Chapter 549: Hanga Yoran (9)

Hangzhou—the city that never sleeps, bright for twelve shichen—is a blaze even hotter tonight.

Chase and counter-chase; sword-qi and blade-qi keep blooming, colliding, grinding, throwing sparks.

Enemies rush in with steel; those Blood Sect freaks with their eyes gone wrong; and the hunters of “divine arts” crowd every side.

There’s a saying: a knife-mountain and a sword-river.

The world as nothing but malice chopping down on you—a figure for a place as vicious and perilous as it gets.

By the same token they likened the martial world to a mountain of knives and a forest of swords.

Before the Great Festival at Wucheng, orthodox, evil, demonic, even the bureaucrats—everyone was rabid to kill each other; lock eyes and you drew blades. Everyday life looked exactly like that.

And now too.

“Halt! You—do you remember the name Yang Seongjin? Elder of the Red-Rafter Ghosts—this bitch is—hck—sh-she’s answering—!”

“Say that after you win!”

Qing snapped, dove low, and drove in. The lowered military dao burst skyward.

True, in martial theory there aren’t many “against-heaven” methods that shoot upward—downward strikes are far stronger once you add weapon weight, and the rebound after favors them. It isn’t the “wise” option.

But if your strength is enough, it’s different.

To stop an upward blast from below, even someone with a thousand-geun brute force can’t easily support more than their body’s own mass.

The nameless foe caught the blade on his edge and tried to shove it back down, but—clang—the collision packed with brute force knocked him out of line, his arms flying up as if in a cheer.

Crack. The dao smashed his pelvis and dug in; both feet popped up and he rocketed skyward, escaping at the apex of his arc and flying high.

Qing, splashed with tacky blood, scattered killing intent like ice.

Only for a moment. From the pavilion’s shadow, killers sprang.

Sunset-colored blade-qi churned; thup thup—pieces of bodies dropped in chunks—and a few still managed to drive daggers in.

Qing let those through—she’d culled the truly dangerous ones; these were hits she could afford to take.

Daggers thudded into muscle sheathed in Guardian Qi; even the deepest sank only an inch—a single finger-joint. It hurt like hell—“patient, this one’s going to sting.”

Pain is my strength. Qing punched clean through the solar plexus in answer; the assassin’s eyes, visible over the mask, curved with venomous glee.

“Heh... the blades are heavy with poison. Your time is short. I’ll be... waiting.”

Qing yanked her hand free. Even as the man hacked blood, khk, khlkk, he forced a laugh.

Mm. Unlucky for you—poison, so what.

What was that group? Flame-Coal Society?

They’d hidden her behind a secret wall and pretended to help; then spat poison darts and demanded she trade the antidote for the “divine art”—so she flipped the table and walked out.

After that they clung like “you die, I die.”

The four “Ghosts” glanced between themselves.

She’s nasty. Let’s not stick our noses in—how about we just go home?

Agreed, elder. The client’s dead; nothing for it but to withdraw.

Murmuring and hedging, the Four Ghosts began to back away, then turned and retreated fast.

Qing drew breath—inhale, inhale, whooo—watching their backs—

Beep! Beep!

“There! The Heavenly Flower Sword is there!”

With the shout, a mass of fighters with red headbands surged in—Jeokgeoncheon.

Qing took a long breath.

Right. Fighters speak with blades.

When was any fight easy and cushioned?

Maybe this was what she should’ve done from the start.

Dodging “troops” and “life-and-death duels,” working tricks—how easy must that have made her look?

If it wasn’t a life-and-death duel, if there weren’t troops, if they could mob her and fish for an opening—leave them leeway and they keep their delusions, and here we are.

Her body slid into eight and seeped into the middle of the matching uniforms. Steel scattered; bong—a temple bell’s clang; she raked, seized, pierced, ripped, and tore—

Then—chaang!—Qing, still gripping the dao, scraped a long line in the ground as she slid, stopping hard.

