One looked over seventy, hunched and stooped as he held a long wooden sword with a cold, stern expression. The other was broad and younger, wielding an axe in each hand. He was thick-browed and sharp-eyed as he warily scanned the area.
The cold-eyed elder glanced at the red-robed man collapsed on the ice and swallowed hard before whispering, "Fellow Daoist Rui, take a look at this..."
The brawny man surnamed Rui frowned and glanced sideways at the flame surrounding the red-robed man. He replied, "That's some intense flames. This cultivator looks seriously wounded and on the verge of death... Wait ten hours or so, and he’ll be in deep trouble."
The old elder swallowed again and murmured, "Fellow Daoist Rui, you have keen eyes. How can we let someone die before us? Let’s save him quickly."
The two exchanged glances and clearly saw the greed in each other’s eyes. The burly man surnamed Rui responded, "Don’t you see the light from that talisman on him? If we don’t deal with that first, how can we ‘save’ him?"
The old elder hesitated for a moment and muttered, "But the Clearing Art Talisman is so expensive... it’s a life-saving treasure. I only have three left..."
But when he was glared at by the burly man surnamed Rui, the elder had no choice but to pull out the talisman from his sleeve. He cast a spell, muttered incantations, and finally pinched off a wisp of blue-green light from his fingertips, commanding, "Go!"
The bluish light burst apart with a pop, but the shield on the man's body only dimmed slightly. The two were stunned and thought inwardly, What a treasure!
Neither of them could recognize the talisman’s type. They were startled when it hadn’t shattered, but the red-robed man remained motionless and their eyes lit up.
The cold-eyed elder said, "We’ve struck gold!"
They now knew the man before them had to be from a wealthy background. The elder hurriedly pulled out two more talismans and got another two from the burly man, drawing all four together into a single point on his fingertip.
Still uneasy, he exchanged a glance with his companion. The two simultaneously drew out their dharma artifacts, gathered their spell force, and shouted, "Break!"
The combined dharma light—everything they owned—slammed into the shield, creating a loud boom. The shield dimmed to the brink of collapse, yet still held. Terrified, they raised their dharma artifacts and started bashing it madly.
After a long struggle, both were panting heavily and their mana was nearly depleted. At last, the light shield shattered with a crack.
The elder, drenched in sweat, collapsed onto the ground and panted, "What a cursed disaster..."
The burly man swept the body with his spiritual sense, only for his hair to stand on end. He jumped back in place and cried out, "Damn it! Foundation Establishment Realm!"
He fled like he’d been stung by a scorpion. The elder froze for a moment, his legs shaking like leaves. He immediately leaped up into the air as the two fled north one after the other.
Sea wind brushed past. After seven minutes, the two returned sneakily, flying in and landing some distance away.
One said, "If he had even a sliver of strength, he could’ve killed us both with a breath."
Emboldened by their own logic, they moved forward again. Once they were nearby, the cold elder reached out his dharma artifact with a trembling hand, his sword shaking as though it would fall. It took two tries before he finally hooked the storage pouch.
He squinted and inspected the pouch closely. An image of a familiar large lake floated on its surface, stamped with a single large character, Li.
"The Qingdu Li Family!"
The two had been in the outer seas recently and were unaware the Li Family had unified Moongaze Lake. They were momentarily speechless as they glanced at each other.
The elder muttered a few words, then looked hesitantly at the burly man, "Back on the riverbank, it was Li Qinghong who saved us with thunder. The one in the sky with the bow was Li Xuanfeng... They did us a favor after all."
The burly man frowned, but the elder had already made up his mind. He said quietly, "Let’s carry him back to the lake. Would the Li Family treat us poorly for it?"
They flew in again, landing near the ice with more composure this time. The burly man surnamed Rui glanced over, then suddenly stopped in his tracks, his face turning fearful as he whispered, "You’ve forgotten what kind of technique we practice!"
The elder frowned in confusion and replied, "What’s the matter? Even beyond the Eastern Sea, there are people secretly cultivating devil techniques in Jiangnan..."
The burly man said fearfully, "You don’t understand! The Li Family is a righteous lineage, and they despise cannibal cultivators above all. We’ve practiced blood-devouring devil techniques and consumed over a hundred lives. How could their elders possibly spare us? You think we’ll get a reward for returning him? He’ll kill us with a single strike!"
The elder was shocked and frightened. After a moment of hesitation, he said, "Then... we can only leave him here... Let’s flee while we can!"
The burly man glanced at him secretly and said in a sorrowful voice, "We already broke his shield and touched his storage pouch. Do you think these families with countless immortal arts won’t notice? If he truly dies and we don’t help, they’ll never forgive us!"
"You—!" The cold elder suddenly felt caught between a rock and a hard place. He muttered, "What are we supposed to do now?"
Seeing his hesitation, the burly man grew greedy again and said through gritted teeth, "Why don’t we just steal his storage pouch and flee north? We can try our luck at Foundation Establishment Realm! Isn’t that a stroke of fortune..."
The elder was tempted. He weighed the storage pouch in his hand, torn with indecision. He murmured, "Fine! We’ll do it your way..."
The burly man stepped closer and examined Li Xijun’s face. After staring blankly for a moment, a chill ran down his spine. He muttered almost inaudibly, "Look at him, he's like a banished immortal. If he looked dim-witted, maybe it’d be fine, but someone this elegant must be a Li Family sword cultivator... who knows how divine his sword arts are..."
"What exactly are you trying to say?!" The elder, now truly uneasy, demanded.
The burly man only whispered, "He must have divine sword skills. Either way, we’re already offending the Li Family. Why not gamble it all on the Foundation Establishment Realm? We’re going to die someday anyway, better to kill him now and have one less threat later...
"Besides, the flames are already killing him. We just need to add two discreet sword thrusts and they’ll never tell how he died. As long as it looks like he was burned to death, they’ll assume it was done by someone who uses fire. But if he survives, he might just come after us for the storage pouch."
Despite being only half-literate in cultivation matters, the burly man made it sound so convincing that it completely bluffed his companion. The elder had always followed the burly man’s lead. Now confused and shaken, he could only watch as the man bent down and picked up the icy sword, hiding in the corner with a lowered head.
The burly man tried drawing the sword twice, but Han Lin refused to leave its sheath. Its cold radiance flared, slicing open his palm and causing blood to gush. He cried out and flung the sword away, clutching his palm with a furious glare.
"Damn it!"
He snatched the elder’s longsword and stabbed down at the man, but it was blocked by the Dharma robe’s fabric. The sword wouldn’t penetrate.
Though he had been full of bravado, his hands trembled as he cried out in panic, "What is this thing?!"
He stabbed three more times, but it was all in vain. Taking a deep breath, he searched the edges of the Dharma robe for a gap and drove the sword toward the youth’s abdomen.
It felt like stabbing into cotton. The blade made no clear wound, only a series of scraping and grinding sounds as if something rock-solid lay beneath the flesh.
"Ah!" The elder beside him saw clearly the heart and lungs glowing red with a stony hue. The sight burned his eyes, and he leaped back like a startled toad, crying out, "Stone—his organs are made of red stone! Fellow Rui... let’s run! Forget the storage pouch... forget Foundation Establishment Realm!"
The burly man’s face turned red as if he was about to bleed, and he muttered, "Cowardly old man. So what if we die? Foundation Establishment Realm is glorious!"