The Girl's Blush

The great hammer tore through the air like an exploding thunderclap.

No, not merely like one!

Dense runes interwove across the Purple-Gold Great Hammer, dazzling lightning coiling around it as the girl swung it up and smashed it down in an instant.

Boom!!

Lightning surged, as though a Suanni were roaring in fury, the explosive report deafening.

"Awoo!" The winged flood dragon's eyes flew wide open. Utterly terrified, he let out a frightened roar.

Then the sound abruptly stopped.

The purple-gold hammer crashed onto his head with enough force to collapse the heavens and cave in the earth.

Fei Jiao's imposing horns shattered instantly. Blood and brains splattered outward, and his entire body was hammered underground, all his scales losing their luster in a single moment.

"What's happening?" Jiao Peng was slow to react and could not help shouting.

Shi Zhao did not stop. She swung the great hammer again and again, repeatedly smashing Fei Jiao's head.

Thunder surged wherever the hammer fell, battering Fei Jiao until his brains blossomed everywhere.

It was a terrifying sight. Fei Jiao was as thick as a water vat and dozens of meters long, his body covered in dense scales, with a pair of enormous wings. Mighty and imposing as he was, a pretty, slender girl had swung a great hammer and beaten him to death.

The scene was so shocking that all the powerful experts stared, dumbstruck.

Was this really a girl from a little mountain village? How could she be so ferocious and terrifying, savagely killing a powerful beast who could rival the experts present with just a few hammer blows?

"How could this happen?" Jiao Peng, the young genius from Luofu Marsh, was stunned.

The middle-aged man behind him came to his senses and shouted:

"Damn it, kill her! Kill her!"

More than a dozen figures appeared in the mountain forest and charged over at tremendous speed, their palms glowing with flickering runes. Beams of light shot into the sky and enveloped the village entrance as they all attacked the girl together.

The members of the other clans were startled. On the surface, only a few people had come from Luofu Marsh, but another group had followed in secret. They had come thoroughly prepared.

Shi Zhao, however, showed no sign of panic. She shook the great hammer in her hand, sending out peals of thunder that warped the air.

The girl swung the hammer, and a single blow drove an expert into the ground, smashing him into expert-sized fragments.

Fierce winds whirled. The hammer swept all before it, lightning roaring and surging, shaking the earth until cracks split across it.

Everyone was stunned. The battle had barely begun, yet one expert after another was already struggling desperately to withstand her onslaught.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

Blood blossomed amid an unending barrage of impacts. Wherever the Purple-Gold Great Hammer passed, bodies fell in heaps, some with their chests smashed through, others struck head-on, and still others hurled sideways to explode with a thunderous crash.

The evening clouds painted the horizon red, and flowers of blood bloomed one after another.

The girl stood amid a ground littered with corpses, her lovely smile saying more than any words could.

The scene was so "beautiful" that it branded itself deep into the minds of everyone present, never to be forgotten for the rest of their lives.

In truth, everything from Fei Jiao being smashed to death to the slaughter of the experts from Luofu Marsh had happened in the flash of lightning and the strike of a spark.

"Waaah!" Jiao Peng finally let out a scream. He was frightened out of his wits.

Several corpses had landed on him, spraying blood all over his head and face. He fell to the ground in terror, then scrambled away on his hands and knees, crying as he fled.

The middle-aged man from Luofu Marsh was pale, every trace of color already drained from his face.

Cold sweat soaked his back, and an immense terror shrouded his heart.

Was this right?!

What was going on with this village, and where had this girl come from?

The people from the other clans were equally bewildered and horrified.

Shi Linhu and the other villagers who had rushed over after hearing the commotion also stood slack-jawed, staring blankly at it all, unable to believe their eyes.

That gentle, delicate girl who always wore a smile actually had this side to her, smashing invading enemies to pieces with a great hammer. It felt unreal.

"Ahem, I'm actually very kind, you know. I don't advocate violence at all..." Shi Zhao blushed and hastily dropped the hammer, trying to salvage her image.

Everyone, inside and outside the village alike, felt the corners of their mouths twitch. Only little Shi Hao called out with innocent sincerity, "That's right! Big Sister is the kindest and gentlest!"

"..."

Nothing was more dreadful than the air suddenly falling silent.

After a moment of silence, the middle-aged man from Luofu Marsh spoke first, asking resentfully, "A prodigy like you could never have been raised in this rustic mountain village. Just where do you come from?"

"What does my background have to do with you?" Shi Zhao stopped pretending altogether. She scoffed, and at some unknown moment, a Dark-Gold Longbow had appeared in her hand.

The bow was extraordinary. It trembled softly as though it had a soul, drawing in vital essence from every direction on its own and giving off waves of savage ferocity.

