Promoted to Martial God, Killing the Guard Commander in an Instant
After the birthday banquet ended, Chen Du returned to the side room and packed a few things.
There was hardly anything to pack: two changes of old clothes, half an uneaten dry flatbread, and a wooden hairpin left behind by the original owner's mother.
He tucked the hairpin away close to his body, wrapped the rest into a small bundle and slung it over his shoulder, then headed out of the residence.
He went by the side gate.
The night was thick with darkness, and the side gate stood ajar. The gatekeeper had long since vanished to who knew where for a drink.
He pushed open the gate and stepped over the threshold. The chilly night
wind swept over his face, carrying the dry cold of the capital's early winter.
He did not look back. His pace was neither fast nor slow, as though he really were just going to tend a grave and would return at daybreak.
But Chen Du knew very well that from the moment he stepped over that threshold, someone would be on his tail.
In the duke's study.
Duke Tianyuan, Ning Shanyue, stood before the window with his hands behind his back. Nearly soundless footsteps came from outside the door, and a middle-aged man in armor, a saber at his waist, entered and dropped to one knee.
"Your Grace."
Ning Shanyue did not turn around. His voice was quiet, but its weight made it hard to breathe. "Has he gone out?"
"Yes," Wu Zhan said, lowering his head. "The third young master left through the side gate."
"Follow him." Ning Shanyue's voice was devoid of emotion. "Stay close. If he makes any unusual move, tries to run, tries to escape, or tries to get out of your sight, break both his legs and feet and bring him back. I want him alive."
"If he behaves himself and finishes tending the grave, bring him back to stay in the side courtyard. I don't want anything else going wrong with this man."
Wu Zhan cupped his fists. "I understand."
"Go." Ning Shanyue turned, walked to his desk and sat down. He unrolled a document and did not give Wu Zhan another look.
Wu Zhan withdrew from the study and leaped down the steps.
His horse was tethered outside the residence gates, a black steed with white feet, saddled and bridled.
He swung into the saddle, pulled his conical hat low and rode after Chen Du toward the side gate.
He made no attempt to conceal the aura of a third-rank Martial Emperor. He was not worried about Chen Du noticing him.
The duke had made himself clear: so long as Chen Du did not run, he could keep his legs.
If he did run, all the better. Wu Zhan could cripple those disobedient legs and have him carried back, saving himself the trouble.
By the time Wu Zhan left the city, Chen Du was already outside. Few people were on the main road, and all he could see in the distance was a thin figure from behind.
Wu Zhan reined his horse in to a slow pace, always keeping half a li between them, neither losing sight of him nor drawing closer.
The night wind was cold, and the moon hid behind the clouds.
He pressed a hand against the hilt of his saber. He was only a son born of a concubine whose martial meridians had been crippled. What waves could he possibly stir up? Once he finished tending the grave, it would be time to go back.
Chen Du did not look back, but he heard it.
Half a li behind him, hoofbeats sounded at an unhurried pace, like fate counting down.
He lowered his head slightly, the corner of his mouth twitching upward. Without a word, he continued forward.
The night was thick as ink, and the road ahead stretched far into the distance.
He walked alone on the empty main road. Behind him stood the city that had confined him for sixteen years, and that man at the peak of the Martial Immortal realm, watching him coldly across half the capital's night.
Chen Du followed the main road south at an unhurried pace.
He gradually reached a point ten li from the city.
If that old bastard had not been constrained by the hall full of guests, he would never have let him out.
Sending a third-rank Martial Emperor after him made his meaning more than clear.
After walking for nearly another half hour, Chen Du stopped before a barren slope.
On the slope, yellow earth half covered a lonely burial mound. A crude stone tablet stood before it, bearing the words "Tomb of Liu Shi." The clumsy lettering had already begun to blur.
Wild grass covered the mound, and the tallest clumps reached above his waist.
Chen Du walked to the grave, bent down and pulled out the weeds one clump at a time, moving slowly, as though combing someone's tangled hair.
"You've followed me this long. Isn't it time you came out?" he said calmly, without looking back. "Commander Wu Zhan."
The darkness half a li behind him fell silent for a moment.
Then hoofbeats approached at an unhurried pace, and a middle-aged man in armor, a saber at his waist, emerged from the night like a silent iron tower.
"Third young master," Wu Zhan said, looking down at Chen Du from horseback, his face expressionless, "please don't make things difficult for me. The duke has ordered you to return to the residence as soon as you've finished tending the grave. If you don't move, I won't move."
Chen Du pulled the last clump of weeds from the grave, tossed it down the slope and slowly straightened up.
Moonlight filtered through the clouds and fell on his gaunt face, lending it an indescribable chill.
"Wu Zhan, you're a third-rank Martial Emperor," he said suddenly. "Following me around, don't you feel like you're using an ox cleaver to kill a chicken?"
Wu Zhan frowned. He did not know where this son of a concubine, whose martial meridians had been crippled, found the confidence to say such a thing.
