Encounter on the Road

The mountain path rose and fell like a strip of gray cloth wrinkled by the wind, winding around the mountainside. Chen Chong kept running along it. Loose stones beneath his feet occasionally tumbled down, making faint, scattered sounds.

Most of the shrubs on either side had withered away. Their leaves curled up and rustled in the wind.

He occasionally encountered wild beasts. A badger crawled out of a hole by the road and was kicked aside; a snake dangled from a branch and was severed with a single slash.

Then he caught an unusual scent of blood.

It was thick and heavy, carrying an indescribable rankness, like rust mixed with rotten mud.

Chen Chong slowed his pace, his nostrils flaring twice. Then he saw it.

In a clearing in the woods, a blood-red figure was crouched low.

It had the shape of a leopard, back arched, all four limbs on the ground, its spine raised high. Yet its fur was blood-red, as if enveloped in a layer of bloody mist. The red was still slowly flowing, seeping from its skin, dispersing into the air before gathering again.

It was lowering its head to feed on a corpse—a corpse dressed as a hunter, its chest torn open and organs exposed. It had its head buried in the body, making low gulping sounds.

Chen Chong's heart jolted. He had encountered a demon beast.

He tightened his grip on his saber and took half a step back. The blood-red demon beast suddenly raised its head and looked back at him.

The heaviness in Chen Chong's heart deepened.

A pair of humanlike, lively eyes. Dark-brown pupils carrying a gleam that did not belong to a beast.

Those eyes looked at him without a beast's muddled confusion, without hunger's greed. There was only something deeper, heavier.

Like a drowning man desperately clutching at his final shred of clarity. Yet that shred was swiftly submerged by the blood-colored mist.

It was Wang Guanyong. That Demonized one.

Chen Chong could not help but smile bitterly. Was this karma coming full circle? As the man who had killed his father, he had actually run into him here by such coincidence.

When those blood-red eyes saw Chen Chong, they turned beastlike. Then he pounced.

Chen Chong was certain that he had completely lost his senses. Only the hunting instincts of a wild beast were at work.

It was said that he had once been a disciple of the Tyrant Blade Sect, and his Tyrant Blade techniques had been superb beyond compare.

But now, he merely used his limbs like a beast, back arched, hands and feet on the ground as he ran soundlessly across the grass. He was incredibly fast, like a red afterimage.

His claws lashed out. Chen Chong's Hundred-Forged Saber clashed with them again and again.

"Clang! Clang! Clang!" The sound of metal striking metal exploded through the forest, startling a flock of birds into flight.

The saber struck his body. But that strange bloody mist continuously repaired his wounds.

The blade cut through him, splitting flesh and skin apart. Bloody mist surged over the wounds, which healed at a speed visible to the naked eye, as though he had never been injured.

His claws also tore through Chen Chong's clothes, leaving three gashes from his left shoulder to his right ribs, strips of cloth curling back.

With the Profound Abyss Dragon-Tiger True Canon, his claws left only faint marks on Chen Chong's body. His skin membrane was tough as iron; the claw tips passed over it, leaving only pale streaks without breaking through.

Fast—far too fast. His speed was truly that of a terrifying demon beast, leaving Chen Chong no room to maneuver.

Chen Chong wanted to circle around with Dragonwalk's footwork and disrupt him with Tiger Roar's sound waves, but Wang Guanyong gave him no chance to catch his breath.

His claws fell like raindrops, every blow carrying the terrifying force of the Bone-Forging Stage, every blow forcing Chen Chong to block.

He could not run, could not create distance. It was wholly a fearless beast, fighting in the most primitive and direct manner.

Fortunately, his body now had the foundation of external training.

Before his eyes, the words Profound Abyss Dragon-Tiger True Canon (Mastery 1162/10000) floated.

Chen Chong's thoughts churned. How could he break this deadlock?

He did not want to remain entangled with this Demonized one. If other demon beasts were drawn here, things would become troublesome.

But the Demonized one fought him relentlessly, never giving Chen Chong time to think.

He watched as the other man repeatedly used his claws to execute moves that resembled the Tyrant Blade.

Chop, cleave, sweep, slash upward—

There was clearly no saber, yet the trajectory of those claws was unmistakably saber technique. The shadow of the Tyrant Blade remained, carved into his bones. Even with his mind gone, his muscles still remembered.

Chen Chong suddenly understood.

The saber. It seemed he had always regarded the Profound Abyss Dragon-Tiger True Canon and saber techniques as two separate things.

Dragon-Tiger Self-Cry was internal cultivation; Myriad Ravines Return to the Edge was an external move.

One trained the body, the other trained the saber. But in truth, both were his cultivation art, both were his weapons.

He recalled the feeling of performing Dragon-Tiger Self-Cry thousands upon thousands of times.

Twisting his body, arching his back, leaping—at those times, his qi and blood surged within him, his sinews and membranes trembled, his bones resonated, and his entire body became like a fully drawn bow.

Myriad Ravines Return to the Edge, meanwhile, was saber intent—the momentum of mountains, the majestic force of thousands upon thousands of ravines pouring down together.

The two had always been one.

Chen Chong's body sank, and he stopped retreating.

He stepped toward Wang Guanyong's incoming pounce and swung his saber at the same time.

His sinews and bones rang together. Qi and blood surged toward his arm like a tide, his sinews and membranes tightening like bowstrings, his bones releasing a dense series of crisp crackles.

The vibrations of Dragon-Tiger Self-Cry traveled from the soles of his feet to his waist and hips, from his waist and hips to his shoulders and arms, then from his shoulders and arms to the tip of his saber. Then came Myriad Ravines Return to the Edge.

With the momentum of a mountain, one slash.

The saber flash passed. There was no fancy move, no superfluous motion.

Just one slash.

Yet within that slash was the resonance of dragon and tiger, the weight of mountains and ravines, and all of Chen Chong's accumulation and understanding from the past half-year.

The blade split the bloody mist, split skin membrane, split flesh, split bone. Clean and crisp, like a blade cutting through a sheet of paper.

Wang Guanyong's body suddenly froze.

That blood-red mist had originally been frantically condensing, surging toward the wound in an attempt to repair it.

But this time, the mist could not gather as quickly as the saber force destroyed. Once, twice, three times.

The mist struggled to gather in several waves before finally dispersing. It scattered completely, like a wisp of smoke blown away by the wind.

Wang Guanyong's body fell. His blood-red fur faded into grayish-brown, dry beast hide. His limbs curled up, like those of a curled-up infant.

Those human eyes closed.

Chen Chong stepped through the dispersing mist and sheathed his saber.

The forest fell quiet. Only the rustle of wind through the leaves remained, along with the calls of unknown birds in the distance. He stood there for a moment, looking at the corpse on the ground, then turned and left.

The mountain path continued stretching ahead, rising and falling as it led beyond the mountains.