"So you're that so-called Young Master Zhehua?" Fang Shaobai tossed the man onto the floor and mocked, "Your qinggong isn't much to brag about, either."
The next moment, another dark figure leapt onto the rooftops not far from the Xu family manor. Darting from roof to roof, he drew near the watchtower, his booming laughter ringing out before he had even arrived.
"Mount Taihua is magnificent and wondrously precipitous, and Taihua Sect disciples are renowned for their lightness skill. Even if this defiler could turn into a bird, he would never escape your grasp, Young Hero Fang."
As his words fell, the dark figure landed on the watchtower.
Wang Yu looked up. It was a middle-aged Buddhist monk in a grey robe, with a square face, appearing to be in his fifties. His expression was solemn yet edged with a smile.
"Master Hongzhao?" Fang Shaobai raised an eyebrow. "Weren't you..."
Halfway through his sentence, Fang Shaobai suddenly looked a little embarrassed.
Hongzhao chuckled. "Did you only arrive after nightfall, Young Hero Fang? Poor monk traded blows with this man last night. His martial arts are mediocre, but his lightness skill is formidable; I was unable to keep him from fleeing.
"Guessing he might tail me by day, I went to meet your junior brothers, Young Hero Lin and Young Hero Wei, this afternoon, asking them to head to the Luo and Liu families in the south of the city tonight to set up a feint and mislead him.
"I myself slipped back to the Xu manor after nightfall, waiting for him to walk right into the trap. Little did I expect that you would rush here as well, beating poor monk to the punch. Amitabha, wonderful indeed!"
"Indeed, indeed! What a coincidence!" Fang Shaobai gave an awkward laugh and glanced subconsciously at Li Yunxiu, his admiration for her deepening.
Hongzhao pressed his palms together. "This man gravely injured Fazhu. Poor monk originally intended to take him back to the Great Vajra Monastery to repent for twenty years. Since Young Hero Fang captured him today, poor monk will not presume to dictate his fate. However, he stole a Tendon-Changing Bone-Forging Pill that our monastery entrusted to Fazhu, and that must be retrieved."
Though Young Master Zhehua lay on the floor with a shoulder blade pierced by Fang Shaobai's sword and his acupoints sealed, his mouth was still free to speak. Hearing this, he sneered, "If Fang Shaobai hadn't shown up out of nowhere, you couldn't have caught me even lying in ambush. Don't I know the rotten nature of you monks? You were definitely planning to wait until I had succeeded and exhausted my essence and stamina before striking! Too bad for you... Huh?"
"Nonsense!" Hongzhao cut him off, eyes widening. As he spread his hands, a metallic glint flashed briefly across his palms.
Young Master Zhehua ignored Hongzhao, his gaze fixing instead on Wang Yu and Li Yunxiu.
Wang Yu's brow twitched. He saw Young Master Zhehua grin and shout out their identities: "Zhao Yu! The Female Top Scholar!"
"You actually took this route?!"
Zhehua's voice dripped with bitter regret. Were his acupoints not sealed, he likely would have been beating his chest and stomping his feet. "I thought I'd missed you! If I'd known you were taking this road, what would holding out for two or three more days have mattered?!"
Fang Shaobai and Hongzhao turned to look at the group of three simultaneously.
Wang Yu blinked and looked at Li Yunxiu.
Li Yunxiu's mouth twitched. She had never expected Young Master Zhehua to have seen them before. The man must have visited the capital previously and laid eyes on Zhao Yu, or even on her.
To keep the disguise natural and convincing, she had only made minor adjustments—tweaking their apparent age and demeanor slightly. The underlying features remained unchanged, so anyone who had seen them before in person would naturally be able to recognize them.
It was just that...
This was not the modern world with widely circulated photographs. Li Yunxiu had never imagined that among the assassins lying in wait along the road to kill them, someone had actually seen them back in the capital.
Fang Shaobai smacked his lips in utter disbelief. "You're Zhao Yu?"
The next instant, Hongzhao's eyes narrowed. He erupted into motion, lunging forward with gale-force winds swirling from his billowing sleeves, his hands curled into tiger claws clawing straight for Wang Yu's and Li Yunxiu's chests.
