Teacher of the Azure Blade

Teacher of the Azure Blade

"What are you planning to do?"

By the broken bridge, Wei Wushuang asked Xia Fan.

"To be honest, I don't know." Xia Fan crouched before the rift, studying the cliff face across from him—the distance between the two sides was roughly fifteen meters, not an impassable chasm. Once everyone discovered that Luo Qingqing had been telling the truth and there really was a Wooden Kite in the cave, their moods eased considerably. At least they were no longer as frantic and restless as before.

After all, keeping their lives was what mattered. This failure was regrettable, but there were people who fought on despite repeated defeats in the imperial examinations. They did not have to force themselves to pass the Scholar Examination either. At worst, they could return in three years.

To Xia Fan, three years meant three more years before he could understand this world. Besides, he had already obtained a bottle of Source of Spirit Fire. As long as he held on for two more days, he could pass. Unless driven into a corner, he did not want to give up now. But the problem was that he could not judge whether they had reached that point of no return.

He knew far too little about how the Great Desolation Evil Night manifested itself, where its dangers lay, and how it could be handled. There was not enough information for him to make an effective analysis or judgment.

One thing was certain: the Scholar Examination had been established to select outstanding talents. It was by no means some "death game" where nine died out of ten. That meant there had to be some means or method in the town to survive the Evil Night safely. But did it require several people working together, or could one person manage it alone? What talents and spells did it demand? If he insisted on staying without knowing any of that, he would be handing his life over to heaven to decide.

He had never forgotten that the Bureau of Military Affairs was a department that bore high risks. It sounded perfectly reasonable for an examination to have a quota for casualties. Even his bargain-bin master had repeatedly warned him that dealing with evil aberrations was a serious matter. And the Great Desolation Evil Night was likely an evil among evils. If one carelessly fell within it, that would be entirely normal.

"Brother Xia... how about you withdraw with me?" Wei Wushuang said after hesitating. "I know your abilities are far above mine. Getting into the Bureau of Military Affairs is only a matter of sooner or later for you. Since that's the case, being three years late is nothing. Look at those children of great clans—aren't they also not all planning to tough it out?"

Judging from those following Luo Qingqing, there were around two hundred examinees inclined to give up. Adding the hundred or so who had already been eliminated, the number had exceeded three-quarters of all examinees. Quite a few among them were disciples of great clans. And among the remaining quarter, there were surely many who still wavered. In other words, when faced with the potentially approaching Great Desolation Evil Night, most people chose to avoid it.

It had to be said, that was how normal people thought—an examination was not worth risking one's life over.

At the same time, it suggested another possibility: there was not only danger on the final day of the Scholar Examination, but quite considerable danger. The three families could not protect every one of their participating disciples, or they would not have arranged for their fellow disciples to withdraw. After all, when it came to understanding the Great Desolation Evil Night, no one present should know more than the Luo Family. Their decision alone spoke volumes.

But looking at it from the other side, fewer than half the people had decided to remain in Qingshan Town. Based on the pass rate of nearly fifty percent in the past, that meant simply staying behind would multiply one's chances of passing the Scholar Examination.

It really left Xia Fan torn between two sides.

"Let me think about it some more," he said after pondering for a long while and letting out a breath. "Building a Release Platform will take at least most of a day. It won't be too late to decide tomorrow. You can queue up first and try to get across early."

Seeing this, Wei Wushuang could not continue persuading him and could only nod silently.

Yet Xia Fan knew perfectly well that even if he did leave, he would have to slip away quietly when no one was around—after all, apart from him, there was an immobile Fox Demon in his room. If he took the Fox Demon away in full view of everyone, what awaited him might well be a cell in the Bureau of Military Affairs.

After parting from his fellow townsman, Xia Fan returned to the inn.

When he opened the room door, he could not help but pause in surprise.

At some point, the candle had been lit, and there was now a figure sitting propped against the head of the bed.

Li had awakened.

"If I were you, I wouldn't move around before recovering from such serious injuries."

Xia Fan walked to the bedside and noticed that her face was flushed, with a fine sheen of sweat on her temples. Clearly, the simple act of propping herself up had consumed a great deal of her energy.

"I'm a Yao, not a human. I'm not as fragile as you..."

Her tone was as cutting as ever, but her weak voice exposed the true state of her body.

Xia Fan curled his lips, climbed onto the table, and opened the window. Bright sunlight immediately flooded into the room.

The Fox Demon instinctively covered her head. "What are you doing?" A rare trace of panic entered her voice.

"Letting the air circulate. A ventilated room is better for a patient's recovery." He studied her with interest—what Li had just covered were clearly those upright ears. Considering that he already knew her identity, it was undoubtedly a reflexive action. "It's not like this is the first time I've seen them. There's no need to hide them. Besides, I think they're quite interesting. At least they aren't ugly."

Only then did Li slowly lower her hand, frowning in displeasure. "What nonsense are you talking about?"

"That's the truth. Believe it or not."

As he spoke, Xia Fan lifted the blanket and examined her injuries. This time, the Fox Demon showed no resistance at all. Compared to close physical contact, she seemed more concerned about her appearance.

