They Turned Back

"Then ask my sword if it agrees."

Before the words had even faded,

"I don't believe you." The girl leading the group gave a sharp cry and charged toward the subway entrance.

But in the next instant,

she shot back like a bolt of lightning and landed where she had started, her expression changed.

"Jiang Xueyao, why did you attack me?"

The girl shouted.

Jiang Xueyao did not even look at her. She raised her head and once again gazed absently at the sky.

The wind

stirred her long hair.

Moonlight spilled down.

A layer of white frost settled over her fluttering robes.

Her eyes were as indifferent as still water. She looked up at the sky without a glance for anyone else, like a celestial maiden descended to the mortal world, leaving no one daring to act rashly.

"Stop it. She didn't move, and she didn't attack you."

A boy could not help speaking up.

The girl bristled and shrieked, "Are you stupid?"

Yes.

She had just staged the whole thing.

If everyone stuck to the same story and said Jiang Xueyao had attacked first, everything they did next would be justified!

Jiang Xueyao remained unconcerned. She merely asked softly:

"Is your grudge really that deep? What did Xu Yuan do?"

"He didn't know what was good for him. He even dared to turn down Teacher Zhang's invitation from Jade Balance University. We wanted to see how strong he really is," the boy leading them said, folding his arms.

"Jade Balance really isn't good enough," Jiang Xueyao said earnestly. "Like me, he's planning to apply to Nine Luminaries. Oh, do you want to apply there too?"

The students fell silent as one.

Do we want to apply to Nine Luminaries?

What kind of question is that?

If we could get into Nine Luminaries, who would go to Jade Balance?

But the boy leading them caught her meaning.

With Jiang Xueyao's strength, her admission to Nine Luminaries or Luofu was practically set in stone.

What she actually meant was—

Xu Yuan's decision not to choose Jade Balance was perfectly normal, just as it was for her.

But what a roundabout way to say it.

"Jiang Xueyao, I've heard of you too. But we're going to teach Xu Yuan a lesson, and nothing you say will change that."

The boy glanced back at the dozen or so students behind him and spoke with confidence.

"What's the point of a dozen people fighting one?"

Jiang Xueyao asked.

"As long as we think it's fun, that's enough," the boy said.

The examinees behind him laughed.

A whole group against one person.

Even if she was powerful, they had no reason to fear her.

Jiang Xueyao finally stopped studying the night sky and looked at the dozen or so examinees across from her.

The Flood Dragon is nowhere to be seen.

Perhaps it had moved elsewhere to fight a high-level cultivator.

Good.

"I told you, Xu Yuan is on my team. We're doing all right in this exam, so don't come looking for trouble."

Jiang Xueyao spoke in earnest.

"Enough talk. If you don't move, we'll beat you too!" said the girl standing at the front.

Thoughts stirred among the group, and their eyes flickered.

So what if she was from Number One Girls' High School?

Right now, they were all in the Qi Refining Realm, with only limited spiritual power.

None had reached Foundation Establishment or Golden Core, realms where the gap truly widened.

Which meant—

this was the best chance they would ever have to defeat Jiang Xueyao.

Fighting her on this pretext might even win them greater fame.

They might even make her see them in a new light and get a chance to know her better!

Before everyone's eyes,

Jiang Xueyao said calmly:

"Don't regret this."

She tapped her waist.

Some kind of storage treasure seemed to open.

Tiny scales flashed into view like flowing water, burst apart, and whirled through the air, becoming a white phoenix that soared between heaven and earth.

"A spirit pet! Impossible!" someone cried.

"A Qi Refining cultivator can't form a contract with a phoenix. Besides, phoenixes don't even exist!" someone else blurted out.

"Shut up. That's Battle Armor," the boy leading them barked.

The crowd fell quiet.

They looked again.

The flying white phoenix descended from the sky and settled over Jiang Xueyao, becoming a helmet, pauldrons, breastplate, waist guard, greaves, and a white armored skirt.

Jiang Xueyao lifted two slender, pale fingers, picked up a faceplate that exposed only her eyes, and gently set it over her face.

The Red Sky Sword was in her hand.

Killing intent rose.

She walked toward them with steps as heavy as mountains.

That heaviness came from the spiritual pressure radiating off the Battle Armor.

To spiritual perception, it felt heavy.

Its divine might was so vast and intricate that it gave the senses an impression of weight.

"That's not fair." The girl leading them stared, unable to suppress her jealousy any longer. "What's so impressive about using Battle Armor that good?"

Jiang Xueyao vanished from where she stood.

She appeared behind the girl and whispered in her ear:

"This is the worst set of Battle Armor I own."

Her sword slashed down.

The girl spun and caught the Red Sky Sword with both blades.

It was no use!

Holding her sword in one hand, Jiang Xueyao pressed downward, seemingly slow but impossibly fast, and cut the girl and her blades down to the ground.

"Aah—"

Half the girl's body was split open, and a scream of agony burst from her mouth.

