Please Reduce

[9-4]

[9-5]

[9-8]

Bang!

This time, Ning Xuan didn't repeat his earlier trick. He simply pinned the Snow White Bear Demon against the old tree and, expressionless, rapidly hammered it with one fist after another.

His gaze was focused and indifferent. The muscles in his fist had grown dense with force, turning into fine scales.

With every impact, the scales on his fist crashed against the scales on the bear demon's cheek.

The bear demon refused to back down, constantly swinging both claws at Ning Xuan's ribs. But every time they touched him, scales formed over Ning Xuan's abdomen and blocked the blows. The bear demon couldn't breach his solid defenses at all.

The two remained locked in their struggle for only a short while.

The balance had already been broken.

More and more black qi poured from the bear demon into Ning Xuan, and the scales on its face could no longer gather.

Bang!

When the next blow fell, the scales on the bear demon's face failed to appear in time, while Ning Xuan's fist was already completely covered in them.

The Snow White Bear Demon's head burst open. Then its chubby brains, along with blood, fur, and shattered bone, began spilling out. Its claws drooped limply, giving up their attack, but it still muttered, "If only I had my weapon. If only my weapon were still here."

Ning Xuan didn't listen to its rambling.

He drew back another punch.

This time, his entire arm was covered in scales.

His fist drew back like a mighty bow pulled to the full moon, then shot from the string.

Boom!

The old tree shuddered violently. Leaves fluttered down, and with a dull crack, its trunk snapped in half.

The Snow White Bear Demon's head was now nothing but a gaping hole. It lay motionless.

In that instant, heaven and earth fell silent.

Ning Xuan casually tossed aside the ruined corpse.

The last wisp of dense black qi inside it burrowed into his body, and the world of the black moon and white sun began to collapse.

Ning Xuan stood with his head raised in the crumbling world and glanced over the panel.

[Ning Xuan]

[Life (Constitution): 3.5]

[Nature (Spirit): 1]

[Heavenly Demon Scroll]

[Master Baiyue]

[Heavenly Demon Life Attribute, Bear Order, Ordinary Division, White Mountain Species (Constitution): 10] (After subduing it, it can additionally provide 8.25 Life Attribute)

[Innate Demonic Art: None]

"General Ning was right. Thirty years east of the river, thirty years west of the river. Life is not yet old, and the road ahead is long. There's no need to belittle yourself at this moment and needlessly wound your fighting spirit."

Immortal Aunt Yaozhen's voice came from beside Ning Xuan's ear.

He listened to it as if from another life.

Immortal Aunt Yaozhen suddenly noticed how quiet the general beside her had become and asked in confusion, "General, have you discovered something?"

Ning Xuan said, "Push the boundary here back another fifty miles. Also, tell the reinforcements coming to investigate to be careful. This place... is very wrong."

Immortal Aunt Yaozhen raised an eyebrow. "General... could it be that you're afraid?"

Ning Xuan didn't answer. He was gazing at the Ice Mountain, which radiated a chilling aura beneath the moonlight.

The noisy chirping of insects had already begun in his ears, and the wind between the trees had grown warm, but the Ice Mountain remained completely unaffected.

Even in his nightmare, he had been unable to set foot on that Ice Mountain.

Master Baiyue was clearly a bear.

A White Mountain Bear.

This kind of bear didn't even have an Innate Demonic Art, yet it had cultivated such formidable strength—and it even bore the title "Master." Thinking back to the "Stealing Incense Rat" with its ten-zhang Bodhisattva Golden Body, Ning Xuan quickly pieced it all together.

Wangyue Prefecture had been at peace for a long time—so long that his father and elder brother could suppress everything and keep the people from knowing demons existed. That meant the demons' power had stayed below "3" for a long time. Even Manfeng Mountain, at "3.5," had been designated a forbidden area and become a place where people fought over Dragon Qi.

But this spring, it was as if someone had pressed the "fast-forward button" on everything.

Take only the ones he had encountered.

The Mountain Crashing Bear Demon had a Constitution of 3.2, which was still normal.

But then came the Stealing Incense Rat, with a Spirit of 5.0, appearing all by itself. Before long, its appearance was followed by the "Hell of Cold Ice" in the north of Ping'an Prefecture.

With the appearance of the "Hell of Cold Ice," the "black smoke with human heads" and the "Frozen Corpses containing Dragon Qi" had also appeared. And now came a "Master Baiyue" with a Constitution of a full 10.

If you found one cockroach in your house, it meant there were actually many more.

Ning Xuan understood that all too well.

What he had seen was merely the tip of the iceberg.

More and more events like these were unfolding across the land.

And there was something else.

In the nightmare, Master Baiyue had kept muttering about its weapon.

That weapon must have been extremely important to it.

Ning Xuan had a guess.

The reason Master Baiyue couldn't find its weapon was that only its "root of life and spirit" had been dragged into the nightmare world of the black moon and white sun, not its actual body. It couldn't bring anything with it.

In other words, the weapon Master Baiyue kept talking about was still in its real body's hands.

With that weapon, Master Baiyue's power would rise to another level.

Ning Xuan didn't particularly want to fight that demon.

Since the dynasty had such deep foundations, and the history of its battles against demons—which he knew of—stretched back more than a hundred years, then let the dynasty take care of it.

He was nobody.

The waters ran this deep. Let whoever wanted to wade in do so.

The Twelve Divine Generals—whoever wanted to be one could go ahead.

