At noon, a cold wind swept through the forest of stone pillars in the valley. A cemetery that held countless fallen heroes lay among the dead leaves, with only a few old white gravestones poking above the ground.
Scrape, scrape-
Dressed like an ordinary laborer, Jian Yuhua held a shovel and gradually cleared away the dead leaves and earth that had accumulated among the gravestones over sixty years, exposing the old stone paving two feet beneath the soil.
The paved road led from a small town outside the mouth of the valley. It had only a few hundred residents, and passing merchants and travelers generally called it Fu Family Manor.
Three hundred years ago, the Fu Family of Liangzhou had been one of Liangzhou's foremost clans. They had risen amid the chaos of war and helped Great Yan conquer half its realm. Their wealth and glory had lasted three hundred years, and they had defended Great Yan's realm for just as long. Only when the entire family died for their country in Great Yan's final years had they vanished completely into the long river of history.
Jian Yuhua was a direct descendant of the Fu Family and had changed his surname to escape persecution. He had not spent long roaming the martial world, but his experiences had been noteworthy-he had become a renowned wandering swordsman almost as soon as he set out, caught the eye of a powerful martial clan upon reaching Zezhou, become its direct disciple and switched to swordsmanship, then been regarded as a promising candidate to inherit the Sword Saint's title. He had even found a beloved who had fallen for him at first sight.
Barring any surprises, Jian Yuhua's life would have been magnificent and eventful. Ten years later, he might have surpassed Zhou Chiyang or