Xu Yuan was a little surprised, but not much. He knew perfectly well that his current strength was nowhere near enough to beat that plot-protagonist bastard. He just had not expected Su Jinxuan to conclude that he would still be instantly deleted.
But after thinking about it, that made sense. If the protagonist of this world could be caught up to in a single month, then there would not be so many young masters from great clans in the later plot, all boasting that they were invincible among their peers, only to get smacked in the face by him for the sake of showing off.
Su Jinxuan noticed Xu Yuan’s expression and asked softly, “You don’t seem surprised.”
Xu Yuan shook his head. He did not show any dissatisfaction either. He was very nonchalant about it. “Qin Mo killed two seventh rank Bone Tempering experts from my family. If he can instantly kill me in a deathmatch, that’s perfectly normal.”
Su Jinxuan looked deeply at Xu Yuan, as if she wanted to ask something. In the end, she only said in a low voice, “When I parted ways with him, he had only just entered the eighth rank.”
Xu Yuan finally frowned when he heard this. “You mean that even back then, he could instantly kill the current me?”
After all, it had already been nearly three or four months since Qin Mo and Su Jinxuan parted ways.
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Su Jinxuan glanced at the wetland lake nearby and thought over her words for a moment. “There is one killing move of his that you can’t handle.”
Xu Yuan frowned. Did Qin Mo have some ultimate move while he was still at eighth rank? He searched through his memories of all the skills in the old-grandpa route, but came up empty.
“What killing move?”
A trace of recollection appeared in Su Jinxuan’s beautiful eyes as she carefully chose her words. “It should count as a kind of sword skill.”
“Sword skill?” Xu Yuan’s frown deepened.
In the old-grandpa story branches, the protagonist’s cultivation method only gave him one ordinary sword skill at the eighth rank, something called Aura Slash.
Su Jinxuan glanced sideways at Xu Yuan, then lifted both of her jade-like hands. “Like this.”
As she spoke, she raised one index finger with one hand, then made a chopping motion with the other hand toward that finger.
Watching those two flawless jade hands wave back and forth in the air, Xu Yuan’s cheek twitched slightly. What low-level sword skill didn’t chop people like that?
Su Jinxuan’s expression did not change as she said, “When he lunges forward, he is very fast.”
Xu Yuan nodded. That did not surprise him. A Forward Slash, basically. A tiny displacement skill.
As Su Jinxuan continued demonstrating, the hand making the slashing motion suddenly sped up. “So fast that my naked eye couldn’t follow it. In an instant, he could sweep across more than ten meters.”
Xu Yuan froze at those words. Then his gaze turned a little grave. The only people whose speed was fast enough to become invisible to the naked eye were Grandmasters. If Su Jinxuan was not lying, then why could Qin Mo, a mere eighth rank cultivator, move so fast that others could not see him?
“Really?”
Su Jinxuan’s eyes were very serious. “I wouldn’t lie to you now.”
“Can you explain it in more detail?” Xu Yuan asked.
“Mhm...” A trace of recollection appeared on Su Jinxuan’s small face. “His starting motion and landing motion were both at the normal speed of an eighth rank cultivator, but the distance in the middle seemed to vanish somehow. Mhm, I know that sounds strange, but that was what it felt like to me.”
Hearing that description, Xu Yuan gradually felt a wave of malice from the world itself wrap around him. He suddenly understood where Qin Mo’s killing move had come from. He was far too familiar with it. J plus W plus R, then press Forward Slash at the right moment.
The short displacement of Forward Slash could be bugged into a long-distance lunge. It was a bug caused by the game engine. Very practical, and during the lunge, there would even be a brief invincibility frame. It was one of the essential tricks for fighting bosses above your level.
But… God damn it. So you can exploit invincibility frames in the real world too?
At that thought, Xu Yuan suddenly raised a hand and rubbed his brow hard. Now that the game had become reality, Qin Mo naturally could not have used this move by exploiting a bug anymore. A skill this close to invincible was most likely something he had learned through some kind of sudden enlightenment beyond his level. It should count as a kind of secret art.
