After Lives!

The Yijin Jing at Great Perfection!? Fang Shuwen's whole body came alive, and a thread of wild joy rose in his heart. Without a moment's hesitation, he chose to claim it. The next instant, line upon line of the mental formulas flowed through his mind. And a current of internal force, refined and pure to the utmost, was born in his dantian, and in a heartbeat it coursed through his limbs and bones. Following the formulas that had risen in his mind, he channeled the true qi within his body. At first it was bearable. Slowly, a burning sensation rose in his meridians, and pain was born of it. A thought stirred in Fang Shuwen: “The Yijin Jing has the power to strip the hair and cleanse the marrow. My foundation is damaged, and with this divine skill, perhaps I can make it whole! “This pain... should be coming from exactly that.” He clenched his teeth and paid it no further mind. He had endured so many years of wind, rain, frost, and ice; a trifling bit of pain was truly not worth mentioning. He did not know how long the fierce pain lasted before it suddenly receded like a tide. The true qi traveled the heavenly cycle. Guided by the mental method, Fang Shuwen heard puff after puff as the acupoints all over his body were pierced through, one after another. He cleared a path through the Ren and Du meridians, and only after the Small Heavenly Cycle turned into the Great Heavenly Cycle could he make that entire internal force wholly his own to use! He slowly pressed both hands downward, drawing all of the internal force into the sea of qi in his dantian. Only then did he open his eyes. He instinctively held out both hands to look at them, and felt that these hands of his seemed somehow different from before. “Just as I thought. The Yijin Jing can make up for my damaged foundation—now it is nothing less than a rebirth, shedding my old body and bones!” He rolled to his feet and, on the momentum, drove out a punch. There was a booming crash, and the window a zhang away was shattered by the force of his punch. “This...” Just then, the sound of talking came from outside the door. “I hear our Eldest Young Miss has looks and a figure both of the very first rank—the number one beauty of all Julu City!” “You dare dream about the Eldest Young Miss? I hear she's a true disciple of Zhujige Pavilion on Jiuning Mountain, and her martial arts are no joke. I advise you to quit dreaming.” “Not dreaming... just talking. The Eldest Young Miss is still up on Jiuning Mountain. As if I'd ever get to see her. Hey! Old Fang, it's time for you and Old Song to swap shifts.” The two who had been talking pushed the door open and came in, about to strip off their outer robes and set their single-edged sabers aside. Seeing that Fang Shuwen was the only one there, one of them asked: “Where's Old Song?” Only then did Fang Shuwen remember: “Song Li went to take a piss.” “A lazy donkey at the millstone, always needing to shit and piss... All right, we two brothers are turning in. Go find that kid; he's probably fallen into a latrine pit.” With that, the two men each climbed onto a bed. It was already close to the hour of the Ox, so naturally they needed a good rest. Fang Shuwen said nothing more. He put on the guard's uniform, hung the single-edged saber at his waist, and went out the door. He faintly heard the two men in the room say: “This window...?” “Who stole our window?” Fang Shuwen turned a deaf ear, striding off with a hand on his saber hilt, as though it had nothing to do with him. But as he walked outward, he puzzled over it. Song Li had said earlier that he was going to take a piss, and all this time had gone by without him coming back. What kind of piss takes this long? Could he have gone off to find that little sweetheart of his, the maid, for some billing and cooing? Fang Shuwen had already completed the three-month guard mission, and could go to Zhou Feixiong to collect his silver and leave the Zhou household. But right now it happened to be the night shift change, and no one goes to tell the master of the house he is quitting in the middle of the night. At the very least it would have to wait until tomorrow morning. He headed first in the direction of the latrine. He had only gone halfway when he saw a figure standing pressed against the base of a wall. Fang Shuwen's brows drew slightly together. He twitched his ears a little; the Yijin Jing at the Great Perfection realm had sharpened his hearing and his sight. Yet from that figure, he could not hear the sound of breathing. “Could it be a dead man?” Alertness rose in his heart. He came up behind the man and lightly tapped his shoulder: “Song Li?” The figure toppled to the ground at once with a flop. By the dim light of night, he could see that it was indeed Song Li. Only now there was a wound across his throat like a thin red line. His throat had been severed by an extremely sharp weapon! He had clearly been dead for some time. Fang Shuwen's eyes narrowed slightly. Suddenly his feet shifted, and his body slipped away from where he had been standing. There came a thock. A shuttle dart struck the wall where he had just been standing. “Huh?” A voice came from the darkness: “A zhi guazi, and with fine skill at that.” Zhi guazi was the cant word for a household guard martial instructor. It was thieves' cant. Fang Shuwen narrowed his eyes slightly: “Since you knew there were guards posted in this house, isn't your hand a little too vicious?” The man across from him laughed at that: “You think I'm a sneak thief working the shadows? “I'll tell you straight: tonight I'm not after wealth... I'm after a life!!” As the words fell, he stepped forward and struck. Before, Fang Shuwen would have had to deal with this man carefully, but now, with a single glance, he already felt the man's moves were slow and riddled with openings. He did not retreat but advanced instead, stepping in and throwing a punch with his right hand. In an instant came two cracks. The man's attack carried a defensive element; quick and vicious as his strike was, it was still cautious. The man had not expected that a single clash would snap both of his arms. His defense collapsed. Fang Shuwen's five fingers hooked and clamped onto the man's face; he applied a little force, about to ask a question, when with a crack the man's whole face and half his skull were crushed to pieces by that grip. “Ah, this...” He had only just obtained the cultivation of the Yijin Jing at Great Perfection, and still had no real notion of what his own martial arts could do. He had never imagined the man across from him would shatter at a single touch. “How come he's as flimsy as paper?” Frowning, he dropped the corpse. Without a second thought, he let out a sharp breath and was about to shout an alarm. Judging from what this man had said, whoever had come was clearly no ordinary sort. If they weren't after wealth but after lives, then were they not here to wipe out the entire household? As things stood now, his earlier worries had not been unfounded after all. Before the words “Assassin!” could leave his mouth, the corner of his eye caught points of firelight. He looked up and saw a rain of fire filling the sky, whistling down. Thock, thock, thock! Thock, thock, thock! They were arrows burning with roaring flames, and once they landed, the night wind instantly set window lattices and haystacks alight. Shouts of killing rose on all sides at once. Just from the clamor, one could tell the attack came with overwhelming force. There was no need for Fang Shuwen to raise any alarm; with such a commotion, the entire Zhou estate had been roused. The place where Fang Shuwen was happened to be secluded; otherwise Song Li's corpse would not have gone undiscovered for so long. And the man who had just appeared had come later as well, and happened to run into Fang Shuwen, which was why he had died so senselessly. Fang Shuwen hesitated in place for only two breaths, then set off toward the main courtyard. Before, faced with a scene like this, he might well have turned and run. But now he had the Yijin Jing at Great Perfection to protect him—how could he retreat easily? Besides, he still hadn't been given this month's wage.