But instincts honed by years of licking blood from the edge of a blade made his heart tighten, and he unconsciously gripped his saber hilt.
Chen Du said no more. He closed his eyes, and the martial within his body.
The martial meridians of this body, once broken beyond repair, gave a rapid series of cracking sounds, like a frozen river thawing, or a trapped dragon breaking its chains.
The spiritual energy of heaven and earth seemed to be dragged over by some force, raising a ring of air with him at its center and sending the freshly uprooted grass flying in all directions.
Seventh-rank Martial Fighter, sixth-rank Martial General, fifth-rank Martial Commander, fourth-rank Martial King, third-rank Martial Emperor... He passed through realm after realm like paper windowpanes. His aura surged forward with the force of splitting bamboo, charging straight into the second-rank Martial God realm.
A low boom erupted in the air, as though some ancient door had been kicked open.
The horse beneath Wu Zhan gave a startled whinny. Its legs went weak, and it dropped straight to its knees.
Wu Zhan's expression changed drastically. Protective energy surged wildly around him as he tried to retreat, but he could not move at all. The pressure, which had risen to its utmost in an instant, pinned him firmly in place.
A second-rank Martial God! This son of a concubine whose martial meridians had been crippled, this boy who had nearly starved to death in the side courtyard, had actually broken through to the second-rank Martial God realm right in front of him?
How was that possible?
"Third young master!"
Chen Du opened his eyes and flicked a finger at him.
There was no technique to it, just an utterly ordinary flick.
Under that flick, the protective barrier around Wu Zhan shattered like thin paper.
An invisible force from the finger strike hit him. His chest caved in, a bulge rose on his back, and he went flying backward with a crash.
Before he hit the ground, his life was already gone.
The horse fell to one side, twitched twice and died as well.
Chen Du lowered his hand and turned toward the lonely grave. After a moment's silence, he said softly, "Mother, I haven't killed many people. Today's was the first. Don't be afraid."
With that, he turned and headed north without returning to the capital, his figure swallowed by the night.
Chen Du did not look back. He activated the Breath-Concealing Technique, suppressing his second-rank Martial God aura layer by layer.
From the outside, he appeared to be no more than a low-level Martial Fighter who had just entered the seventh rank, or perhaps even weaker. Unless a martial cultivator of the same level or higher deliberately probed him, it would be extremely hard to detect.
Then he set off, speeding north like a shadow melting into the night.
He avoided the main road, choosing instead to travel through wild mountains and remote ridges, using tree shadows and rock faces for cover along the way.
After its last refinement, the Breath-Concealing Technique could fool the Spiritual Power probes of high-level martial cultivators. He was not sure whether it could fool an old monster at the peak of the Martial Immortal realm.
But this was his only chance of survival for now. Beyond the capital, heaven and earth were vast, and there would always be somewhere to hide.
A day later, Duke Tianyuan, Ning Shanyue, personally led men to the place where Wu Zhan had died, his black robe stirring without wind.
A delay of just one day had already made him too late.
He did not release his aura, yet every bird, beast, insect and ant within a hundred zhang lay flat and silent.
He stood with his hands behind his back, his gaze sweeping past the dead horse in front of the grave before settling on Wu Zhan's corpse.
The body lay across the ground below the slope, its breastbone shattered, the clothes on its back pushed out in a large bulge. The mark of a finger was clear: it did not look like a fist or palm strike, but a casual flick.
Ning Shanyue stared at the wound for a moment, the indifference in his eyes gradually sinking.
"Trash." He snorted coldly.
It was unclear whether he meant Wu Zhan or the son who had already escaped without a trace.
He walked to the grave. The words "Tomb of Liu Shi" on the stone tablet had already weathered somewhat.
He glanced at the tablet. There was not a trace of remembrance on his face, only the faintest chill, mingled with disgust and killing intent.
He had always thought that bastard would never amount to anything. With his martial meridians severed and himself confined to the side courtyard to await death, he was no different from a cripple.
Yet today he had put on an act right under Ning Shanyue's nose and killed the third-rank Martial Emperor sent to watch him.
To kill a third-rank cultivator with a flick of a finger, he had to be at least a second-rank Martial God, perhaps even higher!
"I never expected it," he said softly, his voice cold as though tempered in ice. "That woman's son truly cannot be allowed to live."
He turned and looked toward the mountains to the north, his gaze deep and dark as an abyss.
Liu Shi was dead, and the boy had escaped. This wretch named Ning Chuan had to die.
Since he carried that woman's blood, he had even less right to live in this world.
But today, he would not personally give chase again.
Where could a second-rank Martial God run?
In the Great Sheng Dynasty, there were plenty of people who would take that head for him.
He cast one last glance at the lonely earthen grave and turned to leave, leaving only a sentence scattered on the wind. "Level the grave. That woman gave birth to this wretch; she doesn't deserve burial."