Half the thick blade-body of the military dao was notched deep. She’d barely warded the blow; inside, her viscera roiled and a mouthful of blood surged up.

“You cur! You think you can touch Jeokgeoncheon and walk away!”

“Ptui. And the Divine Lady’s Gate is chopped liver? What—got Profound-Realm masters too? Absorbing Star Great Law? Sure, call it that—great. You got a plan for the mess after?”

Qing spat blood and shouted right back.

The Jeokgeoncheon master who had yelled flinched.

Of course they didn’t.

“Die!”

Qing stamped with a shout—thoom!

The Jeokgeoncheon master jerked, raising his sword, but Qing split into eight translucent bodies and flew, crawled, and sprang in all directions.

“Damn—tricked!”

Too late. Qing was already ghosting into the back of their formation.

She pivoted—one step to launch the body, two to build speed, three to break away at a furious sprint.

“Damn it—after her! Get her!”

Shouts bayed from behind.

Qing finally understood the demonic-art prospectors.

The Absorbing Qi Demonic Art is a tank.

That tank—the joke everyone tells.

Max out every loan you can and buy a tank.

Then how do you repay the debt?

Idiot. Why worry about debt—you have a tank. Banks? Loan sharks? I. Have. A. Tank.

Once you have the Absorbing Qi Demonic Art, why fear a martial-world indictment or a righteous-vs-evil war?

It guarantees “kill-within-kill,” first under heaven. “I already have it.”

Same idea: “win first, pay it back later.”

It’s the mind of someone so buried they can’t think straight.

So these guys have no “after.”

Gamblers who’ve lost big never think about what comes after—first they “win it back.”

If it fails? Well—what’s worse than dying?

Connections to mobilize troops, shields like “First Among Women,” the Martial Alliance—demonic-art prospectors don’t care about any of that.

Idiots.

Even if the Absorbing Qi Demonic Art existed—get it and you instantly become first under heaven, with the world underfoot?

Look around. You think once you “get it,” you’ll vanish at leisure?

Unless you can fly into the sky or sink into the earth—

But people who haunt illegal gambling dens always think that after a huge win they’ll wake up safe to see tomorrow morning.

They just think the Heavenly Flower Sword is easy.

A single throw of the dice, all-or-nothing, for a guaranteed first-under-heaven—worth a shot, right?

Qing trailed a long string of enemies.

Fact: she could shake them if she wanted.

Then what?

Would they quit and go home because they got shaken?

In gambling terms, they’ve lost big; they’ll burn their eyes trying to get even.

She chose a great avenue, ran hard, and left herself margin—just enough not to open the gap—so Jeokgeoncheon first, then every sort of drifter, every demonic stray and scroungy faction, all came pouring after.

She’d already circled Hangzhou once; the tail was not small.

Ahead, the end of the avenue.

A high wall—one and a half jang—ran left and right, with a great gate at the middle where it met the street and a plaque: in big characters—Great Blood-Lama.

The Blood-Lama Gate.

She’d had no breath to ask directions while being chased; only after a full lap of the city had she found the Blood Sect bastards’ base.

The Blood-Lama Gate’s guards saw Qing sprinting in and, behind her, a mass of mixed fighters filling the street.

Startled, they ducked inside; the great front gate began to slam shut—screeee—hurriedly.

Qing poured on speed—five strides—four—three—

And yet—thud—shut in her face; thud again—the bar dropping in a rush.

She accelerated—two strides—and on the last stride she hammered the ground.

She twisted her hips, shoved the air with both arms, and drove her shoulder—Iron Mountain Lean—straight into the gate.

BANG!

Agony lanced up her shoulder as her body pitched forward and flew.

The iron bar assembly tore free whole; whunk!—the guards bounced off the door as it slammed into them.

The doors flew apart: one side ragged, the other’s hinge snapped—screeee—TUNK.

Qing sailed four jang through the blown-open mouth and crash-landed on her shoulder, skidding three jang with a long carved line across the floor.

“Oof, that’s gotta hurt,” someone would say—but she popped up like pain didn’t exist.

