He paid no further heed to Li Dalu, who stood by Misty Rain Lake, dumbstruck and utterly shocked.
Wang Xian gripped the willow branch in his hand and swung a backhanded sword strike at the person coming through the wind.
"Shhk! Shhk!!"
The two streams of Sword Qi met in the wind and vanished in an instant.
Though his strike had been blocked, Ximen Tinghua wasn't angry. He simply drifted over, sat down in front of Wang Xian, and tossed the half-broken bamboo branch in his hand to the ground.
Frowning, he asked, "Since you'd reached Qingzhou, why didn't you come see me? Don't you trust me? Or were you afraid I'd team up with people from the Tang Clan to set you up?"
"More or less."
Wang Xian smiled faintly. "One moment I was struggling desperately in the South Sea; the next, I'd landed in Qingzhou. I can only say it was fate. It had nothing to do with you."
After a moment, he added, "When the Tang Clan elders hunted me in the Southern Border all those years ago, they and I became sworn enemies."
Ximen Tinghua gave a quiet hum, then clutched his chest and lowered his head.
He looked as if Wang Xian had angered him so badly that he wanted to die on the spot, and was too furious to catch his breath.
Seeing the man's deathly pale face, Wang Xian's heart gave a sudden lurch. He immediately reached out and grabbed Ximen Tinghua by the wrist.
Ximen Tinghua froze and struggled to pull his left hand away.
But in the next instant, pain shot through his whole body. He let out a soft groan and shuddered, cold sweat springing across his forehead.
Feeling the strange fluctuations beneath his fingers, Wang Xian asked gravely, "Did