During the exam, everything was real. Only after leaving the testing grounds would those experiences become illusory techniques and fade from an examinee's body.

"That's it? I thought you'd prepared some trump card to use against me."

Jiang Xueyao sounded puzzled and disappointed.

She was not trying to insult her opponent.

She genuinely could not understand.

You can't do anything.

And you came unprepared.

Why provoke me?

Her sword pierced the girl's neck and swept sharply sideways.

Jiang Xueyao seized the girl's hair, but just as she was about to lift her head, the girl vanished.

She had been forcibly removed from the exam.

Behind her faceplate, no one could see Jiang Xueyao's expression.

But everyone instinctively felt

that she had grown even angrier!

She slowly turned toward the dozen or so examinees who had yet to attack and said softly:

"What disgusts me more than bullying is stupidity."

"You don't know how to do anything, yet you come looking for trouble?"

"Did you come up with any kind of decent battle plan?"

"Or—"

"Do you know how to fight together?"

The other side was silent for a breath.

"Everyone, attack!"

Someone roared.

Five Elements Arts, weapons, and bullets flew at Jiang Xueyao.

She walked through them with her sword in hand, letting them clang against her Battle Armor. Then she closed in on an examinee and slashed straight down.

The examinee and his weapon were sent flying by her sword. They struck the ground and burst into burning ash.

"Second."

Jiang Xueyao's voice was calm and cold, devoid of emotion.

That word was only the beginning—

She kept walking and kept swinging her sword.

"Third." "Fourth." "Fifth"...

Not one of them could withstand a single strike.

Her sword was too powerful!

The boy leading them stumbled back a few steps, stunned.

The Battle Armor had erupted with intense spiritual pressure earlier. It had clearly activated some kind of power.

And whenever her sword struck an enemy, flames burst forth.

Killing them was as easy as chopping melons and slicing vegetables.

Their attacks could not even break through her Battle Armor, and they were utterly unable to stop hers.

How were they supposed to fight that?

"Jiang Xueyao, you're just relying on the power of your Battle Armor! What's the point of that?"

The boy could not help shouting.

"As long as I think it's fun, that's enough," Jiang Xueyao said.

The boy froze.

When she had asked what the point was of a dozen people fighting one, he had given her that very answer.

Heaven's justice spared no one.

She had thrown his own words straight back at him!

And the examiners certainly would not step forward to say a word—

Wealth, companions, arts, and land: the essentials of cultivation.

Without money, equipment, or cultivation methods, how could anyone advance?

She had the strength to wear armor and carry a sword of this caliber in the exam. That was permitted.

Any equipment that improved combat strength was encouraged and allowed.

As long as you had it!

Because on a future battlefield, you would have to give everything you had and fight demons at your strongest!

The boy jolted and turned to run.

But a sword swept in from the side and sliced through his head at the bridge of his nose.

"You—"

His voice cut off, and he vanished on the spot.

Jiang Xueyao spared him no second glance. She lunged forward, ran another girl through, reversed her sword to pierce a boy's head, then turned and delivered five successive slashes, killing seven examinees.

She killed and kept killing.

Quiet returned to the subway station entrance.

Jiang Xueyao landed lightly, the armored skirt striking the ground with a faint metallic clatter.

Clang!

She sheathed her sword and stood there, eyes lowered, silently regulating her breath.

A dozen or so people.

Not one had withstood her attacks.

They had all withdrawn from the exam.

She removed her faceplate, tucked back the long hair the wind had blown loose, and walked into the subway station.

By the time she descended the escalator and reached the defensive fortifications—

The Battle Armor had vanished.

"How did it go?"

Yang Xiaobing asked.

"They really did come looking for trouble with Xu Yuan," Jiang Xueyao said.

"Where are they?" Zhao Afei asked nervously.

"I talked to them a little. They gave me face and turned back," Jiang Xueyao explained, her gaze cool and her voice gentle.

As though she were describing something too trivial to mention.

"Really? That's great."

Zhao Afei breathed a sigh of relief.

Yang Xiaobing rolled her eyes at Jiang Xueyao.

"Turned back"?

More like "lost their heads," surely.

Jiang Xueyao rolled her eyes right back, then took out a Spirit-Restoring Pill and put it in her mouth, slowly sucking on it like candy.

It had all been the awe-inspiring power of the armor and sword. She had barely exerted herself.

Bullying people was no fun.

But since she had gotten a little exercise, taking a Spirit-Restoring Pill to keep her spiritual energy full was absolutely necessary.

No one knew what else might happen.

Just then, the radio crackled again.

"Shh... shh..."

"Special Operations Squad, attention!"

Liu Shanxing's voice came through.

"Sir, we're listening." Jiang Xueyao grabbed the radio.

"Your credentials, supplies, and equipment are about to arrive. Receive them. Over."

The three exchanged glances, their faces lighting up.

"Copy that. Thank you, sir!"

Jiang Xueyao said.