Wang Yu stepped back, slipping behind Fang Shaobai.
Li Yunxiu flipped her right wrist, revealing golden needles between her fingers.
Before Li Yunxiu could unleash her needles, a ringing chime echoed as a sword unsheathed with a sharp clang! A flash of silver blossomed into a lotus of sword light, its twelve radiant silver petals spreading out to bar Hongzhao from Wang Yu and the others.
Wang Yu's eyes blurred; it felt as though he were watching a lotus bloom upon rippling waters—delicate, beautiful, captivating the senses.
"Azure Lotus Sword Song? Twelve-Grade Azure Lotus?!" Hongzhao cried out in alarm and sprang back through the air. Even so, several clean slits had been slashed through his wide sleeves, exposing his burly, muscular arms.
Fang Shaobai sheathed his sword, looking as though he had never drawn it at all. "What is the meaning of this, Master?"
"This man is Zhao Yu!" Hongzhao said with a furrowed brow. "His temperament is perverse, his methods cruel! Back in the capital, he harmed people at will and defiled wives and daughters. If he is allowed to return to Longshan Prefecture and take charge of the Prince of Zhenxi's Manor, the common folk of the Northwest will suffer untold misery!"
Fang Shaobai stared blankly for a second, then shook his head. "Does Master not know that rumors and gossip are not to be taken at face value? Slander can melt metal and bone. From what I have seen, Brother Wang... Brother Zhao is gentle, refined, candid, and upright—nothing like the vicious scoundrel of rumors."
Hongzhao glared. "You can know a person's face, but not their heart! You have only known him for a few days, Young Hero Fang. How dare you make such an assertion?"
Fang Shaobai put his sword aside and patted the wine gourd at his waist. "Because Brother Zhao's drinking etiquette is impeccable! A man with fine character when drinking is bound to have fine character in life!"
Hongzhao's eyes went wide, his mind practically flooded with question marks.
What kind of logic was that?!
"I fear you have been deceived by him, Young Hero Fang!" Hongzhao said. "Set aside the rumors for a moment; let us speak only of the jianghu! The daughter of the Nanhai Sect Leader lost her chastity to him and committed suicide. The Twin Swords of Nanhai came seeking vengeance and were slain by him. That, at least, cannot be false!"
Wang Yu immediately raised three fingers. "Heaven above and Earth below, bear witness: if I drugged and violated the daughter of the Nanhai Sect Leader, may five bolts of thunder strike me dead, may I plunge forever into the netherworld never to be reborn, and may eight generations of my ancestors climb mountains of blades and boil in cauldrons of oil, cast into Avici Hell to suffer boundless torment!"
Li Yunxiu: "..."
Fang Shaobai: "..."
Hongzhao: "..."
Swearing an oath this venomous was pretty much the absolute ceiling.
Fang Shaobai looked toward Hongzhao and chuckled. "What does Master think now?"
The corner of Hongzhao's mouth twitched. He strained to reply, "It cannot be ruled out that this lad is cunning and deceitful, spinning empty falsehoods."
Wang Yu narrowed his eyes at Hongzhao. "Are you monks drooling over the bounty offered by the capital too?"
Li Yunxiu remarked coolly, "The Great Vajra Monastery is one of the two great Buddhist sects; why would monks covet a petty bounty from the capital? What the monk covets are the markets, towns, farmsteads, and fertile lands of Qing'an and Fengming Prefectures."
"Oh?" Fang Shaobai raised an eyebrow.
Wang Yu caught on at once. "The Great Vajra Monastery borders our Zhenxi Manor's territory?"
"Amitabha!" Hongzhao pressed his palms together. "Monks see all four elements as emptiness; wealth and land are mere worldly encumbrances to us. But the Buddha is compassionate, and poor monk cannot bear to see the people of the Northwest suffer further hardship."
Hongzhao looked at Wang Yu. "Even now, assassins targeting Patron lie in wait all along your path. Now that your identity has been exposed, peace will elude you on the road ahead. Patron, please accompany poor monk back to the Great Vajra Monastery. If Patron proves to possess a Buddhist heart and can treat the common folk with kindness, poor monk is willing to assemble the monastic brethren to escort Patron safely back to Longshan Prefecture."
