Tendon-Weakening Powder Hastens the Living Corpse Poison; a Twelve-Year Blood Feud Laid Bare

Yellow sand poured in through the open wooden doors of the main hall, making the blue brick floor rustle.

Zhaxi Dawa didn't take a single step back; instead, he raised his right foot and kicked over the rosewood table in front of him.

The copper kettle and butter tea bowl on the table crashed onto the bluestone slab, splashing scalding hot, milky-white tea all over Gesang's trouser leg.

"Let's do it!"

Zhaxi Dawa gripped his curved sword horizontally, his molars grinding together with a creaking sound, and roared at the dozen or so centurions who had surrounded him.

"Before you chop me up, feel your own bellies and see if there's any movement inside!"

Gesang raised his curved knife with both hands, about to cleave it down, but his wrists sank down without any strength.

Immediately afterwards, his knees swayed, and the tendons in his entire right leg felt sore and numb; he could barely grip the hilt of the knife.

The dozen or so centurions around him also changed their expressions.

The two burly men at the front of the line stumbled and bumped into each other, collapsing onto the broken porcelain shards with a thud, clutching their stomachs and panting heavily.

"You bastard...!"

Gesang knelt on one knee, using the tip of his knife to prop himself up, barely managing not to fall. He craned his neck, staring at Zhaxi Dawa.

"You poisoned the tea?!"

"If I don't drug you, I'll be the one dying on that tiger-skin chair tonight!"

Zhaxi Dawa spat out a mouthful of saliva, strode up to Gesang, and slapped the back of his curved knife against Gesang's red cheek.

"On the way back from Bronze Gorge, that Han Chinese man, Chen Qing, kept nagging in my ear every day."

"They said some of the people around me were acting strangely, secretly meeting with outsiders behind my back."

Zhaxi Dawa looked down at his subordinates, who lay limp on the ground, his chest heaving violently.

"I didn't initially believe that my brothers who had risked their lives for me would betray me, but I still kept my guard up."

The butter tea I served you at noon today...

I personally poured out half a packet of the Ten Fragrances Tendon-Weakening Powder I bought from the Central Plains!

Gesang tried desperately to raise his arm, but his shoulder was so sore and weak that it felt like his bones had been removed. He could only watch helplessly as Zhaxi Dawa raised his scimitar.

"I risked my life for you, and what did you do? You turned around and stabbed me in the back for a few worthless pills!"

Zhaxi Dawa gripped the knife handle with both hands, aiming it at Gesang's neck, ready to chop down.

"I'll clean house first today, then I'll go chop up that Han man surnamed Yang!"

"Clap, clap, clap."

Three slow, deliberate slaps echoed from the lobby entrance.

Standing in the shadows, Yang Tie didn't run away. Instead, he stroked his goatee and let out a strange laugh.

"As expected of the fiercest general among the younger generation of Tubo, his cunning far surpasses that of those fools who only know how to ride horses and fight."

Before Yang Tie finished speaking, he casually threw the two jade medicine bottles he was playing with onto the blue brick ground.

The jade bottle shattered into more than a dozen pieces.

A dozen or so bloodworms, each as thick as a finger and entirely crimson, sprang out from the pile of broken jade. They slithered swiftly along the cracks in the bluestone bricks and, in the blink of an eye, burrowed under the boots of Gesang and the dozen or so centurions.

"Ah--!"

Gesang let out a loud, dry howl.

The sound didn't sound like a human could make; it sounded more like a wild animal being skinned alive.

Zhaxi Dawa's scimitar had already slashed three inches above Gesang's shoulder.

Gesang was originally lying on the ground and couldn't even hold a knife properly,

Suddenly, thick black veins, about the thickness of a thumb, bulged up on both arms, and something alive was darting around rapidly beneath the skin.

Without dodging or avoiding, he raised his left wrist and used his arm to meet Zhaxi Dawa's blade head-on.

A muffled thud!

Zhaxi Dawa's all-out slash landed on Gesang's forearm, but it didn't even break the skin half an inch; instead, the impact made Tashi Dawa's own hand go numb.

