Xiao Yan: Even Ten Years Won't Be Enough for You to Catch Up to Me!

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"Xiao Yan, I refuse to accept this!"

Nalan Yanran abruptly raised her head and forced herself to stand.

Her body was still trembling—not from fear or weakness, but because rage and unwillingness burned within her, making her whole body shake.

Her beautiful eyes were now filled with flames, scorching and bright.

"Thirty years east of the river, thirty years west of the river. Never look down on a young girl because she is poor!"

She practically roared the words, her voice hoarse and tinged with tears, fury, and an almost obsessive stubbornness.

She clenched her fists tightly, her nails digging deep into her palms. The pain kept her barely lucid.

"Three years from now, on Cloud Mist Mountain, we will fight again!"

She stared fixedly at Xiao Yan's back, enunciating every word.

"If I lose, I will become your servant, to do with as you please."

"But if you lose, you must publicly apologize to me on Cloud Mist Mountain!"

Her chest heaved violently, and tears glimmered at the corners of her eyes, yet none fell. She gritted her teeth as though struggling against herself, against the entire world.

"Do you dare?"

She poured every ounce of strength into those final three words.

Xiao Yan stopped.

He turned and looked at Nalan Yanran. On that face twisted by anger and unwillingness, he saw something familiar—an expression he had seen countless times in the mirror over the past three years.

Unwillingness. Stubbornness. Refusal to accept fate.

He suddenly found it rather amusing.

Well, damn. Isn't that supposed to be my line?

Why does this genius girl also want the whole fallen-from-grace, mocked-by-all, then rise-to-the-top-and-rule-the-world storyline?

The corners of his lips curled slightly, but the smile did not reach his eyes.

"Those defeated by my hand have never been worthy of being considered my opponents."

His voice was calm, as still as a dead pool, yet beneath that calm lay bottomless confidence.

"I will give you time to catch up."

He looked into Nalan Yanran's eyes and spoke each word as though declaring an outcome that had long been decided.

"Until you can no longer see me even from afar."

The wind blew in from the distance, stirring his robes and his hair.

He stood there as the setting sun spread a golden-red curtain of light behind him, making him resemble a god of war who had stepped out of an ancient myth.

"Nalan Yanran, I will give you three years."

"Three years from now, I will show you what a true gap is."

His tone was arrogant, arrogant to the bone.

Yet that arrogance did not inspire disgust, because it was neither empty bluster nor a facade. It was absolute confidence in his own strength, born from the depths of his heart.

Three years.

Forget three years—even if Nalan Yanran were given ten years, she would never catch up to him.

With the opportunities from the original story, the system's aid, and Yao Lao's guidance, those three things combined would be enough for him to rise from a four-star Dou Practitioner, break through Dou Master and Great Dou Master, and reach Dou Spirit or even Battle King within three years.

By then, he would descend upon the Misty Cloud Sect and settle the debts of today.

Everyone present was stunned by those words.

Arrogant.

Arrogant to the extreme.

Facing Nalan Yanran, the personal disciple of the Misty Cloud Sect's sect master and a fifteen-year-old three-star Dou Practitioner, Xiao Yan showed not the slightest fear. Instead, he said in such a condescending tone—I will give you three years.

Not "I'll wait three years," nor "See you in three years."

But "I will give you."

As though this three-year agreement was not a condition Nalan Yanran had purchased with her dignity, but an opportunity he had bestowed upon her.

An opportunity to let her cling to life for three more years.

Such bearing, such confidence, moved everyone present.

"This is the Xiao Yan I know."

Xiao Xun'er stood at the edge of the crowd, her beautiful eyes locked tightly on Xiao Yan. They were filled with delight, along with a trace of pride she herself had not noticed.

She had seen Xiao Yan at his lowest—his dou qi steadily declining over three years, mocked and looked down upon, whispered about behind his back.

Yet she had never seen him show anger or grievance. He had always smiled gently, as though those rumors did not exist at all.

She knew that was not magnanimity, nor was it tolerance.

It was the indifference of a dragon in hiding, unwilling to bother with ants.

Now, the dragon had awakened, and everyone saw its true form.

Nalan Yanran's body suddenly shook when she heard Xiao Yan's words.

"I will give you time to catch up, until you can no longer see me even from afar."

Those words were like an invisible sledgehammer, viciously smashing into her chest.