Xu Yuan let out a long breath, and his conviction became even firmer. Once Xu Changge arrived, he would drag this big brother of his along and go slaughter Qin Mo. This kid absolutely could not be allowed to live!
After several breaths of silence, Xu Yuan glanced sideways at Su Jinxuan, his voice carrying a faint trace of gratitude. “I understand.”
Su Jinxuan was slightly stunned, then looked a little hesitant. “You believe me?”
Back then, when she had reported this unreasonable phenomenon to Qin Weijiu, the man had only smiled it off without taking it seriously.
Xu Yuan glanced at her. “Do you have any reason to lie to me?”
“No.” Su Jinxuan shook her head.
“Then why wouldn’t I believe you?”
Su Jinxuan was silent for two seconds, then the corners of her lips curved into a smile. “That move of his seems to have drawbacks too. Back then, every time he used it, he would become weak for a while afterward.”
Xu Yuan understood. He guessed that was probably the price. According to conservation of energy, cough… According to common sense, a powerful move like this, something that in his previous life could only be pulled off by abusing game mechanics, would be far too unreasonable if it had no cost at all.
Xu Yuan asked softly, “Aside from that move, is there anything else about Qin Mo I should watch out for?”
Su Jinxuan did not even need to think before selling out the plot protagonist completely.
“Qin Mo’s regular combat strength is very powerful too. Although he had only just entered the eighth rank at the time, ordinary eighth rank martial apprentices were already no match for him. He had mastered all sorts of martial skills and could use them smoothly together. The guards in your estate simply can’t compare to him.”
Xu Yuan was a little surprised. “You understand the martial skills of martial apprentices too?”
Su Jinxuan replied softly, “When I was in Stillwater, Qin Weijiu saw that I had nothing to do every day, so he handed some of the Skysteer Sect’s secular affairs over to me.”
Hearing this, Xu Yuan suddenly thought of something else.
After reading those account books, Su Jinxuan had turned into a complete and utter anti-Qin warrior. When Xu Yuan used some plot information from his past life to test her, she answered everything she knew, and everything she said was true.
Xu Yuan had actually been puzzled over why, after reading those account books, Su Jinxuan had been turned so firmly against Qin Weijiu, leaving no illusions about him whatsoever. Only now did he react. Managing secular industries. Most likely, some of the contents in Konghua Merchant Guild’s account books had matched things in Su Jinxuan’s memories.
Those torn-up account books had probably been innocent victims of that little disaster.
Xu Yuan chuckled twice and asked lightly, “Were there Skysteer Sect martial halls among the businesses he gave you to manage?”
Su Jinxuan nodded. A faint, complicated coldness flashed through her beautiful eyes. “Yes. Although Qin Weijiu never gave me any cultivation methods, he did not stop me when it came to the body-tempering methods and various martial skills in the martial halls.”
Xu Yuan was silent for two seconds, then asked, “And you never thought about cultivating?”
Su Jinxuan narrowed her beautiful eyes slightly and looked deeply at Xu Yuan. “You want me to train as a martial apprentice?”
In Xu Yuan’s mind, the explosively beautiful muscles of those female guards in the Stillwater estate surfaced instinctively. Then he glanced at the enchantress beside him. He gave a light cough.
“You really aren’t suited to training that stuff.”
Her chest muscles were already big enough. No need to train them further.
Su Jinxuan noticed his gaze, shook her head, and changed the subject. “By the way, why are you so concerned about Qin Mo?”
“Didn’t you say I was jealous?” Xu Yuan answered ambiguously.
Su Jinxuan gave Xu Yuan a somewhat helpless roll of her eyes. Sensibly, she did not press further and simply said, “All right, then I’ll just take it as you being jealous. But if you really care about him that much, you’ll be able to see him very soon.”
Xu Yuan frowned. “What do you mean?”
Su Jinxuan took a sealed letter from the sleeve of her plain robe. There was a hint of mockery in her tone. “Today, Qin Weijiu sent me a message saying Qin Mo has already come out of Everbow Valley. Apparently, he seems to want to come rescue me, so Qin Weijiu told me to do my best to encourage you to leave the city and kill him.”