Mottled bloodstains had seeped through the bandages, likely because she had moved around on her own. But compared with the wound stretching across her abdomen, that amount of bleeding was not worth mentioning. As long as it was not severe bleeding that could soak through her clothes, it was already good news.

Regaining consciousness in just a day and a half, while also stopping her injuries from worsening—what Li had said before was not mere bluster.

If she had been human, she would have gone cold long ago.

"Don't move around if there's no need. Just lie still and rest." Xia Fan pressed her back down. "I'll apply medicine again tonight and change the bandages while I'm at it. Of course, pain will definitely be unavoidable, but you managed to endure even getting stitched up, so changing the dressing shouldn't be a problem—"

"Why?" Li interrupted softly.

"What?" Xia Fan raised a brow.

"Why... did you save me?" After a moment of silence, she repeated herself.

"What kind of strange question is that? Saving a partner who works with you doesn't need any special reason, does it?"

He had actually called her a partner?

Li blanked out for a moment. It was the first time she had ever heard a human refer to her that way.

"You... what exactly do you want from me?"

No, that was not right. She could not be confused by a mere form of address. Human actions were all driven by profit. This had nothing to do with one's character—it was human nature.

"So much." Xia Fan shrugged.

That answer also surprised Li greatly. She had assumed he would keep disguising his intentions, but he had said it so directly.

Li endured the throbbing pain from her wound and took a breath. "Tell me?"

"More or less the same as before—mainly talking. But I want to continue our cooperation, preferably for the long term. There are simply too many things I want to understand. A day or two is nowhere near enough."

Li froze. For a moment, she wondered whether there was something wrong with her ears. Was there something wrong with this man's head? If she had understood correctly, someone aspiring to become a Fangshi actually wanted to establish long-term contact with a Yao—did this fellow even know that he was going to serve in the Bureau of Military Affairs in the future?

Considering he had previously dared to say such absurd things as "use understanding to eliminate prejudice, then spread it among the Fangshi," perhaps there really was something wrong with his head.

"No." She refused flatly.

"Why?"

"I'm going to take revenge on the Bureau of Military Affairs, and you are a Fangshi of the Bureau of Military Affairs. Sooner or later, we'll become enemies."

"What are you taking revenge for?"

"My master..." Li's voice lowered. "She was taken away by the Bureau of Military Affairs."

"But you clearly said you had no master." Xia Fan asked curiously.

"Because she never took disciples, and she never allowed me to call her Master. In fact, I don't even know her real name. But..." She paused. "Ever since I came to understand things, I've always regarded her as my master."

"She was human?"

Li nodded.

"Was it because she was with a Yao? No..." Xia Fan quickly dismissed that guess. "If that were the case, they should have arrested you first. But from what you've said, the Bureau of Military Affairs did not seem to be after you."

"Indeed not. They did not even know I existed."

"My condolences... The dead cannot return to life, after all. I understand your desire for revenge, but what would your master think? Did she truly want you to take revenge?" Xia Fan decided to launch an assault of soul-soothing platitudes with the experience he had accumulated from being poisoned by them for years. "Your opponent is the Bureau of Military Affairs. Calling it an egg striking a stone would not be an exaggeration. Rather than dying at your enemy's hands, I think your master would rather you live well. Even if you somehow succeeded in taking revenge, all you would gain would be emptiness. When people are alive, happiness is what matters most. Want me to make you some... forget it, there are no noodles here."

"What are you talking about?" Li stared at him with a strange expression. "Who told you my master was dead?"

"Cough, cough—" Xia Fan nearly choked. "She isn't dead?"

"Master had foreseen this day long ago. She merely told me to forget her, to act as though I had never met her. The Bureau of Military Affairs would not harm her life. They would only ensure that she could never see the light of day again. As for telling me to live well... Master did say the same thing as you." She bit her lip. "But how could I forget everything from those years? If I abandoned those memories, I would be no different from dead. So I will take revenge on the Bureau of Military Affairs. I will rescue Master from their hands!"

Overwhelmed by emotion, Li suddenly began coughing violently as she finished speaking, a trace of bloody foam spilling from the corner of her mouth.

Xia Fan gently patted her back. Only after she calmed down did he ask, "When was your master captured?"

"...Eight years ago."

That was it. As expected, she had been to the Scholar Examination grounds more than once.

"Have you considered that those might only have been words your master used to comfort you?" Xia Fan tried to persuade her in a calm tone. "So much time has passed. Even if she wasn't dead then, she might not be safe and sound now. Since the Bureau of Military Affairs wanted to arrest her, there must have been some conflict between them. Having fallen into an enemy's hands, her fate certainly won't be pleasant. You know the yamen's prisons, right? Throw an ordinary criminal in there, and in a few months they'll no longer look human."

"My master is not an ordinary criminal."

"A troublesome criminal would likely suffer even more miserably—"

"Before she met me, she was once an Azure Blade of the Bureau of Military Affairs."

"Then she probably had even less chance of escaping... Wait." Xia Fan froze. "What did you say? Your master used to be with the Bureau of Military Affairs? And what is an Azure Blade?"

"An Azure Blade ranks only below a Feathered Garment, equivalent to a second-rank official of the Six Ministries," Li said slowly. "Master committed no crime. She merely defected from the Bureau of Military Affairs."