pathetic bunch of marionettes before Ji Yunchen. The formation of 'Collapsing Mountains and Emptying Seas' prided itself on being able to conquer even the most formidable of opponents, as even a master pugilist that was ensnared within would feel like he had landed in sinking quicksand. But Ji Yunchen had completely tied this large net up in knots. None of the ease with which the fearsome formation had moved at the inn that day could be seen. These gong-wielding men didn't look one bit like they were closing in on their prey. Rather, they looked like sheep lining up for the slaughterhouse!

While Zhou Fei was watching him with rapt attention, Xie Yun suddenly sighed.

Zhou Fei asked: "What's wrong?"

Xie Yun said softly: "Better watch out."

Just as he said this, there was a change in the battlefield. The Azure Dragon Lord Zheng Luosheng, who had been protectively ensconced by his men all this while, was a nasty fellow through and through. Seeing that most of the men he had brought had been slaughtered by Ji Yunchen in the mere twinkling of an eye, Zheng Luosheng knew better than to continue fighting this losing battle, and decided to cut his losses and run.

Suddenly taking a stride forward, he made to deliver a crushing palm strike towards Ji Yunchen's head. The two of them swiftly exchanged more than ten blows in a matter of seconds.

Just when Zhou Fei was beginning to think that this fellow was willing to fight to the death, and actually had a courageous bone in his body, Zheng Luosheng grabbed one of his men without any warning, and shoved him right at Ji Yunchen. This action seemed vaguely familiar to Zhou Fei – she had done the same exact thing when shoving her scabbard into his hand just now!

All this time, Zhou Fei had been picking up things from others. But now the tables had turned, and someone was actually stealing her moves for once – and such an underhanded move no less. She stared open-mouthed at the scene unfolding before her.

Zheng Luosheng took advantage of this distraction to dart towards the exit of the chamber, intending to abandon all his lackeys here and make a break for it!

Zhou Fei and company simultaneously thought: 'Uh oh.'

Those shit-stirrers from the Mountain of the Living Dead did nothing all day but plague innocents and create trouble. If they allowed this fellow to escape, he'd be sure to hound them to no end in future, and would be a terrible nuisance. Zhou Fei immediately made to chase after him.

Although Xie Yun knew that it would be disastrous to let Zheng Luosheng escape, he also knew that it wasn't wise to push a desperate foe too hard. If even dogs could jump fences in desperation, what great lengths might the Azure Dragon Lord go to in order to escape? In Xie Yun's anxiety, his hands moved swiftly, mercilessly yanking the long braid hanging down Zhou Fei's back.

Zhou Fei had pulled Duan Jiuniang's hair before, and was now getting a taste of her own medicine. Her scalp smarted painfully. She whipped round to face Xie Yun, absolutely furious. Xie Yun retracted his errant hand, putting it behind him, and glared right back at her.

Zhou Fei: "…"

Seeing as this scoundrel had just helped to shield her, she decided to let him off the hook for now.

With this delay, it seemed like the Azure Dragon Lord would slip through their fingers. Another gust of wind blew through the passageway, howling as it travelled through the narrow, twisting tunnels. It sounded like the cries of ghouls, roaming the mountains in the black of night. Just then, Yin Pei's feet moved, and he was between the Azure Dragon Lord and the doorway in an instant.

It was all well and good when the young man had been playing dead in a corner, but his appearance right in front of him now reminded the Azure Dragon Lord – hadn't he gone to all this trouble, scouring this mountain and even putting himself in danger several times, precisely because of this fellow? Just when he'd thought that he had him in his clutches, this Northern Blade had gotten in the way, and he had resigned himself to failure. Who knew that this fellow would so foolishly throw himself at him now!

Yin Pei was offering himself up on a silver platter. Not wasting any time at all, Zheng Luosheng grabbed the young man's collar in one fell swoop, like a fearsome eagle pouncing on a rabbit.

Seeing the Azure Dragon Lord seize Yin Pei, Ji Yunchen roared in fury, and hacked his sabre down on the man's back. The Azure Dragon Lord hastened forward, but didn't seem too bothered by this – as Ji Yunchen was more than two steps away from him, the Clouds of Dusk armour on him would be protection enough.

But Yin Pei smiled at him hideously. While Zheng Luosheng's attention was focused on that attack from behind, Yin Pei's hand shot forward lightning-quick and clapped down on Zheng Luosheng's shoulder several times. Given Yin Pei's limited martial arts skills, he shouldn't have been capable of something like that, yet his hand moved with such shocking speed and ease, it seemed like he had practiced that motion hundreds or even thousands of times.