"What an unparalleled treasured bow! This is a powerful treasure artifact refined from a Golden-Winged Roc's precious bones. Why would a young girl use such a vicious weapon?"

The old man beside the twin girls sucked in a sharp breath, recognizing the bow's origins. They belonged to the secluded Cloud Clan and had come from Cloud Heaven Palace.

Shi Zhao heard him too and could not help pursing her lips.

She did not want such a vicious weapon either. It did not suit her temperament.

Unfortunately, the clan elders at Martial King Manor had said this was the only hidden treasure artifact left that suited her reasonably well, and had forced it on her. Since they had already put it in her hands, she could hardly refuse it, could she?

She held the bow in her right hand and drew the string with her left. A mysterious power welled up in her palm, and divine light streamed out like seven stars aligned, forming an arrow ready to fly.

"You have ten breaths to disappear from my sight. Otherwise, you won't be leaving," she said, her voice clear and melodious. The bow and arrow in her hands shone ever more dazzlingly.

Every one of the visiting experts shuddered at her words.

Whoosh!

Suddenly, a streak of golden light flashed out with a terrifying shriek, like the cry of a roc, illuminating heaven and earth. Before anyone could react, it pierced the middle-aged man from Luofu Marsh, punching through one shoulder and blasting apart half his body on the spot.

"Sorry, my hand slipped," Shi Zhao said mildly.

The others instantly felt their scalps prickle, cold sweat spilling down their backs. Their status was so exalted that they would ordinarily never spare a thought for such rustic villages and wilderness folk.

Yet now a girl was threatening and humiliating them.

"Still not leaving? Don't say I didn't warn you." She drew her bow again, this time taking out a glittering golden Roc Feather Arrow. Even before she fired, the shrill cry of a Golden-Winged Roc could be heard.

Although there was no shortage among them of Spirit Transformation Realm

"experts," they truly amounted to little in her eyes. Their cultivation was far too hollow, inflated through and through.

These people had attained strength of several tens of thousands of jin in the Blood Moving Realm, then stumbled their way through opening four or five cave heavens before grinding away for nearly half their lives to barely enter the Spirit Transformation Realm. Their cultivation was frighteningly inflated!

She, meanwhile, had already opened seven cave heavens. Counting the embryonic primordial spirit cave heaven, that made eight. She also possessed the precious techniques of two pureblood heaven-tier ferocious beasts, along with powerful treasure artifacts.

Unless these hollow Spirit Transformation cultivators swarmed her together, they were unlikely to pose any threat.

"Little girl... no, Little Celestial Maiden, we'll leave right now! Right now!" How could the outsiders dare remain in this uncanny village? They hurriedly withdrew.

The evening glow had long since faded, and the sky darkened. Viewed from afar, the charred old willow in Stone Village radiated a hazy halo that enveloped the entire village.

"Our populations number in the tens of millions, and our tribal territories are vast. Does that little girl have no fear of calamity descending on her, threatening us like that?" someone complained angrily after they had gone more than a li from Stone Village.

"We must report this to the clan leader and have him come in person. I suspect that little girl stumbled into some great fortune in the mountains. Those two powerful treasure artifacts, and that Sacrificial Spirit-we cannot let any of them slip away!" someone else said viciously.

But no sooner had those words fallen than a cloud-piercing arrow suddenly arrived.

The arrow seemed to possess a spirit of its own. Everyone who had spoken viciously had their skull pierced, and even the leaders of the various clans were wounded as a warning.

Their scalps prickled. How could this arrow even turn corners?

They no longer dared utter another word. All brought out their treasure artifacts and departed through the night, though they secretly resolved to report to their clans' strongest experts and have them demand an explanation.

"With mere tens of millions under you, you dare call yourselves King or Marquis? You merely swagger about in barren lands, bleeding the suffering common folk dry, with no one to rein you in. Self-appointed titles, nothing more. You have no idea how high the heavens are or how deep the earth runs."

At the village entrance, Shi Zhao gave a soft snort and retrieved the bloodstained arrow.

Back in the Stone Kingdom Imperial Capital, the children of genuine kings and lords had known perfectly well that the remote Great Wilderness held self-appointed kings and lords who had never been granted titles by an ancient kingdom.

The gulf between the two was as vast as heaven and earth. They could not be compared at all.

Suddenly, her starry eyes shifted as inspiration flashed through her mind. She sidled up to Willow Deity to claim credit, hoping to soften this aloof Ancestral Sacrificial Spirit.

To her surprise, Willow Deity actually responded.

A willow branch gently lifted, wrapped around the girl's slender waist, and set her down below the altar.

Shi Zhao: "..."

Silence was Stone Village that night.