Inside Chrysanthemum-Killing Mountain Villa, only twenty or thirty people were present. They all swarmed over to hear the messenger who had brought back news recount the full story.
When Tie Mingzhu heard that her friend had been abducted by White Chrysanthemum, she did not ask for details, nor did she go to Nan Xinlan to inquire. She rashly set off to "avenge" her friend.
After Wang Chong let her go, she had finally learned to be a bit smarter. Everyone knew she had gone to find White Chrysanthemum to avenge her friend, but only the two of them knew that she had been captured alive by "White Chrysanthemum" and that the two of them had stayed alone in a ruined temple for half a day. So when her friend Nan Xinlan came looking for her at great risk, she concealed the "story" and claimed she had not encountered White Chrysanthemum.
Even though Nan Xinlan could tell something was off with her friend, first, she felt guilty toward this close friend and would cover for Tie Mingzhu no matter what; second, she knew she had no ability to rescue anyone from White Chrysanthemum. If Tie Mingzhu had met White Chrysanthemum, she would surely have run into him too, so how could she have escaped being defiled by the lecher herself? She didn't mention a word of it.
The messenger who brought back news was simple and honest, without the habit of exaggerating or spreading lewd rumors. According to the two women's account, he described everything faithfully. Everyone who heard him say that Tie Mingzhu had actually not encountered White Chrysanthemum rejoiced for this "reckless" heroine, especially the women of Qingcheng, who were overjoyed.
Wang Chong, hiding nearby, heard it all clearly and secretly made some calculations, thinking: "Since Tie Mingzhu says she hasn't seen me, she surely wouldn't dare expose me publicly, otherwise she too would be disgraced and her reputation ruined."
"Miss Tie, you wouldn't want people to know that you spent a night with a lecher in a ruined temple, would you?"
"Hmm, and the lecher even put her through bondage play."
In an instant, Wang Chong thought of seven or eight excuses. However, the messenger also said that Nan Xinlan and Tie Mingzhu had suffered some fright and were exhausted, so they would not come to join them, which let him relax a little.
This was Nan Xinlan's idea. She had, in effect, bound herself in her own cocoon: in everyone's eyes she had already been defiled by the lecher White Chrysanthemum, so how could she dare appear before people? Tie Mingzhu was even more worried that she might slip up somewhere and reveal that she had once been captured by the lecher White Chrysanthemum, so she was unwilling to come either.
The Qingcheng women worried about their friend. Since Tie Mingzhu could not come, of course they went to visit. Chu Qiuzi had thought to invite Wang Chong to go along, but considering what had happened to Nan Xinlan, it was simply inappropriate to ask a strange man to accompany them, so she reluctantly left with a group of her junior martial sisters.
Wang Chong stayed at Chrysanthemum-Killing Mountain Villa. He soon noticed that although the sixty-one brothers of the Chrysanthemum-Killing Alliance had ostensibly gathered to hunt White Chrysanthemum, everyone had their own agenda. The vast majority treated the gathering as a social occasion, with banquets almost every day. People often formed groups of seven or eight to go out, claiming to search for White Chrysanthemum, but in reality they were just sightseeing.
He even participated in a poetry gathering, but unwilling to draw undue attention, he did not plagiarize poems to show off. Instead, he acted as a flatterer, praising every participant to the skies, and won a great deal of goodwill.
Through Fang Jingru's introductions and Qin Han's strong recommendation, on the third day of his arrival at Chrysanthemum-Killing Mountain Villa, he successfully joined the alliance and became the sixty-second brother of the Chrysanthemum-Killing Alliance, fitting in like a fish in water.
Every day Wang Chong found time to silently recall various martial arts and secretly train hard.
His identity could be exposed at any moment, and he could become "the lecher White Chrysanthemum." Martial arts were his only hope of survival, so he could not afford the slightest laziness.
Besides the inner-power art he was born with, the lightness skill Riding Clouds and Treading Wind, the Flowing Cloud Palm and Splitting Wind Palm he excelled at, the Holding-Candle Swordplay, and the Wind-Cloud Hundred Styles combining these five arts, Wang Chong also mastered a martial art called Plucking Flower and Leaf Hand.
This Plucking Flower and Leaf Hand was, like Wind-Cloud Hundred Styles, one of Wudang's Thirty-Six Supreme Arts. It was not merely a set of palm techniques but also a hidden-weapon art. Moreover, this set of palm techniques required his inborn internal force to be channeled to exert its subtle wonders. After all, ordinary hidden-weapon arts only need accuracy; to make every flower and leaf wound someone, one cannot do without profound internal force.
The day he used a single leaf to cut a squirrel in half was thanks to this Plucking Flower and Leaf Hand.
If he had not mastered this supreme art, even with profound inner-power art, he could not easily achieve such a technique-dependent effect.
He did not know if it was some effect of transmigration, but he felt his martial arts improved every day. Even the moves of Holding-Candle Swordplay that he had not mastered and could not perform, he could now do easily, quickly, and well.
The seventy-two moves of Holding-Candle Swordplay were not among the Thirty-Six Supreme Arts but were one of Wudang's Seven Divine Swordsets of a higher level—the supreme swordsmanship of the Orthodox Xuanmen! It was one of Wudang's highest secret transmissions!
Not to mention lay disciples; even entry-level and inner-chamber disciples were not qualified to learn it—only true-transmission disciples could glimpse its true form.
However, it was said this swordsmanship was extremely difficult to cultivate. Nowadays, only two people in the Wudang Sect could achieve the sword emitting candle flame: one was the current Heavenly Empress, and the other was Mo Zhenxing, the youngest of Wudang's Seven True Ones. The rest merely mastered the sword moves with slightly faster strikes.
Wang Chong had always found this swordplay a bit incredible. The ignition point of steel is over 1,300 degrees. To ignite by friction with air, at least Mach 6 is needed—that's the level of a Silver Saint.
Even taking a step back, if combustion was not needed and only a faint red heat radiation was produced, it would still need tens of meters per second, about one-tenth the speed of sound.
Hmm, this speed seemed not impossible; the lightness skills in this world were truly too fast.
The striking speed surpassed even lightness skills. With special techniques added, such as high-frequency vibration of the sword tip…
Wang Chong studied it for several days with little success, though he did confirm a slight increase in the speed of his sword strikes. He wanted to continue training hard, but suddenly news arrived that in Pengshan County, two hundred li away, traces of White Chrysanthemum had been discovered.
Hearing this news, Wang Chong was overjoyed. He was probably the person in this world who most hoped the "real White Chrysanthemum" would be caught. So when Fang Jingru called for departure, he was the first to step forward, giving everyone the good image of being public-spirited and ready to face danger.
By now over thirty people had gathered at Chrysanthemum-Killing Mountain Villa, so they divided into three groups to depart in turn, leaving two people to guard the villa. These young men were all outstanding talents of the southern martial world and did things very properly. Wang Chong followed Qin Han and the others in the second group.
Qin Han's group all came from good backgrounds. They had already prepared fine horses and allotted a yellow bay horse to Wang Chong. Although he had never ridden a horse, fortunately his lightness skill was decent and his internal force abundant, so he did not need any advanced riding skills—just sitting steadily on the horse's back was not difficult.
Along the way, Qin Han rode at the head, showing no consideration for the horse's stamina.
But the animals in this world had no extraordinary abilities, so they covered barely over a hundred li in a day and night. They stopped at an inn along the way to rest.
Chapter 16