As Li Xiangping lifted his gaze to the distant peaks, the sound of a horse’s neigh echoed from the mountaintop.
A magnificent horse, its coat a seamless ebony without a hint of another hue, reared and galloped freely across the terrain. Its hooves barely seemed to touch the ground as it navigated the rugged path with ease. It turned out that it was a demonic creature of the Qi Cultivation Realm.
The horse, with hooves barely disturbing the mud on the ground below, soared through the air. Its rider, clad in leather armor, was devoid of any adornment made of bones or jade and seemed rather human.
Jianixi gently patted the horse on its head and squeezed its body between his legs, then glanced over the village below.
Legends in the northern foothills spoke of Jianixi possessing four eyes and eight arms, yet in truth, he had an ordinary appearance with somewhat small eyes and sparse eyebrows.
One might pass him by without a second glance if he stood silently in the fields.
However, once those yellowish-brown eyes opened and locked onto someone, they instilled a deep sense of unease.
“Great King, we are now entering the territory of the demon gate,” announced the attendant with a long braid trailing behind him.
Jianixi, with a subtle lift of his eyebrow, surveyed the military formation below the mountain.
“They’ll break in a quarter of an hour,” he stated with a light, almost nonchalant tone as if discussing something mundane.
The attendant bowed slightly as he silently listened to Jianixi. Behind them, not a single soldier or horse was in sight. As the king who unified the northern foot of Mount Yue, Jianixi ventured into Azure Pond Sect’s territory accompanied only by his attendant. At this point in time, he was only about a kilometer away from Li Xiangping’s encampment.
After a cursory inspection, Jianixi’s interest waned. With a gentle nudge, his horse turned, making its way back effortlessly on the rugged terrain as if it were a smooth road.
The long-braided follower immediately followed closely behind, voicing his caution, “We don’t have much time, there’s no need to delay any further. The living can be cunning, My King. We don’t know how many shamans there are within this demon gate army. It’s best not to underestimate the enemy.”
A low chuckle escaped Jianixi’s mouth. The sword at his side glinted under the moonlight peeking through the clouds. “Who said anything about fighting them?”
————
When Chen Sanshui had awakened, he found a tribesman from Mount Yue standing before him, clad in leather armor. His grip on the collar of Chen Sanshui’s shirt was so firm that it nearly choked him.
Thrown out of the courtyard unceremoniously, Chen Sanshui hit the ground hard, resulting in the loss of two teeth and leaving him with a dizzying vision. Under the gaze of the two Mount Yue soldiers standing rigidly on either side of the entrance, Chen Sanshui wiped the blood away from his face and began scouring the ground for his lost teeth.
However, a heavy boot pinned his hand to the ground. Lifting his eyes, he met the gaze of a pair of yellowish-brown eyes.
He was forced to face the grim reality—Lichuankou Village had fallen in his brief lapse of consciousness.
Chen Sanshui’s mind raced with questions.
How had the clan soldiers, under Li Xiangping’s command and stationed across the river, been overtaken so silently?
Where were Li Tongya and the other immortals of the Li Family during this silent capture of Lichuankou Village?
His confusion deepened, the pain from his mouth now secondary to the flood of inquiries in his mind.
“Where is the stronghold of the Li Family?” the man who was stepping on his hand asked calmly.
Chen Sanshui, under the weight of those piercing eyes, had only one question left in his mind—what his father, Chen Erniu, would have done in such a dire situation.
His thoughts were abruptly cut short as Jianixi ripped his left arm off with a swift motion. Flesh and tendons were torn apart as a gush of blood painted the ground red. Chen Sanshui’s eyes rolled back in agony.
The excruciating pain obliterated his ability to think, reducing his existence to sheer agony.
“T-That hurts...”
Jianixi lightly tapped Chen Sanshui’s head, casting a spell to retain his lucidity so that he could feel the excruciating pain head-on, while not succumbing to his injuries too quickly.
“M-Mount... Li-Lijing...” Chen Sanshui uttered.
His fleeting aspiration to heroism was quickly overshadowed by his incontinence—a humbling reminder of his averageness compared to figures like his father and Li Xiangping. Besides, Li Xiangping might not be any better than him if he found himself in the same situation.
“Bring us there.”
Chen Sanshui was hoisted and found himself dangling upside down, his gaze landing on the moving feet of the Shan Yue soldiers.
The keen instincts that his father, Chen Erniu, had painstakingly instilled in him over the past two decades were now fully awakened. Recognizing his inevitable fate, memories of his life’s follies flooded his mind, leaving him with a profound sense of desolation.
The Mount Yue warriors advanced with stealth. The runes on their ankles silenced their steps, as two contingents escorted Jianixi from Lichuankou Village toward Mount Lijing.
Observing the captives in the hands of the Mount Yue man behind Jianixi, the stalwart from the village, Chen Sanshui realized that lying about their destination would only prolong his suffering.
What a cunning man, he thought bitterly.
Chen Sanshui grew up overshadowed by the four brothers of the Li Family, much like his father, Chen Erniu, who was overshadowed by Li Mutian.
He would often hear his father say, “Among the four brothers of the Li Family, Li Changhu is gentle and unassuming like a deer; Li Tongya is cautious and calculating as a serpent; Li Xiangping is cunning and fierce like a starving wolf; and Li Chejing is clever and graceful as a white fox.”
“What about me?! What am I?!” Chen Sanshui would ask, his eyes filled with a mixture of hope and yearning for his father’s approval.
“Trash.” The blunt dismissal crushed Chen Sanshui, leading him down a path of aimlessness, marrying and fathering children without purpose, and living off his father’s name and influence while indulging in frivolity.
However, that changed the day Jianixi tore his left arm off. The pain jolted him awake from his aimless drift. He regretted not meeting Jianixi and having this awakening sooner, sparing his father years of worry.
“When was the last time you had contact with those troops?” Jianixi asked softly. He could tell that Chen Sanshui was terrified and unlikely to deceive him, yet unaware that Chen Sanshui had undergone a profound transformation deep down.
The spirit of the man he was hoisted over was no longer that of the carefree thirty-year-old Chen Shansui, but that of his sixty-year-old father, Chen Erniu.
“Six hours ago,” Chen Sanshui replied, making sure that his voice was quivering even though his heart was calm. He was finally at peace with having not entirely wasted the privileges of his upbringing for the past two decades.
As Mount Lijing loomed ahead, Jianixi halted his horse, swiftly decapitating Chen Sanshui in a single, fluid motion.
Observing the headless body as it collapsed and the ground stained with fresh blood, Jianixi scoffed, “What a piece of useless trash!”
Chen Sanshui’s head landed softly on the ground by the roadside, his gaze fixed on the cloudy night sky above.
The last thought that crossed his mind before his consciousness faded was— Li Xiangping, this is as much as I can help. You’ve been impressive, but you’ll truly meet your match this time!