Hearing these words, not only did Wang Yu and Li Yunxiu laugh, but even Fang Shaobai chuckled. "Does Master believe I lack the strength to see Brother Zhao to Longshan Prefecture?"
Wang Yu paid him no attention at all. Instead, he crouched down and began frisking Young Master Zhehua.
"What are you doing?" Zhehua glared at him.
From the inner side of Zhehua's belt, Wang Yu pulled out a small box. Opening it, he found a pill the size of a thumb, emitting a slightly bitter medicinal fragrance.
"The Tendon-Changing Bone-Forging Pill!" Hongzhao stepped forward, but Fang Shaobai shifted sideways to block him, forcing him to halt. "This pill is only effective in conjunction with our monastery's secret methods. For ordinary people, taking it causes harm without benefit! Patron, please return..."
Before he could finish, he saw Wang Yu pop the pill into his mouth, gulp hard, and swallow it whole.
"Nearly choked me!" Wang Yu patted his chest, finally forcing the pill down his gullet.
Everyone: "..."
Then they watched as Wang Yu continued searching Young Master Zhehua.
"What else are you looking for?" Fang Shaobai couldn't help asking.
"No idea. Just checking around—maybe there's a pleasant surprise," Wang Yu said as he fished out two blowpipes, two vials of medicinal powder, an embroidered pouch, and a marital aid from inside the man's lapels and sleeves.
"So you're inadequate, eh?" Wang Yu teased. Finally, from within the sleeves, he produced two manuals.
"Found... Thirty-Six Styles of Spring Breeze on the Couch?" Wang Yu cursed under his breath, tossing the first book aside, but a grin broke across his face when he looked at the second.
Swallow Carrying Spring!
Fang Shaobai laughed. "Quite an elegant title, isn't it?"
Wang Yu patted the book and casually flipped through a couple of pages before Fang Shaobai. "It's a manual of lightness skill! Once I master it, at least I won't have to fear being ambushed or chased by monks from the Great Vajra Monastery."
Fang Shaobai remained indifferent; even if mastered, this lightness skill was still no match for the Taihua Sect's.
With his sect's precious pill swallowed whole and Wang Yu openly mocking him, Hongzhao clenched his fists so tight that veins bulged across his forehead. He yearned to unleash the Great Vajra Divine Palm and swat this youth dead on the spot.
Yet without anyone noticing, the turtle shell in Wang Yu's sea of consciousness had already begun to gleam once more.
Having been through this once before, Wang Yu could now gently guide the turtle shell's influence over him. Instead of storing the medicinal power, he absorbed and released it all at once to maximize his immediate gains.
His basic swordsmanship was solidly cemented; daily practice would now yield maximum results with minimal time.
He had completely mastered the Seven Forms of the Setting Sun. While he had only reached basic proficiency with room for improvement, the turtle shell had deduced internal energy circulation techniques paired with Flowing Fire Reflection, allowing him to unlock the sword art's full lethal might.
His meridians broadened, his bones were forged, and his aptitude was enhanced. Guiding the internal circulation of Flowing Fire Reflection, he reached the absolute limit of the second layer. With a little more effort on the journey ahead, he should be able to break through to the third layer before returning to the Prince of Zhenxi's Manor.
What a wondrous pill! Its potency far surpassed that Lesser Restoration Pill!
Wang Yu's eyes gleamed thoughtfully. I wonder if Hongzhao has more on him. Could I find a way to take him down and loot another Tendon-Changing Bone-Forging Pill off his corpse?
Since the other man wanted him dead anyway, Wang Yu felt no moral burden whatsoever.
Meeting Wang Yu's faintly amused, hostile gaze and seeing Fang Shaobai resolute in protecting him, Hongzhao knew he had no chance tonight. He could only press his palms together once more.
"Amitabha!"
"Since you have made your decision, Young Hero Fang, poor monk has nothing more to say. Poor monk can only hope your judgment has not failed you, and that this Zhao Yu is truly a man of benevolence who loves the common people as his own children."
Hongzhao offered a respectful Buddhist bow, then sprang backward, leaping off the watchtower and vanishing into the night.
Chapter 12