The Tubo scimitar, forged from fine iron, cracked open in the middle and snapped in two with a snap!

The broken half of the knife flew out and stuck into a nearby wooden pillar, vibrating and buzzing.

Zhaxi Dawa, gripping the broken hilt of his knife, stumbled back four or five steps, knocking over the tiger-skin chair behind him.

All the dozen or so centurions in the hall got up from the ground.

Their necks twisted stiffly, their once clear black and white eyes turned completely blood red, blood mixed with white foam dripped from the corners of their mouths, and they made gurgling sounds as they breathed out.

"What... what kind of monstrosity did you feed them?!"

Zhaxi Dawa's back was pressed against the cold pillar, and his palms were covered in cold sweat.

" The Crimson Blood Divine Pill, didn't the General already know about it?"

Yang Tie took two steps forward, reached out and grabbed his brocade robe, tearing it open with a ripping sound.

The dim light of the tallow torch shone on his thin chest and belly.

It was covered with charred branding marks and curled knife scars; not a single piece of intact flesh could be found.

Yang Tie lowered his head and touched the deepest horseshoe-shaped brand on his chest, then raised his eyelids to look at Zhaxi Dawa, his voice terribly hoarse:

Twelve years ago, there was a Yang Family Market Town outside the Hexi Corridor.

Our Yang Family family has practiced medicine and alchemy for generations, saving many Han Chinese soldiers on the border and treating plagues for your Tubo herders.

Just because my father unearthed a thousand-year-old Blood Spirit Mushroom in the Qilian Mountains, the border commander of the Great Yan army colluded with your Tubo raiding party!

Zhaxi Dawa tightened his grip on the broken knife, barely daring to breathe.

That night, soldiers from Great Yan stormed into my yard, stole the Blood Spirit Mushroom, and killed my father, my three older brothers, and my two sons.

I was lucky; I survived despite being severely injured and unconscious!

Yang Tie spoke slowly and deliberately, his eyes wide open, two lines of bloody tears seeping from the corners of his eyes.

"You Tubo cavalry kidnapped my mother!"

My wife, and my two daughters who are not yet ten years old!

I lay among the dead, still breathing, following the hoofprints until I reached the outskirts of your Tubo camp.

I watched with my own eyes... watched them being tortured by you dozens of Tubo beasts for three whole days and three nights, and in the end, even their corpses were thrown into a wolf den to be fed to wild dogs!

The howling wind outside the lobby blew in, making the torches flicker.

"The leader of that raiding party was your father Zhaxi Dunzhu's vanguard commander back in the day!"

Yang Tie pointed at Zhaxi Dawa's nose, his entire face contorted in extreme pain.

"From that day on, I, Yang Tie, no longer live for myself!"

I concocted elixirs for the powerful and wealthy of the Great Yan Dynasty, adding a slow-acting poison that would cause them to have no descendants.

I've come all the way to the western border to deliver the Crimson Blood Divine Pill to your Tubo warriors!

Do you know what this divine elixir is made of?

Yang Tie burst into wild laughter, his face streaked with tears and snot:

"It's Living Corpse Catalyst made from the heart blood of a hundred women from your Tubo grasslands, mixed with the rotting corpse poison and corpse beetle eggs from mass graves!"

Now, the insect eggs have already burrowed into their bone marrow!

Zhaxi Dawa felt a chill run down his spine, and his stomach churned violently.

"You're a madman..."

"I should thank the General for the bowl of bone-softening powder he gave them today!"

Yang Tie took out a palm-sized bronze bell from his pocket, shook it in his hand, and...

"Normally, their blood and energy are too strong, which prevents the insect eggs from hatching completely."

Your dose of Ten Fragrances Tendon-Weakening Powder depleted their true energy, which conveniently helped me ripen all the Living Corpse Worm inside their bodies!

Tonight, I'll have them chop you into mincemeat.

Tomorrow morning, all 20,000 Tubo cavalrymen in this Silver City will become living dead obeying my orders.

I led them to attack the west gate of Yi Prefecture.

May you Tubo barbarians and corrupt officials of the Great Yan die a horde of scum!