Distracted by trying to dodge Ji Yunchen's fatal blow towards his back, Zheng Luosheng failed to avoid Yin Pei's hand. He soon discovered to his horror that while Yin Pei's nimble pats on his shoulder had left nary a scratch on him, it had unfastened his already ill-fitting armour!

That body armour which he had been tightly encased in instantly slipped away. This protective covering now gone, Zheng Luosheng felt like Ji Yunchen's blade had already pierced his skin. In anger and desperation, he picked up Yin Pei and flung him aside. The pale-faced young man coughed out a mouthful of blood upon hitting the ground, like a bowl of red soup that had been smashed to pieces. He lay there unmoving, his fate uncertain.

Ji Yunchen had raised the boy on his own after all, even if the young man had turned out to be a horrible ingrate. He felt his heart tremble violently within him, and he shouted: "Pei!"

Zheng Luosheng ripped the armour from his body, and flung it at Ji Yunchen's face.

Ji Yunchen was beside himself with worry. Seeing this treasured possession of the Sword of Mountains and Rivers come hurtling towards him, he reached out a hand to catch it without much thought. But when he touched it, he felt a sharp pain in the centre of his palm – that armour had a row of little hooks on it, sharp as a scorpion's sting, which dug right into his hand. Blood trickled out instantly, which turned black as night once it came into contact with the air. This poisonous shade of black spread from his calloused palm, snaking up his arm in a matter of seconds.

Those hooks had been smeared with a poisonous substance that was even stronger than the poison which the Nine-Dragon Elder had used on Hua Zhenglong!

Zheng Luosheng halted in his tracks, turning around to look at Ji Yunchen with a sneer on his face: "Venom from a wasp's tail, otherwise known as 'Beauty's Favour' – because that has always cost a man most dearly.[4] Hero Ji, how do you find it?"

Ji Yunchen looked down at his hand with indifference. Zhou Fei's eyes widened, expecting him to sever his hand to save his life, like Hua Zhenglong had.

But Ji Yunchen merely smiled.

He had never truly had a carefree smile in his life, and over the years, bitter sorrow had etched itself into his face. Even when he smiled, the deep creases between his brows remained, making him look troubled and inexpressibly lonely.

"A beauty's favour…" Ji Yunchen repeated this softly to himself, then took a sudden step forward.

While such a narrow passageway was restrictive even for a slender young maiden like Zhou Fei, it posed no obstruction to 'Slicing Water and Tangling Silk'. No one would have expected Ji Yunchen to be so set on killing the Azure Dragon Lord despite the poison's spread.

Zheng Luosheng had been prepared for this, and seeing him make a move, instantly moved backwards. But Ji Yunchen's blade was relentless. The blackness on his hand had already spread all the way up to his neck, and then all over his face, making his haggard visage look like that of a corpse's. It was completely inconceivable to someone like Zheng Luosheng, who held on to his life as tightly as wealthy men clutched their gold bars even to the grave, that this madman would ignore the poison spreading in his body and instead charge ahead as if he had a death wish. Livid, he bellowed: "Fine then, since you're so set on dying, I'll give you what you want…"

He suddenly paused.

It seemed like he had just stepped on something.

He turned around in disbelief. Yin Pei, who he thought he had dispatched with one blow, wasn't dead yet.

The young man was curled in a corner like a sick dog, blood covering his entire face and head. Yin Pei's mouth split open, in a smile that was full of hatred, and he mouthed soundlessly: "Go to hell."

Thunder echoed down the passageway from outside, and chilling flashes of lightning could be seen even from inside the narrow tunnel.

At the exact same time, something beneath Zheng Luosheng's feet exploded, the sound of the detonation merging with the thunder outside to make the entire passageway quake dangerously.

Yin Pei had flung some kind of explosive device at the Azure Dragon Lord's feet when he was distracted!

At long last, this was something that the Azure Dragon Lord could not escape. He let out a tortured cry. Ji Yunchen immediately plunged his sabre into the man's chest. With a swift twist of his wrist, he carved out a gaping hole in the Azure Dragon Lord's chest. The Azure Dragon Lord, who had been squealing like a dying pig, was struck dumb. For his entire life, he had been so terribly afraid of death that he couldn't believe it now that it was actually happening. His eyes widened, and he almost looked a tad bewildered.

Lightning flashed again outside, illuminating Ji Yunchen's face. Stone and soil from the passageway's walls showered down on them, and violent tremors echoed down the tunnel.

