The Boy's First Killing

The east wind did not blow sorrow away; spring days only made hatred linger longer.

In the little courtyard beneath the chill spring night, the fierce clash lasted no more than a breath before victory and defeat seemed decided. The cold night wind swept past, as though stirring up a long, lingering resentment.

That resentment naturally came from Hu Jingang, sprawled upon the ground. He hated the noble person who had sent him to kill the boy, and the coachman outside the alley.

From the moment the boy's Embryonic Breathing mind revealed itself and he flicked chopsticks like flying swords, a shadow had fallen over Hu Jingang's heart, giving him a bad premonition.

The faulty intelligence enraged him, but an Opening Qi and Blood cultivator at perfection fighting an Embryonic Breathing cultivator was not impossible.

Yet when the quietly seated boy rose and suddenly transformed into a fierce tiger, when the Qi and Blood breeding and flowing beneath his skin, flesh, and meridians proved even more vigorous than his own, when the boy's aura became even more vast and majestic, Hu Jingang felt like cursing his mother.

What garbage intelligence was this? It had screwed him over without even offering compensation!

The boy's Qi and Blood had reached perfection, his aura like that of a striped fierce tiger. In that instant of confrontation, Hu Jingang had already collapsed in defeat. It was clear that the body-tempering art the boy cultivated was of an extremely high grade, far beyond anything Hu Jingang had learned.

Spirit Refinement Embryonic Breathing, body tempering, both with Qi and Blood at perfection—yet the other party's cultivation art was of a higher grade. What was there left to kill?

With a single move, Hu Jingang was sent flying backward, his back scraping along the ground. Yet he was seasoned after all, and with a carp's leap, he sprang back to his feet.

What met him was the boy attacking with the Bird Form!

Five Animals Body Forging: the Tiger Form was fierce, the Bear Form steady, the Deer Form and Ape Form agile, while the Bird Form was like a sword. It suited An Le best now that he possessed the self-transformed Dao Fruit of the Innate Swordsman.

Though he held no sword, once the Bird Form was unleashed, it was as if a sword were in his hand!

Qi and Blood surged through his meridians, driving forth force. Before Hu Jingang, who had just risen, could react, An Le had already closed in with the nimbleness of the Deer Form. His sword-like palm slashed repeatedly at Hu Jingang's chest.

Hu Jingang flew sideways once more and crashed brutally to the ground. His skin and flesh were a bloody mess, several ribs had broken, and the organs shielded by his bones seemed cracked. Fresh blood seeped from the corners of his mouth, his face ashen. He no longer had the strength to resist.

An Le ended with the Bird Form and looked indifferently at Hu Jingang, the excitement in his heart gradually calming.

The battle could be called a complete crushing. With fifteen strands of Time Qi empowering the Five Animals Tiger Pounce, its might had soared. Coupled with Qi and Blood at perfection, that single palm had possessed the savage strength of a white-browed, hanging-eyed tiger, nearly slapping Hu Jingang to death.

Then came the sword-like consecutive attacks of the Bird Form. Hu Jingang had been beaten like a sandbag from beginning to end.

An Le understood that even though both had reached Opening Qi and Blood perfection, there was still a gap between them. That gap... came from their cultivation arts.

It was like Hu Jingang using a widely available, "castrated version of Zhao Ancestor Long Fist" to fight An Le's "Five Animal Body Tempering Technique." Naturally, Hu Jingang deserved no sympathy for getting beaten.

The leaves of the great locust tree rustled in the cold spring night wind.

An Le picked up the thick-backed saber Hu Jingang had used as a hidden weapon. The saber was quite heavy, but with An Le Now's Qi and Blood strength, lifting it was no great difficulty.

"Little brother, could you spare my life?"

Hu Jingang said as he coughed up blood.

Dragging the saber, An Le walked to his side and looked down at Hu Jingang lying on the ground.

"A reason," An Le said.

"I will give you all my savings. Eighteen Primordial Spirit Treasures in total, hidden somewhere secret. If I live, I can retrieve them and give them to you," Hu Jingang said slowly, enduring the pain of his shattered bones.

"Only eighteen? What a pauper. When I paint a picture for Lin Manor, the brush fee alone is ten Primordial Spirit Treasures."

Leaning on the saber, An Le glanced at him and drove a knife into his heart with those words.

Hu Jingang fell silent.

Then, his eyes suddenly widened in fury. He bit down on the tip of his tongue, Qi and Blood surging through his body as he sprang from the ground and slammed toward An Le like lightning, intending to risk everything in one final strike while An Le was off guard.

Sshk!

Yet An Le's Embryonic Breathing mind had been taut all along; he had been prepared. With one kick, he struck the thick-backed saber he had been leaning upon. The saber spun upward, tracing an arc like a falling star, and a massive head, carrying a spray of Qi and Blood, shot into the sky!

Blood gradually stained An Le's white robes, making his cold, silent face tremble faintly.

This was his first time killing someone, but it would never be his last.

Hu Jingang's head crashed to the ground. His body, which had just sprung up, also lost all momentum and fell back rigidly, a dull thud echoing through the spring night.

Blood flowed across the little courtyard. Amid An Le's faintly ragged breaths, the air was filled with killing chill.

Qingbo Street remained silent. The lights in several homes had all gone out as their inhabitants entered dreamland.

There was not a single pedestrian on the street. Not even a cat that liked wandering alone in the dark could be seen.

The carriage stood quietly parked. The coachman sat upon it and slowly opened his eyes as wind from the alley drifted over, carrying a pungent stench of blood.

The coachman's face beneath his bamboo hat remained hidden in darkness, making his expression and emotions impossible to discern.

The moment his spiritual perception entered the little courtyard in the alley, it had been buffeted by the two men's powerful Qi and Blood, preventing him from seeing clearly.