The pursuers poured in after and fanned through the manor’s halls, bellowing.

“You damn Blood Sect abominations! I’ll kill you all! Cut them down! Kill them all! Don’t leave a single one of these depraved Blood-Sect bastards alive! Not a single dog! Not a single rat! Burn it all!”

Qing kept spitting it—cut them, kill them, purge the Blood Sect.

The pursuers startled.

She’s herding us—on purpose.

Some believed it, some didn’t.

Blood Sect? The Blood-Lama Gate equals Blood Sect?

They had fought the Demonic Union’s combat unit earlier—how’s that the Blood Sect’s business?

Calling anything with “Blood” in the name “Blood Sect” was a bit much.

Unthinkable! The Blood-Lama Gate—Blood Sect!

We should have guessed when we saw the “Blood” character!

Either way, faces went grave, weapons came up, eyes swept the corners, bracing for an ambush.

Only—why so quiet? No one?

Qing’s chest dropped.

Huh? Why... no one?

Were those earlier fighters all they had? Or is this an empty house because everyone ran out to catch me?

And then—

—Silence! What disgrace is this!!

A booming voice out of the air.

All eyes swung one way—an old man had opened the main hall’s doors and stepped out.

The voice alone carried uncommon inner power; the “masters” present all stiffened.

Did the Blood-Lama Gate have someone like this?

The old man spoke.

“I am Chang Sanya, Deputy Gate Master of the Blood-Lama Gate! Who dares make turmoil in our main hall!”

Qing cut him off at once.

“Shut your mouth, Blood Sect abomination! The facts are already plain as day. Don’t tell me you don’t know your chief—impudent as he is—styles himself ‘Demon King’ and makes mock of the laws of the realm!”

“Blood Sect, you say. Nonsense—slander.”

“I have already met the brazen hussy who dared to style herself ‘Princess’—she had the gall to call herself the Heart-Plucking Demon Princess to my face! I twisted her limbs and tore her flesh to carve the lesson in; only then did she sob and show her true identity! What are you, if not Blood Sect vermin!”

Chang Sanya’s face blanched.

“What did you just say.”

“Is this the time to ‘play at being the Blood-Lama Gate’? Examine Yu Ryang’s corpse and you’ll find traces of Heart-Plucking Arts, those filthy demonic techniques. Or will you claim it was her personal deviation? Judging by the way the Heart-Plucking Demon Lord raised his little darling, he dotes on her to the point of madness.”

Chang Sanya’s face hardened.

The pursuers who’d chased Qing in were beginning to realize this wasn’t going to be simple.

“Hold! Our Jeokgeoncheon only entered to settle our score with the Heavenly Flower Sword—we have no wish to cross the Blood-Lama Gate. We apologize for trespassing in your manor. We will pledge appropriate compensation later, so we will now withdr—”

“Omm—om—buuufuum——!”

The Jeokgeoncheon master tried to back out fast, but a strange sound burst out before he finished.

A sorcerer’s mantra—one you knew was wicked the moment you heard it.

CRASH! RIP! SNAP!

Every door in every building blew out; red-eyed monsters came tumbling by the mass.

They spilled over each other, tangled, rolled, and kept pouring—numbers as if someone had stacked them up in rooms by the dozens.

“Heart!” “Hungry!” “Heart! Fresh heart!”

“KyAAAH!” “Grahh!” “KkYAAAH!”

From every side they ran, bounded, and swarmed.

“They really are Blood Sect bastards...!”

“Everyone—retreat! Retreat!”

“The exit—the exits are gone! Every side—!”

As shock and fear crashed over the pursuers, Qing set her grip on the dao and faced the onrushing fiends—

Except—

The column of fiends split down the middle before her, peeling left and right.

“KiEEEek!” “Gk-AAAH!” “Kk-yah!”

With pained, scream-like cries, the monsters ringed her and veered past.

Qing’s face did that face—eh?

What? What is it? Why aren’t they jumping me?