Flying Sword

A flying sword! Qin Sang snapped his eyes open, only to be blinded by the scorching sun, and shut them again at once. His throat burned with an unbearable thirst, and pain surged over him from every direction like an incoming tide. Propping himself up with his arms, Qin Sang pushed his upper body off the ground and realized that he had tumbled out of the prisoner cart at some point, falling unconscious where he lay. His right leg was pinned beneath a shattered cage, explaining the agonizing pain in his calf. It had probably been broken by the impact. How had the prisoner cart overturned? Qin Sang struggled to recall what had happened before he blacked out. His head throbbed as if it would split open. Forcing himself upright, he opened his eyes and looked out, only to find a scene of utter devastation in the distance. Along the riverbank, ancient trees were either toppled or snapped in two; several looked as though they had been struck by lightning. Flames leaped from one of them, sending plumes of acrid smoke drifting with the wind. The wide stretch of yellow reeds was entirely unrecognizable, looking as though it had been thoroughly churned up by wild boars. Deep furrows scarred the earth, exposing a tangled mess of pale roots. Yet when the convoy had arrived, the riverbank had been completely flat and even. Qin Sang stared blankly at the destruction, and fragmented memories finally surfaced. A figure in white had descended from the sky. The bandits had fallen to their knees, crying out for the Immortal Master... A flying sword had pierced toward the black-draped carriage, which erupted with a thunderous boom. A black-robed figure had flown out. The two seemed to harbor an old grudge, coming to blows the instant they met. Then a strange sound had echoed, and darkness had taken him. What had happened after he lost consciousness? Both men could actually fly. That was unmistakably abnormal. The bandits had addressed them as Immortal Masters—could they truly be celestial beings, genuine immortals? As a boy, Qin Sanwa had heard many tales of immortals. Qin Sang had assumed they were mere superstitions, just as in his previous life. Now, it seemed that was not the case at all. Which of the two Immortal Masters had won? Qin Sang saw no sign of either immortal. Looking around, he found the prisoner carts overturned in disarray, their cages mostly smashed to pieces. His fellow captives lay scattered across the ground in every direction. No wonder the ground beneath his hand had felt so soft—his palm was resting right on a man's belly. Qin Sang hurriedly pulled his hand back. Then his expression froze slightly. He reached out gingerly and pressed two fingers to the man's wrist. There was no pulse. Dead... Perhaps because he had already died once, Qin Sang was far bolder than he had been in his past life. With a corpse lying right beside him, he felt little fear. Was anyone still alive? Qin Sang scanned the others. Every single person lay motionless on the ground, even the draft horses. Not a single chest rose or fell. The scene was eerie beyond measure. All of a sudden, Qin Sang caught sight of a row of figures sprawled along the riverbank. Those bandits had been felling trees to build rafts; when the white-robed man appeared, they had dropped to their knees, crying out for the Immortal Master, only to fall unconscious for some unknown reason. Qin Sang's eyes narrowed. Those bandits were strong and burly, and they hadn't suffered any falls. It was entirely possible that, like him, they were merely unconscious, not dead! At that thought, Qin Sang leaned forward and strained to lift the wooden cage pinning his leg. A sharp gasp escaped his lips, followed by an involuntary groan of pain, but he choked it down immediately, terrified of waking the bandits. *Please don't let it be broken.* If his leg was broken, even if he managed to slip away, he would never make it out of this wilderness alive. Praying silently, Qin Sang pulled his leg free to inspect it. Fortunately, the bone wasn't severed. Yet the moment he tried to put weight on it, another wave of excruciating pain hit him. At the very least, it was a hairline fracture. Walking was out of the question for the near future. Even if he had to crawl, he would crawl over. Reaching the waist of a fallen bandit, Qin Sang found a blade. First, he severed the ropes binding his hands and feet. Then, he went down the line, dealing with them one by one. At first, he tried stabbing them through the heart, but the blade struck the sternum, jarring his hand with pain. He shifted to slitting their throats first, before driving a finishing thrust into their chests. After staring blankly at his bloodstained hands for a long moment, Qin Sang realized that not one bandit had uttered a peep while being stabbed. They had already been dead. Yet he had kept plunging the knife into them one after another, as if possessed by madness. A chill of fear ran through him—not of the dead, but of himself. He cast the blade aside, turned, and crawled toward the river. Dunking his face into the water, he held it there until he was nearly suffocating, then jerked his head up, gasping for air as his racing heart slowly settled. *If I hadn't killed them, they would have killed me!* If he had possessed such resolve in his previous life, would he ever have ended up like this? Wait! There was still one more! Qin Sang started violently, a cold sweat nearly breaking across his back. Only when he spotted a corpse riddled with wooden splinters did his heart settle, and he slumped weakly onto the ground. When the black-draped carriage had exploded, the bandit leader had been standing right beside it; he had been killed instantly. All the bandits were dead, yet Qin Sang dared not let down his guard. Using a fallen branch, he propped himself up. When he took in the full view of the reed flats in the distance, he could not help but click his tongue in awe. Had all of this really been wrought by the clash of two Immortal Masters? The sheer destructive force was terrifying. Amid the wild grass lay two figures, one draped in black, the other in white. Reason told Qin Sang that these two Immortal Masters were not ordinary mortals, completely different from mere bandits. Now was the best opportunity to escape. Though his leg was injured, the river's current was gentle, and an almost-finished raft lay nearby. If he could just tie off the last two vines, he could leave this treacherous place behind. After an agonizing internal struggle, Qin Sang picked up the blade and crawled over. Drawing closer, he saw that the black-robed man had been sliced clean in two at the waist. The flying sword had clearly been extraordinarily sharp, leaving a cut so smooth it was chilling to behold. The white-robed man had a ghastly, gaping hole in his chest, as though something had brutally clawed through his ribcage. The wound was a mangled mess of shredded flesh, his internal organs churned into gore. They had perished together. Qin Sang felt a quiet sense of relief, tinged with a faint trace of disappointment. Warily lifting the hem of the black robe, Qin Sang recoiled slightly at an ancient, hideously deformed visage. He then began searching the corpse. This Immortal Master seemed remarkably destitute, carrying not a single copper or sliver of silver. In the end, Qin Sang found only a piece of parchment that resembled sheepskin against the man's chest, along with a book. He flipped through the book; he could recognize most of the characters, but the text was dense, cryptic, and exceedingly difficult to comprehend. The sheepskin bore nothing at all; aside from being exceptionally soft, it appeared to be an ordinary piece of hide. "Huh?" Qin Sang suddenly noticed something pinned beneath the black-robed man's torso. Rolling the upper half of the body aside, he discovered a small black pennant lying on the earth. The pennant was not large. Its staff was only the length of a palm, tipped with a sharp point while the base was ground smooth and round. Qin Sang picked it up for a closer look. He could not tell what material the staff was fashioned from, but it felt ice-cold in his grip. Carved upon it were three small characters—*Yanluo Banner*! The name alone sounded ominous, and recalling how this monster had previously drained living men into withered husks, Qin Sang nearly flung the Yanluo Banner away. The banner's cloth was a narrow, tattered scrap slightly shorter than the staff, riddled with holes. Faintly visible on its surface was the motif of a malevolent demon. After gazing at it for a few heartbeats, Qin Sang felt as though his very consciousness was being dragged inside. He hastily tore his eyes away. Sinister indeed! Nothing on this fiend was good! Qin Sang bundled up the Yanluo Banner haphazardly, wrapped it alongside the book inside the sheepskin, and turned to look at the man in white, his gaze tangled with conflicting emotions.