His home was Wangyue Prefecture. He was born and raised in Wangyue Prefecture, and the Ning Family was there too. So all he had to do was protect Wangyue Prefecture.

After that, he hurriedly pushed the boundary far back and proposed setting up double boundaries at key points. That way, if the first boundary came under attack, those at the boundary behind it could immediately notice, preventing demons from silently infiltrating.

Once he'd finished, he rushed back to Wangyue Prefecture without stopping.

As soon as he returned to the manor, which now bore a plaque reading "General Ning's Residence," he didn't even change his clothes. He immediately sat at his desk and drafted a memorial.

When he had been appointed General Anyuan, his father had already taught him the proper format for memorials. As for the content... he might have been a wastrel, but he wasn't an idiot.

A wastrel had teachers in both the literary and martial arts, and they were all good ones.

So Ning Xuan's handwriting and content both passed muster.

And thanks to Immortal Aunt Yaozhen, as soon as he finished writing, she could transmit an image of the memorial to the Imperial Capital. It was extremely convenient.

Immortal Aunt Yaozhen leaned over, full of curiosity. She truly didn't know why this decisive general had started writing a letter as soon as he returned, or what kind of letter he was writing.

Ink strokes took shape across the memorial, forming words.

Your subject, General Anyuan Ning Xuan, respectfully submits:

My talents are meager, yet my duties are weighty; I am unfit to shoulder such great responsibility. I humbly beg Your Majesty's gracious favor to reduce my fiefdom, for the peace of the army and the people.

I am but an ordinary man, yet by Your Majesty's heavenly grace, I was granted the post of General Anyuan and the lands of two prefectures. I ought to devote myself to the frontier, repaying the sovereign's kindness above and caring for the common people below.

However, my abilities are insufficient to govern so vast a territory. After much consideration, if Ping'an were removed from my fief and I were charged solely with governing Wangyue, perhaps I could do more with my humble abilities, strengthen the frontier defenses, and bring peace to the people. This would spare me the reproach of drawing a salary while doing no work, and accord with the court's principle of matching actual duties with actual abilities.

I do not dare to make a show of false modesty. It is simply that I know my limits. If Your Majesty grants my request and reduces my fiefdom to a single prefecture, I shall labor tirelessly day and night, diligently prepare our defenses, and repay the sovereign's great kindness.

I humbly beg Your Majesty to judge with heavenly wisdom, see my sincere intentions, and grant my request. I await Your command in the utmost trepidation!

Respectfully submitted.

General Anyuan Ning Xuan bows his head.

Immortal Aunt Yaozhen stared blankly for a long while. The coldness in her cheeks gave way to a blush, and then she said, "General, you've already done very well."

Ning Xuan said with shame, "No! The Hell of Cold Ice is right before my eyes, yet I don't even dare set foot in it. I'm afraid. I don't deserve to govern Ping'an Prefecture."

After saying that, he put down the memorial, let out a long sigh, called for Xiao Jie to help him bathe and change, then ran over to Chenxiang Pavilion across the street.

Immortal Aunt Yaozhen stood there for a long time, holding the memorial.

Suddenly, she remembered that earlier, in front of the Hell of Cold Ice, she had asked, in a slightly goading tone, "General, could it be that you're afraid?"

She fell silent.

The General Anyuan had long been tormented by his pride, hating himself for being unable to resolve the Hell of Cold Ice and having to rely on reinforcements. And yet she had twisted the knife at precisely that moment.

She had hurt the General Anyuan, and that was what had led him to write this strange "memorial requesting a reduction of his fiefdom."

Everyone else wanted their fiefdoms to grow larger. Who would want theirs to shrink?

Immortal Aunt Yaozhen pondered for a long time, then took a deep breath.

She needed to apologize.

Chenxiang Pavilion.

Wenxiang Grass Hut.

It was a secluded little courtyard, designed like a hermit's mountain retreat. It was Chenxiang Pavilion's premium experience.

Its overall design drew on the dual-cultivation methods of Daoist priests recorded in some ancient texts.

The walls of the grass hut were hung with free and elegant cursive calligraphy, which read: "Men and women complete one another, just as heaven and earth give rise to each other. Heaven and earth understand the way of union, and thus their cycles are without end; people who lose the way of union gradually approach an early death. If one can avoid what causes gradual harm and attain the art of yin and yang, then one has the path to immortality."

To put it simply: command several women while keeping your yang essence intact.

The grass hut had been designed with great elegance. It wasn't located within Chenxiang Pavilion itself, but on a plot of land separately enclosed nearby.

From the outside, it looked like the garden of a wealthy family.

Ning Xuan was reclining in perfect comfort.

Every inch of his muscles still remembered the agony of the bear demon's bites, and his internal organs still remembered the pain of cutting himself with flying knives.

He needed fine wine and beautiful women to make him forget all that pain.

A charming beauty sat on his left leg, and a dignified lady on his right.

The woman beside him wore a red veil, her face half-hidden behind her lute.

The one in front of him held a long sword and danced with flowing grace—like Yi shooting down the nine suns, like a throng of emperors riding dragons through the skies.

Ning Xuan closed his eyes and enjoyed himself.

That money would have gone to compensation payments anyway. Yet he'd saved it through his own abilities. Spending a tiny fraction of it now wasn't excessive, was it?

As he was enjoying himself, golden light suddenly welled up in front of him.

Immortal Aunt Yaozhen appeared before him and said earnestly, "General, I was wrong."

Ning Xuan said, "Go."

Immortal Aunt Yaozhen said, "Oh," then sank into the ground and left.