His body tempering was formidable, having stepped into the inner core realm, but his Spirit Refinement had only reached Embryonic Breathing.

An Embryonic Breathing mind could barely peer outward, but it was like a ghostly little demon afraid of things imbued with great yang. The farther it spread, the weaker its control became, and the more easily it was scattered by a single impact.

"Is he dead?"

The coachman sniffed the bloody smell in the air. Was it blood shed by the boy?

He looked toward the pitch-black alley untouched by starlight and moonlight.

The sound of a blade scraping against the ground came from the alley, accompanied by footsteps.

The coachman's burly body slowly straightened. He slightly raised his head, and his face beneath the bamboo hat gradually became clear as he looked toward the alley, awaiting Hu Jingang's return.

If Hu Jingang had killed the boy, he still needed to escort Hu Jingang out of Lin'an Prefecture. He could not tarnish Sir's reputation.

Suddenly, the coachman's hand gripping the reins stiffened sharply, and disbelief flashed through his pupils.

Because the one who slowly emerged from the darkness of the alley was not Hu Jingang!

It was a boy dressed in bloodstained white.

One hand dragged a saber, while the other held a head whose eyes had not closed in death.

Ink-black blood dripped from the severed neck, drop by drop, as the boy stepped out from the thick, unbreakable darkness of the alley.

Speak not of the west wind's killing chill; everywhere along the road bloomed yellow flowers!

At this moment, the boy carried a biting killing intent, like a three-inch blade drawn from its sheath, blooming with cold light.

The coachman's eyes beneath the bamboo hat widened slightly, and his breathing hastened by a few beats.

The boy stood at the entrance to Imperial Ancestral Temple Alley just like that, a faint smile at the corner of his lips. Several bloodstains like red plum blossoms marked his white robes as he looked at the familiar burly coachman seated upon the shaft of the luxurious carriage.

"As expected..."

An Le seemed enlightened, yet also mocking.

Hu Jingang coming to kill him had indeed not been an accident. This criminal disciple, who should have been captured by the Black Yamen constables, had been saved by some so-called noble person, then turned into a blade in that noble person's hand to kill him.

For Hu Jingang to willingly come and kill him, some promise must have been made.

Perhaps the noble person intended to exchange the life of a Juren scholar boy for the life of this criminal whose hands were stained with the fresh blood of a hundred people.

But this time, the boy had slain this criminal with his own strength, snapping the blade the noble person had extended. The situation was much better than last time.

Plop.

The boy tossed out the head he had been carrying. It traced a parabola through the air, landed before the carriage, rolled several times across the ground, and only stopped after striking the wheel hub.

The coachman did not even look at the head on the ground. He stared at the boy from afar, seeing the mockery and killing chill in his eyes.

The scene from that rainy spring day rose once more in the coachman's mind: the boy's spine straight as bamboo, standing proudly in the human world, refusing to bow or bend even beneath Sir's pressure.

His constricted pupils slowly relaxed, and a grim killing intent burst from the coachman's eyes.

He truly wanted to kill this boy now, to cut off all future trouble.

But the coachman did not dare.

That day, Madam Hua had summoned three thousand drops of spring rain. A single drop had shattered his bamboo hat; perhaps shattering his skull would take no more than flicking another raindrop.

Sir had said that Madam Hua wished to become this boy's protector of the Dao. Since he had a protector of the Dao, if the coachman used strength to bully the weak and was killed for it, Sir would not even seek justice on his behalf.

An Le looked at the burly coachman seated on the carriage shaft, Luo Qingchen's coachman. He slowly raised his hand, lifting the thick-backed saber. Qi and Blood strength surged within him, his mind stirred, and the artistic conception of the Sword Waterfall Diagram he visualized flowed before his eyes. The saber in his hand seemed to transform into a sword.

He suddenly hurled it. The saber flew toward the carriage in a perfectly straight line, shrieking through the air.

Seeing the saber whistling toward him, the coachman's skin rippled with rolling heat. Qi and Blood circulated beneath it, like a furnace kindling fire to refine a Qi and Blood Inner Core!

He clenched his five fingers and caught the saber An Le had thrown, then smashed it heavily down onto the carriage shaft. The coachman exhaled a mouthful of turbid air and did not look at the boy again.

The reins cracked. Amid a neigh, the red-date horse raised its hooves and pulled the carriage away. The wheels mercilessly rolled over the head, slowly vanishing into the black and tranquil night of Qingbo Street.

An Le watched the carriage depart, then turned and returned to the courtyard.

After the carriage left Qingbo Street.

The coachman suddenly went limp all over and collapsed against the carriage shaft, deep terror in his eyes.

If he had truly attacked to kill An Le just now, he feared he would have instantly been erased by a sword intent. That sword intent had been constantly pressed against his throat, only dispersing once they left Qingbo Street.

"That sword intent... was it Madam Hua of Lin Manor? It could only have been Madam Hua... I never imagined that Madam Hua truly, truly valued this boy so highly..."

"What Sir said was indeed true. I must return at once and report in detail."

The chill spring wind sobered the wine, leaving a faint coldness.

On Qingbo Street, silent as ink, an old man in plain robes stood still with a bamboo staff in hand, squinting toward the direction in which the carriage had departed.

"You have some sense, coachman. Had you used your Qi and Blood Inner Core to bully my little friend, another head would have been added to the ground."

The old man's long brows flew in the wind. Stroking his beard, he turned and slowly walked toward the Imperial Ancestral Temple where scattered lights glimmered in the distance.

In the cold night's spring breeze, the old man chuckled softly.

"Tempered by a thousand blows, still strong; let the winds of east, west, south, and north rage as they please..."

"For little friend An to reach such a realm, tsk, the road ahead is long indeed."

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