Forest Guardians

The man in the conical hat had none of his attention on Qu Hongxiao now. It was fixed entirely on the enormous humanoid figure of light standing behind her.

The figure of light had short hair and stood behind Qu Hongxiao. It was her external incarnation, her Golden Body Dharma Idol.

"Dharma... Idol..." The man in the conical hat stared blankly, murmuring without thinking.

With all his attention on the Dharma Idol, the man in the conical hat clearly failed to notice that Qu Hongxiao's gaze was very different from before, carrying a lazy air quite unlike a cultivator's.

The figure of light turned a page of the book in its hand and spoke, its voice ringing clear. "Slay."

One utterly unremarkable word, yet it held boundless murderous intent.

It all looked so simple, so plain. There were none of the imagined rays of light shooting forth or explosions of spiritual power.

Just one simple word.

Yet the light went out of the man's eyes. His head, conical hat and all, slid down his shoulder and fell into the hand he had unconsciously held out.

The situation turned around quickly and settled just as quickly, ending with the man in the conical hat holding his own head.

The Nascent Soul that fled from his body also perished beneath a gentle breeze.

Atop a tall building, the young man shrouded in a black miasma stood stunned for a long while. He stared blankly at Qu Hongxiao, who had lost all strength and fallen onto the bluestone pavement, shaking his head and murmuring over and over, "How could a mere Nascent Soul cultivator cultivate a Dharma Idol? How could it be? How could it be..."

Something suddenly occurred to him, and he trembled all over in horror. The black miasma around him surged wildly, letting out a shriek like a crow's. He suddenly recalled that the Dharma Idol behind Qu Hongxiao just now had been identical to the sage's form that had appeared over Black Stone City yesterday!

"Could it be... Could it be that Qu Hongxiao already has a sage's form before manifesting as a sage?!"

He could not keep his mind from sinking into chaos, precisely because he understood what it meant to have a sage's form before manifesting as a sage. In the entire cultivation world, only the founding patriarchs of the three great sects had possessed such aptitude. To have a sage's form before manifesting as a sage meant that someone with the ability and qualifications to found a new sect had appeared!

At that thought, he, as a Forest Guardian, was seized by terror, utter terror. He frantically waved his hands, using the Forest Guardians' special ability to shield the secrets of heaven in Black Stone City and prevent others from sensing what had just happened.

All told, he shielded them a full five times in succession, only stopping when he was utterly exhausted and his cultivation was depleted. The black miasma that had surrounded him had long since dissipated completely. Crouching atop the building, he murmured over and over, "I hope it stays hidden, I hope it stays hidden. Otherwise, a great calamity will befall the Forest Guardians."

He knew that if the cultivation world learned that a new sage who could stand alongside the three patriarchs had been born within the Forest Guardians' jurisdiction, the organization would become the enemy of the entire cultivation world.

The Forest Guardians might have been one of the foremost powers, but they would not even dare contemplate opposing the entire cultivation world.

The young man in black felt that his decision was not wrong, and could not be wrong. It was the only way to protect the Forest Guardians. He dared not imagine what would happen if others learned of the events of today.

Afterward, he removed the body of the man in the conical hat, then erased the fluctuations of spiritual power and traces of the fight in the area before leaving.

As for Qu Hongxiao, as long as she was not dead, she was no longer under his jurisdiction. He also believed that this new sage, Qu Hongxiao, would not die no matter what, for she was someone blessed with the great fortune of heaven and earth.

Yet until he left, he never noticed the short-haired young man wearing a T-shirt, shorts, and slippers in the spot where he himself had originally stood atop the building.

Chapter 29: Forest Guardians

Atop the tall building.

Ye Fu smiled and said to himself, "Hongxiao, it looks like you'll have to shoulder this title of sage for me."

He took one step and appeared instantly beside Qu Hongxiao.

"As payment for having you bear that title, I've decided to make you truly become that new sage who can stand alongside the three patriarchs. I keep my word."

He smiled warmly and waved a hand. A gentle breeze swept past, stirring Qu Hongxiao's long hair.

Qu Hongxiao's tightly knitted brows slowly relaxed.

Ye Fu turned and took another step, muttering, "There's still a little bit of Kung Fu left to watch. I'd better hurry and finish it before going to sleep."

He vanished into the night.

A moment later, Qu Hongxiao slowly opened her eyes and saw a crescent moon hanging high in the dark sky. Its chilly light shone on her, a solitary figure on the chilly road.

She came back to her senses with a start, her face full of bewilderment.

She stood up and looked at her shoulder, which was whole and unharmed again. She touched the spot between her brows, and it too was unscathed.

She looked up, but the man in the conical hat had long since disappeared, and the Forest Guardian was gone as well.

The whole road looked perfectly ordinary, as though none of what had just happened had ever taken place, as though it had all been a dream of Nanke.

"What... happened?"

Qu Hongxiao suddenly felt a pain in her head. She held it and carefully recalled what had happened.

In such a desperate situation, she had been powerless to struggle and had already prepared herself to dissipate into heaven and earth, yet somehow she had fallen asleep. To her, it had felt just like falling asleep, and when she woke, things remained as before, but the people were gone.

"Did Spirit Rhinoceros come out in the end?"

"Or did someone else help me?"

Qu Hongxiao moved the arm that had been injured. It moved freely, with no trace of the severe injury it had just suffered.

"Spirit Rhinoceros is only for attack. It has no healing effect. My internal and external injuries have all healed, so it probably wasn't Spirit Rhinoceros. Did someone else help me? Was it another tree cutter?" She pursed her lips and shook her head. "No, the fewer tree cutters there are, the greater their chances of competing for the Ancestral Tree in the end. It probably wasn't another tree cutter who helped me."

Dressed in her red-and-white robes, she walked in the direction of her residence.

"The Forest Guardians exist to maintain order, so they're even less likely to interfere in a fight between tree cutters. And other cultivators who aren't tree cutters can't enter Black Stone City."

She stopped.