That desperately struggling light in Zheng Luosheng's eyes finally faded into darkness. Ji Yunchen stared unblinkingly at him as the life in his eyes slowly went out. He let go of the sabre, leaving it lodged upright in the man's body. Stumbling backwards, he fumbled for the crumbling walls of the chamber, as if futilely trying to find something to prop himself up, but ended up plopping unceremoniously down on the ground anyway.

The corners of Ji Yunchen's mouth twitched, as if he wanted to break into a huge smile – but that smile faltered and died midway. He leaned against the wall of the passageway, staring down at the lifeless eyes of Zheng Luosheng's corpse. Then, as if overwhelmed with exhaustion, he slowly shut his eyes.

Xie Yun could sense that the rumblings in the passageway were only getting louder. Giving Zhou Fei a forceful shove, he said: "You reckless fool, I'm afraid that this place will collapse any second now, we have to leave!"

Zhou Fei knew that this was no time for her to exact revenge on him for yanking her braid just now. She hastily stepped forward and tried to help Ji Yunchen up, saying: "Senior, that fish-faced fellow has a whole bunch of poisons and hidden weapons on him, so he must have the antidote as well, just wait for me to find it…"

Ji Yunchen lightly placed his hand on her wrist and pushed it away. He smiled faintly, saying: "Don't you know what the Soul-Searching Needles are, Miss?"

Zhou Fei looked at him in confusion.

Xie Yun hurried Wu Chuchu to her feet as he said to Zhou Fei: "'In finding a lonely soul for one's body, one must depart like a wandering ghost'. The Soul-Searching Needles were originally called 'Needles of Great Revival'. It's a secret technique originating from the frontier regions, that allows a person to 'resurrect from the dead'. No matter how severe the illness, or how life-threatening the injury, it heals completely, and makes you feel…like you have suddenly regained all the lost years of your prime."

Ji Yunchen continued his explanation: "It's like a kind of terminal lucidity, lasting for three quarters of an hour…"

The swollen clouds above seemed to have been pierced suddenly, emptying themselves on the earth with a tremendous crash. A torrential downpour had begun.

A damp, stale smell wafted up from the soil walls of the chamber. Ji Yunchen's eyes were lowered, unfocused. He seemed to be lost in thought, even at this time. Then his eyes gently shifted, to land on Yin Pei.

Yin Pei had stiffened when he heard his adoptive father utter the words 'terminal lucidity', and turned to look at Ji Yunchen with a mix of emotions on his face. Ji Yunchen looked thoughtfully at him, as if he had a thousand and one things he wished to say. But in the end, he found that there really wasn't much left to say, nothing really worth telling him. So he simply smiled, and said for the third time: "Leave now."

Zhou Fei: "Wait…"

Just as she said this, the section of the passageway leading from the chamber suddenly collapsed. Yin Pei's explosive device had been the straw that broke the back of this old and weathered tunnel.

Soil and rocks rained down on them. Ji Yunchen forcefully shoved Zhou Fei towards the chamber's exit.

Zhou Fei stumbled backwards, prompting Xie Yun to reach out to steady her. In a matter of seconds, a towering heap of soil and rocks had fallen right at the spot where she had just been standing, obscuring the Northern Blade. The passageway continued to quake violently.

Ji Yunchen felt an excruciating pain shoot up both of his legs. They had been crushed by several large rocks, which he hadn't attempted to avoid at all. He let out a muffled groan. He felt disembodied, like all the strength had been sapped from him, such that he couldn't even lift a finger.

While the duration of terminal lucidity afforded by the Soul-Searching Needles should actually last longer than this, the very last bit of fire in him that was keeping him going had dissipated once he killed Zheng Luosheng. The quaking of the passageway and the thunder outside blended together noisily. One had to strain very hard to hear the sound of the rain falling. And as the patter of the rain slowly faded away, Ji Yunchen knew that it wasn't because the skies were clearing and the sun was coming out again, but that his senses were weakening.

A painting that he had chanced upon in a restaurant somewhere all those years ago, when he had just set foot in the central plains, suddenly came to mind.

In an effort to appear cultured, the owners must have obtained this cheap painting from some mediocre local artist. The painting itself wasn't worth a second look, but there was a line from an ancient poem inscribed in one corner of it, that had stayed in Ji Yunchen's memory. He couldn't remember all of it, having hardly read any books in his life. But he vaguely recalled that it was something like: 'A young man listens to the sound of rain falling in a pavilion, amidst the sumptuous flicker of red candles….but now he stands all alone in a monastery as rain falls…'

And his hair has grown white. [5]