Her lips moved as she tried to say something, but it was as though something had clogged her throat. She could not utter a single word.

She suddenly realized that Xiao Yan had never regarded her as important.

It was not contempt or disdain. Rather—she had never even been on his list of opponents.

His true opponents were existences she could not even hope to look up to.

A metallic sweetness suddenly surged into her throat.

"Puh—"

Nalan Yanran spat out a mouthful of blood onto the bluestone ground before her.

Crimson droplets splattered across her snow-white skirt, blooming into one glaring flower after another.

That blood-red color stood out sharply against the moonlike white, like red plum blossoms blooming in snow—tragic and resolute.

"Yanran!"

Ge Ye's expression changed drastically. In a flash, he rushed to Nalan Yanran's side and caught her swaying body.

He reached into his robes with his right hand, swiftly took out a pill that emitted a faint fragrance, and fed it to Nalan Yanran.

A second-grade healing pill—the Spring Rejuvenation Pill.

Such a pill was worth over a thousand gold coins on the market. Even ordinary people with severe injuries would be reluctant to consume one.

Ge Ye did not even frown before stuffing it into Nalan Yanran's mouth—if anything happened to her, the Misty Cloud Sect's elders and upper ranks would likely skin him alive.

Nalan Yanran swallowed the pill and circulated what little dou qi remained in her body to dissolve its medicinal power. The warm energy flowed through her body, soothing her depleted meridians and roiling blood, and her complexion improved slightly.

"Elder Ge Ye, I'm fine."

She pushed away Ge Ye's hand and steadied herself. Her gaze swept over the shattered longsword on the ground, then over the Xiao Clan members watching nearby, before finally settling on Xiao Yan. "Take Senior Brother Lin Ming with you and leave."

Her voice had regained its calm, but beneath that calm lay an ash-gray desolation.

Ge Ye gave Xiao Yan a deep look. Within his cloudy old eyes were anger, wariness, and something indescribable.

"The Xiao Clan has done well." His voice was heavy, as though he were desperately suppressing something. "The Misty Cloud Sect will not let this matter rest."

He turned toward the main hall, intending to take away Lin Ming, whom Xiao Yan had severely injured with a single punch.

"The Misty Cloud Sect?"

Xiao Yan's voice came from behind him. It was not loud, yet Ge Ye's footsteps abruptly halted.

"If I remember correctly, Yun Shan is still in seclusion, attempting to break through to Dou Zong?"

Ge Ye's pupils contracted sharply.

He whirled around and stared fixedly at Xiao Yan as though looking at something impossible.

How did Xiao Yan know about this?

The news that Yun Shan, the previous sect master of the Misty Cloud Sect, was attempting to break through to Dou Zong was top-secret even within the sect. Only core elders and people at the sect master level were qualified to know. How could Xiao Yan, the young master of a minor family in Wutan City, know such a secret?

"If Sect Master Yun Yun were the one saying those words, I might show three parts consideration."

Xiao Yan's gaze turned cold. As his eyes fell upon Ge Ye, it was as though he were looking at a dead man.

"But you—get lost."

His tone was casual, as though he were shooing away a noisy fly.

"Go back and tell the Misty Cloud Sect that three years from now, Xiao Yan will ascend Cloud Mist Mountain and settle everything."

Ge Ye opened his mouth, wanting to say something, but the moment he met Xiao Yan's golden-red eyes, every word stuck in his throat.

Those eyes were too cold.

It was neither killing intent nor a threat, but the indifference of a higher existence looking down upon ants.

That gaze made Ge Ye, a seven-star Great Dou Master who had lived for half his life, feel a chill rise from his bones.

He knew perfectly well that Xiao Yan was only a four-star Dou Practitioner, that he could crush him with one hand, yet he simply did not dare move.

He did not dare.

The feeling was absurd beyond belief, yet terrifyingly real.

Ge Ye's lips moved a few times, but in the end, he could not say a single word. He turned around, quickly entered the Xiao Clan's main hall, hoisted the unconscious Lin Ming onto his shoulder, and left the Xiao Clan without looking back.

His retreating figure looked rather bedraggled.

The courtyard fell silent.

The setting sun cast its final rays over the bluestone ground, stretching everyone's shadows long and longer still.

Xiao Yan stood in the middle of the courtyard, the wind whipping his robes with a rustling sound.

No one spoke.

Everyone looked at him as though he were a stranger they had never truly known.